the pangs of anguish, by the magic of a fresh flower laid upon the pillow, by the song of the joyous bird, by the waving of the green branches at the open window. I have seen it mingling even with delirium, and the fever-dream, soothing with images of the cherished garden, the violet-covered bank, the falling waters, or the favorite grove, where childhood had played, or youth wandered.

3. I have seen it brightening the almost sightless eye of the aged man, from whose side those who began the race of life with him, had fallen, one by one. Yet he finished not his journey alone; for he made a living friend of every unfolding plant, of every growing tree, of every new leaf on the trellised* vine, that shadowed his summer residence; and, in the majestic storm, walking forth at midnight, he heard the voice of that Almighty Father, to whose home he was so near.

4. "O Unseen Spirit of Creation, watching over all things, the desert and the rock, no less than the fresh water, bounding on, like a hunter on his path, when his heart is in his step, or the valley, girded by the glad woods, and living with the yellow corn, to me, though sad and baffled, thou hast ministered, as to the happiest of thy children! Thou gavest to me a music, sweeter than that of palaces, in the mountain wind; thou badest the flowers, and the common grass smile up to me, as children in the face of their father."

5. Why has a Being of perfect wisdom implanted within us a strong perception of the beautiful, and spread the means of its sustenance with an unsparing hand, throughout His Universe? Why, from the depths of the ocean, where the pearl sleeps, and the coral effloresces, to the fixed star on its burning throne, in the far, blue vault of heaven, has He shed abroad that beauty which speaks of Him? That we should walk with our eyes shut, through these ever-changing scenes of loveliness and glory? or, that we should neglect to be taught, through "the things that are seen," the power and goodness of their Invisible Untiring Benefactor?

* TRELLISED, made of trellises, or cross-barred work.

6. "Ah! how can we renounce the boundless store
Of charms which Nature to her votaries yields?
The warbling woodland, the resounding shore,
The pomp of groves, and garniture of fields,
All that the genial ray of morning gilds,
And all that echoes to the song of even,
All that the mountain's sheltering bosom shields,
And all the dread magnificence of heaven,
Ah! how can we renounce, and hope to be forgiven ?”

LESSON CXI.

PLEASURE DERIVED FROM THE BEAUTY OF

NATURE.

DWIGHT.

1. WERE all the interesting diversities of color and form to disappear, how unsightly, dull, and wearisome, would be the aspect of the world! The pleasures, conveyed to us by the endless varieties, with which these sources of beauty are presented to the eye, are so much things of course, and exist so much without intermission, that we scarcely think either of their nature, their number, or the great proportion which they constitute in the whole mass of our enjoyment.

2. But were an inhabitant of this country to be removed from its delightful scenery to the midst of an Arabian desert, a boundless expanse of sand, a waste spread with uniform desolation, enlivened by the murmur of no stream, and cheered by the beauty of no verdure, although he might live in a palace, and riot in splendor and luxury, he would find life, a dull, wearisome, melancholy round of existence, and, amid all his gratifications, would sigh for the hills and valleys of his native and, the brooks and rivers, the living luster of the Spring, and the rich glories of the Autumn.

3. The ever-varying brilliancy and grandeur of the landscape, and the magnificence of the sky, sun, moon, and stars, enter more extensively into the enjoyment of mankind, than we, perhaps, ever think, or can possibly apprehend, without

frequent and extensive investigation. This beauty and splendor of the objects around us, it is ever to be remembered, are not necessary to their existence, nor to what we commonly intend by their usefulness. It is, therefore, to be regarded as a source of pleasure gratuitously superinduced upon the general nature of the objects themselves, and in this light, as a testimony of the Divine goodness, peculiarly affecting.

1. There's beauty all around our paths, if but our watchful eyes
Can trace it 'mid familiar things, and through their lowly guise;
We may find it where a hedge-row showers its blossoms o'er our way
Or a cottage window sparkles forth in the last red light of day.

2. We may find it in the winter boughs, as they cross the cold, blue sky,
While soft on icy pool and stream their penciled shadows lie,
When we look upon their tracery, by the fairy frost-work bound,
Whence the flitting redbreast shakes a shower of crystals to the ground.
3. Yes! beauty dwells in all our paths,-but sorrow, too, is there;
How oft some cloud within us dims the bright, still summer air!
But we feel by the lights and clouds, through which our pathway lies,
By the beauty and the grief alike, we are training for the skies.

MRS. HEMANS.

LESSON CXII.

EXPLANATORY NOTES.-1. MAM' MOTH CAVE in the State of Kentucky, is one of the most celebratad and extensive caverns in the world. It has been explored to the distance of several miles. It contains large streams, pools, and numerous apartments. The following poetry purports to be written in this cave.

2. STYX, from which the word STYGIAN is derived, was fabled by the ancients to be a river in the infernal regions, over which the shades of the dead were said to pass to the Elysian fields. Hence, stygian signifies infernal.

3. COR' RI DORS are galleries, or long aisles, around a building, leading to chambers distant from each other.

4. THE MAS' TO DON was an animal of an enormous size, much larger than the elephant. It is now extinct, and is only known by its remains which are found in various parts of America.

5. BE LEAGUER ED means surrounded, as by an army; besieged. CHERUBIM is the plural of cherub, a celestial spirit.

2.

THE MAMMOTH CAVE.

GEORGE D. PRENTICE.

ALL day, as day is reckoned on the earth,

I've wandered in these dim and awful aisles,
Shut from the blue and breezy dome of heaven;
While thoughts, wild, drear, and shadowy, have swept
Across my awe-struck soul, like specters o'er
The wizard's magic glass, or thunder-clouds
O'er the blue waters of the deep. And now
I'll sit me down upon yon broken rock,
To muse upon the strange and solemn things
Of this mysterious realm.

All day my steps

Have been amid the beautiful, the wild,
The gloomy, the terrific. Crystal founts,
Almost invisible in their serene

And pure transparency,-high pillar'd domes,
With stars and flowers all fretted like the halls

Of Oriental monarchs,-rivers, dark

And drear, and voiceless as oblivion's stream

That flows through Death's dim vale of silence,-gulfs,
All fathomless, down which the loosened rock
Plunges, until its far-off echoes come

(pp) Fainter and fainter, like the dying roll
(。) Of thunders in the distance,-Stygian3 pools
Whose agitated waves give back a sound,
(oo) Hollow and dismal, like the sullen roar

3.

In the volcano's depths, these, these have left
Their spell upon me, and their memories
Have passed into my spirit, and are now
Blent with my being, till they seem a part
Of my own immortality.

God's hand,

At the creation, hollowed out this vast

Domain of darkness, where no herb nor flower
E'er sprang amid the sands; nor dews nor rains,

4.

5.

Nor blessed sunbeams, fell with freshening power; Nor gentle breeze its Eden-message told

Amid the dreadful gloom. Six thousand years
Swept o'er the earth ere human foot-prints marked
This subterranean desert. Centuries,

Like shadows, came and passed, and not a sound
Was in this realm, save, when at intervals,
In the long lapse of ages, some huge mass
Of overhanging rock fell thundering down,
Its echoes sounding through these corridors
A moment, and then dying in a hush
Of silence, such as brooded o'er the earth
When earth was chaos.

The great Mastodon*,
The dreaded monster of the elder world,
Passed o'er this mighty cavern, and his tread
Bent the old forest oaks like fragile reeds,
And made earth tremble.-Armies in their pride,
Perchance, have met above it in the shock
Of war, with shout, and groan, and clarion blast,
And the hoarse echoes of the thunder-gun.
The storm, the whirlwind, and the hurricane,
Have roared above it, and the bursting cloud
Sent down its red and crashing thunder-bolt.
Earthquakes have trampled o'er it in their wrath,
Rocking earth's surface as the storm-wind rocks
The old Atlantic;—yet no sound of these
E'er came down to the everlasting depths
Of these dark solitudes.

How oft we gaze

With awe or admiration on the new
And unfamiliar, but pass coldly by

The lovelier and the mightier! Wonderful
Is this lone world of darkness and of gloom;
But far more wonderful yon outer world,
Lit by the glorious sun. These arches swell