The sun, the moon, the stars, the sea,
All to the wall-flower, and wild pea,
Are changed-we saw the world through thee,
Casa Wappy!
And though perchance a smile may gleam
Of casual mirth,
It doth not own whate'er may seem
An inward birth:
We miss thy small step on the stair:
We miss thee at thine evening prayer;
All day we miss thee everywhere,
Snows muffled earth when thou did'st go,
In life's spring bloom,
Down to the appointed house below,
The silent tomb.
But now the green leaves of the tree,
The cuckoo and the busy bee,
Return-but with them bring not thee,
Casa Wappy!
'Tis so but can it be (wild flowers
Revive again)
Man's doom in death that we and our's
For aye remain ?
Oh! can it be that o'er the grave
The grass renew'd shall yearly wave,
Yet God forget our child to save,
It cannot be for were it so,
Thus man would die;
Life were a mockery, Thought were woe,
And Truth a lie :
Heaven were a coinage of the brain,
Religion, Frenzy, Virtue vain,
And all our hopes to meet again,
Then be to us, O dear, lost child
With beam of love,
A star, death's uncongenial wild
Smiling above:
Soon, soon, thy little feet have trod
The skyward path, the seraph's road,
That led thee back from man to God,
Casa Wappy!
Yet 'tis sweet balm to our despair,
Fond, fairest boy,
That heaven is God's, and thou art there,
With Him in joy.
There past are death and all its woes,
There beauty's stream for ever flows,
And pleasure's day no sunset knows,
Casa Wappy!
Farewell, then-for a while, farewell--
Pride of my heart!
It cannot be that long we dwell
Thus torn apart :
Time's shadows like the shuttle flee,
And dark howe'er life's night may be,
Beyond the grave I'll meet with thee,
Casa Wappy!
THE HOLY DEAD.
By Mrs. SIGOURNEY.
"Wherefore I praised the dead who are already dead more than the living who are yet alive."-SOLOMON.
THEY dread no storm that lowers,
No perish'd joys bewail;
They pluck no thorn-clad flowers,
Nor drink of streams that fail:
There is no tear-drop in their eye,
No change upon their brow;
Their placid bosom heaves no sigh,
Though all earth's idols bow.
Who are so greatly blest?
From whom hath sorrow fled?
Who share such deep, unbroken rest
Where all things toil? The dead!
The holy dead. Why weep ye so
Above yon sable bier?
Thrice blessed! they have done with woe;
The living claim the tear.
Go to their sleeping bowers,
Deck their low couch of clay
With earliest spring's soft breathing flowers;
And when they fade away,
Think of the amaranthine wreath,
The garlands never dim,
And tell me why thou fliest from death,
Or hidest thy friends from him.
We dream, but they awake;
Dread visions mar our rest;
Through thorns and snares our way we take,
And yet we mourn the blest!
For spirits round the Eternal Throne,
How vain the tears we shed!
They are the living, they alone,
Whom thus we call the dead.
THE GARDEN: A THOUGHT.
By Mrs. JAMES GRAY.
SEE the fair and fragrant flowers
Peeping their green mantles through,
Weeping 'neath the passing showers,
Smiling 'neath the sudden blue:
See their lovely colours blended,
Brought from many a varying clime,
And with careful nurture tended,
Till they reach their fullest prime.
So the church, a water'd garden,
Bounded by th' Almighty's power,
Feels his mercy's gracious pardon,
Feels his Spirit's gentle shower;
So, from many a scatter'd nation
Are his chosen brought with care,
Given the life of his Salvation,
Rooted, grounded, 'stablish'd there!
Oh! may we indeed be taken
From the world's polluted waste,
By his presence ne'er forsaken,
All his vital spirit taste;
Where the streams of life are flowing,
Land by saints and prophets trod,
May we still be freshly growing
In the garden of our God!
From YOUNG's Night Thoughts.
Bur why on time so lavish is my song?
On this great theme kind Nature keeps a school,
To teach her sons herself. Each night we die ;
Each morn are born anew; each day a life!
And shall we kill each day? If trifling kills,
Sure vice must butcher.-O, what heaps of slain
Cry out for vengeance on us! Time destroy'd
Is suicide, where more than blood is spilt.
Time flies, death urges, knells call, Heaven invites,
Hell threatens: all exerts; in effort all;
More than creation labours!-Labours more?
And is there in creation, what, amidst
This tumult universal, wing'd despatch,
And ardent energy, supinely yawns?
Man sleeps, and man alone; and man, whose fate,
Fate irreversible, entire, extreme,
Endless, hair-hung, breeze-shaken, o'er the gulf
A moment trembles; drops! and man, for whom
All else is in alarm; man, the sole cause
Of this surrounding storm! and yet he sleeps,
As the storm rock'd to rest.-Throw years away?
Throw empires, and be blameless.-Moments seize,
Heaven's on their wing: a moment we may wish,
When worlds want wealth to buy. Bid Day stand still;
Bid him drive back his car, recall, retake
Fate's hasty prey; implore him, re-import
The period past, re-give the given hour!
Lorenzo-O for yesterday to come!
THEN why thus heavy, O my soul !
Say why distrustful still,
Thy thoughts with vain impatience roll
Ŏ'er scenes of future ill?
suppress each rising fear,
Each anxious doubt exclude;
A Maker's will hath placed thee here,
A Maker wise and good.
He to thy every trial knows
Its just restraint to give;
Attentive to behold thy woes,
And faithful to relieve.
Then why thus heavy, O
Say why distrustful still,
Thy thoughts with vain impatience roll
Ŏ'er scenes of future ill?
Though griefs unnumber'd throng thee round,
Still in thy God confide,
Whose finger marks the seas their bound,
And curbs the headlong tide.
THE SOUL'S SYMPATHY WITH GREATNESS.
Extracted from AKENSIDE's Pleasures of Imagination.
SAY, why was man so eminently raised
Amid the vast creation? why ordain'd
Through life and death to dart his piercing eye
With thoughts beyond the limit of his frame,
But that the Omnipotent might send him forth,
In sight of mortal and immortal powers,
As on a boundless theatre, to run
The great career of justice, to exalt
His generous aim to all diviner deeds,
To chase each partial purpose from his breast,
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