There is naught in art's bravuras that can work with such a spell,

THE EVENING CLOUD.

A CLOUD lay cradled near the setting sun,
A gleam of crimson tinged its braided snow;
Long had I watched the glory moving on

O'er the still radiance of the lake below.
Tranquil its spirit seemed, and floated slow!

Even in its very motion there was rest; While every breath of eve that chanced to blow Wafted the traveller to the beauteous west. Emblem, methought, of the departed soul ! To whose white robe the gleam of bliss is given And by the breath of mercy made to roll

Right onwards to the golden gates of heaven, Where to the eye of faith it peaceful lies, And tells to man his glorious destinies.

JOHN WILSON.

INSIGNIFICANT EXISTENCE.

THERE are a number of us creep
Into this world, to eat and sleep;
And know no reason why we 're born,
But only to consume the corn,
Devour the cattle, fowl, and fish,
And leave behind an empty dish.
The crows and ravens do the same,
Unlucky birds of hateful name;
Ravens or crows might fill their place,
And swallow corn and carcasses,
Then if their tombstone, when they die,
Be n't taught to flatter and to lie,
There's nothing better will be said
Than that "they 've eat up all their bread,
Drunk up their drink, and gone to bed."

burst

A SWEET DISORDER IN THE DRESS

A SWEET disorder in the dress
Kindles in clothes a wantonness :
A lawn about the shoulders thrown
Into a fine distraction;

An erring lace, which here and there
Inthralls the crimson stomacher;
A cuff neglectful, and thereby
Ribbons to flow confusedly;
A winning wave, deserving note,
In the tempestuous petticoat;

And make colloquial happiness your care,
Preserve me from the thing I dread and hate,
A duel in the form of a debate.

The clash of arguments and jar of words,
Worse than the mortal blunt of rival swords,
Decide no question with their tedious length,
For opposition gives opinion strength.
Divert the champions prodigal of breath;
And put the peaceably disposed to death.
O, thwart me not, Sir Soph, at every turn,
Nor carp at every
flaw you may discern !
Though syllogisms hang not on my tongue,
I am not surely always in the wrong;
"T is hard if all is false that I advance,

A fool must now and then be right by chance.
Not that all freedom of dissent I blame;
No, there I grant the privilege I claim.
A disputable point is no man's ground;
Rove where you please, 't is common all around.
Discourse may want an animated No

To brush the surface, and to make it flow;
But still remember, if you mean to please,
To press your point with modesty and ease.
The mark at which my juster aim I take,
Is contradiction for its own dear sake.
Set your opinion at whatever pitch,

Asseveration blustering in your face
Makes contradiction such a hopeless case;
In every tale they tell, or false or true,
Well known, or such as no man ever knew,
They fix attention, heedless of your pain,
With oaths like rivets forced into the brain;
And even when sober truth prevails throughout,
They swear it, till affirmance breeds a doubt.
A Persian, humble servant of the sun,
Who, though devou, yet bigotry had none,
Hearing a lawyer, grave in his address,
With adjurations every word impress,
Supposed the man a bishop, or, at least,
God's name so much upon his lips, a priest;
Bowed at the close with all his graceful airs,
And begged an interest in his frequent prayers.

WHAT'S fame?-a fancied life in others' breath,
A thing beyond us, e'en before our death.
Just what you hear, you have, and what's un-
known

The same (my lord) if Tully's, or your own.
All that we feel of it begins and ends
In the small circle of our foes or friends;
To all beside as much an empty shade
A Eugene living as a Cæsar dead;
Alike or when or where they shone or shine,
Or on the Rubicon, or on the Rhine.
A wit 's a feather, and a chief a rod;
An honest man's the noblest work of God.
Fame but from death a villain's name can save,
As justice tears his body from the grave;

A noisy man is always in the right.

I twirl my thumbs, fall back into my chair,
Fix on the wainscot a distressful stare,
And, when I hope his blunders are all out,
Reply discreetly, - To be sure -no doubt!

WILLIAM COWPER.

Is hung on high, to poison half mankind.
All fame is foreign, but of true desert;
Plays round the head, but comes not to the heart:
One self-approving hour whole years outweighs
Of stupid starers and of loud huzzas ;
And more true joy Marcellus exiled feels
Than Cæsar with a senate at his heels.
ALEXANDER POPE.

OATHS.

" FROM CONVERSATION."

OATHS terminate, as Paul observes, all strife, Some men have surely then a peaceful life. Whatever subject occupy discourse, The feats of Vestris, or the naval force,

THE SEASIDE WELL.

"Waters flowed over mine head; then I said, I am cut off." -LAM. iii. 54.

ONE day I wandered where the salt sea-tide
Backward had drawn its wave,

And found a spring as sweet as e'er hillside
To wild flowers gave.

Freshly it sparkled in the sun's bright look,
And 'mid its pebbles strayed,

As if it thought to join a happy brook
In some green glade.

But soon the heavy sea's resistless swell
Came rolling in once more;

Spreading its bitter o'er the clear sweet well
And pebbled shore.

Like a fair star thick buried in a cloud,
Or life in the grave's gloom,

The well, enwrapped in a deep watery shroud,
Sunk to its tomb.

As one who by the beach roams far and wide,

Remnant of wreck to save,

Again I wandered when the salt sea-tide

Withdrew its wave.

CURSED be the verse, how well soe'er it flow,

No anger in its tone,

Give virtue scandal, innocence a fear,
Or from the soft-eyed virgin steal a tear!
But he who hurts a harmless neighbor's peace,
Insults fallen worth, or beauty in distress,
Who loves a lie, lame slander helps about,
Who writes a libel, or who copies out;
That fop whose pride affects a patron's name,
Yet absent wounds an author's honest fame :
Who can your merit selfishly approve,
And show the sense of it without the love;
Who has the vanity to call you friend,
Yet wants the honor, injured, to defend ;
Who tells whate'er you think, whate'er you say,
And, if he lie not, must at least betray;

Who to the Dean and silver bell can swear,

And sees at Canons what was never there;
Who reads but with a lust to misapply,
Make satire a lampoon, and fiction lie;
A lash like mine no honest man shall dread,
But all such babbling block heads in his stead.

PROFUSION.

TIMON.

ALEXANDER POPE.

66
FROM MORAL ESSAYS."

AT Timon's villa let us pass a day,

my heart to gall!

away!"

So proud, so grand; of that stupendous air,
Soft and agrecable come never there.
Greatness, with Timon, dwells in such a draught
As brings all Brobdingnag before your thought.
To compass this, his building is a town,
His pond an ocean, his parterre a down :
Who but must laugh, the master when he sees,
A puny insect, shivering at a breeze!
Lo, what huge heaps of littleness around!
The whole, a labored quarry above ground.
Two Cupids squirt before: a lake behind
Improves the keenness of the northern wind.
His gardens next your admiration call,
On every side you look, behold the wall!
No pleasing intricacies intervene,

No artful wildness to perplex the scene;
Grove nods at grove, each alley has a brother,
And half the platform just reflects the other.
The suffering eye inverted nature sees,
Trees cut to statues, statues thick as trees;
With here a fountain, never to be played;
And there a summer-house, that knows no shade;
Here Amphitrite sails through myrtle bowers;
There gladiators fight, or die in flowers;
Unwatered see the drooping sea-horse mourn,
And swallows roost in Nilus' dusty urn.

My lord advances with majestic mien,
Smit with the mighty pleasure, to be seen;
But soft by regular approach -- not yet -
First through the length of yon hot terrace sweat;
And when up ten steep slopes you've dragged
your thighs,

Just at his study door he 'll bless your eyes.

His study with what authors is it stored? In books, not authors, curious is my lord; To all their dated backs he turns you round; These Aldus printed, those Du Sueil has bound! Lo, some are vellum, and the rest as good For all his lordship knows, but they are wood. For Locke or Milton 't is in vain to look, These shelves admit not any modern book.

And now the chapel's silver bell you hear, That summons you to all the pride of prayer: Light quirks of music, broken and uneven, Make the soul dance upon a jig to heaven. On painted ceilings you devoutly stare, Where sprawl the saints of Verrio or Laguerre, On gilded clouds in fair expansion lie, And bring all paradise before your eye. To rest the cushion and soft dean invite, Who never mentions hell to cars polite.

But hark! the chiming clocks to dinner call; A hundred footsteps scrape the marble hall: The rich buffet well-colored serpents grace, And gaping Tritons spue to wash your face. Is this a dinner? this a genial room? No, 't is a temple, and a hecatomb.

A solemn sacrifice, performed in state,

You drink by measure, and to minutes eat.
So quick retires each flying course, you'd swear
Sancho's dread doctor and his wand were there.
Between each act the trembling salvers ring,
From soup to sweet wine, and God bless the king.
In plenty starving, tantalized in state,
And complaisantly helped to all I hate,
Treated, caressed, and tired, I take my leave,
Sick of his civil pride from morn to eve;
I curse such lavish cost, and little skill,
And swear no day was ever passed so ill.

The melancholy Jaques grieves at that;
And, in that kind, swears you do more usurp
Than doth your brother that hath banished you.
To-day my lord of Amiens and myself,
Did steal behind him, as he lay along
Under an oak, whose antique root peeps out
Upon the brook that brawls along this wood:
To the which place a poor sequestered stag,
That from the hunters' aim had ta'en a hurt,
Did come to languish; and, indeed, my lord,
The wretched animal heaved forth such groans,
That their discharge did stretch his leathern coat
Almost to bursting; and the big round tears
Coursed one another down his innocent nose
In piteous chase; and thus the hairy fool,
Much marked of the melancholy Jaques,
Stood on the extremest verge of the swift brook,
Augmenting it with tears.

DUKE S. But what said Jaques ? Did he not moralize this spectacle? 1 LORD. O yes, into a thousand similes. First, for his weeping into the needless stream; "Poor deer," quoth he, "thou mak'st a testament As wordlings do, giving thy sum of more To that which had too much": then being there alone,

Left and abandoned of his velvet friends;