this scene of wonders; and for ages the obedient waters have rolled and thundered his praise. It is, as has been stated, where the two lines of the precipice meet, that the deepest and most powerful sheet of water falls; but it is here, also, just where the hand of omnipotence is performing its greatest wonders, that the consummation of the work is hid.
13. What the phenomena are, where this stupendous torrent strikes at the foot of the falls, no mortal eye hath seen : a mist, rising to nearly half the height of the fall, is the veil beneath which the Almighty performs his wonders alone, and there is the hiding of his power. This is the spot upon which the eye wishfully fixes, and tries in vain to penetrate; over which imagination hovers, but cannot catch even a glimpse to sketch with her pencil. This deep recess is the most sublime and awful scene upon which my eye was ever fixed. There, amid thunderings, and in solitude and darkness, from age to age, Jehovah has proclaimed, I am the ALMIGHTY GOD.
14. In beholding this deluge of created omnipotence, the thought, How irresistible is the displeasure of God! rushes upon the soul. Nothing but the wailing of unearthly voices seems necessary to make one feel that hell and destruction is uncovered before him. With these associations, all is dark, terrific, and dreadful, till, from the midst of this darkness and these mighty thunderings, the bow, brilliant type of mercy, arises, and spreads its broad arch over the agitated waters, proclaiming that the Omnipotence which rolls the stream, is associated with mercy as well as with justice.
LESSON CXXV.
The Falls of Niagara.
1. THE thoughts are strange that crowd into my brain,
While I look upward to thee. It would seem
As if God poured thee from his "hollow hand,"
And hung his bow upon thy awful front;
And spoke in that loud voice, which seemed to him
Who dwelt in Patmos for his Saviour's sake,
"The sound of many waters;" and had bade
Thy tlood to chronicle the ages back,
An notch His cent'ries in the eternal rocks.
2. Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we,
That hear the question of that voice sublime?
Oh! what are all the notes that ever rung
From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering side?
Yea, what is all the riot man can make
In his short life, to thy unceasing roar?
And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him
Who drowned a world, and heaped the waters far
Above its loftiest mountains? a light wave,
That breaks, and whispers of its Maker's might.
LESSON CXXVI.
The Mail comes in-The Newspaper.
1. HARK! 'tis the twanging horn o'er yonder bridge,
That with its wearisome but needful length
Bestrides the wintry flood, in which the moon-
Sees her unwrinkled face reflected bright;-
He comes, the herald of a noisy world,
With spattered boots, strapped waist, and frozen locks;
News from all nations lumbering at his back.
2. True to his charge, the close-packed load behind,
Yet careless what he brings, his one concern
Is to conduct it to the destined inn;
And, having dropped th' expected bag, pass on.
He whistles as he goes, light-hearted wretch,
Cold, and yet cheerful; messenger of grief
Perhaps to thousands, and of joy to some;
To him indifferent whether grief or joy.
3. Houses in ashes, and the fall of stocks,
Births, deaths, and marriages, epistles wet
With tears that trickled down the writer's cheeks,
Fast as the periods from his fluent quill,
Or charged with amorous sighs of absent swains,
Or nymphs responsive, equally affect
His horse and him, unconscious of them all.
4. Now stir the fire, and close the shutters fast,
Let fall the curtains, wheel the sofa round,
And, while the bubbling and loud-hissing urn
Throws up a steamy column, and the cups,
That cheer but not inebriate, wait on each,
So let us welcome peaceful evening in.
This folio of four pages,* happy work,
Which not e'en critics criticise; that holds
Inquisitive attention, while I read,
Fast bound in chains of silence, which the fair,
Though eloquent themselves, yet fear to break;
What is it but a map of busy life,
Its fluctuations, and its vast concerns?
5. Here runs the mountainous and craggy ridge,
That tempts ambition. On the summit see
The seals of office glitter in his eyes:
He climbs, he pants, he grasps them! At his heels,
Close at his heels, a demagogue ascends,
And with a dexterous jerk soon twists him down,
And wins them, but to lose them in his turn.
6. Cataracts of declamation thunder here;
There forests of no meaning spread the page,
In which all comprehension wanders lost;
While fields of pleasantry amuse us there
With merry descants on a nation's woes.
The rest appears a wilderness of strange
But gay confusion; roses for the cheeks,
And lilies for the brows, of faded age,
Teeth for the toothless, ringlets for the bald,
Heaven, earth, and ocean, plundered of their sweets,
Nectareous essences, Olympian dews,
Sermons, and city feasts, and favorite airs,
Ethereal journeys, submarine exploits,
And Katterfelto, with his hair on end
At his own wonders, wondering for his bread.
7. 'Tis pleasant, through the loop-holes of retreat,
To peep at such a world; to see the stir
Of the great Babel, and not feel the crowd;
To hear the roar she sends through all her gates
At a safe distance, where the dying sound
Falls a soft murmur on th' uninjured ear.
Thus sitting, and surveying thus at ease
The globe and its concerns, I seem advanced
To some secure, and more than mortal height,
That liberates and exempts me from them all.
8. It turns, submitted to my view, turns round
With all its generations: I behold
The tumult, and am still. The sound of war
Has lost its terrors ere it reaches me;
Grieves, but alarms me not. I mourn the pride
And avarice that makes man a wolf to man;
Hear the faint echo of those brazen throats,
By which he speaks the language of his heart,
And sigh, but never tremble at the sound.
9. He travels and expatiates; as the bee
From flower to flower, so he from land to land:
The manners, customs, policy of all
Pay contribution to the store he gleans;
He sucks intelligence in every clime,
And spreads the honey of his deep research
At his return-a rich repast for me.
He travels, and I too. I tread his deck,
Ascend his topmast, through his peering eyes
Discover countries, with a kindred heart
Suffer his woes, and share in his escapes;
While fancy, like the finger of a clock,
Runs the great circuit, and is still at home.
LESSON CXXVII.
Italy and Switzerland contrasted.
1. NATURE, a mother kind alike to all,
Still grants her bliss at labor's earnest call;
With food as well the peasant is supplied
On Idra's cliffs as Arno's shelvy side;
And though the rocky-crested summits frown, These rocks, by custom, turn to beds of down. 2. Far to the right, where Apennine ascends, Bright as the summer, Italy extends;
Its uplands, sloping, deck the mountain's side,
Woods over woods, in gay, theatric pride;
While oft some temple's mouldering tops between
With venerable grandeur mark the scene.
3. Could nature's bounty satisfy the breast,
The sons of Italy were surely blest.
Whatever fruits in different climes were found,
That proudly rise, or humbly court the ground;
Whatever blooms in torrid tracts appear,
Whose bright succession decks the varied year;
Whatever sweets salute the northern sky
With vernal lives, that blossom but to die;
These, here disporting, own the kindred soil,
Nor ask luxuriance from the planter's toil;
While sea-born gales their gelid wings expand
To winnow fragrance round the smiling land.
4. But small the bliss that sense alone bestows;
And sensual bliss is all the nation knows.
In florid beauty groves and fields appear;
Man seems the only growth that dwindles here.
Contrasted faults through all his manners reign!
Though poor, luxurious; though submissive, vain;
Though grave, yet trifling; zealous, yet untrue;
And e'en in penance, planning sins anew.
All evils here contaminate the mind,
That opulence, departed, leaves behind.
5. Yet still the loss of wealth is here supplied
By arts, the splendid wrecks of former pridė ;
From these the feeble heart and long-fallen mind
An easy compensation seem to find.
Here may be seen, in bloodless pomp arrayed,
The pasteboard triumph and the cavalcade.
6. By sports like these are all their cares beguiled;
The sports of children satisfy the child;
Each nobler aim, repressed by long control,
Now sinks at last, or feebly mans the soul;
While low delights, succeeding fast behind,
In happier meanness occupy the mind;
As in those domes where Cæsars once bore sway,
Defaced by time and tottering in decay,
There in the ruin, heedless of the dead,
The shelter-seeking peasant builds his shed;
And, wondering man could want the larger pile,
Exults, and owns his cottage with a smile.
7. My soul, turn from them; turn we to survey
Where rougher climes a nobler race display-
Where the bleak Swiss their stormy mansion tread,
And force a churlish soil for scanty bread.
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