there, and everywhere,—who, expelled from one country, would suddenly, and without any intimidation, appear in another, to experience similar treatment, whom fires could not burn nor oceans drown, whom torrid suns could not consume, nor polar snows and frosts congeal, whom the sword could not slay, nor chains bind; and even time, that impairs and wastes all things, even the great globe itself, had no power over the nerves, the bones, and sinews of this pet and hero of Eugene Sue: the lightnings could not blast, nor the pestilence smite, nor earthquakes engulph; but over all, through all, and in all, he stalked on untouched and unharmed; urged onward by that mysterious voice, inaudible to all, but to his own ever watchful and waiting ears, pronouncing the one word “March, march.” In this ideal creation, we say of Eugene Sue, we have a type of truth. Such in our world has been its reception; such its treatment, and such its vitality and power.—Crushed in one age, it appears in the next; banished from one country, it rises up in another; confined in dungeons and loaded with chains, burnt at the stake and beheaded on the scaffold, and when its destruction has been proclaimed, and its enemies exulting in the conviction, that truth will trouble them no more, of a sudden it appears in their midst, shaking its gory locks, the axe, the chains and the faggot, at its destroyers and its foes.
Such have been the struggles and trials of truth in the world; such her efforts to establish her dominion over it, and to make men and nations the recipients of her benefits and blessings: to make them that for which they were designed and created, and what, without truth, they never can become.
And now from these general remarks, respecting the nature of truth and its objects, it must be apparent to all, that the only real benefactors of our rage, the only genuine philanthropists of our world, are the heroes and champions of truth; these elevated spirts, who, in advance of their age, and country, and influence only by love and good will to man, have done all things, suffered all things, for the cause of truth—men, who, superior to the prejudices of their times, and the ignorance of their age, lived and died for the advancement of but two objects alone, which are inseparably connected together—God’s glory and man’s good. But, as these can only be promoted by truth alone—this truth constitued the single object of their desires, pursuits and labors; and for this they have gone to the dungeon, the stake and the scaffold. But, from their blood, truth like a phenix in fairer and mightier forms has arisen; and from its ashes, where “lives its wonted fires,” its voice has gone forth over a slumbering world, to awaken its children to a sense of their duties, their interests and happiness. And thus, time after time, and age after age, has she appeared in many an undying name, whose deeds live, and whose memories still shed a hallowed light on the past, and tend to radiate the present;
