But where is he?--ye dead-ye dead,
How secret and how silent all !
No voice comes from the narrow bed
No answer from the dreary pall.
It hath no tale of future trust,
No morning beam, no wakening eye,
It only speaks of dust to dust,'.
Of trees that fall-to lie,
• My bark is yet upon the shore,'
And thine is launched upon
the
sea, Which
eye of man may not explore, Of fathomless eternity! Perchance, in some far future land,
We yet may meet-we yet may dwell; If not, from off this mortal strand, Immortal, fare thee well!
John Malcolm, Esq.
O for a lodge in some vast wilderness,
Some boundless contiguity of shade,
Where rumour of oppression and deceit,
Of unsuccessful, or successful war,
Might never reach me more ! My ear is pained,
My soul is sick, with every day'e report
Of
wrong
and outrage, with which earth is filled.
There is no flesh in man's obdurate heart,
It does not feel for man; the natural bond
Of brotherhood is severed as the flax
That falls asunder at the touch of fire.
He finds his fellow guilty of a skin
Not coloured like his own; and having power
To enforce the wrong, for such a worthy cause
Dooms and devotes him as his lawful prey.
Lands intersected by a narrow frith
Abhor each other. Mountains interposed
Make enemies of nations, who had else
Like kindred drops been mingled into one.
Thus man devotes his brother, and destroys ;
And, worse than all, and most to be deplored,
As human nature's broadest, foulest blot,
Chains him, and tasks him, and exacts bis sweat
With stripes, that mercy, with a bleeding heart,
Weeps when she sees inflicted on a beast.
Then what is man? and what man, seeing this,
And having human feelings, does not blush,
And hang his head, to think himself a man?
I would not have a slave to till my ground,
To carry me, to fan me while I sleep,
And tremble when I wake, for all the wealth
That sinews bought and sold have ever earned.
No: dear as freedom is, and in
my
heart's
Just estimation prized above all price,
I had much rather be myself the slave
And wear the bonds, than fasten them to him.
We have no slaves at home then why abroad ?
And they themselves once ferried o'er the wave
That parts us, are emancipate and loosed.
Slaves cannot breathe in England ; if their lungs
Receive our air, that moment they are free ;
They touch our country, and their shackles fall.
That's noble, and bespeaks a nation proud
And jealous of the blessing. Spread it then,
And let it circulate through every vein
Of all your empire ; that, where Britain's power
mankind
may
feel her merey to.
Cowper.
The
grave is not a place of rest, As unbelievers teach,
Where grief can never win a tear,
Nor sorrow ever reach.
The
eye
that shed the tear is closed,
The heaving breast is cold ;
But that which suffers and enjoys,
No narrow grave can bołd.
The mouldering earth and hungry worm
The dust they lent may claim;
But the enduring spirit lives
Eternally the same.
Caroline Fry.
The path of sorrow, and that path alone,
Leads to the land where sorrow is unknown ;
No traveller ever reached that blest abode,
Who found not thorns and briers on his road.
For he, who knew what human hearts would prove,
How slow to learn the dictates of his love;
That, hard by nature, and of stubborn will,
A life of ease would make them harder still ;
In pity to the souls his grace designed,
To rescue from the ruins of mankind,
Called for a cloud to darken all their
years,
And said, ' Go spend them in the vale of tears !
O balmy gales of soul-reviving air !
O salutary streams that murmur there !
These flowing from the fount of grace above,
Those breathed from lips of everlasting love.
The flinty soil indeed their feet annoys,
Chill blasts of trouble nip their springing joys,
An envious world will interpose its frown
To mar delights superior to its own;
And many a pang experienced still within,
Reminds them of their hated inmate, sin ;
But ills of every shape and every name,
Transformed to blessings, miss their cruel aim;
And every moment's calm that soothes the breast,
Is given in earnest of eternal rest.
Couper.
his carol in the sky; The bees have bummed their noon-tide lullaby ;
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