strictly evangelical, his style animated, and in many places eloquent, and his thoughts profound and practical. This is one of those few books which a man may use to put his own mind in motion, and in reading which he may be as much profited by what is suggested as by what is expressed.
(For the Repository and Library of Entertaining Knowledge.) PLEASURES OF FRIENDLY INTELLECTUAL INTERCOURSE. BY REV. JOSEPH RUSLING.
Is there a place to peace assigned
Secure from tumult, strife and care;
A spot where kindred spirits find
A calm retreat, their joys to share;
Some hallowed shade to friendship given,
Where souls on earth, meet souls from heaven?
Not at the gay voluptuous shrine
Of worldly pleasures, wealth, and fame,
Where moral energies decline,
And bliss is but an empty name,
Where vice refined, our joys impair,
And leaves us victims of despair.
Virtue, alone conforms the mind
To happiness, its heavenly grace
Is pure-and permanent, and kind,
And full of friendship, love and peace;
And brighter scenes perspective rise,
When virtue, happiness supplies.
Heaven has ordained, that perfect bliss
Should flow from goodness; as the stream
A tribute from the fountain is:
Or from the sun, the solar beam;
And where true goodness doth obtain,
Intrinsic friendship must remain.
I venerate the sacred range
Of noble minds, whose pleasures flow
In cheerful streams; whose free exchange
Of sentiment, true goodness show ;
Where social charms, with beauteous smile,
The lapse of passing years beguile.
Sweet, intellectual repast;
Commerce divine; the bliss of heaven!
Long may those grateful pleasures last,
And boundless be their influence given;
Till souls congenial meet above,
In friendly intercourse and love.
THE realms on high-the boundless halls, where sports the wing of light,
And Morn sends forth her radiant guest unutterably bright,
And evening rears her gorgeous piles amidst the purple ray,-
How glorious in their far extent and ever fair are they!
The dark autumnal firmament, the low cloud sweeping by,
The unimaginable depth of summer's liquid sky-
Who hath not felt in these a power, enduring, undefined-
A freshness to the fevered brow, a solace to the mind?
But most when, robed in nun-like garb, with sober pace and still,
The dun night settles mournfully on wood and fading hill,
And glancing through its misty veil, o'er ocean's depths afar,
Shines here and there, with fitful beams, a solitary star.
Then wearied sense and soul alike receive a nobler birth,
Then flies the kindling spirit forth beyond the thrall of earth; While lasts that soft and tranquil hour, to thought's high impulse given,
A chartered habitant of space-a denizen of heaven!
Then, seen in those eternal depths, the forms of vanished days
Come dimly from their far abodes to meet the mourner's gaze;
And they the fondly cherished once, and they the loved in vain,
Smile tranquilly, as erst they smiled, restored and hailed again.
And words which, breathed in long-past years, the ear remembers
And sounds whose low endearing tone the heart shall not forget; The parent speech, the friendly voice, the whispered vow, are
And fill with gentle melody the shadowy Realms of Air.
YE dead! ye dead! how quiet is your long and dreamless sleep,
While the solemn yew trees o'er you their stately vigils keep-
And the long blades sighing gently, as the whisp'ring breezes pass,
Disclose the springing flow'rets amid the waving grass.
The monarch sleeps among ye-the crowds that owned his sway
Lie prone in dust before him--but he lies as low as they-
Above the mould'ring coffin lid the merry crickets sing,
And the still corpse-worm banquets there, companion of the king.
Among the crowd ungreeted, lie the unhonored fair—
The bloom has left their cheek, for no roses flourish where
That form with icy fingers has its pallid sigil prest,
To mark his chosen brides amid the loveliest and the best.
O! where is he, whose sabre, like the meteor's lurid ray,
Marshalled the host to battle, and gleamed above the fray?
His victims cling around him-their arms above him meet-
He lies 'mid fest'ring corpses-his well-earned winding sheet.
And where lies he who noiselessly thro' life had won his way.
With praise begun the morning, with prayer closed in the day?
Who pointed to the pearly gates beyond the western sun,
And in the path his eye had traced, unwearied followed on?
Where?-mark that grassy mound on which the early sunbeams
The gentle daisy loves to bloom upon its verdant breast-
The Jews fall lightly on it when they leave the summer skies,
And mark for angels' visits the hillock where he lies!
THE SABBATH SCHOOL.
'Twas still! for Sabbath morning had arrived.
At the appointed hour the deep toned bells
Pour'd forth their music on the silent air.
The children of the Sabbath School were seen,
With rapid steps hastening to the place
Where they were wont to meet each other's smile
From week to week, and hear of God and Heaven.
It was within the consecrated walls
Of that fair temple (on the hallow'd spot
Where sleep in undisturbed repose, the dead,)
Pointing to heaven its towering spire,
As if to guard its precious sacred trust,
I saw the young immortals, as they sat,
Listening to the word of God's own truth.
Christ's crucifixion was the holy theme;
And as they meditated on that scene,
When on the cross the Lord of glory hung,
Revil'd, and mock'd, and pierc'd by wicked men,
At last exclaiming, "It is finished,"
Bowing his head and giving up the ghost,
Rocks rending, earth convulsing, graves opening,
Upon each countenance I saw surprise,
And heard one wondering say, "How God hates sin!"
THE SETTING SUN AN EMBLEM OF A GLORIOUS
YON sapphire clouds and those gleams divine-
Oh! they tell of a rest far brighter than mine:-
A land of all that is hallow'd and dear;
A land of love undash'd with a tear;
Of spring whose warblers no winter shall dread;
Of flow'rs ne er braided to die o'er the dead;
"Of glories unknown in a world such as this;
Of transports untold in an Eden of bliss!"
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