McGuffey's Sixth Eclectic Reader

Examples — Sitting 16

In person, Scott was tall, and apparently robust, except a slight lameness with which he was affected from childhood. He was kindly in disposition, hospitable in manner, fond of outdoor pursuits and of animals, especially dogs. He wrote with astonishing rapidity, and always in the early morning. At his death, he left two sons and two daughters. A magnificent monument to his memory has been erected in the city of his birth. The following selection is from "The Lady of the Lake." ###

Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er, Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking; Dream of battlefields no more, Days of danger, nights of waking. In our isle's enchanted hall, Hands unseen thy couch are strewing, Fairy strains of music fall, Every sense in slumber dewing. Soldier, rest! thy warfare o'er, Dream of battlefields no more; Sleep the sleep that knows not breaking, Morn of toil, nor night of waking.

No rude sound shall reach thine ear, Armor's clang, or war steed champing, Trump nor pibroch summon here Mustering clan, or squadron tramping. Yet the lark's shrill fife may come, At the daybreak from the fallow, And the bittern sound his drum, Booming from the sedgy shallow. Ruder sounds shall none be near, Guards nor warders challenge here, Here's no war steed's neigh and champing, Shouting clans or squadrons stamping.

Huntsman, rest! thy chase is done; While our slumb'rous spells assail ye, Dream not, with the rising sun, Bugles here shall sound reveille. Sleep! the deer is in his den; Sleep! thy hounds are by thee lying; Sleep! nor dream in yonder glen, How thy gallant steed lay dying. Huntsman, rest; thy chase is done, Think not of the rising sun, For at dawning to assail ye, Here no bugle sounds reveille.

NOTES.--Pibroch (pro. pe'brok). This is a wild, irregular species of music, peculiar to the Highlands of Scotland. It is performed on a bagpipe, and adapted to excite or assuage passion, and particularly to rouse a martial spirit among troops going to battle.

Reveille (pro. re-val'ya) is an awakening call at daybreak. In the army it is usually sounded on the drum.

XXXV. HENRY V. TO HIS TROOPS. (158)

William Shakespeare. 1564-1616, was born at Stratford-upon-Avon. By many (perhaps most) critics, Shakespeare is regarded as the greatest poet the world has ever produced; one calls him, "The most illustrious of the sons of men." And yet it is a curious fact that less is really known of his life and personal characteristics than is known of almost any other famous name in history. Over one hundred years ago, a writer said, "All that is known with any degree of certainty concerning Shakespeare is--that he was born at Stratford-upon-Avon--married and had children there--went to London, where he commenced acting, and wrote poems and plays--returned to Stratford, made his will, died, and was buried." All the research of the last one hundred years has added but very little to this meager record. He was married, very young, to Anne Hathaway, a woman eight years his senior; was joint proprietor of Blackfriar's Theater in 1589, and seems to have accumulated property, and retired three or four years before his death. He was buried in Stratford Church, where a monument has been erected to his memory; he also has a monument, in "Poet's Corner" of Westminster Abbey. His family soon became extinct. From all we can learn, he seems to have been highly respected and esteemed by his cotemporaries.

His works consist chiefly of plays and sonnets. His writings show an astonishing knowledge of human nature, expressed in language wonderful for its point and beauty. His style is chaste and pure, judged by the standard of his times, although expressions may sometimes be found that would not be considered proper in a modern writer. It has been argued by some that Shakespeare did not write the works imputed to him; but this theory seems to have little to support it. This extract is from King Henry V., Act III, Scene I. ###

Once more unto the breach, dear friends, once more; Or close the wall up with our English dead. In peace there 's nothing so becomes a man As modest stillness and humility: But when the blast of war blows in our ears, Then imitate the action of the tiger; Stiffen the sinews, summon up the blood, Disguise fair nature with hard-favored rage; Then lend the eye a terrible aspect; Let it pry through the portage of the head Like the brass cannon; let the brow o'erwhelm it As fearfully as doth a galled rock O'er hang and jutty his confounded base, Swilled with the wild and wasteful ocean.

Now set the teeth, and stretch the nostril wide, Hold hard the breath, and bend up every spirit To its full height! On, on, you noblest English, Whose blood is fet from fathers of war proof! Fathers, that, like so many Alexanders, Have, in these parts, from morn till even, fought, And sheathed their swords for lack of argument; Be copy now to men of grosser blood, And teach them how to war.

And you, good yeomen, Whose limbs were made in England, show us here The mettle of your pasture; let us swear That you are worth your breeding, which I doubt not; For there is none of you so mean and base, That hath not noble luster in your eyes. I see you stand like greyhounds in the slips, Straining upon the start. The game's afoot; Follow your spirit: and, upon this charge, Cry--"God for Harry, England, and St. George!"

NOTES.--Henry V. (1388-1422) was king of England for nine years. During this reign almost continuous war raged in France, to the throne of which Henry laid claim. The battle of Agincourt took place in his reign.

Fet is the old form of fetched.

Alexanders.--Alexander the Great (356-323 B. G) was king of Macedonia, and the celebrated conqueror of Persia, India, and the greater part of the world as then known.

XXXVI. SPEECH OF PAUL ON MARS HILL. (160)

Then Paul stood in the midst of Mars Hill, and said, Ye men of Athens! I perceive that in all things ye are too superstitious. For as I passed by, and beheld your devotions, I found an altar with this inscription, To THE UNKNOWN GOD. Whom therefore ye ignorantly worship, him declare I unto you. God that made the world and all things therein (seeing that he is Lord of heaven and earth) dwelleth not in temples made with hands; neither is worshiped with men's hands, as though he needed anything, seeing he giveth to all life, and breath, and all things; and hath made of one blood all nations of men for to dwell on all the face of the earth, and hath determined the times before appointed, and the bounds of their habitation; that they should seek the Lord, if haply they might feel after him, and find him, though he be not far from everyone of us: for in him we live, and move, and have our being; as certain also of your own poets have said, For we are also his offspring. Forasmuch then as we are the offspring of God, we ought not to think that the Godhead is like unto gold, or silver, or stone, graven by art and man's device. And the times of this ignorance God winked at; but now commandeth all men everywhere to repent: because he hath appointed a day, in the which he will judge the world in righteousness by that Man whom he hath ordained; whereof he hath given assurance unto all men, in that he hath raised him from the dead. And when they heard of the resurrection of the dead, some mocked: and others said, We will hear thee again of this matter. So Paul departed from among them. Howbeit certain men clave unto him, and believed; among the which was Dionysius the Areopagite, and a woman named Damaris, and others with them.

--Bible.

NOTES.--At the time this oration was delivered (50 A. D.), Athens still held the place she had occupied for centuries, as the center of the enlightened and refined world.

Mars Hill, or the Areopagus, was an eminence in the city made famous as the place where the court, also called Areopagus, held its sittings,

Dionysius, surnamed Areopageita, from being a member of this court, was an eminent Greek scholar, who, after his conversion to Christianity by St. Paul, was installed, by the latter, as the first bishop of Athens, He afterwards suffered martyrdom.

XXXVII. GOD IS EVERYWHERE. (161)

Oh! show me where is He, The high and holy One, To whom thou bend'st the knee, And prayest, "Thy will be done!" I hear thy song of praise, And lo! no form is near: Thine eyes I see thee raise, But where doth God appear? Oh! teach me who is God, and where his glories shine, That I may kneel and pray, and call thy Father mine.

"Gaze on that arch above: The glittering vault admire. Who taught those orbs to move? Who lit their ceaseless fire? Who guides the moon to run In silence through the skies? Who bids that dawning sun In strength and beauty rise? There view immensity! behold! my God is there: The sun, the moon, the stars, his majesty declare.

"See where the mountains rise: Where thundering torrents foam; Where, veiled in towering skies, The eagle makes his home: Where savage nature dwells, My God is present, too: Through all her wildest dells His footsteps I pursue: He reared those giant cliffs, supplies that dashing stream, Provides the daily food which stills the wild bird's scream.

"Look on that world of waves, Where finny nations glide; Within whose deep, dark caves The ocean monsters hide: His power is sovereign there, To raise, to quell the storm; The depths his bounty share, Where sport the scaly swarm: Tempests and calms obey the same almighty voice, Which rules the earth and skies, and bids far worlds rejoice." --Joseph Hutton.

XXXVIII. LAFAYETTE AND ROBERT RAIKES. (163)

Thomas S. Grimke', 1786-1834, an eminent lawyer and scholar, was born in Charleston, South Carolina, graduated at Yale in 1807, and died of cholera near Columbus, Ohio. He descended from a Huguenot family that was exiled from France by the revocation of the edict of Nantes. He gained considerable reputation as a politician, but is best known as an advocate of peace, Sunday Schools, and the Bible. He was a man of deep feeling, earnest purpose, and pure life. Some of his views were very radical and very peculiar. He proposed sweeping reforms in English orthography[1], and disapproved of the classics and of pure mathematics in any scheme of general education. The following is an extract from an address delivered at a Sunday-school celebration. ###

[Transcriber's Footnote 1: Orthography: Spelling using established usage.]

It is but a few years since we beheld the most singular and memorable pageant in the annals of time. It was a pageant more sublime and affecting than the progress of Elizabeth through England after the defeat of the Armada; than the return of Francis I. from a Spanish prison to his own beautiful France; than the daring and rapid march of the conqueror at Austerlitz from Frejus to Paris. It was a pageant, indeed, rivaled only in the elements of the grand and the pathetic, by the journey of our own Washington through the different states. Need I say that I allude to the visit of Lafayette to America?

But Lafayette returned to the land of the dead, rather than of the living. How many who had fought with him in the war of '76, had died in arms, and lay buried in the grave of the soldier or the sailor! How many who had survived the perils of battle, on the land and the ocean, had expired on the deathbed of peace, in the arms of mother, sister, daughter, wife! Those. who survived to celebrate with him the jubilee of 1825, were stricken in years, and hoary-headed; many of them infirm in health; many the victims of poverty, or misfortune, or affliction. And, how venerable that patriotic company; how sublime their gathering through all the land; how joyful their welcome, how affecting their farewell to that beloved stranger!

But the pageant has fled, and the very materials that gave it such depths of interest are rapidly perishing: and a humble, perhaps a nameless grave, shall hold the last soldier of the Revolution. And shall they ever meet again? Shall the patriots and soldiers of '76, the "Immortal Band," as history styles them, meet again in the amaranthine bowers of spotless purity, of perfect bliss, of eternal glory? Shall theirs be the Christian's heaven, the kingdom of the Redeemer? The heathen points to his fabulous Elysium as the paradise of the soldier and the sage. But the Christian bows down with tears and sighs, for he knows that not many of the patriots, and statesmen, and warriors of Christian lands are the disciples of Jesus.

But we turn from Lafayette, the favorite of the old and the new world, to the peaceful benevolence, the unambitious achievements of Robert Raikes. Let us imagine him to have been still alive, and to have visited our land, to celebrate this day with us. No national ships would have been offered to bear him, a nation's guest, in the pride of the star-spangled banner, from the bright shores of the rising, to the brighter shores of the setting sun. No cannon would have hailed him in the stern language of the battlefield, the fortunate champion of Freedom, in Europe and America. No martial music would have welcomed him in notes of rapture, as they rolled along the Atlantic, and echoed through the valley of the Mississippi. No military procession would have heralded his way through crowded streets, thickset with the banner and the plume, the glittering saber and the polished bayonet. No cities would have called forth beauty and fashion, wealth and rank, to honor him in the ballroom and theater. No states would have escorted him from boundary to boundary, nor have sent their chief magistrate to do him homage. No national liberality would have allotted to him a nobleman's domain and princely treasure. No national gratitude would have hailed him in the capitol itself, the nation's guest, because the nation's benefactor; and have consecrated a battle ship, in memory of his wounds and his gallantry.

Not such would have been the reception of Robert Raikes, in the land of the Pilgrims and of Penn, of the Catholic, the Cavalier, and the Huguenot. And who does not rejoice that it would be impossible thus to welcome this primitive Christian, the founder of Sunday schools? His heralds would be the preachers of the Gospel, and the eminent in piety, benevolence, and zeal. His procession would number in its ranks the messengers of the Cross and the disciples of the Savior, Sunday-school teachers and white-robed scholars. The temples of the Most High would be the scenes of his triumph. Homage and gratitude to him, would be anthems of praise and thanksgiving to God.

Parents would honor him as more than a brother; children would reverence him as more than a father. The faltering words of age, the firm and sober voice of manhood, the silvery notes of youth, would bless him as a Christian patron. The wise and the good would acknowledge him everywhere as a national benefactor, as a patriot even to a land of strangers. He would have come a messenger of peace to a land of peace. No images of camps, and sieges, and battles; no agonies of the dying and the wounded; no shouts of victory, or processions of triumph, would mingle with the recollections of the multitude who welcomed him. They would mourn over no common dangers, trials, and calamities; for the road of duty has been to them the path of pleasantness, the way of peace. Their memory of the past would be rich in gratitude to God, and love to man; their enjoyment of the present would be a prelude to heavenly bliss; their prospects of the future, bright and glorious as faith and hope. * * *