of his evil habits, complete the awful work of desecration. God has given the day; and blind selfishness not only wrongs itself of the invaluable boon, but would lay an embargo upon its free blessings in relation to others also. Sloth is seen, foolishly idling away the golden hours. Profaneness is heard, uttering its coarse jests and blasphemies, in the very precincts of the sanctuary. Profligacy comes forth, meretriciously attired, and, heedless of rebuke, tracks the very, footsteps of the pious. The "lovers of pleasure," transported by the wild liberty of the day, rush into scenes of sinful excitement crowd the steamboats, riot in suburban teagardens, or promenade the streets, the parks, or the river's banks. Trains rush across the startled country, robbing thousands of railway servants of their heritage of rest, and pouring influxes of dissipated strangers into quiet villages and distant towns; whence, after roaming and carousing for hours, they are again borne back by the returning train; but not without having given an additional stimulus to all that was evil, and leaving behind them broad sowings of demoralization, destined to spring up and yield a wild produce of corruption and sorrow in future years.-JoHN ALLAN QUINTON.
I venerate the man, whose heart is warm,
Whose hands are pure, whose doctrine and whose life,
Coincident, exhibit lucid proof
That he is honest in the sacred cause.
To such I render more than mere respect,
Whose actions say, that they respect themselves
But loose in morals, and in manners vain,
In conversation frivolous, in dress
Extreme, at once rapacious and profuse;
Frequent in park with lady at his side,
Ambling and prattling scandal as he goes;
But rare at home, and never at his books,
Or with his pen, save when he scrawls a card;
Constant at routs, familiar with a round
Of ladyships, a stranger to the poor;
Ambitious of preferment for its gold,
And well-prepared, by ignorance and sloth,
By infidelity and love of world,
To make God's work a sinecure; a slave
To his own pleasures and his patron's pride;
From such apostles, O ye mitred heads,
Preserve the church! and lay not careless hands
On skulls, that cannot teach, and will not learn.
Would I describe a preacher, such as Paul,
Were he on earth, would hear, approve, and own,
Paul should himself direct me. I would trace
His master strokes, and draw from his design.
I would express him simple, grave, sincere ;
In doctrine uncorrupt; in language plain,
And plain in manner; decent, solemn, chaste,
And natural in gesture; much impress'd
Himself, as conscious of his awful charge,
And anxious mainly that the flock he feeds
May feel it too; affectionate in look,
And tender in address, as well becomes
A messenger of grace to guilty men.
Behold the picture!-Is it like ?-Like whom?
The things that mount the rostrum with a skip,
And then skip down again; pronounce a text;
Cry-hem! and, reading what they never wrote,
Just fifteen minutes, huddle up their work,
And with a well-bred whisper close the scene?
In man or woman, but far most in man,
And most of all in man that ministers
And serves the altar, in my soul I loathe
All affectation. 'Tis my perfect scorn;
Object of my implacable disgust.
What!—will a man play tricks, will he indulge
A silly fond conceit of his fair form
And just proportion, fashionable mein
And pretty face, in presence of his God?
Or will he seek to dazzle me with tropes,
As with the diamond on his lily hand,
And play his brilliant parts before my eyes,
When I am hungry for the bread of life?
He mocks his Maker, prostitutes and shames
His noble office, and, instead of truth,
Displaying his own beauty, starves his flock.
Therefore avaunt all attitude, and stare,
And start theatric, practised at the glass!
I seek divine simplicity in him
Who handles things divine; and all besides,
Though learn'd with labour, and though much admired
By curious eyes and judgments ill inform❜d,
To me is odious as the nasal twang
Heard at conventicle, where worthy men,
Misled by custom, strain celestial themes
Through the press'd nostril, spectacle-bestrid.
Some decent in demeanour while they preach,
That task perform'd, relapse into themselves;
And having spoken wisely, at the close
Grow wanton, and give proof to every eye,
Whoe'er was edified, themselves were not!
Forth comes the pocket mirror.
First we stroke
An eyebrow; next compose a straggling lock;
Then, with an air most gracefully perform'd
Fall back into our seat, extend an arm,
And lay it at its ease with gentle care,
With handkerchief in hand depending low;
The better hand more busy gives the nose
Its bergamot, or aides th' indebted eye
With opera glass, to watch the moving scene,
And recognise the slow-retiring fair.
Now this is fulsome, and offends me more
Than in a churchman slovenly neglect
And rustic coarseness would. A heavenly mind
May be indifferent to her house of clay,
And slight the hovel as beneath her care;
But how a body so fantastic, trim,
And quaint in its deportment and attire,
Can lodge a heavenly mind-demands a doubt.
He that negociates 'tween God and man,
As God's ambassador, the grand concerns
Of judgment and of mercy, should beware
Of lightness in his speech. "Tis pitiful
To court a grin, when you should woo a soul;
To break a jest, when pity should inspire
Pathetic exhortation; and t' address
The skittish fancy with facetious tales,
When sent with God's commission to the heart!
So did not Paul. Direct me to a quip
Or merry turn in all he ever wrote,
And I consent you take it for your text,
Your only one, till sides and benches fail.
No: he was serious in a serious cause,
And understood too well the weighty terms
That he had ta'en in charge. He would not stoop
To conquer those by jocular exploits,
Whom truth and soberness assail'd in vain.-CowPER.
"OH, where is the knight or the squire so bold, As to dive to the howling charybdis below?— I cast in the whirlpool a goblet of gold,
And o'er it already the dark waters flow; Whoever to me may the goblet bring,
Shall have for his guerdon that gift of his King."
He spoke, and the cup from the terrible steep,
That, rugged and hoary, hung over the verge
Of the endless and measureless world of the deep,
Swirl'd into the maëlstrom that madden'd the surge.
"And where is the diver so stout to go-
I ask ye again-to the deep below?
And the knights and the squires that gather'd around,
Stood silent-and fix'd on the ocean their eyes;
They look'd on the dismal and savage Profound,
And the peril chill'd back every thought of the prize.
And thrice spoke the Monarch-"The cup to win,
Is there never a wight who will venture in?"
And all as before heard in silence the King
Till a youth with an aspect unfearing but gentle,
'Mid the tremulous squires, stept out from the ring,
Unbuckling his girdle, and doffing his mantle;
And the murmuring crowd, as they parted asunder,
On the stately boy cast their looks of wonder.
As he strode to the marge of the summit, and
gave
One glance on the gulf of that merciless main,
Lo! the wave that for ever devours the wave,
Casts roaringly up the charybdis again,
And as with the swell of the far thunder-boom,
Rushes foamingly forth from the heart of the gloom.
And it bubbles and seethes, and it hisses and roars,
As when fire is with water commix'd and contending,
And the spray of its wrath to the welkin up-soars,
And flood upon flood hurries on, never ending;
And it never will rest, nor from travail be free,
Like a sea that is labouring the birth of a sea.
Yet, at length, comes a lull o'er the mighty commotion,
And dark through the whiteness, and still thro' the swell,
The whirlpool cleaves downward and downward in ocean,
A yawning abyss, like the pathway to hell;
The stiller and darker the farther it goes,
Suck'd into that smoothness the breakers repose.
The youth gave his trust to his Maker! Before
That path through the riven abyss closed again,
Hark! a shriek from the gazers that circle the shore,
And, behold! he is whirl'd in the grasp of the main !
And o'er him the breakers mysteriously roll'd,
And the giant-mouth closed on the swimmer so bold.
All was still on the height, save the murmur that went
From the grave of the deep, sounding hollow and fell,
Or save when the tremulous sighing lament
Thrill'd from lip unto lip, "Gallant youth, fare-thee-well!"
More hollow and more wails the deep on the ear-
More dread and more dread grows suspense in its fear.
If thou shouldst in those waters thy diadem fling,
And cry,
"Who may find it shall win it and wear;"
God wot, though the prize were the crown of a king-
A crown at such hazard were valued too dear.
For never shall lips of the living reveal
What the deeps that howl yonder in terror conceal.
Oh, many a bark to that breast grappled fast,
Has gone down to the fearful and fathomless grave;
Again, crash'd together the keel and the mast,
To be seen toss'd aloft in the glee of the wave!
Like the growth of a storm ever louder and clearer,
Grows the roar of the gulf rising nearer and nearer.
And it bubbles and seethes, and it hisses and roars,
As when fire is with water commix'd and contending;
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