respect and friendship, at the moment when his hopes are brightest and his affections warmed into ecstasy, wakens suddenly from his sweet protracted dream, and finds himself without honor, without love, without even a remembrance, and virtually in as great solitude as if he were already in his grave! 3. Well might they shudder at the thought of this eternal chilliness, this spiritual isolation, this bitter and unholy state! Truly it was fearful, and something too much for tears! Sweet Jesus, how different would have been their state, if they had sought only to love and serve thee! for thy love alone can give rest and comfort to the heart-a sure and last. ing joy: Other good 4. Changed, then, be the way and object of our research, and let the converse to that which formerly took place hold respecting our employment here; and if we shall again meet with knights and the world's chivalry, let it be only in the way of accident, and, as it were, from the visit of those who pass near our spot of shelter; and let our place of rest henceforth be in the forest and the cell. 5. Times there are, when even the least wise can seize a constant truth-that the heart must be devoted either all to the world, or all to God. When they, too, will pray, and make supplications urged with weeping, that the latter may be their condition in the mortal hour, that they may secure the rest of the saints for eternity. 6. Returning to that cloisteral meditation, how many thought I, throughout the whole world, have heard this day the grounds and consummation of the saints' felicity! how many have been summoned onward, and told the steps were pear, and that now the ascent might be without difficulty gained? and yet, A scanty few are they, who, when they hear Though born to soar, why suffer ye a wind So slight to baffle ye?" 7. But for those who seemed to feel how sweet was that solemn accent, eight times sung, which taught them who were blessed, would it not be well, when left alone, and without distraction, if they were to take up histories, and survey the course which has been trod by saintly feet, and mark, as if from the soul-purifying mount, the ways and works of men or earth, keeping their eyes with fixed observance bent upon the symbol there conveyed, so as to`mark how far the form and acts of that life, in ages past, of which there are still so many monuments around them, agreed, not with this or that modern standard of political and social happiness and grandeur, but with what, by Heaven's sufferauce, gives title to divine and everlasting beatitude? 8. Such a view would present a varied and immense horizon, comprising the manners, institutions, and spirit of many generations of men long since gone by. We should see in what manner the whole type and form of life were Christian, although its detail may have often been broken and disordered; for instance, how the pursuits of the learned, the consolations of the poor, the riches of the Church, the exercises and dispositions of the young, and the common hope and consolation of all men, harmonized with the character of those that sought to be poor in spirit. 9. How, again, the principle of obedience, the Constitution of the Church, the division of ministration, and the rule of government, the manners and institutions of society, agreed with meekness and inherited its recompense. Further, how the sufferings of just men, and the provisions for a penitential spirit were in accordance with the state of those that were to inourn and weep there. 10. How the character of men in sacred orders, the zeal of the laity, and the lives of all ranks, denoted the hunger and thirst after justice. Again, how the institutions, the foundations, and the recognized principle of perfection, proclaimed Dante Parad. 12. Carey's translation. men merciful Moreover, how the philosophy which prevailed, and the spiritual monuments which were raised by piety and genius, evinced the clean of heart. 11. Still further, how the union of nations, and the bond of peace which existed even amid savage discord, wars, and onfusion; as also, how the holy retreats for innocence, which hen everywhere abounded, marked the multitude of pacific men. And, finally, how the advantage taken of die events, and the acts of saintly and heroic fame, revealed the spirit which shunned not suffering for sake of justice. 49. THE SHEPHERD'S SONG. TASSO. L'ORQUATO TASSO-an Italian poet of the sixteenth century. He wrote nuch, but his "Jerusalem Delivered" gained him the greatest renown; during his life it excited universal favor, and has ever since been justly regarded as one of the great poems of the world. "Jerusalem Delivered" is a history of the crusades, related with poetic license. Clement VIII. invited Tasso to Rome, that he might receive the laurel crown-an honor which had not been conferred upon any one since the days of Petrarch. But scarcely was the day of coronation about to dawn when the poet felt his dissolution approaching. He requested liberty to retire to the monastery of St. Onofrío. On hearing that his last hour was near, he jovfully returned thanks to God for having brought him to so secure a haven. A few days before his death, one of the monks sought to raise his spirits oy speaking to him of the triumphal honors preparing for him at the Capitol. Tasso replied-" Glory, glory, nothing but glory. Two idols have reigned in my heart and decided my life-love and that vapor you call glory. The one has always betrayed me; the other, after fleeing me for forty years, is ready to-day to crown-what?-a corpse. Laurels for Tasso! It is a winding sheet he requires! I feel too well to-day that on earth all is vanity, all but to love and serve God. But," he added, as his head sunk on his breast, "all the rest is not worth a quarter of an hour's trouble." On receiving a plenary indulgence from the Pope, he said "This was the chariot on which he hoped to go crowned, not with laurel as a poet into the Capitol, but with glory, as a saint, to Heaven." Feeling his mortal agony at hand, he closely embraced the crucifix, and murmuring, “Inte ny hands, O Lord!" peacefully resigned his spirit. 1. SAFE stands our simple shed, despised our little store; Despised by others, but so dear to me, That gems and crowns I hold in less esteem; Nor fear lest poison the pure wave pollutes ; With flocks my fields, my fields with herbage teem; My garden-plot supplies nutritious roots; And my brown orchard bends with Autumn's wealthiest fruits. 2. Few are our wishes, few our wants; man needs These are my sons; they keep the flock that feeds, Now the slim stags bound through the forest dark; 5. Time was (these gray hairs then were golden locks), I scorn'd the simple charge of tending flocks, And made me keeper of his flower-domains ; And though to town I rarely made resort, 4. Long by presumptuous hopes was I beguiled, But when with youth false hope no longer smiled, The abandoned quiet of this humble shed; Then farewell State's proud palaces! once more To these delightful solitudes I fled; And in their peaceful shades harmonious days have led 50. BISHOP BRUTÉ. BAYLEY. JANED ROSEVELT BAYLEY, D. D., first bishop of Newark, was born in New York, on the 23d of August, 1814. Being by birth and education, a Protestant, he spent some years in the ministry of the Episcopal Church. He was received into the Catholic Church, by the Rev. Father Esmonde, S. J., at Rome, April 26, 1842. On the 4th of March, 1843, he was ordained priest, by Bishop (now Archbishop) Hughes, and on the 30th of October, 1853, was consecrated by the most Reverend Archbishop Bedini, Bishop of Newark, which had been erected into an Episcopal See, by his Holiness Pope Pius IX., on the 29th of July, 1853. Bishop Bayley is the author of a very useful and interesting work on the history of the Catholic Church in New York. It may be interesting to observe, that the Right Reverend prelate is a nephew of Mother Seton, the founder of the Sisters of Charity in this country, also a convert to the Catholic Church. [Extract from the forthcoming Memoirs of the Right Reverend Simon Wm. Gabriel Bruté, D. D., by the Right Reverend Dr. Bayley.] 1. He turned from it (the medical profession), only because he had higher and more important objects in view. His eleven thousand classmates in medicine, told him that it was easy to find physicians for the body, but the Revolution had made it more difficult to find physicians for the souls of men. For ten years the houses of religious education and seminaries had been shut up. The guillotine, and prisons, and privations of exile, had spared but a comparatively small number of the former clergy, and of these many were occupied in foreign missions. 2. Dreadful as had been the ravages of infidelity and impiety, and the almost entire privation of all spiritual succor, an immense number of the French people still remained faithrul to their religion, and a new supply of Levites, to fill the places of those who had perished, was called for on every side. One of the first matters to which the new bishops turned their attention, was the re-establishment of Diocesan Seminaries, in order to provide for these pressing wants. 3. These were the circumstances which induced Mr. Bruté to seek admission into the sanctuary. Such a determination could surprise no one who knew him. His whole life, even in the world, had already been a preparation for it. At a different time, it would probably have been his first choice, and having chosen it now, he gave himself wholly to the work. |