Then kneeling down to Heaven’s eternal King,
       The saint, the father, and the husband prays;
    Hope springs exulting on triumphant wing,
       That thus they all shall meet in future days: 
    There ever bask in uncreated rays,
       No more to sigh or shed the bitter tear
    Together hymning their Creator’s praise,
       In such society, yet still more dear;
    While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere.

May He who enlightened the understanding of those cottagers with a knowledge of Himself for the entertainment of such hope, ’who sanctified their affections that they might love Him, and put His fear into their hearts that they might dread to offend Him’—­may He who, in preparing for these blessed effects, disdained not the humble instrumentality of parochial schools, enable this of ours, by the discipline and teaching pursued in it, to sow seeds for a like harvest!  In this wish, I am sure, my friends, you will all fervently join; and now, after renewing our expression of regret that the benevolent founder is not here to perform the ceremony himself, we will proceed to lay the first stone of the intended edifice.

NOTES AND ILLUSTRATIONS.

I. POLITICAL.

I. Apology for the French Revolution.

P. 3, l. 5.  ‘A sublime allegory.’  ‘The Vision of Mirza’ of Addison, originally published in ‘The Spectator’ (No. 159, Sept. 1, 1711).

P. 4, ll. 38-9.  ’A bishop, a man of philosophy and humanity, as distinguished as your lordship.’  This was the Abbe Gregoire, whom Schlosser describes as the ‘good-natured, pious, and visionary bishop;’ and again, ’particular attention must be paid to the speeches of the pious Gregoire and his dreams of Utopian virtue.’ (’History of the 18th Century,’ vol. vi. pp. 203-434). cf.  Alison’s ’History of the French Revolution,’ vol. ii. c. vii. pp. 81-2 (ed. 1853); vol. xii. p. 3, et alibi.

P. 7, l. 20.  ‘The hero of the necklace.’  Prince de Rohan.  More exactly the Cardinal de Rohan, but who was of the princely house of De Rohan.  Carlyle has characteristically told the story of ‘the diamond necklace’ in one of his Essays.  Cf.  Alison, as before, i. p. 177; and Schlosser, s.u.

P. 8, l. 22.  ’Mr. Burke, in a philosophic lamentation over the extinction of chivalry,’ &c.  The famous apostrophe in relation to Marie Antoinette in his ‘Reflections on the Revolution in France’ (1790).

P. 9, ll. 8-12.  The author gives no reference whatever to the source of this French quotation.

P. 14, l. 34.  ‘The Rights of Man.’  The famous (or notorious) book of Thos.  Paine, published in 1791-2 as ’The Rights of Man; being an Answer to Mr. Burke’s Attack on the French Revolution.’  See p. 21 for Wordsworth’s vehement denunciation of Burke in the work which Paine answers, viz.  ‘The Reflections,’ &c.  But Wordsworth’s ultimate estimate of Burke is the splendid praise of ‘The Prelude,’ book vii. ll. 513-544.