train-ner clusters for the reaping of all nations, her bounda ry measured by the spray of the Atlantic and Pacific seas. If not with such prophetic vision, we know, at least, with what hopes and sympathies Franklin contemplated the future of his country; and it is no sectional declamation, it is an American duty, it is an honor which his memory itself claims for us, to refer to what those hopes and sympathies were. He never faltered in the work of freedom,—he never tired of it, he never grew disheartened or skeptical. Indeed, of what humane and generous course did he tire? What claim of his country or the world did he fail to answer?--Against what wrong did he not protest? How he hated war,-how he detested dueling, -as his last public act he signs a petition for the abolition of slavery;-his last paper written about three weeks before his death was an ironical reply to a proslavery speech. And the explanation of all he did exists in the prime fact, back of all, that he was so good and great a man. As a practical man, mindful of all other interests, he did not forget himself, but took care to keep a sound mind in a sound body. What constitutional vigor, what marvelous activity to the very close of his life-every day crowded with business, and every act marked with propriety and clearness! How genial, how delightful to the young and the aged! He never really grew old, never became a dried up, parched Franklin, but was as sociable as in earlier years, and as fresh as ever. He is one of those men whose early youth contin ues to the end; his was a large, full, glorious life; a calm, cheerful death, without terror, without regret. One thing we may regret, one thing every Christian does and must regret, that he did not evince a more solid faith: and yet who of us is to judge him? The more I study Franklin's life, the more I am convinced that his religious character has been much underrated. Certainly the deep roots of religion were vital in him. He seems to have cherished that essence of all religion, which does not reject all religion for mere philosophy, but he had a deep and steadfast faith in Divine Providence. In that he trusted-to that in dark and troubled hours he lifted up his voice in prayer. His relations with God are hidden with God. His work on earth is known-approved of all men ;and what he was in himself as a man, finds for us no more acceptable expression than in these words addressed to hiru by a friend: "If to be venerated for benevolence, if to be admired for talents, if to be esteemed for patriotism, if to be blessed for philanthropy, can gratify the human mind, you must have the pleasing consolation to know that you have not lived in vain. So long as I retain my memory, you will be recollected with respect, veneration, and affection, by your sin cere friend, GEORGE WASHINGTON." Ex. CXCVI.-INAUGURATION OF THE STATUE OF R. C. WINTHROP. THE deliberate opinion of the world has now been formed upon Benjamin Franklin. Personal partialities and personal prejudices, which so often make. or mar a recent reputation, or a living fame, have long ago passed away, with all who cherished them. The great posthumous tribunal of two whole generations of men,-less fallible than that to which antiquity appealed, has sat in solemn judgment upon his character and career. The calm, dispassionate Muse of History,—not overlooking errors which he himself was ever earliest in regretting, nor ascribing to him any fabulous exemption from frailties and infirmities which he was never backward in acknowledging,-has pronounced her unequivocal and irrevocable award; not only assigning him no second place among the greatest and worthiest who have adorned the annals of New England, but enrolling him for ever among the illustrious benefactors of mankind! And we are here, this day, to accept, confirm, and ratify that award, for ourselves and our posterity, by a substantial and enduring token, which shall no longer be withheld from your view! Let it be unvailed! Let the stars and stripes no longer conceal the form of one who was always faithful to his country's flag, and who did so much to promote the glorious cause in which it was first unfurled! And now behold him, by the magic power of native genius, once more restored to our sight! Behold him in the enjoyment of his cherished wish,-" revisiting his native town and the grounds he used to frequent when a boy!" Behold him, re-appearing on the old school-house green, which was the play-place of his early days. Behold the man, to whom Washington himself wrote, for the consolation of his declining strength,-a consolation more precious than all the compliments and distinctions which were ever showered upon him by philosophers or princes,-"If to be venerated for benevolence, if to be admired for talents, if to be esteemed for patriotism, if to be beloved for philanthropy, can gratify the human mind, you must have the pleasing consolation to know that you have not lived in vain.~ And I flatter myself that it will not be ranked among the least grateful occurrences of your life to be assured, that so long as I retain my memory, you will be recollected with respect, veneration, and affection, by your sincere friend, GEORGE WASHINGTON !" Other honors may grow cheap, other laurels may fade and wither, other eulogiums may be forgotten, the solid bronze before us may molder and crumble, but the man of whom it may be said that he enjoyed the sincere friendship, and secured the respect, veneration, and affection of Washington, has won a title to the world's remembrance which the lapse of ages will only strengthen and brighten. Behold him," the sage of antiquity coming back to give austere lessons and generous examples to the moderns," the wise old man of his own Apologue of 1757, discoursing to the multitude of frugality and industry, of temperance and toleration!-Behold him, with that calm, mild, benevolent countenance, never clouded by anger, or wrinkled by ill humor, but which beamed ever, as at this instant, with a love for his fellow-beings and "a perpetual desire to be a doer of good" to them all. Behold him, children of the schools, boys and girls of Boston, bending to bestow the reward of merit upon each one of you that shall strive to improve the inestimable advantages of our noble free schools! Behold him, mechanics and mechanics' apprentices, holding out to you an example of diligence, economy, and virtue, and personifying the triumphant success which may await those who follow it! Behold him, ye that are humblest and poorest in present condition or in future prospect,-lift up your heads and look at the image of a man who rose from nothing, who owed nothing to parentage or patronage, who enjoyed no advantages of early education which are not open,- -a hundred fold open,-to yourselves;-who performed the most menial offices in the business in which his early life was employed, but who lived to stand before kings, and died to leave a name which the world will never forget. Lift up your heads, and your hearts with them, and learn a lesson of confidence and courage which shall never again suffer you to despair-not merely of securing the means of an honest and honorable support for yourself, but even of doing something worthy of being done for your country and for mankind! Behold him, ye that are highest and most honored in the world's regard, judges and senators, governors and presidents, and emulate each other in copying something of the firmness and fidelity, something of the patient endurance, and persevering zeal, and comprehensive patriotism, and imperturbable kind feeling and good nature, of one who was never dizzied by elevation, or debauched by flattery, or soured by disappointment, or daunted by opposition, or corrupted by ambition, and who knew how to stand humbly and happily alike on the lowest round of obscurity, and on the loftiest pinnacle of fame! Behold him, and listen to him, one and all, citizens, free. men, patriots, friends of liberty and of law, lovers of the Constitution and the Union, as he recalls the services which he gladly performed, and the sacrifices which be generously made, in company with his great associates, in procuring for you those glorious institutions which you are now so richly enjoying! Ex. CXCVII-THE GRANDEUR OF NATIONS. CHARLES SUMNER. CASTING our eyes over the history of nations, with horror we discern the succession of murderous slaughters by which their progress has been marked. Even as the hunter traces the wild beast, when pursued to his lair, by the drops of blood on the earth, so we follow man, weary, staggering with wounds, through the black forest of the past, which he has reddened with his gore. O, let it not be in the future ages, as in those which we now contemplate! Let the grandeur of man be discerned, not in bloody victories, or in ravenous conquests, but in the blessings which he has secured; in the good he has accomplished; in the triumphs of benevolence and justice; in the establishment of perpetual peace. As the ocean washes every shore, and, with all-embracing arms, clasps every land, while, on its heaving bosom, it bears the products of various climes; so peace surrounds, protects, and upholds all other blessings. Without it, commerce is vain, the ardor of industry is restrained, justice is arrested, happiness is blasted, virtue sickens and dies. And peace has its own peculiar victories, in comparison with which Marathon and Bannockburn and Bunker Hill, fields held sacred in the history of human freedom, shall lose their luster. Our own Washington rises to a truly heavenly stature, not when we follow him over the ice of the Delaware to the capture of Trenton,-not when we behold him victorious over Cornwallis at Yorktown,-but when we regard him in a noble deference to justice, refusing the kingly crown which a faithless soldiery proffered, and, at a later day, upholding the peaceful neutrality of the country, while he received unmoved the clamor of the people wickedly crying for war. Ex. CXCVIII.—THE AMERICAN FLAG. I. C. PRAY, JR HAIL! standard of the free and bold! Linked fast in league well known to fame,— Whose souls thy glory emulates,— Whose sons shall never read thy shame, Float ever, flag, as when at first, Our fathers bore thee through the air, And pledged their lives, while on them burst Aye, pledged their lives and liberty, To guard, protect, and honor thee,- Aye! float as when each soldier in his tent, Thou lofty ensign of the free,— May every land thy glory know, And every freeman cling to thee, While breezes 'mid thy folds shall flow. |