Ex. CCXXVI-THE DISHONEST POLITICIAN.

H. W. BEECHER.

IF there be a man on earth whose character should be framed of the most sterling honesty, and whose conduct should conform to the most scrupulous morality, it is the man who administers public affairs. The most romantic notions of integrity are here not extravagant. As, under our institutions, public men will be, upon the whole, fair exponents of the character of their constituents, the plainest way to secure honest public men is to inspire those who make them with a right understanding of what political character ought to be.

The lowest of politicians is that man who seeks to gratify an invariable selfishness by pretending to seek the public good. For a profitable popularity, he accommodates himself to all opinions, to all dispositions, to every side, and to each prejudice. He is a mirror, with no face of its own, but a smooth surface from which each man of ten thousand may see himself reflected. He glides from man to man, coinciding with their views, pretending their feelings, simulating their tastes; with this one, he hates a man; with that one, he loves the same man; he favors a law, and he dislikes it; he he is on both sides at once, and approves, and seemingly wishes that he could be on one side more than both sides.

opposes;

He has associated his ambition, his interests, and his affec

tions, with a party. He prefers, doubtless, that his side should be victorious by the best means, and under the championship of good men; but rather than lose the victory, he will consent to any means, and follow any man. Thus, with a general desire to be upright, the exigency of his party constantly pushes him to dishonorable deeds. He gradually adopts two characters, a personal and a political character. All the requisitions of his conscience he obeys in his private character; all the requisitions of his party he obeys in his political conduct. In one character he is a man of principle; in the other, a man of mere expedients. As a man, he means to be veracious, honest, moral; as a politician, he is deceitful, cunning, unscrupulous,-any thing for party. As a man, he abhors the slimy demagogue; as a politician, he employs him as a scavenger. As a man, he shrinks from the flagitiousness of slander; as a politician, he permits it, smiles upon it in others, rejoices in the success gained by it. As a

man, he respects no one who is rotten in heart; as a politician, no man through whom victory may be gained can be too bad.

For his religion he will give up all his secular interests; but for his politics he gives up even his religion. He adores virtue, and rewards vice. Whilst bolstering up unrighteous measures, and more unrighteous men, he prays for the advancement of religion, and justice, and honor! I would to God that his prayer might be answered upon his own political head; for never was there a place where such blessings were more needed! What a heart has that man, who can stand in the very middle of the Bible, with its transcendant truths raising their glowing fronts on every side of him, and feel no inspiration but that of immorality and meanness! Do not tell me of any excuses! It is a shame to attempt an excuse! If there were no religion; if that vast sphere, out of which glow all the supereminent truths of the Bible was a mere emptiness and void; yet, methinks, the very idea of Fatherland, the exceeding preciousness of the laws and liberties of a great people, would enkindle such a high and noble enthusiasm, that all baser feelings would be consumed! But if the love of country, a sense of character, a manly regard for integrity, the example of our most illustrious men, the warnings of religion and all its solicitations, and the prospect of the future, can not inspire a man to any thing higher than a sneaking, truckling, dodging scramble for fraudulent fame and dishonest bread, it is because such a creature has never felt one sensation of manly virtue ;-it is because his heart is a howling wilderness, inhospitable to innocence.

Ex. CCXXVII.—A DROP OF GIN.

GIN! Gin! a drop of Gin!

What magnified monsters circle therein !
Ragged, and stained with filth and mud,
Some plague-spotted, and some with blood!
Shapes of misery, shame, and sin!
Figures that make us loathe and tremble,
Creatures scarce human, that more resemble
Broods of diabolical kin,

Ghoul and vampyre, demon and Gin!

ANON.

Youngs

Gin! Gin! a drop of Gin!

The dram of Satan! the liquor of Sin!—
Distilled from the fell

Alembics of hell,

By Guilt, and Death, his own brother and twin!
That man might fall

Still lower than all

The meanest creatures with scale and fin.

But, hold; we are neither Barebones nor Prynne,
Who lashed with such rage

The sins of the age;

Then, instead of making too much of a din,

Let Anger be mute,

And sweet Mercy dilute,

With a drop of Pity, the drop of Gin!

That's steeped in poverty up to the chin ;-
But snub, neglect, cold shoulder, and cut
The ragged pauper, misfortune's butt,-
Hardly acknowledged by kith and kin,
Because, poor rat!

He has no cravat,

A seedy coat, and a hole in that !—

No sole to his shoe, and no brim to his hat;
Nor a change of linen,-except his skin;
No gloves,-no vest,

Either second or best;

And, what is worse than all the rest,

No light heart, though his trousers are thin,—
While time elopes

With all golden hopes,

And even with those of pewter and tin,—
The brightest dreams,

And the best of schemes,

All knocked down, like a wicket by Mynn.-
Each castle in air

Seized by giant Despair,

No prospect in life worth a minikin pin,—
No credit,-no cash,

No cold mutton to hash,

No bread,-not even potatoes to mash; No coal in the cellar, no wine in the binn,Smashed, broken to bits,

With judgments and writs;

Bonds, bills, and cognovits distracting the wits,
In the webs that the spiders of Chancery spin,-
Till weary of life, its worry and strife;

Black visions are rife of a razor, a knife;
Of poison, a rope,-"louping over a linn."

Gin! Gin! a drop of Gin!

Oh! then its tremendous temptations begin,
To take, alas!

To the fatal glass;—

And happy the wretch that does not win
To change the black hue

Of his ruin to "blue,"

While angels sorrow, and demons grin,-
And lose the rheumatic

Chill of his attic

By plunging into the palace of Gin!

Ex. CCXXVIII.-GUSTAVUS VASA TO THE SWEDES.

Are ye not marked, ye men of Dalecarlia,
Are ye not marked by all the circling world
As the last stake? What but liberty,

BROOKE.

ye

Through the famed course of thirteen hundred years,
Aloof hath held invasion from your hills,
And sanctified their name? And will ye, will
Shrink from the hopes of the expecting world,
Bid your high honors stoop to foreign insult,
And in one hour give up to infamy

The harvest of a thousand years of glory?
Die all first!

Yes, die by piecemeal!

Leave not a limb o'er which a Dane may triumph!

Now from my soul I joy, I joy, my friends,

To see ye feared; to see that even your foes
Do justice to your valor!-There they are,
The powers of kingdoms, summed in yonder host,
Yet keep aloof, yet trembling to assail ye,
And oh when I look around, and see you here,
Of number short, but prevalent in virtue,

My heart swells high, and burns for the encounter.
True courage but from opposition grows;
And what are fifty, what a thousand slaves,
Matched to the virtue of a single arm
That strikes for liberty? that strikes to save
His fields from fire, his infants from the sword,
And his large honors from eternal infamy?

What doubt we then? Shall we, shall we stand here!
Let us on!

Firm are our hearts, and nervous are our arms,
With us truth, justice, fame, and freedom close,
Each, singly, equal to a host of foes.

Ex. CCXXIX.-THE SCHOLAR'S MISSION.

GEORGE PUTNAM.

THE wants of our time and country, the constitution of our modern society, our whole position,-personal and relative,— forbid a life of mere scholarship or literary pursuits, to the great majority of those who go out from our colleges. However it may have been in other times, and other lands, here and now, but few of our educated men are privileged

"From the loop-holes of retreat

To look upon the world, to hear the sound
Of the great Babel, and not feel its stir."

Full

Society has work for us, and we must forth to do it. early and hastily we must gird on the manly gown, gather up the loose leaves and scanty fragments of our youthful lore, and go out among men, to act with them and for them. It is a practical age; and our wisdom, such as it is, "must strive and cry, and utter her voice in the streets, standing in the places of the paths, crying in the chief place of concourse, at the entry of the city, and the coming in at the doors."

This state of things, though not suited to the tastes and qualities of all, is not, on the whole, to be regretted by edu