Retain the sound: the broad responsive low,

Ye valleys, raise; for the GREAT SHEPHERD reigns; And his unsuffering kingdom yet will come.

Ye woodlands all, awake: a boundless song

Burst from the groves! and when the restless day, Expiring, lays the warbling world asleep,

Sweetest of birds! sweet Philomela, charm

The listening shades, and teach the night His praise.
Ye chief, for whom the whole creation smiles,
At once the head, the heart, the tongue of all,
Crown the great hymn; in swarming cities vast,
Assembled men, to the deep organ join
The long-resounding voice, oft breaking clear,
At solemn pauses, through the swelling bass;
And as each mingling flame increases each,
In one united ardor rise to heaven.

Or if you rather choose the rural shade,
And find a fane in every sacred grove:
There let the shepherd's flute, the virgin's lay,
The prompting seraph, and the poet's lyre,
Still sing the GOD of SEASONS, as they roll!
For me, when I forget the darling theme,
Whether the blossom blows, the summer ray
Russets the plain, inspiring Autumn gleams,
Or winter rises in the blackening east;

Be my tongue mute, may fancy paint no more,
And, dead to joy, forget my heart to beat!

Should fate command me to the farthest verge

Of the green earth, to distant barbarous climes, Rivers unknown to song; where first the sun Gilds Indian mountains, or his setting beam Flames on th' Atlantic isles; 'tis naught to me: Since GOD is ever present, ever felt,

In the void waste as in the city full;

And where HE vital breathes there must be joy.
When e'en at last the solemn hour shall come,
And wing my mystic flight to future worlds,
I cheerful will obey; there, with new powers,
Will rising wonders sing: I cannot go
Where Universal Love not smiles around,
Sustaining all your orbs, and all their suns;
From seeming Evil still educing Good,
And better thence again, and better still,
In infinite progression. But I lose

Myself in Him, in Light ineffable!

Come then, expressive Silence muse HIS praise.

INDOLENCE.

"It was not by vile loitering in ease
That Greece obtain'd the brighter palm of art,
That soft ye ardent Athens learnt to please,
To keen the wit, and to sublime the heart,

In all supreme! complete in every part!

It was not thence majestic Rome arose,

And o'er the nations shook her conquering dart: For sluggard's brow the laurel never grows; Renown is not the child of indolent repose.

"Had unambitious mortals minded nought,
But in loose joy their time to wear away;
Had they alone the lap of dalliance sought,
Pleas'd on her pillow their dull heads to lay,
Rude Nature's state had been our state to-day;
No cities e'er their towery fronts had rais'd,
No arts had made us opulent and gay;

With brother-brutes the human race had graz'd;

None e'er had soar'd to fame, none honor'd been, none prais'd.

ALLAN RAMSAY.

1686-1758.

ALLAN RAMSAY was born in the village of Leadhills, Lanarkshire, where his father held the situation of manager of Lord Hopeton's mines. At fifteen he was put apprentice to a wig-maker in Edinburgh. In 1712 he married and commenced the more congenial. business of book-selling. In 1725 appeared his pastoral drama of the Gentle Shepherd. It was received with universal approbation, and was republished both in London and Dublin. It is by far the best of Ramsay's works, and perhaps the finest pastoral drama in the world. It is a genuine picture of Scottish life, but of life passed in simple, rural employments, apart from the guilt and fever of large towns, and reflecting only the pure and unsophisticated emotions of our nature.