his prospects of advancement in the world were gone; and in the new-born zeal of his religious fervor, his friends might well doubt whether his reason had been completely restored. He retired to the town of Huntingdon, near Cambridge, where his brother resided, and there formed an intimacy with the family of the Rev. Mr. Unwin, a clergyman resident in the place. He was adopted as one of the family; and when Mr. Unwin was removed, soon after, by death, the same connection was continued with his widow. Death only could sever a tie so strongly knit-cemented by mutual faith and friendship, and by sorrows of which the world knew nothing. To the latest generation the name of Mary Unwin will be associated with that of Cowper, partaker of his fame as of his sad decline

By seraphs writ with beams of heavenly light.

On the death of Mr. Unwin, in 1767, the family were advised, by the Rev. John Newton, to fix their abode at Olney, in the northern part of Buckinghamshire, where Mr. Newton himself was settled. This was accordingly done, and Cowper removed with them to a spot which he has consecrated by his genius. The river Ouse was still before him, and with more varied and attractive scenery than at Huntingdon. His life was that of a religious recluse; he ceased to correspond with his friends, and associated only with Mrs. Unwin and Newton. The latter engaged his assistance in writing a volume of hymns, and of those which Cowper furnished we present the following as a specimen :

SUFFICIENCY OF THE ATONEMENT.

1. There is a fountain fill'd with blood
Drawn from Immanuel's veins;
And sinners plung'd beneath that flood,
Lose all their guilty stains.

2. The dying thief rejoic'd to see
That fountain in his day;

And there have I, as vile as he,
Wash'd all my sins away.

3. Dear dying Lamb, thy precious blood
Shall never lose its power,

Till all the ransom'd church of God
Be saved to sin no more.

4. E'er since by faith, I saw the stream
Thy flowing wounds supply,
Redeeming love has been my theme,
And shall be till I die.

5. Then in a nobler, sweeter song

I'll sing thy power to save;

When this poor lisping, stamm'ring tongue
Lies silent in the grave.

VOL. II.-2D

6. Lord, I believe thou hast prepared
(Unworthy though I be)

For me a blood-bought free reward,
A golden harp for me!

7. 'Tis strung, and tuned, for endless years,
And form'd by power divine;

To sound in God the Father's ears
No other name but thine.

Cowper's morbid melancholy had been, for some time, increasing, and in 1773, it became a case of decided insanity. He passed about two years in this unhappy state; and after his recovery, he occupied his time alternately with gardening, rearing hares, drawing landscapes, and composing poetry. The latter was fortunately the most permanent source of enjoyment; and its fruits appeared in a volume of poems, published in 1783. The reception of these poems, though not enthusiastic, was such as to revive his spirits: he resumed his correspondence, and cheerfulness again became an inmate of his retreat at Olney. This happy change was augmented by the presence of a third party, Lady Austen, a widow, who came to reside in the immediate neighborhood of Olney, and whose conversation charmed away, for a time, Cowper's melancholy spirit. She told him the story of John Gilpin, and the 'famous horseman and his feats were an inexhaustible source of merriment.' Lady Austen also prevailed upon him to try his powers in blank verse, and from her suggestion sprung the noble poem, The Task. This great work appeared in 1785, and its success was instant and decided. The public rejoiced to hear again the true voice of poetry and of nature, and in the rural descriptions and fireside scenes of 'The Task,' they saw the features of English scenery and domestic life faithfully delineated.

Cowper had no sooner completed the Task, than he resolved to undertake the translation of Homer. He had gone through the great Grecian at Westminster school, and afterwards read him critically in the Temple; and by translating forty lines a day he at length completed the laborious undertaking, which, in 1791, appeared, in two volumes quarto. As a translation the work is faithful to the original; but it wants the infusion of the old Ionian bard's spirit, and hence it has failed to become popular. This, with the exception of the Castaway, one of his minor poems, was his last literary performance. On the seventeenth of December, 1796, Mrs. Unwin died suddenly at Norfolk, whither Cowper had accompanied her on a visit. When the mournful intelligence was imparted to the unhappy poet, he refused to believe that his long-tried friend was actually dead. He went to see the body, and on witnessing the unaltered placidity of death, flung himself to the other side of the room with a passionate expression of feeling, and from that time forward he never mentioned her name. He lingered on in lonely life, however, for more than three years; but death at length came to his relief, on the twenty-fifth of April, 1800.

The mind uniformly turns from contemplating the life of Cowper with

deep melancholy. So sad and strange a destiny never has, before or since, attended a man of genius. With wit and humor at all times at his command, he was, for the most part of his life, bordering on despair. Though innocent, pious, and confiding, he lived in constant dread of everlasting punishment: he could only see between him and heaven a high wall, which he despaired of ever being able to scale. Yet who can doubt that the spirit that breathed forth such strains as the following, is not now in heavenly bliss!

one.

Oh! for a closer walk with God,

A calm and heavenly frame;
A light to shine upon the road,
That leads me to the Lamb!

Where is the blessedness I knew,
When first I saw the Lord?
Where is the soul-refreshing view
Of Jesus and his word?

What peaceful hours I once enjoyed!
How sweet their mem'ry still!
But they have left an aching void,
The world can never fill.

Return, O holy Dove, return,

Sweet messenger of rest;

I hate the sins that made thee mourn,
And drove thee from my breast:

The dearest idol I have known,
Whate'er that idol be,

Help me to tear it from thy throne,
And worship only thee.

So shall my walk be close with God,
Calm and serene my frame;

So purer light shall mark the road,
That leads me to the Lamb.

The almost universal popularity of Cowper's poetry, renders the task of selecting particular poems or passages from it, a very delicate and difficult We shall first present, without reference to their relative merit, his verses addressed to Mrs. Unwin, in 1793, and then his sketch of the Greenland Missionaries, in 'Conversation.' These shall be followed by his 'Lines on his Mother's Picture,' after which some extracts from 'The Task,' will find an appropriate place.

TO MARY.

The twentieth year is well nigh past
Since first our sky was overcast;

Ah, would that this might be our last!

My Mary!

THE GREENLAND MISSIONARIES.

That sound bespeaks salvation on her way,
The trumpet of a life-restoring day;

'Tis heard where England's eastern glory shines,
And in the gulfs of her Cornubian mines.
And still it spreads. See Germany send forth

Her sons to pour it on the farthest north;
Fired with a zeal peculiar, they defy
The rage and rigour of a polar sky,
And plant successfully sweet Sharon's rose
On icy plains and in eternal snows.

Oh blessed within the inclosure of your rocks,
Nor herds have ye to boast, nor bleating flocks;
No fertilizing streams your fields divide,
That show reversed the villas on their side;
No groves have ye; no cheerful sound of bird,
Or voice of turtle in your land is heard;
Nor grateful eglantine regales the smell
Of those that walk at evening where ye dwell;
But Winter, armed with terrors here unknown,
Sits absolute on his unshaken throne,
Piles up his stores amidst the frozen waste,
And bids the mountains he has built stand fast;
Beckons the legions of his storms away

From happier scenes to make your lands a prey;
Proclaims the soil a conquest he has won,
And scorns to share it with the distant sun.
Yet Truth is yours, remote unenvied isle!
And Peace, the genuine offspring of her smile;
The pride of lettered ignorance, that binds
In chains of error our accomplished minds,
That decks with all the splendour of the true
A false religion, is unknown to you.
Nature indeed vouchsafes for our delight
The sweet vicissitudes of day and night;
Soft airs and genial moisture feed and cheer
Field, fruit, and flower, and every creature here;
But brighter beams than his who fires the skies
Have risen at length on your admiring eyes,
That shoot into your darkest caves the day
From which our nicer optics turn away.

ON THE RECEIPT OF HIS MOTHER'S PICTURE.

Oh that those lips had language! Life has passed
With me but roughly since I heard thee last.
Those lips are thine-thy own sweet smile I see,
The same that oft in childhood solaced me;

Voice only fails, else, how distinct they say,
'Grieve not, my child, chase all thy fears away!'
The meek intelligence of those dear eyes
(Blest be the art that can immortalize,