Then will he fit his tongue

To dialogue of business, love, or strife;
But it will not be long

Ere this be thrown aside,

And with new joy and pride

The little actor cons another part;

Filling from time to time his "humorous stage"
With all the persons, down to palsied age,
That life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation

Were endless imitation.

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy soul's immensity;

Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,
Haunted forever by the eternal mind,-
Mighty prophet! seer blest!

On whom those truths do rest,
Which we are toiling all our lives to find,
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;
Thou, over whom thy immortality

Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave,
A presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom, on thy being's height,
Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke
The years to bring the inevitable yoke,
Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?
Full soon thy soul shall have her earthly freight,
And custom lie upon thee with a weight
Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

Oh! joy, that in our embers

Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!

The thought of our past years in me doth breed

Perpetual benedictions: not indeed

For that which is most worthy to be blest;

Delight and liberty, the simple creed

Of childhood, whether busy or at rest,

With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:

Not for these I raise

The song of thanks and praise ;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;

Blank misgivings of a creature

Moving about in worlds not realized,
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble, like a guilty thing surprised!
But for those first affections,

Those shadowy recollections,

Which, be they what they may,

Are yet the fountain light of all our day,
Are yet a master light of all our seeing;

Uphold us, - cherish, and have power to make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal silence: truths that wake,
To perish never;

Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,
Nor man nor boy,

Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence, in a season of calm weather,

Though inland far we be,

Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither;

Can in a moment travel thither,

And see the children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.

Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song!
And let the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound!

We, in thought, will join your throng,
Ye that pipe and ye that play,

Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May!

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now forever taken from my sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find

Strength in what remains behind,
In the primal sympathy

Which having been must ever be,
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering,

In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

And O ye fountains, meadows, hills, and groves,
Think not of any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;
I only have relinquished one delight,

To live beneath your more habitual sway.

I love the brooks, which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they ;
The innocent brightness of a new-born day
Is lovely yet.

The clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality:
Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live;
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears;
To me the meanest flower that blows, can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

EXERCISE CXCII.

PORTIA'S DESCRIPTION OF HER WOOERS.

Portia and Nerissa.

Shakspeare.

Por. By my troth, Nerissa, my little body is a-weary of this great world.

Ner. You would be, sweet madam, if your miseries were in the same abundance as your good fortunes are: and yet, for aught I see, they are as sick that surfeit with too much, as they that starve with nothing. It is no mean happiness, therefore, to be seated in the mean: superfluity comes sooner by white hairs, but competency lives longer.

Por. Good sentences, and well pronounced.
Ner. They would be better, if well followed.

plicity is everywhere apparent. Her subject is so clearly presented and moulded, that the form involuntarily presents itself, and in the most unambiguous manner.

The charms of her pleasing style, however, are heightened by the richness and chasteness of the contents. They consist of pictures of real life, striking, calculated to excite reflection, well selected, attractive, illuminated with taste, and with a background of strong common sense; — in outline, disposition and colouring, all conceived and finished with the same ability. With all the palpable connection of the subjects, between which a family resemblance is soon detected, the variety of incidents and characters is very great. The conceptions, it is true, exhibit no marks of a fiery or luxuriant imagination; but they are neither barren nor uniform; and in no case are they wanting in the charms of novelty or originality. In every new volume, new characters are brought forward, which, although we may imagine that we have in part heard or seen them before; yet being exhibited in another dress and under other circumstances, or in another point of view, are no specimens of every-day individuality.

In the delineation of character, our authoress evinces uncommon skill. Not only the principal actors, but several of the inferior ones, are sharply and truly-defined portraits, which possess not only the appearance of life, but have, in fact, a substantial life; they stand, move, speak, and act before us; and we are continually taxing our memories for the originals, the counterparts of which the versatile authoress has placed before our eyes; we have a dim remembrance of having, somewhere or other, during our lives, encountered each one of them. But it is far from being the case that every-day forms, - those which every one is already acquainted with, are all that are presented before us: even those readers who have lived much in the world, and have associated with many men, will here make new and interesting acquaintances, whose images they will ever fondly retain in memory. As the marks of truth and nature are everywhere impressed upon these portraits, so there are some which are conceived and drawn with peculiar force. Seldom has the graver, in the hands of a female, drawn and finished such sharply-defined and forcible characters.

Born upon a Finland estate, not far from Abo, Frederika Bremer was, in her earliest years, removed to Sweden, where her father was an extensive land-proprietor. The simple life

of the family glided calmly away from spring to autumn in the country, and from autumn to spring in the capital city, with agreeable society in either place; their time being taken up principally in the household duties, in familiar readings, where attention was mostly directed to the German classics, and the practice of the arts. Each daughter of the house availed herself of the means of education here offered, each one, according to her own peculiar taste and disposition, and painted a future glowing with all the enchantment of a lively and excited imagination. It may be mentioned as characteristic, that our poetess, in all her visions, foresaw herself a warrior heroine.

A sad reality, a deep and bitter melancholy, the origin of which, in consideration of her reluctance to explain it, we can only surmise, here drew like a dark gloomy cloud over the life of the young maiden; for many a year did she struggle with it; but at length she came out victorious, free, and strong. "The illusions of youth are dissolved; the springtime of youth is past." But a new youth, light, and freedom, have arisen in the purified soul, and, with renovated strength, she goes to the daily work which she has recognized as her、 calling. She began early, even when but a girl, to write, yet t is but lately that she has allowed any of her productions to e printed. "I wrote under the impulse of youthful and stless feelings; I wrote that I might write. Latterly, I have resumed the pen under far different influences; but upon what these are, she is silent. On the verge of the autumn of life, she still delights in the same cheerful society to which she has been accustomed from her earliest spring days, and in the possession of a beloved mother and sister. For the future, she has no other wish than that she may perfect the labours which she has undertaken, to which her former writings "form the beginning." Thus we may still expect many a ripe and rich offering from her; if her health remains as sound, and her heart as fresh, as the past warrants us in assuming.

These revelations from the life of the authoress, give a key to the peculiar delineation and colouring of several of the female characters in her romances, a high-souled resignation, a calm and impartial contemplation of the world, a rising above the opposition of circumstances, the joys of the peaceful life of a confiding family circle, together with a lively interest in all the noble and beautiful that lies beyond