Oh, my Friends! All the distinctions alluded to such as we know them here, are comparatively little things. Greater things are in prospect; but these things, though they seem great, are really little. Pause, think, recall what life has taught you--what observation and experience have combined to impress most deeply upon your consciousness--and begin your review with the sad words, _after all_! After all, health is a little thing, and genius is a little thing, and learning, and eloquence, and pleasure, and fame, and power, and wealth, and rank, and office, all earthly things are little things. How little satisfaction they yield while they last, and how soon they pass away! THE SHIP AND THE BIRD.--_Owen Meredith._ Hear a song that was born in the land of my birth! The anchors are lifted, the fair ship is free, And the shout of the mariners floats in its mirth 'Twixt the light in the sky and the light on the sea. And this ship is a world. She is freighted with souls, She is freighted with merchandise; proudly she sails With the Labor that stores, and the Will that controls The gold in the ingots, the silk in the bales. From the gardens of Pleasure, where reddens the rose, And the scent of the cedar is faint on the air, Past the harbors of Traffic, sublimely she goes, Man's hopes o'er the world of the waters to bear! Where the cheer from the harbors of Traffic is heard, Where the gardens of Pleasure fade fast on the sight, O'er the rose, o'er the cedar, there passes a bird; 'Tis the Paradise Bird, never known to alight. And that bird, bright and bold as a poet's desire, Roams her own native heavens, the realms of her birth, There she soars like a seraph, she shines like a fire, And her plumage hath never been sullied by earth. And the mariners greet her; there's song on each lip, For the bird of good omen, and joy in each eye, And the ship and the bird, and the bird and the ship, Together go forth over ocean and sky. Fast, fast fades the land! far the rose-gardens flee, And far fleet the harbors. In regions unknown The ship is alone on a desert of sea, And the bird in a desert of sky is alone. In those regions unknown, o'er that desert of air, Down that desert of waters--tremendous in wrath-- The storm-wind Euroclydon leaps from his lair, And cleaves through the waves of the ocean, his path. And the bird in the cloud, and the ship on the wave. Overtaken, are beaten about by wild gales, And the mariners all rush their cargo to save, Of the gold in the ingots, the silk in the bales. Lo! a wonder which never before hath been heard For it never before hath been given to sight; On the ship hath descended the Paradise Bird, The Paradise Bird never known to alight!