rary with Christ, but who could have known nothing of what was going on in Judæa, and who, alas! did not always "reck his own rede," wrote thus to a younger friend, as a precept for a worthy life: "Some good man must be singled out and kept ever before our eyes, that we may live as if he were looking on, and do everything as if he could see it." *

Let me borrow the spirit, if not the exact letter, of that precept, and address it to the young men of my Country: "Keep ever in your mind, and before your mind's eye, the loftiest standard of character. You have it, I need not say, supremely and unapproachably, in Him who spake as never man spake, and lived as never man lived, and who died for the sins of the world. That character stands apart and alone. But of merely mortal men the monument we have dedicated to-day points out the one for all Americans to study, to imitate, and, as far as may be, to emulate. Keep his example and his character ever before your eyes and in your hearts. Live and act as if he were seeing and judging your personal conduct and your public career. Strive to approximate that lofty standard, and measure your integrity and your patriotism by your nearness to it, or your departure from it. The prime meridian of universal longitude, on sea or land, may be at Greenwich, or at Paris, or where you will. But the prime meridian of pure, disinterested, patriotic, exalted human character will be marked forever by yonder Washington obelisk!" *

Our matchless Obelisk stands proudly before us to-day, and we

* “Aliquis vir bonus nobis eligendus est, ac semper ante oculos habendus, ut sic tanquam illo spectante vivamus, et omnia tanquam illo vidente faciamus.-Senecae Epistola ad Lucilium XI.

hail it with the exultations of a united and glorious Nation. It may, or may not, be proof against the cavils of critics, but nothing of human construction is proof against the casualities of time. The storms of winter must blow and beat upon it. The action of the elements must soil and discolor it. The lightnings of Heaven may scar and blacken it. An earthquake may shake its foundations. Some mighty tornado, or resistless cyclone, may rend its massive blocks asunder and hurl huge fragments to the ground. But the character which it commemorates and illustrates is secure. It will remain unchanged and unchangeable in all its consummate purity and splendor, and will more and more command the homage of succeeding ages in all regions of the Earth.

GOD BE PRAISED, THAT CHARACTER IS OURS FOREVER!

ROBERT CHARLES WINTHROP was born in Boston, May 12, 1809, graduated at Harvard College in 1828, and studied law with Daniel Webster. He entered the state legislature in 1835, and was speaker in 1838-40; member of Congress 1840-50, speaker in 1847-8, and United States Senator 1850-1. Mr. Winthrop has published several memoirs, delivered many historical addresses, is a ripe scholar, and an eloquent speaker. Our extract is from the second edition of his “Oration on the completion of the National Monument to Washington agreeably to the appointment of Congress, February 21, 1885." 8vo, pp. 39. Boston: 1885. Extracts from Mr. Winthrop's oration on the occasion of laying the corner-stone of the monument, July 4, 1848, are given on page 264.