Boon's Lick times. [volume] (Fayette, Mo.) 1840-1848, 1845-06-14
BY REQUEST.

How great and how frightful have been
the works inspired by thee. How many
have exchanged the quiet walks of life to
mingle in the noise and the tumult of the
camp, TO wrest from the proper owner their
lawful rights, to deluge the earth in blood
and TO scatter destruction, desolation, mis-.
cry and woe over many smiling, peaceful
and happy land; to fill the earth with the
groans of thy victims, while their blood
fatens the soil and causes it to yield yet
more abundant increase to the spoiler, while
the tears of the widow and the orphan
water the land; but unlike those wept by
plying night, instead of fructifying the
earth, causes the curse Of God to visit it.
Who can turn the pages of history and
not sigh, when he counts the number of
victims slain upon thy altar; the noble
works of art that have been demolished by
thee, all to bind around the brow of the
stained with blood; still he weeps that there
is not another world upon which he can
react those bloody scenes.
But is it only in the battle field that we
behold thy works. No. Let US now turn
to anew scene. Go, if you please, to the
rural country-to the crowded city--or the
quiet village; look at that solitary chamber.
Soon will Aurora, with her rosy fingers,
unlock the golden portals of the east; yet
why does that taper illuminate that silent
chamber; draw aside that curtain and one
look will tell all. Beside that small table,
covered with profuson of volumes, sc.
lec,ed from the best poets historians and
philosophers, sits one porting over some
volume; it may that il takes him back some
thousand years ago, perhaps in ancient
Greece--that name so bewtching TO every
son Of song, so venerated by every. lover
of the fine arts--or it may be in Rome-or
Egypt, it matters not. His unfinished pa.
per lies before him, his pen, by the by,
what affection does he not cherish for that
humble inst rument by which he reveals
"words that burn"-thoughts that when
fashioned into words will ere long thrill
the reader with sensations of the most ex-
quisite delight, and cause his name TO be
engraved in illegible characters in the tenn
pie of fame, and will Irvine around his
brow wreath; but it is laurel unstained
by blood-ungilded by gold wrested from
the vanquished. All this now passes be-
fore his mental vision, and to attain il, he
has labored and toiled to reach the Par
luSSuS, VI lllo NlcllCS, uLtIl DTGIIlu-
ture wrinkles have been stamped u pom his
lofty brow, and the light that is sent from
his eye has to the knowing fearful mean
ing, like the bright but flfu glimmerings
of an expiring lamp. And the glow tina,
tinges his pale thin cheek, the cough that
interrupts his easy posture, what tale do
they reveal Of midnight watchings, while
they point to an early grave and the funeral
obsequies of one, who has been a devout
worshipper at Ambitions shrine, and who
will ere long, be self inundated victim
upon her altar.
But is it light thing in the sight of
Heaven, for creature TO yield himself a
martyr for anything save the cause of
truth? Most assuredly he is guilty of self
destruction before his Maker. But of all
species of self destruction, this, PERHAPS.
has enlisted our warmest sympathies, for
while we venerate, yea, almos, idolze the
memory of those renowned sons of song.
while their names shed bright halo over
the land of their nativity, yet, is il not often
the case that their richest requests. like
; the dying silk worms, are made with their
, expiring breath. Who would not heaye
; the sigh Of regret and shed the tear of pity
over The evanCscence of so much worth
talent and genius! And is this thv work,
Ambition NJ, JP.