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the plants, it renders fluid the nourishing sap, it penetrates into the deepest recesses of the ground; and, widely as its rays are darted, it becomes the universal origin of animation, ornament, and beauty. If there were no Redeemer, how dead, how barren, how frightful would be the rational world? He alone can refresh it, and give it life and blessedness. He is "the true Light, which lighteth every man that cometh into the world."

6. The sun has a peculiar power to exhilarate the mind and gladden the heart. If, in the morning, it shines with unclouded radiance, all creatures are buoyant in spirits, and rejoice; if, on the contrary, it is overcast only for a few minutes, che reign of sadness becomes equally general; the birds are mute; the sounds of transport cease; dejection usurps even the human breast, terror and gloom every where Occupy the scene. If Christ hides his countenance, ah! what black obscurity envelops all that the soul beholds! All that is around me, is then melancholy; all that is within me, comfortless.

7. Let, therefore, O benignant Savior, the brightness of thy face for ever shine upon me. Show thyself in my heart, and repeat to me that which nothing earthly can bestowthe light of the soul and the peace of the mind. Then the material sun may be extinguished, and the light of the earth darkened; all nature may mourn; the heavens may go down and disappear; thou wilt be my sun, and my light, and my joy, and my heaven. In thy splendor, thou immeasurable one, I shall see light and enjoy it for ever!

1. O THOU that rollest above, round as the shield of my fathers! Whence are thy beams, O Sùn! thy everlasting light? Thou comest forth in thy awful beauty, and the stars hide themselves in the sky: the moon, cold and pale, sinks in the western wave. But thou thyself movest alone: who can be a companion of thy course? The oaks of the mountains fall; the mountains themselves decay with the ocean shrinks and grows again; the moon herself is lost in heaven; but thou art for ever the same, rejoicing in the brightness of thy course.

years;

2. When the world is dark with témpests; when thunders roll and lightnings fly'; thou lookest in thy beauty from the clouds, and laughest at the storm. But to Ossian thou

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lookest in vain; for he beholds thy beams no more; whether thy yellow hair floats on the eastern clouds, or thou tremblest at the gates of the west. But thou art, perhaps, like me, for a season-and, thy years will have an end. shalt sleep in thy clouds, careless of the voice of the morning.

Thou

3. Exult, then, O sun, in the strength of thy youth! Age is dark and unlovely; it is like the glimmering light of the moon, when it shines through broken clouds, and the mists on the hills; the blast of the north is on the plain, the traveler shrinks in the midst of his journey.-OSSIAN.

QUESTIONS.-1. What effects of the sun's light are mentioned in the first verse? 2. What would the world be without its light? 3. Of what is the sun a type? 4. What is said of the growth of things without the sun? 5. What is said of the Redeemer? 6. What influence has the sun in causing joyfulness? 7. What influence has the Savior's presence?-8. To what is the extract from Ossian addressed? 9. What evidence have you that the writer was blind?

Whyalling inflection on fathers, beams, Sun, and light, in the first verse? With what is thou, near the close of the same verse, contrasted? Should the second extract be read with the same modulation of voice as the first?

LESSON LXII.

SPELL AND DEFINE.-1. Repository, a place where things are depošited for safety or preservation. 2. Con'fines, borders. 3. Couched, laid down in secret or in ambush. 4. Apparition, mere appearance. 5. Quick-set, thickly planted. G. Quoit, a kind of iron plate, or a plain flat stone to be pitched or thrown at a fixed object in a play. 7. Handicraft, work performed by the hand. 8. Angler, one who fishes with an angle or book. 9. Floundering, struggling with violence. 10. Phantoin, something that appears; an apparition. 11. Stalked, walked with high and lofty step. 12. Vouchsafed, granted i condescension.

The Spirit-World.--KNICKERBOCKER.

1. It is related by an elegant writer, that there is a tradition among a certain tribe of our Indians, that one of their number once descended in a vision to the great repository of souls, as we call it, the other world; and that upon his return, he gave his friends a distinct account of every thing he saw among those regions of the dead. He stated that after having traveled for a long space under a hollow mountain, he arrived at length on the confines of the world of spirits, but could not enter it by reason of thick forest, made

up of bushes, brambles, and pointed thorns, so perplexed and interwoven with one another, that it was impossible to find a passage through it.

2. While he was looking about for some tract or pathway that might be worn in any part of it, he saw a huge lion couched under the side of it, which kept his eye upon him in the same posture, as when he watches for his prey. The Indian immediately started back, while the lion rose with a spring and leaped towards him. Being wholly destitute of weapons, he stooped down to take up a large stone in his hand; but, to his infinite surprise, grasped nothing, and found the supposed stone to be only the apparition of one.

3. If he was disappointed on this side, he was much pleased on the other, when he found the lion, which had seized his left shoulder, had no power to hurt him, and was only the ghost of that ravenous creature which it appeared to be. He no sooner got rid of his impotent enemy than he marched up to the wood, and, having surveyed it for some time, endeavored to press into one part of it, that was a little thinner than the rest; when again, to his great surprise, he found the bushes made no resistance, but that he walked through briars and brambles with the same ease as through the open air; and, in short, that the whole wood was nothing else but a wood of shades.

4. He immediately concluded that this huge thicket of thorns and brakes was designed as a kind of fence, or quick-set hedge to the ghosts it inclosed; and that probably their soft substances might be torn by these subtil points and prickles, which were too weak to make any impression in flesh and blood. With this thought he resolved to travel through this intricate wood; when, by degrees, he felt a gale of perfumes breathing upon him, that grew stronger and sweeter in proportion as he advanced. He had not proceeded much farther, when he observed the thorns and briars to end, and give place to a thousand beautiful green trees, covered with blossoms of the finest scents and colors, that formed a wilderness of sweets, and were a kind of lining to those ragged scenes, through which he had before passed.

5. He had no sooner got out of the wood, but he was entertained with such a landscape of flowery plains, green meadows, running streams, sunny hille, and shady vales, as were not to be represented by his own expressions, nor, as he said, by the conceptions of others. This happy region was

peopled with innumerable swarms of spirits, who applied themselves to exercises and diversions, according as their fancies led them. Some of them were pitching the figure of a quoit; others were tossing the shadow of a ball; others were breaking the apparition of a horse; and multitudes employing themselves upon ingenious handicrafts with the souls of departed utensils.

6. As he traveled through this delightful scene, he was very often tempted to pluck the flowers that rose every where about him in the greatest variety and profusion, hav ing never seen several of them in his own country; but he quickly found that, though they were objects of sight, they were not liable to his touch. He at length came to the side of a great river, and being a good fisherman himself, stood upon the banks of it some time to look upon an angler that had a great many shapes of fishes, which lay floundering up and down by him.

7. The tradition goes on to say, that the Indian had not long stood by the fisherman when he saw, on the opposite side of the river, the shadow of his beloved wife, who had gone before him into the other world. Her arms were stretched out toward him; floods of tears ran down her eyes; her looks, her hands, her voice, called him over to her; and, at the same time, seemed to tell him that the river was impassable. Who can describe the passion, made up of joy, sorrow, love, desire, astonishment, that rose in the Indian upon the sight of his dear departed? He could express it by nothing but his tears, which ran like a river down his cheeks as he looked upon her. He had not stood in this posture long, when he plunged into the stream which lay before him; and finding it to be nothing but the phantom of a river, stalked on the bottom of it till he arose on the other side!

8. At his approach, the loved spirit flew into his arms while he himself longed to be disencumbered of that body which kept him from the continued enjoyment of her society. After many questions and endearments, she conducted him, to a bower, which day by day she had embellished with her own hands from these blooming regions, expressly for his reception. As he stood astonished at the unspeakable beauty of the habitation, she brought two of her children to him who had died some years before, and who resided with her in the same delightful dwelling imploring him to train up

those others which were still with him, in such a manner, that they might hereafter all of them meet together in that happy place.

9. Bereaved mourner! treasure this record in thy heart of hearts. To the untutored mind, even of this poor Indian, was vouchsafed, in a vision of the night, a glimpse of that Spirit-Land to which we all are tending. There we shall meet the loved and lost:

"The dear departed, gone before

To that unknown and silent shore,
Sure we shall meet as heretofore,
Some summer morning."

1. Lo, the poor Indian whose untutor'd mind
Sees God in clouds, or hears him in the wind;
His soul proud science never taught to stray
Far as the Solar Walk or Milky Way,
Yet simple nature to his hope has given,
Behind the cloud-topt hill, a humbler Heaven;
Some safer world in depth of wood embrac'd,
Some happier island in the watery waste,
Where slaves once more their native land behold,
No fiends torment, no Christians thirst for gold.

2. To bè, contents his natural desire;

He asks no angel's wing, no seraph's fire;
But thinks, admitted to that equal sky',

His faithful dog shall bear himn còmpany.-POPE.

QUESTIONS.-1. What tradition does the writer mention as existing among a certain tribe of our Indians? 2. On entering the SpiritWorld what apparent difficulties did the Indian say he encountered? 3 For what purpose did he imagine this thicket designed? 4. What did he say of the landscape after passing the thicket? 5. With what was it peopled, and how were they employed? 6. What did he observe as he came to a river? 7. Whom did he see on the opposite side? 8. Relate what then took place. 9. What does the writer say to the bereaved mourner? 10. Can you assign any reason why the Indian should speak of a hollow mountain-a lion-thickets-beautiful landscapessports-rivers-and his wife and children in his vision?

Why the inflections as marked in the last verse of the poetry? (Rule VI. Note I.) Which consonant sounds occasion the greatest difficulty in giving a distinct articulation? (Les. II. Rem. 2.) Wherein consists the difficulty of distinctly articulating such words as ghosts, points. finest, scents, &c.? What inflection on mourner, ninth verse? What poetical pauses does the second part contain?

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