yond the sea; was it some, or all of these united, that hurried this forsaken company to their melancholy fate ?

-And is it possible that neither of these causes, that

not all combined, were able to blast this bud of hope ?-90 Is it possible, that from a beginning so feeble, so frail,

so worthy, not so much of admiration as of pity, there has

gone forth a progress so steady, a growth so wonderful, an expansion so ample, a reality so important, a promise, yet to be fulfilled, so glorious ? Evereit.

56. The Progress of Poesy.
Woods, that wave o'er Delphi's steep;
Isles, that crown the Egean deep;
Fields, that cool Ilissus laves,

Or where Mæander's amber waves 5 In ling’ring lab'rinths creep,

How do your tuneful echoes languish,
Mute but to the voice of anguish !
Where each old poetic mountain,

Inspiration breath'd around ;
10 Ev'ry shade and hallow'd fountain

Murmur'd deep a solemn sound:
Till the sad Nine, in Greece's evil hour,
Left their Parnassus for the Latian plains :

Alike they scorn the pomp of tyrant pow'r, 15 And coward vice, that revels in her chains.

When Latium had her lofty spirit lost,
They sought, O Albion ! next thy sea-encircled coast
Far from the sun and summer gale,

In thy green lap was nature's darling laid, 20 What time, where lucid Avon stray'd,

To him the mighty mother did unveil
Her awful face the dauntless child
Stretch'd forth his little arms and smil'd.

This pencil take, (she said,) whose colors clear 25 Richly paint the vernal year ;

Thine too these golden keys, immortal boy!
This can unlock the gates of joy ;
Of horror, that, and thrilling fears,
Or ope the sacred source of sympathetic tears.

30 Nor second he, that rose sublime

Upon the seraph wings of ecstasy,
The secrets of th' abyss to spy.
He pass'd the flaming bounds of space and time;

The living throne, the sapphire blaze, 35 Where angels tremble while they gaze,

He saw ; but, blasted with excess of light,
Clos'd his eyes in endless night.
Behold, where Dryden's less presumptuous car

Wide o'er the fields of glory bear 40 Two coursers of etherial race, With necks in thunder cloth’d, and long resounding pace.

Hark, his hands the lyre explore !
Bright-eyed fancy, hov'ring o'er,

Scatters from her pictured urn
45 Thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.

But ah ! 'tis heard no more
O lyre divine ! what daring spirit
Wakes thee now? though he inherit

Nor the pride nor ample pinion, 50 That the Theban eagle bear,

Sailing with supreme dominion
Through the azure deep of air ;
Yet oft before his infant eyes would run

Such forms as glitter in the muse's ray,
55 With orient hues, unborrow'd of the sun;

Yet shall he mount, and keep his distant way
Beyond the limits of a vulgar fate,
Beneath the good how far -- but far above the great.

Gray.

I had a dream, which was not all a dream.
The bright sun was extinguished, and the stars
Did wander darkling in the eternal space,

Rayless, and pathless, and the icy earth
5 Swung blind and blackening in the inoonless air ;

Morn came, and went—and came, and brought no day,
And men forgot their passions in the dread
Of this their desolation ; and all hearts

Were chill'd into a selfish prayer for light: 10 And they did live by watchfires-and the thrones,

The palaces of crowned kings-the huts,
The habitations of all things which dwell,
Were burnt for beacons ; cities were consumed,

And men were gather'd round their blazing homes 15 To look once more into each other's face ;

Happy were those who dwelt within the eye
Of the volcanoes and the mountain-torch :
A fearful hope was all the world contain'd ;

Forests were set on fire-but hour by hour
20 They fell and faded—and the crackling trunks

Extinguish'd with a crash-and all was black.
The brows of men by the despairing light
Wore an unearthly aspect, as by fits

The flashes fell upon them; some lay down
25 And hid their eyes and wept; and some did rest

Their chins upon their clenched hands, and smild ;
And others hurried to and fro, and fed
Their funeral piles with fuel, and look'd up

With mad disquietude on the dull sky,
30 The pall of a past world : and then again
With curses cast them down

upon

the dust,
And gnash'd their teeth and howld: the wild birds

shriek’d,
And, terrified, did flutter on the ground,

And flap their useless wings; the wildest brutes 35 Came tame and tremulous; and vipers crawl'd

And twined themselves among the multitude;
Hissing, but stingless-they were slain for food;
And War, which for a moment was no more,

Did glut himself again ;-a meal was bought 40 With blood, and each sat sullenly apart

Gorging himself in gloom : no love was left ;
All earth was but one thought-and that was death,
Immediate and inglorious ; and the pang

Of famine fed upon all entrails—men 45 Died, and their bones were tombless as their flesh;

The meagre by the meagre were devour'd,
Even dogs assailed their masters, all save one,
And he was faithful to a corse, and kept

The birds and beasts and famish'd men at bay, 50 Till hunger clung them, or the drooping dead

Lured their lank jaws : himself sought out no food,
But with a piteous and perpetual moan
And a quick desolate cry, licking the hand

Which answer'd not with a caress--he died. 55 The crowd was famish'd by degrees; but two

Of an enormous city did survive,
And they were enemies ; they met beside
The dying embers of an altar-place

Where had been heap'd a mass of holy things 60 For an unholy usage; they raked up,

And shivering scraped with their cold skeleton hands
The feeble ashes, and their feeble breath
Blew for a little life, and made a flame

Which was a mockery ; then they lifted up 65 Their eyes as it grew lighter, and beheld

Each other's aspects-saw, and shriek’d, and died-
Even of their mutual hideousness they died,
Unknowing who he was upon whose brow

Famine had written Fiend. The world was void, 70 The populous and the powerful was a lump,

Seasonless, herbless, treeless, manless, lifeless-
A lump of death—a chaos of hard clay.
The rivers, lakes, and ocean all stood still,

And nothing stirred within their silent depths ; 75 Ships sailorless lay rotting on the sea,

And their masts fell down piecemeal; as they dropp'd
They slept on the abyss without a surge-
The waves were dead; the tides were in their grave,

The moon their mistress had expired before ; 80 The winds were wither'd in the stagnant air,

And the clouds perish'd ; Darkness had no need
Of aid from them--She was the universe. Byron.

The land is not wholly free from the contamination of a traffic, at which every feeling of humanity must forever revolt-I mean the African slave trade. Neither public sentiment, nor the law, has hitherto been able entirely

5 to put an end to this odious and abominable trade. At

the moment when God, in his mercy, has blessed the Christian world with an universal peace, there is reason to fear, that, to the disgrace of the Christian name and

character, new efforts are making for the extension of 10 this trade, by subjects and citizens of Christian states

in whose hearts no sentiment of humanity or justice inhabits, and over whom neither the fear of God nor the fear of man exercises a control. In the sight of

our law, the African slave trader is a pirate and a felon ; 15 and, in the sight of heaven, an offender far beyond the ordinary depth of human guilt

. There is no brighter part of our history, than that which records the measures which have been adopted by the government, at

an early day, and at different times since, for the sup20 pression of this traffic; and I would call on all the true

sons of New England, to co-operate with the laws of man, and the justice of heaven. If there be within the extent of our knowledge or influence, any participation

in this traffic, let us pledge ourselves here, to extirpate 25 and destroy it. It is not fit, that the land of the Pil

grims should bear the shame longer. I hear the sound of the hammer, I see the smoke of the furnaces where manacles and fetters are still forged for human limbs.

I see the visages of those, who by stealth, and at mid30 night, labor in this work of hell, foul and dark, as

may become the artificers of such instruments of mis-' ery and torture. Let the spot be purified, or let it cease to be of New-England. Let it be purified, or let

it be set aside from the Christian world ; let it be put 35 out of the circle of human syinpathies and human re

gards, and let civilized man henceforth have no communion with it.

I would invoke those who fill the seats of justice,

and all who minister at her altar, that they execute the 40 wholesome and necessary severity of the law. I invoke

the ministers of our religion, that they proclaim its denunciation of those crimes, and add its solemn sanctions to the authority of human laws. If the pulpit be silent

whenever, or wherever, there may be a sinner bloody 45 with this guilt within the hearing of its voice, the pul