With yearning throes, which nothing can impart In kindred raptures, I have borne my part; And from the crest of Alps peruse the mighty plan. 'Tis ecstasy "to brood o'er flood and fell," Converse with Nature's God, and see His stores unrolled. Forget we not the Artist in the art, Nor overlook the Giver in the grace; Say, what is Nature, but that little part Which man's imperfect vision can embrace Of the stupendous whole, which fills all space; The work of Him by whom all space is bound! Shall Raphael's pencil Raphael's self efface? Shall Handel's self be lost in Handel's sound? Or, shall not Nature's God in Nature's works be found? But Harold "through sin's labyrinth has run," Nor "made atonement when he did amiss;" And does the memory of that evil done Disturb his spirit, or obscure his bliss? 'Tis just; 'tis Harold's due-yet let not this Press heavier on his heart than heaven ordains; What mortal lives, not guilty nor remiss? What breast that has not felt remorse's pains? What human soul so pure, but marked by sin's sad stains? And can this helpless thing, pollute, debased, That can the sculptor's hand alone perform, So man may sin and wail, but not atone; Yet is atonement made:- Creation's Lord Deserts not thus the work his skill devised; Man, not his creature only, but his ward, Too dearly in his Maker's eye is prized, Than thus to be abandoned and despised. Atonement is the Almighty's richest dole, And ever in the mystic plan comprised, To mend the foul defacements of the soul, Restore God's likeness lost, and make the image whole. Oh! "if, as holiest men have deemed there be, In better worlds!-Ah! Harold, I conjure, Has pledged his sacred word, and demonstration brought. Did Babylon, in truth, by Cyrus fall? Is 't true that Persia stained the Grecian land? Did Philip's son the Persian host enthrall? Or Cæsar's legions press the British strand? Fell Palestine by Titus' sword and brand?— Can Harold to such facts his faith entrust? Then let him humbly learn, and understand; "Then Christ is risen from the dead!"-the first Dear pledge of mortal frames yet mouldering in the dust. But Harold "will not look beyond the tomb," P Fie! Harold, fie! unconscious of thy doom, And languish for their own celestial clime, There must thou surely live-and of that life Such, such the prospect,―such the glorious boon, Would thou hadst loved through Judah's courts to stray; What joy to hear thy muse's potent lay The sacred honours of that land declare, And all that holy scene engage her care; Where poets harped ere Homer's shell was strung, But, thanks for what we have; and for the more Nor vainly bids those whom she charmed before; Her skill can judge the speaking of a friend; LIGHTS AND SHADOWS. Gleamings of poetry,- if I may give That name of beauty, passion, and of grace, In a pale twilight, or a rosebud morn, Glance o'er my spirit,-thoughts that are like light, Ir spread beneath the summer sky, A green turf, as just meet For lilies and blue violets, And in the midst a rose tree grew, I watched the beauty of that rose, Its June-touched bloom, its love-sweet breath, When suddenly, I marked how dark Its shadow fell beneath. Clings darkness to-I sadly thoughtThe fair in form, the fresh in hue? Alas! there's not that thing on earth So bright, but has its shadow too! Literary Gazette. THE WALL-FLOWER. THE wall-flower-the wall-flower! Around the wrecks of time;— Flower of the solitary place! Thy roots outspread the ramparts o'er, In battle's grim array: The clangour of the field has fled; The beacon on the hill No more through midnight blazes red, But thou art blooming still. Whither hath fled the choral band In the belfry's crevices, the dove Her young brood nurseth well, Whilst thou, lone flower! dost shed above A sweet decaying smell. |