under an efficient government, the period is not far off, when we may defy material injury from external annoyance; when we may take such an attitude as will cause the neutrality we may at any time resolve upon, to be scrupulously respected; when belligerent nations, under the impossibility of making acquisitions upon us, will not lightly hazard the giving us provocation; when we may choose peace or war, as our interest, guided by justice, shall counsel.

Why forego the advantages of so peculiar a situation? Why quit our own, to stand upon foreign ground? Why, by interweaving our destiny with that of any part of Europe, entangle our peace and prosperity in the toils of European ambition, rivalship, interest, humour, or caprice?

LESSON CXXII.

Adams and Jefferson.-W. WIRt.

JEFFERSON and Adams were great men by nature. Not great and eccentric minds, " shot madly from their spheres" to affright the world and scatter pestilence in their course; but minds whose strong and steady light, restrained within their proper orbits by the happy poise of their characters, came to cheer and to gladden a world that had been buried for ages in political night. They were heaven-called avengers of degraded man. They came to lift him to the station for which God had formed him, and to put to flight those idiot superstitions with which tyrants had contrived to enthral his reason and his liberty.

And that Being who had sent them upon this mission, had fitted them, pre-eminently, for his glorious work. He filled their hearts with a love of country which burned strong within them, even in death. He gave them a power of understanding which no sophistry could baffle, no art elude; and a moral heroism which no dangers could appal. Careless of themselves, reckless of all personal consequences, trampling under foot that petty ambition of office and honour which constitutes the master passion of little minds, they bent all their mighty powers to the task

for which they had been delegated-the freedom of their beloved country, and the restoration of fallen man.

They felt that they were Apostles of human liberty; and well did they fulfil their high commission. They rested not until they had accomplished their work at home, and given such an impulse to the great ocean of mind, that they saw the waves rolling on to the farthest shore, before they were called to their reward. And then they left the world, hand in hand, exulting, as they rose, in the success of their labours.

Adams and Jefferson were born, the first in Massachusetts, on the 19th of October, 1735; the last in Virginia, on the 2d of April, 1743. On the earliest opening of their characters, it was manifest that they were marked for distinction. They both displayed that thirst for knowledge, that restless spirit of inquiry, that fervid sensibility, and that bold, fearless independence of thought, which are among the surest prognostics of exalted talent; and, fortunately for them, as well as for their country and mankind, the Universities in their respective neighbourhoods opened to their use all the fountains of ancient and modern learning.

With what appetite they drank at these fountains, we need no testimony of witnesses to inform us. The living streams which afterwards flowed from their own lips and pens, are the best witnesses that can be called, of their youthful studies. They were, indeed, of that gifted order of minds, to which early instruction is of little other use than to inform them of their own powers, and to indicate the objects of human knowledge. Education was not with them, as with minor characters, an attempt to plant new talents and new qualities in a strange and reluctant soil. It was the development, merely, of those which already existed.

Thus, the pure and disinterested patriotism of Aristides, the firmness of Cato, and the devotion of Curtius, only awakened the principles that were sleeping in their young hearts, and touched the responding chords with which Heaven had attuned them. The statesman-like vigour of Pericles, and the spirit-stirring energy of Demosthenes, only roused their own lion powers, and informed them of their strength. Aristotle, and Bacon, and Sidney, and

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Locke, could do little more than to disclose to them their native capacity for the profound investigation and ascertainment of truth; and Newton taught their power to range among the stars. In short, every model to which they looked, and every great master to whom they appealed, only moved into life the scarcely dormant energies with which Heaven had endued them; and they came forth from the discipline, not decorated for pomp, but armed for battle.

LESSON CXXIII.

Anecdote of Napoleon.-DUCHESS D'ABRANTES.

THE Emperor, on arriving at Brienne, made several inquiries after old Mother Margaret: such was the appellation given to a good wife who occupied a cottage in the midst of the forest, to which the pupils of the military school had, in days of yore, made frequent excursions Napoleon had not forgotten the name, and he learned with no less pleasure than surprise, that the good old dame was still in existence. Continuing his morning ride, he struck into the forest, galloped to the well-known spot, and having dismounted, unceremoniously entered the cottage. Age had somewhat impaired the old woman's sight, and the Emperor's person was much changed.

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Good morning, Mother Margaret," said Napoleon, saluting his hostess; "it seems you have no curiosity to see the Emperor ?"

"Yes, but I have; I should like of all things to see him, and I intend to take that basket of fresh eggs to Madame de Brienne, that I may be invited to remain at the chateau, and so catch a glimpse of the Emperor. Ah! I shall not see him so well to-day as formerly, when he used to accompany his comrades to old Mother Margaret's and call for a bowl of new milk. To be sure, he was not Emperor then, but no matter; the rest marched before him. He always made them pay me for my milk, eggs, brown bread, and broken crockery, and commenced by paying his own share of the reckoning."

"Then," replied Napoleon, with a smile, "you have not forgotten Bonaparte !"

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'Forgotten him! Do you think one could forget such a steady, serious, melancholy-like, young gentleman, so considerate too for the poor? I am a weak old woman, but I always foretold that the lad would turn out well." Why, yes; he has made his way."

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At the commencement of this short dialogue, the Emperor had turned his back to the door, and consequently to the light; the narrow entrance thus blocked up, the interior of the cottage was left in darkness. By degrees, however, he approached the old woman, and the light again penetrated from without. The Emperor, upon this, rubbing his hands together, and assuming the tone and manners of his early youth-" Come, Mother Margaret," said he, "bestir yourself some milk and fresh eggs; I am half dead with hunger."

Margaret stared at her visitor, and seemed as though endeavouring to recall her buried recollections.

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Ha, ha!" said the Emperor, laughing; "how positive you were just now that you had not forgotten Bonaparte! we are old acquaintances, dame!"

Meanwhile, old Margaret had fallen at the Emperor's

feet.

Raising her with unaffected kindness,-"Have you nothing to give me, Mother Margaret," said he; "I am hungry-as hungry as a student."

The poor woman, beside herself with joy, hastily laid before her guest some fresh eggs and new milk. His repast finished, Napoleon forced his purse into the hands of his hostess, at the same time observing, "You recollect, Margaret, I used to make every one pay his reckoning. Adieu! I shall not forget you ;" and as he again mounted his horse and rode away, the old Dame, weeping with excess of delight, and straining her eyes to catch a last look, could only recompense him with her prayers.

LESSON CXXIV.

Reply to Sir Robert Walpole.-LORD CHATHAM.

SIR,-The atrocious crime of being a young man, which the honourable gentleman has, with such spirit and decency charged upon me, I shall neither attempt to palliate nor deny; but content myself with wishing, that I may be one of those whose follies may cease with their youth, and not of that number who are ignorant in spite of experience. Whether youth can be imputed to any man as a reproach, I will not, Sir, assume the province of determining; but surely age may become justly contemptible, if the opportunities which it brings have passed away without improvement, and vice appear to prevail, when the passions have subsided.

The wretch, who after seeing the consequences of a thousand errors, continues still to blunder, and whose age has only added obstinacy to stupidity, is surely the object either of abhorrence or contempt, and deserves not that his grey hairs should secure him from insult. Much more, Sir, is he to be abhorred, who, as he has advanced in age, has receded from virtue, and become more wicked with less temptation; who prostitutes himself for money which he cannot enjoy, and spends the remains of his life in the ruin of his country. But youth, Sir, is not my only crime; I have been accused of acting a theatrical part. A theatrical part may either imply some peculiarities of gesture, or a dissimulation of my real sentiments, and an adoption of the opinions and language of another man.

In the first sense, Sir, the charge is too trifling to be confuted; and deserves only to be mentioned, that it may be despised. I am at liberty, like every other man, to use my own language; and though, perhaps, I may have some ambition to please this gentleman, I shall not lay myself under any restraint, nor very solicitously copy his diction or his mien, however matured by age, or modelled by experience. But if any man shall, by charging me with theatrical behaviour, imply, that I utter any sentiments but my own, I shall treat him as a calumniator, and a vil