and LEESER, and others, were not more beautiful than those which have given to us the Word, from the sovereign command of the First James of England. Let us list the following, as read in the Fast of the ninth of Ab. The lot of the Lord's inheritance is Jacob. He encircled him, and he watched him, and be guarded him as the apple of his eye. As an eagle stirreth up her nest, fluttereth her young, spreadeth abroad her wing, taketh them, beareth them aloft on her pinions, so the Lord did lead him.' And how eloquently do they complain! Where,' they ask, in their deep and briefest language, 'where is the residence of the Divine Glory? the house of the Levitic order, and their desk? Where the glory of the faithful city? Where are the chiefs of thy schools, and where thy judges? Who arrange the answers to them?- who ask concerning thy mysteries? Where are they who walk in the paths of truth, enlightened by the brightness of thy shining?'

There is something extremely touching to me in these Israelitish lamentations. They were wailed con amore, and by the card. I truly believe, that all the sackcloth poetry of modern time, put together, would give a mere dividend of the great capital of dolor employed by the olden-time Hebrews. They wept and howled copiously yea, abundantly. There is something, after all, sacred in sorrow. It has a dignity, which joy never possesses. The sufferings of Medea in Euripides- the scenes betwixt Andromache and Hector the pangs of Virginius- these are remembered, and will be, when the glittering treasures of Croesus at Delphi shall be forgotten, and the gay measures of Gyges be lost to men. Here is a strain in this kind; one that was spent at the close of a summer day, some year or so agone. It needs a little preliminary blazon,

You must know, reader, that there lieth, some three miles or so from Brotherly Love- a city of this continent, a delectable citya place of burial, Laurel Hill' by name. On a sweeter spot, the great sun never threw the day-spring of the morning, nor the blush of the evening West. There the odors and colors of nature profusely repose; there, to rest of a spring or summer afternoon, on some rural seat, looking at trees, and dancing waters, and the like, you would wonder at that curious question addressed of Dean Swift, on his death-bed, to a friend at his side: Did you ever know of any really good weather in this world? You would take the affirmative. Well, thus I sang:

VOL. XI.

HERE the lamented dead in dust shall lie,

Life's lingering languors o'er- its labors done;
Where waving boughs, betwixt the earth and sky,
Admit the farewell radiance of the sun.

Here the long concourse from the murmuring town,
With funeral pace and slow, shall enter in;
To lay the loved in tranquil silence down,
No more to suffer, and no more to sin.

And here the impressive stone, engraved with worde
Which Grief sententious gives to marble pale,
Shall teach the heart, while waters, leaves, and birds
Make cheerful music in the passing gale.

58

Say, wherefore should we weep, and wherefore pour
On scented airs the unavailing sigh

-

While sun-bright waves are quivering to the shore,
And landscapes blooming-that the loved should die?

There is an emblem in this peaceful scene -
Soon, rainbow colors on the woods will fall;
And autumn gusts bereave the hills of green,
As sinks the year to meet its cloudy pall:

Yet, when the warm, soft winds shall rise in spring,
Like struggling day-beams o'er a blasted heath,
The bird returned shall poise her golden wing,
And liberal nature break the spell of death."

So, when the tomb's dull silence finds an end,
The blessed Dead to endless youth shall rise;
And hear the archangel's thrilling summons blend
Its tones with anthems from the upper skies.

There shall the good of earth be found at last,
Where dazzling streams and vernal fields expand;
Where Love her crown attains-her trials past

And, filled with rapture, hails the better land!

Thus I strummed the old harpsichord, from which I have aforetime, at drowsy hours and midnight intervals, extracted a few accidental numbers, (more pleasant doubtless to beget than read) 'sleepless myself, to give to others sleep!'

WELL, that is the only way to write without fatigue, both to author and reader. In all that pertains to the petty businesses which bow us to the routine of this work-day world, I am as it were at home. I am distinctly a mover in the great tide of Action sweeping on around me; yet when I enter into the sanctuary of the muses, lo! at one wave of the spiritual wand, this 'dim and ignorant present' disappears. I breathe a rarer atmosphere. Visions of childhood throng upon my soul; the blue mountain-tops-the aerial circles of far-off landscapes the hazy horizon of ocean-waters; the wind-tossed verdure of summer-the hills that burst into singingand the sweet harmonies of nature-Universal Parent! - all appeal to my spirit. This dismemberment of the ideal from the actual, is a fountain of enjoyment, which whoso knows not, has yet the brightest lessons of life to learn. He has yet to enter that fairy dominion which seems the intermediate territory betwixt the airy realms conceived of in this world, and the more radiant glories of that undiscovered country,

from whose bourne

No traveller returns.'

There is something in the feeling, beyond the impulses of fame, beyond the 'mouth honor, breath,' which the falsest of the world are the most ready to bestow; something beyond the empty plaudits, the spurious honors, of the multitude, given to-day-withheld tomorrow. Anathemas a moment gone-benedictions now - these are the marks and signals of the multitude. I would not seek their favor, for their disapproval is the same in the end. It is a curious

truth, that no man realizes fame, until he is beyond it; that the tardy honors which men receive from kingly or from republican powers, generally come too late to be appreciated or rather, too late to be

of value.

YET there is something exceedingly solemn in the mutability of a name. 'Tis indeed as a vapor, which appeareth but for a little season, and then vanisheth away. I like not this life-after-death repute - this post-mortem vitality. 'Give it to me, if I deserve it, while the breath of existence sports in my nostrils; while I can walk, and hear, and see, and jostle among men !' Such are my aspirations - malgré the littleness of it. To have antiquaries puzzling themselves with one's merits-supposing that they might reach beyond his sepulture is to my mind a dry and arid prospect. One wants to be quiet. To subsist in bones,' saith my old friend, Sir Thomas Browne, ' and to be but pyramidally extant, is a fallacy in duration. Vain ashes, which in the oblivion of Names, Persons, Times, and Sexes, have found unto themselves a fruitless continuation, and only arise unto late posterity, as emblems of mortal vanities, antidotes of pride. Oblivion blindly scattereth her poppy, and deals with the memory of men, without distinction to merit of perpetuity. Who can but pity the founder of the pyramids? Herostratus lives that burnt the temple of Diana - he is almost lost that built it. Time hath spared the epitaph of Adrian's horse confounded that of himself. In vain we compute our felicities by the advantage of our good names, since bad have equal durations; and Thersites is like to live as long as Agamemnon, without the favor of the Everlasting Register. The Canaanitish woman lives more happily without a name, than Herodius with one; and who had not rather, have been the good thief, than Pilate? Who knows whether the best of men be known? Or whether there be not more remarkable persons forgot, than any that stand remembered in the known accompt of time?' These be puzzling queries.

In our own country, methinks I can depaint the means and methods of posthumous fame. Here, if one who had attained to some eminence in his life-time, could awake fifty years after he had been quietly inurned, and be permitted to read the newspapers, he might find that a steamer of his name, had burst her boiler' a terrible accident, with loss of lives,' on river Mississippi or Ohio; or mayhap that a horse, commemorating his cognomen, had been beaten at the Eagle or other course with the particulars. Perhaps that he had devoted himself to posterity to be cited in other years as the source whence sanguinary mixtures of renown had sprung; advertised in hand-bills and to aid, perhaps, in promoting to the legislature his owner, or guardian, or friend. This is fame, or a part of its mode of bestowment, here below. Fame! - a betword a paragraph a feuille volante —a hand-bill. Thank the powers! I have precious little thereof. And the most I would have, reader, is to write myself your friend,

-

OLLAPOD.

UPON this wonderful and glorious ALL

I look, and see there's nought destroyed, or lost, Though all things change. The rain-drops gently fall, But die not where they fall. Some part doth post Swiftly away on wings of air, to accost The summer clouds, and ask to sail the deep With them, as vapory travellers, or frost. Some part anon into the ground doth creep, And maketh the sweet herbs and flowers to grow, Or oozeth softly through the dark, deep earth, Teaching the streamlet under ground to flow, "Till forth it breaks with a glad sunshine birth Ripples a dancing brook - then flows a riverThen mingles with the sea, the air, circling for ever.

Even so I looked on the vast realm of Truth,
And saw it filled with spirit, life, and power.
Nought TRUE did ever die. Immortal youth
Filled it with balmy odors, from the hour
It first dropped gently from its upper shower
On high; swiftly it flew away, or sank.
Awhile amid the darkness that doth lower
Below, it seemed to struggle. But earth drank

The drop. From heart to wakening heart it sped-
From sire to son- from age to age it ran;

It swelled the stream of Truth. It is not dead,
But flowing, filleth every want of man.

It NEVER dieth- -nor can ever die,

Circling from God to God, through all eternity!

Yea, Truth, immortal as its primal source,
Once uttered, once set free, shall never rest.
O, Father! hath it such undying force
When unrevealed, and left without attest
Of miracle from Thee, and unconfessed

By man; and shall not thine own WORD go forth,
In all its fulness, through these times unblest,
'Till it shall reach all corners of the earth?
If one small trembling drop is ne'er destroyed,
But runneth, a bright messenger from Thee,
Shall thy own living streams return back void,'
And not fulfil their saving ministry?

O, no! Even now I see them spreading wide,
With life and beauty, on the pure, deep, swelling tide!

LITERARY NOTICES.

THE AMERICAN DEMOCRAT, OR HINTS ON THE SOCIAL AND CIVIC RELATIONS OF THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. By J. FENIMORE COOPER. In one volume. pp. 192. Cooperstown: H. AND E. PHINNEY. New-York: WILEY AND PUTNAM.

THE 'American Democrat' opens with a brief preface, from which we learn that the work was written in consequence of its author having had many occasions to observe the manner in which principles that are of the last importance to the happiness of the community, are getting to be confounded in the popular mind;' and that the intention of the book is, 'to make a commencement toward a more just discrimi nation between truth and prejudice.' Mr. COOPER says, in conclusion: 'Had a suitable compound offered, the title of the book would have been something like 'Anti-Cant,' for such a term expresses the intention of the writer better, perhaps, than the one he has actually chosen. The work is written more in the spirit of censure than of praise, for its aim is correction; and virtues bring their own reward, while errors are dangerous.' From these sentences, the reader will infer, that the 'American Democrat' is a plain-speaking volume-and such is the fact. It is unnecessary to add, that Mr. COOPER no where loses sight of what he deems distinctive American principles, and what is due to the American character.

Our limits will not admit of the extracts we had selected for insertion, from those portions of the volume which treat of government, the republic, executive powers, advantages and disadvantages of monarchy, aristocracy, democracy, public and private duties of station, etc. In the remarks on 'American Equality,' the readers of the KNICKERBOCKER will find the very same grounds maintained, which were assumed and defended by the author of The Nobility of Nature,' published a few months since in these pages. If the writers had been identical, they could scarcely have reasoned more alike. Mr. COOPER pays very little court to the American press; indeed, his observations upon this theme are more severe and bitter than any he has here put forth. Passing these, and other topics, however, we proceed to make a few extracts from those sections which touch upon language, manners, deportment, etc. We take the following random paragraphs from the last-named division:

"The American people are superior in deportment, in several particulars, to the people of Europe, and inferior in others. The gentlemen have less finesse, but more frankness of manner, while the other classes have less vulgarity and servility, relieved by an agreeable attention to each other's rights, and to the laws of humanity in general. On the whole, the national deportment is good, without being polished, supplying the deficiency in this last essential, by great kindness and civility. In that part of deportment which affects the rights of all, such as the admission of general and common laws of civility, the absence of social selfishness, and a strict regard to the wants and feebleness of woman, all other nations might be benefitted by imitating this.

"The Americans are reproached with the want of a proper deference for social station; the lower classes manifesting their indifference by an unnecessary insolence. As a rule, this charge is unmerited, civility being an inherent quality of the American character; still, there are some who mistake a vulgar audacity for independence. Men and women of this disposition, require to be told that, in thus betraying their propensities, they are