plaints of the people; is ever watchful of popular rights and jealous of class encroachments, and the highest in authority know that it is above President or Senate. 8. The free pulpit, sustained not by legally exacted tithes wrung from an unwilling people, but by the free-will offerings of loving supporters, gathers about it the millions, inculcates the highest morality, points to brighter worlds, and when occasion demands will not be silent before political wrongs. Its power, simply as an educating agency, can scarcely be estimated. In this country its freedom gives a competition so vigorous that it must remain in direct popular sympathy. How strong it is, the country saw when its voice was lifted in the old cry, "Rebellion is as the sin of witchcraft." Its words started the slumbering, roused the careless, and called the "sacramental host as well as the "( men of the world to arms." These three grand agencies are not rival but supplementary, each doing an essential work in public culture. 9. Ours, above all others, is the land of homes. Local attachment is essential to patriotism. Give a man a bit of ground and let him build a house, though it be scarce larger than Queen Mab's, and he becomes a permanent part of the country. He has something to live for, vote for, fight for. Here there is no system of vast land-ownerships, with lettings and sub-lettings, but, on the contrary, the abundance and cheapness of land, and the prevalence of wise home exemptions, give a large portion of the population proprietary interests. 10. To all this add the freedom of the elective franchise, which invests the humblest citizen with the functions of sovereignty, and opens to his competition the highest places of trust and profit, and is there not reason for loving such a country? Is there not reason why its home-born sons should swear upon its holy altars that this trust, received from their fathers, shall be transmitted, pure and whole, to their chil dren? Is there not reason why each adopted son should see that the land which gives him sanctuary, refuge, and citizenship shall not be rent in twain? Especially that it shall not be divided in the interest of class-distinctions, of distinction between labor and capital, based upon a difference of birth and ancestry. 11. Above all, we assume the higher doctrine that civil government is divinely appointed, "that the powers that be are ordained of God," and thus make the maintenance of lawfully established government duty. God, the King of nations, summons us to prevent its overthrow, and He declares that in the hour when it is imperiled the magistrate shall not bear the sword in vain, but shall be "the minister of God, a revenger to execute wrath upon him that doeth evil," and that they who rise up against lawful authority and "resist the power resist the ordinance of God, and they that resist shall receive to themselves damnation." Patriotism, then, comes to the baptism of Christian duty, and for the hour when just government and righteous authority are periled, the duty is one of sternness, and the sword of the magistrate is its symbol. CXXV.-PATRIOTISM. WALTER SCOTT. Breathes there the man with soul so dead, This is my own, my native land! Whose heart hath ne'er within him burned, From wandering on a foreign strand! High though his titles, proud his name, To the vile dust, from whence he sprung, CXXVI.-HOUSE-CLEANING IN THE OLDEN TIMES. FRANCIS HOPKINSON. 1. The husband gone, the ceremony begins. The walls are stripped of their furniture-paintings, prints, and looking-glasses lie huddled in heaps about the floors; the curtains are torn from their testers, the beds crammed into windows, chairs, and tables, bedsteads and cradles crowd the yard; and the garden-fence bends beneath the weight of carpets, blankets, cloth cloaks, old coats, petticoats, and ragged breeches. Here may be seen the lumber of the kitchen, forming a dark and confused mass for the foreground of the picture; gridirons and frying-pans, rusty shovels and broken tongs, joint stools, and the fractured remains of rush-bottomed chairs. There a closet has disgorged its bowels-riveted plates and dishes, halves of china bowls, cracked tumblers, broken wine-glasses, phials of forgotten physic, papers of unknown powders, seeds and dried herbs, tops of tea-pots, and stoppers of departed decanters-from the rag-hole in the garret, to the rat-hole in the cellar, no place escapes unrummaged. 2. It would seem as if the day of general doom was come, and the utensils of the house were dragged forth to judgment. In this tempest, the words of King Lear unavoidably present themselves, and might with little alteration be made strictly applicable. 66 Let the great gods That keep this dreadful pother o'er our heads Find out their enemies now. Tremble thou wretch That hast within thee undivulged crimes Unwhipt of justice -Close pent up guilt, Rive your concealing continents, and ask 3. This ceremony completed, and the house thoroughly evacuated, the next operation is to smear the walls and ceilings with brushes, dipped into a solution of lime called WHITE-WASH; to pour buckets of water over every floor, and scratch all the partitions and wainscots with hard brushes, charged with soft soap and stone-cutter's sand. 4. The windows by no means escape the general deluge. A servant scrambles out upon the pent-house, at the risk of her neck, and with a mug in her hand, and a bucket within reach, dashes innumerable gallons of water against the glass panes, to the great annoyance of passengers in the street. 5. I have been told that an action at law was once brought against one of these water-nymphs, by a person who had a new suit of clothes spoiled by this operation; but after long argument it was determined that no damages could be awarded; inasmuch as the defendant was in the exercise of a legal right, and not answerable for the consequences. And so the poor gentleman was doubly nonsuited; for he lost both his suit of clothes and his suit at law. 6. These smearings and scratchings, these washings and dashings, being duly performed, the next ceremonial is to cleanse and replace the distracted furniture. You may have seen a house-raising, or a ship-launch-recollect, if you can, the hurry, bustle, confusion, and noise of such a scene, and you will have some idea of this cleansing match. The misfortune is, that the sole object is to make things clean. It matters not how many useful, ornamental, or valuable articles suffer mutilation or death under the operation. A mahogany chair and a carved frame undergo the same discipline; they are to be made clean at all events; but their preservation is not worthy of attention. 7. For instance: a fine large engraving is laid flat upon the floor; a number of smaller prints are piled upon it, until the super-incumbent weight cracks the lower glass-but this is of no importance. A valuable picture is placed leaning against the sharp corner of a table; others are made to lean against that, till the pressure of the whole forces the corner of the table through the canvas of the first. The frame and glass of a fine print are to be cleaned; the spirit and oil used on this occasion are suffered to leak through and deface the engraving—no matter! If the glass is clean and the frame shines, it is sufficient-the rest is not worthy of consideration. An able arithmetician hath made a calculation, founded on long experience, and proved that the losses and destruction incident to two white-washings are equal to one removal, and three removals equal to one fire. 8. This cleansing frolic over, matters begin to resume their pristine appearance; the storm abates, and all would be well again: but it is impossible that so great a convulsion in so small a community should pass over without producing some consequences. For two or three weeks after the operation, the family are usually afflicted with sore eyes, sore throats, or severe colds, occasioned by exhalations from wet floors and damp walls. 9. I know a gentleman here who is fond of accounting for every thing in a philosophical way. He considers this, that I call a custom, as a real periodical disease, peculiar to the climate. His train of reasoning is whimsical and ingenious, but I am not at leisure to give you the detail. The result |