country and respectable members of society. J. Q. Adams.

The incongruity of the Bible with the age of its birth; its freedom from earthly mixtures; its original, unborrowed, solitary greatness; the suddenness with which it broke forth amidst the general gloom : these, to me, are strong indications of its Divine descent: I cannot reconcile them with a human origin.-Channing.

I believe that the Bible is to be understood and received in the plain and obvious meaning of its passages; for I cannot persuade myself that a book intended for the instruction and conversion of the whole world should cover its true meaning in any such mystery and doubt that none but critics and philosophers can discover it.Daniel Webster.

The Gospel is not merely a book--it is a living power-a book surpassing all others. -I never omit to read it, and every day with the same pleasure. Nowhere is to be found such a series of beautiful ideas, and admirable moral maxims, which pass before us like the battalions of a celestial army.

The soul can never go astray with this book for its guide.-Napoleon on St. Helena.

Turn from the oracles of man-still dim even in their clearest response-to the oracles of God, which are never dark. Bury all your books when you feel the night of skepticism gathering around you; bury them all, powerful though you may have deemed their spells to illuminate the unfathomable; open your Bible, and all the spiritual world will be as bright as day.-J. Wilson.

The Bible belongs to the world. It has outlived all other books as a mighty factor ir civilization, as radical in its unique and peerless teachings, as identified with the promotion of liberty, as the companion or pioneer of commerce, as the foundation of civil government, as the source and support of learning, as both containing and fostering literature of the noblest order, as the promoter and purifier of art, and as the book which claims to be, and is, from God.

Never yet did there exist a full faith in the divine word which did not expand the intellect, while it purified the heart; which did not multiply and exalt the aims and objects of the understanding, while it fixed and simplified those of the desires and feelings.-S. T. Coleridge.

There is not in the whole compass of human literature a book like the Bible, which deals with such profound topics,

which touches human nature on so many sides of experience, which relates so especially to its duties and sorrows and temptations, and yet which looks over the whole field of life with such sympathy and cheerfulness of spirit.-The New Testament is a book of radiant joy.-H. W. Beecher.

When that illustrious man, Chief Justice Jay, was dying he was asked if he had any farewell address to leave his children. He replied, "They have the Bible."

In this little book (the New Testament), is contained all the wisdom of the world.Ewald.

All the distinctive features and superiority of our republican institutions are derived from the teachings of Scripture.Everett.

Read your Bible, making it the first morning business of your life to understand some portion of it clearly, and your daily business to obey it in all that you do understand. To my early knowledge of the Bible I owe the best part of my taste in literature, and the most precious, and on the whole, the one essential part of my education.Ruskin.

The majesty of Scripture strikes me with admiration, as the purity of the Gospel has its influence on my heart. Peruse the works of our philosophers; with all their pomp of diction, how mean, how contemptible, are they, compared with the Scriptures! Is it possible that a book at once so simple and sublime should be merely the work of man? The Jewish authors were incapable of the diction, and strangers to the morality contained in the Gospel, the marks of whose truths are so striking and inimitable that the inventor would be a more astonishing character than the hero.-Rousseau.

The morality of the Bible is, after all, the safety of society.-The doctrine of the golden rule, the interpretation of the law as love to God and man, and the specific directions in it to husbands and wives, parents and children, masters and servants, rulers and citizens, and the warnings against covetousness and sin are the best preventives and cure of all political diseases.-F. C. Monfort.

I use the Scriptures not as an arsenal to be resorted to only for arms and weapons, but as a matchless temple, where I delight to contemplate the beauty, the symmetry, and the magnificence of the structure, and to increase my awe and excite my devotion to the Deity there preached and adored.Boyle.

That the truths of the Bible have the power of awakening an intense moral feel

ing in every human being; that they make bad men good, and send a pulse of healthful feeling through all the domestic, civil, and social relations; that they teach men to love right, and hate wrong, and seek each others welfare as children of a common parent: that they control the baleful passions of the heart, and thus make men proficient in selfgovernment; and finally that they teach man to aspire after conformity to a being of infinite holiness, and fill him with hopes more purifying, exalted, and suited to his nature than any other book the world has ever known-these are facts as incontrovertible as the laws of philosophy, or the demonstrations of mathematics.-F. Way

land.

We account the Scriptures of God to be the most sublime philosophy. I find more sure marks of authenticity in the Bible than in any profane history whatever.--Isaac Newton.

Of the Bible, says Garibaldi, "This is the cannon that will make Italy free."

Sink the Bible to the bottom of the ocean, and still man's obligations to God would be unchanged. He would have the same path to tread, only his lamp and his guide would be gone ;-the same voyage to make, but his chart and compass would be overboard.-H. W. Beecher.

I know the Bible is inspired because it finds me at greater depths of my being than any other book.-Coleridge.

The highest earthly enjoyments are but a shadow of the joy I find in reading God's word.-Lady Jane Grey.

They who are not induced to believe and live as they ought by those discoveries which God hath made in Scripture, would stand out against any evidence whatever; even that of a messenger sent express from the other world.-Atterbury.

Do you know a book that you are willing to put under your head for a pillow when you lie dying? That is the book you want to study while you are living. There is but one such book in the world.-Joseph Cook.

Hold fast to the Bible as the sheet-anchor of your liberties; write its precepts in your hearts, and practice them in your lives. To the influence of this book we are indebted for all the progress made in true civilization, and to this we must look as our guide in the future. "Righteousness exalteth a nation; but sin is a reproach to any people."-U. S. Grant,

The most learned, acute, and diligent student cannot, in the longest life, obtain an entire knowledge of this one volume. The more deeply he works the mine, the

richer and more abundant he finds the ore; new light continually beams from this source of heavenly knowledge, to direct the conduct, and illustrate the work of God and the ways of men; and he will at last leave the world confessing, that the more he studied the Scriptures, the fuller conviction he had of his own ignorance, and of their inestimable value.- Walter Scott.

Philosophical argument, especially that drawn from the vastness of the universe, in comparison with the apparent insignificance of this globe, has sometimes shaken my reason for the faith that is in me; but my heart has always assured and reassured me that the gospel of Jesus Christ must be a divine reality.-Daniel Webster.

Cities fall, empires come to nothing, kingdoms fade away as smoke. Where is Numa, Minos, Lycurgus? Where are their books? and what has become of their laws? But that this book no tyrant should have been able to consume, no tradition to choke, no heretic maliciously to corrupt; that it should stand unto this day, amid the wreck of all that was human, without the alteration of one sentence so as to change the doctrine taught therein, -surely there is a very singular providence, claiming our attention in a most remarkable manner.-Bp. Jewell.

A noble book! All men's book! It is our first, oldest statement of the never-ending problem,-man's destiny, and God's ways with him here on earth; and all in such freeflowing outlines,-grand in its sincerity, in its simplicity, and its epic melody.- Carlyle.

One monarch to obey, one creed to own; that monarch God; that creed his word alone.

If there is any one fact or doctrine, or command, or promise in the Bible which has produced no practical effect on your temper, or heart, or conduct, be assured you do not truly believe it.-Payson.

There is a Book worth all other books which were ever printed.--Patrick Henry.

The Bible furnishes the only fitting vehicle to express the thoughts that overwhelm us when contemplating the stellar universe.-O. M. Mitchell,

The grand old Book of God still stands, and this old earth, the more its leaves are turned over and pondered, the more it will sustain and illustrate the sacred Word.Prof. Dana.

In my investigation of natural science, I have always found that, whenever I can meet with anything in the Bible on my subjects, it always affords me a firm platform on which to stand.-Lieutenant Maury.

It is impossible to mentally or socially enslave a Bible-reading people. The principles of the Bible are the groundwork of human freedom.-Horace Greeley.

I speak as a man of the world to men of the world; and I say to you, Search the Scriptures! The Bible is the book of all others, to be read at all ages, and in all conditions of human life; not to be read once or twice or thrice through, and then laid aside, but to be read in small portions of one or two chapters every day, and never to be intermitted, unless by some overruling necessity.-J. Q. Adams.

Give to the people who toil and suffer, for whom this world is hard and bad, the belief that there is a better made for them. Scatter Gospels among the villages, a Bible for every cottage.- Victor Hugo.

The word of God will stand a thousand readings; and he who has gone over it most frequently is the surest of finding new wonders there.-J. Hamilton.

Holy Scripture is a stream of running water, where alike the elephant may swim, and the lamb walk without losing its feet.Gregory the Great.

A Bible and a newspaper in every house, a good school in every district-all studied and appreciated as they merit-are the principal support of virtue, morality, and civil liberty.-Franklin.

As the profoundest philosophy of ancient Rome and Greece lighted her taper at Israel's altar, so the sweetest strains of the pagan muse were swept from harps attuned on Zion's hill.-Bp. Thomson.

The whole hope of human progress is suspended on the ever growing influence of the Bible.- William H. Seward.

The Bible is the only cement of nations, and the only cement that can bind religious hearts together.-Bunsen.

The Bible stands alone in human literature in its elevated conception of manhood as to character and conduct.-It is the invaluable training book of the world.-H. W. Beecher.

After all, the Bible must be its own argument and defence. The power of it can never be proved unless it is felt. The anthority of it can never be supported unless it is manifest. The light of it can never be demonstrated unless it shines.—H, J. Van Dyke.

You never get to the end of Christ's words. There is something in them always behind. They pass into proverbs, into laws, into doctrines, into consolations; but they never pass away, and after all the use

that is made of them they are still not exhausted.-A. P. Stanley.

Nobody ever outgrows Scripture; the book widens and deepens with our years.— Spurgeon.

After reading the doctrines of Plato, Socrates, or Aristotle, we feel that the specific difference between their words and Christ's is the difference between an inquiry and a revelation.-Joseph Parker.

When one has given up the one fact of the inspiration of the Scriptures, he has given up the whole foundation of revealed religion.-H. W. Beecher,

I have read the Bible through many times, and now make it a practice to read it through once every year.-It is a book of all others for lawyers, as well as divines; and I pity the man who cannot find in it a rich supply of thought and of rules for conduct.-Daniel Webster.

So far as I have observed God's dealings with my soul, the flights of preachers sometimes entertained me, but it was Scripture expressions which did penetrate my heart, and in a way peculiar to themselves.-John Brown of Haddington.

A man may read the figures on the dial, but he cannot tell how the day goes unless the sun is shining on it; so we may read the Bible over, but we cannot learn to purpose till the spirit of God shine upon it and into our hearts.-T. Watson.

There is no book on which we can rest in a dying moment but the Bible.-Selden.

Wilmot, the infidel, when dying, laid his trembling, emaciated hand on the Bible, and said solemnly and with unwonted energy, "The only objection against this book is a bad life!"

The Bible is to us what the star was to the wise men; but if we spend all our time in gazing upon it, observing its motions, and admiring its splendor, without being led to Christ by it, the use of it will be lost to us. -T. Adams.

All human discoveries seem to be made only for the purpose of confirming more and more strongly the truths that come from on high and are contained in the sacred writings.-Herschel.

A loving trust in the Author of the Bible is the best preparation for a wise and profitable study of the Bible itself.-H. C. Trumbull.

BIGOTRY.-The mind of the bigot is like the pupil of the eye; the more light you pour upon it, the more it will contract. -O. W. Holmes.

The bigot sees religion, not as a sphere, bat a line; and it is the line in which he is moving. He is like an African buffalosees right forward, but nothing on the right or the left. He would not perceive a legion of angels or devils at the distance of ten yards, on the one side or the other.-John Foster.

Bigotry has no head, and cannot think; no heart, and cannot feel. When she moves, it is in wrath; when she pauses it is amidst ruin; her prayers are curses--her God is a demon-her communion is death.O'Connell,

There is no bigotry like that of "free thought" run to seed.-Horace Greeley. Bigotry murders religion to frighten fools with her ghost.-Colton.

There is no tariff so injurious as that with which sectarian bigotry guards its commodities.-It dwarfs the soul by shutting out truths from other continents of thought, and checks the circulation of its own.-E. H. Chapin.

When once a man is determined to believe, the very absurdity of the doctrine does but confirm him in his faith.-Junius.

A man must be both stupid and uncharitable who believes there is no virtue or truth but on his own side.-Addison.

The bigot for the most part clings to opinions adopted without investigation, and defended without argument, while he is intolerant of the opinions of others.Buck.

BIOGRAPHY.-Biography is the personal and home aspect of history.- Wilmott. The best teachers of humanity are the lives of great men.--Fowler.

Great men have often the shortest biographies. Their real life is in their books or deeds.

There is properly no history, only biography.-Emerson.

One anecdote of a man is worth a volume of biography. Channing.

The remains of great and good men, like Elijah's mantle, ought to be gathered up and preserved by their survivors; that as their works follow them in the reward of them, they may stay behind in their benefit.-M. Henry.

Most biographies are of little worth.They are panegyrics, not lives.-The object is, not to let down the hero; and consequently what is most human, most genuine, most characteristic in his history, is excluded. No department of literature is so false as biography.—Channing.

Rich as we are in biography, a well written life is almost as rare as a well-spent one; and there are certainly many more men whose history deserves to be recorded than persons able and willing to furnish the record.-Carlyle.

To be ignorant of the lives of the most celebrated men of antiquity is to continue in a state of childhood all our days.-Plutarch.

A life that is worth writing at all, is worth writing minutely and truthfully.Longfellow.

Biography, especially of the great and good, who have risen by their own exertions to eminence and usefulness, is an inspiring and ennobling study.--Its direct tendency is to reproduce the excellence it records.-H. Mann.

Of all studies, the most delightful and useful is biography.-The seeds of great events lie near the surface; historians delve too deep for them.-No history was ever true; but lives which I have read, if they were not, had the appearance, the interest, the utility of truth.-Landor.

Biography is the most universally pleasant and profitable of all reading.-Carlyle.

Those only who live with a man can write his life with any genuine exactness and discrimination, and few people who have lived with a man know what to remark about him.-Johnson.

Biographies of great, but especially of good men, are most instructive and useful as helps, guides, and incentives to others. Some of the best are almost equivalent to gospels-teaching high living, high thinking, and energetic actions for their own and the world's good.-S. Smiles.

History can be formed from permanent monuments and records; but lives can only be written from personal knowledge, which is growing every day less, and in a short time is lost forever.-Johnson.

:

My advice is, to consult the lives of other men as we would a looking-glass, and from thence fetch examples for our own imitation. Terence.

BIRTH. (See " ANCESTRY," and "GENEALOGY.")

Our birth is nothing but our death begun. as tapers waste the moment they take fire. -Young.

Custom forms us all; our thoughts, our morals, our most fixed belief, are consequences of the place of our birth.-Hill..

What is birth to a man if it be a stain to

his dead ancestors to have left such an offspring?-Sir P. Sidney.

A noble birth and fortune, though they make not a bad man good, yet they are a real advantage to a worthy one, and place his virtues in the fairest light.-Lillo.

High birth is a gift of fortune which should never challenge esteem toward those who receive it, since it costs them neither study nor labor.-Bruyere.

Of all vanities and fopperies, the vanity of high birth is the greatest. True nobility is derived from virtue, not from birth. Titles, indeed, may be purchased; but virtue is the only coin that makes the bargain valid.-Burton.

Distinguished birth is indeed an honor to him who lives worthily of the virtue of his progenitors. If, as Seneca says, "Virtue is the only nobility," he is doubly a nobleman who is not only descended from a virtuous ancestry, but is himself virtuous.

When real nobleness accompanies the imaginary one of birth, the imaginary seems to mix with the real and become real too. Greville.

Those who have nothing else to recommend them to the respect of others but only their blood, cry it up at a great rate, and have their mouths perpetually full of it.-By this mark they commonly distinguish themselves; but you may depend upon it there is no good bottom, nothing of the true worth of their own when they insist so much and set their credit on that of others. -Charron.

I have learned to judge of men by their own deeds, and not to make the accident of birth the standard of their merit.— Mrs. Hale.

Features alone do not run in the blood; vices and virtues, genius and folly, are transmitted through the same sure but unseen channel.-Hazlitt.

BLESSEDNESS.-True blessedness consisteth in a good life and a happy death. Solon.

Nothing raises the price of a blessing like its removal; whereas, it was its continuance which should have taught us its value. -H. Moore.

Blessings we enjoy daily, and for the most of them, because they be so common, men forget to pay their praises.-But let not us, because it is a sacrifice so pleasing to him who still protects us, and gives us flowers, and showers, and meat, and content.-Izaak Walton.

Reflect upon your present blessings, of

which every man has many not on your past misfortunes, of which all men have some.-Dickens.

The beloved of the Almighty are the rich who have the humility of the poor, and the poor who have the magnanimity of the rich.-Saadi.

Let me tell you that every misery I miss is a new blessing.-Izaak Walton.

There are three requisites to the proper enjoyment of earthly blessings: a thankful reflection, on the goodness of the giver; a deep sense of our own unworthiness; and a recollection of the uncertainty of our long possessing them.-The first will make us grateful; the second, humble; and the third, moderate.-Hannah More.

Blessings ever wait on virtuous deeds, and though a late, a sure reward succeeds.-Congreve.

It is generally true that all that is required to make men unmindful of what they owe to God for any blessing, is, that they should receive that blessing often and regularly. Whately.

How blessings brighten as they take their flight!-Young.

Health, beauty, vigor, riches, and all the other things called goods, operate equally as evils to the vicious and unjust, as they do as benefits to the just.-Plato.

The good things of life are not to be had singly, but come to us with a mixture; like a schoolboy's holiday, with a task affixed to the tail of it.-Charles Lamb.

Blessedness consists in the accomplishment of our desires, and in our having only regular desires.-Augustine.

BLOCKHEAD. (See "COMMON

SENSE.")

A blockhead cannot come in, nor go away, nor sit, nor rise, nor stand, like a man of sense. Bruyere.

There never was any party, faction, sect, or cabal whatsoever, in which the most ignorant were not the most violent; for a bee is not a busier animal than a blockhead.-Pope.

Heaven and earth fight in vain against a dunce.-Schiller.

BLUSH.-A blush is the color of virtue.--Diogenes.

Whoever blushes seems to be good.Menander.

Whoever blushes, is already guilty ; true innocence is ashamed of nothing.-Rous

seau.