6. "It is Life," I hear a Butterfly say, When the stars the heavens illume; 7. "It is Life," a majestic War-horse neighed, To dash, unappalled, through the fiery heat, 'Mid the trumpet's clang, and the drum's loud beat, And the hoarse artillery's roar." 8. "It is Life," said a Savage, with hideous yell, “To roam unshackled the mountain and dell, And feel my bosom with majesty swell, As the primal monarch of all; To gaze on the earth, the sky, and the sea, 9. An aged Christian went tottering by, And white was his hair, and dim was his eye, * MAN'I TOU, (man' i too,) a spirit, god, or devil, of the American Indians. "It is Life to move from the heart's first throes, IT IS LIFE TO PREPARE FOR DEATH!" LESSON LXI. 1 GIBBON, EDWARD, the celebrated English historian, was born at Putney, 1737; and died in London, 1794. His "Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire” is a work of great merit, and its extraordinary union of excellences-variety, correctness, and vigor of narrative and description-deepens the regret with which we contemplate the skeptical taint that is diffused through its pages. 2 LEIBNITZ, GODFREY WILLIAM, an eminent mathematician and philosopher, was born at Leipsic, 1646; and died at Hanover, 1716. Within the vast region of speculative thought, there was no department unvisited by the ever-living activity of Leibnitz, or unillumined by his brilliancy. He has left the firm impress of his intellect upon the minds of jurists, historians, theologians, naturalists, mathematicians, and metaphysicians of the highest order. 3 PAS' CAL, BLAISE, an eminent geometrician and writer, was born in France, 1623; and died 1662. During a protracted illness, he had such an overwhelming sense of the importance of religion, that he resolved to renounce all his scientific and secular pursuits, and to apply his mind exclusively to the study of theology, and the means by which he might promote the best interests of his fellow-men. * CICE RO, MARCUS TULLIUS, the most famous of Roman orators, was born 106 before Christ, and was murdered by order of Mark Antony, 43 B.C. RAPHA EL, SANTI or SANZO, the most celebrated of Italian painters, was born April 6, 1483; and died at Rome, on his birthday, April 6, 1520, aged thirty-seven years. Raphael's greatest works are unrivaled, and his fame soars above that of all his competitors, not excepting Michael Angelo himself. He is universally acclaimed the Prince of Painters, and chiefly for those lofty sentimental qualities of his works, which all can feel, but few describe. • HOMER and MILTON. See notes pp. 106, 107. PLEASURES OF KNOWLEDGE. SYDNEY SMITH. T is NOBLE to seek Truth, and it is BEAUTIFUL to find it. IT It is the feeling of the human heart, that knowledge is better than riches; and it is deeply and sacredly true. To mark the course of human passions as they have flowed on in the ages that are past; to see why nations have risen, and why they have fallen; to speak of heat, and light, and the winds; to know what man has discovered in the heavens above, and in the earth beneath; to hear the chemist unfold the marvelous properties that the Creator has locked up in a speck of earth; to be told that there are worlds so distant from our own, that the quickness of light, traveling from the world's creation, has never yet reached us; to wander in the creations of poetry, and grow warm again with that eloquence which swayed the democracies of the Old World; to go up with great reasoners to the First Cause of all, and to perceive, in the midst of all this dissolution, and decay, and cruel separation, that there is one thing unchangeable, indestructible, and everlasting, it is worth while, in the days of our youth, to strive hard for this great discipline; to pass sleepless nights for it; to give up for it laborious days; to spurn for it present pleasures; to endure for it afflicting poverty; to wade for it through darkness, and sorrow, and contempt, as the great spirits of the world have done in all ages, and in all times. 2. I appeal to the experience of any man who is in the habit of exercising his mind vigorously and well, whether there is not a satisfaction in it, which tells him he has been acting up to one of the great objects of his existence. The end of nature has been answered: his faculties have done that which they were created to do, - not languidly occupied upon trifles, nor enervated by sensual gratification, but exercised in that toil which is so congenial to their nature, and so worthy of their strength. 3. A life of knowledge is not often a life of injury and crime. Whom does such a man oppress? with whose happiness does he interfere? whom does his ambition destroy? and whom does his fraud deceive? In the pursuit of science he injures no man, and, in the acquisition, he does good to all. A man who dedicates his life to knowledge, becomes habituated to pleasure which carries with it no reproach and there is one security that he will never love that pleasure which is paid for by anguish of heart. His pleasures are all cheap, all dignified, and all innocent; and, as far as any human being can expect permanence in this changing scene, he has secured a happiness which no malignity of fortune can ever take away, but which must cleave to him while he lives, ameliorating every good, and diminishing every evil of his existence. 4. The prevailing idea with young people has been, the incompatibility of labor and genius; and, therefore, from the fear of being thought dull, they have thought it necessary to remain ignorant. I have seen, at school and at college, a great many young men completely destroyed by having been so unfortunate as to produce an excellent copy of verses. Their genius being now established, all that remained for them to do was to act up to the dignity of the character; and as this dignity consisted in reading nothing new, in forgetting what they had already read, and in pretending to be acquainted with all subjects by a sort of off-hand exertion of talents, they soon collapsed into the most frivolous and insignificant of men. 5. It would be an extremely profitable thing to draw up a short and well-authenticated account of the habits of study of the most celebrated writers, with whose style of literary industry we happen to be most acquainted. Gibbon1 was in his study every morning, winter and summer, at six o'clock; Mr. Burke was the most laborious and indefatigable of human beings; Leibnitz was never out of his library; Pascal' killed himself by study; Cicero1 narrowly escaped death by the same cause; Milton was at his books with as much regularity as a merchant or an attorney; he had mastered all the knowledge of his time: so had Homer. Raphael' lived but thirty-seven years, and in that short space carried his art so far beyond what it had before reached, that he appears to stand alone as a model to his successors. 6. There are instances to the contrary; but, generally speaking, the life of all truly great men has been a life of intense and incessant labor. They have commonly passed the first half of life in the gross darkness of indigent humility, — overlooked, mistaken, contemned, by weaker men,-thinking while others slept, reading while others. rioted, feeling something within that told them they should not always be kept down among the dregs of the world. And then, when their time was come, and some little accident has given them their first occasion, they have burst out into the light and glory of public life, rich with the spoils of time, and mighty in all the labors and struggles of the mind. 7. Then do the multitude cry out, "A miracle of genius!" Yes; he is a miracle of genius, because he is a miracle of labor; because, instead of trusting to the resources of his own single mind, he has ransacked a thousand minds; because he makes use of the accumulated wisdom of ages, and takes as his point of departure the |