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Who stands in happiness pre-eminent?
The favoured spirit that from God enjoys
The largest share of delegated power

To guide the currents of his boundless love.

Now wide o'er nature has the Muse her glance Turned rapid, and discovered nought but scenes Of blooming, rich, unfathomable joy.

The higher still she soars, the deeper dives,
The wider ranges, more and more of good
Bursts on th' expanding view. With such pure love
As mothers feel for their dear progeny,

Benevolence reigns o'er all. But who shall tell
From what unnumbered springs her bounties flow?
The garden and the wild, earth, ocean, air,
Darkness and light, and height and depth confess
Her joy-inspiring presence—On each sense
She scatters rapture-for the eye illumes
What scenes of glory! for the ear awakes

What sounds of ravishment! The touch, taste, smell,
Are all her handmaids; hers the kindly play
Of each benign affection, all the joys
Of intellect, of memory, judgment, taste,
And winged imagination-Yes-for man
She opes a thousand, and ten thousand springs
Of never ebbing bliss.-Her reign extends
Through suns and systems numerous as the sands,
Uniting all by ties infrangible,

In such harmonious movements as create
True music in the spheres. Great God to her
Gave the high charge, to hold the mighty chain
Of causes and effects. Through every link
Of its immeasurable circuit, shoot

Her quickening energies. But should her hand
Its hold forego, 'twere chaos all again.

BENEVOLENCE OF MAN TO INFERIOR ANIMALS. 309

THE BENEVOLENCE OF THE GOOD MAN EXTENDS
EVEN TO THE INFERIOR ANIMALS.

WHAT soil or clime, or barrier raised by pride,
Or prejudice, can bound the good man's love?
For man and misery, wherever found,

It freely springs. Expanding wide it spreads
E'en to infinitude ;-now greets the race
That people heaven, then downward to the worm.
Insect or shell-fish, e'en to lifeless things,
With sacred flow descends. If Nature bids
To kill or eat,—the life-destroying steel
He edges with compassion. He, the friend
And guardian, not the tyrant of whate'er
Inhales the vital breeze, ne'er issues forth
Breathing dismay and slaughter in the paths
Where happy creatures sport. Ye feathered tribes,
Sing unmolested in your leafy bowers;

Ye finny nations, in your streams and lakes
And pearly grottos play; ye insect swarms,
Murmur melodious, turn your burnished wings
Bright-twinkling to the sun; at morn and eve,
With all your sportive myriads in the air,
Reel thro' the mazy dance-for in your mirth
His soul participates.—Around your cliffs,
In many a playful curve, ye sea-birds, wheel;
Preen your gray wings; along the level brine
Quick-diving plunge; or on the sunny swell
Float like small islets of embodied foam;
Stars of the sea, ye stud and beautify
Its azure waste, as the empyrean fires
Gem and illumine the ebon vault of night.
Who would not deem it an offence to heaven
To harm your joys, or from one little nook,
Their heritage from God, your wingless brood
Cruel dislodge? Like man, from God ye spring,
Are God's dependents-ratified as his,
Your rights to share the bounty Nature gives,
Sport in the waves, or on your native rocks
To congregate and clamour as ye will.

EDWARD CARRINGTON.

VILLAGE BELLS.

Он, merry are the village bells that sound with soothing chime

From the dim old tower, grown gray beneath the shadowy touch of time;

And gaily are they borne along upon the summer air, Telling of bridal happiness to the youthful and the

fair;

They give a murmur of delight to earth, and sky, and

seas,

That mingles with the running streams, and floats upon the breeze.

Tis past, the bridal glee is past, those echoing peals are

o'er;

But the sweet, the holy Sabbath comes-we hear them now once more,

With a message from the heavens of love, a voice that speaks to all;

Unto the temple of our God, unto His shrine they call. Whether your home's in halls of state, or by the lowly

dells,

Come forth and listen to the sounds of the hallowed Sabbath bells!

Ye tuneful records, yours it is to watch the pace of time, And mark the footfalls of each year with deep and soothing chime;

Coming at midnight's silent hour, when all is dim and

drear,

'Tis yours to breathe the last farewell of the sad expiring

year;

And while we bid its hopes and fears, its fleeting hours

adieu.

'Tis yours to hail with cheerful voice the birthday of the new.

VILLAGE BELLS.

311

And yet once more your music breaks upon my listening

ear,

Though not the gaily sounding notes we love so well to

hear;

Changed is your message to the heart, your joyous tone is fled;

Ye speak to us of buried hopes, a requiem for the dead! Some home to-day is desolate, a soul from earth is free. Mortal, the knell thou hearest now full soon may toll for thee!

O changeful bells, that swell'd but now the tide of human bliss,

What ministers of grief ye seem, in such an hour as this! Say, is your knell a sorrowing one, for the lovely doomed

to die,

Youth's early blush upon their cheek, its radiance in their eye?

Or do ye mourn in mockery for the beings frail as fair, Whose lives, like golden evening clouds, have melted into air?

Yet such, alas, is human life; woe for the haughty breath!

To-day in health and power 'tis raised, to-morrow stilled in death.

One voice proclaims our joy and grief, our wishes, hopes and fears;

The eye that brightly beams to-day, to-morrow dims with

tears.

A few short years, a few brief suns, in earthly homes we dwell,

Then life with all its dreams shall be but as that passing

bell.

CAROLINE F. ORNE.

LABOUR.

Ho! ye who at the anvil toil,
And strike the sounding blow,
Where from the burning iron's breast
The sparks fly to and fro,

While answering to the hammer's ring,
And fire's intenser glow-

Oh! while ye feel 'tis hard to toil
And sweat the long day through,
Remember it is harder still

To have no work to do.

Ho! ye who till the stubborn soil,
Whose hard hands guide the plough,,
Who bend beneath the summer sun,
With burning cheek and brow—
Ye deem the curse still clings to earth
From olden time till now--.

But while ye feel 'tis hard to toil
And labour all day through,
Remember it is harder still

To have no work to do.

Ho! ye who plough the sea's blue field-
Who ride the restless wave,
Beneath whose gallant vessel's keel

There lies a yawning grave,
Around whose bark the wintry winds

Like fiends of fury rave-

Oh! while ye feel 'tis hard to toil
And labour long hours through,
Remember it is harder still

To have no work to do.

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