join in one universal chorus, to attest their excellence; and the names of Columbus, the pilgrim fathers, Washington and Jefferson, resound from every hill and valley-be graven on every heart! Here has been established, by their aid and influence, a government founded on more liberal principles than any that ever before existed; a government dependent, not on the desires of the few, but on the will of the majority. How important, then, that that majority should consist of enlightened persons, who could not only know, but appreciate and maintain their rights. The stability of our institutions, it is believed, depends on this. And here let me ask, may not associations of young men like ours, having for their object the diffusion of that knowledge, on which it depends, become one day, one of the most important aids in contributing to that stability?

Time is rolling on, and of what shall future history consist? Shall it, like that of the past, be a history of revolutions effected in blood! Let us hope that a new era has arrived, and that instead of such recitals, it shall consist of records of the overthrow, not of nations, but of false prejudices, both political and moral; - of the progress of intellectual improvement, and the appreciation of mind throughout the world. In

this new era, each individual person has his important part to perform, for individuals compose the mass; and may we hope that, amidst the various influences which are operating together to establish it, by associating ourselves together, the better to promote our "mutual improvement," * our influence, however small, may not be entirely lost; and that, at some future period, as we look back upon the events of our lives, we may rejoice in the reflection, our part was not left undone?

*Motto of the Association.

ADDRESS,

DELIVERED AT THE THIRD ANNIVERSARY CELEBRATION OF

THE METROPOLITAN ASSOCIATION, MARCH 27, 1843.

IN one of the racy "Letters from under a bridge," the writer, after decribing to his friend the manner in which he had been passing an hour, "falls to wondering," to use his words, "whether the hour of which he has given the picture, was a fitting link in a wise man's destiny."

"The day," he continues, " was one to give birth to great resolves, bright, elastic, and genial ; such air and sunshine, I thought, should overtake one in some labor of philanthropy, in some sacrifice for friend or country, or in the glow of some noble composition."

Another cycle is now finished in the history of the Association that meets you here this evening, and it is about entering upon the fourth year of its existence; and at such a time, and on such an occasion, it may not, perhaps, be unmeet, that we also should, in a similiar spirit with the above, "fall to wondering" whether the hours we have spent in the Association have been fitting links in the chain of life.

The history of the Association during the past three years presents little, it may be, that would appear important or interesting to a mere observer; true, there has emanated nothing from the Association, which, thundering loud in its ear, has startled the public, and given, for a while, food to all the thousand tongues of rumor; but there has been a by-life, quiet perhaps, far from uninteresting, or even unimportant, to those concerned in it.

The progress of such societies is not dissimilar to that of individual life. Ardent at first, surrounded by many friends, warm and hopeful as himself, man commences his career with prospects that seem to brighten ever as he contemplates them; his visions are gay, illumined by the sunshine of the imagination. As he moves on with the rapid flight of years, one by one those who started with him he sees dropping away, some to the grave, some to dwell in distant places; as he nears the scene, at the noon of life, the view of which in the distance was SO charming, the exaggerations of the morning mist disappear, and only reality is there; not without beauty, but less beautiful. The loss of friends, and the absence of his former excited imagination; the formation of new friendships, which have but little of the warmth of earlier ones, have

calmed and sobered the feelings, though the energies, mental and moral, are strengthened and matured in this struggle. So with societies many ardent spirits form their first meetings; all is enthusiasm; months or perhaps years roll along, and as they pass, faces that were wont to shed an additional beam of life and happiness at each gathering, are seen no longer; voices that were accustomed to sound in the ear with pleasant words, as they endeavored to promote the objects of their association, by earnest participation in its exercises, are heard no more; the places of those who owned them, become one after another vacant; or, as the weeks flow on, are filled by others, who again, as they become familiar, drop away, some forced by the strong hand of death, others by the ordinary changes of life. Yet, amid these changes, the institutions, as such, become more firmly settled; and though there be missed, in some, the enthusiasm of their first meetings, this is succeeded by the stronger and more enduring energies of greater experience and deeper convictions.

Our Association was formed by those who, to use their own language, "were desirous of extending their knowledge, and of promoting a spirit of inquiry on useful subjects," by means of debates, essays, or in whatever other manner might