Page:The future of Africa.djvu/165

Rh extensive enough for excursive reason; and so, after all adventurous daring, and grand endeavor, and ennobling effort, his soul is forced back to the Great Being, the idea of whom, within his soul, originated all his thought and action; to seek satisfaction in the Infinite and the Eternal! But the soul that worships things low and grovelling, clings to the dust; and is not only divorced from all spiritual greatness, but knows not even the simplest beauty of nature, nor yet the excellence of its own being! . I advance now to the second point which I was to speak of, that is, that the true ideas of God and religion, if maintained in purity by a nation, will make that nation immortal. I present this consideration because every thoughtful man desires that his country may live; and hence it is a matter of importance to all such, to learn and know what will prolong, and hand down to the future that nation's life, with which he is connected, and which he loves. There are various causes which cause this solicitude in the breast of a good citizen: the great poet of our language says that "man is a creature who looks both before and after;" and among his many cherished sentiments, are hope for his children and love of his country. And I have no doubt that, to a great extent, it is because reason and manly feeling thus act in man, that, besides anxiety for a pure past history, a Christian patriot ponders deeply upon the interests of the future. It is the wont of most men, in the ordinary current of life, to think but little whether they shall live very long in this world: they know they must die; they know