Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1857-03-03

genius become ever nobler and more beautiful
as each successive achievement enables it to
start from higher point and take higher
flight @ -fl
The Iamentation of the skeptic, who, believ-
ing not in the law Of hum An progress, exclaims
GAN true glory rests,
All praise, all safely. and all happiness,
/ Upon the moral law. Egyptian Thebes,
| Tyre, by the margin Of the sounding waves,
/ Palmyra, central In the desert, fell;
And the arts died by which they had been raised
Call Archimides nom his buried tomb,
| Upon the plain Of vanished Syracuse.
And feelingly the sage shall make report,
Is the philosophy whose sway depends
On mere material instruments how weak
Phose arts and high inventions, II unpropped
Amid his calm sbstrsctiOns, would admit
That not the slender privilege Is tn eirs,
To save themselves from blank forgetfulness
is only just and true In partial sense
The speaker would not dare assert the su-
periorIty of the material over the moral i'm
provement of mankind, but that the latter can
only be reached through the former and by its
instrumentality. The material wants of man
must be first supplied. Hunger, thirst, cold,
constitute demands which, in their extremi-
ties at least, admit but little consideration of
the morality involved in the means of satisfy
ing them. When mans physical wants are
fully supplied, and his elegant tastes cultiva-
ted and in q measure gratiied, he has then
both the opportunity and the inclination to
study the still more beautiful system of moral
truth. The overfowing productions of indus.
try and the vast system of commercial inter.
changes which they invite and stimulate, are
fast making Of all advanced nations one COM
munity of friends and brothers The great
Powers of Europe, by virtue of their congresses
and treaties, are assuming almost the charac-
ter of a confederation. The law of nations is
becoming modified and ameliorated from gen.
GRAFTON to generation, and the day is probably
not many centuries distant when this great
public law will acquire somewhat the nature
Of constitution embracing in its wide control
all the continents of the earth.
The interests of peace were advanced by the
advance of science. The very increase of
material power, with its engines Of destruc-
ton, which would appal Archimides himself,
tends to render the bare idea Of war utterly
horrible and repugnant to human thought
The average Of human life has been consid.
erably prolonged, attributable in great pro-
portion TO the partial cessation of war, the in
crease Of labor saving machinery, and the
greater comfort and elevation of tho masses
in short, to that very development of science
and mechanic art which is the subject of the
present exhibition. 1t is only reasonable to
suppose that future ages will carry this i'm
prOycment to the extreme limit consistent with
the physical nature of man.
The results would BIO greater permanence
aud stability in human affairs and promo.
ton of the moral and political harmony and
progress Of man.
The position was taken th at the love of the
beautiful, as we'll as Of tho true and good, fol-
low after and flow out of the increase of mate
rial power, and the abundance of material
means.
The speaker in eloquent terms went on to
demonstrate that the immense material de-
velopment which is characteristic of tho pres
ent age, far from being in any point of
view Questionable, it is only the basis of
higher and better order of things necessarily
TO grow out OF it. It is the foundation upon
which glorious superstructure will be reared,
such as no former age has exhibited, because
no former age has ever based power and pro-
gross upon the same eternal principles of nat
ural law
In his view it was peculiarly appropriate
that this Central Institution should be organ
lied IN this metropolis of the American Union,
the capital Of the freest and most enterprising
people Of the whole earth.
Emulation and ambition will be excited,
and general interest in the progress of in.
ventlon and improvement will be gradually
dlnuSed among the whole people to the ex
tremities OF our immense country No better
place could be selected than here in this city,
under the shadow of that great institution,
the Patent Office, and In contact with the cen.
trail government itself. 1t would seem impos
sible that our high public functionaries can
be Indifferent to the establishment and sue
cess OF this important organization. Its oper-
atoms 90 down to the very foundations of the
public prosperity, and reach upward to the
highest priniples of social and moral truth,
by which the grandeur and glory Of our hap
Pr institutions are to be promoted. 1t is the
n rrNt IWoo "a fffU 49, Al
success of its objects will be their best and
surest support; for the intelligent power, the
success and prosperity Of the industrial m asses
Of our people, are the broad basis upon which
rests the grand political fabric of this glorious
confederation Of States
A benedictiOn by Rev. Mr.. Phelps closed
the exercises
The large assemblsge then commenced q
general promenade ALL" and an eager ex-
animation OF the endless array of articles,
elegant and useful
The exercises were enlivened by the bril-
liant performances of the band engaged for
the Fair.
DREADFUL CATAsrRoPHE.-AboutS o'clock
last night fire broke out in the Washington
Asylum, (alms and workhouse, } situated near
the Congressional burying ground, and had
gained such Roadway before discovered tn at,
IN the absence OF supply of water, no check
could be made to Its progress, and in q short
space OF time nothing was left of the building
but the bare walls. The FIRE originated in the
northwest wing of the building from the fue
OF the furnace, which supplied heat to the
Workhouse department. The painful rumor
sfoat in regard to the loss of life, we are happv
to say, Is greatly exaggerated.
The scene presented on a visit to the ruins
was sufficiently CHASTITY. On shutter in the
yard was deposited the charred remains of a
colored woman named Eliza Baltimore. She
was a paupsr Of unsound mind, ar d it is stated
was once rescued from the flames, but lost her
life in returning to secure some brass finger
rings and similar articles Of personal adorn-
ment.
The other inmates of the house were, It an.
pears, completely beuildered and required to
be forced from the burning building. No
person, however, is missing from the list of in.
mates save the colored person.
There were in the house at the time of the
nre "a paupers, 40 in the workhouse, and 10
persons in the family Of the Intendant Had
the fre occurred in the middle of the nigbt