Hymn to the Stars.-ANONYMOUS.
Ar! there ye shine, and there have shone
In one eternal hour of prime;
Each rolling, burningly, alone,
Through boundless space and countless time!
Ay! there ye shine! the golden dews
That pave the realms by seraphs trod;
There, through yon echoing vault diffuse
The song
of choral worlds to God.
Ye visible spirits! bright as erst
Young Eden's birth-night saw ye shine
On all her flowers and fountains first,
Yet sparkling from the hand divine,-
Yes! bright as when ye smiled to catch
The music of a sphere so fair,
Ye hold your high immortal watch,
And gird your God's pavilion there!
Gold frets to dust-yet there ye are :
Time rots the diamond-there ye roll
In primal light, as if each star
Enshrined an everlasting soul!
And do they not? Since yon bright throngs
One all-enlightened Spirit own,
Praised there by pure sidereal tongues,
Eternal, glorious, blest, and lone?
Could man but see what ye have seen,
Unfold awhile the shrouded past,
From all that is, to what has been-
The glance how rich, the range how vast!
The birth of time; the rise, the fall
Of empires; myriads, ages flown;
Thrones, cities, tongues, arts, worships, all-
The things whose echoes are not gone!
Ye saw red Zoroaster send
His soul into your mystic reign : Ye saw the adoring Sabian bend, The living hills his mighty fane;
Beneath this blue and beaming sky,
He worshipped at your lofty shrine,
And deemed he saw with gifted eye,
The Godhead in his works divine.
And there ye shine, as if to mock
The children of an earthly sire :
The storm, the bolt, the earthquake's shock,
The red volcano's cataract fire;
Drought, famine, plague, and blood, and flame,
All nature's ills, and life's worst woes,
Are nought to you; ye smile the same,
And scorn alike their dawn and close.
Ay! there ye roll, emblems sublime
Of him whose spirit o'er us moves,
Beyond the clouds of grief and crime
Still shining on the world he loves.
Nor is one scene to mortals given
That more divides the soul and sod,
Than yon proud heraldry of heaven,
Yon burning blazonry of God!
The Passions-COLLINS.
WHEN Music, heavenly maid, was young,
While yet in early Greece she sung,
The Passions oft, to hear her shell,
Throng'd around her magic cell;
Exulting, trembling, raging, fainting,
Possess'd beyond the Muse's painting.
By turns, they felt the glowing mind
Disturb'd, delighted, raised, refined :
Till once, 'tis said, when all were fired,
Fill'd with fury, rapt, inspired,
From the supporting myrtles round
They snatch'd her instruments of sound;
And, as they oft had heard apart,
Sweet lessons of her forceful art,
Each for Madness ruled the hour-
Would prove his own expressive power.
First, Fear, his hand, its skill to try,
Amid the chords bewilder'd laid;
-And back recoil'd, he knew not why,
Even at the sound himself had made.
Next, Anger rush'd, his eyes on fire,
In lightnings own'd his secret stings:
In one rude clash he struck the lyre,
And swept, with hurried hands, the strings.
With woful measures, wan Despair-
Low sullen sounds!—his grief beguiled;
A solemn, strange, and mingled air;
'Twas sad, by fits-by starts, 'twas wild.
But thou, O Hope! with eyes so fair,
What was thy delighted measure!
Still it whisper'd promised pleasure,
And bade the lovely scenes at distance hail.
Still would her touch the strain prolong;
And from the rocks, the woods, the vale,
She call'd on Echo still through all her song.
And, where her sweetest theme she chose,
A soft responsive voice was heard at every close;
And Hope, enchanted, smiled, and waved her golden hair.
And longer had she sung-but with a frown,
Revenge impatient rose.
He threw his blood-stain'd sword in thunder down;
And, with a withering look,
The war-denouncing trumpet took,
And blew a blast, so loud and dread,
Were ne'er prophetic sounds so full of woe;
And, ever and anon, he beat
The doubling drum with furious heat.
And though, sometimes, each dreary pause between, Dejected Pity, at his side,
Her soul-subduing voice applied,
Yet still he kept his wild unalter'd mien;
While each strain'd ball of sight seem'd bursting from his head.
Thy numbers, Jealousy, to nought were fix'd;
Sad proof of thy distressful state!
Of differing themes the veering song was mix'd:
And, now, it courted Love; now, raving call'd on Hate.
With eyes upraised, as one inspired,
Pale Melancholy sat retired;
And, from her wild sequester'd seat,
In notes by distance made more sweet,
Pour'd through the mellow horn her pensive soul:
And, dashing soft, from rocks around,
Bubbling runnels join'd the sound.
Through glades and glooms the mingled measure stole ; Or o'er some haunted streams, with fond delay— Round a holy calm diffusing,
Love of peace and lonely musing
In hollow murmurs died away.
But, oh, how alter'd was its sprightlier tone!
When Cheerfulness, a nymph of healthiest hue,
Her bow across her shoulders flung,
Her buskins gemm'd with morning dew,
Blew an inspiring air, that dale and thicket rung;
The hunter's call, to Faun and Dryad known!
The oak-crown'd sisters, and their chaste-eyed queen,
Satyrs, and sylvan boys, were seen,
Peeping from forth their alleys green;
Brown Exercise rejoiced to hear;
And Sport leap'd up, and seized his beechen spear
Last, came Joy's ecstatic trial.
He, with viny crown advancing,
First to the lively pipe his hand address'd;
But soon he saw the brisk awakening viol,
Whose sweet entrancing voice he loved the best.
They would have thought, who heard the strain,
They saw, in Tempe's vale, her native maids,
Amid the festal-sounding shades,
To some unwearied minstrel dancing;
While, as his flying fingers kiss'd the strings,
Love framed with Mirth a gay fantastic round-
Loose were her tresses seen, her zone unbound;
And he, amid his frolic play,
As if he would the charming air repay.
Shook thousand odours from his dewy wings.
Van Den Bosch persuades Philip Van Artevelde to accept the command of Ghent.-HENRY TAYLOR.
Artevelde. THIS is a mighty matter, Van den Bosch, And much to be revolv'd ere it be answered.
Van den Bosch. The people shall elect thee with one voice. I will ensure the White-Hoods, and the rest
Will eagerly accept thy nomination,
So to be rid of some that they like less.
Thy name is honour'd both of rich and poor,
For all are mindful of the glorious rule
Thy father bore, when Flanders, prosperous then,
From end to end obey'd him as one town.
Art. They may remember it—and, Van den Bosch,
May I not, too, bethink me of the end
To which this people brought my noble father?
They gorged the fruits of his good husbandry,
Till, drunk with long prosperity, and blind
With too much fatness, they tore up the root
From which their common weal had sprung and flourished,
Van den B. Nay, Master Philip, let the past be past.
Art. Here on the doorstead of my father's house,
The blood of his they spilt is seen no more.
But when I was a child I saw it there;
For so long as my widow-mother lived
Water came never near the sanguine stain.
She lov'd to show it me, and then with awe,-
But hoarding still the purpose of revenge,.
I heard the tale-which, like a daily prayer
Repeated, to a rooted feeling grew-
How long he fought, how falsely came like friends
The villains Guisebert Grutt and Simon Bette,-
All the base murder of the one by many!
Even such a brutal multitude as they
Who slew my father-yea, who slew their own,
(For like one had he ruled the parricides,)
Even such a multitude thou'dst have me govern.
Van den B. Why, what if Jacques Artevelde was killed? He had his reign, and that for many a year,
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