3. Going, our early friends. Footsteps grow dim in the morning dew; 1. By energy I mean application, attention, activity, perseverance, and untiring industry in that business or pursuit, whatever it may be, which is undertaken. Nothing great or good can ever be accomplished without labor and toil. Motion is the law of living nature. Inaction is the symbol of death, if it is not death itself. The hugest engines, with strength and capacity sufficient to drive the mightiest ships across the stormy deep, are utterly useless without a moving power. 2. Energy is the steam-power, the motive principle of intel lectual capacity. It is the propelling force; and, as in physics, momentum is resolvable into velocity and quantity of matter, so in metaphysics the extent of human accomplishment may be resolvable into the degree of intellectual endowment and the energy with which it is directed. A small body driven by a great force will produce a result equal to, or even greater than, that of a much larger body moved by a considerably less force. So it is with minds. Hence we often see men of comparatively small capacity, by greater energy alone, leave — and justly leave their superiors in natural gifts far behind them in the race for honors, distinction, and preferment. 3. This is the real vital force, or that principle in human nature which gives power and vim to the efforts of genius, toward whatever objects such efforts may be directed. It is this which imparts that quality which we designate by the very expressive term, "force of character," which meets, defies, and bears down all opposition. This is, perhaps, the most striking characteristic of those great minds and intellects which never fail to impress their names, their views, ideas, and opinions indelibly upon the history of the times in which they live. 4. Men of this class are those pioneers of thought who sometimes, even "in advance of the age," are known and marked in history as originators and discoverers, or those who overturn old orders and systems of things and build up new ones. To this class belong Columbus, Watt, Fulton, Franklin, and Washington. It was to the same class that General Jackson belonged; for he not only had a clear conception of his purpose, but a will and energy to execute it. And it is in the same class, or amongst the first order of men, that Henry Clay will be assigned a place. 5. Mr. Clay's success, and those civic achievements which will render his name as lasting as the history of his country, were the result of nothing so much as that element of character which I have denominated energy. Thrown upon life at an early age, without any means or resources save his natural powers and abilities, and without the advantages of anything above a common-school education, he had nothing to rely on but himself, and nothing upon which to place a hope but his own exertions. But, fired with a high and noble ambition, he resolved, young as he was, and cheerless as were his prospects, to meet and surmount every embarrassment and obstacle by which he was surrounded. 6. His aims and objects were high, and worthy of the greatest efforts; they were not to secure the laurels won on the battle-field, but those wreaths which adorn the brow of the wise, the firm, the sagacious, and far-seeing statesman. The honor and glory of his life was "The applause of listening senates to command, The threats of pain and ruin to despise, To scatter plenty o'er a smiling land, And read his history in a nation's eyes." In his life and character, a most striking example is presented of what energy and indomitable perseverance can do, even when opposed by the most adverse circumstances. Alex. H. Stephens. LESSON XCV. VEGETABLE AND MINERAL GOLD. 1. We have no need to go or send to California for gold, inasmuch as we have gold-diggings on this side of the continent much more productive, and consequently much more |