From the past a lesson learning,
Onward move, by duty led;
With a truthful eye discerning

Right from wrong, nor backward turning, -
Upward-onward-straight ahead.

Let no thought of gain or power
Swerve you from the path of right;
Virtue is a diamond dower,

Growing brighter every hour;
Upward-onward-day and night.

Though life's tempests roundu gather,
Tremble not, but press the d
With firmer step, the storm y u'll weather,
Pulling heart and head together;
Upward-onward-trust in God.

EXERCISE LXXVIII.

ALL IS ACTION, ALL IS MOTION.
ALL is action, all is motion,

In this mighty world of ours;
Like the current of the ocean,
Man is urged by unseen powers!

Steadily, but strongly moving,
Life is onward evermore,
Still the present age improving
On the age that went before.

Duty points, with outstretched fingers,
Every soul to actions high;
Woe betide the soul that lingers!-
Onward! onward! is the cry.

Though man's foes may seem victorious
War may waste and famine blight,

Still from out the conflict glorious
Mind comes forth with added light!

O'er the darkest night of sorrow,
From the deadliest field of strife,
Dawns a clearer, brighter morrow.
Springs a truer, nobler life.

Onward, onward, onward ever!
Human progress none may stay;
All who make the vain endeavor,
Shall, like chaff, be swept away.

EXERCISE LXXIX.

TRY-KEEP TRYING.

HAVE your efforts proved in vain?
Do not sink to earth again;
Try-keep trying:

They who yield can nothing do-
A feather's weight will break them through
Try-keep trying:

On yourself alone relying,

You will conquer; try-keep trying.

Falter not-but upward rise,
Put forth all your energies;
Try-keep trying:

Every step that you progress
Will make your future effort less:
Try-keep trying:

On the truth and God relying,
You will conquer; try-keep trying.

Ponderous barriers you may meet,
But against them bravely beat:
Try-keep trying:

Nought should drive you from the track
Or turn you from your purpose back,
Try-keep trying:

On yourself alone relying,

You will conquer; try-keep trying.

You will conquer if you try-
Win the good, before you die;
Try-keep trying:

Remember-nothing is so true,
As they who dare will ever do;
Try-keep trying:

On yourself and God relying,

You will conquer; try--keep trying.

EXERCISE LXXX.

THE WORLD AS IT IS.

THIS world is not so bad a world
As some would like to make it;
Though whether good or whether bad,
Depends on how we take it.
For if we scold and fret all day,
From dewy morn till even,

This world will ne'er afford to man
A foretaste here of heaven.

This world in truth 's as good a world
As e'er was known to any,
Who have not seen another yet,
And these are very many;
And if the men, and women too,
Have plenty of employment,
Those surely must be hard to please
Who cannot find enjoyment.

This world is quite a clever world,
In rain or pleasant weather,
If people would but learn to live
In harmony together;

Nor seek to burst the kindly bond

By love and peace cemented,
And learn that best of lessons yet,
Always to be contented.

Then were the world a pleasant world,
And pleasant folks were in it;
The day would pass most pleasantly
To those who thus begin it;
And all the nameless grievances
Brought on by borrowed troubles,
Would prove, as certainly they are,
A mass of empty bubbles!

EXERCISE LXXXI.

PHILOSOPHY OF ENDURANCE.

WERE the lonely acorn never bound
In the rude, cold grasp of the rotting ground;
Did the rigid frost never harden up
The mould above its bursting cup;

Were it never soaked by the rain or hail,
Or chilled by the breath of the wintry gale,
It would not sprout in the sunshine free,
Or give the promise of a tree;

It would not spread to the summer air
Its lengthening boughs and branches fair,
To form a bower where in starry nights
Young love might dream unknown delights;
Or stand in the woods among its peers,
Fed by the dews of a thousand years.

Were never the dull, unseemly ore
Dragged from the depths where it slept of yore
Were it never cast into scorching flame,
To be purged of impurity and shame;
Were it never molten 'mid burning brands,
Or bruised and beaten by stalwart hands,
It would never be known as a thing of worth;
It would never emerge to a noble birth;
It would never be formed into mystic rings,

To fetter love's erratic wings;

It would never shine amid priceless gems,
On the girth of imperial diadems;

Nor become to the world a power and pride,
Cherished adored, and deified.

So, then, O man of a noble soul,
Starting in view of a glorious goal,

Wert thou never exposed to the blasts, forlorn,— The storms of sorrow, the sleets of scorn;

Wert thou never refined in pitiless fire,

From the dross of thy sloth and mean desire;
Wert thou never taught to feel and know
That the truest love has its roots in woe,
Thou wouldst never unriddle the complex plan
Or reach half way to the perfect man

Thou wouldst never attain the tranquil height,
Where wisdom purifies the sight,
And God unfolds to the humble gaze

The bliss and beauty of his ways.

EXERCISE LXXXII.

THE STORM.

A DROWSY Stillness steals along the plain;
The leaves hang motionless on every tree;
The twittering swallow glides along the ground,
While cautious pigeons seek the sheltering eaves.
The geese, that o'er the green so stately stalked,
Fly towards the gloomy west with heavy wing,
And give a noisy welcome to the rain.
The cattle from the hills come early home,
And from the fallow ground the laborer turns,
Long ere the hour of sunset, with an eye
That reads the secrets of the heavens as well
As though it opened first in Chaldea's land.
Along the road the mimic whirlwind runs,
And with its unseen fingers lifts the dust;
The town-returning wagon faster moves,
And down the hill, and o'er the sandy plain,
The village Jehu makes the coach-wheel spin,
His horn's wild music swelling on the ear.

Flash after flash lights up the dreaded scene,
And answering thunder speaks from every cloud,
While the deep caverns of the ocean swell
Their mystic voices in the chorus grand.
Men sit in silence now, with anxious looks,
While timid mothers seek their downy beds,
And press their wailing infants to their breasts.

From her low lattice by the cottage door,
The anxious housewife marks the pelting storm;
Sees the adventurous traveller onward go,
Seeking his distant hamlet ere the night
Adds tenfold horrors to the dismal scene.
Swiftly the steed bounds o'er the woodland plain,
While hope beams brightly from the rider's eye,