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But should these credulous infidels, after all, be in the right, and this pretended revelation be all a fablè; from believing it, what harm could ensue? Would it render princes more tyrannical, or subjects more ungovernable; the rich more insolént, or the poor more disorderly? Would it make worse parents or childrén, husbands or wives; masters or servánts, friends or neighbórs? or, would it not make men more virtuous, and, consequently, more happy in every situation?

(m) Tired Nature's sweet restorer, balmy sleep,

He, like the world, his ready visit pays,

Where fortune smiles; the wretched he forsakes:
Swift on his downy pinion flies from wo,
And lights on lids unsullied by a tear.-Young.

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LESSON XIII.

Extract from the Declaration of Independence.--JEFFERSON.

WHEN, in the course of human events, it becomes neces-. sary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another, and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the laws of nature and of nature's God entitle them; a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires, that they should declare the causes, which impel them to the separation.

We hold these truths to be self-evident-that all men are created equal; that they are endowed by their Creator, 2 with certain unalienable rights; that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness. That to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed: that whenever any form of government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new government, laying its foundation on such principles, and organizing its powers in such form, as to

them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness. Prudence, indeed, will dictate, that governments 3 long established, should not be changed for light and transient causes; and accordingly, all experience hath shown that mankind are more disposed to suffer, while evils are sufferable, than to right themselves by abolishing the forms to which they are accustomed. But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same object, evinces a design to reduce them under absolute despotism, it is their right, it is their duty, to throw off such government, and to provide new guards for their future security.

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The great comprehensive truth, written in letters of living light on every page of our history, the language addressed by every past age of New England to all future agés, is this: Human happiness has no perfect security but freedòm ;— freedóm none but virtùe;-virtue none but knowledge; and neither freedóm, nor virtúe, nor knowledge, has any vigor, or immortal hópe, except in the principles of the Christian faith, and in the sanctions of the Christian religion.-Quincy.

We cannot honor our country with too deep a reverence; we cannot love her with an affection too pure and fervent ; we cannot serve her with an energy of purpose or a faithfulness of zeal too steadfast and ardent. And what is our country? It is not the East, with her hills and her valleys with her countless sails, and the rocky ramparts of her shores. It is not the North, with her thousand villages, and her harvest-home, with her frontiers of the lake and the ocean. It is not the Wèst, with her forest-sea and her inland isles, with her luxuriant expanses, clothed in the verdant corn; with her beautiful Ohio, and her majestic Missouri. Nor is it yet the South, opulent in the mimic snow of the cotton, in the rich plantations of the rustling cane, and in the golden robes of the rice-field. What are these but the sister families of one greater, better, holièr family, our COUNTRY?Grimke.

LESSON XIV.

My Mother's Grave.-ANONYMOUS

"I had a mother once, like you,
Who o'er my pillow hung,
Kissed from my cheek the briny dew
And taught my faltering tongue.

But then there came a fearful day :-
I sought my mother's bed;

Till harsh hands tore me thence away,
And told me she was dead."

1 It was thirteen years since my mother's death, when, after a long absence from my native village, I stood beside the sacred mound beneath which I had seen her buried. Since that mournful period, great changes had come over me. My childish years had passed away, and with them had passed my youthful character. The world was altered too; and as I stood at my mother's grave, I could hardly realize that I was the same thoughtless, happy creature, whose cheek she so often kissed in her excess of tenderness. But the varied events of thirteen years had not ef2 faced the remembrance of that mother's smile. It seemed as if I had seen her yesterday-as if the blessed sound of her voice was then in my ear. The gay dreams of my infancy and childhood were brought back so distinctly to my mind, that, had it not been for one bitter recollection, the tears I shed would have been gentle and refreshing. The circumstance may seem a trifling one; but the thought of it even now agonizes my heart, and I relate it, that those children who have parents to love them, may learn to value them as they ought.

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My mother had been ill a long time, and I had become so much accustomed to her pale face and weak voice, that I was not frightened at them, as children usually arc. At first, it is true, I had sobbed violently- for they told me she would die; but when, day after day, I returned from school, and found her the same, I began to believe she would always be spared to me.

One day, when I had lost my place in the class, and done my work wrong-side-outward, I came home discour

aged and fretful. I went into my mother's chamber, She 4 was paler than usual,-but she met me with the same affectionate smile that always welcomed my return. Alas! when I look back, through the lapse of thirteen years, I think my heart must have been stone, not to have been melted by it.

She requested me to go down stairs, and bring her a glass of water. I pettishly asked why she did not call the domestic to do it. With a look of mild reproach, which I shall never forget, if I live to be a hundred years old, she said, "And will not my daughter bring a glass of 5 water for her poor sick mother?"

I went and brought her the water; but I did not do it kindly. Instead of smiling, and kissing her, as I was wont to do, I set the glass down very quick, and left the

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After playing a short time, I went to bed without bid ding my mother " good night," but when alone in my room, in darkness and silence, I remembered how pale she looked, and how her voice trembled when she said, "Will not my daughter bring a glass of water for her poor 6 sick mother?"-I could not sleep; and I stole into her chamber to ask forgiveness. She had just sunk into an uneasy slumber; and they told me I must not waken her. I did not tell any one what troubled me; but stole back to my bed, resolving to rise early in the morning and tell her how I was for sorry conduct. my The sun was shining brightly when I awoke, and, hurrying on my clothes, I hastened to my mother's room.

She was dead!-she never spoke to me more-never smiled upon me again;-and when I touched the hand 7 that used to rest upon my head in blessing, it was so cold it made me start. I bowed down by her side and sobbed in the bitterness of my heart. I thought then, I wished I could die, and be buried with her; and, old as I now am, I would give worlds, were they mine to give, could my mother but have lived to tell me she forgave my childish ingratitude. But I cannot call her back: and when I stand by her grave, and whenever I think of her manifold kindness, the memory of that reproachful look she gave me, will "bite like a serpent and sting like an adder."

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At the same time that I think discretion the most useful talent a man can be master of, I look upon cunning to be the accomplishment of little, mean, ungenerous minds. Discretion points out the noblest ends to us, and pursues the most proper and laudable methods of attaining them; cunning has only private, selfish aims, and sticks at nothing which may make them succeed. Discretion has large and extensive views, and like a well-formed eye, commands a whole horizon; cunning is a kind of short-sightedness, that discovers the minutest objects which are near at hand, but is not able to discern things at a distance.-Addison.

-Not to know at large of things remote

From use, obscure and subtlé; but to know
That, which befòre us lies, in daily life,
Is the prime wisdóm: what is móre, is fùme,
Or emptiness, or fond impertinènce,

And renders us, in things that most concern,
Unpractised, unprepared, and still to seek.-Milton.

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LESSON XV.

Forgiveness of Injuries.-BIBLE.

AND it came to pass, when Saul was returned from following the Philistines, that it was told him, saying, Behold, David is in the wilderness of En-gedi. Then Saul took three thousand chosen men out of all Israel, and went to seek David and his men upon the rocks of the wild goats. And he came to the sheep-cotes by the way, where was a cave; and Saul went in to cover his feet: and David and his men remained in the sides of the cave. And the men of David said unto him, Behold the day of which the Lord said unto thee, Behold, I will deliver thine enemy into thy 2 hand, that thou mayest do to him as it shall seem good unto thee. Then David arose, and cut off the skirt of Saul's robe privily. And it came to pass afterward, that David's heart smote him, because he had cut off Saul's skirt.

And

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