stitution, and a conscientious regard to the preservation of it, are in the political, like charity in the religious system, a cloak to hide a multitude of sins; and as the performance of all other religious duties will not avail in the sight of God without charity, so neither will the discharge of all other ministerial duties avail in the sight of men, without a faithful discharge of this principal duty.

"Should a minister govern in various instances of domestic and foreign management ignorantly, weakly, or even wickedly, and yet pay this reverence and bear this regard to the Constitution, he would deserve certainly much better quarter, and would meet with it, too, from every man of sense and honor, than a minister who should conduct the administration with great ability and success, and should at the same time procure and abet, or even connive at such indirect violations of the rules of the Constitution as tend to the destruction of it, or even at such evasions as tend to render it useless. A minister who had the ill qualities of both these, and the good ones of neither; who made his administration hateful in some respects, and despicable in others; who sought that security by ruining the Constitution, which he had forfeited by dishonoring the government; who encouraged the profligate and seduced the unwary to concur with him in his design by affecting to explode all public spirit, and to ridicule every form of our Constitution; such a minister would be looked upon most justly as the shame and scourge of his country; sooner or later he would fall with out pity, and it is hard to say what punishment would be proportionable to his crimes. To conclude this head, therefore, since the obligation of interest and duty on every man, especially on every minister, and more especially on a prime or sole minister, to reverence the Constitution, to conform his conduct to it, and neither to invade nor suffer it to be invaded by others, are so undeniable and so strong, and since the means which the minister's power gives him to preserve it in purity and vigor, to corrupt and weaken it, are so many, nothing could be more proper than a dedication to one in your exalted station, of papers that are written to explain this interest, and to enforce this duty, and to press them on the understanding and conscience of every man in Britain, but of him most who is most

concerned."

them their implicit monosyllables; whilst he is drawing out his screen, and providing for a safe and decent elopement; or, it may be, comforts himself with the hopes that the public joy at his removal will drown all future inquiries; or that he shall keep sweet a good while longer, till the worm seizes his carcass, and posterity preys upon his memory; it may not be improper to turn your thoughts upon the reverse of his character, and to inquire by what marks a good minister may be found out and distinguished; or, since he is only a creature, by what arts, and in what method, he may be formed and brought into being. A people who are running the hazard of a deathbed repentance want nothing so much as a good minister; and a bad one dreads nothing more than an honest successor, who comes after him without treading in his steps; takes his place without giving into his secrets; and will not be won by a share of his rapine to partake, at the same time, of his crimes and corruptions."

The next extract is the conclusion of a reply which Bolingbroke wrote to a pamphlet in which Walpole had attacked him, either personally or through one of his writers. The "noble pair" are Walpole and his brother Horace:

"But there are men in the world who know

that there is something in life better than power and riches; and such men may prefer the low condition, as it is called by the remarker, of one man, to the high condition of another. There are men who see that dignity may be disgraced, and who feel that disgrace may be dignified.

Of this number is the gentleman whom I have undertaken to defend; who possesses his soul without hopes or fears, and enjoys his retreat without any desires beyond it. In that retreat he is obedient to the laws, dutiful to his prince, and true to his oaths. If he fails in these respects, let him be publicly attacked; let public vengeance pursue and overtake him; let the noble pair indulge for once their passions in a just cause. If they have no complaints of this nature to make against him, from whence does this particular animosity proceed? Have they complaints of any other kind to make, and of a private nature? If they have, why is the public troubled on this account? I hope the remarker's mask is now taken off; that the true drift of this personal railing is enough exposed; and that the attention of mankind will be brought back to those more important subjects which have been already started, and to those which every day may furnish."

The following specimen of irony is from the first number of the Occasional Writer, in which Bolingbroke, in the

dismay, if he showed any, arose from this, that he had desired to have the credit of a freethinker among his own set, without his opinion being suspected by the world at large. It is far more like Pope to have been governed by such feelings as these than to have been so dull as not to understand his tutor. We must quote one passage from the introduction, in illustration of the tone and temper with which Bolingbroke wrote of the clergy, and also as a good example of his best style.

"The authority of the schools lasted till the resurrection of letters, but as soon as real

knowledge was enlarged, and the conduct of the understanding better understood, it fell into contempt. The advocates of artificial theology have had since that time a very hard task. They have been obliged to defend in the light what was composed in the dark, and to acquire knowledge in order to justify ignorance. They were drawn to it with reluctancy; but learning that grew up among the laity and controversies with one another, made that unavoidable which was not eligible on the principles of ecclesiastical policy. They have done with these new arms all that great parts, great pains, and great zeal could do under such disadvantages. But this Troy can not be defended; irreparable breaches have been made in it. They have improved in learning and knowledge, but this improvement is as remarkable at least among the laity as among the clergy; besides which it must be owned that the former have had in this respect a sort of indirect obligation to the latter; for, whilst these men (the clergy) have searched into antiquity, have improved criticism, and almost exhausted subtlety, they have furnished so many arms the more to such of the others as do not submit implicitly to them, but examine and judge for themselves. By refuting one another when they differ, they have made it no hard matter to refute them all when they agree; and, I believe, there are few books written to propagate or defend the received notions of artificial theology which may not be refuted by the books themselves."

Whatever we may think of these sentiments, it is impossible to refuse the highest praise to the clearness, vigor, and point with which they are expressed.

The last circumstance connected with the literary life of Bolingbroke, is the publication of the Patriot King. It is a curious illustration of the state both

As opposed to natural.

of literature and politics at that period, that many of Bolingbroke's writings were printed only for private circulation, and some not printed at all when they were first written. It was enough for fame, and enough for power, if they circulated among a chosen few. Thus the Patriot King, written as a textbook for young Toryism, and a manual for the Prince of Wales, was not, in the first instance, intended for publication. Pope, however, was one of the select circle; and a few copies were given him, of course with an express with the author's wishes. Instead of understanding that he was to comply this he had fifteen hundred copies printed. Bolingbroke discovered this after Pope was dead, bought them all up, and burned them. Unluckily, however, they had not passed through the printer's hands without toll being taken of them. After the incremation aforesaid, fragments began to appear in the columns of a monthly magazine; and then it was that Bolingbroke resolved to publish a complete edition, to which he prefixed an advertisment, reflecting very severely on Pope, whom, however, he did not mention by name. For this action Bolingbroke has been a good deal blamed. But, we must say, we think without reason. Pope's conduct was unjustifiable. The Spirit of Patriotism and the Patriot King contained allusions to living characters which the author, greatly to his credit, had never meant to make public, while the garbled versions which were now being given to the world compelled him, rowever much against his will, to produce the original. That Bolingbroke was justly irritated at this circumstance we shall continue to believe; as likewise that no word contained in the advertisement is harsher than the offense merited.

It has been our object in this article to illustrate the literary powers of Lord Bolingbroke rather from those works which are less known to the public than from those which are more commonly associated with the name. This, if the reader should be surprised, is the reason why we have made no extracts from the Patriot King or the Dissertation upon Parties. These are, doubtless, very brilliant performances;

Love's magic pencil wrought Fair visions that were photographed

IN TRUST.

BY ISIDORE G. ASCHER.

ONLY a faded portrait,

Wrought with exquisite art,
That I hide from the garish daylight,
And keep in trust on my heart;
Only a shadowy image

Of one so true and dear,
That a halo of love surrounds it,
And makes its features clear.

I can not pierce the care-steeped past,
When tear-mists blind my eyes,
For mournful hues of the gloaming
Float on my thoughts that rise.

In a lonely mound, 'neath the careless grass,
They buried his sacred dust,

In the depths of my heart, far from human gaze,
I hoarded his truth and trust.

Can the callous world, with its Gorgon leer,
Deaden the beautiful glow

That blooms from the withered skies of the past,
Once lit with an iris-bow?

There are ghostly tracks of death in the years,
That have heedless, onward sped,
Unmindful of all they shattered in gloom

In their cruel, remorseless tread.

The bright of joy, and the dark of grief,
No eyes can truly see;

For none may read the scroll of the heart
With love's own sympathy.

Can I paint the charm of that spell-wrought hour,
When he cast his love at my feet,
And I wept with bliss in my thanks to God
For a happiness so complete?

'Twas a summer's day, and the joyful winds
Were loaded with honeyed breath,
And the heart of the air, with its pulses of life,
Could not harbor a thought of death;
For the fragrance of hope was scattered abroad,
And its light was spread above,

And over all was the summer calm,

As sweet as our pledge of love!

For oft, in the stealth of a chosen hour,
I wound, with a woman's art,
Remembrance of looks, and tones, and speech,
In a woof within my heart;
Until his words, like flashes of light
Revealing a hidden flower,

Laid bare the unseen bud of love
With the truth that forms its dower.

I wrote the book of our future life

With the sun-flecks of each hope,

And never a thought that was edged with gloom O'ershadowed its horoscope;

Through the lens of each cherished thought.

But a breeze, surcharged with venom of death, Wrenched the book from my hold,

And blotted and wasted the hues of my dreams,
Infused with affection's gold;

Till my life seemed bare as a soddened tree,
Scathed by the wind and rain,
With no vernal sap within it,

To make it bloom again.

Till the tempest of grief had spent its force,
And I bore to the patient years

The trust of his worth and fealty,

To banish vain, futile tears;

Till my barren life was hallowed and blest
With faith's undying hues,

And my heart took strength from sorrow's mists,
As a flower is fed with dews.

Only a faded portrait,

Wrought with a marvelous art,

That the sacred past has bequeathed to me,
To place in trust on my heart,

Till the kindly years, in their gentle march,
To his soul may bring me nigh,

And restore in heaven the love and truth
That were never meant to die!

-Bentley's Miscellany.

Macmillan's Magazine.

REMINISCENCES OF HARTLEY COLERIDGE.

IN the summer of 183-, it was the fortune of the writer, between leaving school and residing at the University, to join an Oxford reading-party in the beautiful valley of Grasmere. Grasmere was then a much more sequestered spot than it has since become; there were none of the villas which have since been built; and, except two or three farm-houses on the borders of the lake, and a shepherd's hut here and there upon the mountains, the neighborhood of the little village was the very ideal of repose and solitude. Not that this most peaceful of valleys has lost its peculiar tranquillity even now, when its charms have attracted a greater number of inhabitants. It combines, indeed, so many elements of quiet beauty that its character can not easily be changed. Not so small as to give the sense of compression and confinement to the view, it is yet so bounded by surrounding hills that it has a unity and distinctness of its own. The eye

centre.

In the south-west corner of the churchyard there is a spot which resembles in its sacredness, though so strangely contrasted in its surrounding features, the Poets' Corner in Westminster Abbey. Here are two gravestones, inscribed respectively with the names of William Wordsworth and Hartley Coleridge. At the time alluded to, both were living-Wordsworth in his house near Rydal; Hartley Coleridge in a cottage just outside the village of Grasmere, on the road that leads to Rydal. The latter was a frequent guest of our party, and companion of our walks. He was then in appearance about fifty years of age, of unusually short, even diminutive, stature; his hair beginning to be gray, his brow broad and intellectual. His gestures and movements were peculiar; he had a habit, even in company, of rising from his seat, and laying his hand upon his head, with open fingers, as if measuring its shape and size; and, when he thought that no one observed him, as he walked among the quiet roads, or on the hills, he would wave his arms as if reciting poetry or conversing with the mountains, his companions. His eyes, if memory serves right, were dark gray, and the expression of his face thoughtful and benevolent, with a touch of sadness. He was a frequent attendant at the church on Sundays; but even there his poetic fancies often seemed to follow him, and it was difficult not to watch his features with wonder and amusement, while he stood up in his pew and looked round on the kneeling congregation, a strange but kindly smile playing on his face, as of one looking down with benevolent interest on children engaged in their devotions. Not that he himself was wanting in decorous attention to the service, for his mind was in its very structure devotional, as his writings

Of the impression produced by his conversation it is difficult to give an adequate conception. Young men, it is true, are more susceptible of pleasure from intercourse with a really original thinker than those whose admiration is held in check by larger experience and perhaps distrust. And it may be partly due to this intense appreciation of what is far-reaching and beautiful in thought and imagery, which is the gift of youth, that the conversation of Hartley Coleridge seems in retrospect so marvelous. For the minds of the young in the four or five years preceding and following manhood are receptive of ideas to a degree that is never the case in after-life. Practical experience, in the vast majority of cases, sets a bar to the imagination, and limits intellect ual interests. Even where the latter are still retained, the vivid delight in new thoughts and ideas gives place to a critical habit; we no longer climb the mountains merely for the sake of the unknown views beyond, but choose safe paths that will bring us with the least trouble to our journey's end. The abandon with which we threw ourselves upon the untried regions of thought is gone, never to return. Nor can the mind, that retains to the end most of its first freshness, recover the keen delight and the eager admiration with which, in the opening of its powers, it welcomed the utterances of gifted men, and drank in their teaching.

Even older men, however, have borne testimony to the remarkable brilliance of Hartley Coleridge's conversation. It was not that it was sprightly, clever, and witty; such conversation is sometimes most fatiguing. It was not, as his father's is described, an eloquent, rapt monologue; there was nothing in it obscure and misty, no oracular pretension, no dark profundities. Yet few ever exemplified more strongly the inborn difference between genius and talent. Beautiful ideas seemed to be breathed into his mind perpetually, as if they came to him from the mountain breezes, or welled up in his heart and