Man is his own star, and the soul that can
     Render an honest and a perfect man
     Commands all light, all influence, all fate,

     Nothing to him falls early, or too late. 
     Our acts our angels are, or good or ill,
     Our fatal shadows that walk by us still.

HOLY WRIT.

The Lord has well loved man:  “He found him in a desert land, and in the waste howling wilderness; he led him about, he instructed him, he kept him as the apple of his eye.  As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth over her young, spreadeth abroad her wings, taketh them, beareth them on her wings, so the Lord alone did lead him.”  “The Lord hath sought him a man after his own heart, and the Lord hath commanded him to be a captain over his people.”  “When I consider thy heavens, the work of thy fingers, the moon and the stars which thou hast ordained, [then] what is man, that thou art mindful of him? and the son of man, that thou visitest him?  For thou hast made him

A LITTLE LOWER THAN THE ANGELS,

and hast crowned him with glory and honor!” “I have set the Lord before me.  Because he is at my right hand, I shall not be moved.”  “Thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.”  “I have been young, and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous forsaken, nor his seed begging bread.”  “For a thousand years in thy sight are but as yesterday when it is past, and as a watch in the night.”  “For all our days are passed away in thy wrath:  we spend our years as a tale that is told.”  “So teach us to number our days, that we may apply our hearts unto wisdom.”  “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet and a light unto my path.”  “He giveth his beloved sleep.”  “A man’s heart deviseth his way, but the Lord directeth his steps.”  “One event happeneth to them all.”  “Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was; and the spirit shall turn unto God who gave it.”

We perceive, upon a glance at this broad subject, that a book would be better fitted to its treatment than a chapter, and yet a chapter alone will aid in attuning the mind to the nobility of our destiny.  A single thought entering the mind at the right time will turn the current of a life.  Let us elevate and strengthen our present into the nobler foundation of a happier future on earth and a blissful eternity in heaven.  We are endowed with shame.  Let it keep us from meriting the stinging epigram:  “God made him, and therefore let him pass for a man.”

WOMAN.

     She was a phantom of delight
     When first she gleamed upon my sight.

     And now I see, with eye serene,
     The very pulse of the machine;
     A being breathing thoughtful breath,
     A traveler betwixt life and death;
     The reason firm, the temperate will,
     Endurance, foresight,