speculations of this treatise, that I know of no passage more fitted to form the conclusion of the work---or more likely to leave the reader with such impressions as I am most anxious to impart to him.

The passage is from the works of the American poet Bryant-and deserves to be universally known.

"When thoughts

Of the last bitter hour come like a blight
Over thy spirit, and sad images

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,
And breathless darkness, and the narrow house
Make thee to shudder and grow sick at heart-
Go forth under the open sky, and list

To nature's teachings: while from all around-
Earth and her waters, and the depths of air
Comes a still voice,-Yet a few days, and thee,
The all-beholding Sun shall see no more

In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground
Where thy pale form was laid with many tears,
Nor in the embrace of Ocean, shall exist
Thy image. Earth that nourished thee, shall claim
Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again:
And, lost each human trace, surrendering up
Thine individual being, shalt thou go

To mix for ever with the elements

To be a brother to the insensible rock

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain
Turns with his share, and treads upon.

The oak

Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould;
Yet not to thy eternal resting place

Shalt thou return alone, nor couldst thou wish
Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down
With patriarchs of the infant world-with kings,
The powerful of the earth, the wise, the good,—
Fair forms, and hoary seers of ages past-
All in one mighty sepulchre ! The hills,
Rock ribbed, and ancient as the sun-the vales,

Stretching in pensive quietness between

The venerable woods-rivers that move

In majesty, and the complaining brooks

That make the meadows green; and, poured round all,

Old Ocean's grey and melancholy waste

Are but the solemn decorations all

Of the great tomb of man! The golden sun,

The planets, all the infinite host of heaven

Are shining on the sad abodes of death

Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread
The globe are but a handful to the tribes
That slumber in its bosom. Take the wings
Of morning, and the Barcan desert pierce,
Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregan, and hears no sound
Save his own dashings; yet the dead are there,
And millions in these solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep-the dead reign there alone.
So shalt thou rest. And what if thou shalt fail
Unheeded by the living, and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of Care
Plod on, and each one as before will choose
His favourite phantom: Yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glides away, the Sons of Men-
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the grey-headed man—
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side
By those who in their turn shall follow them.
So live, that when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan that moves

To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of Death,
Thou go not, like the galley-slave at night

Scourged to his dungeon; but sustained and soothed
By an unfaultering trust, approach thy grave
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
Around him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

FINIS.

J. THOMSON, FRINTER, MILNE SQUARE.

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