New-York daily tribune. [volume] (New-York [N.Y.]) 1842-1866, 1843-02-08
srRuer,op,s Lee.ure.


of their ancestors and the influence OF each oathelr
past history and present state, were considered
and presented as only he could have presented
them. We viii not report this Lecture, nor any
portion of its language, as we trust it will De re-
pea,ed before be leaves our city-the audience ma
wing been thinner than it would have been in more
accessible place, and on less Indictment evening
He chose New-Engand as his theme, he said, net
because the virtues to which he should e!ude were
more strongly Developed there than in other Sec
tons of the land or because others were less la
bic to the criticisms he should venture; bnt be-
cause that district might serve central sec
ton. a sol of ganglion for the whole whence are
radiated the influences of life and thought. The
origin of tie English nation was graphically
sketched--that nation now the most powerful ana
most highly civilized on the face OF the globe hose
arms even now conquer the East, as they before
have planted the West, whose arts minister to the
power, the pride, or the comfort of every oiher
land, whose observatory at Greenwish furnishes
calendar for the Earth, whose chronemeters mea-
sure time for all the world, and yet whose moral
weight is of the greatest worth, it being land OF
Established Law, where the principles OF justice
have most power and religion mos. universal
reverence. This race came from no gentle stock ::
they sprang from the loins of as abandoned men
as history has ever described. The Asia,ic Cmbri,
who frs, came to Europe 700 years before Christ,
and spread by degrees along the Western Coas; OF
Europe lived under ground and ate flesh and
-, Xii, anl revaranced the nal md
mistletoe: they were cruel and ierocious, and inn
nola,ed human beings in their sscfihces-much
such men were they as those who now inhabit the
islands of the Pacific
Another branch from whom they sprang were
dweers in the German ocean, men OF tair blue
ewes. who held the female sex in great respect and
on horseback welded the sledge-hammer without
WEAKNESS and without pity. They were pirates
upon the sea and leaving the kings eldest son
alone behind sought their food by the sail and the
sword When the Bersekr came in sight of his
foe he howled like wolf and foamed like mad
dog and rushed with fury into the combat. And OF
these at the three immigratons about 300, GOO
landed upon the British Island and gave it the
name of England Ont of this rugged soil was 1t
that the flowers of English wit and wisdom were
to bloom.
The English, Mr.. Emerson said, had always
been marked by taciturnity, and the Saxons used
to measure their time by successive Mi hs and win
ters English wit is not the shoughtless merriment
of the French but that sense Of the uaicrous prop
er to grave nature. This is accompanied by a
sowness of thought, which has led the French to
say thar the English wit always comes atterward
The nation possesses a strong attachment TO home
and that determination of the intellectual faculties
on the objects of the external world called Common
Sense, which leads to works of economy and utili-
~, signihed by the saying that the French invent
ed the ruie and the English added 10 it the shirt"
They have a strong love of truth and O downright
way of speaking il; and from the highest TO the
lowest they always love fair play strong rel-
pious feeling likewise peryades them, and they are
capable ofenthusias thong they do not often exh-
biti, These traits have had from that
vast expansion which destiny has given to the Brit
ish race.
We, said Mr.. Emerson, are that people. The
blood Of the Bersekir runs msdy through cur veins
Among the people of New-England, where in this
country the population is most homogeneous, the
British character is extended but not altered The
two points which most distinguish the English peo-
ple-ther conscience and common sense-are here
most clearly seen.
Mr.. EMERSON proceeded to speak Of the char
acter of those early Purtans who came to this
country. as the most religious men of that religious
era. All history is the record of but few thoughts
and few thoughts build States and Cities. The
cause seems most inadequate to the effect, but
who shall tell from what crater shot up the CLEAN
that SET the world on fire! When the Puritans
came to this country they had many wants, bur
more satisfactons; the light struggled through
oiled paper in their cabin windows, bat by II they
read the word of God; they were fain TO make
tables Of their knees, but their limbs were their
own; and TO their ears the bowling winds Of the
forest sounded with more musical tones than the
smoothvoice Of the English prela,es. There was
an oajec,ivty--an eutwardness which character
ICED all the religion of the Saxons IL was not
philosophical ner spiritual: yet 1t was full OF al
lection and took strong hold of the imagination
and the heart. The objects of the other world
took bodily form TO their eyes, and CT this the Lite
of Luther, his Table Talk, Paradise Lost and Bun
vans record are marked examples. How richly
this stream from Antiquity descended into New
England every town bears witness, and 1t stands in
cold contrast with the theology OF the schools, Ike
religion in the blood.
One of the most marked features of New-Eng-
land is the intellectual culture which from the ear
est DAYS of its colonization has existed there.
Provision for universal education Of the children Of
every township was made at once to these Schools
have succeeded the village Lyceum; and from
New.Ensland have continually gone forth young
men as teachers or preachers to the other States.
Such is the value every where attached TO the
means Of sound and thorough culture that all Po-
,ical and religious prejudices at once give way
before it If the result OF this spirit be sought ii
may be found mos, perfectly exhibited in a poor
bu, educated family-such as abound throughout
her borders.