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UNIVERSITY COURIER.
thin rougher
I take it then that no principle of civil or personal import attains its merited results, unless it becomes a part of the national fabric. Further, to become such a part, it must be the very light and life of individual existence. Men have risen, declared truth, and the light of reform flickered for a moment, only to be followed by a darker gloom. But the continued enunciation of truth made the impulses of the individual the heart beats of the world, quickened as reconstruction followed, and a new principle was placed in the organic law of nations. Some of the grandest, most sublime truths recorded have been written in blood, while the individuality of empires was crumbling under the force of a new idea—the centralized thought of many minds.
Liberty, scarcely known on the plains of the East, secured a following that enabled her to found a nation among the hills of Greece. Her power there destroyed by the hand of monarchy, she crossed the continent, leaving prosperity and happiness among the Alps; lightened oppression in the Peninsula; broke the imperial chains and severed the Papal bonds that bound Holland; fought with the Puritan of England; won, but lost as the grasp of empire tightened. Driven across the water, enthroned in the hearts of a people, she met Justice, loved, and on a July morn of 76, youth bade it, the multitude responded, and silvered age with wrinkled hand rang the wedding bells at a marriage that gave us our Columbia.
True, nations have an individuality. But where is our individuality? We think this child of a hundred years, stands above monarchy and aristocracy, beautified by the dawning of a new era. What new era? Alas, there is none. The light of this epoch first pierced the darkness with the martyr fires of the sixteenth century. It burned the brightest when around the camp fires of the revolution a bankrupt, burdened, heartbroken people demanded freedom. When, tell me, when did the light of this age burn higher? Was it when the hot, scorching tears of over four hundred million bondmen burned the life out of the "Sunny South?" Or was it when Liberty and Justice could look down upon this withering and marrowing of life, this blighting of home, and not shed a single tear?
At the outset of our career, we declared that freedom is a God-given right. For over half a century, by virtue of that declaration, we were liars in the sight of the world. We could declare, but other nations acted and took the first step towards stamping out slavery. Freedom was the rallying cry in the struggle for our independence. But we allowed nations of the Old World to lead us in acting, and thus they placed upon record as their individuality, that of ours. Talk of being an example to the world, when kingdoms and empires could peaceably wipe slavery from their domain long before this boasted Republic of ours could do it, even by force of arms. Long enough have we listened, to the praises alone, of America. Long enough have over-zealous patriots led to national action, carrying a banner inscribed, "We make no mistakes."
But we have passed that turning point in our life, and it remains for us to determine whether or not there is vitality and virtue enough left in this camp-follower in the army of progress to advocate an idea and to record it as its own. Many intellectual men say that the signs
of the times indicate that we have passed beyond the meridian of our existence. Be this so or not, we do know that four elements are woven into our fabric that have a tendency to tear it asunder. To-day we are stamping into our laws, the individuality of ignorance, of corporate powers, of sections, and of parties.
We open our doors to the civilized world and ask the people to come. And they do come.Many of them ignorant of our government and of the duties devolving upon citizens. Many are led here by the sole desire of finding liberty. They exercise liberty even though justice suffer. Our own element of ignorance unites with this foreign, and even now they are making impressions that time alone can wash out. But worse, they increase the strength of corporate powers and of parties.
Need I tell you of the influence of gold upon our government? No. It is enough to know that it meets one man at the ballot box, and makes another Chief Justice of the United States. But more, it strengthens the bonds of parties, and by them our civil service is debased, perverted, and made a laughing stock for the world.
Apparant justice binds liberty; liberty robs justice, and the Union trembles under this conflict of principles that should go hand in hand.
I would that I could see ignorance taken from the ballot; corporate powers deprived of their influence upon the government; parties held together by the demands of the nation, not those of individuals; and finally, I would that I might bring South and North face to face; show them their unity of interests; make them feel that the welfare of our Union demands their hearty co-operation; then I believe we should exercise an individuality, and stamp it upon the roll of nations. Then, with these elements under our feet, we could place high on the mount of mental ascendency, a beacon light for succeeding nations, this truth, and let us make it a truth, "Liberty and Justice can and do dwell in harmony."
SCIENTIFIC NOTES.
Additions to Cabinets in Department of Natural History during the past two weeks:
Two very fine specimens of Itacolumyte, one of which is a bar over two feet long and two inches thick, contributed by Master Russell Whitman, of Lawrence. Itacolumyte is a schistose quartz rock, consisting of quartz grains with hydrous mica. On account of the mica in lamination it is tough and bends considerably without breaking; it is owing to this property that it is commonly called "flexible sandstone."
Thirteen more species of fossil dicotyledonous leaves from Ottawa county, making a total of twenty-five, all of which are new to science. Such specimens make a collection rich.
A collection of 197 species and 552 specimens of rare beetles and butterflies from Germany, Hungary, Switzerland, High Alps of Southern France, Austria, Italy, Spain, and the Balearic Islands.
A box containing a fine series of the rocks from the subcarboniferous region South-eastern Kansas, contributed by Erasmus Haworth, who used them at the Academy of Science in the illustration of his papers. Some of the specimens are exceedingly instructive, especially the Chert rocks, which contain fossils and crystals of zinc and lead, others show cavities from which the lead