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On the "flimsy and superficial system of female education which has received so much encouragement," the author is justly severe.

"That precious period of life," says he, the best portion of which should certainly be devoted to the improvement of the mind, to the lessons of domestic duty, and to the cultivation of the love of virtue, is sacrificed, under our connivance, to the frivolous accomplishments of music and singing, Italian and French, dancing, drawing, and painting; in each of which our female youth must now be placed, under the instruction of a separate master, generally of dubious. and frequently of debased principles. While their time is thus so entirely occupied in the pursuit of superficial acquirements, it is not to be wondered at, that they should in fact be rendered, from habit, incapable of, and averse to, the more important and useful duties of life. Neither is this reprehensible plan confined to the more elevated ranks, but it is adopted with equal infatuation by the middling classes; and with what pernicious effects, the distresses of many a sorrowing family, and the streets of the metropolis, too plainly demonstrate !

"I do not pretend entirely to disapprove of these refinements of education, or to affirm that they are destitute of advantage, when cultivated in moderation: I only regret that they are made the principal, if not sole object of study, instead of an accessary and secondary consideration; and I deprecate the consequences: for while such a system is tolerated, with me it ceases to be a wonder, that conjugal fidelity should be violated with little compunction; that the base acts of seduction have cast upon the town that numerous list of unfortunates, which crowds our theatres and public places, to the outrage of all decency; and that matrimony is become an enterprize of danger and doubt, in which the reflecting mind is reluctant to engage."

What the author observes on the subject of Tithes, appears to us far from being correct, particularly when he says that Tithes are a leading cause of "estrangement from the regular places of worship, and of augmenting the number of dissenting congregations. This we are convinced is not the case; and the increase of schism must be traced to very different sources than "the question of Tithes." The pamphlet on the whole, however, has our warm approbation.

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Poetry.

POETRY.

A HYMN TO NARAYENA.

(By Sir William Jones.)
THE ARGUMENг.

A COMPLETE introduction to the following ode would be no less than a full comment on the Vayds and Purans of the Hindus, the remains of Egyptian and Persian theology, and the tenets of the Ionic and Italic schools; but this is not the place for so vast a disquisition. It will be sufficient here to premise, that the inextricable difficulties attending the vulgar notion of material substances, concerning which "We know this only, that we nothing know,"

induced many of the wisest among the ancients, and some of the most enlightend among the moderns to believe, that the whole creation was rather an energy than a work, by which the Infinite Being' who is present at all times aud in all places, exhibits to the minds of his creatures a set of perceptions, like a wonderful picture or piece of music, always varied, yet always uniform; so that all bodies and their qualities exist, indeed, to every wise and useful purpose, but exist only as far as they are perceived; a theory no less pious than sublime, and as different from any principle of Atheism, as the brightest sunshine differs from the blackest midnight. This illusive operation of the Deity the Hindus philosophers call MAYA, or Deception; and the word occurs in this sense more than once in the commentary on the Rig Vayd, by the great VASISHTHA, of which Mr. Hathed has given us an a imirable specimen.

The first stanza of the Hymn represents the sublimest attributes of the Supreme Being, and the three forms in which they most clearly appear to us, Power, Wisdom, and Goodness; or in the language of ORPHEUS, and his disciples, Love: the second comprises the Indian and Egyptian doctrine of the divine essence and archetypal Ileus; for a distinct account of which the reader must be referred to a noble description in the sixth book of PLATO's Republic; and the fiue explanation of that passage in an elegant discourse by the author of CYRUS, from whose learned work a hint has been borrowed for the conclusion of this piece. The third and fourth are taken from the Institutes of MENU, and the eighteenth Puran of VYASSA, entitled, Srey Bhagawat, part of which has been translated into Persian, nor without elegance, but rather too paraphrastically. From BREHME, or the Great Being, in the neuter gender, is formed BREHMA, in the masculine; and the second word appropriated to the creative power of the Divinity.

The spirit of GoD, called NARAYENA, or moving on the water, has a multiplicity of other epithets in Sanscret, the principal of which are introduced expressly, or by allusion, in the fifth stanza; and two of them contain the naines of the evil Beings, who are feigned to have sprung from the cars of VISHNU; for thus the divine spirit is enentitled, when considered as the preserving power: the sixth ascribes the perception of secondary qualities by our senses to the immediate influence of MAYA; and the seventh imputes to her operation the primary qualities of extension and solidity.

THE

THE HYMN.

I.

PIRIT of SPIRITS, who, through every part
Of space expanded, and of endless time,
Beyond the stretch of lab'ring thought sublime,
Badst uproar into beauteous order start,
Before Heaven was, Thou art:

Ere spheres beneath us roll'd, or spheres above,
Ere earth in firmamental ether hung,

Thou satst alone; till, through thy mystic love,
Things unexisting to existence sprung,
And grateful descant sung.

What first impell'd thee to exert thy might?
Goodness unlimited. What glorious light
Thy pow'r directed? Wisdom without bound.
What prov'd it first? Oh! guide my fancy right;
Oh! raise from cumbrous ground

My soul in rapture drown'd,

That fearless it may soar on wings of fire;

For Thou, who only know'st, Thou only canst inspire.

II.

Wrapt in eternal solitary shade,

Th' impenetrable gloom of light intense,
Impervious, inaccessible, immense,
Ere spirits were infus'd or forms display'd,
Brehm his own mind survey'd,

As mortal eyes (thus finite we compare
With infinite) in smoothest mirrors gaze:
Swift at his look, a shape supremely fair
Leap'd into being with a boundless blaze,
That fifty suns might daze.

Primeval Maya was the goddess nam'd,
Who to her sire with love divine inflam'd,
A casket gave with rich ideas fill'd,

From which this gorgeous universe he fram'd;
For when th' Almighty will'd
Unnumber'd worlds to build,

From unity diversified he sprang,

While gay Creation laugh'd and procreapt Nature rang.

III.

First, an all-potent, all-pervading sound

Bade flow the waters, and the waters flow'd,

Exulting in their measureless abode,

Diffusive, multitudinous, profound,

Above, beneath, around;

Then o'er the vast expanse primordial wind
Breath'd gently, till a lucid bubble rose,
Which grew in perfect shape an egg refin'd:
Created substance no such lustre shows,
Earth no such beauty knows.

Above the warring waves it danc'd elate,
Till from its bursting shell with lovely state
A form cerulean flutter'd o'er the deep,
Brightest of beings, greatest of the great:
Who not as mortals steep

Their eyes in dewy sleep,

But heav'nly pensive on the Lotos lay,
That blossom'd at his touch, and shed a golden ray.

IV.

Hail primal blossom! hail empyreal gem!
Kemel or Pedma, or whate'er high name

Delight thee, say, what four-form'd Godhead came,
With graceful stole and beamy diadem,

Forth from thy verdant stem?
Full-gifted Brehma! Wrapt in solemn thought
He stood, and round his eyes fire-darting threw :
But, whilst his viewless origin he sought,
One plain he saw of living waters blue,
Their spring nor saw nor knew;

Then in his parent stalk again retir'd,
With restless pain for ages he inquir'd

What were his pow'rs, by whom, and why conferr❜d.
With doubts perplex'd, with keen impatience fir'd,
He rose, and rising heard

Th' unknown all-knowing Word,

"Brehma! no more in vain research persist,

My veil thou canst not move---Go, bid all worlds exist."

V.

Hail self-existent, in celestial speech
Narayen, from thy wat'ry cradle, nam'd:
Or Venamaly may I sing unblam'd,

With flow'ry braids, that to thy sandals reach,
Whose beauties who can teach ?

Or high Peitamber, clad in yellow robes

Than sunbeams brighter in meridian glow,
That weave their heav'n-spun light o'er circling globes ?
Unwearied, Lotos-eyed, with dreadful bow,

Dire evil's constant foe!

Great Pedmanabha, o'er thy cherish'd world

The pointed Checra, by thy fingers whirl'd,

Vol. XI. Churchm. Mag. for Aug. 1806. X

Fierce Kytabh shall destroy, and Medhu grim
To black despair and deep destruction hurl'd.
Such views my senses dim,

My eyes in darkness swim:

What eye can bear thy blaze, what utt'rance tell Thy deeds with silver trump or many-wreathed shell.

VI.

Omniscient Spirit, whose all-ruling pow'r

Bids from each sense bright emanations beam;
Glows in the rainbow, sparkles in the stream,
Smiles in the bud, and glistens in the flow'r
That crowns each vernal bow'r;

Sighs in the gale, and warbles in the throat
Of every bird that hails the bloomy spring,
Or tells his love in many a liquid note,
Whilst envious artists touch the rival string,
Till rocks and forests ring;

Breathes in rich fragrance from the sandal grove,
Or where the precious musk-deer playful rove :
In dulcet juice from clust'ring fruit distils,
And burns salubrious in the tasteful clove :
Soft banks and verd'rous hills
Thy present influence fills;

In air, in floods, in caverns, woods, and plains,
Thy will inspirits all, thy sov'reign Maya reigns.

VII.

Blue crystal vault and elemental fires,

That in th' ethereal fluid blaze and breathe;
Thou, tossing main, whose sraky branches wreathe
This pensile orb with intertwisting gyres;

Mountains, whose radiant spires

resumptuous rear their summits to the skies,

And blend their em'rald hue with sapphire light;
Smooth meads and lawns, that glow with varying dyes
Of dew-bespangled leaves and blossoms bright,
Hence! vanish from my sight:

Delusive pictures! unsubstantial shows!
My soul absorb'd One only Being knows,
Of all perceptions One abundant source,
Whence ev'ry object, ev'ry moment flows.
Suns hence derive their force,

Ilence planets learn their course;

But suns and fading worlds I view no more, God only I perceive, God only I adore.