Darkness with horror sullenly wrapt up.
The first time, murky as the thunder-cloud
He floated by, looking askance and stern:-
Then he return'd with more determined tread,
And scowl'd his hatred. Troubled with strange awe,
I shunn'd the red beam of his burning eye,-
The ominous third time that he rush'd along,
He lower'd towards me in triumphant scorn
And pride of evil mastery."

While they are thus speaking, the
morning begins to brighten in the
east, and the effect of the increasing
light is described, in which the sha-
dows of earthly things are compared
to the dark spirits that are constantly
in malignant attendance on the chil-
dren of men. The calm and contem-
plative reflections which the first ef-
fects of the light had awakened, are
however abruptly interrupted by the
angel of Cain discovering the same
dreadful being approaching in the dim
of twilight to the place where the
ancestors of mankind are assembled
to celebrate their religious rites. But
although several striking descriptions

are introduced into the dialogues between the spiritual beings, yet it is not till we are brought to take a part with the creatures of our own nature, that the author puts forth his strength. There is, however, something impressive in the compassion with which the angels speak of the ineffectual prayers and offerings of man. It is wonderful indeed that we should have been encouraged to hope, that the supplications of a creature so ignorant, weak, and vain, could affect the eternal purposes of Almighty Wisdom!

The second scene opens with the following hymn by Adam :

"O Thou, who, through the infinite abyss
Of darkness void, like yon ascending orb
Leaving his nightly chamber, rose serene,-
As thy creative influence spread around
Millions of angels-stars of that first morn
Then sparkled into being, but their light
In thy effulgent coming soon was lost
Amidst thy glory, Universal Sun!

O, who shall sing of thy berrignant power,
When from thy thrones of everlasting might
Thou didst look down upon the shoreless ocean
Of the all-heaving elements, and bade
Creation, that lay slumbering at thy feet,
Awake and open all her eyes of light,
To celebrate thy goodness. At thy word,
Yon ruling sun, the pale attendant moon,
And their bright kindred orbs, out of the deep
Like birds from off the waters, circling rose,
And thy bright morning stars, the witnesses,
Shouted with joy to see their flight begin."
Adam is rudely disturbed in his ado-
ration by Cain, who reminds him that
the customary daily worship was to be
suspended until the controversy be-
tween himself and Abel had been de-
cided. "The father," as he is em-
phatically called, justly indignant, re-
bukes Cain, and angrily tells him that
he mistakes the forms for the essence

of religion. But in a moment the fit of anger passes, and full of remorse and grief for the woes he has entailed on the world, prophetically deplores the miseries that must ensue when priests, actuated by the sordid motives of ambition and self-aggrandizement, shall forget the solemn essentialities of their office

"When the proud man, dilating at the altar,
Shall make himself be worshipp'd."

Eve, who throughout the story is adorned with the most beautiful and interesting graces of her sex, breaks in upon the sorrows of Adam, and endeavours to excuse and palliate the offence of their son.

"Alas! he has been from the very hour
When first he nestled, blameless, in my bosom,
A freakish, fitful, and a froward child.

But, though in nature rude, stern and rebellious,
Still in his breast he bore a heart most apt
To melt with pity, and to feel the flow
That generous kindness yields to sympathy.
O turn not from him with those eyes of grief; .
He is the first pledge of our sinless love,
The eldest heir, born to our misery:
Of all that now or may hereafter date

Their woes or sorrows from our dire transgression,
He only, he may say, I was the first,
The oldest sufferer from that parent sin,
Which smote with mildew and perpetual blight

The green and goodly world in its flush'd youth
Of spring and blossom, innocence and joy."

Abel, profoundly affected by the remorse of his parents, and particularly by the grief of his father, turns to Cain, and with the most simple and pathetic tenderness endeavours to dissuade him from the indulgence of that rash and turbulent humour which is so often the cause of so much distress.

"Why wilt thou still, my brother, thus provoke
These sad lamentings that so deeply pain
Thy own free generous bosom?-Nay, my brother,
Turn not away, nor hide thy face from me.
By that concealment, you but leave your heart
More open, with its bleeding wounds to view :—
Oh wherefore has this harsh contention sprung?
Why did I ever, Cain, debate with thee
That right which was thy birthright!

Cain.

Give it up:

Resign the claim, and all contention ends.

Adam. That must not be-the forfeiture incurr'd

Incurr'd, my children, by your hapless parents,

Cuts off the rights of all inheritance,

And Heaven has reassumed the awful gift

Which was on man conferr'd.-To Heaven again

Let man submit himself, and thence receive

New ordination to its holy service."

Cain professes his readiness to acquiesce in this proposal; but Eve, under the influence of some solemn and misgiving presentiment, urges him to forego the probation, and to yield the priesthood to the meek and pious Abel,

"Whose holy, lowly, and serene demeanour
Has made him fittest to perform the part."

Cain, however, spurns the suggestion,
and resolute to assert his claim, "drags
with impatient hands," the lamb des
tined for his sacrifice to the altar. Se-
veral of the younger children of Adam
and Eve are witnesses to this trans-
action, and in a chorus of great sweet-
ness and simplicity, they mourn for
the lamb hurried so cruelly to the
slaughter.

The scene, after the chorus, is again changed, and the angel of Abel, who remains contemplative and serene on the brow of the mountain, is addressed by one of the winged ministers of Heaven, who had been commissioned to the guardian of the world, of whom this spirit gives the following description:

"He sits on pillowed flakes of golden light, Midway between the glorious gate of Heaven, VOL. X.

2 S

And the dim frontiers of this vapoury world,
Crown'd with a diadem of sparkling towers;
In his right hand he holds a glowing sceptre,
Framed of all hues that in the rainbow shine:
Wakeful he sits; to his unclosing eyes

The vast mysterious circling wheels of time
Move onward in the rounds of destiny,
Open and all disclosed."-

On the angel of Abel inquiring the object of the mandatory spirit's mission, he is informed that a recent general irruption of the fiends from their dark and profound abodes had been observed, and the reader is prepared by the description, for the accomplishment of some tremendous event, the nature and issue of which are still hidden

"Behind the shadowy curtain of hereafter,"

even from the knowledge of the angels.

"Th' antagonists of Heaven

Their clamorous flight directed to the earth:
The fires of hell, as they ascended, gleam'd
Lurid and fiercely on their breasts and wings.
As o'er the wild abyss they flew, their flight
Was as the changeful birds that cross the seas,
When winter sends them forth, or spring recalls.
Aloft they rose, and then descending, seem'd
A living arch, a dismal galaxy

Red and malignant, reaching from the cave
Which through the adamantine rocks that bound
The oceans of old Chaos, leads from hell
To the drear confines of creation:-There
They scattering spread themselves, for as they came
They saw above severely fix'd on them

The eye of heaven's great centinel, and sought
Refuge and screen from its pursuing ray;
And they beheld, along the cliffs of time,
The muster'd armies of the dreadful God,
On their bright horses, trampling wrath and fire.
In burning chariots, arm'd for enterprize,
The glorious seraphim, for battle ranged,
Standards of flame unfurl'd, that, waving, swept
The starry concave of this measured world.
This saw th' accursed; and they shrinking cower'd,
Gnashing the teeth of hate and blasphemy,
To think the host of heaven so marshall'd stood,
And only spared them in their flight from hell,
For some tremendous utter overthrow.
But courage is re-kindled by despair;
And each more fiercely burns with zeal, to work
Ill for the harm it does. Not in the hope
That aught of good will thence revert to them,
They seek the horrid means to sink themselves
Deeper into perdition; for the thought
Of heaven lost breeds in them such a pang,
That hell's intensest fires are as a sea
Of cooling tides: therein their direful rage
Is ever temper'd for new tasks of woe."

The ministering spirit then departs; and the angel of Abel, touched with sorrow and commiseration for the evils which are coming upon the children of man, awfully anticipates a total erasure, by fire, of all created things, according to a prediction that had been promulgated by the oracles of heaven.

"In the dread hour when that last fire begins,
A bright archangel, stepping from his throne,
Will, as a curtain, rend the skies asunder,"
And shew within, to all the peopled worlds,
The star-crown'd armies of the seraphim,

And heaven's artillery, charged with wrath and doom;
While the bright towers, and crystal walls around,
Cluster'd with myriads of the angelic host,
Shall shine reveal'd to man, as the vast roar
Of chaos bursting in with all its waves,
Heralds the coming of the dread Avenger,
Whose breath of storm will as a lambent flame
Blow out, and quench the element of light.”

"Yes: he may serve their altars. What of that?
The mountain-top shall be my place of prayer;
No priest shall ever mediate for me.
But am I not rejected and cast out?

My sacrifice and supplication scorn'd?
Before the countless myriads of the skies
I stand degraded. Yea, the fiends of hell
Laugh and point at me, as a thing become
Among my brethren loathsome, as themselves
Amidst the sons of light."

While thus indulging these humilia
ting reflections, the demon who had
acquired the mastery of his guardian
spirit approaches towards him. At the
first sight of that dark and tremen-
dous being, he starts from his seat,
and tries to shun him in the hollow

cr

of a cavern; but the fiend awfully advances, and bitterly taunts him with the rejection of his offering, and perpetual degradation from the natural right that belonged to the seniority of his birth

66

But," says the deriding demon

"What though no flame from Heaven your altar fired,
Yet is your sacrifice not unconsumed.
The blow-fly and the maggot are upon't,
They do accept you for their minister."

The demon then insinuates reasons
and suggestions which have the effect
of converting the keen sense of de-
gradation into resentment against an
implied usurpation on the part of
Abel. A contest of feeling between
fraternal affection and the instigations
of revenge then ensues; in the end,
the influence of the tempting fiend
prevails, and the murder of Abel closes
the second act.

In the third division of the subject, Cain, gnawed by remorse, is represented as endowed with more than Promethean fortitude. The first scene introduces him returning after he had murdered his brother. Eve, seeing him approach, runs to meet him, unconscious of the crime he had committed, and only anxious to sooth and console him; but on advancing towards him, she halts suddenly, alarmed and terrified at the alteration in his looks-the awful impress of his guilt. We are not told of what the mark set on his forehead consists; but the horror and aversion with which his heretofore too partial mother turns away and bids him hide his dreadful visage from her sight, is far more impressive than the most emphatic description. At her exclamation the fratricide sullenly retires, and the scene changes to an assembly of the fiends exulting at having gained, as they suppose, the soul of the first-born man, and triumphantly anticipating a tremendous increase of

power and dominion by their achievements over mankind. In the midst, however, of this terrific exultation, their joy is suddenly silenced by the glorious apparition of Abel's spirit seen ascending to heaven, welcomed by the angels, and conducted by the host of the cherubim and seraphim, rejoicing in the salvation of the first of the human race that has incurred the penalty of death. This magnificent apotheosis is succeeded by a scene of solitude and horror that has no example. Cain, having wandered into a wilderness where nature suffered the first and greatest shock of the curse which shattered and blasted the face of the earth at the fall of man, leans against a rock, and looking abroad on a vast expanse of gloomy precipices, dark woods, and troubled waters, watches the heavy and funereal progress of a thunder-cloud which lowers between him and the sun, covering the landscape with the mantle of its black and portentous shadow. When he has stood some time in the sullen contemplation of these dark and lugubrious objects, he breaks out into a so liloquy, which we dare not venture to quote, calling upon the slumbering fires and thunders of the cloud to burst upon his head, and relieve him from the horrors of existence. Maddening in impiety, he exclaims, stretching his right hand in defiance towards the skies,

"Thou dread, eternal, irresponsible,
I charge thee on thy everlasting throne
To answer me, the wretch thy will has made.
Didst thou thyself not steep thy hands in crime,
When I was fram'd to be thus miserable?-