globe, follow him wherever he goes. Their prayers blend with all the winds which swell his sails. Their affections hover over his dreams. Children count the months and the days of a father's absence. The babe learns to love him, and to lisp his name. Not a midnight storm strikes their dwellng, but the wife starts from her sleep, as if she heard, in the wailing of the wind, the sad forebodings of danger and wreck. Not a soft wind blows, but comes to her heart as a gentle messenger from the distant seas. 7. And, after years of absence, they approach their native shores. As the day closes, they can see the summits of the distant highlands, hanging like stationary clouds on the horizon. And long before the night is over, their sleepless eyes catch the light glancing across the rim of the seas, from the light-house at the entrance of the bay. With the morning they are moored in the harbor. 8. The newspapers announce her arrival. But here again, how little of her cargo is of that material kind which can be reckoned in dollars and cents! She is freighted with human hearts, with anxieties, and hopes, and fears. There are many there, who have not dared to ask the pilot of home. The souls of many, which yesterday were full of joy, are now overshadowed with anxiety. They almost hesitate to leave the ship, and pause for some one from the shore to answer those questions of home and of those they love, which they dare not utter. There are many joyful meetings, and some that are full of sorrow. 9. Let us follow one of this crew. He is still a youth. Years ago, of a wild, and reckless, and roving spirit, he left his home. He had fallen into temptations which had been too strong for his feeble virtue. His feet had been familiar with the paths of sin and shame. But, during the present voyage, sickness and reflection have "brought him to himself." Full of remorse for evil courses, and for that parental love which he has slighted, he has said: "I will arise and go my father's house;" they who gave me birth shall no longer to mourn over me as lost. I will smooth the pathway of age to them, and be the support of their feeble steps. 10. He is on his way to where they dwell in the country. As the sun is setting, he can see, from an eminence over which the road passes, their solitary home on a distant hill-side. O scene of beauty, such as, to him, no other land can show! There is the church, here a school-house, and the homes of those whom he knew in childhood. He can see the places, where he used to watch the golden sunset; not, as now, with a heart full of penitence, and fear, and sorrow for wasted years, but in the innocent days of youth. There are the pastures and the woods, where he wandered, full of the dreams and hopes of childhood-fond hopes and dreams that have issued in such sad realities. 11. The scene to others would be but an ordinary one. But, to him, the spirit gives it life. It is covered all over with the golden hues of memory. His heart leaps forward to his home, but his feet linger. May not death have been thére? May not those lips be hushed in the silence of the grave, from which he hoped to hear the words of love and forgiveness? He pauses on the way, and does not approach, till he beholds a light shining through the uncurtained windows of the humble dwelling. And even now his hand is drawn back, which was raised to lift the latch. He would see, if all are there. With a trembling heart, he looks into the window, and there-blessed sight!—he beholds his mother, busy, as was her wont, and his father, only grown more reverend with increasing age, reading that holy book which he had taught his son to revere, but which that son had so forgotten. 12. But there were others; and, lo! one by one they enter,-young sisters, who, when he last saw them, were but children that sat on the knee, but have now grown up almost to womanly years. And now another fear seizes him. How shall they receive him? May not he be forgotten? May they not reject hím? But he will, at least, enter. He raises the latch,—with a heart too full for utterance, he stands, silent and timid, in the door-way. The father raises his head, the mother pauses and turns to look at the guest who enters. It is but a moment, when burst from their lips the fond words of recognition-my son! my son! 13. Blessed words, which have told so fully that nothing remains to be told, the undying strength of parental love! To a traveler who might that night have passed this cottage among the hills, if he had observed it at all, it would have spoken of nothing but daily toil, of decent comfort, of obscure fortunes. Yet, at that very hour, it was filled with thanksgivings, which rose like incense to the heavens, because that "he who was lost, was found; and he that was dead, was alive again." 14. Thus ever under the visible is the invisible. Through dead material forms circulate the currents of spiritual life. Desert rocks, and seas, and shores, are humanized by the presence of man, and become alive with memories and affections. There is a life which appears, and under it, in every heart, is a life which does not appear, which is to the former as the depths of the sea to the waves, and the bubbles, and the spray on its surface. There is not an obscure house among the mountains, where the whole romance of life, from its dawn to its setting, through its brightness and through its gloom, is not lived through. 15. The commonest events of the day are products of the same passions and affections which, in other spheres, decide the fate of kingdoms. Outwardly, the ongoings of ordinary life are like the movements of machinery, lifeless, mechanical, common-place repetitions of the same trifling events. But they are neither lifeless, nor old, nor trifling. The passions and affections make them ever new and original, and the most unimportant acts of the day reach forward in their results into the shadows of eternity. QUESTION.-1. Where are the passages to be found referred to in the 9th and 13th paragraphs? See Luke, chap. xv., 17th, 18th, and 82d verses. EXERCISE IX. 'st, In order to pronounce such words as think'st, could'st, sleep'st, bid's &c., clearly and distinctly, pupils should be frequently exercised on the examples presented on pages 15 and 16. NO CONCEALMENT. L. H. SIGOURNEY. 1. Think'st thou to be concealed, thou little streám, That through the lonely vale dost wend thy way, Loving beneath the darkest arch to glíde Of woven branches, blent with hillocks gráy? The mist doth track thee, and reveal thy course Unto the dawn, and a bright line of green Tinting thy marge, and the white flocks that haste, At summer noon, to taste thy crystal sheen, Make plain thy wanderings to the eye of day. And then, thy smiling answer to the moon, Whose beams so freely on thy bosom sleep, Unfold thy secret, even to night's dull noon- 2. Think'st thou to be concéaled, thou little seed, 3. Think'st thou to be concealed, thou little thought, Thy lineage plain before the noonday sun; How vain thy trust in darkness to repose, 1. 2. 3. EXERCISE X. THE TWO WEAVERS. HANNAH MORE. As at their work two weavers sat, "What with my bairns and sickly wife," "How glorious is the rich man's state! |