unsteady as you gaze. It is impossible to stand here without experiencing the strongest yet sweetest emotions. There is awe sublime, and yet present confidence: you know that the waters have their bounds, which they cannot pass; the hand of Him who walked the waves, and rebuked the storm, upholds and reins them as they leap their headlong course, and that, too, with fearful roarings, as if they lived, and could, and would, but for the God who holds them chained, and guides their mad career, devour you. You admire, but you tremble as you admire. Thus, near the bars of a new-caught lion's den, as they see him chafe, and hear his loud forestvoice, the safe crowd stand backwarder in fear. I think the Rhine-falls glorious.—Ibid.

ENTRANCE TO ITALY BY THE PASS OF THE ST. GOTHARD.

THE circumstance of St. Gothard being, to this day, impassable for carriages, leaves it in possession of all that character of romance which the musing mind may have been wont, from early age, to attach to a passage of the Alps.

As soon as you begin to descend, all that was naked and stony disappears; it is left behind; beautiful prospects open on you; the vale, into which you are moving down, is green; there are villages and foliage; trees climb all the hills, and, on the very summits, screens and patches of black fir lie disposed in the most picturesque forms, and contrast protectingly with the sheltered pastures beneath them. The sun broke out, and lighted all things. "Buon giorno," said a man coming up with the broad hat, the round blue jacket, the blue breeches, the white stockings, and the large shoe-buckles of the Italian peasant. You are in Italy; the very sound of the Tessino would tell you so, it hurries so gladly on, leaps so rejoicingly from rock to rock, and whitens, and foams, and sparkles so at its many beautiful falls.

The small inn at Airolo is kept by a most civil landlord : the chamber where I washed, the beds, the furniture, all Italian in fashion; while the countenances of two females of his family more particularly and more pleasingly announce Italia, the sunny and the soft, the land of warm tints and fine features. I travelled from hence by what is called the

post, to Bellinzone. The vehicle is indescribable; it must have stood for upwards of a century, undisturbed, in some old remise, and have been lately purchased by our speculating host for a song, drawn forth and advanced or degraded to the service of carrying a mail and passengers. The old faded velveteen linings, the heavy panels, the clumsy springs, were of a date now forgotten. The driver, indeed, was in keeping with it: he was a peasant in old peasant garb, and the buckles must have been made, I should think, about the time when the carriage was built.-Ibid.

OCCASIONAL PAPERS ON ENGLISH POETS
AND POETRY.

THE OLD MYSTERIES AND MORALITIES.

SPENSER, as we have seen, was not only the poet of the age of Elizabeth, but one of the poets of ages, and, wherever the language in which he wrote is known, for all readers. This true greatness, however, becomes more evident when he is contrasted with some by whom he had long been preceded. The eyes that could read, and the ears that could hear, the old Mysteries or Moralities, as they were termed,—containing an almost ludicrous mixture of an ill-formed drama with religion,―would be dazzled and astounded by the splendour and rich harmony of "The Faery Queen." To one of these old Mysteries we intend to devote the present paper. To most of our readers it will be a curiosity; and to all of them it will furnish an instructive specimen of what the literature of the country was when the Reformation burst out in all its effulgence, awakened the sleeping mind of the nation, and roused into action those master-spirits whose names gave to the Elizabethan age a character for both solidity and brilliance which it will never lose.

The title of this production runs thus:

"A Tragedye or Enterlude, many festyng the chefe promyses of God unto man by all ages in the old lawe, from the fall of Adam, to the incarnacyon of the Lorde Jesus Christ. Compyled by Johan Bale, Anno Domini MDXXXVIII. VOL. X. Second Series.

H

In the worde (which now is called the eternall Soone of God) was lyfe from the begynnynge, and that lyfe was the lyght of This lyght yet shyneth in the darknesse, but the darknesse comprehendeth it not.-Joan i."

men.

The piece seems to have been written by one who had embraced at least the leading principles which Luther, only twenty years before, had begun to preach in opposition to Tetzel, the indulgence-seller, but which he had held, for his own peace and salvation, already several years. One design of the author-besides the exhibition of the great truths of the Gospel-appears to have been the vindication of the doctrines of divine grace, in opposition to the Pelagian notions of freewill, and the Popish dogmas respecting the meritoriousness of works. It is opened by a statement or address describing the subject and design of the work, by the author himself,— Baleus Prolocutor. Seven divisions then follow, each containing a dialogue between Pater Cœlestis, and the following personages, marking so many dispensational advances,—Adam, primus homo,-Justus Noah,- Abraham fidelis,— Moses sanctus, David Rex pius,-Esaias Propheta,-Joannes Baptista.-Baleus Prolocutor then gives a concluding address. It is written in verse; but this has nothing of either the correctness or force of Chaucer, though he wrote nearly two hundred years earlier. England had made no progress in intellect-cultivation during those two centuries; and the impulse which was to carry it so far forward in so little time, had but just been given, and it was too soon yet to look for its full manifestation. And as for poetry, that which lives, and either glows or sparkles in every line of Chaucer, Master John Bale seems to have had none in his composition. Weighty and instructive truth is found throughout, but nothing imaginative.

The measure is a stanza of seven lines, the first and third, the second and fourth, roughly rhyming together, the fifth then rhymes with the fourth,-the sixth and seventh rhyme together. The lines have from ten to twelve syllables in them, and are prosaic enough. The orthography is more unsettled and loose than could have been expected. The reader will be satisfied with a few specimens, taken from each division.

From the Introduction.

Yow therfor (good fryndes) I lovyngely exhort
To waye soche matters as wyll be uttered here,
Of whom ye maye loke to have no tryfeling sporte
In fantasyes fayned, nor soche lyke gaudysh gere,
But the thyngs that shall your inwarde stomake chear,
To rejoyce in God for your justificacyon,

And alone in Christ to hope for your salvacyon.

From the Dialogue with Adam.

Incessant praysynge to the most heavenlye Lorde
For thys thy socoure, and undeserved kyndnesse.
Thu byndest me in hart thy gracyouse gyftes to recorde,
And to beare in mynde, now after my heavynesse,
The brute of thy name, with inward joye and gladnesse,
Thu dysdaynest not, as wele apereth thys daye,

To fatche to thy folde thy first shepe goynge astraye.

NOAH.

Whom may we thanke, Lorde, for our helthe and salvacyon
But thy great mercye and goodnesse undeserved?

Thy promyse in faythe is our justifycacyon,
As it was Adam's, when hys hart therin rested,
And as it was theirs, whych therein also trusted.
Thys faythe was grounded in Adam's memorye,
And clerely declared in Abel's innocencye.
Faythe in that promyse, olde Adam ded justyfye,
In that promyse faythe made Eva to prophecye.
Faythe in that promyse proved Abel innocent,
In that promyse fay the made Seth full obedyent.
That faythe taught Enos on God's name first to call,
And made Mathusalah the oldest man of all.

Not onlye thys gyfte thu hast geven me, swete Lorde,
But with it also thyne everlastynge covenaunt,
Of trust for ever, thy raynebowe bearynge recorde.
Nevermore to drowne the worlde by floude inconstaunt,
Makynge the waters more peaceable and plesaunt.
Alac! I cannot to the geve prayse condygne,
Yet wyll I synge here with harte meke and benygne.

ABRAHAM.

Mercyfull Maker, my crabbed voyce dyrect,

That it maye breake out in some swete prayse to the.
And suffre me not thy due lawdes to neglect,
But lete me shewe forth thy commendacyons fre.
Stoppe not my wynde pypes, but give them lyberte,
To sounde to thy name, whych is most gracyouse,
And in it rejoyce with hart melodyouse.

(Then follows an anthem, accompanied by the organ.)

MOSES.

Thou wentest before them in a shynynge cloude all daye,
And in the darke nyght, in fyre thu shewedst their waye.
Thu sentest them manna from heaven, to be their food,
Out of the hard stone thu gavest them water good.
Thu appoyntedest them a lande of mylke and honye,
Let them not perysh for want of thy great mercye.

Laude be for ever to the most mercyfull Lorde,

Whych never withdrawest from man thy heavenlye comfort, But from age to age thy benefytes doth recorde

What thy goodnesse is, and hath bene to hys sort.

As we fynde thy grace, so ought we to report.

And doubtlesse it is to us most bounteouse,
Yea, for all our synnes most rype and plenteouse.

DAVID.

Immortall glorye to the, most heavenly Kynge,
For that thu hast geven contynuall vyctorye
To me thy servaunt, ever sens my anoyntynge,
And also before, by manye conquestes worthye.
A beare and lyon I slewe through thy strength onlye.
I slew Golias, which was vi. cubites longe,
Against thy enemyes thu madest me ever stronge.
My fleshlye fraylenesse made me do deadlye wronge,
And cleane to forget thy lawes of righteousnesse.
And though thu vysytest my synnefulnesse amonge,
With pestylent plages, and other unquyetnesse;
Yet never tokest thu from me the plenteousnesse