A TRUE PATRIOT. BY JAMES C. FIELDS. When dust to dust returns, Are they then lost? No, still their spirit burns And quickens in the race ; the life they give Humanity receives, and they survive While Hope and Virtue live. The land-marks of their age, The hopeful future is their heritage; Re-echo through all time. Such kindling words are thine, Thou o'er whose tomb the requiem soundeth still, Thou from whose lips the silvery tones yet thrill In many a bosom, waking life divine; And since thy Master to the world gave token That for Love's faith the creed of fear was broken, None higher have been spoken. Thy reverent eye could see, Heir of His love, born to high destiny: Thy brother, high or low. Great teachers formed thy youth, * Nature and God spoke with thee, and the truth Shall still shine on undimmed. Ages agone, like thee, By the blue waters of the Egean Sea; And thy great teachers spake not unto him. * " In this town I pursued my theological studies. I had no professor to guide me, but I had two noble places of study. One was yonder beautiful edifice now so frequented as a public library; the other was the beach, the roar of which has so often mingled with the worship of this place, my daily resort, dear to me in the sunshine, still more attractive in the storm. Seldom do I visit it now without thinking of ihe work, which there, in the sight of that beauty, in ihe sound of those waves, was carried on in my soul. No spot on earth has helped to form me so much as that beach. There I lifted up my voice in praise amidst the tempest. There, softened by beauty, I poured out my thanksgiving and contrite confessions. There, in reverential sympathy with the mighty power around me, I became conscious of the power within. There, strug. gling thoughts and emotions broke forth, as if moved to utterance by nature's eloquence of winds and waves. There began happiness surpassing all worldly pleasure, all gifts of fortune-the happiness of communing with the work of God.”—Dr. Channing's Discourse at Newport.R.I. It is related that when Socrates fell a victim to the passions of a partial tribunal, and a deluded people, and all his disciples were terrified into flight, his friend Isocrates had the honorable intrepidity to appear in the streets of Athens with the mourning garb. Ha ! leave ye, in affright, The corse alone! Are all,-all gone ? With pallid fear ! The grey-haired seer ! In mourning robes ; Grief his heart probes ! Low bows his head. Weep for the dead. In sorrow driven. Calm thoughts of heaven ! « Behold the slain." Take up the strain ! That silent bier; The world must hear! Can break the spell; God. like!-Farewell! GONE. BY JOHN G. WHITTIER. Fold her, oh Father! in thine arms, And let her henceforth be A messenger of love between Our human hearts and Thee. Still let her mild rebuking stand Between us and the wrong, And her dear memory serve to make Our faith in Goodness strong. And, grant that she who, trembling, here Distrusted all her powers, The well belov'd of ours. us, LIGHT. BY EBENEZER ELLIOT. ** Gone before To that unseen and silent shore, Shall we not meet as heretofore Some summer morning ?"-LAMB. Another call is given; The path which reaches Heaven. Made brighter summer hours, Has left with the flowers. Forewarned us of decay; Fell around our sister's way. As sinks behind the hill Clear, suddenly and still. Eternal as the sky; A sound which could not die. The changing of her sphere, Who walked an Angel here. Fell on us like the dew; Like fairy blossoms grew. Were in her very look; A true and holy book : To which our hearts could move ; A canticle of love. And by the hearth-fire's light ; Once more her sweet · Good night !" There seems a shadow on the day, Her smile no longer cheers ; A dimness on the stars of night, Like eyes that look through tears. Alone unto our Father's will One thought hath reconciled ; That he whose love exceedeth ours Hath taken home His child. God said, “Let there be light! And fled away ; And cried, «'Tis day! 'tis day!' O'er daisies white; And blushing, murmur'd, · Light' Then floods of praise Pour'd forth her pensive lays. Lo, heaven's bright bow is glad ! Lo, trees and flowers all clad In glory, bloom ! And shall the mortal sons of God Be senseless as the trodden clod; And darker than the tomb ? No, by the Mind of man ! By God, our sire! Shall see and feel its fire. By earth, and hell, and heaven, Mind, mind alone, The night of minds, is gone! THE STAR OF BETHLEHEM. BY JOHN G. WHITTIER. He ceased; for at his very feet In mild rebuke, a floweret smiled How thrilled his sinking heart to greet The Star-flower of the Virgin's child! Sown by some wandering Frank, it drew Its life from alien air and earth, And told to Paynim Sun and Dew The story of the Saviour's birth. From scorching beams, in kindly mood, The Persian plants its beauty screened ; And on its pagan sisterhood, In love, the Christian floweret leaned. With tears of joy the wanderer felt The darkness of his long despair Before that hallowed symbol melt, Which God's dear love had nurtured there. From Nature's face, that simple flower The lines of sin and sadness swept ; And Magian pile and Paynim bower In peace like that of Eden slept. Each Moslem tomb, and cypress old, Looked holy through the sunset air ; And angel-like, the Muezzin told From tower and mosque the hour of prayer. With cheerful steps, the morrow's dawn From Shiraz saw the stranger part; The Star-flower of the Virgin-Born Still blooming in his hopeful heart! Where time the measure of his hours By changeful bud and blossom keeps, And like a young bride crowned with flowers, Far Shiraz in her garden sleeps ; Where, to her poet's turban stone, The Spring her grateful gists impart, Less sweet than those his thoughts have sown In the warm soil of Persian hearts; There sat the stranger, where the shade Of scattered date-trees thinly lay, While in the hot clear heaven delayed The long, and still, and weary day. Strange trees and fruits above him hung, Strange odors filled the sultry air, Strange birds upon the branches swung, Strange insect voices murmured there. And strange bright blossoms shone around, Turned sunward from the shadowy bowers, As if the Gheber's soul had found A fitting home in Iran's flowers. Whate'er he saw, whate'er he heard, Awakened feelings new and sad, No Christian garb, nor Christian word, Nor church with Sabbath bell chimes glad, But Moslem graves, with turban stones, And mosque-spires gleaming white, in view, And grey-beard Mollahs in low tones Chanting their Korar service through. As if the burning eye of Baal The servant of his Conqueror knew, From skies which knew no cloudy veil, The Sun's hot glances smote him through, The flowers which smiled on either hand Like tempting fiends, were such as they Which once, o'er all that Eastern land, As gifts on demon altars lay. - Ah me!" the lonely stranger said, . The hope which led my footsteps on, And light from Heaven around them shed, O'er weary wave and waste, is gone! “ Where are the harvest fields all white, For Truth to thrust her sickle in ? Where flock the souls, like doves in flight From the dark hiding place of sin ? " A silent horror broods o'er all The burden of a hateful spellThe very flowers around recall The hoary magi's rites of bell! « And what am I, o'er such a land The banner of the Cross to bear ? Dear Lord uphold me with thy hand, Thy strength with human weakness share!" SONG. BY FELICIA D. HEMANS. Wbat woke the buried sound that lay In Memnon's harp of yore? Along the Nile's green shore ? And not the lightning's fire- This woke the mystic lyre ! What wins the heart's deep chords to pour Their music forth on life, The sounds of torrent strife? Nor e'en the triumph's hour; To wake that music's power! FOREFATHERS' DAY. My wonder, then, was not unmixed The 225th anniversary of the landing of the Pilgrims With merciful suggestion, was celebrated at Plymouth on the 22d inst. with the When, as my musing eye grew fixed usual empty declamation about their virtues, sufferings Upon the chair in question, and sacrifices. Among those who made speeches at I saw its trembling arms enclose the dinner given on the occasion were Edward Everett and Rufus Choate, - men who have not an atom of | A figure grim and rusty, moral heroism in their composition, and who stand in Whose doublet plain and plainer hose this evil generation, where the time-serving and pusil. Were somewhat worn and musty. lanimous in all ages have stood. Respecting this matter, we find in the Boston Courier, of Tuesday last, Now even those men whom nature forms the following original lines, which ó cut to the quick,' Only to fill the street with, and which, though unaccompanied by any name or Once changed to ghosts by hungry worms, signature, we are almost certain were written by that Are serious things to meet with. true poet of Humanity and freedom, James RUSSELL Your penitent spirits are no jokes, Lowell.–Liberator, for 2nd mo. 2, 1846. And, though I'm not averse to A cheerful ghost, they are not folks AN INTERVIEW WITH MILES STANDISH. One chooses to speak first to. • I'll take the ghost's word for a thousand pounds."— Hamlet. Who knows, thought I, but he has come, I sate one evening in my room By Charon kindly serried, In that sweet hour of twilight, To tell me of some mighty sum When mingling thoughts,-half light, half gloom, - Behind the wainscot buried ? Throng through the spirit's skylight; There is a buccaneerish air The flames by fits curl'd round the bars, About that garb outlandishAnd up the chimney crinkled, Just then the ghost drew up his chair While embers dropped, like falling stars, And said, “ My name is Standish." And in the ashes tinkled. There was a bluntness in his way I sate and mused; the fire burned low, That pleased my taste extremely; And, o'er my senses stealing, The native man had fullest play, Crept something of that ruddy glow Unshackled by the seemly: Which bloomed on wall and ceiling; His bold, gray eye could not conceal My pictures (they are very few, Some flash of the fanatic, The heads of ancient wise men,) His words, like doughty blows on steel, Smoothed down their knotty fronts, and grew Rang sharply through my attic. As rosy as excisemen. “I come from Plymouth, deadly bored Mine ancient, high-backed Spanish chair With songs and toasts and speeches Felt thrills through wood and leather As long and flat as my old sword, That had been strangers long since, while, As threadbare as my breeches; 'Mid Andalusian heather, They understand us Pilgrims! they, The oak, that made its sturdy frame, Smooth men with rosy faces, His happy arms stretched over Strength's knots and gnarls all pared away, The ox, whose fortunate hide became And varnish in their places! « We had some roughness in our grain; That brought our sires intrepid, The eye to rightly see us is Capacious as another ark Not just the one that lights the brain For furniture decrepid; Of drawing-room Tyrtæ uses ; Such talk about their Pilgrim blood, Their birthrights high and holy!- A nountain stream that ends in mud And furnished half the nation. Methinks is melancholy. Kings sit, they say, in slippery seats ; He had stiff knees, the Puritan, But those slant precipices That were not good at bending ; Of ice, the northern sailor meets, The homespun dignity of Man Less slippery are than this is; He thought was worth defending ; To cling therein would pass the wit He did not, with his pinchbeck ore, Of royal man or woman, His country's shame forgotten, And whatsoe'r can stay in it Gild Freedom's coffin o'er and o'er Is more or less than buman. While all within was rotten. These loud ancestral boasts of yours, « Child of our travail and our woe, "Good sir,” I said, " you seem much stirred, I looked, no form my eyes could find, dismal tune was blowing; FROM "DREAM LOVE." “While knaves are busy with their charts No, Freedom, no ! blood should not stain How slight is a smile or a kind word to the giverhow much it may be to the receiver. So little do we know of the thoughts and feelings of those who move about us, so little does the inward and hidden world correspond with the outward and apparent, that we cannot calculate our influence, and when we think that trivial offices of kindness, which cost us nothing, may make flowers to spring up in another's heart, we should be slow to refuse them. This pas. sing jest may have built the climax to an argument, which shall turn a struggling soul from out the path of duty-that word of encouragement afforded the prompting impulse which shall last forever. We cannot help the bias which others take from us. No man can live for himself, though he bury himself in the most eremitical caverns. We, as it were, are an illimitable and subtly entangled chain in the vast mechanism of Nature. The vibration of one link sounds along the whole line. Life is after all just what we choose to make it-and no man is so poor that he can not shape a whole world for himself even ont of nothing. When I stand under the trees of another, and see the yellow morning gleaming through their tall shafts, and broken into a magnificent, illuminated oriel by the intervening leaves ; when I look down the forest's sombre aisles, and hear the solemn groaning of the oaks, wrestling with the night blast, as if they struggled in prayer against an evil spirit-is it not my world that I behold, do I not own the silent stars that seem to fly through the clouds-and is not the large and undulating stretch of summer landscape mine, which my moving eye beholds? The power of enjoyment is the only true ownership that man can have in nature, and the landed proprietor may walk landless as MacGregor, though the world |
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