But redder yet their fires shall glow 'Tis morn; but scarce yon level sun Shout in their sulphurous canopy! The combat deepens! On, ye brave, And charge with all thy chivalry ! Few, few shall part where many meet; Shall be a soldier's sepulchre ! CAMPBELL. Resignation. HERE is no flock, however watched and tended, There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, But has one vacant chair! The air is full of farewells to the dying, And mournings for the dead ; The heart of Rachel, for her children crying, Will not be comforted! Let us be patient! These severe afflictions Not from the ground arise, But oftentimes celestial benedictions Assume this dark disguise. We see but dimly through the mists and vapours; Amid these earthly damps, What seem to us but sad funereal tapers May be heaven's distant lamps. What seems so is transition; There is no death! This life of mortal breath Is but a suburb of the life Elysian, Whose portal we call Death. She not dead-the child of our affection But gone unto that school Where she no longer needs our poor protection, In that great cloister's stillness and seclusion, Safe from temptation, safe from sin's pollution, Day after day, we think what she is doing Year after year, her tender steps pursuing, RESIGNATION. Thus do we walk with her, and keep unbroken Thinking that our remembrance, though unspoken, Not as a child shall we again behold her, In our embraces we again enfold her, But a fair maiden, in her Father's mansion, And beautiful with all the soul's expansion And though, at times, impetuous with emotion The swelling heart heaves moaning like the ocean, We will be patient, and assuage the feeling We may not wholly stay; By silence sanctifying, not concealing, The grief that must have way. LONGFELLOw. 33 [HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW, by far the most successful of the American poets, occupies a distinguished position in a New England University. He is an accomplished linguist, and his poems display the advantages of his careful studies, especially of German literature.] E Paraphrase of the Nineteenth Psalm. 0000000000000HE spacious firmament on high, With all the blue ethereal sky, Their great Original proclaim. to day, Does his Creator's power display, Soon as the evening shades prevail, Repeats the story of her birth ; [JOSEPH ADDISON, the masterly essayist, the elegant classic scholar, and, above all, the sincere Christian, was born in 1672, and educated at Oxford. He had reached his thirtieth year, and was still almost unknown to fame, when the poem of "The Campaign," written in celebration of Marlborough's earlier victories in the great war of the Spanish succession, brought him Court patronage and fortune. He held several high offices, and at last became one of the Under-Secretaries of State. Addison's fame is more identified with The Spectator than with his poetry. His tragedy of "Cato" has always been popular. He died in 1719.] |