As soon would I, if power were given, Yet oh, my love! I know not why The tribute should not be a smile! No! give me but a single sigh, That strain my spirit long must pour: We feel the witching influence of the bard; we own his sway: the shadows of evening fall around us; the sun is setting in misty gloom; the rain beats against our window; the fire glimmers with its last red embers; the twilight sinks into night; the leaves are strewn upon the ground; the trees are bare; the winds sweep ever and anon through their leafless branches; melancholy thoughts pass over the soul; the past comes before us; the loveliness of earth is clouded with dimness; our mind dwells on the days long since flown; we sink into pensive reveries; our eye falls listlessly on the grate; every sound is hushed save when the autumnal gale howls. BISHOP HEBER. "Hence, in all the ages and countries of civilization, religion has been the parent and fosterer of the fine arts-as of poetry, music, painting, and the like, the common essence of which consists of a similar union of the universal and the individual. In this union, moreover, is contained the true sense of the ideal. Under the old law, the altars, the curtains, the priestly vestments, and whatever else was to represent the beauty of holiness, had an ideal character; and the temple itself was a masterpiece of ideal beauty." COLERIDGE. To contemplate Heber, either in the character of a Christian bishop or as a sacred poet, must ever be a pleasing task. With the bard alone we have at present to do; and the very morn on which we write seems to partake much of the gentleness and quiet beauty of his poetry. His strains do not madden the brain, flush the cheek, and quicken the throbbings of the heart; but they breathe a softness and gentleness quite his own. It has been one of our sweetest enjoyments to listen to the melody of his voice, and the mild yet elegant language of his lips. We love to suit the time of reading a favourite author with the distinguishing features of his productions; thus we read Coleridge when the heavens are serene, and the world seems to lie in dreaminess; Cowper, when the winter covers the landscape with snow, and makes us feel deeper and higher delight in the comforts of an English fireside; and Heber, when the beautiful dawn streaks the horizon with the light of a summer's day. The fair, enchanting loveliness of creation expands the soul, gives it a richer tone, draws out the feelings, lets loose the imagination, weaves a web of glorious thoughts, wraps into a forgetfulness of every-day existence, brightens, radiates, etherealizes the fancy, opens up resplendent visions, fits the spirit to enter fully into the liquid harmonies of the poet. In Heber's poems, piety shines pre-eminent; we mean the piety of the heart, which includes heirship to the throne of heaven. They are alike suited to the sunny day of success and the dark hour of adversity; they ever yield consolation. Nor are we less pleased with their elegance; they are chaste and exquisite. What can be more beautiful than this? By cool Siloam's shady rill How sweet the lily grows: How sweet the breath beneath the hill Of Sharon's dewy rose. Lo such the child whose early feet The paths of peace have trod; Whose secret heart, with influence sweet, Is upward drawn to God. By cool Siloam's shady rill The lily must decay; The rose that blooms beneath the hill Must shortly fade away. And soon, too soon, the wintry hour Of man's maturer age, Will shake the soul with sorrow's power, O Thou, whose infant feet were found Whose years with changeless virtue crowned, Dependent on Thy bounteous breath, In childhood, manhood, age, and death, There is a sweetness and a melting music about these verses which we cannot well describe; enough, however, that they cheer the troubled breast with the melody of immortal hope. There is a strange spell in reading true poetry. However simple the subject, let but the bard just touch it, and immediately it is vital with interest and beauty. Poetry is the language of man's pristine state; the language of angels; the language of the Divinity: its intonations are everlasting, its harmonies imperishable. The purer and the holier we become, the deeper will be our love for its sublime teachings. None ever listened to its grandeurs of song without sighing for immortality, without feeling that the spirit is eternal, without wishing for something more hallowed than aught on earth, without making resolves of future good, without determining to forsake sin, without sending the thoughts far out into the infinite expanse of existence, without creating scenes of quiet, and undisturbed and unruffled bliss. Poetry is truth; truth is poetry: and in as far as poetry reaches its legitimate character, so far does it succeed, come home to the heart, take possession of the mind. There is ever a beauty about truth; there is ever a beauty about poetry. Truth is from the skies, so is poetry; truth will burn with an inextinguishable brilliancy, so will poetry. If the one die, so will the other; they are inseparable and indissoluble. Clear truth of its earthliness, and it is the sweetest, divinest poetry, ever exalting and purifying the whole man. Every vibration of its chords is as the sweep of the hurricane, yet gentle as the soft cooing of the ring-dove. We cannot hear its lofty minstrelsy without beholding the beauty of flower, field, and tree, brook and lake, hill and valley, sky and twilight, without seeing additional loveliness in the gambols of childhood, the blush of first affection, the devotedness of true-hearted attachment, the bended knee, the meek devotion of a child of God; without thirsting more intensely after a fairer and sunnier clime, and a happier and better home. And sculpture and architecture and painting produce the same effect; the same everlasting potency dwells in all; they issue from the same immortal spirit. We do not say that they influence man always to put into practice what they inspire; that must come from a far higher and Diviner power; but they ever stir his bosom with thrilling and beautiful emotions-they ever tend to that which is good and lovely. Heber is chiefly known by his prize poem of "Palestine." It displays both learning and elegance, but little or no originality; for chasteness of expression and beauty of design it has, perhaps, few equals. This, on the restoration of the Jews to favour, is very harmonious: : Lo! cherub hands the golden courts prepare, Who died, who lives, triumphant o'er the grave." Though there is much grace and harmony in these lines, there is little of the deep, thrilling outbreaks of |