and happy, — blessed, both of them, with liberty, Christianity, and peace.
But how, it will be asked, is that great result to be brought about through so insignificant an instrumentality as that of the Colony of Liberia, a little State, composed of a few emigrant blacks? Ha! when the wise and knowing king James saw a small vessel, the "Mayflower," push off from the English coast, with a little band of emigrants, fleeing from religious persecution, and bound to the shores of the new western World, — what idea had he, think you, that, led on by Providence, they were going to lay the foundation of a great nation, which would one day extend itself across that continent, from ocean to ocean, and which would at length powerfully influence the destinies of the world? But the prophetic eye reads effects in causes: in the shooting acorn it sees the mighty oak; in the first drooping branch of the Banyan-tree, it perceives a future forest; in Adam and Eve, it beholds a populous world. Show the reflective man but a principle, and he will give you a thousand results, which to the common mind are indiscernible till they are actually produced: from a single fossil bone, a Cuvier will present you the whole form of the animal to which it belonged, tell you its habits and history, and draw you a sketch of the country and scenery through which it roamed.
