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LESSON CXLI.-LOCAL ASSOCIATIONS.-HARRISON GRAY OTIS.

Among all the objects of mental association, ancient buildings and ruins affect us with the deepest and most vivid emotions. They were the works of beings like ourselves. While a mist, impervious to mortal view, 5 hangs over the future, all our fond imaginings of the things, which "eye hath not seen nor ear heard," in the eternity to come, are inevitably associated with the men, the events and things, which have gone to join the eternity that is past.

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When imagination has in vain essayed to rise beyond the stars, which "proclaim the story of their birth," inquisitive to know the occupations and condition of the sages and heroes, whom we hope to join in a higher empyrean, she drops her weary wing, and is compelled to alight 15 among the fragments of "gorgeous palaces and cloudcapped towers," which cover their human ruins, and, by aid of these localities, to ruminate upon their virtues, and their faults, on their deeds in the cabinet, and in the field, and upon the revolutions of the successive ages in which 20 they lived. To this propensity may be traced the sublimated feelings of the man, who, familiar with the stories of Sesostris, the Pharaohs, and the Ptolemies, surveys the pyramids, not merely as stupendous fabrics of mechanical skill, but as monuments of the pride and ambitious folly 25 of kings, and of the debasement and oppression of the wretched myriads, by whose labors they were raised to the skies. To this must be referred the awe and contrition, which solemnize and melt the heart of the Christian, who looks into the holy sepulchre, and believes he sees 30 the place where the Lord was laid.

From this originate the musings of the scholar, who, amid the ruins of the Parthenon and the Acropolis, transports his imagination to the age of Pericles and Phidias ;

the reflections of all, not dead to sentiment, who 35 descend to the subterranean habitations of Pompeii,handle the utensils that once ministered to the wants, and the ornaments subservient to the luxury, of a polished city, behold the rut of wheels upon the pavement hidden for ages from human sight,-and realize the awful hour, 40 when the hum of industry, and the song of joy, the wailing of the infant, and the garrulity of age, were suddenly

and forever silenced by the fiery deluge, which buried the city, until accident and industry, after the lapse of nearly eighteen centuries, revealed its ruins to the curiosity and cupidity of the passing age.

LESSON CXLII.—THE REPRESENTATIVE.—Anonymous. [Mr. Sittingbourn, the representative, is seated at breakfast.] Enter Mist.

Mist. Sir, I ought to apologize for breaking in upon you, at what I dare say you consider an early hour of the morning; but I could not help it. I was prompted to it,moved to it, as I may say, by reading your speech of 5 Tuesday night. Why, sir, you are going to vote for the appropriation of the funds of the Protestant Church, for the education of Roman Catholics!

Sittingbourn. Yes, yes; I think, and, what is more important, perhaps, those with whom I act, think that 10 course advisable, and I—

Mist. "Advisable!" Sir, it is destructive ;-it is the beginning of all evil,-the very germ of ruin!

Sitt. Sir, I am pledged to my party.

Mist. I know nothing of party, sir,-I am no party 15 man; but you will be pleased to regulate your conduct by the feelings and instructions of your constituents; and I, for one, protest against the admission of a principle likely to overrun the country with Papists, and bring us to as bad a state as that to which our wretched ancestors 20 were reduced in the days of bloody Mary, or the more recent misrule of Charles the First. [Enter Cross.]

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Sitt. Well, Mr. Cross, what are your commands? We are all in the same boat; you may speak before your friend, Mr. Mist.

Cross. Well, sir, I am sure if you have no objection, I can have none; but I have come up upon an unpleasant business, in regard to your speech of Tuesday.

Mist. Ah! there it is.

Cross. I dare say we two sha'n't agree as to particu30 lars; but for my part, Mr. Sittingbourn, if you support that appropriation clause in the Irish Tithe Bill, I have done with you.

Sitt. How so? Why, Mr. Cross, you are, I believe, a Romanist. You, surely, can have none of the fears and 35 apprehensions which my friend, Mr. Mist, entertains as

to the overweening influence of your religion, in this Protestant country.

Cross. Fear, sir! no,-there is no great fear of that, while we have such men in Parliament as yourself. Why, 5 Sir, let me ask you, why should you so readily accede to a proposition for benefiting Catholics in Ireland, and make no exertion to secure us similar advantages in England? We are all on equal ground now, sir, we are emanci pated; that is to say, we have our common rights; and I 10 am just as eligible to sit in Parliament, as you, sir. Why, then, is Ireland to be favored at our expense? I say, sir, it is your duty to advocate our cause, as well as that of the Irish Catholics; and you must, if you expect any support from me, either vote against that clause, or 15 originate some motion to extend the same advantages to England.

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Sitt. Time alone is wanting. Rome was not built in a day; nor can her church be established in an hour: everything must be done by degrees.

Mist. Oh! then, it is gradually to be effected.
Sitt. I did not say that.

Cross. Did n't you mean it, sir?

Sitt. Why, really

Cross. This will not do; I must have a specific answer 25 before I go. [Enter Clerk.]

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Clerk. Sir, I was not aware that you had company. Mr. Mist, how d'ye do? Mr. Cross, your servant; I won't detain you five minutes;-can I speak to you

alone?

Sitt. I dare say, you may speak before your friends.

Clerk. Well, sir, I shall be very short. I hear you have made a speech in favor of a general registration of wills in London. Is that the case, sir?

Sitt. Why, I certainly did support that measure. It 35 was represented to me as an advisable thing,-and

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Clerk. "Advisable," is it! What, sir, to deprive hundreds of honest professional men of their livelihood, to gorge the already bloated London practitioners? Sir, it is nonsense, madness,-folly.

Sitt. It did not strike me to be so: I must be the best judge of what I have myself examined and inquired into. There appears to be a vast deal of difficulty and intricacy in the present system, and no small proportion of chicanery and extortion; and I really cannot submit to

****Clerk. Submit, sir, what do you mean by submitting?

I sent you to Parliament to represent me.-I tell you that the new Registration Bill is a most shameful bill, and will rob me of four hundred and eighty pounds per 5 annum; what have you, sir, to set against that? I insist upon it you do not vote for that bill.

Sitt. But I have pledged myself in a speech.

Clerk. Then, sir, I wish you would not speak so much, like the parrot, you might perhaps think the more; or, 10 like our last excellent representative, who never spoke at all, think as much as he did. You must not vote for it, sir,-that's all. [Enter Dobbins.]

Sitt. Mr. Dobbins, your servant.

Dobbins. Yours, sir, ah! some friends and neighbors; 15 perhaps we are here on the same errand.

Sitt. These gentlemen are come to complain of me.

Dobb. Then, sir, we are all agreed; and as we are all of the same party, and the same club, I have no scruple in speaking out at once, for I am in a hurry,—we military 20 men are punctual, and I have another appointment. In fact, Mr. Sittingbourn, I perceive that you voted for the reduction of the army.

Sitt. I did, sir, and conscientiously too: I think our military force is too considerable for the peaceable times 25 in which we live.

Dobb. That's all very fine, Mr. Sittingbourn; and no man in the kingdom is more anxious for reduction in the public expenditure than myself; but of all the things to touch, the army, sir, is the last. I have been for many 30 years on half-pay.-I have no chance of getting upon full pay, if the least reduction takes place, if things remain as they are, it is possible; but the idea of blighting the prospects of a man who so strenuously supported you

Sitt. Sir, I was speaking on a great national question, 35-I spoke in generals :

Dobb. Yes, sir, and forgot the lieutenants; but that won't do.

Sitt. All I know, is, that amongst the most vehement advocates for reduction,-amongst the most ardent de40 nouncers of extravagant expenditure,—you were the foremost, and I

Dobb. That's all very right, sir: I feel that I am an oppressed man. I have had beardless boys put over my

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head:-the system is a corrupt one, and a base one ;—but reduction, sir-I-[Enter Cowl.]

Mr. Cowl. So, sir, you voted against the repeal of the malt-tax, that's a pretty go :-how came that about?

Sitt. Why, sir, as you ask me so plainly, I will answer as candidly. I went determined to oppose the tax, and support the repeal; but after hearing Sir Robert Peel's explanation, I confess I could not, in justice and honor, do otherwise than vote for its continuation.

Cowl. That's a pretty go: you are a nice man to send to the House of Commons, with your Peel and your repeal; all I can say is, that you ought to be ashamed of yourself, sir; and I am worth fifty thousand pounds, and neither ashamed nor afraid to tell

you so.

Sitt. I cannot see why I should be ashamed of acting conscientiously.

Cowl. Didn't you pledge yourself to vote against it?
Sitt. I did, but I was convinced by argument.

Cowl. Argument !—fiddledeedee for argument: I didn't 20 give you my vote, sir, to be argued out of your promise. Silt. I saw no injury done to the people by the tax, 1

saw

Cowl. "Saw!" I don't care what you saw. Who cares for the people? I have heard you say it would not have 25 made a penny a pot difference in beer to the people, as you call them; but it would have made more than five or six shillings in the bushel to me; and who are the people, I should like to know, if it is not the maltsters? [Enter Lock.]

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Sitt. Mr. Lock, are you here too,-and to complain? Lock. Indeed I am, sir.-here, sir, here is your name, voting in a majority for the Rattledumslap Railroad; the success of which will just rob me of four thousand six hundred a year,-supersedes the whole line of the Tow35 twaddle canal, of which I hold, at this moment, two-thirds of the shares. [Enter Jarvis.]

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Mr. Jarvis. That is nothing to me, Mr. Lock,-nothing, sir,-nothing.

Lock. How so, Mr. Jarvis ?

Jarvis. Why, sir, you are a rich man, I am a poor one :-your kinal did us a precious sight of harm of itself; and that ought never to have been suffered; but as you say, the rail-road, which will take passengers as well as luggage, will be the ruin on me. Yes, Mr. Sittingbourn

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