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help and be helped. In sickness and health, in sorrow and joy, 

 in Avealth and in poverty, there must be a perpetual interchange 

 of good offices. 



As we turn over the leaves of this wondrous book, there is 

 one page in which are inscribed the loftiest thoughts, the noblest 

 lessons, the most beauteous pictures of life. There is one word 

 which sounds and swells with universal music to every heart — a 

 music of fears and hopes, of memories, of joys and sorrows, the 

 one old dear word of " Home !" How many thoughts cling and 

 cluster around it. How many memories rush unbidden with the 

 word — of the past as well as of the present — of those early days 

 which we would fain recall, of that old house in the country which 

 we loved so well, of those green shadows which have passed away 

 — those vanished shadows, and the children playing in the shad- 

 ows, which we can see far off, as if in some beautiful dream. The 

 light that is nat on the land or sea, lingers always around those 

 hours, and hallows them forever. 



Who is there among you who does not recall the picture of 

 a happy Ncav England home, seen from the highway, as we 

 journey along at eventide ; or seen in the sweet, sacred mem- 

 ories of other years. You seem to feel the hush of peace and 

 repose, which dwell beneath the drooping elm trees that shade 

 and guard the door. The last rays of the sunset are fading 

 in dissolving beauty in the West, and in their soft light you 

 can see the farmer who, by his thoughtful labor, has well earned 

 his repose. He is resting there in the wide porch, looking out 

 over his well tilled fields, watching the last fading traces of the 

 sunset, the first trembling beams of the evening star, as he will 

 watch one day for another sanset, and for another evening star, 

 and will know that it is his morning star also. Beside him is the 

 wife and mother — for what would be the picture of a home if 

 woman's sweet influence and empire were forgotten ? We should 

 miss the flame on the altar, the fire on the hearth, the angel in the 

 house, if her form were wanting there. Flowers are growing 

 in the shelter of the porch, but fairer flowers are blooming in the 

 shelter of that quiet home. Her daughters are with her, not 

 languid and pale, but as fresh and modest as the dewy rosebuds, 

 half opening by the porch. On the grass, a little apart, the boys 

 are gathered ; — a little apart, for with a growing sense of raanli- 



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