which we ought to exercise for their good. And for what? I will tell you for what. 66 That the oppressed may lie more passive at the feet of the oppressor; that one sixth of our American people may never know their rights; that two-and-a-half millions of our own countrymen, crushed in the cruel folds of slavery, may remain in all their misery and despair, without pity and without hope. "For such a purpose, so wicked, so inexpressibly mean, the southern slave-holder calls on us to lie down, like whipped and trembling spaniels, at his feet. "Our reply is this; our republican spirits cannot submit to such conditions. God did not make us, Jesus did not redeem us, for such vilę and sinful uses. * * * "Whom shall we muster on our side in this great battle between liberty and slavery. Not the many. The many never will muster in such a cause, until they first see unequivocal signs of its triumph. "We don't want the many, but the true-hearted, who are not skilled in the weapons of carnal warfare. We don't want the politicians, who, to secure the votes of the south, care not if slavery is perpetual. We don't want the merchant, who, to secure the custom of the south, is willing to applaud slavery, and leave his countrymen, and their children, and their children's children, to the tender mercies of slavery for ever. "We want only one class of men for this warfare. Be that class ever so small, we want only those who will stand on the rock of Christian principle. We want men who can defend the right of free discussion on the ground that God gave it. “We want men who will act with unyielding honesty and firmness. "We have room for all such, but no room for the timeserving and selfish. We have room as well for the aged and decrepid warrior as for the vigorous and the young. "The hands that are now trembling with the weight of years, are the best hands in the world to grasp the shield of faith. These gray-haired servants of God best know how to move the hands that move the world. "We want them and such as them; men who are acquainted with God, and used to God's work, and these we shall have. And his blessing we shall have if we are humble, and we cannot fail. EDWARD BEECHER. Oh, what is man, Great Maker of mankind! That Thou to him so great respect dost bear- EDWARD BEECHER is a close thinker, a cogent reasoner, an impassioned speaker. His sermons are not elegant essays, got up for the entertainment of his hearers. They are not blank verse wire-drawn into very blank prose not pearls and diamonds and precious stones, all stolen except the string that ties them together. They are true-blue, orthodox sermons, full of Beecher, truth, spirit, and scripture. They are living, breathing, talking sermons-famous for great thoughts and simple words. Mr. Beecher is a fluent and forcible speaker, and makes use of the simplest (not always the purest) Saxon in his discourses. In his happiest mood his voice is often raised to a high pitch, and he soars with untiring wing higher, and higher still, and still higher, until his head is among the stars, and his face-like the countenance of Moses on the mountain-reflects the radiance of inspiration. He not unfrequently produces a thrilling effect by reiterated strokes, and by presenting epithet after epithet, figure after figure, fact after fact, argument after argument, appeal after appeal, which flow on like the waves of the sea, exciting the alarm of the unconverted, who have spread their sail upon the waters of life, without provisions or pilot, and eliciting the admiration of those who have, and those who hope they have, fair prospects for reaching the haven of rest. Mr. Beecher has studied mental philosophy, and is well versed in theology; has considerable knowledge of the ways of the world, for, unlike many of his cloth, he does not deem it a duty to shut himself up in his study continually, for fear of rendering himself "too common " to excite the wonder of the people on the Sabbath. There are some clergymen who keep themselves as wild beasts are kept in a menagerie; you cannot see them withont a ticket, and then you must keep at a respectable distance. Why, it is more difficult to obtain an interview with some ministers, than it is to have a tête-à-tête with the Pope of Rome! If Paul, with his hands hardened at tent-making, or Peter, fresh from his fishing tackle, were to solicit an opportunity to preach in their pulpits, they would give Peter and Paul such a response as the Pharisees of old gave them. Dr. Beecher is not one of that class of spiritual teachers. You will see him in the streets, and at the exchange, in the reading-rooms, in the police court, at the public meetings in Faneuil Hall and Tremont Temple. He is a sociable, accessible, generous man, and capital company where he is sufficiently acquainted to "unbend the monkish brow." It is because he mingles with the people that he is in advance of many of his clerical brethren. But Edward Beecher, like the rest of us poor mortals, has faults. He often seems to attempt to work up his feelings to a pitch of intense excitement. Under such circumstances there will be noise without eloquence, extreme gesture without extreme unction. In that way he exchanges the sublime for the sledge-hammer style. He has a good share of moral courage. Like his brother, the "Thunderer" in Brooklyn, he assails with tongue and pen, from the pulpit and the press, the tergiversation, the coat-turning, the mouse-ing, the meanness of public men, who, for laurels or lucre, basely betray their country with a kiss. The Brooklyn Beecher is almost constantly throwing shot and shell into the camp and court of the enemy. Some poor fool in his congregation became offended with him, the other day, because he publicly rebuked the recreancy of a prominent politician who recently betrayed his country, and put a · crown of thorns on the bleeding brow of humanity. This nervous simpleton put down on paper the unpalatable sentiments he could not swallow, and had them published; and Sir Oracle, the editor, in all the pomp of pigmy grandeur, undertook to lecture H. W. Beecher on the duties of preachers! His labors were lost; for it does not run in the blood of the Beechers to be frightened at pop-guns in the arms of grasshoppers. Dr. Lyman Beecher, speaking of his two distinguished sons, said, Edward fires forty-pounders, and woe |