expedition to Samos, he seized the occasion to describe, with great but pardonable pride, the grandeur of Athens. It was the first year of the Peloponnesian War, and he spoke amid the trophies of the Persian conquest and the creations of the Greek genius. In that immortal oration he depicted in glowing colors the true sources of national greatness, and enumerated the titles by which Athens claimed to be the first city of the world. He spoke of the constitutional guarantees, of democratic principles, of the supremacy of the law, of the freedom of the social march. He spoke of the elegance of private life of the bounteousness of comforts and luxuries-of a system of education—of their encouragement to strangers-of their cultivated tastes-of their love of the beautiful-of their rapid interchange of ideas; but above all, he dwelt upon the courage of her citizens, animated by reflections that her greatness was achieved "by men of daring, full of a sense of honorable shame in all their actions."

Fellow citizens, in most of these respects we may adopt the description; but if in taste, in manners, if in temples. and statues, if in love and appreciation of art, we fall below the genius of Athens, in how many respects is it our fortune to be superior! We have a revealed religion; we have a perfect system of morality; we have a literature, based, it is true, on their models, but extending into realms of which they never dreamed; we have a vast and fertile territory within our own dominion, and science brings the whole world within our reach; we have founded an empire in a wilderness, and poured fabulous treasures into the lap of commerce.

But, amid all these wonders, it is obvious that we stand upon the threshold of new discoveries, and at the entrance to a more imperial dominion. The history of the last three hundred years has been a history of successive advances, each more wonderful than the last.

There is no reason to believe that the procession will be stayed, or the music of its march be hushed; on the contrary, the world is radiant with hope, and all the signs in earth and heaven are full of promise to the race. Happy are we to whom it is given to share and spread these blessings; happier yet if we shall transmit the

great trust committed to our care undimmed and unbroken to succeeding generations.

A PROPHECY.

I have spoken of three hundred years past-dare I imagine three hundred years to come? It is a period very far beyond the life of the individual man; it is a span in the history of a nation, throughout the changing generations of mental life. The men grow old and die, the community remains, the nation survives. As we transmit our institutions, so we shall transmit our blood and our names to future ages and populations. What multitudes shall throng these shores, what cities shall gem the borders of the sea! Here all people and all tongues shall meet. Here shall be a more perfect civilization, a more thorough intellectual development, a firmer faith, a more reverent worship.

Perhaps, as we look back to the struggle of an earlier age, and mark the steps of our ancestors in the career we have traced, so some thoughtful man of letters in ages yet to come, may bring to light the history of this shore or of this day. I am sure, fellow citizens, that whoever shall hereafter read it, will perceive that our pride and joy are dimmed by no stain of selfishness. Our pride is for humanity; our joy is for the world; and amid all the wonders of past achievement and all the splendors of present success, we turn with swelling hearts to gaze into the boundless future, with the earnest conviction that it will develop a universal brotherhood of man.

FREEDOM.

(Extract from American Theater Speech.)

In the presence of God-I say it reverently- freedom is the rule, and slavery the exception. It is a marked, guarded, perfected exception. There it stands! If public opinion must not touch its dusky cheek too roughly, be it so; but we will go no further than the terms of the compact. We are a city set on a hill. Our light cannot be hid. As for me, I dare not, I will not be false

to freedom! Where in youth my feet were planted, there my manhood and my age shall march. I will walk beneath her banner. I will glory in her strength. I have seen her, in history, struck down on a hundred chosen fields of battle. I have seen her friends fly from her; I have seen her foes gather around her; I have seen them bind her to the stake; I have seen them give her ashes to the winds, regathering them that they might scatter them yet more widely. But when they turned to exult, I have seen her again meet them face to face, clad in complete steel, and brandishing in her strong right hand a flaming sword red with insufferable light! And I take courage. The Genius of America will at last lead her sons to freedom.

TO A WAVE.

(The first appearance of this poem was in the Philadelphia Press, November, 1861.)

Dost thou seek a star with thy swelling crest
O wave, that leavest thy mother's breast?
Dost thou leap from the prisoned depths below,
In scorn of their calm and constant flow?

Or art thou seeking some distant land
To die in murmurs upon the strand?

Hast thou tales to tell of the pearl-lit deep,
Where the wave-whelmed mariners rock in sleep?
Canst thou speak of navies that sunk in pride
Ere the roll of their thunder in echo died?
What trophies, what banners are floating free
In the shadowy depths of that silent sea?

It were vain to ask, as thou rollest afar,
Of banner, or mariner, ship or star;
It were vain to seek in thy stormy face
Some tale of the sorrowful past to trace.
Thou art swelling high, thou art flashing free-
How vain are the questions we ask of thee!