HE SHALL FLY AWAY AS A DREAM.

I DREAM'D:-I saw a rosy child,

With flaxen ringlets, in a garden playing;
Now stooping here, and then afar off straying,
As flower or butterfly his feet beguiled.

'T was changed; one summer's day I stepp'd aside
To let him pass; his face had manhood's seeming,
And that full eye of blue was fondly beaming
On a fair maiden, whom he called his bride.

Once more; 'twas evening, and the cheerful fire
I saw a group of youthful forms surrounding,
The room with harmless pleasantry resounding,
And, in the midst, I mark'd the smiling sire.

The heavens were clouded—and I heard the tone
Of a slow-moving bell; the white-hair'd man had gone!

Anonymous.

THE SABBATH.

How many blessed groups

this hour are bending,

Through England's primrose meadow-paths, their

way

Towards spire and tower, 'midst shadowy elms ascending,

Whence the sweet chimes proclaim the hallow'd day. The halls, from old heroic ages grey,

Pour their fair children forth; and hamlets low, With whose thick orchard blooms the soft winds play, Send out their inmates in a happy flow,

Like a freed vernal stream. I may not tread
With them those pathways—to the feverish bed
Of sickness bound; yet, oh my God! I bless
Thy mercy, that with sabbath peace hath fill'd
My chasten'd heart, and all its throbbings still'd
To one deep calm of lowliest thankfulness.

Mrs. Hemans.*

* Composed a few days before her death, and dictated to her brother.

TIME.

TIME is the most undefinable yet paradoxical of things; the past is gone, the future is not come, and the present becomes the past even while we attempt to define it; and, like the flash of the lightning, at once exists and expires. Time is the measurer of all things, but is itself immeasurable, and the grand discloser of all things, but is itself undisclosed. Like space, it is incomprehensible, because it has no limit, and it would be still more so if it had. It is more obscure in its source than the Nile, and in its termination than the Niger; and advances like the slowest tide, but retreats like the swiftest torrent. It gives wings of lightning to pleasure, but feet of lead to pain; and lends expectation a curb, but enjoyment a spur. It robs beauty of her charms, to bestow them on her picture, and builds a monument to merit, but denies it a house; it is the transient and deceitful flatterer of falsehood, but the tried and

final friend of truth.

Time is the most subtle yet

the most insatiable of depredators, and by appearing to take nothing, is permitted to take all; nor can it be satisfied until it has stolen the world from us, and us from the world. It constantly flies, yet overcomes all things by flight; and, although it is the present ally, it will be the future conqueror of death. Time, the cradle of hope but the grave of ambition, is the stern corrector of fools, but the salutary counsellor of the wise, bringing all they dread to the one, and all they desire to the other; but, like Cassandra, it warns us with a voice that even the sagest discredit too long, and the silliest believe too late. Wisdom walks before it, opportunity with it, and repentance behind it: he that has made it his friend will have little to fear from his enemies; but he that has made it his enemy will have little to hope from his friends.

Colton.

PRUDENCE may be considered in relation to a man as the string is to the kite; it properly restrains it. It enables the kite to rise, and maintains it when raised.

NIGHT.

O SWEET and beautiful is night, when the silver moon is high,

And countless stars, like clustering gems, hang sparkling in the sky,

While the balmy breath of the summer breeze comes whispering down the glen,

And one fond voice alone is heard-O night is lovely then!

But when that voice, in feebler moans of sickness and

of pain,

But mocks the anxious ear that strives to catch its sounds in vain,

When silently we watch the bed, by the taper's flickering light,

Where all we love is fading fast-how terrible is

night!

Rev. R. H. Barham.