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Who hath not shared that calm so still and deep,

The voiceless thought which would not speak but weep, A holy concord, and a bright regret,

A glorious sympathy with suns that set?

"Tis not harsh sorrow,

but a tenderer woe,

Nameless, but dear to gentle hearts below,
Felt without bitterness, but full and clear,
A sweet dejection, a transparent tear,
Unmix'd with worldly grief or selfish stain,
Shed without shame and secret without pain.
Even as the tenderness that hour instils
When summer's day declines along the hills;
So feels the fulness of our heart and eyes
When all of genius, which can perish, dies.
A mighty spirit is eclipsed—a power
Hath passed from day to darkness.

Monody on Sheridan, by BYRON.

We count over the pious spirits of the world, the beautiful writers, the great statesmen, all who have invented subtly, who have thought deeply, who have executed wisely :—all these are proofs that we are destined for a second life; and it is not possible to believe that this redundant vigour, this lavish and excessive power, was given for the mere gathering of meat and drink. If the only object is present existence, such faculties are cruel, are misplaced, are useless. They all show us that there is something great awaiting us,-that the soul is now young and infantine, springing up into a more perfect life when the body falls into dust.-SYDNEY SMITH.

Oh! deep, enchanting prelude to repose,
The dawn of bliss, the twilight of our woes!
Yet half I hear the parting spirit sigh-

It is a dread and awful thing to die!
Mysterious worlds! untravelled by the sun,
Where time's far wandering tide has never run!
From your unfathom'd shades and viewless spheres
A warning comes, unheard by other ears.

Unfading Hope! when life's last embers burn,
When soul to soul and dust to dust return,
Heaven to thy charge resigns the awful hour,
Oh! then, thy kingdom comes, Immortal Power!
What! though each spark of earthborn rapture fly
The quivering lip, pale cheek, and closing eye,
Bright to the soul thy seraph hands convey
The morning dream of life's eternal day.

CAMPBELL.

Surely that great event in our history, which transports us to the full possession of the promised inheritance, where no element of grief shall be mingled in the cup of gladness, where no lingering corruption shall interfere with our obedience or defile our worship, where no temptation shall ever demand vigilance and conflict, and no weariness shall suspend our service; but ceaseless activity shall be the rapture of repose and life [shall be eternal progress towards infinite perfection]—surely the event, which introduces into this state of being, cannot correctly be designated death. NEWMAN HALL.

Peace! peace! Thy little bosom
Labours with shortening breath:
Peace! peace! that tremulous sigh
Speaks his departure nigh!

Those are the damps of death!

Mount up, immortal essence!

Young spirit, haste, depart! And is this death? Dread thing! If such thy visiting,

How beautiful thou art!

Oh! I could gaze for ever
Upon that waxen face-
So passionless, so pure;
The little shrine was sure

An angel's dwelling-place.

CAROLINE BOWLES.

Tread softly-bow the head

In rev'rent silence bowNo passing bell doth toll,

Yet an immortal soul

Is passing now.

Stranger! however great,

With holy reverence bow; There's one in that poor shedOne on that paltry bed,

Greater than thou.

Beneath that broken roof,

Lo! Death doth keep his state.
Enter-no crowds attend-

Enter-no guards defend
This palace gate.

That pavement damp and cold
No smiling courtiers tread ;

One silent woman stands,

Holding in meagre hands-
A dying head.

No mingling voices sound-
An infant wail alone;

A sob suppressed—again

That short deep gasp, and then-
The parting groan.

Oh! change-oh, wondrous change!

Burst are the prison barsThis moment there, so low,

So agonized and now

Beyond the stars.

Oh! change stupendous change!

There lies the soul-less clod;

The sun eternal breaks

The new immortal wakes

Wakes with his God.

CAROLINE SOUTHEY.

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There is something most affecting in the natural sorrows of poor men, as, after a few days' wrestling with affliction, they appear again at their usual work, melancholy but not miserable. There's no thoughtless clamour in kintra houses when the cloud o' God's judgment passes over them, and orders are given for a grave to be dug in the kirkyard. All the house is hushed and quiet—just as if the patient were still sick, and no gone away. The father, and perhaps the mother, the brothers and the sisters are all ganging about their ordinary business, with grave faces no doubt, and some of them no doubt dashing the drops from their eyes; but, after the first black day, little audible weeping, and no indecent and impious outcries.

And so people think, how callous, how insensible are the poor! that nature has kindly denied to them those fine feelings that belong to cultivated life! But if they heard the prayer o' the auld man at night, when the surviving family were on their knees around the wall, and his poor wife next him in the holy circle, they would ken better and confess, that there is something as sublime, as it is sincere and simple, in the resignation and piety of those humble Christians, whose doom it is to live by the sweat of their brow, and who are taught almost from the cradle to the grave to feel every hour they breathe that all they enjoy and all they suffer is dropt down from the hand of God almost as visibly as the dew or the hail; and hence their faith in things unseen and eternal is firm as their belief in things seen and temporal, and that they all feel when letting down the coffin into the grave.

Noctes Ambrosianæ, XLIII.

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