Falling before thy feet, kneeling and howling, And not a triumph. I ne'er feared to die, More than I wished to live. When I had reached CHARACTER OF NAPOLEON. Phillips. He is fallen! We may now pause before that splendid prodigy, which towered amongst us like some ancient ruin, whose frown terrified the glance its magnificence attracted. Grand, gloomy, and peculiar, he sat upon the throne, a sceptred hermit, wrapt in the solitude of his own originality. A mind bold, independent, and decisive a will, despotic in its dictates-an energy that distanced expedition, and a conscience pliable to every touch of interest, marked the outline of this extraordinary character-the most extraordinary, perhaps, that, in the annals of this world, ever rose, or reigned, or fell. Flung into life, in the midst of a Revolution, that quickened every energy of a people who acknowledged no superior, he commenced his course, a stranger by birth, and a scholar by charity! With no friend but his sword, and no fortune but his talents, he rushed into the lists where rank, and wealth, and genius had arrayed themselves, and competition fled from him as from the glance of destiny. He knew no motive but interest-he acknowledged no criterion but success he bowed before the Cross; the orphan of St Louis, he became the adopted child of the Republic: and with a parricidal ingratitude, on the ruins both of the throne and the tribune, he reared the throne of his despotism. A professed Catholic, he imprisoned the Pope; a pretended patriot, he impoverished the country; and in the name of Brutus, he grasped without remorse, and wore without shame, the diadem of the Cæsars! Through this pantomime of his policy, fortune played the clown to his caprices. At his touch, crowns crumbled, beggars reigned, systems vanished, the wildest theories took the colour of his whim, and all that was venerable, and all that was novel, changed places with the rapidity of a drama. Even apparent defeat assumed the appearance of victoryhis flight from Egypt confirmed his destiny-ruin itself only elevated him to empire. But if his fortune was great, his genius was transcendent; decision flashed upon his councils; and it was the same to decide and to perform. To inferior intellects, his combinations appeared perfectly impossible, his plans perfectly impracticable; but in his hands, simplicity marked their developement, and success vindicated their adoption. His person partook the character of his mind ;-if the one never yielded in the cabinet, the other never bent in the field. Nature had no obstacles that he did not surmount-space no opposition that he did not spurn; and whether amid Alpine rocks, Arabian sands, or polar snows, he seemed proof against peril, and empowered with ubiquity! The whole continent of Europe trembled at beholding the audacity of his designs, and the miracle of their execution. Skepticism bowed to the prodigies of his performance; romance assumed the air of history; nor was there aught too incredible for belief, or too fanciful for expectation, when the world saw a subaltern of Corsica waving his imperial flag over her most ancient capitals. All the visions of antiquity became common places in his contemplation; kings were his peoplenations were his outposts; and he disposed of courts, and crowns, and camps, and churches, and cabinets, as if they were the titular dignitaries of the chess-board! Amid all these changes he stood immutable as adamant. It mattered little, whether in the field or the drawing-room -with the mob or the levee-wearing the jacobin bonnet or the iron crown-banishing a Braganza, or espousing a Hapsbourgh-dictating peace on a raft to the Czar of Russia, or contemplating defeat at the gallows of Leipsic-he was still the same military despot! INDUSTRY NECESSARY TO FORM THE ORATOR. H. Ware, Jr. THE history of the world is full of testimony to prove how much depends upon industry: not an eminent orator has lived, but is an example of it. Yet, in contradiction to all this, the almost universal feeling appears to be, that industry can effect nothing, that eminence is the result of accident, and that every one must be content to remain just what he may happen to be. Thus multitudes, who come forward as teachers and guides, suffer themselves to be satisfied with the most indifferent attainments, and a miserable mediocrity, without so much as inquiring how they might rise higher, much less making any attempt to rise. For any other art they would have served an apprenticeship, and would be ashamed to practise it in public before they had learned it. If any one would sing, he attends a master, and is drilled in the very elementary principles, and only after the most laborious process, dares to exercise his voice in public. This he does, though he has scarce anything to learn but the mechanical execution of what lies, in sensible forms, before his eye. But the extempore speaker, who is to invent as well as to utter, to carry on an operation of the mind as well as to produce sound, enters upon the work without preparatory discipline, and then wonders that he fails! If he were learning to play on the flute for public exhibition, what hours and days would he spend in giving facility to his fingers, and attaining the power of the sweetest and most impressive execution. If he were devoting himself to the organ, what months and years would he labour, that he might know its compass and be master of its keys, and be able to draw out, at will, all its various combinations of harmonious sound, and its full richness and delicacy of expression. And yet he will fancy, that the grandest, the most various, the most expressive of all instruments, which the infinite Creator has fashioned, by the union of an intellectual soul with the powers of speech, may be played upon without study or practice. He comes to it, a mere uninstructed tyro, and thinks to manage all its stops, and command the Success in every art, whatever may be the natural talent, is always the reward of industry and pains. But the instances are many, of men of the finest natural genius, whose beginning has promised much, but who have degenerated wretchedly as they advanced, because they trusted to their gifts, and made no effort to improve. That there have never been other men of equal endowments with Cicero and Demosthenes, none could venture to suppose; but who have so devoted themselves to their art, or become equal in excellence? If those great men had been content, like others, to continue as they began, and had never made their persevering efforts for improvement, what would their countries have benefited from their genius, or the world have known of their fame? They would have been lost in the undistinguished crowd, that sunk to oblivion around them. Of how many more will the same remark prove true! What encouragement is thus given to the industrious ! With such encouragement, how inexcusable is the negligence, which suffers the most interesting and important truths to seem heavy and dull, and fall ineffectual to the ground, through mere sluggishness in the delivery! How unworthy of one, who performs the high function of a religious instructer, upon whom depend, in a great measure, the religious knowledge, and devotional sentiment, and final character of many fellow-beings, to imagine that he can worthily discharge this great concern by occasionally talking for an hour, he knows not how, and in a manner he has taken no pains to render correct, impressive, or attractive; and which, simply through that want of command over himself, which study would give, is immethodical, verbose, inaccurate, feeble, trifling! It has been said of the good preacher, That truths divine come mended from his tongue. Alas! they come ruined and worthless from such a man as this. They lose that holy energy, by which they are to convert the soul, and purify man for heaven, and sink, in interest and efficacy, below the level of those principles, which govern the ordinary affairs of this lower world. BURIAL OF SIR JOHN MOORE. Wolfe. NOT a drum was heard, not a funeral note, We buried him darkly; at dead of night, No useless coffin enclosed his breast, Nor in sheet nor in shroud we wound him; But he lay like a warrior taking his restWith his martial cloak around him! Few and short were the prayers we said, We thought as we hollowed his narrow bed, How the foe and the stranger would tread o'er his head, 'Lightly they'll talk of the spirit that's gone, But nothing he'll reck, if they let him sleep on But half of our heavy task was done, When the clock tolled the hour for retiring, And we heard the distant and random gun, That the foe was suddenly firing |