Let us keep sacred the Sabbath of God in its purity, and have no city so great, or village so small, that every Sunday morning shall not stream forth over towns and meadows the golden benediction of the bells, as they summon the people to the churches of their fathers, and ring out in praise of God and the power of His might. Let us keep the states of this Union in the current of the sweet old-fashioned, that the sweet rushing waters may lap their sides, and everywhere from their soil grow the tree, the leaf whereof shall not fade, and the fruit whereof shall not die.
Let us remember that the home is the source of our national life. Back of the national Capitol and above it stands the home. Back of the President and above him stands the citizen. What the home is, this and nothing else will the Capitol be. What the citizen wills, this and nothing else will the President be.
A PALACE IN A VALLEY.
DR. SAMUEL JOHNSON.
Dr. Samuel Johnson was born at Lichfield, England, in 1709, and died in 1784.
He was educated at Oxford, where he gained honor as a student in spite of his poverty and defective eyesight.
After leaving college Johnson held a position as an usher, and later was employed by some booksellers.
He gradually began a literary life, publishing some poems, and then conducted “The Rambler” and “The Idler,” two periodicals.
He wrote the story of “Rasselas” to pay the expenses of his mother’s funeral. His greatest work was a Dictionary of the English Language.
Dr. Johnson’s character was a strange union of strength and weakness. His manners were uncouth, but his conversation was rich in wit and wisdom. His genius was recognized during the latter years of his life.
Ye who listen with credulity to the whispers of fancy and pursue with eagerness the phantoms of hope; who expect that age will perform the promises of youth, and that the deficiencies of the present day will be supplied by the morrow,—attend to the history of Rasselas, Prince of Abyssinia.