A flame intenser than the sun

Shall melt his goldern urn,
TIME's empty glass no more shall run,

Nor human years return!

Then with immortal splendour bright

That glorious orb shall rise,
Which through ETERNITY shall light

The new-created skies!

Thou Sun of Nature, roll along,

And bear our years away!
The sooner shall we join the song

Of EVERLASTING DAY!

BUTCHER.*

The longevity of man has constituted a curious subject of speculation. But what has excited particular attention, is the duration of human life among the patriarchs of the antediluvian world. METHUSALEH lived nine hundred and sixty-nine years! For this great age various reasons are assigned. Some ascribe it to mere natural causes, such as temperance, wholesome nature of the fruits on which they lived, to the exclusion of animal food, surface of the globe less solid and compact, genial nature of the air and seasons, &c. &c. But whether any one or all of these operated for the purpose, a good moral reason has been specified ; for, says Denham: "Immediately after the crea

* See Two excellent Volumes of SERMONS, for the Use of Families, by the Rev. Edmund Butcher. Second Edition. A fair specimen of their contents will be found at the conclusion of this little work.

tion, when the world was to be peopled by one man and one woman, the ordinary age was nine hundred years and upwards! After the flood, when there were three persons to stock the world, their age was cut shorter, and none of those patriarchs but Shem, arrived at five hundred years. In the second century, we find none that reached two hundred and forty ;-in the third, none but Terah, that came to two hundred years; the world, at least a part of it, by that time, being so well-peopled, that they had built cities, and were cantoned out into distant nations. By degrees, as the number of people increased, their longevity dwindled till it came down at length to seventy or eighty years, and there it stood, and has continued to stand ever since the time of Moses.” It is also added, that the present ordinary term of life is the best medium for population, by which the world is neither thin nor overstocked. It is the appointment of Providence for the happiness of mankind. Wisely accelerated is our march toward the tomb.

"A TOMB,” remarks a popular writer, “has been justly said to be a monument situated on the confines of both worlds! It at once presents to us the termination of the inquietudes of life, and sets before us the image of eternal rest. There the wicked (says Job) cease from troubling, and there the weary are at rest. It is very remarkable that in all languages, and among all nations, Death has been described in a style of this kind; expressed by

figures of speech which convey every where the same idea of rest, or sleep, or retreat from the evils of life! Such a style perfectly agrees with the general belief of the immortality of the Soul, but assuredly conveys no high idea of the boasted pleasures of the world."

SHAKSPEARE having described the Infant, the School-Boy, the Lover, the Soldier, the Justice, and the Pantaloon, concludes his series of portraitures with Second Childishness. And his last effort is not inferior to any of the former ones for distinctness .and fidelity. It is a last scene indeed--and it may be truly said to end a strange eventful history. Nothing can be more affecting than this Second Childishness, and mere oblivion, sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans every thing! The description of the closing scene of human existence by privations, holds up to our view the consummation of debility. Here is a human being arrived at a period destitute of all the ordinary means of enjoye ment. Having lost teeth, eyes, taste, and every thing conducive to his comfort and happiness, how deplorable the condition! Of the original sentence, Dust thou art, and unto dust shall thou returnhere is indeed a memorable exemplification.

The Poet, in Henry the VIth, represents the expiring Mortimer in similar circumstances of decay and approaching dissolution:

These eyes, like lamps whose wasting oil is spent,
Wax dim, as drawing to their exigent !

Weak shoulders, overborne with burdening grief,
And pithless arms, like to a wither'd vine

That droops his sapless branches to the ground;
Yet are these feet, whose strengthless stay is numb,
Unable to support this lump of clay;

Swift winged with desire to get a grave

As witting I no other comfort have!

And in Richard the Second, a passage of like

import occurs!

For ere the six years that he hath to spend,

Can change their moons, and bring their times about,
My oil-dried lamp, and time-bewasted light,

Shall be extinct with AGE and endless night!

There are two other passages in SHAKSPEARE, exhibiting OLD AGE in a state of accelerated debility:

Not know my voice! O Time's extremity !
Hast thou so crack'd and splitted my poor tongue
In seven short years, that here my only son
Knows not my feeble key of untun'd cares?
Though now this grained face of mine be hid
In sap-consuming winter's drizzled snow,
And all the conduits of my blood froze up;
Yet hath my night of life some memory,
Mine wasting lamp some fading glimmer left,
My dull deaf ears a little use to hear
All these old witnesses-I cannot err,
Tell me thou art my Son!

I have liv'd long enough-my way of life
Is fall'n into the sear, the yellow leaf!
And that which should accompany OLD AGE,
As honour, love, obedience, troops of friends;
I must not look to have-but in their stead

Curses, not loud but deep-mouth honour, breath,
Which the poor heart would fain deny and dare not!

Thus SHAKSPEARE hath proved himself an accurate observer of human nature in all its gradations from the cradle to the grave! His exhibition of old age in its extremest debility, is an affecting picture; a most eloquent address to all the senses; a striking memento of the frail condition of humanity.

SHAKSPEARE speaks very strongly also of human life, in the following energetic lines:

To-morrow, and to-morrow, and to-morrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusky death! Out, out, brief candle ?
Life's but a walking shadow-A POOR PLAYER
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage,
And then is heard no more! it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing!
0! gentlemen, the time of life is short !
To spend that shortness basely, were too long
If life did ride upon a dial's point,
Still ending at the arrival of an hour!

It is worthy of observation that this deplorable period, extreme old age, is noticed by two poets, the one ancient, the other modern, both of high celebrity. Pope has these lines, inimitably tender and affecting :

-LIFE protracted is protracted wo!
Time hovers o'er impatient to destroy,
And shuts up all the passages of joy :
In vain their gifts the bounteous seasons pour,