By fairy hands their knell is rung;
By forms unseen their dirge is sung;
There Fancy comes, at twilight grey,
To bless the turf, that wraps their clay;
And Pity does a while repair,

To mourn, a weeping pilgrim, there.

XX.

And yet―many of these illustrious characters have been fated not only to want, but even to starve !

"Those illustrious men," says one of the most powerful and energetic writers of modern times1," who, like torches, have consumed themselves, in order to enlighten others, have often lived unrewarded, and died unlamented. But the tongues of AFTER-TIMES have done them justice in one sense, but injustice in another. They have honoured them with their praise, but they have disgraced them with their pity. They pity them, forsooth, because they missed of present praise, and temporal emolument : things great to the little, but little to the great. Shall we pity a hero, because on the day of victory he had sacrificed a meal? And those mighty minds, whom these Pigmies presume to commiserate, but whom they cannot comprehend, were contending for a far nobler prize than any, which those, who pity them, could either give or withhold. Wisdom was their object; and that object they attained. She was their exceeding great reward.' Let us, therefore, honour such men, if we can; and imitate them, if we dare. But let us bestow our pity, not on them, but on ourselves, who have neither the merit to deserve renown, nor the magnanimity to despise it."

6

I Colton.

After the expiration of several ages, the Portuguese have at length attempted to cover the ignominy of their forefathers, by erecting a monument over the ashes of Camöens. Illustrious shade! rise from thy bed of earth;pulverize the monument;-and strew it to the winds!

man.

XXI.

Contrasts are the springs of our happiness. Without a knowledge of the muriatic, we should be ignorant of the sweet; without the sweet, we should be incapable of the pungent. Had noon no excess, we should never enjoy the temperature of evening; were there no darkness, we could never appreciate the value of light: without labour, who could be sensible of the enjoyments of rest? and were we not sometimes visited by pain, where would be found the captivations of pleasure? Such is the organization of That we could have been formed in a manner to have a continual appetite for enjoyment, without any of the contrasts arising from vicissitude, is as certain, as that we possess a general appetite for food, even though we feel no pain from partial hunger, or from temperate thirst. But it has pleased the Eternal thus to frame us. He has decreed, also, a temporary success to vice, and a temporary depression to virtue. Regardless of the means he employs, the VILLAIN prospers! He rolls in wealth, and becomes the petty despot of his village; the Napoleon of his neighbourhood. His will is his logic; power is his mistress; and money his god. He dies! unpitied, unlamented, he is almost hissed and hooted into his grave. The hatred of his relatives is signified by the nettles growing over his monument; and the joy of the poor is the best epitaph he deserves. He awakes!—another world

opens itself: the dream of his hopes, that death is an eternal sleep, has vanished!

The GOOD MAN, on the other hand, frequently pines from day to day. His efforts are unavailing to him industry brings no harvest of profit: every object he touches crumbles into ashes! Weary and fainting, he droops into the midnight of the grave; after having borne, with meekness and resignation,

The strife of little tongues,

And coward insults of the base-born crowd.

Blair.

His body consigned to the earth, his friends weep over his monument; and lament the hard destiny of a man, adorned with all the embellishments of education, and animated with all the impulses of virtue! They look at each other, in all the amiable ignorance of grief; and appear to anticipate the unanimous question, whether indeed there is an all-governing providence! In the meantime, the soul of their friend has separated from its tenement of clay; it has passed through its aurelia state; and has awakened to landscapes of matchless beauty, and to scenes of endless happiness.

XXII.

organ

As a knowledge of the mechanism of the visual affords no conclusive explanation how visual sensation arises, so, though we are conscious of the goodness of our original, yet are we no more permitted to fathom the purposes of our Creator, than the meanest soldier of an army is permitted to know the secrets of his general. Continual movements are ordered without any visible design; long and weary marches are made in the dead of

night; fortresses of little apparent importance are invested; he breaks down bridges; moves along narrow defiles; animates his troops at one time, while he restrains their impatience at another. Wild and angry conjectures, ceaseless murmurs, and innumerable complaints, are echoed through the camp. The moment, however, at length arrives! The trumpet sounds; the signal is given; the charge is made. It is irresistible! The place, the time, and manner, having been well chosen. The ranks of the enemy are broken; thousands join in the pursuit; the notes of victory sound from hill to hill; murmurs and conjectures and complaints, all are at an end; the whole design is cleared up; every one gives himself to joy; every one resounds and celebrates the praises of his general.

INSCRIPTION.

SCENE;-VALE OF LLANDISILLIO.

Oh thou! who hither com'st from far,
From peaceful vales, or fields of war;
From WOLGA's fiercely rolling tide;
Or ARAR's banks, whose tranquil side
With thyme and moss is cover'd o'er;
Here rest, and try the world no more!
Here, where flowers of various hue,
In modest pride, attract thy view;
Where rills from mountain heights descend
In gurgling streams, and wildly bend
Their murmuring course adown the vale,
Where peace and blooming health prevail;
And where the birds their notes prolong,
Charming the woods with warbling song.

Oh! pilgrim! fly from every earthly woe,
And taste those raptures, which these scenes bestow.
Fly from the world,-beset with passions rude,

And fix thy home in peaceful solitude.