Oh, soft be my slumbers on that holy bed ! While the anthems of rapture unceasingly And then the glad morn soon to follow that roll, night,

And the smile of the Lord is the feast of the When the sunrise of glory shall beam on my soul?

sight, When the full matin-song, as the sleepers arise That heavenly music! what is it I hear? To shout in the morning, shall peal through The notes of the harpers ring sweet on my the skies!

ear;

And see, soft unfolding, those portals of gold; Who,who would live alway, away from his God, The King, all arrayed in his beauty, behold! Away from yon heaven, that blissful abode, Oh give me, oh give me the wings of a dove! Where the rivers of pleasure flow o'er the Let me hasten my fight to those mansions bright plains,

above; And the noon-tide of glory eternally reigns; Ay, 'tis now that my soul on swift pinions Where the saints of all ages in harmony meet,

would soar, Their Savior and brethren transported to And in ecstasy bid earth adieu evermore. greet;

WILLIAM AUGUSTUS MUHLENBERG.

“From under the boughs in the snow-clad wood

The merle and mavis are peeping.”

CHRISTMAS IN THE WOODS. OSROM under the boughs in the snow-clad The merle and mavis are peeping. wood

Alike secure from the wind and the flood,

Yet a silent Christmas keeping.

Still happy are they,

And their looks are gay,
And they frisk it from bough to bough,

Since berries bright red

Hang over their head,
A right goodly feast, I trow.
There under the boughs in their wintry dress,

Haps many a tender greeting;
Blithe hearts have met, and the soft caress
Hath told the delight of meeting.

Though winter hath come

To his woodland home,
There is mirth with old Christmas cheer,

For 'neath the light snow

Is the fruit-fraught bough.
And each to his love is near.
Yes! under the boughs, scarce seen, nestle

they,
Those children of song together,-
As blissful by night, as joyous by day,
'Mid the snows and the wintry weather.

For they dream of spring,

And the songs they'll sing,
When the flowers bloom again in the mead;

And mindful are they
Of those blossoms gay,

Which have brought them to-day
Such help in their time of need!

HARRISON WEIR.

The wonders of all-ruling Brandence ;

Ile jingue that & from celestial Merry flow; Efnbak banuty, perfect wullinu,

Ennable and refine the native glow The fock fuelo

and thence his best resource
To paint his feelings with sublined force.

Aprié 23-1317
The filmini Cinghint of thing
the Bitte wa hurbed
for a poch the form his taste by.

John Keats

THE BIBLE. 'HE Bible is the treasure of the poor, the solace of the rich, and the support of the

dying; and while other books may amuse and instruct us in a leisure hour, it is the peculiar triumph of the Bible to create light in the midst of darkness, to alleviate the

sorrow which admits of no other alleviation, to direct a beam of hope to the heart which no other topic of consolation can reach; while guilt, despair, and death vanish at the touch of its holy inspiration.

ROBERT HALL.

When I soar through tracts unknown,
See thee on thy judgment throne,
Rock of Ages, cleft for me,
Let me bide myself in thee!

AUGUSTUS MONTAGUE TOPLADY.

Above the crowd,
On upward wings could I but fly,

To bathe in yon bright cloud,
And seek the stars that gem the sky.

'Twere heaven indeed
Through fields of trackless light to soar,

On nature's charms to feed,
And nature's own great God adore.

CHARLES SPRAGUE.

THE WINGED WORSHIPERS.
QAY, guiltless pair,

What seek ye from the fields of heaven?

Ye have no need of prayer,
Ye have no sins to be forgiven.

Why perch ye here,
Where mortals to their Maker bend ?

Can your pure spirits fear
The God ye never could offend ?

Ye never knew
The crimes for which we come to weep;

Penance is not for you,
Blessed wanderers of the upper deep.

To you 'tis given
To wake sweet nature's untaught lays,

Beneath the arch of heaven
To chirp away a life of praise.

Then spread each wing
Far, far above, o’er lakes and lands,

And join the choirs that sing
In yon blue dome not reared with hands.

Or, if ye stay
To note the consecrated hour,

Teach me the airy way,
And let me try your envied power.

*

THE GOOD OLD TIMES. HE admiration of former times.is a feeling at first, perhaps, engrafted on our minds by the regret of those who vainly seek in the evening of life for the sunny tints which adorned their morning landscape; and who are led to fancy a deterioration in

surrounding objects, when the change is in themselves, and the twilight in their own powers of perception. It is probable that as the age of the individual or of the species is subject to its peculiar dangers, so each has its compensating advantages; and that the difficulties which, at different periods of time, have impeded the believer's progress, to heaven, though in appearance equally various, are, in amount, very nearly equal. * Had we lived in the times of the infant Church, even amid the blaze of miracle on one hand, and the chastening fire of persecution on the other, we should have heard, perhaps, no fewer complaints of the cowardice and apostasy, the dissimulation and murmuring inseparable from a continuance of public distress and danger, than we now hear regrets for those days of wholesome affliction, when the mutual love of believers was strengthened by the common danger; when their want of worldly advantages disposed them to regard a release from the world with far more hope than apprehension, and compelled the Church to cling to her Master's cross alone for comfort and succor.

REGINALD HEBER.

THE COTTER'S SATURDAY NIGHT.

(Inscribed to Robert Aikin, Esq., of Ayr.)
“Let not ambition mock their useful toil,

Their homely joys and destiny obscure;
Nor grandeur hear, with a disdainful smile,
The short and simple annals of the poor."

GRAY.
Y loved, my honored, much respected The blackening trains of craws to their re-
friend,

pose ; No mercenary bard his homage pays;

The toil-worn Cotter frae his labor goes,With honest pride, I scorn each selfish end; This night his weekly moil is at an end, My dearest meed a friend's esteem and Collects his spades, his mattocks, and his praise.

hoes, To you I sing, in simple Scottish lays, Hoping the morn in ease and rest to spend, The lowly train in life's sequestered scene; And, weary, o'er the moor, his course does

The native feelings strong, the guileless ways; homeward wend. What Aikin in a cottage would have been;

Ah! though his worth unknown, far happier At length his lonely cot appears in view, there I ween.

Beneath the shelter of an aged tree;

Th' expectant wee things, toddlin, stacher November chill blaws loud wi' angry sugh; through,

The shortening winter day is near a close; To meet their dad, wi' flichterin noise and The miry beasts retreating frae the pleugh ;

glee.