with thankfulness to the bright sun, without whose rays its cheek would know no beautyso tender, that the wild bee which had nestled went in its scented bosom when that sun down, returns in the morning and beholds the colour faded from its cheek, while by its side an infant rose is rising with the blush of a cherub, unfolding its petals to live its little day, and then, having expended its sweetness, to die like its fair sisters, without murmur or regret. Blooming in the sterile waste, this lovely flower is seen unfolding its fair leaves where there is no beauty to reflect its own, and thus calling back the heart of the weary traveller to thoughts of peace and joy-reminding him that the wilderness of human life, though rugged and barren to the discontented beholder, has also its sweet flowers, not the less welcome for being unlooked for, nor the less lovely for being cherished by a hand unseen.

There is one circumstance connected with the rose, which renders it a more true and striking emblem of earthly pleasure than any other flower-it bears a thorn. While its odorous breath is floating on the summer gale, and its blushing cheek, half hid amongst the

sheltering leaves, seems to woo and yet shrink from the beholder's gaze, touch but with adventurous hand the garden queen, and you are pierced with her protecting thorns: would you pluck the rose and weave it into a garland for the brow you love best, that brow will be wounded: or place the sweet blossom in your bosom, the thorn will be there. This real or ideal mingling of pain and sorrow, with the exquisite beauty of the rose, affords a never-ending theme to those who are best acquainted with the inevitable blending of clouds and sunshine, hope and fear, weal and woe, in this our earthly inheritance.

With everything fair, or sweet, or exquisite in this world, it has seemed meet to that wisdom which appoints our sorrows, and sets a bound to our enjoyments, to affix some stain, some bitterness, or some alloy, which may not inaptly be called, in figurative language, a thorn. St. Paul emphatically speaks of a "thorn in the flesh," and from this expression, as well as from his earnestness in having prayed thrice that it might be removed, we conclude it must have been something particularly galling to the natural man. We hear of the thorn of ingratitude, the thorn of envy, the thorn of

unrequited love-indeed of thorns as numerous as our pleasures; and few there are who can look back upon the experience of life, without acknowledging that every earthly good they have desired, pursued, or attained, has had its peculiar thorn. Who has ever cast himself into the lap of luxury, without finding that his couch was strewed with thorns? Who has reached the summit of his ambition, without feeling on that exalted pinnacle that he stood on thorns? Who has placed the diadem upon his brow, without perceiving that thorns were thickly set within the royal circlet? Who has folded to his bosom all that he desired of earth's treasures, without feeling that bosom pierced with thorns? All that we enjoy in this world, or yearn to possess, has this accompaniment. The more intense the enjoyment, the sharper the thorn; and those who have described most feelingly the inner workings of the human heart, have unfailingly touched upon this fact with the melancholy sadness of truth.

Far be it from one who would not willingly fall under the stigma of ingratitude, to disparage the nature, or the number of earthly pleasures-pleasures which are spread before

us without price or limitation, in our daily walk, and in our nightly rest-pleasures which lie scattered around our path when we go forth upon the hills, or wander in the vallies, when we look up to the starry sky, or down to the fruitful earth-pleasures which unite the human family in one bond of fellowship, surround us at our board, cheer us at our fireside, smooth the couch on which we slumber, and even follow our wandering steps longlong after we have ceased to regard them with gratitude or joy. I speak of the thorn which accompanies these pleasures not with murmuring or complaint. I speak of the wounds inflicted by this thorn with a living. consciousness of their poignancy and anguish; because exquisite and dear as mere earthly pleasures may sometimes be, I would still contrast them with such as are not earthly. I would contrast the thorn and the wound, the disappointment and the pain which accompany all such pleasures as are merely temporal, with the fulness of happiness, the peace, and the crown, accompanying those which are eternal.

888

THE POETRY OF TREES.

Is contemplating the external aspect of nature, trees, in their infinite variety of form and foliage, appear most important and conspicuous; yet so many are the changes which they undergo from the influence of the sun and the atmosphere, that it would be useless to attempt to speak of the associations belonging to this class of natural productions abstractedly, and detached from collateral circumstances. What poet, for instance, would describe the rich foliage of the summer woods, without the radiance of the summer sun; the wandering gale that waves their leafy boughs; the mountain side to which their knotted roots are clinging; the green valley where they live and flourish, safe from raging storms; and the murmuring stream, over which their branches.