The Bedford gazette. [volume] (Bedford, Pa.) 1805-current, 1866-01-05

ton. tits impossible to Overrate the
power of books, of reading ofalI kinds.
A printed word is the most potent in
fiuence on earth. The speech of an or
ator, no matter how eloquent he may
be, no matter how much his music may
charm the ear Of those who hear him,
dies out of the mind. You are delight
ed with it; you repeat it; you chat a.
bout it with your friends. But time
weakens the impression. The words
begin to fail and to be forgotten new
sights and sounds crowd them out of
recollection. But printed book is a.
mother thing. 1t addresses itself per-
sistently, constantly and forever, to the
eye and to the mind. Children read it
although it may he but the rubbish of
a library. 1t fastens its impression on
young minds and old ,Witha firm, sharp
touch which is beyond the power Of
spoken words, and which, if it begins
to fade, can be deepened and renewed
as often rs you take up the forgotten
pages. 1t never dies. Everywhere in
the land you will find books, written
by inconsiderable and even cOntempti-
bic men, bought by chance and preserv-
ed by accident, which have influenced
the minds of the millions who make
up the people. TO ignore such an intiu
ence, or to attempt to slight it, is as idle
an undertaking as to seek to stay the
flow of the tides or stop the sun in his
rising. YoR must accept it youDl1tst re-
cognize 1.-THE only thing you can do
is tOregulate it, and divert tiOodWhich
cannot be checked into channels from
which YOU and your children may draw
the water Of life.
The abolition Yankees were the first
people in the country to recognize this
power. Deny them everything else
take away from them all the virtues to
which they have no claim, honor, pa
triotism, common honesty-yOu must
still cOncede to them the craft which Sc
/ lects the fittest means for a chosen end.
They know the value of types and ink,
! the power of newspapers, the might of
I books, the witchery of words which ad-
dress the eye and which speak to peO-
pie in their homes, by their hearth
! stones. and all the time.
| 1t is hardly necessary to say anything
! to Pennsylvania audience, especially
if there are any middle-aged persons
among it, Of Y05lkee cunning. The time
is even within my recollection, when
/ the vendors of tin-ware, clocks and
/ split-Ieather boots, swOoped, summerby
/ summer, from the recesses Of the North
/ through hepeaceful defiles and valleys
/ of this innocent old State, on their an
nual pilgrimage of swindling. Thou
Ghg6Sks9 Ghg6Sk the 69q66h 6aiss; F283f yetfaded have
been vexed out of allpatience by those
deceptive pots and kettles which gilt
tered so fair in the sunshine, and lost
their bottoms with such provoking d.
lacrity when they We're set upon the
fire. Thousands of stalWart men, not
old enough now to escape the grasp of
a ConscriptiOn Act, have had their toes
peep out and their feet go bare through
those boots which the enticingelOquence
Of the wagon-man would not suffer
them to refuse. Clocks are still stand
ing on the mantel-piece of many acOun-
try homestead whose mOveless hands,
although unable to tell the time, speak
loud enough of the rogue who brought
them from the East. The yeomanry
OfPennsylvnniap purchased theirkn0wl-
edge of the Yankee, dearly, with hard
cash, and with good deal of it. But
they hare the knowledge, and, if they
remember it and apply it now, they
have driven no hard bargain.
The tin-ware, the split-leather, the
clock businesses, have all passed away.
The gentlemen who vended those val
liable commodities have retired upon
their fortunes. Some of them have be-
come saints, and are preaching the gos-
pei; some of them Senators and are
doctoring the Constitution; some of
them contractors, and have set their
squadrons on the field armed with cast
iron sabres, mounted on skeleton hOrs-
es, and clad in picturesque rags Of sh0d-
dy; some of them poets, and are tun-
ing their Tyres in praise of John Brown
and the noble black but all of them
/ Senator, saint, shOddy-contractOr and
tuneful warbler alike, are simply clock
| and tin-pedIers in a new disguise.
Their lyrics and their essays are of a
piece with their kettles and their shoe
leather. They are a sham. The artist
who has spent his early years in the
contrivance of mechanical cheats is not
likely, wnen he turns his attention to
poetry, to forsake his old tricks, or es-
tablish any very close correspondence
with the MUSES.. His sauce-pans and
his SMILES, his shoe-pegs and his meta
phors, are equally ingenious frauds. He
is alike dishonest tinker, whether he
wields the pen, or holds the lap-stOne.
Hence, the Abolition Literature is not
the out-cropping of spontaneous genius,
nor even the result Of honest and pa
tient labor. 1t is made to sell, to cheat,
+n dncniya not tn inDroVp or instruct