lative rest. All matter, then, is in constant motionindeed, can only exist in motion; it forming with heat. and some others, a class of qualities as inseparable from material being as extension or solidity. I suggest these qualities would be more properly considered as elements. It may be objected that attraction is a spirit acting upon. matter, and not one of its attributes; but this cannot be admitted, since of matter we can pretend to know nothing about its substratum. We are only acquainted with its qualities, and we necessarily attribute to it what we invariably find in it. Attraction falls in the category of these inseparables. One word on the other part of the proposition. All that we know of mind is deduced from its operations, by attentively observing which we find that it never moves except when acted upon by something external to itself, whether through the senses alone, as Locke and Condillac would persuade us, or by means also of some other and more spiritual mean of communication, as seems highly reasonable to suppose, it matters not. The fact is so plainly evident from the slightest view of any man's mental operations, that it is rather surprising that it has not been more commonly observed, and affords another most convincing proof that mind is so disposed to inertia that it is almost universally considered preferable to adopt the notions of others, however erroneous and however easily discovered to be so, than to take the delightful trouble of thinking for ourselves. This is man's intellectual nature, and accordingly we find men everywhere and through all time the willing dupes of sophistry, and slaves to other men's opinions. Fearing to rebel against the tyrannical dominion of old maternal whims, which have been carefully instilled into the infant mind as of hallowed authori ty, they have chosen rather to submit reason, imagination, faith and every other faculty of the understanding, together with every moral sense and social sentiment, to the unexamined chain of established prejudice, frequently as corroding as it is gilded by the assiduous hand of a deadening education, and as fragile to a struggling soul, rebellious with its love of freedom, as it ought to be galling, rather than make the painful effort to arouse the slumbering intellect to generous action in the holy cause of right, liberty and truth. Such has been so commonly the patient. endurance of mankind, that when, as in the case before us, some daring genius has arisen in his conscious might to burst the cursed bonds of what is popularly and of course improperly termed education, to breathe the pure atmos phere of untrammeled thought, to luxuriate in the fresh fountain of nature's uncompounded affections, it speaks to others in an unaccustomed voice, with an accent of imperative power, and exhilarating sweetness: "If thou wouldst be wise, free, and happy, learn the grand secret of firm self-reliance: trust none other than thine own arm confide only in thy own heart: else shalt thou find too late, in some trying hour, that thou hast leaned for thy support upon a piercing reed or hung upon a rope of sand." It was self-confidence that inspired Bacon to question the value of Aristotle's logic after its almost undisturbed reign of centuries; to institute a novum organum, and by thus effecting a complete revolution in philosophy, to enrol his name in the temple of immortality, as the brightest' though the 'meanest of mankind.' It was an unshaken reliance on the resources of his own mind, that sustained Washington when the storm was loud and the night dark,' and other weaker men were tempted to despair. Did his heart sink? "Perhaps," beautifully re : marks an anonymous reviewer, "perhaps it did, like a tempest-beaten ship, sink till it rested on the rocks of eter nal justice and his own good sword, and it could fail no further." It was undeviating action on the same high principle, that raised the hero of an hundred generations from his humble Corsican habitation to the palace of Europe, and taught the world to wonder equally at the sudden transitions in his condition, the almost incomprehensible magnitude and perfectly miraculous success of his resolutions. He who would emulate great examples, who burns to be an actor of noble deeds, an originator of undying thoughts, a writer of living words, whose glow shall be unquenched by the chill, dimming breath of time, must trust himself and be so far uninfluenced by others as not to fear the frown of bigoted sensoriousness, the scorn of insolent ignorance, or the ridicule of senseless prejudice. This is the lesson in which we are instructed by Diogenes. Across the still, deep chasm of the tomb, and the oblivious abyss of more than two thousand years, a stirring voice, borne on the air that spirits breathe, comes booming on the spirit's ear, bidding us by his life of brave, God-like independence, by his example of dauntless, deathless perseverance, "be just and fear not.” Son of America, descendant of those noble bloods who, when liberty had been almost driven from earth, gave trembling kings a new proof, "That man has yet a soul and dares be free;" would you be a worthy son of honored sires? a useful member of community-not a dead, sinking weight on society and would you leave, departing, some memorable. impress on the scroll that tells to after-times of human actions, thoughts and feelings? Remember and improve by this sublime lesson. When you are called upon to desist from some high undertaking, because it happens to be in advance of public sentiment, remember then, "To suffer woes that hope thinks infinite, To forgive wrongs darker than death or night, To love and bear, to hope till hope creates This, like the Titan's glory, is to be 6 |