Then bind the palm, thy sage's brow to suit,
Of blasted leaf, and death-distilling fruit!
Ah me! the laurell'd wreath that murder rears,
Blood-nursed, and water'd by the widow's tears,
Seems not so foul, so tainted, and so dread,
As waves the nightshade round the sceptic's head.
What is the bigot's torch, the tyrant's chain?
I smile on death, if heavenward hope remain !
But, if the warring winds of Nature's strife
Be all the faithless charter of my life,
If Chance awaked, inexorable power!
This frail and feverish being of an hour,
Doom'd o'er the world's precarious scene to sweep,
Swift as the tempest travels on the deep,

To know Delight but by her parting smile,
And toil, and wish, and weep, a little while;
Then melt, ye elements, that form'd in vain
This troubled pulse, and visionary brain!
Fade, ye wild flowers, memorials of my doom!
And sink, ye stars, that light me to the tomb !
Truth, ever lovely, since the world began,
The foe of tyrants, and the friend of man,—
How can thy words from balmy slumber start
Reposing Virtue, pillow'd on the heart!
Yet, if thy voice the note of thunder roll'd,
And that were true which Nature never told,
Let Wisdom smile not on her conquer'd field :
No rapture dawns, no treasure is reveal'd!
Oh! let her read, nor loudly, nor elate,
The doom that bars us from a better fate!
But, sad as angels for the good man's sin,
Weep to record, and blush to give it in!

231. ATHEIST. Labour of the THE unbeliever,

Despising reason, revelation, God,

And kicking 'gainst the pricks of conscience, rush'd
Deliriously upon the bossy shield

Of the Omnipotent; and in his heart
Purposed to deify the idol Chance.

And labour'd hard-oh, labour worse than nought!
And toil'd with dark and crooked reasoning,
To make the fair and lovely Earth, which dwelt
In sight of Heaven, a cold and fatherless,
Forsaken thing, that wander'd on, forlorn,
Undestined, uncompassion'd, unupheld ;
A vapour eddying in the whirl of chance,
And soon to vanish everlastingly.

He travail'd sorely, and made many a tack,
His sails oft shifting, to arrive-dread thought-
Arrive at utter nothingness; and have
Being no more-no feeling, memory,

No lingering consciousness that e'er he was.
Guilt's midnight wish! last, most abhorred thought,
Most desperate effort of extremest sin.
Others, preoccupied, ne'er saw true hope;
He, seeing, aim'd to stab her to the heart,
And with infernal chemistry to wring
The last sweet drop from sorrow's cup of gall;
To quench the only ray that cheer'd the earth,
And leave mankind in night which had no star.
Others the streams of pleasure troubled; he
Toil'd much to dry her very fountain-head.
Unpardonable man! sold under sin !

He was the Devil's pioneer, who cut

The fences down of Virtue, sapp'd her walls,
And open'd a smooth and easy way to death.
Traitor to all existence! to all life!
Soul-suicide determined foe of being!
Intended murderer of God, Most High!
Strange road, most strange! to seek for happiness!
Pollok.

The Jew besought the clemency divine,

The hope of mercy blending with contrition. Sin must have death! Its holy requisition The law may not relax. The opening tomb Expects its prey; mere respite, life's condition; Nor can the body shun its penal doom. Yet, there is mercy; wherefore else delay

To punish? Why the victim and the rite? But can the type and symbol take away

The guilt, and for a broken law requite? The cross unfolds the mystery,-Jesus died : The sinner lives: the Law is satisfied.

Shame and iniquity hath whelm'd me over :

From head to foot no good couldst thou discover;
For this in hell should I, with deep lamenting,
Be aye repenting.

But oh! the depth of love beyond comparing,
That brought Thee down from heaven, our burden
bearing!

I taste all peace and joy that life can offer,
Whilst Thou must suffer!

Eternal King! in power and love excelling, Fain would my heart and mouth Thy praise be telling;

But how can man's weak powers at all come nigh Thee,

How magnify Thee?

Such wondrous love would baffle my endeavour
To find its equal, should I strive for ever:
How should my works, could I in all obey Thee,
Ever repay Thee?

Yet this shall please Thee, if devoutly trying
To keep Thy laws, mine own wrong will denying,
I watch my heart, lest sin again ensnare it
And from Thee tear it.

Johann Heermann, tr. by F. E. Cox.

Josiah Conder.

Say! wherefore thus by woes wast Thou surrounded?
Ah! Lord, for my transgressions Thou wast wounded:
God took the guilt from me, who should have paid it ;
On Thee He laid it.

How strange and marvellous was this correction!
Falls the good Shepherd in His sheep's protection;
The servants' debt behold the Master paying,
For them obeying.

The righteous dies, who walk'd with God truehearted;

The sinner lives, who has from God departed:
By man came death, yet man its fetters breaketh;
God it o'ertaketh.

IF this mute earth Of what it holds could speak, and every grave Were as a volume, shut, yet capable Of yielding its contents to eye and ear, We should recoil, stricken with sorrow and shame, To see disclosed, by such dread proof, how ill That which is done accords with what is known To reason, and by conscience is enjoin'd; How idly, how perversely, life's whole course, To this conclusion, deviates from the line, Or of the end stops short, proposed to all At her aspiring outset.- Wordsworth.

237. ATTAINMENT. Mockery of

THERE are hopes

Promising well; and love-touch'd dreams for some;
And passions, many a wild one; and fair schemes
For gold and pleasure-yet will only this
Balk not the soul-Ambition only gives,
Even of bitterness, a beaker full!
Friendship is but a slow-awaking dream,
Troubled at best-Love is a lamp unseen,
Burning to waste, or, if its light is found,
Nursed for an idle hour, then idly broken-
Gain is a grovelling care, and Folly tires,
And Quiet is a hunger never fed-

And from Love's very bosom, and from Gain,
Or Folly, or a Friend, or from Repose,-
From all but keen Ambition-will the soul
Snatch the first moment of forgetfulness
To wander like a restless child away.

Oh, if there were not better hopes than these-
Were there no palm beyond a feverish fame-
If the proud wealth flung back upon the heart
Must canker in its coffer-if the links
Falsehood hath broken will unite no more-
If the deep-yearning love, that hath not found
Its like in the cold world, must waste in tears-
If truth, and fervour, must return
And die of their own fulness-if beyond
The grave there is no heaven in whose wide air
The spirit may find room, and in the love
Of whose bright habitants the lavish heart
May spend itself-what thrice-mock'd fools are we!
N. P. Willis.

238. ATTRACTION: reversed.

CHAINS of my heart, avaunt, I say;

I will arise, and in the strength of love
Pursue the bright track, ere it fade away,
My Saviour's pathway to His home above.
Sure, when I reach the point where earth

Melts into nothing from the uncumbered sight, Heaven will o'ercome the attraction of my birth, And I shall sink in yonder sea of light.-Keble.

239. ATTRACTIONS. Earthly

FAREWELL, ye gilded follies, pleasing troubles;
Farewell, ye honour'd rags, ye glorious bubbles:
Fame's but a hollow echo; gold, pure clay;
Honour, the darling but of one short day;
Beauty, the idol, but a damask'd skin;
State, but a golden prison to live in,

And torture free-born minds; embroider'd trains,
Merely but pageants for proud-swelling veins ;

To use it like a giant.

Could great men thunder

As Jove himself does, Jove would ne'er be quiet;
For every pelting, petty officer

Would use his heaven for thunder,—
Nothing but thunder. Merciful heaven!

Thou rather, with thy sharp and sulphurous bolt,
Split'st the unwedgeable and gnarlèd oak,
Than the soft myrtle: but man, proud man!

Drest in a little brief authority,

Most ignorant of what he's most assured,

His glassy essence,-like an angry ape,

Plays such fantastic tricks before high heaven,
As make the angels weep: who, with our spleens,
Would all themselves laugh mortal.—Shakespeare.

The year's in the wane ;

There is nothing adorning ;
The night has no eve,

And the day has no morning;
Cold winter gives warning.

The rivers run chill;

The red sun is sinking;
And I am growing old,

And life is fast shrinking;
Here's enough for sad thinking!
Thomas Hood.

249. AVARICE: of the Aged.

OF age's avarice I cannot see

What colour, ground, or reason there should be;
Is it not folly, when the way we ride
Is short, for a long voyage to provide?
To avarice some title youth may own,
To reap in autumn, what a spring had sown ;
And with the providence of bees or ants,
Prevent with summer's plenty winter's wants.
But age scarce sows, till death stands by to reap,
And to a stranger's hand transfers the heap :
Afraid to be so once, she's always poor,
And to avoid a mischief, makes it sure.
Such madness, as for fear of death to die,
As to be poor for fear of poverty.—Denham.

A MAN in authority is but as
A candle in the wind, sooner wasted
Or blown out than under a bushel.
Beaumont and Fletcher.

248. AUTUMN. Lesson of

THE Autumn is old;

The sere leaves are flying;
He hath gather'd up gold,
And now he is dying:
Old age, begin sighing!

The vintage is ripe ;

The harvest is heaping; But some that have sow'd Have no riches for reaping :Poor wretch, fall a-weeping!

251. AVARICE: its Folly.

Go, miser! go: for lucre sell thy soul;
Truck wares for wares, and trudge from pole to pole,
That men may say, when thou art dead and gone,
See what a vast estate he left his son !-Dryden.

Why lose we life in anxious cares
To lay in hoards for future years?
Can these, when tortured by disease,
Cheer our sick hearts, or purchase ease?
Can these prolong one gasp of breath.
Or calm the troubled hour of death?—Gay.

Riches, like insects, when conceal'd they lie,
Wait but for wings, and in their season fly;
Who sees pale Mammon pine amidst his store
Sees but a backward steward for the poor;

AND greedy avarice by him did ride

Upon a camell loaden all with gold;
Two iron coffers hang on either side,
With precious metall full as they might hold,
And in his lap an heap of coin he told ;

For of his wicked pelf his god he made,
And into hell himself for money sold;

Accursed usury was all his trade,

And right and wrong ylike in equall balance waide, His life was nigh unto death's dore yplaste; And thread-bare cote and cobbled shoes he ware, He scarce good morsell all his life did taste,

But both from backe and belly still did spare, To fill his bags, and richesse to compare : Yet child nor kinsman living had he none, To leave them to; but thorough daily care To get, and nightly feare to lose his own, He led a wretched life unto himselfe unknown.

Most wretched wight, whom nothing might suffice,
Whose greedy lust did lack in greatest store,
Whose need had end, but no end covetise,
Whose wealth was want, whose plenty made him
poor,

Who had enough, yet wished evermore.-Spenser.

When I was blind, my son, I did miscall
My sordid vice of avarice, true thrift.
But now forget that lesson, I prithee do.
That cos'ning vice, although it seems to keep
Our wealth, debars us from possessing it,
And makes us more than poor.-May.

Who, lord of millions, trembles for his store,
And fears to give a farthing to the poor;
Proclaims that penury will be his fate,
And, scowling, looks on charity with hate.
Wolcott.

The more we have, the meaner is our store;
The unenjoying craving wretch is poor.-Creech.
He turns with anxious heart and crippled hands
His bonds of debt and mortgages of lands;
Or views his coffers with suspicious eyes,
Unlocks his gold, and counts it till he dies.

To compass wealth, and bribe the god of gain,
To give thee flocks and herds, with large increase ;-
Fool! to expect them from a bullock's grease!
And think'st that when the fatten'd flames aspire,
Thou seest the accomplishment of thy desire!
Now, now my bearded harvest gilds the plain,
The scanty folds can scarce my sheep contain,

And showers of gold come pouring in amain!

Thus dreams the wretch, and vainly thus dreams on,
Till his lank purse declares his money gone.
O souls in whom no heavenly fire is found,
Fat minds, and ever grovelling on the ground!
We bring our manners to the blest abodes,
And think what pleases us must please the gods.
Persius, tr. by Dryden.

257. AVARICE. Peril of
YET in thy thriving still misdoubt some evil,

Lest gaining gain on thee, and make thee dim. To all things else. Wealth is the conjurer's devil, Whom when he thinks he hath, the devil hath him. Gold thou mayst safely touch; but if it stick Unto thy hands, it woundeth to the quick.

What skills it if a bag of stones, or gold,

About thy neck do drown thee? raise thy head;