life. While discharging the duties of these offices, he prepared his sermons on systematic theology, on which his fame chiefly rests, entitled Theology Explained and Defended in a Series of Sermons, in five volumes. This admirable and comprehensive system of divinity has passed through many editions in England, as well as in our own country. In his college vacations, he was in the habit of journeying; and to this we owe his Travels in New England and New York, published after his death, in four volumes. He died January 11th, 1817, aged sixty-four, having been President of the College twenty-one years. Pleasing as Dr. Dwight is as a poet, and learned and eloquent as he was as a divine, it is as President of Yale College that he was most valued, and honored, and loved while living, and as such is embalmed in the hearts of the large number of scholars, divines, and statesmen still living, who were instructed by him in their collegiate course. He had the remarkable faculty of winning the affections and commanding the most profound respect of the young men who came under his influence, while he poured forth his instructions in a most impressive eloquence, from a mind stored with the treasures of ancient and modern learning. And knowing, as we do, that for the last twenty years of his life he could scarcely use his eyes at all, our wonder increases that he accomplished so much. But what cannot singleness of aim, determined purpose, and unremitting industry effect ?? DUELLING. Life, to man, is his all. On it every thing is suspended which man can call his own,-his enjoyments, his hopes, his usefulness, and his salvation. Our own life is to us, therefore, invaluable. As we are most reasonably required to love our neighbor as ourselves, his life ought, in our estimation, to possess the same value. In conformity to these views, mankind have universally regarded those who have violently deprived others of life with supreme Another of Dr. Dwight's writings should be noticed,―his Remarks on the Review of Inchiquin's Letters published in the Quarterly Review. The facts that gave rise to this work are these. In 1809 appeared a work called Inchiquin's Letters, purporting to be letters sent from Washington by Inchiquin, a Jesuit, to his friends in Europe, giving an account of the state of things in this country, partly serious, partly ludicrous, and partly satirical. The "Quarterly Review" for January, 1814, reviewed these letters, and was very severe on our manners, habits, and institutions, bringing forward every thing that would make us appear in an unfavorable light. To this Dr. Dwight replied the same year, in his "Remarks," a book of one hundred and seventy-six pages. It was very severe upon England, contrasting every defect urged against America with a corresponding failing in our fatherland, and exonerating us from many of the charges, as utterly unfounded. Of Dr. Dwight's other works, the chief are The Triumph of Infidelity, a Poem; The History, Eloquence, and Poetry of the Bible; America, a Poem in the style of Pope's Windsor Forest; A Discourse on Duelling; another on Some Events of the Last Century; and another on The Character of Washington. 2 In person he was about six feet high, and of a full, round, manly form. He had a noble aspect,-a full forehead, and piercing black eyes. His presence was singularly commanding, enforced by a manner somewhat authoritative and emphatic. His voice was one of the finest I ever heard from the pulpit,-clear, hearty, sympathetic, and entering into the soul like the middle notes of an organ." -Goodrich's Recollections. abhorrence, and branded their names with singular infamy. Murderers have been punished, in every age and country, with the most awful expressions of detestation, with the most formidable array of terror, and with the most excruciating means of agony. On the heads of murderers, at the same time, mankind have heaped curses without bounds. The City of Refuge, nay, the Altar itself, a strong tower of defence to every other criminal, has lost its hallowed character at the approach of a murderer, and emptied him out of its sacred recesses into the hands of the Avenger of blood. God hath said, A man that doeth violence to the blood of any person, he shall flee to the pit: let no man stay him. In solemn response, the world has cried, Amen. But all these sentiments, all these rights, all the obligations of this law, the Duellist has violated. Nay, he has violated them in cold blood; with the deliberation of system; in the season of serenity; in the tranquillity of the closet. This violation he has made a part of his creed, and settled purpose of his life; a governing rule of his conduct. All this he has done amid the various advantages of birth and education; under the light of Science, with the Bible in his hand; and before the altar of his God. He has done it all, also, in the face of arguments which have commanded the conviction of all mankind, except himself; and which would have convinced him, had his mind been honestly open to the force of argument. His opinions have been a thousand times exposed: his arguments have been a thousand times refuted. Against him have been arrayed, in every Christian country, the common sense of mankind, the feelings of humanity, the solemn voice of Law, and the infinitely awful command of the Eternal God. With a moral hardihood, not often exampled even in this world, he encounters them all, overcomes them all, and goes coolly onward to the work of destruction. THE NOTCH OF THE WHITE MOUNTAINS. The Notch of the White Mountains is a phrase appropriated to a very narrow defile, extending two miles in length between two huge cliffs apparently rent asunder by some vast convulsion of nature. This convulsion was, in my own view, that of the deluge. There are here, and throughout New England, no eminent proofs of volcanic violence, nor any strong exhibitions of the power of earthquakes. Nor has history recorded any earthquake or volcano in other countries of sufficient efficacy to produce the phenomena of this place. The objects rent asunder are too great, the ruin is too vast and too complete, to have been accomplished by these agents. The change appears to have been effected when the surface of the earth extensively subsided; when countries and continents assumed a new face; and a general commotion of the elements produced a disruption of some mountains, and merged others beneath the common level of desolation. Nothing less than this will account for the sundering of a long range of great rocks, or rather of vast mountains; or for the existing evidences of the immense force by which the rupture was effected. The entrance of the chasm is formed by two rocks, standing perpendicularly, at the distance of twenty-two from each other; one about twenty feet in height, the other about twelve. Half of the space is occupied by the brook mentioned as the headstream of the Saco; the other half by the road. The stream is lost and invisible beneath a mass of fragments, partly blown out of the road, and partly thrown down by some great convulsion. When we entered the Notch, we were struck with the wild and solemn appearance of every thing before us. The scale on which all the objects in view were formed was the scale of grandeur only. The rocks, rude and ragged in a manner rarely paralleled, were fashioned and piled by a hand operating only in the boldest and most irregular manner. As we advanced, these appearances increased rapidly. Huge masses of granite, of every abrupt form, and hoary with a moss which seemed the product of ages, recalling to the mind the saxum vetustum of Virgil, speedily rose to a mountainous height. Before us the view widened fast to the southeast. Behind us it closed almost instantaneously, and presented nothing to the eye but an impassable barrier of mountains. About half a mile from the entrance of the chasm, we saw, in full view, the most beautiful cascade, perhaps, in the world. It issued from a mountain on the right, about eight hundred feet above the subjacent valley, and at the distance from us of about two miles. The stream ran over a series of rocks almost perpendicular, with a course so little broken as to preserve the appearance of a uniform current; and yet so far disturbed as to be perfectly white. The sun shone with the clearest splendor, from a station in the heavens the most advantageous to our prospect; and the cascade glittered down the vast steep like a stream of burnished silver. THE GOODNESS OF GOD AS MANIFESTED IN CREATION. Were all the interesting diversities of color and form to disappear, how unsightly, dull, and wearisome would be the aspect of the world! The pleasures conveyed to us by the endless varieties with which these sources of beauty are presented to the eye, are so much things of course, and exist so much without intermission, that we scarcely think either of their nature, their number, or the great proportion which they constitute in the whole mass of our enjoyment. But, were an inhabitant of this country to be removed from its delightful scenery to the midst of an Arabian desert, a boundless expanse of sand, a waste, spread with uniform desolation, enlivened by the murmur of no stream, and cheered by the beauty of no verdure; although he might live in a palace and riot in splendor and luxury, he would, I think, find life a dull, wearisome, melancholy round of existence; and, amid all his gratifications, would sigh for the hills and valleys of his native land, the brooks and rivers, the living lustre of the spring, and the rich glories of the autumn. The ever-varying brilliancy and grandeur of the landscape, and the magnificence of the sky, sun, moon, and stars, enter more extensively into the enjoyment of mankind than we, perhaps, even think or can possibly apprehend, without frequent and extensive investigation. This beauty and splendor of the objects around us, it is ever to be remembered, is not necessary to their existence, nor to what we commonly intend by their usefulness. It is, therefore, to be regarded as a source of pleasure gratuitously superinduced upon the general nature of the objects themselves, and, in this light, as a testimony of the divine goodness, peculiarly affecting. GOFFE, THE REGICIDE. In the course of Philip's war, which involved almost all the Indian tribes in New England, and among others those in the neighborhood of Hadley, the inhabitants thought it proper to observe the 1st of September, 1675, as a day of fasting and prayer. While they were in the church, and employed in their worship, they were surprised by a band of savages. The people instantly betook themselves to their arms,-which, according to the custom of the times, they had carried with them to the church,-and, rushing out of the house, attacked their invaders. The panic under which they began the conflict was, however, so great, and their number was so disproportioned to that of their enemies, that they fought doubtfully at first, and in a short time began evidently to give way. At this moment an ancient man, with hoary locks, of a most venerable and dignified aspect, and in a dress widely differing from that of the inhabitants, appeared suddenly at their head, and with a firm voice and an example of undaunted resolution, reanimated their spirits, led them again to the conflict, and totally routed the savages. When the battle was ended, the stranger disappeared; and no person knew whence he had come, or whither he had gone. The relief was so timely, so sudden, so unexpected, and so providential; the appearance and the retreat of him who furnished it were so unaccountable; his person was so dignified and commanding, his resolution so superior, and his interference so decisive, that the inhabitants, without any uncommon exercise of credulity, readily believed him to be an angel sent by Heaven for their preservation. Nor was this opinion seriously controverted until it was discovered, several years afterward, that Goffe and Whalley had been lodged in the house of Mr. Russell. Then it was known that their deliverer was Goffe, Whalley having become superannuated some time before the event took place. Of the following specimens of Dr. Dwight's poetry, the first is from the Conquest of Canaan: the other is one of the sweetest of his sacred lyrics, and is embalmed in the affections of the Christian church : EVENING AFTER A BATTLE. Above tall western hills, the light of day Bright from the storm, with tenfold grace he smiled, Graced with bright domes, and crown'd with towers of fire; On cliffs cliffs burn; o'er mountains mountains roll: A burst of glory spreads from pole to pole: Rapt with the splendor, every songster sings, Tops the high bough, and claps his glistening wings; Far south the storm withdrew its troubled reign, In clear, full beauty, round all nature smiled, And claim'd, o'er heaven and earth, dominion mild; I LOVE THY KINGDOM, LORD. I love thy kingdom, Lord, The church our blest Redeemer saved With his own precious blood. |