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humous fame, too, has been laughed at by these worthies, and the hope, which some have indulged in, of an abiding immortality after the body shall decay, has been scouted as childish weakness, and egregious folly. The author of Religion of Nature Delineated has said that, "in reality the man is not known ever the more to posterity, because his name is transmitted to them: he doth not live because his name does. Such a poor business is this boasted immortality! and such is the thing called glory among us! To discerning men this fame is mere air, and what they despise, if not shun.”

But which constitutes the man-his body or his soul? If his soul, then assuredly he does live, though unseen by mortals, and is as fully sensible to man's applause; although, perhaps, not equally greedy of it, as when on earth. The love which men cherish is not the love of the body-the clay in which the man is wrapped-but it is the love of the spiritual part-the love of the man himself: were it otherwise, he would number his friends in proportion to his symmetry of shape, or beauty of countenance; then what a splendid retinue of admirers would throng round that thing that has his two yards of mortality in a handsome shape, but in whose soul there is no more vigour or beauty than in a rotting toad. How that empty fop, with his pretty face and efflorescent whiskers, would be flattered and fawned upon, while he, whose external coating was mean and unattractive to the eye, would be left to pine and waste in solitary misery. A man's powers would be measured by the dress he wore, or the name he was called by; and infants then might be drowned like puppies, should they happen to inherit any physical deformities. A baby-Brougham might be doomed to death, should its nasal organ not harmonize with the line of beauty; and a Shakspere would be strangled in his cradle, if sent amongst us with clubbed feet or crooked legs.

It would be a matter of some difficulty, I think, to prove to us that when man's sojourn upon this earth has been accomplished, when his three score years and ten have been completed, and his soul has passed beyond the bounds of time and sense to another and a nobler existence, that he is unconcerned at what is passing below, that he does not realize a refined delight in the knowledge that his memory is blessed, and that, unlike the whole spiritual kingdom, he cares not for that race of which he himself was a part. Who can believe that the soul is ignorant of what is transpiring among men, and that its powers are contracted and enfeebled by being transplanted to a brighter and a more genial atmosphere? We have learned beyond a doubt that the things of earth are known in heaven; that even the angels, who have never mingled with men as fellows, high though they be in dignity, and perfect in purity, not only know what man is doing here, but take delight in his well-being, for "there is joy in heaven over one sinner that repenteth." The just and true on earth and the glorified in heaven, will eventually dwell together in the mansions prepared for them in the City of the Land of Light; they are already but one family, though separated; they are divided by a boundary which shall soon be passed; they are only

"Parted by a narrow stream-
The narrow stream of DEATH."

The desire of Fame is implanted by Nature in the human breast, and is more or less fully developed in the hearts of all. Next to the love of life it is perhaps the most universal passion. All superior minds have continual longings and pantings after something higher; and it is well that it is so, for-if it were not for these aspirationsthe sensual part of man would drag him down from his intellectual eminence, and sink him to the level of the brute. The thinking man realizes a delightful contentment in those loftier emotions resulting from intellectual activity, which no idle amusement can afford, and when affliction besets him, he feels strengthened against repining and finds comfort in himself. It is the love of Glory which impels man to rise above the mass, to think and to act. He does not, in his natural state, do good solely for the sake of doing good, for his heart is by nature selfish, and all his deeds are actuated by self. We know that this is wrong, but it is so; we may regret it, but we cannot deny the fact. The traveller, we may be sure, does not submit to toil and trouble, to separation from his friends and family and all he holds dear in life, to want, deprivation, hardships and sorrow, for the love of them; no, the desire of immortalizing his name is prompting him to action and continuance, and even should death threaten him, this hope sustains him. Remove from society the love of Renown, and little that is great or good would henceforth be accomplished; destroy Honour-which is not a real thing but an imaginary-and where would you find your Rulers and Legislators, your Warriors and Heroes? Take from Man his hope of immortality, and you make him a mere machine, without one spark of true vitality: but, on the other hand, encourage this passion, and he moves and acts with purpose and effect; no obstacle can stay his progress-he becomes a Columbus or a Wellington! He not only brings into activity all the greater powers of his soul, but he seems possessed of consummate skill in moulding small things, as well as great, to his purpose. Addison has well said, that "The desire of Fame will not suffer endowments to lie useless:" it is indeed one of the mainsprings of action in all civilized communities. There can be on earth no sweeter music than the praises of the just, and all that man has to do is to take care that they are merited.

What is it that cheers the lonely scholar when, overcome by the langour of fatigue, he feels that exhausted nature is likely soon to hold out no longer, and yet still pores over his studies by the dim light of his expiring lamp, but the hope of raising himself amongst his fellows, receiving the applause of the learned, and of carving to himself some enduring monument in the niche of Fame? What is it that sustains the politician when wending his way through his toilsome and vexatious course, meeting, as he must do in every step, with rebuffs and insults, submitting to slavish fatigues, anxieties and fears, but the desire of Fame? And who derives the greatest benefit from his exertions-the man or the nation? Unquestionably the nation: and yet we are told this passion must be repressed!

Why did Cicero leave his seat at Arpinum and his farm near Naples, where he might have spent his days in elegant retirement in the bosom of philosophy, to breast the heavy waves of contention for glory in the city of the mighty Rome? He might have enjoyed the good

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things of life, and have gone down to death in a peaceful old age, but then the name of Cicero would have been forgotten; Roscius would have lost his advocate, Caius Verres his prosecutor,-innocence would have suffered-guilt have escaped-and Rome, on her seven hills, might have perished in the flames of a Catiline! 'We are all of us," he has told us, "influenced by a love of praise, and the best and wisest are most eager to win renown." This was the secret of his success-ambition to excel was the prime originator of all his exertions.

It was the triumph of Callistratus, in his grand oration in the cause of the City of Oropus, that first fired the soul of Demosthenes to a spirit of emulation; had he been careless of the applause of men, and deaf to the music of their praise, Philip of Macedon might have ridden roughshod over the ruins of Athens, and dragged all her heroes in chains.

If the glorious thoughts that slumbered in the bosom of a Columbus had been stifled by a disdain of Glory, if his belief in the existence of another and a mighty World in the western waves had not been encouraged by himself, would he have gone forth to bring back so welcome an intelligence to his race? No! the thoughts of undiscovered lands, of regions of verdure and bloom, and a thousand beauteous and wondrous uncertainties and hopes, became to him a passion; he cradled it in his heart, he nursed it, he cherished it, and lo! what a progeny he reared. The world bade him to crush it, to destroy it. Never! a parent's fonduess was stronger than the sneers of a whole generation; and the faith of this one Great Man was more intense than the unbelief of a universe. Oh! what did not this lone man accomplish? He, who arrived as a beggar at the gates of the convent at Palos, on a mission in rags to the Sovereign of the Court of Castile! Who can calculate the result of this one man's Thought? Its influence has extended from shore to shore-from nation to nation. Earth has felt it; Ocean has known it; the whole World has been moved by it; and its distant vibrations shall continue

"Long as eternal ages roll."

At his bidding innumerable armies have arisen-" the plumed troops and the big war-the neighing steed, and the shrill trump-the spiritstirring drum-the ear-piercing fife;"-and mighty fleets, with their banners waving in the breeze, and manned by the true and the brave. At his call there arose vast cities, with spires and turrets crowned

"The high-raised battlements

And laboured mound, thick wall and moated gate,
And bays, and broad-armed ports, where laughing at
The storm, rich navies ride,'

and States, Principalities, and Republics, have owed their existence and origin to one Columbus. It is a dreadful, a bewildering thought, that such was the awful strength of this one man, that he not only pushed a new era of time into the world's history, but he pushed a New World into time, and this too, unhelped-and alone.

Who knows the limits of man's mental powers-the extremest bounds of his intellectual dominion? For what we know, there may

be none; the extent of his sway and conquests may rest with himself. The Ocean of Mind has never yet been fully fathomed by man; his plummet has sounded only its shores and shallows; no line can reach the deepest deep-no man can tell it. Man never shall discover all its resources, the glitter of all its wondrous wealth, and the great and the mighty things that lie there. Some of its riches have been brought to light, but doubt not that there are buried and sunk far below its surface, things great and glorious, of which we have not yet the most remote conception; mountains of coral which ages have erected, the ruby and the pearl, and the precious stone. To appease his hunger, man has cast in his net and has taken the sprat and the flat-fish, but who knows that there are not mighty Leviathans which have hitherto kept out of his reach and eluded his search, who near not the land, and are only to be found far, far away in the deep profound. Some men have fancied they saw something precious below the waves, have dived for it--but with their eyes shut-grasped at it, and brought up sand, and of this but little, for it disperses as they bear it-they have made much noise and splutter, as if they had brought up a precious jewel; but, alas! it is but mud. Columbus, however, discovered a goodly prize; he took a steady plunge-made a glorious dive, with little fuss about it. Such a man dives with his eyes open.

Now, what induced this poor Genoese to prosecute his wild scheme; to brave the insults of his fellow-beings, and the perils of an unknown sea; to be charged with madness and villany, and what is worse, to become an object of pity? Was it not, think you, the love of Fame, combined with his poetic enthusiasm-for he was a true Poet, as his writings and all his actions show-impelling him. with such force as that nothing short of Omnipotence could check his progress? Since the days of Adam, no mere mortal had been placed in a position of such awful responsibility as he voluntarily took upon himself. He in effect said, that what all the empires of antiquity had failed to accomplish, what the efforts of the whole world, since the dawn of time, had been unable to effect, he-one man-could easily perform. This was a bold saying for one like him--a poor man ;— it is a miracle he was not murdered;-this had not been said with impunity in all places. They let him try! and he did try. O! the feelings of the man's soul on that Friday, the 3rd of August, 1492, as he launched his Santa Maria from the shores of the homes of his fathers: how must he have swelled with his own deep thoughts: few Poets have inspirations like his : his bosom must have well nigh burst. Embarking upon a mysterious undertaking, and actuated by mysterious impulse all the nations predicting and praying for his failure. He might picture to himself the hideous shout of fiendish ridicule with which he should be greeted if he returned unsuccessful, the bitter scorn which the ignorant small would pour upon him, and the anguish which he must endure if the long-cherished hope of his life should wither in the bud. But Columbus had a great soul; nothing daunted or swerved him from his grand design; eighteen long years of hopes deferred, and the insults of office; then the vexations of the voyage; false alarms; the mutinies of his mariners, and the desertion of those who were associated with him in the enterprise, were alike insufficient

to damp his ardour or to repress those big thoughts of ambition which lay buried in his breast.

The Poets in all ages have had the most intense aspirations after Fame, and of all the worshippers at the shrine of the Goddess, they have been the most devoted. As they never can anticipate deriving wealth even from their sublimest conceptions-seeing that a Milton's Paradise Lost was worth but ten pounds of men's money-they have deemed themselves well paid in the praise of man. That, however, for which they pant is not the low adulation of the ignorant and the vulgar-so grateful to little minds-but their's is the pure, highminded longing for the applause of the good, for a renown that shall increase as time progresses; an impulse which none but superior intellects can fully appreciate. This passion, whether it be an excellence or an infirmity, belongs to all great and noble minds; nor can we believe that a feeling which has been given to man universally, and which is most potent in the hearts of the noblest and the best, was intended to be suppressed or destroyed. We find no such sentiment in the Bible; on the contrary, the religion of that Book would teach us to foster its growth and to encourage its activity, when exercised upon objects not unworthy of the virtuous: for, amongst other blessings which it promises to the righteous, not the least important is, that they shall be exalted with honour. and shall be had in everlasting remembrance; and we are told that the Mother of the Saviour of the World was glad and rejoiced because all generations should call her blessed.

It is true that ambition has been unworthily directed. An Alexander or a Napoleon may have been actuated by it to commit deeds at which we shudder; Satan's ambition lost him the joys of heaven; but does it follow that all ambition is a crime? EvE saw the fruit in the garden that it was goodly to behold, and she tasted it and fell: but is man therefore for ever to be deprived of sight? If the man's mind be properly constituted, if his tastes and desires be pure and virtuous, ambition will stir up and put in motion the refined activities of his soul, and will incite him to great and generous actions; but if he be vile and vicious, if he be devoid of all grand and noble emotions— like a stray breeze from heaven, which penetrates the gloomy depths of some foul cavern fails to illume and to purify it, but sets in motion all the foul and pestilent vapours by which it is inhabited, it not only leaves him still impure, but impels him to acts and doings in accordance with his perverted tastes and desires. We should not endeavour to destroy this principle of vitality and to shackle its growth; our aim should be rather to implant in the heart of man the seeds of virtue and of love, and then he will flourish and fructify, and bring forth good fruit.

Although Poets are so eager to obtain from others applause and encouragement, though they devote the best years of their life to the pursuit of Glory, they are but few who reap the reward, and its enjoyment is unsubstantial and evanescent.

"A simple race! they waste their toil

For the vain tribute of a smile."

They have to endure more pain from disappointments, censure and

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