Our air is with them for ever stirred,
But still in air they stay.

And Happiness, like thee, fair one,
Is ever hovering o'er,

But rests in a land of brighter sun,
On a waveless, peaceful shore,
And stoops to lave her weary wings,
Where the fount of "living waters" springs.

ON GAMING.

WHENCE Sprung th' accursed lust of play,
Which beggars thousands in a day?
Speak, sorc'ress speak, for thou canst tell,
Who call'd the treach'rous card from hell:
Now man profanes his reas'ning powers,
Profanes sweet friendship's sacred hours;
Abandon'd to inglorious ends,

And faithless to himself and friends;
A dupe to every artful knave,
To every abject wish a slave:
But who against himself combines,
Abets his enemy's designs.

When rapine meditates a blow,
He shares the guilt who aids the foe.
Is man a thief who steals my pelf-
How great his theft who robs himself!
Is murder justly deem'd a crime?
How black his guilt who murders time!

THE WOUNDED EAGLE.

EAGLE! this is not thy sphere!
Warrior bird, what seek'st thou here?
Wherefore by the fountain's brink
Doth thy royal pinion sink?
Wherefore on the violet's bed
Layest thou thus thy drooping head?
Thou, that hold'st the blast in scorn,
Thou, that wear'st the wings of morn?

Eagle! wilt thou not arise?

Look upon thine own bright skies!
Lift thy glance!—the fiery sun
There his pride of place hath won,
And the mounting lark is there,
And sweet sound hath filled the air,
Hast thou left that realm on high?
—Oh, it can be but to die!

Eagle, Eagle! thou hast bowed
From thine empire o'er the cloud!
Thou that hadst ethereal birth,

Thou hast stooped too near the earth,
And the hunter's shaft hath found thee,
And the toils of death have bound thee!
-Wherefore did'st thou leave thy place,
Creature of a kingly race?

Wert thou weary of thy throne?
Was the sky's dominion lone?

Chill and lone it well might be,
Yet that mighty wing was free!
Now the chain is o'er it cast,
From thy heart the blood flows fast.

-Woe for gifted souls on high!
Is not such their destiny?

MONITIONS ON THE FLIGHT OF TIME.

WHATEVER we see on every side reminds us of the lapse of time and the flux of life. The day and night succeed each other, the rotation of seasons diversifies the year, the sun rises, attains the meridian, declines, and sets; and the moon every night changes its form.

The day has been considered as an image of the year, and the year as the representation of life. The morning answers to the spring, and the spring to childhood and youth; the noon corresponds to the summer, and the summer to the strength of manhood.

The evening is an emblem of autumn, and autumn of declining life. The night with its silence and darkness shows the winter, in which all the powers of vegetation are benumbed; and the winter points out the time when life shall cease, with its hopes and pleasures.

He that is carried forward, however swiftly, by a motion equable and easy, perceives not the change of place but by the variation of objects. If the wheel of life, which rolls thus silently along, passed on through undistinguishable uniformity, we should never mark its approaches to the end of the

course.

If one hour were like another; if the passage of the sun did not show that the day is wasting; if the change of seasons did not impress upon us the flight

of the year; quantities of duration equal to days and years would glide unobserved.

If the parts of time were not variously coloured, we should never discern their departure, or succession, but should live thoughtless of the past, and careless of the future, without will, and perhaps without power, to compute the periods of life, or to compare the time which is already lost with that which may probably remain.

But the course of time is so visibly marked, that it is observed even by the birds of passage and by nations who have raised their minds very little above animal instinct.

There are human beings whose language does not supply them with words by which they can number five, but I have read of none that have not names for day and night, for summer and winter.

Yet it is certain that these admonitions of nature, however forcible, however importunate, are too often vain; and that many who mark with such accuracy the course of time, appear to have little sensibility of the decline of life: every man has something to do which he neglects; every man has faults to conquer which he delays to combat.

So little do we accustom ourselves to consider the effects of time, that things necessary and certain often surprise us like unexpected contingencies.. We leave the beauty in her bloom, and after an absence of twenty years, wonder, at our return, to find her faded.

We meet those whom we left children, and can scarcely persuade ourselves to treat them as men.

From this inattention, so general and so mischievous, let it be every man's study to exempt himself. Let him that desires to see others happy make haste

to give while his gift can be enjoyed, and remember that every moment of delay takes away something from the value of his benefaction.

And let him, who purposes his own happiness, reflect, that while he forms his purpose the day rolls on, and the night cometh when no man can work.

THE AIR.

No term is more familiar to every body than the term air. But if an uninstructed person were asked what the air was, his first answer would probably be, that it was nothing at all. This hand, he might say, which is now plunged in water, on being drawn out of the water is said to be lifted into the air-which means merely that there is nothing, or only vacancy, around it. In other words, he might say, the air is just the name that is given to the empty space, which is immediately over the surface of the earth.

A little reflection, however, or a question or two more, would probably raise some doubts as to the correctness of this philosophy. If the air be nothing, it might be asked, what is the wind? Or what is it, even when there is no wind, which makes very light substances wave or flutter on being drawn through the air, or when they are merely dropped from the hand, detains them on their way to the ground? Or, to take another illustration from the commonest experience, who is there that has not seen a bladder distended or swollen with the air? If the air be nothing, how comes a portion of it to present such palpable resistance to pressure, when thus confined? The truth is, the air in which we walk is as much