one would be those pieces of silver, gold, or paper, which we call cash, were not indefatigable industry at work to produce the necessaries and comforts that money buys? Would shillings and sovereigns satisfy the cravings of hunger? Would bank-notes, mortgages, and scrip shield the back from the cold, and ward off the pelting of the storm? Must not the painter lay down his brush, and poet his pen; must not the philosopher suspend his experiments, and the voice of the orator be dumb; would not the jeweled crown become a worthless bauble, the most stately palace a region of desolation, but for the labor of the agriculturist and the craftsman? The monarch and the mechanic, the peer and the peasant, the sage and the simple, depend for each day's existence upon toil. Labor is the foundation on which the mighty fabric of human society rests, and none but the foolish and the proud will look down with contempt from the higher rank in which Providence has placed them, as though they were under no obligation to the poor. A reciprocity of advantage binds all classes together in mutual obligation. If the man of toil is indebted for much of the comfort of social order and intellectual elevation to the man of rank and leisure, the man of leisure is dependent on the man of toil for existence itself. If the strong and graceful arch could not stand without the keystone which binds its parts together, neither could that key-stone be upheld in its elevation, without the massive piers on either side.

The dignity of labor! Consider its achievements! Dismayed by no difficulty, shrinking from no exertion, exhausted by no struggle, ever eager for renewed efforts in its persevering promotion of human happiness, "clamorous labor knocks with its hundred hands at the golden gate of the morning," obtaining each day, through succeeding centuries, fresh benefactions for the world!

Labor clears the forest, and drains the morass, and makes the wilderness rejoice and blossom as the rose. Labor drives the plow, and scatters the seed, and reaps the harvest, and grinds the corn, and converts it into bread, the staff of life. Labor, tending the pastures and sweeping the waters, as well as cultivating the soil, provides with daily sustenance the nine hundred millions of the family of man. Labor gathers the gossamer web of the caterpillar, the cotton from the field, and the fleece from the flock, and weaves it into raiment, soft, and warm, and beautiful-the purple robe of the prince, and the gray gown of the peasant, being alike its handiwork. Labor molds the brick, and splits the slate, and quarries the stone, and shapes the column, and rears, not only the humble cottage, but the gorgeous palace, and the tapering spire, and the stately dome. Labor, diving deep into the solid earth, brings up its long-hidden stores of coal, to feed ten thousand furnaces, and in millions of habitations to defy the winter's cold. Labor explores the rich veins of deeply-buried rocks, extracting the gold, the silver, the copper, and the tin. Labor smelts the iron, and molds it into a thousand shapes for use and ornament, from the massive pillar to the tiniest needle-from the ponderous anchor to the wire-gauze-from the mighty flywheel of the steam-engine to the polished purse-ring or the glittering bead. Labor hews down the gnarled oak, and shapes the timber, and builds the ship, and guides it over the deep, plunging through the billows, and wrestling with the tempest, to bear to our shores the produce of every clime. Labor brings us Indian rice and Ameri can cotton; African ivory and Greenland oil; fruits from the sunny south, and furs from the frozen north; tea from the east, and sugar from the west; carrying in exchange to every land the products of British industry and British skill. Labor, by the universally-spread ram

ifications of trade, distributes its own treasures from country to country, from city to city, from house to house, conveying to the doors of all the necessaries and luxuries of life; and by the pulsations of an untrammeled commerce, maintaining healthy life in the great social system. Labor, fusing opaque particles of rock, produces transpar ent glass, which it molds, and polishes, and combines so wondrously, that sight is restored to the blind; while worlds, before invisible from distance, are brought so near as to be weighed and measured with an unerring exactness; and atoms, which had escaped all detection from minuteness, reveal a world of wonder and beauty in themselves. Labor, possessing a secret far more important than the philosopher's stone, transmutes the most worthless substances into the most precious; and, placing in the crucible of its potent chemistry the putrid refuse of the sea and land, extracts fragrant essences, and healing medicines, and materials of priceless importance in the arts. Labor, laughing at difficulties, spans majestic rivers, carries viaducts over marshy swamps, suspends aerial bridges above deep ravines, pierces the solid mountain with its dark undeviating tunnel, blasting rocks and filling hollows; and while linking together with its iron but loving grasp all nations of the earth, verifies, in a literal sense, the ancient prophecy-"Every valley shali be exalted, and every mountain and hill shall be brought low." Labor draws forth its delicate iron thread, and, stretching it from city to city, from province to province, through mountains, and beneath the sea, realizes more than fancy ever fabled, while it constructs a chariot on which speech may outstrip the wind, compete with the lightning, and fly as rapidly as thought itself. Labor seizes the thoughts of genius, the discoveries of science, the admonitions of piety, and, with its magic types impressing the vacant page, renders it pregnant with life

and power, perpetuating truth to distant ages, and diffusing it to all mankind. Labor sits enthroned in palaces of crystal, whose high arched roofs proudly sparkle in the sunshine which delighteth to honor it, and whose ample courts are crowded with the trophies of its victories in every country and in every age. Labor, a mighty magician, walks forth into a region uninhabited and waste; he looks earnestly at the scene, so quiet in its desolation; then, waving his wonder-working wand, those dreary valleys smile with golden harvests; those barren mountain slopes are clothed with foliage; the furnace blazes; the anvil rings; the busy wheels whirl round; the town appears; the mart of commerce, the hall of science, the temple of religion, rear high their lofty fronts; a forest of masts, gay with varied pennons, rises from the harbor; the quays are crowded with commercial spoils-the peaceful spoils which enrich both him who receives and him who yields; representatives of far-off regions make it their resort; science enlists the elements of earth and heaven in its service; art, awaking, clothes its strength with beauty; literature, new-born, redoubles and perpetuates its praise; civilization smiles; liberty is glad; humanity rejoices; pity exults-for the voice of industry and gladness is heard on every hand. And who, contemplating such achievements, will deny that there is dignity in labor?

The dignity of labor! Judge of it by its effects on the laborer. Does it debase the spirit, blunt the feelings, pervert the conscience, deaden the natural susceptibilities to what is true, and noble, and generous, and kind? The very contrary. If laborious poverty has its evils, it has its moral advantages too. "The strawberry grows underneath the nettle." The necessity for industry saves from the peculiar perils of the indolence which wealth permits. If it is denied the luxuries of leisure, it is

spared its temptations too. The continual struggle with difficulties for the supply of the body is favorable to developing strength and steadfastness in the soul. They who live by the labor of their own hands find it more easy to offer from the heart the prayer, "Give us this day our daily bread," than those who can say, “Soul, thou hast much goods laid up for many years." If well-stored coffers diminish the danger of discontentment at our lot, the toils, privations, and anxieties of industrious poverty render a man less likely to set his affections inordinately on things below, and dispose him the more readily to listen to the announcement of those glad tidings to which the poor are as welcome as the rich, and to the promise of a world in which the weary shall be at rest, not in idleness, but where labor, with all its dignity fully developed, shall be the repose of the perfected soul. Thus, while our Savior said, "How hardly shall they that have riches enter into the kingdom of heaven," one of his apostles wrote, "Hath not God chosen the poor in this world, rich in faith, and heirs of the kingdom?" And while there have been always illustrious examples of distinguished piety among the noble and the wealthy, piety often the more illustrious in proportion to the difficulties it has overcome, and the lofty position it adorns, yet who that has ever labored in the Gospel vineyard but acknowledges that, as a general rule, religion finds its healthiest soil and purest development among the industrious poor?

"Sweet are the uses of adversity,

Which, like the toad, ugly and venomous,
Wears yet a precious jewel in his head."

The men of toil, though not enjoying so much liberty of action as the men of wealthy leisure, have in many respects more liberty of thought. The more they are