, 1874-04-24
MR.. SUMMERS BOOK.

ton " with their graduation at collage and
finished their work in time to pass q,
quiet old age OF many years has passed
away. The study and the toll OF
lifetime are now the essentials Of high success.
The men who are remembered for something
besides the accidents OF place and power die in
the harness. When death comes, it finds the
Statesman still urging some measure, the
merchant still at the head Of his firm, tho
man Of letters still penning the paragraphs Of
his book The mechanism OF the brain works at
high pressure. and is brought to violent stop
when at full speed. Senator Sumner combined
the statesman and the man Of letters, perhaps
to the disadvantage OF each. His speeches we're
overcrowded With the results OF his reading, and
his few non-political publications. marked
with something Of the arrogant tone that be-
comes second nature in man who in loug
political life, is always at one or the other ex-
treme-either III hopeless minority or an over
whelming majority. He left something undu-
ished in each capacity. His Civil-Rights bill was
drawn up and his book ca prophetic Voices
Concerning America" was writteu but the one
was not passed and the other waa not published.
The latter will be issued, however, this week.
It begins with the prophecy Of Seneca, in
"Medea," which Archbishop Whateiey trans
lated: There shall come time in later
ages when ocean shall relax his chains and q vast
continent appear, aud pilot shall find new
worlds, and Thule shall be no more earth's
bounds" # this vague prediction had been in
the Bible, the discovery Of America would ever
be cited as q proof OF prophecy. seneca's
words have been often commented upon. Bacon
calls them - prophecy Of the discovery Of
America" Fox wrote: 1.-THE prophecy in
hfa1ap Ia init
Irving called the prediction !" wonderfully ap-
posite;" said it showed show nearly the warm
imagination Of poet may approach to proph-
ecy," and used it as motto for his
"Lfe Of Columbus" Mr. Sumner shows
that Columbus himself had read this
passage before his voyage. a wide
range OF quotations from Strabo, Pulci, Dray
ton, Milton, etc.. down to Turgot, Horace Wal
pole, and john Adams follows. Most Of them
a1o aattering enough to excuse our occasionally
too lofty airs. Judge Sewall, through whose
veins much Of the Boston blue-blood OF to-day
once flowed, wrote, IN 1727: "And one that has
been born, or but ivd in America moro than
three-score years; it may be pardonable for him
to ask: Why may not that be the place Of New
Jerusalem7 ?" The question would be All easy
one to answer now. George Herbert wrote:
Religion stands on nptoe in our land,
Keady to pass to the American strand.
The ve1aeB we're refused license at first, and
could not be published Americans were no
behindhand in similar lRudAtions. The Rev.
William Mor1il, settler Of 1923, said Of Nav
England:
4 gTaudchId to earth's paradise Il born,
Well umbed, well nezved, fair, sweet, jet forIorn.
The Rev. S:thAniel Ward, Of Ipswich, NAss,
wrote in 1G45:
Sc farewell England oldl
u evil times ensue
Let good men come to u4,
Fee1 welcome them to New.
4 couplet OF unknown origin.
The esste-e nations atnt, their glory ends,
An6 empire 1tsea where tho sun descepds,
is said to have been drilled By the Puri-
tans into rock on the shore near Plym-
outh,-an unlikely story, for the Maynowers
passengers had no time to spare for such
sentimentality. Jenerson, by the way, always
insisted that the epig1am, "Rebellion to
tyrants is obedience to God, WAS originally in
sc1ihed On 4 cannon ii Jamaica in honor Of ths
IL II