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You push'd right onward, while the loose-zoned maid
Unheeded cross'd your path: her siren song
Assail'd your soul, but soon, as from a rock,
Roll'd back a wasted melody; for still
Attention stedfast look'd towards the goal,
While Reason, with his wand, your chosen guide,
Dispell'd Imagination's air-built fanes,
And promises of bliss to indolence.

Your toil is o'er, and yours is now the palm,
The shout of thousands, and the laurel crown;
Ah! envied! When together we set forth-

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Yes! I was fresh and vigorous as you,

And might, like you, have speeded. Now the race
Is run and lost, and I, unpraised, unknown,
Follow inglorious;-doom'd to hide
Midst the low crowds of mediocrity:

my shame

Past is my pride, my honour among men.
In those illusive hours, when Cheerfulness
Conducts Reflection, and bears up the heart;
Placid, self-satisfied, the mind will turn
Inward its contemplative eye, and smile;
Then all looks glad and joyous, as creation,
When fresh and fragrant from the summer shower
It glitters in the sun: O! then, the soul
Panting with ardour, big with confidence,
Deems it has giant powers, and will achieve
Things yet untried by man: th' enthusiast glow
Burns in each vein, fire flashes from the eye,

The frame's incumbent weight seems lighten'd, raised,
Expanded by an energy divine!

Yet soon, too soon, the paroxysm subsides
In sad despondence: now the powers collapse
And sink in lassitude, while all around
The scene is darken'd, and the languid eye
Perceives no beauty in the earth or heavens,
Nor aught to be desired-delights no more
Or man or woman: science, pleasure, wealth,
All the pursuits, the uses of this world,
Seem weary, flat, unprofitable, stale:

Ah! now no more complacent musings spring

From self-inspection; discontent, despair,
Its sole results; while imperfection stains,
Or seems to stain, all objects and all toils,
But most of all, in the sad sufferer's mind,
Whate' er had
sprung from his inventive brain,
And once seem'd fair and faultless. With a blush,
Viewing his own creation, in disgust

He blots the canvas, or destroys the page.

Alas! for him, who in this woe-fraught hour, Finds nought within to prop his sinking soul, No secret flattery, no consciousness,

That on the walks of life he is revered,

And named with honour by the sage and good-
That might be something, echoing their praise,
The mind in sweet soliloquy might say,
"Be of good cheer, 'tis but a passing cloud;
Anon the sun will pour his radiance bright,
And all once more will be serene;-the while
Endure." But how, if all the moral past
Be but a blank, or worse; if strong desire
To climb to honour have sustain'd defeat
If no soft welcome accent have approved
The cherish'd view that look'd to future times,
And grasp'd the laurel of a century's growth?
O! who can bear, when such the drear account,
Reflection's horror: -who, but feels, can tell!

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Then all the common places, which the world
Prattles by rote, and thinks not from the heart,
That life is brief, and full of cares; delight
A passing flower, that withers as it blows;
'That wealth is worthless, since it cannot buy
Tranquillity; that friendship is most false,
And wisdom's self most vain;-vain every wish
And each research of man, who, toiling long,
Is baffled in pursuit, or may succeed
And grasp a shadow:-these and many more,
The saws of Pedantry with frozen lips,

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That lectures woe, are realized and felt,
Felt with a pain acute it never knew.

What then remains, since all is worthless, vain,
Beneath a wise man's aim, a good man's hope,
But to escape from this polluted scene,

To burst the toil, and flee?-Rash mind! forbear ;
Think of the mandate, "Tarry till I call;"
Endure unto the end; wait, wait th' appointed time,
Nor rush unlicenced to the judgment-throne;
For canst thou tell what lies across the gulf?
And were it worse than all thy sufferings here,
Say, canst thou flee from that?

Back to thy sheath, detested poniard!-No,
Though all this world be weariness, though hope
Of gladness be from me for ever fled,
My sole sad prospect but to totter on
Some joyless years, and sink into the grave;
Yet will I bend me to th' awards of Heaven,
Nor wrest its high prerogative, to say,
When I have borne enough. Dark are God's ways,
Yet not less wise, because unsearchable.

In each affliction he decrees, design

There is, and doubtless that design is good:
In this depression even I now sustain,
This weariness of life, this hate of self,
May mercy be at work. And be it so!
Look, look, my soul, on thy polluted self,
Nor think thou gazest with a jaundiced eye,
What now thou loath'st is thou, is very thou!
Self-flattery gloss'd thee in thy brighter hours
Now first thou hat'st, now first thou know'st, thyself.
Know and amend, that when the hour shall come,
That brings thy lawful summons to be gone,
Thou may'st depart with dignity and hope.
Lo! the wide field of Piety extends,

The field of Virtue, fair beneath thy feet:

Act well thy part, and smooth thy wrinkled brow,

And kiss the rod, and do the will of Heaven;
Soon will a few short years of sorrow pass,
And bliss, long sigh'd for, will at length be thine,
Far richer bliss than this low world could yield,
Than wish could seek, than fancy could conceive.
Rev. J. Grant.

CONSUMPTION, OR THE THREE SISTERS.

CAROLINE was the first to die. Her character, unlike that of both her sisters, had been distinguished by great spirit and vivacity, and when they were present, had always diffused something of its own glad light over the serene composure of the one, and the melancholy stillness of the other, without seeming ever to be inconsistent with them; nor did her natural and irrepressible buoyancy altogether forsake her even to the With her the disease assumed its most very last. beautiful show. Her light-blue eyes sparkled with astonishing brilliancy-her cheeks, that had always hitherto been pale, glowed with a rose-like lustrealthough she knew that she was dying, and strove to subdue her soul down to her near fate, yet, in spite of herself, the strange fire that glowed in the embers of her life, kindled it often into a kind of airy gladness: so that a stranger would have thought her one on whom opening existence was just revealing the treasures of its joy, and who was eager to unfold her wings, and sail on into the calm and sunny future. Her soul, till within a few days of her death, was gay in the exhilaration of disease; and the very night before she died she touched the harp with a playful hand, and warbled, as long as her strength would permit, a few bars of a romantic tune. No one was with her when she died, for she had risen earlier than her sisters, and was found by them, when they came down to the parlour, leaning back with a smiling face on the sofa, with a few lilies in her hand, and never more to have her head lifted up in life.

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The youngest had gone first, and she was to be followed by Emma, the next in age. Emma, although so like her sister who was now dead, that they had always been thought by strangers to be twins, had a character altogether different. Her thoughts and feelings ran in a deeper channel: nature had endowed her with extraordinary talents, and whatever she attempted, serious acquisition, or light accomplishment, in that she easily excelled. Few, indeed, is the number of women that are eminently distinguished among their sex, and leave names to be enrolled in the lists of fame. Some accidental circumstances of life or death have favoured those few, and their sentiments, thoughts, feelings, fancies, and opinions, retain a permanent existence. But how many sink into the grave in all their personal beauty, and all their mental charms, and are heard of no more! Of them no bright thoughts are recorded, no touching emotions, no wild imaginations. All their fine and true perceptions, all their instinctive knowledge of the human soul, and all their pure speculation on the mystery of human life, vanish for ever and aye with the parting breath. A fair, amiable, intelligent young maiden has died and is buried-that is all, and her lies grave in its unvisited rest. Such an one was Emma Beatoun. Her mother, her sisters, and a few dear friends, knew what treasures of thought were in her soul, what gleams of genius, and what light of unpretending wisdom. But she carried up her pure and high thoughts with her to heaven, nor did any of them survive her on earth, but a few fragments of hymns set by herself to plaintive music, which no voice but her own, so deep and yet so sweet, so mellow yet so mournful, could ever have fitly sung.

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The sufferings of this sister were heavy indeed, and she at last prayed to be relieved. Constant sickness, interrupted only by fits of racking pain, kept the fair Shadow for the last weeks of her life to bed, and nothing seemed to disturb her so much as the incessant care of her dying sister, who seemed to forget her own approaching doom in the tenderest ministrations of

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