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“LIVE! as much as you can—to serve Him whose kingdom advances with the progress of peace.”

Another stroke, and another month faded away; still he sang“LIVE! as much as you can-that my Great Exhibition of Industry may show its good effects in you! May you help to show that it is 'a new starting-point from which all nations will be able to direct thir future exertions ""'

But the persevering clock gave Old Eighteen-Fifty-One his eighth stroke; yet with a fainter voice he cried—

"LIVE! as much as you can, that you may render more delightful all general news.""

The ninth stroke struck him in its turn, yet with a still fainter voice, and a stronger exertion, the old year cried “Live!” “LIVE! as much as you can—and help that the 'general bad news' may be quickly written in the histories of your years.”

TEN! vibrated from the clock; and the month of October, with all his fruits and riches, was shaken from Old EighteenFifty-One-so, only two months of him now remained.

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“LIVE! as much as you can,” he cried; care very much for your country, and for the progress of the Government. Help, that the Government may govern by the 'rule of right. ' And learn to care, too, for your Church, that it may be the jealous keeper of The Sacred Truth; and that it may be 'guided and governed by the Holy Spirit.'

ELEVEN!—And chill November went off in a fog. With a husky voice came forth the sound—“ Live !”

"LIVE!-as much as you can. Even care for your countrymen in distant lands. Children may care for the progress of the Colonies, as much as for their country's g-o-o

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Burr-r-r-r-r-r-r-BANG! with all his might the sturdy clock struck TWELVE on the head of the old year. It was a noble stroke! but the dim dwindling form of the dying December struggled hard to send forth his still small voice.

Hush!-hearken to the last whisper of Old Eighteen-FiftyOne! "C-H-I-L-D-R-E-N! L-I-V-E! t-h-a-t y-o-u m-a-y

d-i-i-e a-s e-m-e-m-i-n níu eft me u!

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But no! the last stroke killed him; his "parts of speech" could neither be heard nor read.

Never mind! We all guessed the last words of OLD EIGHTEEN-FIFTY-ONE.

THE TEACHINGS OF A DAY.

CONSIDER what a new day is, as a time of action in the world. It is God's new trial of a man, whom he has anew placed, in favorable circumstances. In the world, men so placed often fail, and then the difficulty is to renew their advantageous position. "You were tried and found wanting," is man's voice to us, "we can help you no more." But what is thus hard to be obtained from man, God gives us every day. We mean not that we are as favorably placed every new day as if we had not neglected past advantages. We are truly affected by past failures, but there is a new starting point of hope. It is as if God said to us, every new day, "Thus didst thou yesterday, and now that I have given thee rest, and thy strength is renewed, and thy heart freshened, and thy grief gone, what wilt thou do to-day?" This is God's voice to man; and man's answering voice should be, "I will do thy will, oh Lord!" Our God does not readily give us up; if we would speak to him of our welfare he does not reply, "Speak no more unto me of this matter;" but every day as with a solemn, urgent voice addresses us, "What wilt thou do to-day?"

Again, a new day is as a new life. Every day is a little life by itself. This little life is like our greater one in many ways. We little think at its commencement what shall happen before its close: we little think of what we shall become ready to do, and what we shall be compelled to bear. We think not of sorrows, changes and unfaithfulness. Our great life and our little one are also alike in this, that the character of their advance and ending depends very much upon that of their commencement. The way in which we spend our morning will influence greatly the way in which we spend our day, as the character of our youth will affect that of our after-life. Waste early hours or early years, and who shall ensure the security of later ones! Sin away early strength, and cast away early opportunities, and who can tell whether strength shall be repaired, or opportunities renewed!

Once more, our ordinary day, and our day of life, present us also with this resemblance. Often, just before the darkness, before the end, we see efforts made to accomplish, as in a

moment, the work which should have been spread over past hours or past years, and there is great uncertainty whether this will be done. The darkness is at hand; is the work ready for the master? The servant is hasting to finish it, having but newly begun; or is even now looking for the tools. Often in the twilight do we sit, anxious to finish something before it has departed, but we cannot, we call for a light. But though we may have a lamp in our chamber, we cannot have one in our grave. Thoughts on a Day.

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PRECEPTIVE BIOGRAPHY.

THOMAS PLATTER.

THERE is often more pleasure and profit to be derived from the study of those characters who are born without any strong intuitive faculties, and who attain to eminence by dint of severe labor, than in following the brilliant and rapid progress of individuals eminently gifted by nature.

Nothing is to be done without work-almost everything by it. We were never more convinced of this than when reading the autobiography of Thomas Platter, a poor goat-herd of the sixteenth century, which has been translated from the German, and published in this country.* The freshness and simple naiveté of the narrative is of itself sufficient to recommend a perusal, were it altogether devoid of those interesting and suggestive incidents in which it abounds. Such a combination of extreme docility and true heroism we have rarely met with. The whole story is in fact a most triumphant refutation of the dangerous and paralysing theory, that man is the creature of circumstances. To us there is no sublimer spectacle than that of a lone child fighting manfully against poverty, ignorance, superstition, and the most untoward accidents of life, till he has achieved a standing far above anything that could have been expected of him, and settling down on his own estate at Basle, a virtuous, useful, happy man, professor in the head school next the university, and the intellectual father of doctors, nobles, and judges of the land.

Such was THOMAS PLATTER. "I came into this world" says

London. Werthiem, 1839.

he, "on the Shrove-Tuesday of the year 1499, just as they were coming together for mass. From this circumstance my friends derived the confident hope that I should become a priest, for at that time that sort of superstition was still every where prevalent. My father's name was Anthony Platter, of the old family of Platter, who have their name from a house which stands on a broad plat (Platte). This plat is a rock on a very high mountain, near a village of the name of Grenchen, in the district and parish of Visp, a considerable village of the Canton of St. Gall."

His grandfather, on the mother's side, attained the patriarchal age of one hundred and twenty six years, and the same robustness of constitution seems to have descended to young Thomas; who, notwithstanding the unprecedented hardships and sufferings of his early life, reached an unusually ripe old age.

His predilection for a wandering life began very early to manifest itself. When a mere infant, taking advantage of his aunt's absence, he rose from his little bed and staggered, almost naked, to a neighbour's house through a deep snow; and at three years of age, ran off to church to be confirmed, without the knowledge even of his godfather, tempted most probably by the prospect of the small presents usually made upon such occasions,

When about seven, he was sent to Eisenthal to keep goats. Again and again they knocked him down, ran over him and trampled on his head, arms, and back. After awhile he had to lead them up "the high and frightful mountains" at the imminent peril of his life. Once he fell over a precipice which, but a short time after, caused the death of a goat, but by miracle escaped unhurt, and at another time barely saved himself by clinging to the tufts of grass that grew between the crevices in the face of a huge perpendicular cliff. Again-but let him tell his own touching story-

"It once happened that I and a little girl," he says, "who also minded her father's goats were playing by an artificial channel, whereby the water was conducted down the mountain to the grounds, and had forgotten ourselves in play. We had made little meadows, and watered them as children do. In the

meanwhile the goats had gone up the mountain, we knew not whither. Then I left my little coat lying there, and ascended the mountain up to the very top; the little girl however went home without the goats. I, on the contrary, as a poor servant, would not venture to go home unless I had the goats. Up very high I saw a kid that was just like one of my young goats, and this I followed at a distance till the sun went down. When I looked back to the village and saw that at the houses it was quite night, I began to descend again; but it was soon quite dark. In the mean time I climbed from one tree to another, and held myself by the loose roots from which the earth had fallen off. When, however, it became quite dark, I would not venture any farther, but held myself by my left hand on a root; with the other I scratched the earth loose under the trees and roots, to hollow out a place to lie in, and listened how the lumps of earth rolled down into the abyss. Thereupon I forced myself into the opening which was made between the earth and roots, in order to lie firmly, and not to fall down in my sleep. I had nothing on except a little shirt, neither shoes nor hat; for the little coat, in my anxiety at having lost the goats, I had left by the watercourse. As I lay under the tree the ravens became aware that I was there; and made a noise on the tree; so that I was in great terror, being afraid that a bear was at hand. However I crossed myself and fell asleep, and slept till the morning, when the sun shone over all the mountains. When however I awoke, and saw where I lay, I do not know that I was ever more frightened in my life; for had I in the night gone four yards deeper, I must have fallen down a frightfully steep precipice many thousand feet deep."

A first rate artist could not have drawn a sweeter picture. The mountain-tops radiant in the sunshine, while the village below lay in solemn shadow-the transition from the lighthearted forgetfulness of play, to the heavy anxieties of neglected duty-the contrast between the child and the poor servant, the night mysteries of childish ignorance-the placid sleep and the glad awakening, "when the sun shone over all the mountains," are elements appreciable only by a true lover of nature and the poetic.

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