Spontaneous worship hallows deep
The scene where none intrudes,
When earth and heaven, communing, keep

The Sabbath of the woods;
While sunset sanctifies the calm,

Devout, of earth and skies;

And low, like prayer from fields of balm,
The breath of evening sighs.

Yet, spotless dove, religion lends
My theme a glory too—

A charm, harmoniously that blends
With nature's simple due.

Oh marvellous was the sign of love
Through thee to mortals given,
When stoop'd thy brooding wings above
The Majesty of heaven!

Bird of the consecrated plume,
Whom Earth's Creator chose,
(Whilst yet above its watery tomb
One lonely mountain rose,)
To waft the pledge of peace to men,
The olive's welcome bough;

I hail thee, Mercy's herald then,
Her sacred symbol now.

J. F. SMITH, 1845.

T

ALONE.

I AM alone-within the world alone

Shut out from Heaven and Hope my star of life, I darkling stem Time's whirling tides alone, Alone within our being's troubled strife— ALONE! the surges of a shoreless main Give back the sound to dreary life again.

ALONE! SO Soon the smiling Heaven obscured,
That shone unclouded on an earlier day,
So short a while, kind joys, have ye endured,
That wreath'd Spring's roses round my youthful way;
Oh sad and fearful word! Alone! alone!

What boding echoes lurk within thy tone!

Is man alone? oh, dull and thankless thought!

Still flings the sunbeam its unchanging gold,
Still blooms the meadow with the hues inwrought,
That Eden knew ere yet our earth was old;
Still God hath oracles in leaf and stream,
In the flower's glory, and night's starry gleam.

Doth not God speak in thee? Yes, when the night
Of doubt would bid each happier ray depart,
When faithless murmurs wing each arrow's flight,
Thy foe would scatter rankling in thy heart,
Then God and Love would say, "We are thine own,"
With God and Love thou art no more alone!

With GOD and LOVE-oh, words of hopeful cheer!

They hover round, unnumber'd spirits blest,
To chase away each evil dream of fear—

No sullen shadow lingers o'er our rest,
To mar the blissful light around us thrown—
With God and Love we are no more alone.

O God and Love! O Thou Love's source and stay
Thou soother of all woes the heart has borne,
Thou that didst rise with healing in our day,
Thou that for me didst wear the cruel thorn-

O Lamp of Love! within my being shine,
And all on Earth and all in Heaven are mine?

ANONYMOUS.

THE OAK.

WHAT gnarl'd stretch, what depth of shade, is his! There needs no crown to mark the forest's king; How in his leaves outshines full summer's bliss! Sun, storm, rain, dew, to him their tribute bring, Which he with such benignant royalty

Accepts, as overpayeth what is lent; All nature seems his vassal proud to be, And cunning only for his ornament.

How towers he, too, amid the billow'd snows,
An unquell'd exile from the summer's throne,
Whose plain, uncinctured front more kingly shows,
Now that the obscuring courtier leaves are flown.
His boughs make music of the winter air,

Jewell'd with sleet, like some cathedral front Where clinging snow-flakes with quaint heart repair The dents and furrows of time's envious brunt.

How doth his patient strength the rude March wind
Persuade to seem glad breaths of summer breeze,
And win the soil that fain would be unkind,

To swell his revenues with proud increase!
He is the gem; and all the landscape wide
(So doth his grandeur isolate the sense)
Seems but the setting, worthless all beside,
An empty socket, were he fallen thence.

So, from oft converse with life's wintry gales,
Should man learn how to clasp with tougher roots
The inspiring earth;-how otherwise avails

The leaf-creating sap that sunward shoots?
So every year that falls with noiseless flake

Should fill old scars up on the stormward side,
And make hoar age revered for age's sake,
Not for traditions of youth's leafy pride.

So, from the pinch'd soil of a churlish fate,

True hearts compel the sap of sturdier growth, So between earth and heaven stand simply great, That these shall seem but their attendants both;

For nature's forces with obedient zeal

Wait on the rooted faith and oaken will; As quickly the pretender's cheat they feel,

And turn mad Pucks to flout and mock him still.

Lord! all Thy works are lessons,—each contains Some emblem of man's all containing soul; Shall he make fruitless all Thy glorious pains, Delving within Thy grace an eyeless mole? Make me the least of Thy Dodona-grove,

Cause me some message of Thy truth to bring, Speak but a word through me, nor let Thy love Among my boughs disdain to perch and sing,

-American.

J. RUSSELL LOWELL, 1819—

GRATITUDE AND LOVE TO GOD.

ALL are indebted much to Thee,
But I far more than all,

From many a deadly snare set free,
And raised from many a fall.
Overwhelm me, from above,
Daily, with Thy boundless love.

What bonds of gratitude I feel
No language can declare;