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Kindness, exorcising evil,

By her spell of potent power;
Love and Truth, mankind encircling

With the bliss which is their dower.

Up! it is a glorious era!

Never yet has dawned its peer!
Up! and work! and then a nobler
In the future shall appear;
"Onward!" is the present's motto,
To a larger, higher life;

"Onward!" though the march be weary,
Though unceasing be the strife.

Pitch not here thy tent, for higher
Doth the bright ideal shine,
And the journey is not ended

Till thou reach that height divine;
Upward! and above earth's vapors,
Glimpses shall to thee be given,
And the fresh and odorous breezes,
Of the very hills of heaven.

FOREST HYMN.

W. C. BRYANT.

FATHER, thy hand

Hath reared these venerable columns; thou
Didst weave this verdant roof. Thou didst look down
Upon the naked earth, and, forthwith, rose
All these fair ranks of trees. They, in thy sun,
Budded, and shook their green leaves in thy breeze,
And shot towards heaven. The century-living crow,
Whose birth was in their tops, grew old and died
Among their branches; till, at last, they stood,
As now they stand, massy and tall and dark,
Fit shrine for humble worshipper to hold
Communion with his Maker.

Thou art in the soft winds

That run along the summits of these trees
In music; thou art in the cooler breath,

That, from the inmost darkness of the place,

Comes, scarcely felt; the barky trunks, the groundThe fresh moist ground

are all instinct with thee.

Here is continual worship; nature, here,
In the tranquillity that thou dost love,
Enjoy thy presence. Noiselessly, around,
From perch to perch, the solitary bird
Passes; and yon clear spring, that midst its herbs
Wells softly forth, and visits the strong roots
Of half the mighty forest, tells no tale

Of all the good it does. Thou hast not left
Thyself without a witness, in these shades,
Of thy perfections. Grandeur, strength, and grace,
Are here to speak of thee. This mighty oak-
By whose immovable stem I stand and seem
Almost annihilated—not a prince,

In all the proud old world beyond the deep,
E'er wore his crown as loftily as he

Wears the green coronal of leaves with which
Thy hand has graced him. Nestled at his root
Is beauty such as blooms not in the glare
Of the broad sun. That delicate forest flower,
With scented breath, and look so like a smile,
Seems, as it issues from the shapeless mould,
An emanation of the indwelling life,
A visible token of the upholding love,
That are the soul of this wide universe.

My heart is awed within me, when I think
Of the great miracle that still goes on,
In silence, round me-the perpetual work
Of thy creation, finished, yet renewed
Forever. Written on thy works I read
The lesson of thy eternity.

Oh! from the sterner aspects of thy face,
Spare me and mine, nor let us need the wrath
Of the mad unchained elements to teach
Who rules them! Be it ours to meditate,
In these calm shades, thy milder majesty,
And to the beautiful order of thy works
Learn to conform the order of our lives.

THE CLOSING YEAR.

G. D. PRENTICE.

'Tis midnight's holy hour-and silence now
Is brooding like a gentle spirit o'er
The still and pulseless world.

Hark! on the winds
The bell's deep tones are swelling;- 't is the knell
Of the departed year. No funeral train

Is sweeping past,-yet, on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest
Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred
As by a mourner's sigh—and on yon cloud,
That floats so still and placidly through heaven,
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand,

Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,
And Winter with his aged locks, -and breathe,
In mournful cadences that come abroad,

Like the far wind-harp's wild and touching wail,
Gone from the Earth forever.

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'T is a time

For
and for tears. Within the deep,
memory
Still chambers of the heart, a spectre dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of time,
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful

And holy visions that have passed away,

And left no shadow of their loveliness

On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts
The coffin-lid of hope, and joy, and love;

And, bending mournfully above the pale,

Sweet forms, that slumber there, scatters dead flowers
O'er what has passed to nothingness. The year
Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
Its shadow in each heart.

In its swift course

It waved its sceptre o'er the beautiful,
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man, and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous,-and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er

208

POETICAL DECLAMATIONS AND RECITATIONS.

The battle plain, where sword, and spear, and shield,
Flashed in the light of mid-day,-and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came,
And faded, like a wreath of mist at eve!
Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,

It heralded its millions to their home

In the dim land of dreams.

Remorseless Time!

Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe!- What power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt

His iron heart to pity? On, still on,

He presses, and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes, that can soar

Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
The fury of the northern hurricane,

And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall, and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain crag,—but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinions. Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow, - cities rise and sink
Like bubbles on the water,-fiery isles

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Spring blazing from the ocean, and go back
To their mysterious caverns,— mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain, new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations, -and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter a while in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away
To darkle in the trackless void,
· yet, Time,
Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all pitiless, and pauses not,
Amid the mighty wrecks that strew his path,
To sit and muse, like other conquerors,
Upon the fearful ruin he has wrought.

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[The Priestess stands alone, with one arm leaning on her altar.]

Priestess. Here is my altar, naked—and I a Priestess! Why come they not, those gentle messengers whom I sent abroad to bring me the pure and beautiful things of earth? Has the glory of this world departed, that they linger thus in its pursuit? Nay, not all departed, for here cometh Flora, the queen of a radiant realm.

Flora.

All hail, sweet Priestess! I have wandered long,
But the dear flowers were sleeping in their graves;
Only a few, from all the beauteous throng,
Have wakened at the song of spring's wild waves.
Those few I bring thee, from their far retreat,
An offering for thine altar, pure and sweet.

Thou

Priestess. Bless thee, Flora! They shall lie there, as beautiful tokens of thy faithful ministries to man. makest the earth radiant for his footsteps; and the rugged scenes along his pilgrimage are decked with beauty by thy gentle hand. Bless thee, Flora, for thy fragrant offering. Hast thou aught to ask in return?

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