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qualities instead of men. They may be better able to analyze human nature than their predecessors. But analysis is not the business of the poet. His office is to portray, not to dissect." "The Greeks," says Menzel, "translated beautiful nature; the middle ages translated faith; we translate our science into poetry."

If this theory be true, the student can kindle the true poetic enthusiasm in his own bosom, only by stealing a coal from the altar of the ancient muses. A thorough acquaintance with ancient poetry will undoubtedly give him a just notion of the office of the imagination in literature, and reveal to him the secret process by which this "shaping spirit" creates the magic wonders of its power. It is not enough that the scholar views and admires these unequalled productions of genius; he must become familiar with them. and feel their influence. It is not sufficient to notice and treasure up the beautiful conceits and striking expressions of an author; but he must strive to reproduce in himself the inspiration of the bard and the enthusiasm of the orator. He must, for the time, forget self, and, in imagination at least, exchange places with the author, live in the very midst of the stirring scenes that called forth the orator's pathos, or kindled the poet's fire, breathe in his spirit, be moved by the same impulses of feeling that actuated him, be touched by his sorrow, be melted by his tears, catch his fire, feel the same emotions of sublimity, and enjoy the same beauties that elevated or ravished his soul, soar with him in imagination, and train the whole intellectual being to like modes of thought. In this way he may acquire sufficient strength and nerve to wield the giant armor of men of other days.

By this process alone can the student become an adept in classic lore. Some practical men may cry out: "Enthusiasm! extravagance!" Admit that it is enthusiasm. Great attainments were never made in any branch of literature, science, or art, without some degree of professional enthusiasm. This devotion of eminent scholars and artists to their favorite pursuits is the very secret of their success.

The geologist is in raptures at the discovery of some antediluvian reptile, or more recent petrifaction. The philosophic antiquarian gazes with mingled awe and reverence at the remains of ancient art,—those magnificent ruins and marvellous columns that stand upon the soil beneath which countless generations sleep,

Flinging their shadows from on high,
Like dials which the wizard Time
Hath raised to count his ages by.

The physician boasts of his splendid illustrations of morbid anatomy, and of his beautiful specimens of diseased bones; and no one objects to this devotion to a particular department of study, this professional enthusiasm. On the contrary, every intelligent man commends it as the very key that unlocks the temple of science.

The taste is refined and matured by this same discipline. By constant association with refined society the individual is himself refined. The mind, in like manner, is moulded by the objects it contemplates. By long familiarity with these finished models of composition, the principles of philosophic criticism are gradually acquired, and a cultivated taste is unconsciously formed, so that, in writing, the student instinctively adopts what is beautiful in sentiment and faultless in expression, and rejects what is vulgar and anomalous. Though he may forget every word and every thought he has ever learned from ancient authors, his time will not have been lost. There still remains in the soul "an intellectual residuum," a kind of mental precipitate, which, though differing from all the elements that were originally thrown into the intellectual crucible, still contains their very essence, and is superior to them all. The student's taste is classical. And can we use a more expressive epithet? Can there be higher praise? After long acquaintance with classic excellences, he has an intuitive perception of the beauties of a literary production. does not need to recur to the standard he once used. He

He

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has risen from the condition of a learner to that of judge, and his nice perception of the beauties of a finished composition has become a part of his mental constitution. The man who has been thus educated, can scarcely become so degraded as to lose entirely his taste for the beautiful, the poetic and the sublime in literature. Nor is this discipline, which thus forms the taste and polishes the mind, a mere unrequited toil, destitute of pleasure or profit. There is a pleasure in mere intellectual activity. We are so constituted, that without exertion we cannot enjoy. Knowledge is the proper aliment of the soul, and the highest mental enjoyment results from the uninterrupted pursuit and the constant acquisition of new truths. A philosopher once said: "If the gods would grant me all knowledge, I would not thank them for the boon; but if they would grant me the everlasting pursuit of it, I would render them everlasting thanks." When the student commences a course of classical study, he does not enter upon a barren desert, with only here and there an oasis to gladden his heart, but a land of hill and dale, whose eminences are clothed with perpetual sunlight, and in whose bosom sleep the treasures of a world.

THE OLD MAN'S LAST DREAM.

BY Ᏼ . B. FRENCH.

AN aged and a weak, worn man
Slept in his easy chair,

While the declining sun's last rays
Fell on his silvery hair.

'T was summer-through the open door
Young zephyr winged his way,
And fanned that aged sleeper's cheek
And o'er his brow did play.

That summer scene of perfect peace

The hardest heart might feel,

For oh! far less of earth than heaven
Its beauty did reveal.

And as that aged man slept there,
Where did his fancy roam?

His mind that mind which never rests

And has no human home!

Where was it then? The weary path

That aged man had trod,

Since first his young and spotless soul
Had communed with its God;

As speeds the lightning from the cloud,
As flies the viewless wind;
So o'er that long and weary path
Sped back his restless mind.

Again the dreamer roamed in youth
O'er many a beauteous scene,

Where, when his life was new and fresh,
His footsteps oft had been;

Through tangled dell and shady grove

He sought the peaceful shore

Of the deep, wood-embosomed lake,
Where oftentime of yore

His little skiff had swept the wave,
Urged by his sinewy arm,

Or in whose deep and shadowy nooks
He sought the noontide's calm;
Or by the sparkling trout-brook's side,
With rod and line he stood,
Seeking to draw the speckled prey
From out the tiny flood.

THE OLD MAN'S LAST DREAM.

And wheresoe'er the dreamer roved,
Still roving at his side,

His bright-eyed Eleanor was there,
His fair, his beauteous bride.

A smile lit up his sunken cheek,
And o'er his wrinkled brow
It spread, as if his sunny youth
Were with him, even now.

He waked-'t was eve - the sun had gone
Down in his western bed,

And oh how soon that sunny smile

Was gone forever fled!

His sun was setting. and his life

Was in its evening shade;

His Ella in her silent grave

Had long-long since been laid.

Earth had no charm for that old man,

For all to him was drear,

The autumn of his life was past,

The winter of his year

Had come and cold and chill the world

Passed onward in its pride,

And with a hope of future life,

He looked to Heaven, and died!

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