Earth's cultureless buds, to my heart ye were dear, Had scathed my existence's bloom; Once I welcome you more, in life's passionless stage, With the visions of youth to revisit my age, And I wish you to grow on my tomb. THOMAS CAMPBELL. PROCRASTINATION. THE bell strikes one. We take no note of time, But from its loss. Is wise in man. To give it then a tongue I feel the solemn sound. If heard aright It is the knell of my departed hours. Where are they? With the years beyond the flood. Be wise to-day; 'tis madness to defer; The vast concerns of an eternal scene. YOUNG. THE REAPER AND THE ANGELS. THERE is a Reaper whose name is Death, He reaps the bearded grain at a breath, And the flowers that grow between. I "Shall I have nought that is fair ?" said he, He gazed at the flowers with tearful eyes, He kissed their drooping leaves; It was for the Lord of Paradise, He bound them in his sheaves, 'My Lord has need of these flowerets gay," "Dear tokens of the earth are they, 66 Where he was once a child. They shall all bloom in fields of light, And saints upon their garments white, And the mother gave, in tears and pain, O, not in cruelty, not in wrath, 'Twas an angel visited the green earth, LONGFELLOW. THE BEAUTIES OF CREATION. I PRAISED the earth, in beauty seen, 66 I praised the sun, whose chariot roll'd O God! O good beyond compare ! Where thy redeem'd shall dwell with Thee! HEBER. THE VOICE OF SPRING. I COME, I come! ye have call'd me long, I come o'er the mountains with light and song; I have breath'd on the South, and the chestnut-flowers, I have pass'd o'er the hills of the stormy North, And the rein-deer bounds through the pasture free, And the moss looks bright where my step has been. I have sent through the wood-paths a gentle sigh, From the streams and founts I have loosed the chain; They are sweeping on to the silvery main, They are flashing down from the mountain-brows, Come forth, O ye children of gladness, come! Come forth to the sunshine, I may not stay. Away from the dwellings of care-worn men, Mrs. HEMANS. THE MISSIONARY'S HOME. Ir stood amid the mountains, From whose crowned crests sublime So dashed it to the main. A home to dream of-beautiful! It stood beneath the trees, That gave the fragrance of their breath To every passing breeze. A lovely dwelling, low and lone, A calm and sweet abode, A habitation fit for one, Whose life was given to God. The Indian from the forest, From the prairie, from the wild, With the gladness of a child; |