the college opportunities tendered to him, that he turned his studies in that direction. He was admitted at Dartmouth in 1813, where he pursued the ancient languages and literature with diligence; and where, under the influence of a religious excitement which took place at the college, he became deeply devotional, which led to his entrance at the theological school at Andover. He passed a year there, and became a tutor in 1818 at Dartmouth. After two years profitably spent in this way he returned to Andover, taking a visit to Cambridge by the way, for the sake of a candid view of the studies he was prosecuting. His course at Andover was laborious. Abstemious in diet, and frugal of his physical resources and the claims of society, he devoted all his powers to learning. One of the first fruits of these studies was an article on Ancient and Modern Poetry, published in the North American Review for July, 1822, in which he exhibits the influences of Christianity upon the later literature. German literature had occupied much of his attention, and he prepared a translation of the work of Bellerman on the Geography of the Scriptures, as he afterwards employed himself upon a version of Hedgewisch on the Elements of Chronology. His most important work in this way was his translation of Herder's Spirit of Hebrew Poetry, published in two volumes at Burlington, in 1833.

From Andover he passed for awhile to the South, where he was engaged in the business of tuition in Hampden Sidney College, in Virginia, with Dr. Rice. He sometimes preached, though he had little fondness or aptitude for this "acting in public," as he called it at the time. Turning his thoughts to the North, an editorial connexion was planned with the Christian Spectator, a theological review at New Haven, a position for which he was well qualified, but it was not carried out. In 1824 he was formally appointed to a professorship in Hampden Sidney, and the same year was ordained a minister. His entire connexion with this college lasted but three years, when he was appointed to the presidency of the University of Vermont in 1826, a position which he entered upon and occupied till 1833, when he exchanged its duties for the professorship of Moral and Intellectual Philosophy in the same institution. He held this till his death, July 3, 1842, in the fifty-eighth year of his age.

It is by his college labors and the philosophical publications which they elicited, as well as by his noble personal influence upon his pupils, that Dr. Marsh is best known. He was one of the first to revive attention in the country to the sound Christian philosophy advocated by Coleridge, and illustrated in the writings of the old English divines, as contradistinguished to the school of Locke. In the words of his faithful biographer, Professor Torrey, "the prevailing doctrine of the day was, Understand, and then believe; while that which Mr. Marsh would set forth, not as anything new, but as the old doctrine of the church from the earliest times, was, "Believe, that ye may understand." "Such views," said Marsh, "may not indeed be learned from the superficial philosophy of the Paleian and

* Memoir prefixed to the Remains, p. 91.

Caledonian schools; but the higher and more spiritual philosophy of the great English divines of the seventeenth century abundantly teaches them, both by precept and practice." In accordance with these views he published in 1829 the first American edition of Coleridge's Aids to Reflection, as a book which answered his purpose, for which he wrote an able Preliminary Essay, addressed to "the earnest, single-hearted lovers" of Christian, spiritual, and moral truth. With the same view he edited a volume of Selections from the Old English Writers on Practical Theology, which contained Howe's Blessedness of the Righteous, and Bates's Four Last Things.

His views of college study and discipline were those of a liberal-minded reformer, and were to a considerable extent adopted by the institution over which he presided. He held that the admission to colleges might be extended with advantage to those who could avail themselves only of a partial course; that a paternal discipline, based on moral and social influence, might be employed; that the liberty of the powers of the individual might be preserved under a general system of training; that additional studies might be prosecuted by the enterprising: and that honors should be conferred on those only of real abilities and attainments. These were all liberal objects; and as they were pursued with warmth and candor by Dr. Marsh, they gained him the respect and affection of the best minds among his students, who have now carried his influence into the walks of active life.

In addition to the writings which we have mentioned, Dr. Marsh published in 1829 a series of papers in the Vermont Chronicle, signed "Philopolis," on Popular Education. He wrote also for the Christian Spectator a review of Professor Stuart's Commentary on the Hebrews, in which he did justice to the objects of the author. At the close of his life Dr. Marsh intrusted his manuscripts to Professor Torrey of the University of Vermont, by whom in 1843 a volume of Remains was published with a Memoir. It contains the author's college lectures on psychology, several philosophical essays, and theological discourses. He had projected and partially executed a System of Logic, and meditated a matured treatise on psychology.

In 1833, on the retirement of Dr. Marsh from the presidency, the Rev. John Wheeler, of Windsor, Vermont, was appointed president. A subscription which had been projected for the benefit of the college was now completed, and the sum of thirty thousand dollars obtained, which added largely to the practical efficiency of the institution. Other collections of funds have since been made, which have further secured its prosperity.

During the administration of Dr. Wheeler, Professor Torrey succeeded Dr. Marsh in his chair of moral and intellectual philosophy, the Rev. Calvin Pease was elected professor of the Latin and Greek languages, and the Rev. W. G. T. Shedd professor of English literature. In 1847 Professor George W. Benedict, a most active supporter of the college welfare, resigned his seat as professor of chemistry and natural history, after twenty-two years' services to the institution.

President Wheeler resigned in 1848, and was succeeded by the present incumbent, the Rev. Worthington Smith, D.D., of St. Alban's, Vt.

On the 1st of August, 1854, the semi-centennial anniversary of the University was celebrated at Burlington.

A historical discourse was delivered by the former president, Dr. Wheeler, from which the materials of this narrative have been mostly drawn. An oration, "Our Lesson and our Work, or Spiritual Philosophy and Material Politics," was pronounced by Mr. James R. Spalding; a poem by the Rev. O. G. Wheeler; while the associations of the Institution were recalled in the after dinner festivities, with an honest pride in the favorite philosophy of the University.

In the course of the Historical Address Dr. Wheeler gave the following sketch of the course of study projected by Dr. Marsh and his associates, for the institution.

"The principal divisions or departments of a course of collegiate study are set forth in the laws of the University. They are four: first, the department of English literature; second, the department of languages; third, that of the mathematics and physics; fourth, that of political, moral, and intellectual philosophy. Every year, during my personal connexion with the University, the synopsis was carefully examined, always in reference to its practical execution, and commonly in reference also to its theoretic excellence. How much this means and involves, few can understand, who were not members of the faculty. If this course of study is carefully examined, it will be found to contain, perhaps, what no other course of collegiate study in the United States has so fully attempted. It seeks to give a coherence to the various studies in each department, so that its several parts shall present more or less the unity, not of an aggregation, nor of a juxtaposition, nor of a merely logical arrangement, but of a natural development, and a growth; and therefore the study of it, rightly pursued, would be a growing and enlarging process to the mind of the student. It was intended also, that these departments of study should have a coherence of greater or less practical use with each other. The highest department, that of philosophy, it was intended, should be, now the oscillating nerve, that should connect the various studies together, during the analytical instruction in each; and now the embosoming atmosphere that should surround and interpenetrate the whole and each in its synthetical teachings. In philosophy the course began with crystallographythe lowest form of organization-and discussed the laws of all forms, that is, the geometry of all material existence. It proceeded to the laws of vegetable life, as the next highest; to the laws of animal life, that is to physiology, as the next; thence to psychology, and the connexion of the senses with the intellect;-thence to the science of logic-the laws of the intellect,-in the acquisition and in the communication of knowledge, that is, the laws of universal thought, as seen in language and grammar; and thence to metaphysics, as the highest and last form of speculative reasoning, or of contemplation. Within this pale it considered the spiritual characteristics of humanity, as distinguished from all other exist- |

ences. From this position moral science was seen to issue; the ground of the fine arts was examined and made intelligible; the principles of political science, as grounded in the truths of reason, but realized under the forms of the understanding, was unfolded, and natural and revealed religion was shown to open the path where reason had reached her termination, to glory, honor, and immortality."

CHARLES SPRAGUE

Was born in Boston, October 26, 1791. His father, a native of Hingham, Mass., where the family had lived for five generations, was one of those spirited Whigs of the Revolution who engaged in the adventure of throwing overboard the tea in Boston harbor. His mother, Joanna Thayer of Braintree, is spoken of for her original powers of mind and her influence in the development of her son's talents. The latter was educated at the Franklin school at Boston, where he had for one of his teachers, Lemuel Shaw, now the Chief-justice of Massachusetts. By an accident at this time he lost the use of his left eye. At thirteen, he entered a mercantile house engaged in the importation of dry-goods; and in 1816, at the age of twenty-five, formed a partnership with his employers, Messrs. Thayer and Hunt, which was continued till 1820, when he became a teller in the State Bank. On the establishment of the Globe Bank in 1825, he was chosen its cashier, an office, the duties of which he has discharged with exemplary fidelity to the present day.

Halleck, another poetical cashier by the way, has sighed over this "bank note world" and the visions of the romantic past, now that

Noble name and cultured land,
Palace and park and vassal band,
Are powerless to the notes of hand
Of Rothschild or the Barings.

He plucks the pearls that stud the deep,
Admiring Beauty's lap to fill;
He breaks the stubborn marble's sleep,
And now mocks his Creator's skill.
With thoughts that swell his glowing soul,
He bids the ore illume the page,
And, proudly scorning Time's control,
Commerces with an unborn age.

In fields of air he writes his name,

And treads the chambers of the sky; He reads the stars, and grasps the flame That quivers round the Throne on high. It war renowned, in peace sublime,

He moves in greatness and in grace; His power, subduing space and time, Links realm to realm, and race to race.

THE TRAVELLER-FROM CURIOSITY.

Withdraw yon curtain, look within that room,
Where all is splendor, yet where all is gloom:
Why weeps that mother? why, in pensive mood,
Group noiseless round, that little, lovely brood?
The battledoor is still, laid by each book,
And the harp slumbers in its customed nook.
Who hath done this? what cold, unpitying foe
Hath made this house the dwelling-place of woe?
"Tis he, the husband, father, lost in care,
O'er that sweet fellow in his cradle there:
The gallant bark that rides by yonder strand
Bears him to-morrow from his native land.
Why turns he, half unwilling, from his home,
To tempt the ocean, and the earth to roam?
Wealth he can boast a miser's sigh would hush,
And health is laughing in that ruddy blush;
Friends spring to greet him, and he has no foe-
So honored and so blessed, what bids him go?-
His eye must see, his foot each spot must tread,
Where sleeps the dust of earth's recorded dead;
Where rise the monuments of ancient time,
Pillar and pyramid in age sublime;

The Pagan's temple and the Churchman's tower,
War's bloodiest plain and Wisdom's greenest bower;
All that his wonder woke in school-boy themes,
All that his faney fired in youthful dreams:
Where Socrates once taught he thirsts to stray,
Where Homer poured his everlasting lay;
From Virgil's tomb he longs to pluck one flower,
By Avon's stream to live one moonlight hour;
To pause where England" garners up" her great,
And drop a patriot's tear to Milton's fate;
Fame's living masters, too, he must behold,
Whose deeds shall blazon with the best of old;
Nations compare, their laws and customs scan,
And read, wherever spread, the book of Man;
For these he goes, self-banished from his hearth,
And wrings the hearts of all he loves on earth.
Yet say, shall not new joy those hearts inspire,
When, grouping round the future winter fire,
To hear the wonders of the world they burn,
And lose his absence in his glad return?-
Return?-alas! he shall return no more,
To bless his own sweet home, his own proud shore.
Look once again-cold in his cabin now,
Death's finger-mark is on his pallid brow;
No wife stood by, her patient watch to keep,
To smile on him, then turn away to weep;
Kind woman's place rough mariners supplied,
And shared the wanderer's blessing when he died.
Wrapped in the raiment that it long must wear,
His body to the deck they slowly bear;
Even there the spirit that I sing is true,
The crew look on with sad, but curious view;
The setting sun flings round his farewell rays,

O'er the broad ocean not a ripple plays;
How eloquent, how awful, in its power,
The silent lecture of death's sabbath-hour
One voice that silence breaks-the prayer is said,
And the last rite man pays to man is paid;
The plashing waters mark his resting-place,
And fold him round in one long, cold embrace;
Bright bubbles for a moment sparkle o'er,
Then break, to be, like him, beheld no more;
Down, countless fathoms down, he sinks to sleep,
With all the nameless shapes that haunt the deep.

THE BROTHERS.

We are but two-the others sleep
Through Death's untroubled night;
We are but two-0, let us keep
The link that binds us bright!

Heart leaps to heart-the sacred flood
That warms us is the same;

That good old man-his honest blood
Alike we fondly claim.

We in one mother's arms were locked-
Long be her love repaid;

In the same cradle we were rocked,

Round the same hearth we played.
Our boyish sports were all the same,
Each little joy and woe;-
Let manhood keep alive the flame,
Lit up so long ago.

We are but two-be that the band
To hold us till we die;
Shoulder to shoulder let us stand,
Till side by side we lie.

To you 't is given

To wake sweet Nature's untaught lays;
Beneath the arch of heaven
To chirp away a life of praise.

Then spread each wing,
Far, far above, o'er the lakes and lands,
And join the choirs that sing

In yon blue dome not reared with hands.
Or, if ye stay,

To note the consecrated hour,
Teach me the airy way,
And let me try your envied power.
Above the crowd,

On upward wings could I but fly,
I'd bathe in yon bright cloud,
And seek the stars that gem the sky.

"Twere Heaven indeed Through fields of trackless light to soar, On Nature's charms to feed,

And Nature's own great God adore.

CHARLES JAMES SPRAGUE, a son of the preceding, has also written verses in a delicate vein of sentiment. One of these is entitled

THE EMPTY HOUSE.

"This house to let !"-so long the placard said, I went across to see

If it were dull, or dark, or comfortless,
Or what the cause could be.

The parlor was a pleasant little room;

The chambers snug and light,

The kitchen was quite neat and cheerful too,
Although 'twas almost night.

My mind was somewhat in a thoughtful mood,
So on a broken chair,

I sat me down to moralize awhile

Upon the silence there.

How many changing scenes of life, thought I,
This solitude recalls!

Joy's ringing laugh and sorrow's smothered moan,
Have echoed from these walls!

Here in this parlor, jovial friends have met
On many a winter's night!

Ripe ale has foamed, and this old rusty grate
Sent forth a cheerful light.

Here stood the sofa, whereupon has wooed
Some young and loving pair!

Here hung the clock that timed the last caress,
And kiss upon the stair!

These chambers might relate a varied tale,
Could the dumb walls find breath;
Of healthful slumber, and of wakeful pain-
The birth-cry and the death.

Some crusty bachelor has here, perhaps,
Crept grumbling into bed;

Some phrensied Caudle desperately sought
To hide his aching head.

Some modest girl has here unrobed the charms
Too pure for vulgar view;

Some bride has tasted here the sweets of love,-
And curtain lectures, too.

This little studio has seen the toil

Of some poor poet's brain,

His morn of hope, his disappointed day,
And bitter night of pain.

Or else some well paid preacher has wrought out
His hundredth paraphrase;

Or some old bookworm trimmed his lamp, to read
The tale of other days.

And what are they to whom this was a home?
How wide have they been cast,

Who gathered here around the social board,
And sported in days past?

How many distant memories have turned
To this deserted spot!

Recalling errors and reviving joys

That cannot be forgot!

Young love may here have heaved its dying sigh,
When angry words were spoken ;
Domestic tyranny may here have reigned,
And tender hearts have broken.
Perchance some mother, as she passes by,
May cast a lingering gaze

Upon the scene of many a happier hour,
The home of her young days.

And what are they who next will fill this void
With busy, noisy life?

Will this become a home of happy peace,
Or one of wretched strife?

In sober thought, I left the silent house,
And gladly sought my own;

And when I passed next week, upon the door
I saw the name of-Brown.

LYDIA H. SIGOURNEY.

LYDIA HUNTLEY, the daughter and only child of Ezekiel Huntley and Sophia Wentworth, was born at Norwich, Conn., September 1, 1791. Her father, who bore a part in the war of the Revolution, was a man of worth and benevolence. His wife possessed those well balanced, unobtrusive virtues of character which marked the New England lady of the olden time.

Among the happiest influences attending the childhood of their daughter, was the cultivated society of Madam Lathrop, the widow of Dr. Daniel Lathrop, and the daughter of the Hon. John Talcott, of Hartford, who held for a succession of years the office of Governor of Connecticut. Mr. Huntley, having charge of her estate, resided with his separate family under her roof, and in that fine old mansion their child was born. Her precocity was exhibited in reading fluently at the age of three, and composing simple verses at seven, smooth in rhythm, and of an invariable religious sentiment. As she grew older, she profited by the society of the distinguished visitors who sought the hospitable home; and received in addition every advantage of education which could then be obtained.

When Miss Huntley was fourteen, she had the misfortune to lose her venerable friend, who died at the ripe age of eighty-nine. She continued her studies until her nineteenth year, when she put into execution a plan she had long contemplated, of engaging in the work of instruction. sociating herself with her most intimate friend, Miss Ann Maria Hyde, who sympathized warmly in her scheme, a school was opened for young ladies, and conducted with great success for two years.

As

In 1814 Miss Huntley was induced to commence a select school at Hartford, under the auspices of influential relatives of her early friend, Mrs. Lathrop. Removing to that city, she became an inmate in the mansion of Mrs. Wadsworth, the widow of Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth, a lady of high intellectual and moral worth. It was at the suggestion, and under the auspices of a son of this lady, Daniel Wadsworth, Esq., who had known Miss Huntley from her infancy, that a selection from her writings appeared in 1815. Moral Pieces in Prose and Verse, the title of Miss Huntley's volume, affords a good indication to its contents, almost all of the short poems which it contains having a direct moral purpose in view. The prose essays are introduced by the remark, that they were addressed to "a number of young ladies under her care," and the writer, throughout the volume, seems to have had her vocation of teacher in view. A poem on General St. Clair, "neglected and forgotten by his country, poor and in obscurity, on one of the Alleghany mountains," shows the sympathy with patriotic and national topics which has characterized her entire literary career. The volume was well received, and led to the author's engagement as a contributor to various periodicals.

In the summer of 1819 Miss Huntley became the wife of Mr. Charles Sigourney, a thoroughly