And the remainder of a sinners's life Another flash, on viewless pinions borne, The Angel of the Lord came down from heaven, Luther, thy vow has reached the Eternal's ears, Know then, most favoured of the human race, The kingdoms of our God, when Christ shall reign The vision spoke, and, shrouded from his sight, Halifax. GULIELMUS. THE ATHEIST. A FRAGMENT. Conscience thus makes cowards of us all.-Shakspeare. * Rapt in the scene, he saw not that the boat was floating towards an eddy; his arms were folded, and the oar trailed along in the water. The current slowly and imperceptibly bore him towards the cataract, its echoes were wafted faintly on the breeze at intervals, but he heard it not, his thoughts were far away-they were with his infant years-the visions of the past were floating before his eyes; but they came unbidden: it was not his hand that flung back the veil of oblivion and pointed to the past: he called not up the forms which rose before him-no, if the pride of unbelief' had not blinded him he would have seen that it was the Divine Spirit making one more effort to retrieve him from perdition; appealing, and for the last time, to his best and purest feelings; those feelings that even yet flowed through the dark and troubled sea of his mad thoughts in one pure, little rill, unmingled and unpolluted with its turbulent waves, even when the storm of passion worked them into very nigh a frenzy. But he saw it not. He contemplated the scenes of his childhood, and his mind became calm-calm as the treacherous stream that was hurrying him to eternity. The spell of bygone affections was upon him, and earth, and its glory, and beauty, were forgotten, and even the majesty of nature was absorbed in their presence. He saw the home of his early years-the mother who cradled him in her breast, and who taught his infant lips the voice of thanksgiving. He was kneeling upon her footstool, repeating, in half-formed accents, his evening prayer: he rose, and her embrace and joyful smile were his reward: her sweet arms laid him upon his smooth pillow, and her kiss and blessing were his protection through the hours of darkness. The morning sun awoke him, and his light step bounded through the garden, and over the fields, and his little heart was overflowing with joy and happiness. * The dream passed on. Years had intervened, but his mother's form was there again. He was to depart for another clime, and the hour was come. She was giving him her parting counsel, and the book of Godthat book that he now despised-that book that, to seal his apostacy, he tore piecemeal, and sacrificed to the flames. Her arms were round him, and her fresh, warm tears were falling fast upon his face. He felt them then-he feels them now entering into his very soul. Her soft heavenly voice breathed forth a prayer for his safety. His feelings were warm then, the gloom of infidelity was not upon him, and his heart was full even to bursting; but the pang passed over, and the deep sea bore him away upon its bosom, and the clime of Italy received him. There he drank deep of the cup of sensuality-drank to intoxication; there did the demon of atheism fasten upon him, drinking up his life-blood, and searing and blighting the noblest affections of his nature: it flung the veil of despair before the prospect of eternity, and buried his bright hopes of heaven and immortality in the black and everlasting darkness of annihilation. There it was that, unrestrained by care for his mental or physical energies, and without the guiding hand of pure affection, he gave way to the torrent of all the passions that agitate the human breast; there, amidst the wreck of his holiest hopes and feelings, he cast away, in the pride of his unbelief, the plank that would have saved him-the belief in a superintending Providence. * The vision passes into oblivion, and he looks once more. Again, and for the last time, he saw his mother's face : she was on the bed of death: he would have asked the cause of her illness, but his conscience gave the answer ere his lips unclosed. He sat down and took her hand. It lay upon the Bible: his eyes fell on it, and a change came over his features. His mother saw, and a tear rose in her eye: it fell upon his hand. ('Aye! there! there! there!' he mutters now, as his eye strains, as it would start from its socket, to look upon the spot). She attempted to speak once-twice, but there was a choking in her utterance: she tried yet again. My son,' she said, and her sweet eyes were lighted up with a gleam of maternal tenderness as she spoke, my dear son, 1 am about to appear before my God, but I dread it not, for I have a mediator in my Saviour. This book,' and she pressed the Bible to her heart, this book has been my guide through life. It is my hope in death, and my assurance of immortality. Promise-' and her voice deepened into the tone of one who felt that she should speak no more on earth, promise your dying, broken-hearted mother that it shall be the same to you, that my God shall be your God; promise me this, and I die happy.' Her words were uttered with great difficulty at the last, and when she had finished she sunk down upon her pillow her eyes closed; and she seemed expiring; but her spirit delayed a moment in its flight: she unclosed her eyes again, and turned them, with imploring earnestness upon her son. His brow was bent, and his frame trembled with agony: all the better feelings of his breast were struggling long and awfully for the mastery over the fiend; but it prevailed. With an almost super-human effort of mental power he quelled the strife, but it cost him dear: one of the smaller vessels in his head burst, and a stream of blood gushed from his nose and mouth, and he sank backwards in the chair: his mother turned her dying eyes upon him for an instant-and expired. He saw that look, even then he saw it-that look of agony--it is before him now; and he hides his face with his hand, as he would shut it out; but in vain; his spirits' eye beholds it still. * The boat was hurrying on, now, with fearfully rapid speed; the trunk of a tree floating by struck against VOL. II. July, 1829. C : the oar, and the shock snapped it: it roused him from his trance he saw his danger-saw that there was no chance of safety, and his face grew pale: it was but for a moment; he heard the rushing sound of the distant cataract approach nearer every instant: he saw the mist rising up above it to the skies: he looked around what was it for? he knew not: he felt that he was alone-that there was none to save-no hope. He tried to calm his spirit, and to look upon death face to face. 'A moment,' he said, and its past-a moment, and I am as nothing.' But that thought withered him he could not contemplate the fathomless gulf of annihilation, the thick, all-involving darkness of non-existence; and his mind, without a resting place, shrunk back upon itself;-in that recoil he felt a future. The boat was now borne along so rapidly that he could scarcely distinguish objects as he passed; but he could discern the pointed rocks that opposed the falling river. The sun, which had been obscured, now burst forth, and, shining on the mist, produced a rainbow of the most beautiful hues; the pines were waving fitfully on the banks, and sounded in concert with the distant torrent. His soul was, for a short interval, rapt in the glory of the scene, and his enthusiastic love of nature triumphed over his fears; but he soon awoke again to the oppressive sense of his danger. The deafening roar of the accumulated waters, the dashing of the spray upon the boat, its frightful speed, the awful certainty of his destruction, and the instinctive horror of annihilation, overpowered him; he sunk down, and, in that hour of his extremity, when every thing grew dark around him, his stoicism and his philosophy deserted him. He lay some moments stupified, and then raised his head; the black rocks frowned awfully upon him, and reverberated eternally with the dash of the waters that foamed and chafed against them. 'Oh God!' he exclaimed, this is fearful!' and then a moment after- but what does His name in |