6 VOICES OF THE TRUE-HEARTED. would give him food when hungry, shelter him him. erful and thrilling appeal to his countrymen, when they were on the eve of welcoming back the tyranny and misrule which at the expense of so much blood and treasure had been thrown off, can ever forget it? How nobly does liberty speak through If," said he, "ye welcome back a monar. chy, it will be the triumph of all tyrants hereafter, over any people who shall resist oppression, and their song shall then be to others, How sped the rebellious English,' but to our posterity, How sped the rebels, your fathers.'" How solemnly awful is his closing paragraph : "What I have spoken, is the language of that which is not called amiss, The good old cause.' If it seem strange to any, it will not seem more strange I hope, than convincing, to backsliders. This much I should have said, though I were sure I should have spoken only to trees and I felt rebuked for my want of faith, and conse. quent shallowness of insight. That hard-handed labourer brought greater riches to my soul than an Eastern merchant laden with pearls. Again I re-stones; and had none to cry to but with the prophet, peat, money is not wealth.-Letters from New York. BLIND OLD MILTON. BY WILLIAM E. AYTOUN. O earth, earth, earth! to tell the very soil itself what its perverse inhabitants are deaf to; nay, though what I have spoken should prove (which The following beautiful poem is from the December Thou suffer not, who didst create mankind free! nor number of Blackwood's Magazine It is a noble pic-Thou next, who didst redeem us from being servants ture of that sublime old man, who, sick, poor, blind, of men !) to be the last words of our expiring liberand abandoned of friends, still held fast his heroic ty." It was the consciousness of having done all in his integrity, rebuking with his unbending republican-power to save his countrymen from the guilt and ism the treachery, and cowardice, and servility of his folly into which they had madly plunged, the answer old associates. He had outlived the hopes and bea- of a good conscience, which sustained him in his old tific visions of his youth; he had seen the loud-age and destitution.-Joshua Leavitt. mouthed advocates of liberty throwing down a nation's freedom at the feet of the shameless, debauched, and unprincipled Charles the Second, crouching to the harlot-thronged court of the tyrant, and forswearing at once their religion and their republicanism. The executioner's axe had been busy among his friends. Cromwell's ashes had been dragged from their resting place, for even in death the effeminate tyrant hated and feared the conqueror of Naseby and Marston Moor. Vane and Hamp. den slept in their bloody graves. He was left alone in age, and penury, and blindness; oppressed with the knowledge that all his pure heart and free soul abhorred, had returned upon his beloved country: Yet the spirit of the stern, old republican remained to the last unbroken, realizing the truth of the language of his own Samson Agonistes. - Patience is the exercise Of saints, the trial of their fortitude, That tyranny or fortune can inflict." Place me, once more, my daughter, where the sun And soon amidst the ever-silent dead I must repose, it may be, half forgot. Yes! I have broke the hard and bitter bread My heart the sternest consciousness of right, More honor by it than the blinded train Within my heart I picture them, and then VOICES OF THE TRUE-HEARTED. 7 I almost can forget that I am blind, And old, and hated by my fellow men. Fain would I see thy countenance, my child, I hear thy voice so musical and mild, And wait the hour which is approaching fast, I have had visions in this drear eclipse Sat He who fashioned glory. This hath driven To find the straight and narrow path to heaven. Yet I am weak-O, how entirely weak, For one who may not love or suffer more! Which made the beautiful Italian shore Do the sweet breezes from the balmy West Despite of years, and wo, and want, and pain, Possess my being; from afar I greet Love's burning secret faltered on my tongue, And tremulous looks and broken words betrayed The secret of the heart from whence they sprung. Ah me! the earth that rendered thee to heaven Gave up an angel beautiful and young; Spotless and pure as snow when freshly driven; A bright Aurora for the starry sphere Where all is love, and even life forgiven. Bride of immortal beauty-ever dear! Dost thou await me in thy blest abode ! While I, Tithonus-like, must linger here, And count each step along the rugged road, A phantom, loitering to a long made grave, And eager to lay down my weary load! I, that was fancy's lord, am fancy's slaveLike the low murmurs of the Indian shell Ta'en from its coral bed beneath the wave, Which, unforgetful of the ocean's swell, Retains within its mystic urn the hum Heard in the sea-grots, where the Nereids dwellOld thoughts that haunt me, unawares they come Between me and my rest, nor can I make Those aged visitors of sorrow dumb. O, yet awhile, my feeble soul awake! Nor wander back with sullen steps again!For neither pleasant pastime canst thou take In such a journey, nor endure the pain. The phantoms of the past are dead for thee; So let them ever uninvoked remain, And be thou calm till Jeath shall set thee free. Thy flowers of hope expanded long ago, Long since their blossoms withered on the tree; No second spring can come to make them blow, But in the silent winter of the grave They lie with blighted love and buried wo. I did not waste the gifts which nature gave, How of our own accord we courted shame, And so renounced the great and glorious claim Of freedom, our immortal heritage. I saw how bigotry, with spiteful aim, So, as a champion, even in early youth I waged my battle with a purpose keen ; 8 VOICES OF THE TRUE-HEARTED. And trace the ramparts of Heaven's citadel On the cold flag-stones of his dungeon drear. And I have walked with Hampden and with Vane, Names once so gracious to an English ear In days that never may return again. My voice, though not the loudest, hath been heard Whenever freedom raised her cry of pain, And the faint effort of the humble bard Hath roused up thousands from their lethargy, To speak in words of thunder. What reward Was mine or theirs? It matters not; for I Am but a leaf cast on the whirling tide, Without a hope or wish, except to die. But truth, asserted once, must still abide, Unquenchable, as are those fiery springs Which day and night gush from the mountain side, Perpetual meteors, girt with lambent wings, Which the wild tempest tosses to and fro, But cannot conquer with the force it brings. Yet I, who ever felt another's wo More keenly than my own untold distress; I, who have battled with the common foe, And broke for years the bread of bitterness; Who never yet abandoned or betrayed The trust vouchsafed me, nor have ceased to bless, Am left alone to wither in the shade, A weak old man, deserted by his kindWhom none will comfort in his age, nor aid! O, let me not repine! A quiet mind, Conscious and upright, needs no other stay; Nor can I grieve for what I leave behind, In the rich promise of eternal day. Henceforth to me the world is dead and gone, Its thorns unfelt, its roses cast away, And the old pilgrim, weary and alone, Bowed down with travel, at his Master's gate Now sits, his task of life-long labor done, Thankful for rest, although it comes so late, After sore journey through this world of sin, In hope and prayer, and wistfulness to wait, Until the door shall ope and let him in. FOOT-PRINTS OF ANGEL S. BY HENRY W. LONGFELEOW. It was Sunday morning; and the church bells bells were ringing together. From all the neighbouring villages came the solemn, joyful sounds, floating through the sunny air, mellow and faint and low, all mingling into one harmonious chime, like the sound of some distant organ in heaven. Anon they ceased; and the woods, and the clouds, and the whole village, and the very air itself seemed to pray, so silent was it everywhere. The venerable old men, --high priests and patriarchs were they in the land, went up the pulpit stairs, as Moses and Aaron went up Mount Hor, in the sight of all the congregation, for the pulpit stairs were in front and very high. Paul Femming will never forget the sermon he heard that day,—no, not even if he should live to be as old as he who preached it. The text was, I know that my Redeemer liveth.' It was meant to console the pious, poor widow, who sat right before him at the foot of the pulpit stairs, all in black, and her heart breaking. He said nothing of the terrors of death, nor of the gloom of the narrow house, but, looking beyond these things, as mere circumstances to which the imagination mainly gives importance, he told his hearers of the innocence of childhood upon earth, and the holiness of childhood in heaven, and how the beautiful Lord Jesus was once a little child, and now in heaven the spirits of little children walked with him, and gathered flowers in the fields of Paradise. Good old man! In behalf of humanity, I thank thee for these benignant words! And, still more than I, the bereaved mother thanked thee, and from that hour, though she wept in secret for her child, yet. "She knew he was with Jesus, And she asked him not again." After the sermon, Paul Flemming walked forth alone into the churchyard. There was no one there, save a little boy, who was fishing with a pin hook in a grave half full of water. But a few moments afterward, through the arched gateway under the belfry, came a funeral procession. At its head walked a priest in white surplice, chanting. Peasants, old and young, followed him, with burning tapers in their hands. A young girl carried in her arms a dead child, wrapped in its little winding sheet. The grave was close under the wall, by the church door. A vase of holy water stood beside it. The sexton took the child from the girl's arms, and put it into a coffin; and, as he placed it in the grave, the girl held over it a cross, wreathed with roses, and the priest and peasants sang a funeral hymn. When this was over, the priest sprinkled the grave and the crowd with holy water; And then they all went into the church, each one stopping as he passed the grave to throw a handful of earth into it, and sprinkle it with holy water. A few moments afterwards, the voice of the priest was heard saying mass in the church, and Flemming saw the toothless old sexton treading the fresh earth into the grave of the little child, with his clouted shoes. He approached him, and asked the age of the deceased. The sexton leaned a moment on his spade, and shrugging his shoulders replied; Only an hour or two. It was born in the night, and died early this morning?' A brief existence,' said Flemming. C The child seems to have been born only to be buried, and have its name recorded on a wooden tombstone.' VOICES OF THE TRUE-HEARTED. 9 The sexton went on with his work and made no reply. Flemming still lingered among the graves, gazing with wonder at the strange devices, by which man has rendered death horrible and the grave loath some. back again. Wisely improve the Present. It is thine. Go forth to meet the shadowy Future, without fear, and with a manly heart.' It seemed to him, as if the unknown tenant of that grave had opened his lips of dust, and spoken to him the words of consolation, which his soul needed, and which no friend had yet spoken. In a moment the anguish of his thoughts was still. The stone was rolled away from the door of his heart; death was In the Temple of Juno at Elis, Sleep and his twin-brother Death were represented as children reposing in the arms of Night. On various funeral monuments of the ancients the Genius of Death is sculptured as a beautiful youth, leaning on an invert-no longer there, but an angel clothed in white. He ed torch, in the attitude of repose, his wings folded stood up, and his eyes were no more bleared with tears; and, looking into the bright, morning heaven, he said: I will be strong!' Men sometimes go down into tombs, with painful longings to behold once more the faces of their departed friends; and as they gaze upon them, lying there so peacefully with the semblance that they wore on earth, the sweet breath of heaven touches them, and the features crumble and fall together, and are but dust. So did his soul then descend for the. last time into the great tomb of the Past, with pain. ful longings to behold once more the dear faces of One of the most popular themes of poetry and those he had loved; and the sweet breath of heaven painting in the Middle ages, and continuing down touched them, and they would not stay, but crumbled even into modern times, was the Dance of Death. away and perished as he gazed. They, too, were In almost all languages is it written,-the apparition dust. And thus, far-sounding, he heard the great of the grim spectre, putting a sudden stop to all bugate of the Past shut behind him as the Divine Poet siness, and leading men away into the remarkable did the gate of Paradise, when the angel pointed him retirement' of the grave. It is written in an ancient the way up the Holy Mountain; and to him likeSpanish Poem, and painted on a wooden bridge in wise was it forbidden to look back. Switzerland. The designs of Holbein are well known. The most striking among them is that, where, from a group of children sitting round a cottage hearth, Death has taken one by the hand, and is leading it out of the door. Quietly and unresisting goes the little child, and in its countenance no grief, but wonder only; while the other children are weeping and stretching forth their hands in vain towards their departing brother. A beautiful design it is, in all save the skeleton. An angel had been better, with folded wings, and torch in verted! The causes In the life of every man, there are sudden transitions of feeling, which seem almost miraculous. At once as if some magician had touched the heavens and the earth, the dark clouds melt into the air, the wind falls, and serenity succeeds the storm. which produce these sudden changes may have been long at work within us, but the changes themselves are instantaneous, and apparently without sufficient cause. It was so with Flemming; and from that hour forth he resolved, that he would no longer veer with every shifting wind of circumstance; no longer be a child's plaything in the hands of Fate, which we ourselves do make or mar. He resolved hence forward not to lean on others; but to walk self-con years in vain regrets, nor wait the fulfillment of boundless hopes and indiscreet desires; but to live in the Present wisely, alike forgetful of the past, and careless of what the mysterious Future might bring. And from that moment he was calm, and strong; he was reconciled with himself! His thoughts turned to his distant home beyond the sea. An indescribable, sweet feeling rose within And now the sun was growing high and warm. A little chapel, whose door stood open, seemed to invite Flemming to enter and enjoy the grateful cool-fident and self-possessed; no longer to waste his ness. He went in. There was no one there. The walls were covered with paintings and sculpture of the rudest kind, and with a few funeral tablets. There was nothing there to move the heart to devotion but in that hour the heart of Flemming was weak,-weak as a child's. He bowed his stubborn knees, and wept. And oh how many disappointed hopes, how many bitter recollections, how much of wounded pride, and unrequited love, were in those him. tears, through which he read on a marble tablet in the chapel wall opposite, this singular inscrip Thither I will turn my wandering foostetps,' said he; and be a man among men, and no longer a dreamer among shadows. Henceforth be mine a life 'Look not mournfully into the Past. It comes not of action and reality! I will work in my own tion: 2 10 VOICES OF THE TRUE-HEARTED. sphere, nor wish it other than it is. This alone is health and happiness. This alone is life; 'Life that shall send A challenge to its end, And when it comes, say, Welcome, friend!' Why have I not made these sage reflections, this wise resolve, sooner? Can such a simple result spring only from the long and intricate process of experience? Alas! it is not till Time, with reckless hand, has torn out half the leaves from the Book of Human Life, to light the fires of passion with from day to day, that Man begins to see, that the leaves which remain are few in number, and to remember, faintly at first, and then more clearly, that, upon the earlier pages of that book was written a story of happy innocence, which he would fain read over again. Then come listless irresolution, and the inevitable inaction of despair; or else the firm resolve to record upon the leaves that still remain, a more noble history than the child's story, with which the book began.'-Hyperion. MY SOUL IS FREE. Disguise and coward fear! away! DEMOCRACY. BY JOHN G. WHITTIER. "All things whatsoever ye would that men should do to you, do ye even so to them."-Matthew vii. 12. Spirit of Truth, and Love, and Light! The foe of Wrong, and Hate, and Fraud ! Of all which pains the holy sight, Or wounds the generous ear of God! Beautiful yet thy temples rise, Though there profaning gifts are thrown; And fires unkindled of the skies Are glaring round thy altar-stone. Still sacred-though thy name be breathed By those whose hearts thy truth deride; And garlands, plucked from thee, are wreathed Around the haughty brows of Pride. O, ideal of my boyhood's time! The faith in which my father stood, Even when the sons of Lust and Crime Had stained thy peaceful courts with blood. Still to those courts my footsteps turn, For through the mists which darken there I see the flame of Freedom burnThe Kebla of the patriot's prayer! The generous feeling pure and warm, Which owns the rights of all divineThe pitying heart-the helping arm The prompt, self-sacrifice-are thine. How fade the cords of caste and birth! Whatever clime hath nurtured him; By misery unrepelled, unawed By pomp or power, thou see'st a MAN Beneath the flaunting robes of sin, On man, as man, retaining yet, The immortal gift of God to him. For that frail form which mortals wear And veiled his perfect brightness there. He who of old on Syria's mount Thrilled, warmed by turns the list'ner's heart. In holy words which cannot die, In thoughts which angels lean'd to know, Proclaimed thy message from on highThy mission to a world of wo. |