the same effect, or nearly so, as not any. There is something about it cold and repelling to the feelings. The marble seems effectually to shut the beloved object from your embraces-it adds chillingness and gloom even to the darkness of the grave. Why should you seek to lay your cheek against it—to water it with your tears, or to circle it with your embraces? The form of the lost one is not there-that has no part with the buried dust-it is the barrier which still more widely separates you from the form you loved. The associations, too, which are connected with it, are full of dreariness and disgust. The proud monument, with all its grace and beauty, cannot conceal from the mind's eye the loathsomeness beneath it-no indeed-no vain mockery of ornament for the grave! You shudder at the revolting contrast of its secret chambers. The exhibition of decaying mortality is brought too forcibly before the mind-the thought of death is filled with fresh images of terror, and resignation is again converted into grief. The still green mound, over which the sunlight plays, and the breeze revels in gladness, distinguished from its fellows only by the name of the sleeper who lies below, carved upon the white head-stone-this is associated with no such images of gloominess-the bright flower that waves there is like a portion of the cherished dust— the heart is soothed by the sweet influences of nature, and looks forward with a fresher hope to another meeting-they leave the present dreariness of death, to revert to all the happy past, and to recall all the counsels of the silent sleeper. If it be a stranger only who is wandering among these memorials of death, every tablet is an open leaf offering fit subjects for meditation. If the grave beside which we stand, be that of one of the earth's "master-spirits"-one upon whose words we still hang with enthusiastic admiration, and whose memory we cherish with affectionate devotion, where is the heart that will not catch from the inhumed ashes some kindling of virtuous emulation, or turn its glance anxiously inward to the inspection of its own character? Thou wilt say, perhaps, Could we not elsewhere meditate the same upon his virtues and the lessons that he has given to the world? Undoubtedly we could. But the mind is not always in a fitting mood for instruction-there the secret springs of thought and feeling are touched, and all their secret chambers lie open. "Our thoughts," says Rogers,

linked by many a hidden chain”

"Awake but one, and lo! what myriads rise!"

"are

But I have already said enough, perhaps too much, upon the subject—and after all, I can give only my own feelings respecting it. Yet I know how much we are the creatures of circumstances-how much our opinions and our actions are controlled by strong mental associations. An Italian author is said on the grave of Virgil to have resolved to dedicate his life to the muses. When Clarkson dies, will not the young philanthropist who stands by his grave, feel his pulse beat with a higher and firmer resolution to follow in his steps?"

Speaking of the dying sayings of Rousseau, as mentioned by Whittier, in his review of the last illness of that celebrated philosopher, she very briefly remarks:

"It seems indeed difficult with many to imagine how the death-bed of an infidel could be one of serenity. But the mind of Rousseau was probably so worn out by continual and intense excitement, that it could not be easily aroused into vivid feeling of any kind. A high fever is usually succeeded by utter debility and languor; and the apparent calmness which he exhibited, may perhaps only have been the effect of apathy and mental exhaustion."

In quoting some of the beautiful and sentimental effusions of Mrs. Hemans, relative to the imminent perils to which those engaged in the pearl-fishery are subjected, she makes these few but appropriate comments :—

"How few calculate the cost of their ornaments at more than the coin which they have paid for them! A serious estimate of the effect which they have upon the happiness of others, would be, I think, the best means of checking an undue fondness for them. Who would wish to wear pearls with the thought continually before their minds, that their "pale quivering ray" had perhaps been purchased at the expense of the life of a fellow creature?-Would it not seem as though the gleam had been caught from the expiring glance of the victim, and perpetuated there to turn on them with a keen upbraiding?"

It is said that, to be a poet, a person must be naturally fond of music. To a casual remark of her friend, in relation to this subject, Elizabeth replies thus :

"I had been thinking of what were thy sentiments on this subject, only a few hours before reading the above sentence.

They coincide very nearly with my own ;-though had I an ear, as it is called, for music, I believe I should be more fond of it. I would allow it the same license that I think can properly be given to poetry, but nothing further. When it comes with a purifying influence over the heart, calming the turbulence of its passions, cooling the flow of its vain desires and emotions, erasing with a soft touch some line of folly or care, and bearing the thoughts on its wing to a better and purer atmosphere, —then, by whatever name the strains may be called, the enjoyment or the practice of music is, I think, not culpable. The further it swerves from this, the more it is liable to, if it does not always degenerate into, an abuse of the gift."

She alludes in a most feeling manner to the untimely death of Lucretia M. Davidson, a young lady of rare poetical genius, and of high promise, as follows:

"Young, amiable, and so highly gifted with intellectual brightness, it is almost painful to write the name of death beside that of so rare a blossom. She died of a poetical malady, consumption, and while the poetry of life was yet thrilling deliciously round her heart. I think of her with sadness, yet I cannot lament; and I have sometimes thought that hers was a singularly happy fate. Had she lived, she might, it is true, have devoted her talents to the cause of religion and virtue. She might have added a worthy tribute to the stores of our country's literature, and gathered to her pages bright gems of thought, and treasures of intellectual wealth—or she might have forgotten the high gift entrusted to her charge, or wasted it unworthily -or she might, a few years later, have gone down to the grave, with her heart's core scorched to ashes by the fever of disappointed hopes and the inward burning of her own spirit. The unmasking of the world to a highly sensitive and imaginative mind, is not without danger. But Lucretia escaped this. She died at sixteen, or earlier, and she had all the brightness, all the enjoyments of genius, without its bitterness-she has won a meed of early praise, and sleeps-not unforgotten.' Briefly adverting to her reading, she states:

"I have been reading No Cross, No Crown,' for the first time quite lately, and have been very much pleased with it. I think William Penn characterized it rightly, when he recommended it to his children as possessing 'true wisdom.' It is

full of excellent advice, and a practical work, which I like much better than a doctrinal one. I have seldom read a work of the kind with more satisfaction, or one by which the conduct could be better regulated.

"I have also been looking through the Memoir of Mrs. Judson, the first female missionary to the Burman empire. Some parts, descriptive of the character and manners of the Burmans, are very interesting, as is also a narrative of their situation during an invasion of the English. Probably thou dost not feel as much interested in these matters as some others; but I am sure thee will respond to the wish that arose with me as I was reading of this female's zeal and sacrifices in that cause, -that even one-half as much energy were displayed in loosening the fetters of our poor slaves, and in giving them the benefits of education.

"At present I am reading Russell's History of Modern Europe, a very interesting work, commencing with the fall of the Roman Empire.

"I do not doubt that C. Beecher's work on education, would be interesting, for Mental Philosophy, of which I consider that a branch, and a very important one, is a science in which I take great delight, though I have had but little opportunity of indulging my fondness for it. I have lately read a little work of Reid's, on the Mind, but which enters into little more than the alphabet of the science. I intend to get Locke's Essays as soon as I can, and should dearly like, were it in my power, to go through a regular course of reading on the subject. It may be compared to lifting the veil of another fresh and beautiful world, or to standing in the midst of a new creation, to be permitted to gaze in among the hidden feelings, the fine and delicate perceptions, and the unveiled mysteries of the human mind. It is like being endowed with a new intellect, or gifted suddenly with another sense. Such are probably the feelings, on the first illuminings of every science which is pursued with earnestness, but with this branch of knowledge, it appears to me particularly so."

The following remarks will show the humble estimate which she made of the powers of her own mind, and the ideas she entertained with respect to wordly fame. So far did she carry the restriction of the ambitious aspirations of her heart, that it

is to be doubted whether she was really conscious either of the excellency of her own example, the scope and strength of her intellectual capacity, or the title she had fairly acquired to the meed of virtuous renown.-She replies to the suggestion, that she might possibly feel too much humbled at the view of the weakness and imperfections of her own nature.

"I reply in the words of a noted author, with whose sentiments thou art probably familiar:-'I will not hypocritically accuse myself of offences which I have no temptation to commit, and from the commission of which motives inferior to religion would preserve me. But I am continually humbled in detecting mixed motives in almost all I do. Such struggling of pride in my endeavours after humility-such irresolution in my firmest purposes-so much imperfection in my best actions -such fresh shoots of selfishness where I hoped the plant itself was eradicated-such frequent deadness of duty-such infirmity of will-such proneness to earth in my highest aspirations after heaven.'—And I may add to these, so much darkness, so much ignorance, so great a disproportion between my wishes and my actions, so many of the rank weeds of prejudice often very unexpectedly discovered in my own mind, and the fear of still greater evils lurking undiscovered there, that I sometimes forget, almost, that there must be some light to render the darkness visible. Whether it is that formed by nature to find a happiness in the presence of all natural and mental beauty, and admiring mental and moral excellence as of the highest order, to an almost enthusiastic excess, I feel more painfully the weakness and errors of my own mind, I know not:-but this I do know,-that when I look upon the imperfections within-when I think of my oft-repeated resolutions frittered away into nothing-of the moments and hours wasted upon trifles, or in sloth or profitless musings-of the risings of irritation or impatience in a temper which I hoped was better disciplined and all the long et ceteras of human weakness -there is reproach and mortifications in the retrospect. I would wish myself and all others to reach the highest point of excellence that God has created human nature capable of attaining; and it is this which I feel myself fallen so far short of. Error and darkness wherever I discover them, whether in my own mind or those of others, are always painful to me, and