learned him of myself. But he has shown himself as the sun of our firmament.

MARHAM.

As the Father of our Lord Jesus.

Stars, and

ages, and infinities, these are not the way to think of God.

AUBIN.

They can awe a spirit, but enlighten it they cannot. At least they cannot be the beginning of light in the soul; but Christian belief, when it has begun, draws into itself light from almost every thing. To understand at all what life means, one must begin with Christian belief. And I think knowledge may be sorrow with a man, unless he loves. It is my right, and there is some duty in it, too, to learn all that is to be known of what the ages and the great men of this world have been, and of the worlds beyond worlds which are round us every way. But the look of the firmament itself hints wisdom to us; for bounded by the horizon, all the world round me is only a few miles. From which I may feel, that for me the world is specially meant to be what is just about me, what I can see and talk with men in, and be kind in, and do duty in. Let me be right with the world about me, and the whole world beyond will then look right towards me.

MARHAM.

Thank you, Oliver; for you have instructed

noon.

and you have delighted me very much this afterAnd your imagination is not lawless, as I have sometimes feared it might perhaps be, a little, a very, very little but it is not. It is re

ligiously chastened; it is hither and thither, but it is to do Christian work it is lowly service at the door of the church; and it is a noble hymn in the choir; and it is a voice from the pulpit like a clarion; and in quieter moments it is a vision of heaven and hell, and unearthly things.

AUBIN.

You are yourself imaginative, uncle.

MARHAM.

I! not I! No, Oliver, no!

AUBIN.

Yes, you are, my dear uncle; and now and then very beautifully so; but more so in talking with me than with any one else, I think.

MARHAM.

What time is it, Oliver?

AUBIN.

Ten minutes to five. Which time of the twenty-ninth of May, of the year eighteen hundred and forty-seven, will never be again, never, not ever. Every day the world is ripening against that harvest which is to be at the end of it; slowly, perhaps ; and yet not so very slowly considering what the fruits of it are to be, for they will be eternal; they will be souls, everlasting souls.

MARHAM.

A very beautiful afternoon! And so sweet the air is; is not it, Oliver?

AUBIN.

O that lark! He is up, singing his thanks after yonder cloud, for having dropped a few big raindrops on the field; for his nest is in it; and so the grass smells more sweetly to his mate.

MARHAM.

It must have been on an afternoon like this that holy George Herbert first sung his four verses on virtue; playing the while on the theorbo.

AUBIN.

I should like to hear them, uncle. Will you repeat them?

MARHAM.

Now you must like them, Oliver; for I do very much.

Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky;
The dew shall weep thy fall to-night;
For thou must die.

Sweet rose, whose hue, angry and brave,
Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye;

Thy root is ever in its grave,

And thou must die.

Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,

A box where sweets compacted lie;

My music shows ye have your closes,
And all must die.

Only a sweet and virtuous soul,
Like seasoned timber, never gives;

But though the whole world turn to coal,
Then chiefly lives.

a

George Herbert! Holy George Herbert! It is more than two hundred years since he was living. Since he was living, did I say? As though he had been any thing else but living! Between him and me there have dawned and darkened nearly eighty thousand days; and yet he is to me as though he lived yesterday. And if he is this to me, then, very certainly, he is more than this to God. It is long, — long, space of two revolutions and many wars, since George Herbert lived at Bemerton. And yet through eighty millions of English people who have lived between him and me do I feel him, feel his feelings, feel his having been in the earth. I am only one of so many brothers of his, but his spirit has not died to me; and if to me his spirit has not died, then how it must be living on to God! O Lord, thou lover of souls! You look at me, Oliver, as though you thought those words were my own; but no,—they are not. They are from the Wisdom of Solomon, and very beautiful they are. I like repeating them, O Lord, thou lover of souls!

CHAPTER XXI.

Praise God, creature of earth, for the mercies linked with secrecy,
That spices of uncertainty enrich thy cup of life.

Praise God, his hosts on high, for the mysteries that make all joy;
What were intelligence, with nothing more to learn, or heaven, in eternity
of sameness? - M. F. TUPPER.

MARHAM.

THERE is no knowing what a day may bring forth.

AUBIN.

There is many a one for whom that is almost all the happiness of his life, uncle.

MARHAM.

In the midst of life we are in death. Life is so uncertain!

AUBIN.

O, this uncertainty is great wealth, and it is the freshness of existence. And there are those who could not keep living from year to year without it.

Do you think so?

MARHAM.

AUBIN.

To-day I am poor, ill, and friendless. But

to-morrow I may be,

ay, what

may

I not be ?