MOORE’S RURAL NEW-YORKER: AN AGRICULTURAL AND FAMILY NEWSPAPER. 
JAN. 3. 
CONDUCTED BY AZILK. 
For Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
THE ABSENT, UNFORGOTTEN. 
JIT KATK CAMERON. 
The Absent, t'nforgotten,— 
They come at even-tide, 
The noble who have wander'd, 
The lovelv*who have died ; 
With the sunlight on each brow, 
And terelight in each eye, 
They come in all the beauty 
They wore in days gone by I 
It may be that old Ocean 
With cold waves rolls between, 
Or Death with colder billows 
May darkly intervene; 
Yet in vain—for Twilight’s hour 
Still finds them at onr side. 
The noble who have have wander’d,- 
The lovely who have died I 
We feel their mystic presence, 
■ We. hear—or seem to hear— 
The music of their voices 
In tones of love and cheer, 
The long miles that divide us, 
’Tis then we half-Ibrget, 
And the weary months and years 
Since last we fondly met. 
We deem not they are absent, 
They seem to us so near, 
The friends whom we hare cherish’d. 
Those whom our hearts hold dear. 
They come when fall the shadows 
At the still even-tide, 
. The noble who have wander’d, 
The lovely who have died! 
God grant that when the shadows 
Close round our Life’s brief day, 
And every wandering spirit 
Hath gone its Homeward way, 
We may meet in that Love-land, 
Where falls no even-tide, 
The noble who have wander'd, 
The lovely who have died I 
January, 1857. 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
WXLL THE YOUTH HEED THEM P 
Heed what? Why the counsels and admonitions 
contained in the following lines—and Oil! that 
my pen was guided by the infinite mind, while I 
endeavor to give counsel to the young immortal. 
"What a startling fact that thousands of youth are 
this hour forming HABITS of thought, of feeling, and 
of action, which will govern their course through 
life, and probably seal their fate to all eternity— 
which will almost to a certainly make them happy 
or miserable as long as they exist. Y'es, youthful 
reader, you whose eye follows along these lines, are 
now forming habits which will as certainly bring 
you happiness or misery as you are a living being. 
Stop, then, and reflect! That wicked deed which 
yon may commit this day may— yes. will probably 
lead to another, and still another; and ere you are 
aware, of it, a habit as irresistible as the thunder¬ 
ing Niagara will be rooted on your being. 
Oh ! that, first wrong step ! It is of little use to 
remonstrate with the young after they have once 
commenced a wild, a vicious, or a reckless career; 
for, like the crushing avalanche, they are precipi¬ 
tated onward with triple force at every step.— 
Therefore my words are especially directed to the 
one who has just set sail on life’s broad ocean. 
And raethinks I see such an one throw these 
thoughts away, with scorn at the weakness they 
manifest. But let me beseech you to ponder well 
your path, for my words are true as though written 
in the burning characters of an angel's pen. 1Vow, 
as you unfurl your sails to the breeze, and start 
upon life’s voyage, you cau take what course you 
will; but after you have once committed yourself 
to the direction you will pursue upon life’s rush¬ 
ing tide, yoifcWiU be borne onward with accelerated 
speed at every pace. Bee yonder, above the foam¬ 
ing cataract, is a man pushing his little bark into 
the stream. Now it floats lazily along, and he may 
go which way he will. The current gently bears 
}iim downwards, and although warned by his 
friends of the danger lurking in those placid, 
sparkling waters, he smiles at their alarm. With 
increasing, hut unnoticed speed, that fearful stream 
hurries him along, and now seeing and hearing the 
furious lashing of the waters, he seizes his ours; 
but alas ! of what avail is human strength now !_ 
He takes one more look at those who have warned 
him, and plunges into the awful abyss. 
Bucli, .young friend, is a faint picture of the 
career of many a traveler who started upon life’s 
voyage with as cheering prospects as you can pos¬ 
sibly have. And such will almost inevitably be 
your sad fate, unless when you launch you steer for 
a bright and glorious port. Let not the glitter¬ 
ing allurements of earth or the deceitful crav¬ 
ings of your own passions, or appetites, make you 
swerve from the path of virtue. 
Peoria, Ill., Dec., 1856. D. B. Walt. 
-- 4 ^*.- 
For Moorn’s Rural New-Yorker 
BY - GONE S. 
Winter winds are again beginning to wbistlo 
among the empty branches, and to pierce into 
every nnoccnpied nook and cranny, and we wil¬ 
lingly turn from the tempest without, to the happy 
home-circle that surrounds the cheerful fireside 
within. 
The very sight of a schoolboy’s sled sends a 
thrill of pleasure to my heart, as I remember with 
what glee I used to bail the coming of winter in 
years gone by. The first Bnow storm! how anx¬ 
iously were the pearly flakes watched as they 
noiselessly descended to earth. With what zest 
was the old sled taken down from its snmruer resi¬ 
dence, and speedily put into action. Lear reader, 
do you ever call to mind the heartfelt pleasure 
with which, when school was out, you hastened to 
the big hill which stood behind, and laboriously 
toiled up the steep ascent to obtain the merry ride 
down. 
A happy group were we, assembled each snowy 
morn and night to slide down hill. Clarence 
Woodvjllk, a noble, manly hoy of fourteen, who 
especially claimed sweet Cora Ashton for his 
companion in his rides. Methinks I can hear even 
now her silvery laughter, as he would carefully 
take his seat beside her on his little red sled, and 
skillfully guide it with unerring swiftness down 
the side of the steep old hill. And there was 
- roguish Frank Carrol and his sister Annie; 
pretty Nellie Stanley and thoughtful Charlie 
* Somers, who used to delight in making monu¬ 
ments and men of snow. But a plain white marble 
slab, standing at the head of a lowly mound in 
yonder cemetery, now marks the spot where repo¬ 
ses all that remains of his mortal body. It. was 
not long since that Cora Asjjton took her sent on 
Clarence Woodville's sled, and promised to ride 
with him down the hill of life. Many fleeting years 
have passed away since that childish group were 
wont to lie gathered together, but now they are 
strangely scattered. Some are in far distant climes, 
treading foreign shores, and mingling in Far differ¬ 
ent scenes than those which marked their child¬ 
hood’s home. Some have gone to their last resting 
place—some, their names are written in the Book 
of Fame, and others, I trust, in the .Lamb’s Book 
of Life. Winnie Willian. 
Rochester, N. Y., Jan., 1857. 
-—:-- 4 — 4 -- 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
A SKETCH. 
Tui? sun as it sinks behind the western hills, 
sends back a golden glow, lighting up the pale face 
of a noble and lovely hoy of four summers, who 
lies upon his sick couch. His eyes were large and 
lustrous, and the clustering ringlets fell thick 
around a brow of marble whiteness. 
A careworn and anxious mother watches by the 
bed-side of her only and darling child, nor thinks 
of her own aching brow and weary body, but as 
she gazes upon the pallid cheek and hears the 
short-drawn breath, thinks with sad forijodings of 
the dark and lonely future. Closely she clasps the 
little sufferer to her aching heart, and as she fondly 
kisses his snowy brow, she perceives that death 
with relentless hand, is fast placing his icy seal 
upon her only and idolized child. The dying eyes 
slowly unclose, and those feeble lips faintly articu¬ 
late “Mother, mother —good night” The face 
assumes a lovely smile; the spirit has left its prison- 
house ot clay, and, borne on angel wings, it passes 
the pearly gates which lead to mansions of the blest. 
Ah! mother, weep not; thy loved and cherished 
one hath been transplanted to a fairer clime, where 
its cherub foot now walk the golden streets of the 
New Jerusalem—and its goideu harp shall ever be 
attuned to the praise of Him who said “Buffer 
little children to come unto me, and forbid them 
not, for of such i3 the kingdom of heaven." Dry, 
then, thy tears—thou hast now a gem laid up in 
heaven —an angel-chiid waiting to welcome thee 
[ home, where sin comes not and parting is never 
known. Bo live, that when the waiting seraph 
shall bill thee home, thou, too, shalt join the white- 
robed clioir, and ever attune thy praise to Him 
who reigns on high. Marion. 
Wilson, Niagara Co., Jan., 1857. 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
FRAGMENTS. 
How blind we are! Our eyes perceive but dimly 
through the “obscuring day-light” the wondrous 
loriii ol Beauty though she dwelletli everywhere. 
We may trace her presence in all nature; in the 
waters, in the forests, in the changeful clouds that 
float above us, or in the emerald green, or dazzling 1 
white, beneath our feet. We may note her in the 
sunshine ami the storm; but her noblest temple is 1 
the human heart. 
Yea, beauty is the child of Love; and Love is 1 
Oon, and Go» is everywhere! How deaf we are !_ ' 
Our ears acknowledge not the perfect Harmony 
that reigns and sings in all of nature’s realms! 
And what know we of the masterpiece — that won- ! 
drous “harp of a thousand strings?” 
But when we are freed from this clay prison- \ 
house, when we mount upward as on wings,—our j 
eyes will open on the Son in all his Beauty,—we 
shall joy in all the fullness of the Father’s Love, ] 
and join the eternal Harmonics of Heaven. 
Viana Meadows. 
Ragle Harbor, N. Y., Jan., 1857. 
—■- 
THE RETURNING ANSWERS, 
Hear the story of the child which went forth ! 
into the mountain ravine. Whilst the child wan¬ 
dered there, he called aloud to break the loneliness ‘ 
and heard a voice which called to him in the same 
tone. He called again, and, as he thought, the 
voice again mocked him. Flushed with anger, he 
rushed to find the boy who insulted him, but could 
find none. He then called out to him in anger, 
and with all abusive epithets—all of which was 
faithfully returned to him. Choking with rage, the 
child ran to his mother and complained that a boy 
in the woods had abused and insulted him with ! 
many vile words. But the mother took her child 
by the hand, and said: “My child, these names ] 
were hut the echoes of thine own voice. Whatever 
thou didst call was returned to thee from the hill¬ 
side. Hadsttbou called out pleasant words, pleasant * 
words had returned to thee. Let this he thy lesson 1 
through life. The world will be echoes of thine c 
own spirit. Treat thy fellows with uukindness, aud 1 
they will answer with unkindness; with love, and 
thou shalt have love. Send forth sunshine from ! 
thy spirit, and thou shalt never have a clouded 
day; carry about a vindictive spirit, and even in ‘ 
the flowers shall lurk curses. Thou shalt receive * 
ever what thou givest, and that alone.” Always, 
said the speaker, is that child in the mountain | 
passes—and every man and every woman is that 
child.— Selected, 
t 
----_ 
BARTH AND HEAVIES', 
Fi.owkrs that bloom to wither fast; ^ 
Light, whose beams are soon o’ercast; 
Friendship warm, but not to last;— v 
Such by earth are given. 8 
Seek the flowers that ne’er shall fade ; 1 
Find the light no cloud can shade ; 
Win the friend who ne’er betrayed— 
These are found in heaven. g 
[Jlfi.s H. F. Gould. n 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker, 
THE VAGRANT’S DEATH. 
IIV IDA FAIRFIELD, 
Tears lay on the old man’s withered cheek 
He was faded, and wrinkled, and grey, 
And his quivering lips refused to speak, 
Of the life fast ebbing away ; 
But Memory came with a spectral form 
And stood by his tattered bed, 
Aud back through the dim aisles of the past 
His wandering thoughts she led. 
Back to the hour when that hoary lipad 
Was pillowed a bright, wee. thing, 
And nestled close on a mother's breast, 
As a bird, neath a sheltering wing, 
And hack to the hour when the (Ire went out 
In that mother's lovc-lit eye, 
And a frail boy knelt with an ashen brow, 
And deemed ‘twore a joy to die. 
But stars shone out—and a fiiirer form 
Than mother could ever wear, 
Shed o'er his dreams the light of her smile, 
And the gleam of her golden hair; 
Then came an hour of passion and power, 
When he knelt by the altar's side, 
And clasped in liis own a trembling hand, 
The hand of his fair young bride. 
The Sybil paused at a fearful time. 
When lie foil by the tempter's snare, 
And one by one lifi-.'s lights paled out 
Neath the wine-rup’s reddening glare 
When bis frail wife hushed her nfnaning babe, 
And closing her tear-dimmed eye, 
With a loving smile still on her lip 
Bowed down her bead to die. 
Then came long years of suffering and sin. 
Treading that downward way, 
Till he grew a friendless, worn old man, 
Bogging from day to day, 
And turned at last in a hovel to die. 
Without friend or kindred near. 
Alone with the hitter thoughts which wrung 
From his glazing oyes the tear. 
Beath came with a cold but pitying hand, 
And stilled the heart’s wild throb, 
Perchnnce it boro that penitent tear 
To ftie throne of a pardoning God, — 
Perchance that swept from the angel’s book 
The stain of the wasted past, 
And the erring found, with the early loved, 
His Heaven of rest at last. 
Independence, N. Y., Jan., 1857. 
- 4—4 - 
THE NEW VOYAGE. 
“A gallant bark is Eighteen Hundred Fifty- 
Seven ” was the exclamation of thousands, as she 
cast off her moorings at the docks of the Old Year, 
trimmed her canvas and sped forward upon her 
voyage. Her “clearance” is for the whole world, 
and her “ bill of lading” embraces something for 
each and all of the inhabitants thereof. There are 
months, weeks, days, and golden minutes in her 
cargo, and these are to bo put ont at interest or 
squandered as her consignees desire. There is al¬ 
so a “full freight’’—some there are whose hearts 
will be made glad, others will he bowed down with 
grief, in the reception of their allotted portions.— 
Young life ;s there, and there, also, are the sepul¬ 
chral robes—the cerements for the dead. Joys 
and sorrows, smiles and tears, doubts, fears, hopes 
and aspirations high, are entered upon the manifest. 
We are at sea, and though six thousand keels, 
like unto our own, have crossed before us, the deep 
is trackless, and we must take new “reckonings” 
and "soundings.” Charts pointing out the rocks 
and shoals upon which many a valuable cargo has 
been lost are in our possession, and we may shun 
them if there is naught to disturb the polarity of 
our compass. Each must stand his " trick ” at the 
helm, and if the muscle be there (stern rectitude) 
and the man at the lookout (conscience) become 
not drowsy, and the crew—untiring energy, ncver- 
lailing purpose, calm reflection, cool and precise 
calculation,—keep the vessel trim, we will doubt¬ 
less reach the desired Haven. 
ItCR a i. Readers, afloat on the sea of life, we 
would wish that the winds of Prosperity might he 
with you as steady as the “Trades,” could such 
things be—but Nature’s laws forbid; yet, we can 
hope for belter things—a stout ship, a trusty crew, 
a “clean bill of health," and a successful voyage. 
We can have these or their opposites—the work is 
our own, will we perform the requisite labor? 
- 4 <♦ - 
For Moore’s Rural New-Yorker. 
DIFFICULTIES. 
" The wise and active conquer difficulties 
By daring to Attempt thorn.” 
It would require but a moment’s reflection, were 
any incredulous, to satisfy all that in the attainment 
of an enviable eminence, obstacles have proved no 
hindrance, but rather motives to encourage un¬ 
wearied exertion, and awake the mind to greater 
energy and bolder undertakings. 
Does the beacon on science bill lure one to 
attempt its climbing, the rough impediments, 
rugged obstacles detain him not. He pushes on, 
each obstacle surmounted, furnishing tried armor 
to attack the next, and clear the way for those that 
follow. Difficulties are requisite to bring to light 
the hidden might of man’s nature, and establish 
his power to accomplish. The ingenuity, energy 
and perseveranoc with which obstacles are met 
and conquered, by those toiling in the public 
arena, writes men great on the historic page. Bays 
one, self-knowledge is wisdom, and no man can be 
truly acquainted with himself till his will to over¬ 
come and strength to endure are known. Difficul¬ 
ties, obstacles and trials, aro teachers, often harsh 
and severe, in whose schools these lessons are 
taught Endurance, energy and perseverance, are 
important qualifications of character, insuring a 
worthy distinction to their possessors, and nowhere 
so thoroughly learned as in the guidance of these 
instructors. Swollef. 
MEMORIES. 
Thoughts of the dead are always sad, and yet, 
Those we have loved wo never can forget. 
Kind eyes look sweetly through the shadowy gloom. 
And mournful voices whisper from the tomb, 
While, with low tone and mildly pensive eye, 
We speak their names whose doom lias been to die. 
Public Opinion is modesty personified. It never 
speaks first, but waits to behold the success or fail¬ 
ure of its votary. If successful, she loads him 
with honor and applause; if unfortunate, she’ 
clothes him with contempt In fact, she judges 
only of merit by success or failure. 
- 4 > »- 
The difficulty of refuting very silly and weak ar¬ 
guments reminds one of the well known difficult 
feat of catting through a cushion with a sword. 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
THE LEGAL PBOFESSION. 
: There is no pursuit in life in which rare talents 
are more essential than the profession of law. He 
who would he a successful counsellor, must he 
gifted with generous powers—ft strong head, atrue 
heart, a brilliant intellect In the practice at the 
bar there must be displayed tact and talent, wit, 
judgment and learning. To succeed in forensic 
disputations requires 'quickness of thought, ease 
and richness of utterance. To think rapidly, to 
speak fluently, are the first, of attainments. If he 
would move a jury he must have nerve ami spirit. 
He must abound in illustrations—but such as are 
both pointed and pleasant. There is perhaps no 
position in which a speaker maybe placed, that 
requires a greater talent, a greater adapted ness to 
particular cases in speaking, than at the bar.— 
Though he must cultivate the art of speaking, yet 
it should be that of speaking well. The flowers of 
oratory should not be gaudy exotics, out of season 
and destitute of root, but they should grow out of 
the subject and come forth living from the heart 
and head of the speaker. There must also be 
imagination, but faithful and true. "Pathos must, 
kindle the soul by piteous seem s to sympathy ami 
compassion. Every jest must, have the weight of 
an argument, and. every" sally of wit he keen mid 
pointed. Sometimes there must lie sarcasm and 
scorn when one fails to agitato aiul melt. The 
barbs of satire must be bitter tu sting the guilty 
soul, to bare the mean heart, aud to excite shame 
and teiTor. 
In no other profession is there need of so much 
deliberation, deep insight, and shrewd policy.— 
State affairs demands thorough investigation and 
promptness in action. There is no better field for 
displaying wealth of mind than in this. Here is 
demanded genius, and will, and knowledge. The 
store-house of memory may here send out her 
richest veins of lore. The acquirements and prac¬ 
tice of years here find a lit scope and meet with 
due reward. The statesman and the barrister 
need the highest powers of mind. There must lie 
thought, deep and patient.; a logic rigid and se¬ 
vere; feeling fervent and strong; fancy to paint; 
wit to delight; humor to please; eloquence which 
flows strong and deep, resistless as the mountain 
torrent and sportive as the ocean wave. These, 
With a generous heart overflowing with sympathy 
and kindness for the whole brotherhood of man, 
deep emotions of pity filling the soul and sending 
it upward in gratitude to a fatherly God, constitute 
the noblest qualities of the statesman, and make 
the counsellor an honor to the bar. Thus cultiva¬ 
ting aud improving his head and heart, he becomes 
at once the defender of truth and the advocate of 
the rights of man. a. j. e. 
Rochester, Jan., 1857. 
For Moore's Rural New-Yorker. 
I HAVE BEEN DECEIVED. 
Ofttimes, in the toilsome way of life, we are 
deceived, and he who can say in sincerity “I have 
not been deceived,” has been more fortunate than 
most of his fellows. Deception lurks in every 
dark place, seeking an opportunity to immolate its 
appointed victim. We not uufrequently deceive 
ourselves, and such deceptions are poignant in the 
extreme. 
u It Is men who Are deceived—not the devil. 
The first Bnd worst of nil frAuds is to cheat 
Oneself AJ1 sin is easy after that*” 
If you have to say, “I have been deceived,” it is 
far better that you may add. “Not by myself.”— 
Deception is so common that people hardly give it 
a thought. They seem to think it an “institution” 
apposite the times; and are content by simply 
avoiding circumstances without administering a 
suitable rebuke, or endeavoring to establish a 
healthy opinion in the public mind upon the sub 
jeot. Shop keepers cheat tlieir customers by de¬ 
ception; by representing tilings better than they 
really are. All classes of Mechanics and Trades¬ 
men are habitually deceiving tlieir patrons. Binall 
deceptions they may he, among the greater portion 
of them, hut great things grow from small ones, 
and if large deceptions are bad, small ones are 
proportionately so. 
It is impossible to reform all tricksters; but were 
public opinion sufficiently strong against it, we 
should not so frequently hear the exclamation, “ I 
have been deceived 1” a 
Burk River, Wis., 1857. 
The Old Man.— Bow low the head, hoy; do rev¬ 
erence to the old man. Once like you, the vicissi¬ 
tudes of life have silvered the hair, and changed 
the round, merry face to the worn \isage before 
you. Once that heart beat with aspirations co¬ 
equal to any that you have felt; aspirations crushed 
by disappointment, as yours are, perhaps, destined 
to be. Once that form stalked proudly through 
the gay scenes of pleasure, the beau-ideal of grace; 
now the hapd of Time, that withers the flower of 
yesterday, lias warped that figure and destroyed 
the noble carriage. Once at your age, he possessed 
the thousand thoughts that paRs through your 
brain, now wishing to accomplish deeds equal to a 
niche in fame; anon imagining life a dream, that 
the sooner be awoke from the better. But he lived 
the dream very near through. The time to awake 
is very near at band; yet his eye ever kindles at 
old deeds of during, and the hand takes a firmer 
grasp of the staff. Bow low the head, boy, as yon 
would, in your old age, be reverenced. 
The following verse contains a moral which it 
would he well for all of us to inscribe upon onr 
phylacteries: 
There in a thief that walks the world, 
In the quick noon-day and starless dark, 
Protean-like; now ringed and curled, 
Ragged anon, and grim and stArk ; 
And he plies his trade with a ceaseless skill, 
Defiantly, warily, working 1U. 
But I trow the charm 
* Will keep you from harm. 
If scored In your memory ever : 
Who walks iu the street of By-and-by, will stop 
In the house of Never, 
■ - 4 ■ » 
Leigh Hunt says: —“ Those who have lost an in¬ 
fant are never, as it were, without an infant child. 
They are the only persons who, in one sense, retain 
it/ always, and they furnish other persons with the 
same idea. The other children grow up to man¬ 
hood and womanhood, and suffer all the changes 
of mortality. This one alone is rendered an im¬ 
mortal child.” 
THE PRINTING PRESS. 
Without knowledge there can be no sure Pro¬ 
gress. Vice and barbarism are the inseparable 
companions of ignorance. Nor is it too much to 
say, that, except in rare instances, the highest vir¬ 
tue is attained only through intelligence. And this 
is natural; for in order to do right, we must first 
understand what is right. But the people of Greece 
and Rome, even in the brilliant days of Pericles 
and Augustus, wore unable to arrive at this know¬ 
ledge. The sublime teachings of l’lato and Socrates 
—calculated in runny respects to promote the best 
interests of the race—were restrained in their influ¬ 
ence to the small company of listeners, or to the 
few who could obtain a copy of the costly manu¬ 
script in which they were preserved. Thus the 
knowledge and virtue, acquired by individuals, 
failed to be diffused in their own age or secured to 
posterity. 
But now at last, through an agency all unknown 
to antiquity, knowledge of every kind has become 
general and permanent. It can no longer be con¬ 
fined to a select circle. H cannot be crushed by 
tyranny or lost liy neglect. It is immortal, as the 
soul from which it proceeds. This alone renders 
all relapse into barbarism impossible, while it af¬ 
fords an unquestionable distinction between Ancient 
and Modern Times. The Press, watchful with more 
than the hundred eyes of A i gus—strong with more 
than the hundred arms of Briarcus—not only 
guards all the conquests of civilization, but leads 
the way to future triumphs. Through its untiring 
energies, the meditations of the closet, or tliC ut¬ 
terances of the lmman voice, which would die 
away within the precincts of a narrow room, are 
prolonged to the most distant nations and times, 
with winged words circling the globe, We admire 
the genius of Demosthenes, of Sophocles, of Plato, 
and of Phidias; but the printing-press is a higher 
gift to man than the eloquence, the drama, the phi¬ 
losophy, and the art of Greece.— Charles Sumner. 
ACTIVITY. 
Activity is one of the everlasting laws of exist¬ 
ence. There is no religion without work. Lazi¬ 
ness is spiritual death. Who ever acquired any¬ 
thing worth having by lying still and waiting for 
it to come to him? All things are within roach of 
man, if he will only go after them; all things 
mock him who liugers by the way. Who gains 
money but the man who toils with hand or hrain? 
Who finds knowledge save by the striving of the 
understanding? Who knows anything of beauty 
in nature but lie who spurns the morning couch 
and is on the hill-top while his neighbors are asleep; 
can defy the snow and the rain, anil strain up the 
mountain summit and endure the noonday heats? 
And through what watching and lonely wrestling 
with languor ami discouragement the artist leads 
out human loveliness from the rough marble, and 
coaxes beauty upon the canvas! And does not 
every good man go up to his virtue as Jesus went; 
like him resist Batan in the desert, sweat drops of 
blood in Gethsemane, and hear his cross up Cal¬ 
vary. Activity is the law of life. Let us be up 
and doing. Time waits for no man; all things go 
on; go on with all things, or you will fall out of 
your rank in the procession of existence, and never 
find your place again unless through toils that will 
wring your soul with anguish. Listen to the voice 
of the sea, for it Is the voice of God, which ever¬ 
more says, " Work while it is called to-day .”— Christ¬ 
ian Inquirer. 
AMERICAN LIRE. 
American t.iff. is but the agony of a fever. There 
is no repose for us. We push on in frenzied ex¬ 
citement through the crowd, the noise, the hot’ 
glare and dust of the highways, without turning 
for a moment to refresh ourselves in the quiet and 
shade of the by-paths of life. We have but one 
object in our rapid journey, and that is to get the 
Start of onr fellow-travelers. Onr political equality 
offering to all a chance for the prizes of life, and 
thus encouraging every one to try his speed in the 
race, is no doubt a spur to the Characteristic hurry 
of Americans. Our institutions, however, are not 
responsible for the prize we choose to strive for. 
There is no reason that we know of why a republi¬ 
can should have no other aim in life but to get 
richer than bis neighbor; but there are a thousand 
good reasons, if we value health and happiness, 
why we should pursue other and higher objects. 
When the pursuit of wealtli is the great purpose of 
life in so rapidly n progressive state of material 
prosperity ns exists in our commercial communi¬ 
ties, it requires exclusive devotion, and the high 
est strain of (he faculties, to succeed. A fair 
competence, however, is easily reached; and if we 
had learned to care for better things, we would not 
strive- for more. 
- 4-4 - 
The Dying and the Dead.— The following 
lines, written by Charles G. Eastman, of Ver¬ 
mont, are extremely touching and musical. No 
one who ever watched a person passing to rest so 
quietly that you “thought her dying when Bhe 
slept, and sleeping when she died,” can fail to ap¬ 
preciate their beauty and significance: 
Softly I 
She is lying, 
With her lips apart, 
Softly I 
She Is dying, 
Of a broken heart. 
Whisper! 
She is going 
To her final rest. 
Whisper! 
Lite is growing 
Dim within her breast. 
Gently! 
Slio is sleeping; 
She has breathed her hot. 
Gently 1 
Whilo you are weeping, 
She to Heaven has past 1 
-- 4—4 - 
Youth.—I n youth we seem to be climbing a hill 
on whose top eternal sunshine seeems to rest. How 
eagerly we pant to attain the summit! We sigh as 
wo contemplate dreary wastes before us, and look 
back with wistful eye upon the flowery path we have 
passed, but may never retrace. Life is a porten¬ 
tous cloud, fraught with thunder, storm and rain; 
but virtue, like streaming rays of sunshine, will 
clothe it with light as with a garment, and fringe 
its shadowy skirts with gold. 
_. __ _1 i. 
