Imagini ale paginilor
PDF
ePub

"Contrast.-When either extremity of one side is elevated, the other is depressed.

"Harmony.-The upper extremity of one side and the lower of the other, are elevated, and inflected, and depressed, and extended together."

I see no good reason why the principle of attitude in the fine arts, is not applicable, as our author contends, alike to gesture in oratory, to sculpture, and to the higher species of painting.

HEAVEN'S ATTRACTIONS.

1. I have been thinking of the attractions of heaven -what there is in heaven to draw souls to it. I thought of the place. Heaven has place. Christ says to his disciples: "I go to prepare a place for you." It is a part of the consolation with which he comforts them, that heaven is a place, and not a mere state. What a place it must be ! Selected out of all the locations of the universe-the cho

sen spot of space. We see, even on earth, places of great beauty, and we can conceive of spots far more delightful than any we see. But what comparison can these bear to heaven, where every thing exceeds whatever eye has seen or imagination conceived?

2. Then I thought of the freedom of the place from the evils of earth. Not only what is in heaven should attract us to it, but what is not there. And what is not there? There is no night there. Who does not want to go where no night is? No night-no natural night-none of its darkness, its damps, its dreariness; and no moral night -no ignorance—no error—no misery—no sin. These all belong to the night; and there is no night in heaven. And why no night there? What shines there so perpetually? It is not any natural luminary. It is a moral radiance that lights up heaven. "The glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof." No need have they of other light. This shines every where and on all. All light is sweet, but no light is like this.

3. And not only no night there, but "no more curse." Christ redeemed them from the curse of the law, being made a curse for them. And, “no more death,” The last

enemy is overcome at last. Each as he enters the place, shouts victoriously; "Oh! death! Oh! grave!" "Neith er sorrow." It is here. Oh! yes it is here-around, within. We hear it, we see it, and at length we feel it. But it is not there. "Nor crying," no expressions of grief. "Neither shall there be any more pain; for the former things have passed away." And what becomes of tears? Are they left to dry up? Nay, God wipes them away. And this is a sure sign they will never return. What shall cause weeping, when he wipes away tears?

4. I have not said that there is no sin in heaven. I have not thought that necessary. If sin was there, night would be there, and the curse, and death, and all the other evils-the train of sin. These are not there. Therefore, sin is not. No; 66 we shall be like him; for we shall see

him as he is."

5. What is there, since these are not? Day is there -and there is the blessings that maketh rich--and there is life, immortality-and since no sorrow, joy-" fulness of joy -joy unspeakable"-and smiles where tears were-and there they rest, not from their labors only, but from cares, and doubts, and fears. And glory is there, an "exceeding and eternal weight."

6. Is that all? Where is he who used to lisp: "Father, mother,"-thy child? Passing out of your hands, passed he not into those of Jesus? Yes; you suffered him. If any other than Jesus had said: "Suffer them to come unto me," you would have said: No. Death does not quench those recently struck sparks of intelligence. Jesus is not going to lose one of those little brilliants. All shall be in his crown.

7. Perhaps thou hast a brother, or a sister there. That should draw you towards heaven. Perhaps a mother-she whose eye wept while it watched over thee, until at length, it grew dim, and closed. Took she not in her cold hand thine, while yet her heart was warm; and said she not, "I am going to Jesus. Follow me there?" Perhaps one nearer, dearer than child, than brother, than mother-the nearest, dearest, is there. Shall I say who? Christian female, thy husband. Christian father, the young mother

of thy babes. He is not-She is not; For God took them. Has heaven no attractions?

8. Heaven is gaining in attractions every day. True, the principal attractions continue the same. But the lesser ones multiply. Some have attractions there now, which they had not but a few months ago. Earth is losing. How fast it has been losing of late! But earth's losses are heaven's gains. They who have left so many dwelling places of earth desolate, have gone to their Father's house in heaven. What if they shall not return to us! We shall go to them. That is better.

9. But the principal attractions I have not yet mention. ed. There is our Father-our heavenly Father, whom we have so often addressed as such in prayer. He that nour. ished and brought us up, and has borne us on- -He that has watched over us with an eye that never sleeps, and provided for us with a hand that never tires; and who can pity too. We have never seen our heavenly Father. But there he reveals himself. There he smiles; and the nations of the saved, walk in the light of his countenance.

10. And there is He, to depart and be with whom, Paul desired, as being "far better" than to live. There is his glorified humanity. If not having seen, we love him, and in him, though now we see him not, yet believing, we rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory, what will be the love and joy, when "we shall see him as he is?" There is He.

11. Heaven has attractions-many and strong-and yet who would think it? How few feel and obey the heavenly attraction! How much more powerfully earth acts upon us! How unwilling we are to leave it even for heaven!— New York Observer.

ELOQUENCE OF SHERDIAN.

1. Public curiosity was

scarcely ever so strongly inter

ested as on the day when Mr. Sherdian was to speak on impeachment of Mr. Hastings.

the Begum charge on the

The avenues leading to the hall were filled with persons of the first distinction, many of them peeresses in full dress, who waited in the open air for upwards of an hour and a half before the gates were opened, when the crowd pressed so eagerly forward, that many persons had nearly perished. No extract can do justice to this speech; the following is a partial specimen of its power.

2. "When we hear the description of the paroxysm, fever, and delirium, into which despair had thrown the natives, when on the banks of the polluted Ganges, panting for death, they tore more widely open the lips of their gaping wounds, to accelerate their dissolution; and while their blood was issuing, presented their ghastly eyes to Heaven, breathing their last and fervent prayer, that the dry earth might not be suffered to drink their blood; but that it might rise up to the throne of God, and rouse the eternal Providence to avenge the wrongs of their country.

3. What motive could have such influence in their bosom? What motive! That which nature, the common parent, plants in the bosom of man; and which, though it may be less active in the Indian than in the Englishman, is still congenial with, and makes part of, his being; that feeling which tells him that man was never made to be the property of man; but that when, through pride and insolence of power, one human creature dares to tyrannize over another, it is a power usurped, and resistance is a duty; that feeling which tells him that all power is delegated for the good, not for the injury of the people, and that when it is converted from the original purpose, the compact is broken, and the right is to be resumed; that principle which tells him, that resistance to power usurped, is not merely a duty which he owes to himself and to his neighbor, but a duty which he owes to his God, in asserting and maintaining the rank which he gave him in the creation! to that common God, who, where he gives the form of man, whatever may be the complexion, gives also the feelings and the rights of man;-that principle, which neither the rudeness of ignorance can stifle, nor the enervation of refinement extinguish !-that principle which makes it base for a man to suffer when he ought to act,

which, tending to preserve to the species the original designations of providence, spurns at the arrogant distinc. tions of man, and vindicates the independent quality of his

race.

4. The majesty of Justice, in the eyes of Mr. Hastings, is a being of terrific horror-a dreadful Idol, placed in the gloom of graves, accessible only to cringing supplication, and which must be approached with offerings, and worshipped by sacrifice. The majesty of Mr. Hastings is a being whose decrees are written with blood, and whose oracles are at once secure and terrible. From such an idol I turn mine eyes with horror-I turn them here to this dig. nified and high tribunal, where the majesty of justice really sits enthroned. Here I perceive the majesty of justice in her proper robes of truth and mercy, chaste and simple, açcessible and patient, awful without severity, inquisitive without meanness. I see her enthroned and sitting in judg. ment on a great and momentous cause, in which the happiness of millions is involved.

5. Pardon me, my lords, if I presume to say, that in the decision of this great cause, you are to be envied as well as venerated. You possess the highest distinction of the hu man character; for when you render your ultimate voice on this cause, illustrating the dignity of the ancestors from whom you spring, justifying the solemn asseveration which you make, vindicating the people of whom you are a part, and manifesting the intelligence of the times in which you live, you will do such an act of mercy and blessing to man, as no men but yourselves are able to grant."

6. On the conclusion of Mr. Sheridan's speech, the whole assembly, members, peers, and strangers, involuntarily joined in a tumult of applause, and adopted a mode of expressing their approbation, new and irregular in that house, by loudly and repeatedly clapping their hands. A motion was immediately made and carried for an adjournment, that the members who were in a state of delirious insensibility from the talismanic influence of such powerful eloquence, might have time to collect their scattered senses for the exercise of a sober judgment. This motion was made by Mr. Pitt, who declared that this speech "surpassed all the eloquence

« ÎnapoiContinuă »