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THg COUNTRYMAN.
99
Fasting and Prayer.
Mr. Countryman :—Please publish the
following, with such comments as you may
deem proper, and oblige your friend, R.
J. Wynne.
“The Rev. M. W. Arnold will preach at
the Putnam Camp-ground, on friday, the
27th inst., responsive to the proclamation
of President Davis. All are affectionately
invited to attend, of every name and order,
and bring their slaves. The meeting will
continue 3 days.”
In obedience to the proclamation of our
president, whose glory is, that he acknowl
edges the hand of God in this revolution,
the people of Putnam County are all invi-
ted, as above, to assemble at the camp
ground, and humble themselves as a peo
ple before the God of battles—the Creator
and Preserver of nations. It is, in
conformity with the president’s idea, a call
made, not upon any particular class, but
upon the whole body of the people, to in
voke Heaven’s blessing upon our cause,
and to pray for the success of our arms.
That man or woman has but an inade-
idea of the mighty struggle now going on,
who does not believe—and not only be
lieve with the mind, but feel it in his heart
—that this war is conducted under the im
mediate eye, and supervision of the Al
mighty. There is no accident in this
bloody strife. Each event, as it occurs,
however trifling it may seem, is but a link
in the chain which binds God’s purpose to
its fulfillment. The mighty results which
often flow from apparently the most tri
lling circumstance, piove that even the
fanatic and the madman who caused this
war, are but instruments in the hands of
Omnipotence for the accomplishment of
His counsel.
Is there net cause, then, for every man,
woman, and child to bow in humility and
veneration before Jehovah] Let us all,
therefore, go up as a united people on the
27th inst., and let our slaves go with us,
and acknowledge supremacy of the Great
I Am. It is meet that saint and sinner
unite their supplications before the*throne
of Omnipotence.
“ Sanctify ye a fast, call ye a solemn as
sembly, gather the elders and all the in
habitants of the land, into the house of
the Lord your God, and cry unto the
Lord.
Therefore, also, now, saith the Lord,
Turn ye even to me with all your heart,
and with fasting, and with weeping, and
with mourning.
Blow the trumpet in Zion,sanctify a fast,
call a solemn assembly.
Gather the people, sanctify the congre
gation, assemble the elders. Gather the
children and those that suck the breasts. Let
the bridegroom .come fbrth of his chamber,
and the bride of her closet.”
liberty.
“All governments ought to aspire to pro
duce the highest happiness by the least ob
jectionable means. To produce good with
out some admixture of ill, is the preroga
tive of the Deity alone. In a state of na
ture, each individual would strive to pre
serve the whole of his liberty, but then he
would be also liable to the encroachments
of others, who would feel equally deter
mined to preserve the whole of theirs. In
a state of eivizilation, each individual vol
untarily sacrifices a part of his liberty to
increase the general stock. But he sacri
fices his liberty only to the laws ; and it
ought to be the care of good governments
that this sacrifice of the individual is re
paid him with security, and with interest;
otherwise the declarations of Rousseau
might be verified, and a state of nature
preferred to a state of civilization. The
liberty we obtain by being members of civ
ilized society, would be licentiousness if it
allowed us to harm others, and slavery if it
prevented us from benefitting ourselves.—
True liberty, theiefoie, allows each indi
vidual to do all the good he can to himself
without injuring his neighbor.”
Language.
“The ignorance of the Chrnese may be
attributed to their language. A literary
Chinese must spend half his life in acquir
ing a thorough knowledge of it. The use
of metaphor,which may be said to the be al
gebra of language, is, I apprehend, un
known amongst them. And as language,
after all, is made up only of the signs and
counters of knowledge, he that is obliged
to lose so much time in acquiring the sign,
will have but little of the thing. So com
plete is the ignorance of this conceited na
tion, on many points, that very curious
brass models of all the mechanical powers,
which the French government had sent
over as a present, they considered to be
meant as toys for the amusement of the
grand-childien of the emperor. And I have
heard the late Sir George Staunton declare^
that the costly mathematical instruments
made by Ramsden and Dolland, and taken
to Pekiu by Lord Macarteny, were as ut
terly useless .to the ChiLese as a steam
engine to an Esquimaux, or a loom to a
Hottentot. The father of Montaigne, not
inaptly to my present subject, has observ
ed that the tedious time we moderns em
ploy in acquiring the language of the ac-
cient Greeks and Romans, which cost them
nothing, is the principal reason why we
cannot arrive at that grandeur of soul, and
perfection of knowledge, that was in them.
But the learned languages, after all, are in
dispensable to form the gentleman and the
scholar, and are well worth all the labor
that they have cost us, provided they are
valued not for themselves alone, which
would make a pedant, but as a foundation
for further acquirements. The foundation,
therefore, should be in a great measure
hidden, and its solidity presumed and in
ferred from the strength, elegance, and con
venience of the superstructure. In one of
the notes to a former publication, I have
quoted an old writer, who observes, “ that
we fatten a sheep with grass, not in order
to obtain a crop of hay from his back, but
in the hope that he will feed us with mut
ton. and clothe us with wool.’ We may
apply this to the sciences: we teach a
young man algebra, the mathematics, and
logic, not that he should take his quota
tions and parallelograms into Westminster
Hall, nor bring his ten predicaments to the
House of Commons, hut that he should
bring a mind to both these places so well
stored with the sound principles of truth
and of reason, as not to be deceived by
the chicanery of the bar, nor the sophistry
of the senate. The acquirements of sci
ence may be termed the armor of the
mind ; but that armor would be worse than
useless that cost us all we had, and left ua
nothing to defend.”
Honesty the Best Policy.
“A nobleman travelling in Scotland,
about 6 years ago, was asked for alms in
the high streer of Edinburgh, by a little
ragged boy. He said he had no change,
upon which the boy offered to procure it.
His lordship, in order to get rid of his im
portunity, gave him a piece of silver, which
the boy conceiving was to be changed, ran
off for that purpose. On his return, not
finding his benefactor, whom he expected
to wait, he watched for for several days in
the place where he had received the mon
ey. At leDgtb,, the nobleman happened
again to pass that way. The boy accosted
him, and put the change he had procured
into his hand, counting it with great exact
ness. His lordship was so pleased with the
boy’s honesty, that he placed him at school,
with the assurance of providing for him.”
“Larry’s” communication has been re
ceived, and will appear next week. I trust
that he will frequently communicate with
The Countryman.