Oh! if it had been so ordered by the wise and beneficent Deity, that those mighty intellects, which have sailed before man's wondering eyes with majesty and beauty down the stream of time, and, like invigorating summer's mists, have evaporated into the ocean of space. If the but I must pause from their number, and refer the reader for their noble names, and far more noble qualities, to his Biographical Dictionary. Well, then, the living, if the Moehler's, the Görres', the Buckland's, the Silliman's, the Bulwer's, the Lardner's, the Forrest's, the Irving's, the Moore's, the Rossini's, the Bryant's, gracious heaven! I am again overwhelmed by the crowds of the living of all nations, who are nearly as numerous, and whose productions are as nutritious as the prolific bee, while their arguments are as irresistible, their statements and researches as astounding, as the waters of Niagara, their sentiments as delicate as its never ceasing foam, and as elegant as its diurnal tinted rainbow, yet withal as brilliant and as sparkling as the polished diamond.

I must, therefore, cease personating and eulogizing, but simply presume, were it possible for men of genius, past, present, and to come, to bequeath this glorious portion of themselves to their successors, with the same facility as the wealthy do their possessions; even the unimaginative, unintellectual miser, and the most wasteful, thoughtless spendthrift would no longer worship at the shrine of mammon; this general, this generous, this holy diffusion of their mighty qualities would put this false principle to shame. Thus might we make one step, in the progress of a better art of living, which appears as now conducted, to consist chiefly in the assumption and indulgence of false principles.

"Look round the habitable world, how few

Know their own good, and kuowing, it pursue." DRYDEN.

"Some sects in religion," which sprung up during this period, "declaimed against ornament in dress, furniture, and other modes of life. They renounce those as vanity; but this is not the language of universal nature, nor of physical nature either. Where Ideality exists to a considerable extent, there is an innate desire for the beautiful, and an instinctive love and admiration of it; and so far from the arrangements of the Creator in the material world, being in opposition to it, He has scattered, in the most profuse abundance, objects calculated in the highe degree, to excite and gratify the feeling."

What are the flowers that deck the fields, combining perfect elegance of form, with the most exquisite loveliness, delicacy and harmony of tint; but objects addressed purely to Ideality, and the subordinate faculties of Colouring and Form?

They enjoy not their beauty themselves; and afford neither food, nor raiment, nor protection to the corporeal frame of man; and, on this account, some persons have been led to view them as merely nature's vanities, and shows, possessed of neither dignity nor utility. But the individual in whom Ideality is large, will in rapture say, that these objects, and the lofty mountain, the deep glen, the roaring cataract, and all the varied loveliness of hill and dale, fountain and fresh shade, afford to him the banquet of the mind; and they pour into his soul a stream of pleasure so intense, and yet so pure and elevated, that in comparison with it, all the gratifications of sense and animal propensity, sink into insipidity and insignificance."

"In short, to the Phrenologist, the existence of this faculty in the mind, and of external objects fitted to gratify it, is one among numberless instances of the boundless beneficence of the Creator toward man; for it is a faculty purely of enjoyment— one whose sole use is to refine, and exalt, and extend the range of our other powers, to confer on us higher susceptibilities of improvement, and a keener relish for all that is great and glorious in the universe."-Combe's Phrenology.

TASTE AND GENIUS.

TASTE has been defined (in "Good's Book of Nature,") to be," that faculty which selects and relishes such combinations of ideas, as produce genuine beauty, and rejects the contrary." If this is correct, I think it must be conceded, that they also felt and appreciated this charm to a considerable extent.

ON TASTE.

There is a charm which Taste can give,
Which art alone can ne'er attain;

This zest, this charm will e'er outlive,
All sorts of pleasure and of pain.

What can the sculptor's chisel do,

What can the shuttle e'er perform ;
What can the painter's colours prove,
Without this thrilling, feeling charm?

In vain do poets cull their words,
In vain melodious strings are touch'd,
As much so as the songless birds,

In leafless groves where all is hush'd

This charm to science gives a tone,
Which cold philosophy approves ;
For want of skill this will attone,

Each passion, sense, and thought, it moves.

Dr. Good, farther observes that "Taste and Genius cannot but be favourable to virtue. They cannot consist conjointly without sensibility. While it is of the very essence of vice, to have its feelings blunted, its conscience seared; their pleasures are notoriously derived from elevated and virtuous sources. There may perhaps be a few exceptions to the remark, but I am speaking of the general principle. The lovely, the graceful, the elegant, the novel, the wonderful, the sublimethese are the food on which they banquet; the grandeur and magnificence of the heavens-the terrible majesty of the tempestuous ocean the romantic wildness of forests and precipices, and mountains, that lose themselves in the clouds-the sweet tranquillity of a summer evening-the rural gayety of vineyards, hop grounds, corn fields, and orchards-the cheerful hum of busy cities-the stillness of village solitude-the magic face of human beauty-the tear of distressed innocence-the noble struggle of worth with poverty, of patriotism with usurpation, of piety with persecution; these, and innumerable images like these-tender, touching, and dignified-are the subjects for which they fondly hunt, the themes on which they daily expatiate. To say nothing of the higher banqueting, the 'food of angels,' that religion sets before them."

There is another view which we may take of them; the money was not then so much noticed as the person. The present age is distinguished for an inordinate craving for money, merely to exhibit it in senseless, fragile things, displaying neither utility, taste, or judgment, but just to show the party is rich.

The author of the "Economy of the Human Life," justly observes: "An immoderate desire of riches is a poison lodged in the mind; it contaminates and destroys every thing that is good in it; it is no sooner rooted there than all virtue, all honesty, all natural affection fly before the face of it," but, "when I caution you against becoming a miser, I do not therefore advise you to become a prodigal or spendthrift."* For, "'tis one thing to be rich, another to be covetuous."+

As a strong proof of this contempt of money, I select the following lines in reprobation of it:

"To one who Married a very Rich, but very Deformed Woman."

"Who is't that says, it was not love

Which you unto this match did move,

* Horace.

+ Chrysostome.

'Twas love, but love of money sure,
That thus to wed did you allure;
'Twas not the beauty which doth lie
In your wife's cheek, or lip, or eye,
Or any part that shines,

Save only, in her golden mines;
It were the Angels in her chest,
That first made love, within your breast
There sat the cupids, there the graces,
Reside in those red and white faces,
In having one, you have many,
Each bag a wife is-how then can ye
Choose but be rich? for such as these,
Being put to use, will soon increase;
Nor will their beauty fade, for th'are
At fifty, more than fifteen fair,
As pure gold metal, as refin'd

An age hence, as when they were coin'd,
Provided you keep them in bands,
From falling into huckster's hands;
If pleasure be not, profits in,
Your match, polygamy's no sin.
In a free state, you may be bold
To marry every piece of gold,
Though they so numerous be, as will
The great Turk's vast seraglio fill;
Yet take my council, look well to them;
They may be called in by the state,
And valued at a lower rate;
They may be rounded and defac'd;
Or with worse metal be debas'd,
They may perhaps suffer a rape,

Be plundered from you, should they 'scape
These accidents, yet wings have they,
Like Cupid's, and will flee away,

Leaving you little else behind,

But your sad choice, and sadder mind;
For when your money's gone, your wife
Will stay to vex you all your life."

From "Divine Poems," 1654, a very scarce little volume of poetry, by the Rev. Thomas Washbourne, B. D. In the time of the rebellion, he had a prebendall stall at Gloucester; having suffered in the royal cause, at the restoration he was reinstated, and presented to the rectory of Dumbleton, in Gloucestershire.

49

RURAL SPORTS

"We shall walk, ride, run, dance, swim, fence, sail, or shoot to little purpose, without a cheerful companion." DR. TISSOT.

"THE great business of life, in the country, appertains, in some way or other, to the game and especially at this time of the year, (25th October.) If it were not for the game, a country life would be like an everlasting honey-moon, which would, in almost half a century put an end to the human race. In towns or large villages, people make a shift to find the means of rubbing the rust off from each other by a vast variety of sources of contest. A couple of wives meeting in the streets, and giving each other a wry look, or a look not quite civil enough, will, if the parties be hard pushed for a ground of contention, do pretty well. But in the country there is, alas! no such resource; here are no walls for people to take of each other. Here they are so placed as to prevent the possibility of such lucky local contact. Here is more than room enough of every sort, elbow, leg, horse, or carriage, for them all. Even at church (most of the people being in the meeting houses) the pews are surprisingly too large. Here, therefore, where all circumstances seem calculated to cause never-ceasing concord with its accompanying dullness, there would be no relief at all were it not for the game. This happily supplies the place of all other alternate dispute and reconciliation; it keeps all in life and motion, from the lord down to the hedger.

"When I see two men, whether in a market-room, by the way side, in a parlour, in a church-yard, or even in the church itself, engaged in manifestly deep and most momentous discourse, I will, if it be any time between September and February, bet ten to one that it is some way or other about the game. The wives and daughters hear so much of it, that they inevitably get engaged in the disputes; and thus all are kept in a state of vivid animation. I should like very much to be

able to take a spot or circle of twelve miles in diameter, and take an exact account of all the time spent by each individual, above the age of ten, (that is the age they begin at,) in talking during the game season of one year, about the game and about sporting exploits. I verily believe that it would amount, upon an average, to six times as much as all the other talk put together; and as to the anger, the satisfaction, the scolding, the commendation, the chagrin, the exaltation, the envy, the emulation, where are there any of these in the country, unconnected with the game?"

"There is, however, an important distinction to be made