Keep. My lord, the winter now creeps on apace :
Hoar frost this morning on our sheltered fields
Lay thick, and glanced to the up-risen sun,
Which scarce bad power to melt it.

Ed. Glanced to the up-risen sun! Ay, such fair morns,
When every bush doth put its glory on,
Like a gemmed bride! your rusticks now
And early binds, will set their clouted feet
Through silver webs, so bright and finely wrought
As royal dames ne'er fashioned, yet plod on
Their careless way, unheeding.
Alas, how many glorious things there be
To look upon! Wear not the forests, now,
Their latest coat of richly varied dyes ?

Keep. Yes, good my lord, the cold chill year advances, Therefore I pray yon, let me close that wall.

Ed. I tell thee no, man; if the north air bites, Bring me a cloak. Where is thy dog to-day?

Keep. Indeed I wonder that he came not with me As he is wont.

Ed. Bring him, I pray thee, when thou comest again, He wags his tail and looks up to my face With the assured kindness of one Who has not injured me.

LESSON CLXXX. i.
A Summer Evening meditation. Mrs. BARBAULD.
'Tis past! The sultry, tyrant of the south
Has spent his short-lived rage; more grateful bours
Move silent on; the skies no more repel
The dazzled sight, but with mild maiden beams
Of tempered lustre, court the cherished eye
To wander o'er their sphere; where, hung aloft,
Dian's bright crescent, like a silver bow,
New strung in heaven, lists high its beamy horns, .
Impatient for the night, and seems to push .
Her brother down the sky. Fair Venus shines
Even in the eye of day; with sweetest beam
Propitious shines, and shakes a trembling flood
Of softened radiance from her dewy locks.
The shadows spread apace ; while meek-eyed Eve,
Her cheek yet warm with blushes, slow retires

Through the Hesperian gardens of the west, And shuts the gates of day. 'Tis now the hour When Contemplation, from her sunless haunts, The cool damp grotto, or the lonely depth Of unpierced woods, where wrapt in solid shade She mused away the gaudy hours of noon, And fed on thoughts unripened by the sun, Moves forward ; and with radiant finger points

To yon blue concave swelled by breath divine, Where, one by one, the living eyes of heaven Awake, quick kindling o'er the face of ether One boundless blaze; ten thousand trembling fires, And dancing lustres, where the unsteady eye, Restless and dazzled, wanders uncontined O’er all this field of glories ; spacious field, And worthy of the Master; he, whose hand With hieroglyphicks older than the Nile Inscribed the mystick tablet; hung on high To publick gaze, and said, Adore, O man! The finger of thy God! How deep the silence, yet how loud the praise ! But are they silent all? or is there not A tongue in every star, that talks with man, And wooes him to be wise ? or wooes in vain. This dead of midnight is the noon of thought, And wisdom mounts her zenith with the stars. At this still hour, the self-collected soul Turns inward, and beholds a stranger there Of high descent, and more than mortal rank; An embryo God; a spark of fire divine, Which must burn on for ages, when the sun (Fair transitory creature of a day!) Has closed his golden eye, and, wrapt in shades, Forgets his wonted journey through the east.

Seized in thought, On fancy's wild and roving wing I sail, From the green borders of the peopled earth, And the pale moon, her duteous fair attendant; From solitary Mars; from the vast orb Of Jupiter, whose buge gigantick bulk Dances in ether like the lightest leaf; To the dim verge the suburbs of the system, Where cheerless Sãturn 'midst his watery moons Girt with a lucii zone, in gloomy pomp,

Sits like an exiled monarch: fearless thence
I launch into the trackless deeps of space,
Where, burning round, ten thousand suns appear, .
Of elder beam, which ask no leave to shine,
Of our terrestrial star, nor borrow light
From the proud regent of our scanty day-
Sons of the morning, first-born of creation,
And only less than He who marks their track,
And guides their fiery wheels.
But o thou mighty mind! whose powerful word
Said, Thus let all things be, and thus they were,
Where shall I seek thy presence ? how,unblamed,
Invoke thy dread perfection?
Have the broad eye-lids of the morn beheld thee?
Or does the beamy shoulder of Orion
Support thy throne ? Oh! look with pity down
On erring, guilty man; not in thy names
Of terrour clad; not with those thunders armed
That conscious Sinai felt, when sear appalled
The scattered tribes; thou hast a gentler voice,
That whispers comfort to the swelling heart,
Abashed, yet longing to behold her Maker.
But now my soul, unused to stretch her powers
· In flight so daring, drops her weary wing,
And seeks again the known accustomed spot,
Drest up with sun, and shade, and lawns, and streams,
A mansion fair and spacious for its guest,
And all replete with wonders. Let me here,
Content and grateful wait the appointed time,
And ripen for the skies: the hour will come
When all these splendours bursting on my sight
Shall stand unveiled, and to my ravished sense
Unlock the glories of the world unknown.

LESSON CLXXXI.
The blind Preacher : Extract from a letter of the British

Spy.-WIRT.

Richmond, October 10, 1803. ' I have been, my dear S......., on an excursion through the counties which lie along the eastern side of the Blue · Ridge. A general description of that country and its inhabi.

tants may form the subject of a future letter. For the present, I must entertain you with an account of a most singular and interesting adventure, which I met with, in the course of the tour.

It was one Sunday, as I travelled through the county of Orange, that my eye was caught by a cluster of horses tied near a ruinous, old, wooden house, in the forest, not far from the road side. Having frequently seen such objects before, in travelling through these states, I had no difficulty in understanding that this was a place of religious worship

Devotion alone should have stopped me, to join in the duties of the congregation; but I must confess, tbat curiosity, to hear the preacher of such a wilderness, was not the least of my motives. On entering, I was struck with his preternatural appearance. He was a tall and very spare old man; his bead, which was covered with a white linen cap, his shrivelled hands, and his voice, were all shaking under the influence of a palsy; and a few moments ascer. tained to me that he was perfectly blind.

The first emotions which touched my breast, were those of mingled pity and veneration. But how soon were all my feelings changed! The lips of Plato were never more worthy of a prognostick swarm of bees, than were the lips of this holy man! It was a day of the administration of the sacrament; and his subject, of course, was the passion of our Saviour. I had heard the subject handled a thousand times: I had thought it exhausted long ago. Little did I suppose, that in the wild woods of America, I was to meet with a man whose eloquence would give to this topick a new and more sublime pathos, than I had ever before witnessed.

As he descended from the pulpit, to distribute the mystick symbols, there was a peculiar, a more than human sv. lemnity in his air and manner, which made my blood run cold, and my whole frame shiver.

He then drew a picture of the sufferings of our Saviour; his trial before Pilate; his ascent up Calvary; his cruci. fixion; and his death. I knew the whole history; but never, until then, had I heard the circumstances so select. ed, so arranged, so coloured! It was all new : and I seemed to have heard it for the first time in my life. His enunciation was so deliberate, that his voice trembled on every syllable ; and every heart in the assembly trembled in unison. His peculiar phrases had that force of description,

that the original scene appeared to be, at that moment, acting before our eyes. We saw the very faces of the Jews: the staring, frightful distortions of malice and rage. We saw the buffet: my soul kindled with a flame of indignation; and my hands were involuntarily and convulsively clinched.

But when he came to touch on the patience, the forgiva ing meekness of our Saviour; when he drew, to the life, his blessed eyes streaming in tears to heaven; his voice breathing to God, a soft and gentle prayer of pardon on his enemies, 66 Father, forgive them, for they know not what they do”—the voice of the preacher, which had all along faltered, grew fainter and fainter, until, his utterance being entirely obstructed by the force of his feelings, he raised his handkerchief to his eyes, and burst into a loud and irrepressible flood of grief. The effect is inconceivable. The whole house resounded with the mingled groans, and sobs, and shrieks of the congregation.

It was some time before the tumult had subsided, so far as to permit him to proceed. Indeed, judging by the usual, but fallacious standard of my own weakness, I began to be very uneasy for the situation of the preacher. For I could not conceive, how he would be able to let his audience down from the height to which he had wound them, without impairing the solemnity and dignity of his subject, or perhaps shocking them by the abruptness of the fall. Butno: the descent was as beautiful and sublime, as the elevation had been rapid and enthusiastick.

The first sentence, with which he broke the awful silence, was, a quotation from Rousseau: “ Socrates died like a philosopher, but Jesus Christ, like a God!”

I despair of giving you any idea of the effect produced by this short sentence, unless you could perfectly conceive the whole manner of the man, as well as the peculiar crisis in the discourse. Never before, did I completely understand what Demosthenes meant by laying such stress on delivery. You are to bring before you the venerable figure of the preacher: his blindness, constantly recalling to your recolIection old Homer, Ossian and Milton, and associating with bis performance, the melancholy grandeur of their geniuses; you are to imagine that you hear his slow, solemn, well-accented enunciation, and his voice of affecting, trembling melody ; you are to remember the pitch of passion and enthusiasm to which the congregation were raised; and then,