To ask his sympathy, his care, his love,
And with a deep familiar earnestness

Blend all thy thoughts with his, with filial fear
Yet fearless in affection; if thou hast

Thou knowest an emblem, faint indeed and dim,
But yet the brightest, loveliest earth affords
Of the joy fountains gushing in the heart
Of one, who, from the world a fugitive,

And from despair, and darkness, and thick doubt,
Finds there is yet one bosom where to cast
His sorrows, and a Father's heart that glows
For him, and yearns to greet him as a child.
Entranced imparadised in joy I knelt
There at the footstool of my Father's throne,
My Father's and my God's, and from his smile,
Drank life, drank beauty, drank intensest love,
From love, and life, and beauty's fountain head-
I may not tell ye more-but when that dream
Had passed me like a golden sunset cloud,
My soul was as a sea of light, whereon
No grief did cast a shadow, such as oft
Thou mayst have seen within a summer sky,
Sleeping untroubled in calm mellow light,
Above the spot where the sun's chariot wheels
Sank slowly into ocean. Yes, it passed,
But yet I felt it was my own for ever,
A wealth, a rapture, an inheritance.
And quickly I bethought me once again
Of all those airy scenes of young delight,
That whilome, as I gazed, had passed away,
Or seemed to pass, like phantom soulless things.
And a voice spake within me, "Thou hast found,
By finding out thy spirit's home in God,
A master key of truth, that shall unlock

The thousand wards of earthly mysteries,
And show thee unto whom alone, the good,
The true, the noble, pure, and beautiful,
Whatever seems to mortals loveliest,
Can have or claim an immortality

Of goodness, truth, or beauty-'tis to those

Whose hearts are right, whose beings one with God, Who in him find their all-to other men,

The beauteous things that pass them by on earth, Oh yes, they are immortal, but it is

An immortality of deathless woe,

That haunts them with the sting of lost delight.

And once again, retracing all my steps,
I gazed upon those lovely scenes of life;

Those passion fountains of unfathomed depth,
Those springs of human love, those beautiful homes
Of friendship and affection, which the dove

Of Peace broods over evermore, and there
Doth shelter underneath her sacred wing
A father's heart, a mother's, or a child's—
Those dearest types of heaven; and lo, they rose
In tenfold loveliness before me, rose
More passionately beautiful than ever,

And oh, the blessed change !—they vanish'd not.
At first my faithless heart was chill with fear,
And trembled as the moments swift flew by,
And the far beatings of the clock of time,
Struck in dim cadence on mine ear, but soon
Faith whispered, "they are amaranthine now,
Thou livest now 'mid everlasting things—
Fear not-what once was of the present, soon
Is numbered with the past—what once was now,
Let one brief moment pass away, is then ;

But yet what has been, shall be, aye and is.”

In peace, my spirit lingered on the scenes
Of her eternal Past-in peace I mused
On those delicious spots of earth, those fair
Oases in the wilderness of life,

Those isles too often few and far between,
Emblems of home upon the homeless sea,
Those Edens blooming in a ruin'd world,
Those sunbeams 'mid the storm-clouds all astray,
Those gushing springs within a thirsty land,
Those stars that startle us like friends at night,
Those blessed things so inexpressibly dear,
There, there I mused-there wander'd like a child
Thro' flowerets all his own; and when at length
The cycle was complete, and thro' the heavens
Thrice peal'd the everlasting answer, gone,
I looked upon those scenes of far delight,
And there unfading and unchanged they lay
In the clear cloudless region of the Past,
Imperishably shrined in love and light.

E. H. B.

DIALOGUE ON CONFIRMATION.

Ellen and Fanny.

Fanny. Ellen, I am so glad I have met you just now, we can take a turn round the field, and go on talking on the subject we were upon yesterday.

Ellen. I am very glad we have met.

Fanny. When I think that I have indeed been confirmed, I cannot tell you what I feel.

Ellen. Of course you cannot tell me. The gratitude of the soul that is "called and chosen," can be told only to the Saviour who has called and chosen her.

Fanny. When I think that though my dear pious parents dedicated me to Jesus when I was an infant, though they always endeavoured to teach me every thing good, though God has showered such unnumbered mercies on me, giving me health, and food, and clothes, and a happy home, besides giving me the Bible, and his ministers to preach the gospel to me, and more, much more than I can reckon up; yet I loved him not, I contented myself with a form of godliness, I saw no beauty in the Saviour, Christ was not precious to me, and now during the last year, without the smallest merit of my own, He has given me another heart, and made me take such a different view of every thing, "I have heard of Thee by the hearing of the ear, but now mine eye seeth Thee," and when I think I have now been given this opportunity of joining myself to the

Lord, in a perpetual covenant which shall not be forgotten, it seems to myself as if I must be the happiest human being upon earth.

Ellen. Yes, and there is another reflection, dear child, which must solemnize and heighten your gratitude, making you humble while it makes you happy. When you reflect that all this mercy of God to your soul was not an afterthought, if I may so speak-not a mere relenting on the part of God out of compassion to your perishing condition when He saw you walking in darkness, but that long before you were born, even before the foundations of the world were laid, even from all eternity, the salvation of your soul, even yours, was planned in the counsels of the Most High, and your unworthy name was written in heaven; you must feel that while human boasting is for ever excluded, your soul must magnify the Lord, and glory in Him for ever, and for ever.

Fanny, (after a pause.) Ellen, how did you feel when you were confirmed?

Ellen. It was many years ago, dear Fanny-ten years this spring-but I perfectly remember it; I did not feel as you do now, nor indeed like a child of God at all. I felt very little about the matter. I considered it a proper custom like going to church. I thought God would bless me when the Bishop put his hand on me, but I had not one sufficient reason for expecting to be so blest, except a sort of notion that I was trying to be good; in short I was trusting in myself, and not in the blood of Jesus.

Fanny. Oh, Ellen, it does so astonish me that any should trust in themselves for salvation. I think I should hardly care for salvation if it were to be earned: but when I look on it as a gift-a free gift, and say,