heap. I might boast that, during all this scene of horror, not a Figh or expression of fear escaped me, had not my support been founded on that miserable though strong consolation, that all mankind were involved in the same calamity, and that I imagined that I was perishing with the world itself. 10. "At last this dreadful darkness was dissipated (after a duration of three days), by degrees, like a cloud or smoke; the real day returned, and even the sun appeared, though very faintly, and as when an eclipse is coming on. Every object that presented itself to our eyes seemed changed, being covered over with white ashes, as with a deep snow. We returned to Mi-se'num, where we refreshed ourselves as well as we could, and passed an anxious night between hope and fear, for the earthquake still continued. However, my mother and I, notwithstanding the danger we had passed and that still threatened us, had no thought of leaving the place till we should receive some account of my uncle." 11. He had already perished on the beach at Stabiæ, ten miles from Vesuvius, the second day of the eruption — this was now the fourth. There appear to have been three days of total darkness, except occasionally relieved by the breaking out of flames or lava. It may be imagined what the scene must have been which presented itself in the neighborhood of Herculaneum and Pompeii, or at Naples, when that which Pliny describes occurred at Mi-se'-num, twenty miles, nearly, from the mountain, with Naples itself, and the high lands intervening between it and the volcano; and what multitudes must have perished, if at ten miles distance Pliny was suffocated by the poisonous gases. 12. I believe no account has come to us how great the destruction of life was on this occasion, nor even of what befell the Neapolitans. The only fact in this relation is the immediate relief which the Emperor Titus, with characteristic humanity, dispatched to the scene, as soon as the news of the disaster had reached Rome. We may readily conjecture, that all the inhabitants in the immediate neighborhood of the hill must have had sufficient warning by the earthquake, and the first bursting out of smoke from the crater, to enable them to escape. And that the most did escape, at least from Pompeii, is proved by the comparatively few skeletons that have been discovered there. WM. WARE. CXIX.. THE SWORD AND THE PRESS. 1. WHEN Tamerlane had finished building his pyramid of seventy thousand human skulls, and was seen standing at the gate of Damascus, glittering in his steel, with his battle-axe on his shoulder, till his fierce hosts filed out to new victories and car nage, the pale looker-on might have fancied that Nature was in her death-throes; for havoc and despair had taken possession of the earth, and the sun of manhood seemed setting in a sea of blood. ΕΙ EI 2. Yet it might be on that very gala-day of Tamerlane that a little boy was playing nine-pins in the streets of Mentz, whose history was more important than that of twenty Tamerlanes. The Khan, with his shaggy demons of the wilderness, "passed away like a whirlwind," to be forgotten forever; and that German artisan has wrought a benefit which is yet immeasurably expanding itself, and will continue to expand itself, through all countries and all times. 3. What are the conquests and the expeditions of the whole corporation of captains, from Walter the Penniless to Napoleon Bonaparte, compared with those movable types of Faust? EI Truly it is a mortifying thing for your conqueror to reflect how perishable is the metal with which he hammers with such violence; how the kind earth will soon shroud up his bloody footprints; and all that he achieved and skilfully piled together will be but like his own canvas city of a camp- this evening loud with life, to-morrow all struck and vanished, a few pits and heaps of straw." 66 4. For here, as always, it continues true, that the deepest force is the stillest; that, as in the fable, the mild shining of the sun shall silently accomplish what the fierce blustering of the tempest in vain essayed. Above all, it is ever to be kept in mind that not by material but by moral power are men and their actions to be governed. How noiseless is thought! No rolling of drums, no tramp of squadrons, no tumult of innumerable baggage-wagons, attend its movements. 5. In what obscure and sequestered places may the head be meditating which is one day to be crowned with more than imperial authority! for kings and emperors will be among its ministering servants; it will rule not over124 but in all heads; and with these solitary combinations of ideas, and with magic form'ulas, bend the world to its will. The time may come when Napoleon himself will be better known for his laws than his hattles, and the victory of Waterloo prove less momentous than the opening of the first Mechanics' Institute. THOMAS CARLYIE. Beneath the rule of men entirely great The loud earth breathless! Take away the sword O THOU great Arbiter of life and death! 2. HE LIVES LONG WHO LIVES WELL. Randolph. Wouldst thou live long? The only means are these, 'Bove Galen's diet, or Hippocrates': Strive to live well; tread in the upright ways, But he that outlives Nestor, and appears To have passed the date of gray Methuselah's years, If he his life to sloth and sin doth give, I say he only was— he did not LIVE. 3. RETIREMENT. — Goldsmith. O, blest retirement,162 friend to life's decline! Who quits a world where strong temptations try, Sinks to the grave with unperceived decay, 4. THE OLD MAN BY THE BROOK. Wordsworth. Down to the vale this water steers, how merrily it goes! 5. FREEDOM. - Bryant. O Freedom! thou art not, as poets dream, With which the Roman master crowned his slave, Armed to the teeth, art thou: one mailed hand Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, With tokens of old wars; thy massive limbs Are strong and struggling. Power at thee has launched 6. THE FOLLY OF PROCRASTINATION. 117 To-morrow's action! can that hōary wisdom, 7. PRACTICAL CHARITY.-Crabbe. An ardent spirit dwells with Christian love, – "T is not enough that we with sorrow sigh, And plants relief for coming miseries. 8. THE GUILTY CONSCIENCE. - Byron. The mind that broods o'er guilty woes One, and a sole relief she knows : 9. PRAYER.Alfred Tennyson. More things are wrought by prayer Than this world dreams of. Wherefore, let thy voice For what are men better than sheep or goats, If, knowing God, they lift not hands of prayer, 10. CORONACH.EI-Scott. He is gone on the mountain, he is lost to the forest, |