In 1854 he was ap Few men possessed Dream of Day and other Poems," which appeared in 1813 pointed State Geologist of Wisconsin. He died in 1856. higher poetical qualities than PERCIVAL. His learning was comprehensive and thorough. He had a rich imagination, a remarkable command of language, and wrote with a facility rarely equaled; but he shrunk from the labor of thoroughly revising his writings, and giving them the polished excellence that can only be attained by a slow and laborious process. VA 68. PROGRESS OF FREEDOM. ARIOUS have been the efforts in the Old World at popular forms of government, but, from some cause or other, they have failed; and however time, a wider intercourse, a greater familiarity with the practical duties of representation, and, not least of all, our own auspicious example, may prepare the Europe'an mind for the possession of republican freedom, it is very certain that, at the present moment, Europe is not the place for republics. 2. The true soil for these is our own continent, the New World. This is the spot on which the beautiful theories of the Europe'an philosopher-who had risen to the full freedom of speculation, while action was controled-have been reduced to practice. The atmosphere here seems as fatal to the arbitrary institutions of the Old World as that has been to the democratic forms of our own. It seems scarcely possible that any other organization than these latter should exist here. 3. In three centuries from the discovery of the country, the various races by which it is tenanted-some of them from the least liberal of the Europe'an monarchies-have, with few exceptions, come into the adoption of institutions of a republican character. Toleration, civil and religious, has been proclaimed, and enjoyed to an extent unknown since the world began, throughout the wide borders of this vast continent. Alas for those portions which have assumed the exercise of these rights without fully comprehending their import-who have been intoxicated with the fumes of freedom, instead of drawing nourishment from its living principle! 4. It was fortunate, or, to speak more properly, a providential thing, that the discovery of the New World was postponed to the precise period when it occurred. Had it taken place at an earlier time during the flourishing period of the feudal ages, for example-the old institutions of Europe, with their hallowed abuses, might have been ingrafted on this new stock, and, instead of the fruit of the tree of life, we should have furnished only varieties of a kind already far exhausted and hastening to decay. 5. But, happily, some important discoveries in science, and, above all, the glorious Reformation, gave an electric shock to the intellect, long benumbed under the influence of a tyrannical priesthood. It taught men to distrust authority, to trace effects back to their causes, to search for themselves, and to take no guide but the reason which God had given them. It taught them to claim the right of free inqui'ry as their inalienable birthright, and, with free inquiry, freedom of action. The sixteenth and seventeenth centuries were the period of the mighty struggle between the conflicting elements of religion, as the eighteenth and nineteenth have been that of the great contest for civil liberty. 6. It was in the midst of this universal fer'ment, and in consequence of it, that these shores were first peopled by our Puritan ancestors. Here they found a world where they might verify the value of those theories which had been derided as visionary, or denounced as dangerous, in their own land. All around was free-free as nature herself: the mighty streams rolling on in their majesty, as they had continued to roll from the creation; the forests, which no hand had violated, flourishing in primeval grandeur and beauty-their only tenants the wild animals, or the Indians, nearly as wild, scarcely held together by any tie of social polity. 7. Nowhere was the trace of civilized man or of his curious contrivances. Here was no star-chamber nor court of high commission; no racks, nor jails, nor gibbets; no feudal tyrant, to grind the poor man to the dust on which he toiled; no inquisition, to pierce into the thought, and to make thought a crime. The only eye that was upon them was the eye of Heaven. 8. True, indeed, in the first heats of suffering enthusiasm, they did not extend that charity to others which they claimed for themselves. It was a blot on their characters, but one which they share in common with most reformers. The zeal requisite for great revolutions, whether in Church or State, is rarely attended by charity for difference of opinion. Those who are willing to do and to suffer bravely for their own doctrines, attach a value to them which makes them impatient of opposition from others. 9. The martyr for conscience' sake can not comprehend the necessity of leniency to those who denounce those truths for which he is prepared to lay down his own life. If he set so little value on his own life, is it natural he should set more on that of others? The Dominican, who dragged his victims to the fires of the inquisition in Spain, freely gave up his ease and his life to the duties of a missionary among the heathen. The Jesuits, who suffered martyrdom among the American savages in the propagation of their faith, stimulated those very savages. to their horrid massacres of the Protestant settlements of New England. God has not often combined charity with enthusiasm. When he has done so, he has produced his noblest work—a More,' or a Fenelon. 10. But if the first settlers were intolerant in practice, they brought with them the living principle of freedom, which would survive when their generation had passed away. They could not avoid it; for their coming here was in itself an assertion of that principle. They came for conscience' sake-to worship God in their own way. Freedom of political institutions they at once avowed. Every citizen took his part in the political scheme, and enjoyed all the consideration of an equal participation in civil privileges; and liberty in political matters gradually brought with it a corresponding liberty in religious concerns. SIR THOMAS MORE, author of "Utopia," able and profound in law and divinity, an illustrious statesman, was born in London, in 1480. In 1521 he was knighted and made treasurer of the exchequer. He became speaker of the House of Commons in 1523, and succeeded Wolsey, as Lord Chancellor, in 1529. Having refused to take an oath to maintain the lawfulness of the wicked marriage of Henry VIII. with Anne Boleyn, this virtuous man was condemned to death, and beheaded on the 6th of July, 1535.- FENELON, an eminent and pious Frenchman, Archbishop of Cambray, author of "Telemachus," was horn in 1651, and died in the sixty-third year of his age. 11. In their subsequent contest with the mother country they learned a reason for their faith, and the best manner of defending it. Their liberties struck a deep root in the soil, amid storms which shook but could not prostrate them. It is this struggle with the mother country, this constant assertion of the right of self-government, this tendency-feeble in its beginning, increasing with increasing age-toward republican institutions, which connects the colonial history with that of the Union, and forms the true point of view from which it is to be regarded. W. H. PRESCOTT.1 1 69. THE ANTIQUITY OF FREEDOM. ERE are old trees, tall oaks, and gnarlèd pines, Was never touch'd by spade, and flowers spring up To linger here, among the flitting birds And leaping squirrels, wandering brooks, and winds With pale blue berries. In these peaceful shades— My thoughts go up the long dim path of years, 2. O FREEDOM! thou art not, as poets dream, A fair young girl,' with light and delicate limbs, ground Grasps the broad shield, and one the sword; thy brow, 6 'See Biographical Sketch, p. 151.-3 Birds (bêrdz).—' Squirrel (skwår'. rel). Påss. Unpruned (un prônd').- Påth.- 'Earliest (er'll est).— • Få r.—' Girl (girl). Mås' ter." Gyves, fetters for the legs.12 Gråsps. 10 3. With tokens of old wars; thy massive' limbs Power at thee has launch d' His bolts, and with his lightnings smitten thee; They could not quench the life thou hast from Heaven. And his swart armorers, by a thousand fires, Have forged thy chain; yet while he deems thee bound, 4. Thy birth-right" was not given by human hands: 9 5. Thou shalt wax stronger with the lapse of years, 'Måss' Ive.-Launched (låncht).— Mer' ci less.—Swårt, dark of hue; tawny; moderately black.— Burning (bern' ing).— Birth-right (berth'rit).-'Airs (arz).— Usurper (yu zêrp' er).- Snares (snårz).-1o Câre'less. 10 |