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GLORY OF HOLLAND AND IRELAND.

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an eastern and western world, with treasures the most boundless, with armies the best disciplined, trained to war, and habituated to victory, and led by generals whose experience and skill have been the admiration of after times, they rose against their oppressors. Amid the sorest persccution, under trials, the mere recital of which would blanch the cheek, neither the violence of armed despotism, nor the cruelty of bigoted power, could subdue a people determined to be free; deeply impressed with the truths spread abroad at the period of the Reformation, when their souls were emancipated, their bodies could not be enslaved. In defence of that sacred principle which commands every being to worship his God as his conscience dictates, they rose upon their bigoted persecutors to a man. The same elastic principle which effected the national independence of Holland, spread wide its national prosperity-her fleets filled every harbor-her products supplied every market-the extent of her enterprise was circumscribed only by the limits of the globe-her whalers usurped the Arctic regions-her industry drew from the northern deeps treasures as abundant, and far more blessed than her persecutors could extract, under the lash of tyrants and amid the tears of slaves, from the exhaustless caverns of Potosi and Peru. The shores of three quarters of the globe were interspersed with her settlements-her establishments in the East were almost as numerous as the islands in the Indian Archipelago; and at some future period, when the present state of the habitable world shall have passed away, we know the great ones of the earth will pass away, and new states arise under His bidding, at whose command nations and empires rise and fall, flourish and decay. Suppose, when the great ones of the earth have sunk into oblivion, and that some philosopher or historian, or some one dedicated to antiquarian research some thousand years hence, shall find the names of Holland and Ireland affixed to regions distant from the parent country by a semi-circumference of the globe-when he finds in the nomenclature of geography a monument of their language, he will naturally inquire, what a wondrous country must this have been-her population, how numerous-her territory, how extensive-her climate, how favorable-her soil, how fruitful-and if there be any old almanac in those days, and a reference is made to it, how surprised will he be to find this countless people to have been less than two millions of souls, and this extensive territory not much larger than an English

county! Perhaps, too, he may question the fidelity of the poet, who describes the industry of this surprising people as encroaching upon the ocean,. and creating a sphere for its labors by that firm connected bulwark, which

"Spreads its long arms amidst the watery roar,
Scoops out an empire and usurps the shore,
While the pent ocean, rising o'er the pile,
Sees an amphibious world beneath him smile;
The slow canal, the yellow blossom'd vale,
The willow-tufted bank, the gliding sail;
The crowded mart, the cultivated plain-
A new creation rescued from his reign."

LXXVIII.-APPARITIONS.

THOMAS CARLYLE.

ARE we not Spirits, shaped into a body, into an Appearance; and that fade away again into air, and Invisibility? This is no metaphor, it is a simple scientific fact: we start out of Nothingness, take figure, and are Apparitions; round us, as round the veriest spectre, is Eternity; and to Eternity minutes are as years and cons. Come there not tones of love and faith, as from celestial harp-strings, like the Song of beatified Souls? And again, do we not squeak and gibber (in our discordant screech-owlish debatings and recriminations); and glide bodeful, and feeble, and fearful; or uproar, and revel in our mad Dance of the Dead,-till the scent of the morning-air summons us to our still Home; and dreamy Night becomes awake and Day? Where now is Alexander of Macedon; does the steel Host, that yelled in fierce battle shouts at Issus and Arbela, remain behind him; or have they all vanished utterly, even as perturbed Goblins must? Napoleon too, and his Moscow Retreats and Austerlitz Campaigns? Was it all other than the veriest Spectre Hunt; which has now, with its howling tumult that made Night hideous, flitted away? Ghosts! There are well nigh a thousand million walking the earth openly at noontide; some half-hundred have vanished from it, some half-hundred have arisen in it, ere thy watch ticks once.

So has it been from the beginning, and so it will be to the end. Generation after generation takes to itself the Form

THE LANDED INTEREST.

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of a Body; and forth-issuing from Cimmerian Night, on Heaven's mission appears. What Force and Fire is in earth he expends; one grinding in the mill of Industry; one hunter-like climbing the giddy Alpine heights of Science; one madly dashed in pieces on the rocks of Strife, in war with his fellow; and then the Heaven-sent is recalled; his earthly Vesture falls away, and soon even to sense becomes a vanished Shadow. Thus, like some wild-flaming, wild-thundering train of Heaven's Artillery, does this mysterious mankind thunder and flame, in long-drawn, quick-succeeding grandeur, through the unknown Deep. Thus, like a God-created, firebreathing Spirit-host, we emerge from the Inane; haste stormfully across the astonished Earth; then plunge again into the Inane. Earth's mountains are levelled, and her seas filled up, in our passage: can the Earth, which is but dead and a vision, resist Spirits which have reality and are alive? On the hardest adamant some foot-print of us is stamped in; the last rear of the host will read traces of the earliest Van. But whence?-0 Heaven, whither? Sense knows not; Faith knows not; only that it is through Mystery to Mystery, from God and to God.

"We are such stuff

As Dreams are made of, and our little Life
Is rounded with a sleep!"

LXXIX. THE LANDED INTEREST.

D'ISRAELI.

It is a fact, a well-known fact, that the spirit of the landed interest is deeply moved, and whether they have foundation for their feelings or not, I would not recommend any minister to treat them with contempt. I fear the notion is of old standing, that the landed interest may be treated with impunity. It was a proverb of Walpole's, that they could be fleeced with security; and I observe that at no time was the landed interest treated more unjustly than when demagogues were denouncing them as an oligarchical usurpation. But, sir, I think this may be a dangerous game, if you be outraging justice. It is true you may trust to their proverbial loyalty. Trust to their loyalty, but do not abuse it. I dare

say, it may be said of them, as it was said three thousand years ago, that the agricultural class is the least given to sedition. It is true, I doubt not, that the Englishman, in his plains and dales, is in this respect as the Greeks were in their islands and continents. You should also remember that the ancestors of these men were the founders of your liberty-the men who fought and died for justice. You may rely upon it, that the spirit which refused to pay ship-money is not to be trifled with. Their conduct has exhibited no hostile feeling, notwithstanding the political changes that have occurred during late years, and the apparent diminution of their power. They have inscribed a homely sentiment on their banners; but one, if I mistake not, which touches the heart, and convinces the minds of Englishmen-" Live and let live."

Your

You, the leading spirits of the manufacturing interest, have openly declared your opinion, that if there was not an acre of land cultivated in England, the country would not be in a worse condition, and you have joined in open chorus in announcing that England would monopolize the trade of all countries, and become the workshop of the world. systems, then, and those of the agricultural body, are directly contrary. They invite union; they believe that national prosperity is only produced by the welfare of all. You would wish to achieve an isolated splendor; a solitary magnificence; but, believe me, when I say that, if you succeed in your wishes you will be an exception in the history of mankind. It will be a departure from the principles which have hitherto governed society, if you can maintain that prosperity which you desire, without the possession of that permanence and stability which territorial influence can alone insure. I see no reason, though you may for a moment flourish after their destruction, though our ports may be filled with your shipping, though your factories smoke on every plain, though your forges may flame in every city, I see no reason why you should form an exception to that which history has recorded. I see no reason, why you should not fade with the Syrian, and moulder with the Venetian palaces. Rely upon it, you will find in the landed interest the best and the surest foundation upon which to build enduring prosperity; you will find in that interest, a consoler in your troubles, a champion in your dangers, and a counsellor in your adversity.

VINDICATION FROM DISHONOR.

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LXXX.-VINDICATION FROM DISHONOR.

EMMET.

LET no man dare when I am dead to charge me with dishonor; let no man attaint my memory by believing that I could have engaged in any cause but that of my country's liberty and independence; or that I could have become the pliant minion of power in the oppression or the miseries of my countrymen. The proclamation of the provisional government speaks for our views; no inference can be tortured from it to countenance barbarity or debasement at home, or subjection, humiliation, or treachery from abroad; I would not have submitted to a foreign oppressor; in the dignity of freedom I would have fought upon the threshold of my country, and its enemy should enter only by passing over my lifeless corpse. Am I, who lived but for my country, and who have subjected myself to the dangers of the jealous and watchful oppressor, and the bondage of the grave, only to give my countrymen their rights, and my country her independence, and am I to be loaded with calumny, and not suffered to resent or repel it? No, God forbid!

My lords, you are impatient for the sacrifiice-the blood which you seek, is not congealed by the artificial terrors which surround your victim; it circulates warmly and unruffled, through the channels which God created for noble purposes, but which you are bent to destroy, for purposes so grievous, that they cry to heaven. Be yet patient! I have but a few words more to say. I am going to my cold and silent grave: my lamp of life is nearly extinguished: my race is run: the grave opens to receive me, and I sink into its bosom! I have but one request to ask at my departure from this world,— it is the charity of its silence!-Let no man write my epitaph: for as no man who knows my motives dare now vindicate them, let not prejudice or ignorance asperse them. Let them and me rejoice in obscurity and peace, and my tomb remain uninscribed, until other times, and other men, can do justice to my character; when my country takes her place among the nations of the earth, then, and not till then, let my epitaph be written. I have done.

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