ciation that we shall spend our lives in anxiety and bitter care, only that we may find a covering for our bodies, or the means of assuaging hunger? For what else is an anxiety after the world? Letter to Mr. B. Maddock. ADVICE TO THE YOUNG. I would therefore exhort you earnestly-you who are yet unskilled in the ways of the world-to beware on what object you concentrate your hopes. Pleasures may allure-pride or ambition may stimulate; but their fruits are hollow and deceitful, and they afford no sure, no solid satisfaction. You are placed on the earth in a state of probation-your continuance here will be, at the longest, a very short period; and when you are called from hence you plunge into an eternity, the completion of which will be in correspondence to your past life, unutterably happy or inconceivably miserable. Your fate will probably depend on your early pursuits-it will be these which will give the turn to your character and to your pleasures. I beseech you, therefore, with a meek and lowly spirit, to read the pages of that book which the wisest and best of men have acknowledged to be the word of God. You will there find a rule of moral conduct such as the world never had any idea of before its divulgation. If you covet earthly happiness, it is only to be found in the path you will find there laid down; and I can confidently promise you, in a life of simplicity and purity, a life passed in accordance with the divine word, such substantial bliss, such unruffled peace, as is nowhere else to be found. All other schemes of earthly pleasure are fleeting and unsatisfactory. They all entail upon them repentance and bitterness of thought. This alone endureth for ever; this alone embraces equally the present and the future; this alone can arm a man against every calamity can alone shed the balm of peace over that scene of life when pleasures have lost their zest, and the mind can no longer look forward to the dark and mysterious future. Above all, beware of the ignis fatuus of false philosophy: that must be a very defective system of ethics which will not bear a man through the most trying stage of his existence; and I know of none that will do it but the Christian. ANNA SEWARD, 1747-1809. ANNA SEWARD, daughter of the Rev. Thomas Seward, of Litchfield, was born in the year 1747. In her very early childhood, she showed a great passion for poetry; but her mother, who had no taste for it, and who had a dread lest her daughter should be a "literary lady," persuaded her husband to forbid Anna from pursuing the natural bent of her genius. Poetry, therefore, was prohibited; and, to her praise, she sacrificed her own strong and decided tastes to the inclination of her parents. At the age of seventeen, she lost her only sister, a bereavement which she felt most keenly, and which she subsequently made the subject of an elegy. The blank in her domestic society was, however, in a degree supplied by the attachment of Miss Honora Sneyd,' then residing in her father's family, whom she often mentions in her poetry. When of age to select her own studies, she became a professed votary of the Muse, and she was known by the name of the "Swan of Litchfield." Among her first publications was "An Elegy to the Memory of Captain Cook," and "A Monody on the Death of Major Andre." From the nature of the subjects, they enjoyed great popularity for the time, but are now very little read, though Sir Walter Scott2 says that "they convey a high impression of the original powers of their author." In 1799, she published a "Collection of Original Sonnets," which contain some beautiful examples of that species of composition. After this she did not publish any large poem; yet she continued to pour forth her poetical effusions upon such occasions as interested her feelings, or excited her imagination. She died on the 23d of March, 1809, having bequeathed, by will, to Sir Walter Scott, with whom for many years she had corresponded, the copyright of her poems and letters, with a request that he would superintend their publication. Of her character and her poetry, a distinguished critic3 thus speaks: "She was endowed with considerable genius, and with an ample portion of that fine enthusiasm which sometimes may be mistaken for it; but her taste was far from good, and her numerous productions (a few excepted) are disfigured by florid ornament and elaborate magnificence." THE ANNIVERSARY. Ah, lovely Litchfield! that so long hast shone In blended charms, peculiarly thine own; She was the object of Major Andre's attachment, and afterwards became Mrs. Edgeworth. Read the Biographical Preface of Sir Walter Scott to his edition of Miss Seward's Poetical Works, 3 vols., Edinburgh, 1810. Rev. Alexander Dyce, in his "Specimens of British Poetesses." Stately, yet rural; thro' thy choral day, Sleeps where no vernal sun will ever shine. Why fled ye all so fast, ye happy hours, That saw Honora's eyes adorn these bowers? Fairest, and best!-Oh! can I e'er forget Ah, dear Honora! that remember'd day, First on these eyes when shone thy early ray! Scarce o'er my head twice seven gay springs had gone, Scarce five o'er thy unconscious childhood flown, When, fair as their young flowers, thy infant frame To our glad walls a happy inmate came. O summer morning of unrivall❜d light! June, the bright month, when nature joys to wear The livery of the gay, consummate year, Gave that envermeil'd day-spring all her powers, Gemm'd the light leaves, and glow'd upon the flowers; More poignant fragrance, or more jocund song. 'Twas eve; the sun, in setting glory drest, In the kind interchange of mutual thought, The bishop's palace at Litchfield. On her green verge the spacious walls arise, With arms entwin'd, and smiling as we talk'd, Close to her knees, and charm'd us as we view'd. O! hast thou mark'd the Summer's budded rose, Esteem and sacred confidence impressed, While our fond arms the beauteous child caress'd. Dear Sensibility! how soon thy glow Dy'd that fair cheek, and gleam'd from that young brow! How early, Generosity, you taught The warm disdain of every grovelling thought; Round sweet Honora, e'en in infant youth, "The lustre of the brightest of the stars (says Miss Seward, in a note on her ninety-third Sonnet) always appeared to me of a green hue; and they are so described by Ossian." SONNET. December Morning, 1782. I love to rise ere gleams the tardy light, The grateful thoughts to God, ere they unfold Wisdom's rich page: O hours! more worth than gold, By whose blest use we lengthen life, and, free From drear decays of age, outlive the old! THE GRAVE OF YOUTH. When life is hurried to untimely close, Social, or individual!-no glad step Of welcome friend, with more intenseness listen'd In unpierc'd darkness and in black oblivion. |