Saw in the sun a mighty angel stand, And heard great Babylon's doom pronounced by heaven's command.

Then, kneeling down, to heaven's eternal King, The saint, the father, and the husband prays; Hope springs exulting on triumphant wing

That thus they all shall meet in future days; There ever bask in uncreated rays, No more to sigh, or shed the bitter tear, Together hymning their Creator's praise, In such society, yet still more dear, While circling time moves round in an eternal sphere.

Compared with this, how poor religion's pride,
In all the pomp of method and of art,
When men display to congregation's wide

Devotion's every grace except the heart!
The Power, incensed, the pageant will desert,
The pompous train, the sacerdotal stole ;
But haply, in some cottage far apart
May hear, well-pleased, the language of the
soul,

And in his Book of life the inmates poor enrol.

BURNS.

EXCELSIOR.

THE shades of night were falling fast,
As through an Alpine village pass'd
A youth, who bore 'mid snow and ice,
A banner, with the strange device,
Excelsior!

His brow was sad; his eye beneath,
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath,
And, like a silver clarion rung
The accents of that unknown tongue,
Excelsior!

In happy homes he saw the light
Of household fires gleam warm and bright;
Above, the spectral glaciers shone,

And from his lips escaped a groan,
Excelsior!

66

66 Try not the pass," the old man said;
Dark lowers the tempest overhead,
The roaring torrent's deep and wide!"
And loud the clarion voice replied,
Excelsior!

"O stay," the maiden said, "and rest
Thy weary head upon this breast!"
A tear stood in his bright blue eye,
But still he answered with a sigh,
Excelsior!

"Beware the pine tree's withered branch! Beware the awful avalanche !"

This was the peasant's last good night!
A voice replied far up the height,
Excelsior!

At break of day, as heavenward
The pious monks of Saint Bernard
Uttered the oft-repeated prayer,
A voice cried through the startled air,
Excelsior!

A traveller, by the faithful hound
Half buried in the snow was found,
Still grasping in his hand of ice
That banner with the strange device,
Excelsior!

There, in the twilight cold and grey,
Lifeless, but beautiful he lay,

And from the sky serene and far
A voice fell-like a falling star,

Excelsior!

LONGFELLOW.

SELF-EXAMINATION.

SUM up at night what thou hast done by day, And in the morning what thou hast to do; Dress and undress thy soul, mark the decay

And growth of it; if with thy watch, that too Be down, then wind both up; since we shall be More surely judged, make thy accounts agree. HERBERT.

TO DAFFODILS.

FAIR daffodils, we weep to see
You haste away so soon;
As yet the early-rising sun

Has not attain'd his noon;

Stay, stay,
Until the hastening day
Has run

But to the evensong;

And, having prayed together, we
Will go with you along!

We have short time to stay, as you;
We have as short a spring,
As quick a growth to meet decay,
As you or any thing:

We die,

hours do; and dry

Away

As

your

Like to the summer's rain,
Or as the pearls of morning dew,

Ne'er to be found again.

HERRICK.

THE MAIDEN AT HER SPINNING WHEEL.

ROUND goes the wheel, the merry wheel, The sun shines bright and clear;

The flax is spinning on the reel,
The lark is singing near.