whom dwells the heart of courtesy, and the thing turned out into the fashionable world, under the name of lady, by the combined efforts of the jeweler, milliner and mantuamaker. But the time must and will come, when this false standard of refinement will be overthrown. This fabric of error and prejudice must fall. The general spread of intelligence leads to it. Christianity demands it. The increasing prevalence of an extensive course of study for our sex, tends to it. All foreshadow its overthrow-all point, to the time when only the highest qualities of mind and character will give woman position in society. Let it be yours, young ladies, to forward this progress-to accelerate, if possible, the blessed period of intelligence and intellectual eminence, to which the divine clemency encourages us to aspire. Nowhere, more than in this institution, could circumstanees favor this aspiration. Here, if you are not directly invited to pursue to completeness, the extensive course of study marked out for the literary aspirants of the other sex, you will not certainly, if you have resolutely entered upon it, be thrown off the course. I feel a great desire that the young ladies of this institu "I SEE BEAUTIFUL OBJECTS." The Christian Times says: The following beautiful lines were written by a valued correspondent, and were suggested by a scene at the death-bed of her father. He was observed all at once to raise hi hands and clasp them together, while an expression of delight passed over his features. "What do you see, father?" she asked, “ Oh I see beautiful objects,' was the reply: Father! the pearly gates unfold, The angel bands come singing down, And one thy robe of white. Poising above on silvery wing, To its new home above; There, folded to thy Saviour's breast, I would not hold thee longer here, For the Miscellany. tion should distinguish themselves in the TRUE RELATION OF SCIENCE TO competition of mind; and in accepting your invitation, young ladies, to be with you this day, I did it in the hope that I might help to quicken in your minds, the germ of a lofty literary ambition-that I might impress you with the consciousness of your nature's nobility. If I have encouraged any of you to cultivate a taste for the charms of literary excellence, and a love of intellectual pursuits -if I have strengthened in any of your minds the determination never to give up these pursuits,-never to retire dejected and despairing-but to go forward till you have completed the entire course of collegiate study, I shall feel that I have contributed my mite, to give the world at large the proper direction. POETRY. E. P. HOTCHKISS, Most beautiful and significant among the fancies of the ancients was the Memnonian lyrc. All soundless it lay through the shades of night, but when the sun with its genial beams had scattered from its strings the muffling darkness, its melody awoke. One deep and holy anthem it poured forth in welcome to the mighty God, then quickly hushed again, silence brooding over it, broken only as its chords quivered in feeble murmur to the returning echos of its own brief strain. Thus has it been with song. Melodious and immortal indeed, were the numbers that HOLY impressions made in childhood, are hailed the advent of Genius-the lyre since, seldom erased in manhood. has but flung back as they swept across its strings the echoes of that early orison. Much The votaries of the muse disconsolately wander away from her "painted bowers," despairing of favor with this earnest age that has with vandal hand swept in to oblivion the richest materials of their art. In vain do they seek to preserve the old enchantments of myth and fable, and with lusty breath to revive the dying embers of the past. Superstition touched by the Ithuriel spear of Science, has long since taken up her march with her fantastic train to the land of the Forgotten. The busy crowd of earth have left their old accustomed haunts among the cloudpalaces of the Past and are treading the stonestrewn but flower-decked hills of the Present to the undefined plains of the Future. And because they will no longer listen with delight to the absurd tales of their nursery days must Poetry perish? that Poetry has fallen into some disfavor with earnest men who have something else to do than to read fictions and fables when all around them lie realities surpassing them in all that constitutes the mysterious, grand and beautiful. If then the Poet would fulfil his true vocation as the Interpreter of Nature to the soul, let him choose his materials from his own times, let him make free use of the exhaustless elements, Science has thrown around him, let him take from the uses of Philosophy, pure and all-potent Truth and bring it forth suffused with its own divinity; let him give utterance to the great ideas of the Present, from the fullness of an earnest heart and he will never want listeners.-Then will Poesy renew its "mighty youth," flourish in more than pristine greatness as long as the wonders of mind and matter shall interest and delight the race. Nor if in the fullness of time purer and nobler themes shall occupy human thought, will it perish even then; exalted and refined it will elevate and lead on man's expanded hopes, till the IDEAL and the REAL are One. For the Miscellany. DIFFICULTY. BY MRS. C. H. PARLIMAN. A Low, still voice vibrated over the dark bosom of chaos, and forth sprang the Earth to meet her God. The billowy waters rolled back at His command-giant mountains reared aloft their towering forms-dry land Are not the objects that absorb the interest and energies of this the nineteenth century, themes for the noblest song? Did not that very veil, that Science has withdrawn, conceal infinite regious all glowing with wondrous beauty and the highest Poetry? Though nymphs and naiads no longer besport among our graves and fountains, though the caves of earth and ocean no more send forth their troops of Deities, in each rock and river dwell subtle agencies revealed by Science, more potent far than in their most marvel-outspread to view, o'er-carpeted with gorous legends were the Genii and Gods of Antiquity. Spirits infinitely surpassing in attributes their fabled prototypes, hover in the air, ride on the clouds, and when called from the "vasty deep," will come. Needs the Bard the monsters and "Chi-ed the curtains of the east, and led up the meras dire" that rendered thrilling ancient Lays? Around him in the rifted bosom of our own hills lie, colossal in their very decay. creatures-shapes that render tame by contrast the poet's wildest dream. No wonder Vol. 7, No. 3-8. geous green, variegated by tree and flower,silvery stream and sparkling rivulet. The blue armament, bestud with a thousand glittering spheres, bowed down and encircled the paradisal world. Aurora, with rosy fingers, part azure pathway, the fiery coursers of the sun. How beautiful looked the fair young earth, to those two guileless beings, as with parted lip and wonder-beaming eye, they gazed for the first time together upon creation's dawn. ing smiles! But sin wound its serpentine way into this paradise of love, and dashed out the light of innocence, which shed such a holy halo around the brow of Deity's last, noblest handiwork. Henceforth were mankind doomed to toil, to suffer, and to die.Henceforth, Difficulty has ever trode in the van of humanity,thickly strewing their pathway with obstacles to impede their onward, upward, heavenward progress. Centuries have grown old and dropped into their graves, yet, although by the glorious achievements of mind, time and space are virtually annihilated, obstacles which would appal the stoutest hearts, have vanished;still, new difficulties spring up, phantomlike, to startle and discourage us. Our every step seems encircled with difficulties, which, as with fearful glance we strive to penetrate into the future, appear to grow darker and more gloomy, and should we continue to gaze with shrinking heart, mountain will o'ertop mountain, shutting out every sun-ray of happiness from our fleeting existence. But, press we onward, determined to buffet manfully every billow which may surge around us; to beat back the storms and clouds which hang darkling overhead; the giant shadows recede before us, clouds roll heavily back, disclosing their "silvery linings," erewhile hidden from our view. cleaves the dark clouds of sin and sorrow, flinging back to earth the warm sunshine of truth and immortality, which beacon-like, guides thousands into a haven of safetyLook we upon the world's vast arena! Behold those great souls whose genius has reared aloft, and those who yet stand like colossal pillars, supporting their nation's greatness and grandeur; and few indeed, shall we find who have not battled with difficulties, the recital of which would put to shame the petty trials which have kept us chained into indolence and inaction. Nay, those very difficulties but aroused the slumbering fires, which burned dimly around the mind's holy altar, and goaded them on to victory. There is no barrier to stay the on-sweeping march of a noble soul. Not the stinted soul of the miser, which seems rusted into the iron safe, which contains his glittering treasures--not the soul of the spendthrift, who, with guilty haste, scatters on worthless objects, that which his head or hand never earned-nor of brainless beau, or heartless belle-nor yet the soul whose thoughts ne'er rise above the breath, which wafts them to oblivion;-but that soul which throbs high with the noblest pulses of humanity, which, though chained to earth for a time, sends its thoughts soaring into Heaven, to bathe their bright wings in the smiles of Deity; to gather thence those pure gems of heart and feeling, which sparkle upon the brow of his fellow creatures-flowers to bridge the shores of time and eternity. Such a soul, though cruel shafts of fate, of bitter ingratitude or "It will not bow, it will not bear Difficulty is oft-times the stepping-stone to greatness. Read the history of those whose names are echoing in joyful strains to on-coming generations'; note well the countless difficulties which have hedged | pierced, wounded and bleeding beneath the them round, vainly striving to keep them groveling in the shameless ignorance, in which so many insanely rejoice. There is in the human breast a desire for conquest, which bas steeped the earth in blood, dashed high the bitter waves of strife and contention-poisoned and blackened the stream ⚫ social life. But when this desire centres Heaven opens wide its welcome portals, on ourselves, when we determine to con- beyond which outspreads an eternity of inquer every evil, and to cherish every good | tellectual joys; but, between it and them inâuence; THEN it is that the noble mind lies the field of life, one vast battle-ground starts into giant proportions, overleaping between right and wrong, virtue and vice.every barrier upreared to stay its onward He beholds the starry banner of liberty and progress. Then it is that the god-like mind 'justice, struck down by the blood-recking Its crown of living light away." arm of tyranny and despotism, and girded cordially the neglected, degraded children of gnorance and poverty, as the offspring of the wealthy millionaire. Nay, many of those who now occupy with honor the high est stations in our country's greatness and power, and those, from the fiery crucible of whose brain, have leaped forth, to benefit and ennoble mankind, those great inventions and improvements,which stamp with undy He beholds in the distance, the station from whence he may radiate the noble qual-ing glory, their names and nation; were once sunk in the midnight darkness of poverty and ignorance. Yet, some ray of light, from the all-searching sun of truth, fell upon the dormant mind, and roused the giant soul which slumbered there. Henceforth, it was a vain, a futile attempt to bar the pris ities of soul, which will shed a bright and en new energies, and triumphing over all There is no excuse for the vast amount obstacles, they pursued their rugged way unof ignorance, of folly and crime, which, daunted, on and up-and as we view the like a living, breathing pestilence, taints the thorny path they trod, our hearts are im moral atmosphere, bearing upon its polluted bued with gratitude and respect. Would bosom, the ever-quickening germs of death. that others, drunk with the poisoned wine Oh, it is a humiliating, a degrading sight, to of ignorance and folly, might start from meet continually in our daily walks, with their deadly lethargy and follow their noble those whom God made men, formed in his example. Would that the same energy "own image," inbreathed with a spark of which thousands have exhibited in tearing immortality whose enkind'ed blaze might themselves away from their homes, their irradiate with intellectual light, the world-families, and friends-braving the storms to see them groveling, yea, rejoicing in the and tempests of Heaven, the violence of dark, degrading depths of ignorance and savage foes, risking their life, their all, and folly, or perchance of vice and crime!- as it were, tempting fate, enduring a long and Watch them, as year succeeds year, and say, toilsome march beyond the frowning mounif in aught, save speech, they much excel tains, to the dazzling land of gold, had been the instinct which guides and governs the exerted, in years gone by, in treasuring up brute creation! Their souls seem literally health for the body-wealth for the soul. "rusting out," past hope of repolishing, be- Then might they have been respected for the neath the corroding influence of an inexcusa-qualities of heart and mind, and not for the ble, unpardonable. a criminal ignorance. weight of their gold, honored, useful memOutspreading before them lies a land teem-bers of society instead of adventurers, or the ing with golden harvests and luscious fruits, while from every hamlet, village, and city, rise heaven-pointed spires, which tell the passer-by, that before their sacred altars minister those who do, or should teach and We were called into being, not to enjoy practice the holy precepts of truth and or to endure a few fleeting years of happiness virtue, and fill with love divine, the hunger- or of misery, but to perform some part, some ing souls of his fellow beings-and scatter-action worthy of that existence. How are ed far and wide, are proud and noble insti- we to ascertain what good, what great, what utions of wisdom and learning, inviting as glorious deeds lie within our sphere or our most toilsome and laborious of slaves. They may heap up the shining dust, while the lustre of the far more priceless gems, are becoming tarnished, obscured, obliterated. "Droop not, tho' shame, sin, and anguish are round Bravely fling off the cold chain that hath bound thee; Cherish some flower, be it ever so lowly; For the Miscellany, HOME. - BY J. N. L. capacities, until we have gone forth and fair- genial heart, ignorance would flee abashed |