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hath attempted, with "optic tube," to fathom the deep profound of God's glorious universe! Go with me to yonder "light-house of the skies." Poised on its rocky base, behold that wondrous tube which lifts the broad pupil of its eye high up, as if gazing instinctively into the mighty deep of space. Look out upon the heavens, and gather into your eye its glittering constellations.

3. Pause and reflect that, over the narrow zone of the retina of your eye, a universe is pictured, painted by light in. all its exquisite and beautiful proportions. Look upon that luminous zone which girdles the sky: observe its faint and cloudy light. How long, think you, that light has been streaming, day and night, with a swiftness that flashes it on its way twelve millions of miles in each and every minute? how long has it fled and flashed through space to reach your eye, and tell its wondrous tale?

4. Not less than a century has rolled away since it left its home! Hast thou taken it at the bound thereof? Is this the bound, here the limit from beyond which light can never come? Looking to yonder point in space, you declare that you behold nothing, absolutely nothing: all is blank, and deep, and dark. You exclaim, Surely no ray illumines that deep profound!

5. Place your eye for one moment to the tube that now pierces that seeming domain of night, and, lo! ten thousand orbs, blazing with light unutterable, burst on the astonished sight! Whence start these hidden suns? Whence comes this light from out deep darkness? Knowest thou, O man! the paths to the house thereof? Ten thousand years have rolled away since these wondrous orbs set out on their mighty journey! Then you exclaim, We have found the boundary of light; surely none can lie beyond this stupendous limit. far, in the deep beyond, darkness unfathomable reigns!

6. Look once more. The vision changes: a hazy cloud of light now fills the field of the telescope. Whence comes the light of this mysterious object? Its home is in the mighty

deep, as far beyond the limit you had vainly fixed,—ten thousand times as far, as that limit is beyond the reach of human vision! And thus we rise, and mount, and soar, from height to height, upward, and even upward still, till the mighty series ends, because vision fails, and sinks, and dies.

7. Hast thou, then, pierced the boundary of light? Hast thou penetrated the domain of darkness? Hast thou, weak mortal, soared to the fountain whence come these wondrous streams, and taken the light at the hand thereof? Hast thou stood at yonder infinite origin, and bid that flash depart and journey onward, days and months and years; century on century, through countless ages, - millions of years, and never weary in its swift career?

8. Knowest thou when it started? Knowest thou it because thou wast then born, and because the number of thy days is great? Such, then, is the language addressed by Jehovah to weak, erring, mortal man. How has the light of science flooded with meaning this astonishing passage? Surely, surely we do not mis-read: the interpretation is just.

QUESTIONS.-1. What were the questions addressed to Job by the Almighty? 2. How does the astronomer regard these queries? 2. What does "optic tube" here mean? 3. How fast does light travel? 4. How long has it taken light to reach our eyes, coming from the "milky-way"? 5. Are there worlds still more distant? Can the mind conceive of such vast distances? 8. Do the revelations of the telescope help us to understand the Bible?

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ERRORS.-Some'wut for some'what; frum for from; villige for village; chim'bly for chimney.

THE OLD CLOCK ON THE STAIRS. LONGFELLOW.

1. SOMEWHAT back from the village street

Stands the old-fashioned country-seat:

Across its antique portico

Tall poplar-trees their shadows throw;

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3. By day its voice is low and light;
But in the silent dead of night,
Distinct as a passing footstep's fall,
It echoes along the vacant hall,
Along the ceiling, along the floor;

And seems to say at each chamber door, -
never!

"For ever

Never- for ever!"

4. Through days of sorrow and of mirth, Through days of death and days of birth, Through every swift vicissitude

Of changeful time, unchanged it has stood;
And as if, like God, it all things saw,
It calmly repeats those words of awe,-
"For ever never!

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5. In that mansion used to be

Free-hearted Hospitality:

His great fires up the chimney roared:
The stranger feasted at his board;

But, like the skeleton at the feast,
That warning time-piece never ceased,-
"For ever - never!

Never for ever!"

6. There groups of merry children played; There youths and maidens dreaming strayed: O precious hours! O golden prime,

And affluence of love and time!

Even as a miser counts his gold,

Those hours the ancient time-piece told, —
"For ever - never!

Never for ever!"

7. From that chamber, clothed in white,
The bride came forth on her wedding-night:
There, in that silent room below,

The dead lay in his shroud of snow;
And, in the hush that followed prayer,
Was heard the old clock on the stair, -
"For ever never!

Never - for ever!"

8. All are scattered now, and fled:
Some are married; some are dead;
And when I ask with throbs of pain,
"Ah! when shall they all meet again?"
As in the days long since gone by,
The ancient time-piece makes reply,-

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QUESTIONS.-1. What is represented as speaking here? 1. What does it say! 2. To what is it likened? Who is a monk? 9. What impressive lesson may you learn from the ticking of a clock? What inflection prevails in this piece? With what tone of voice should it be read? What is the general character of the language of this lesson?

1. Co'HORT, a body of soldiers.

LESSON CV.

1. LEAGUER, siege; investment of a place by an army.

2. CEN-TU'RI-ON, a commander of one hun

dred men.

ERRORS.

for for'est.

2. PA-TRICIANS, the aristocracy of Rome. 6. FO'RUM, in Rome, a place where causes were tried; also, a market-place.

9. PAM'PERED, kept in luxury.

12. VIN'DI-CATE, defend ; maintain.

-Gus' for gusts; des'p'rit for des'pe-rate; sul'lun for sul'len; for'ist

VIRGINIUS TO THE ROMAN ARMY. · E. KELLOGG.

1. THE night wind blew in fitful gusts, with occasional dashes of rain, where, grouped around their watch-fires and sheltered by the.dense foliage of a beechen grove, a Romań cohort held its leaguer. Some, their spears thrust into the ground beside them, sat upright against the trees; while others lay at full length, with their heads resting upon their shields.

2. As the flames threw their red light upon the war-scarred faces of the veterans, they revealed only sullen features: no song nor jest was heard, - no sound, save the low hiss of the rain-drops on the embers, the bay of a wolf in the distant forest, and the low muttered words of a soldier who was telling to his comrade, how that, the night before, as the sun fell over the hills, a centurion rode past his beat full speed to Rome, summoned there by some new. outrage of the Patricians.

3. All that night, throughout the host, mysterious forebodings crept. Men around their watch-fires spake in low whis

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