The brain may be clockwork, and mind its spring, mechanism quickened by a spirit.

Who so shrewd as rightly to divide life, instinct,

reason;

Trees, zoophytes, creatures of the plain, and savage men among them?

Hath the mimosa instinct,-or the scallop more than life,

Or the dog less than reason,- -or the brute-man more than instinct?

What is the cause of health,-and the gendering of

Behold, a morsel,-eat and die: the term of thy probation is expired :

Behold, a potion,-drink and be alive; the limit of thy trial is enlarged.

Who can expound beauty? or explain the character of nations?

Who will furnish a cause for the epidemic force of fashion?

Is there a moral magnetism living in the light of example?

Is practice electricity ?-Yet all these are but

names.

Doth normal Art imprison, in its works, spirit trans

lated into substance,

So that the statue, the picture, or the poem, are crystals of the mind?

And doth Philosophy with sublimating skill shred away the matter,

Till rarefied intelligence exudeth even out of stocks and stones?

mysteries, ye all are one, the mind of an inexplicable Architect

Dwelleth alike in each, quickening and moving in them all.

Fields, and forests, and cities of men, their woes and wealth and works,

And customs, and contrivances of life, with all we see and know,

For a little way, a little while, ye hang dependent on each other,

But all are held in one right-hand, and by His will ye are.

Here is answer unto mystery, an unintelligible

God,

This is the end and the beginning, it is reason that He be not understood.

Therefore it were probable and just, even to a man's weak thinking,

To have one for God who always may be learnt, yet never fully known:

That He, from whom all mysteries spring, in whom they all converge,

Throned in his sublimity beyond the grovellings of lower intellect,

Should claim to be truer than man's truest, the boasted certainty of numbers,

Should baffle his arithmetic, confound his demonstrations, and paralyse the might of his necessity,

Standing supreme as the mystery of mysteries, everywhere, yet impersonate,

Essential one in three, essential three in one!

63

Of Gifts.

I had a seeming friend;-I gave him gifts, and he

was gone;

I had an open enemy;-I gave him gifts, and won

him :

Common friendship standeth on equalities, and cannot bear a debt;

But the very heart of hate melteth at a good man's

love:

Go to, then, thou that sayest,-I will give and rivet the links:

For pride shall kick at obligation, and push, the giver from him.

The covetous spirit may rejoice, revelling in thy

largess,

But chilling selfishness will mutter,-I must give

again :

The vain heart may be glad, in this new proof of man's esteem,

But the same idolatry of self abhorreth thoughts of thanking.

Nevertheless, give; for it shall be a discriminative

test

Separating honesty from falsehood, weeding insincerity from friendship.

Give, it is like God; thou weariest the bad with benefits:

Give, it is like God; thou gladdenest the good by

gratitude.

Give to thy near of kin, for providence hath stationed thee his helper:

Yet see that he claim not as his right, thy freewill offering of duty.

Give to the young, they love it; neither hath the poison of suspicion

Spoilt the flavour of their thanks, to look for latent motives.

Give to merit, largely give; his conscious heart will bless thee:

It is not flattery, but love,—the sympathy of men his

brethren.

Give, for encouragement in good; the weak desponding mind