vitable they seem to be-of the drama, in a state of great wealth and high civilization, theatres may be to many places rife with danger,-and that we allow, notwithstanding the senseless jeremiads against playhouses, of the Master-Tailor of The Age, a Poem. The influence of literature in general-the drama included-is benignant and beneficent; but it may be overrated; and the strength and stability of the moral soul of a people, is in the Christian religion, and in the Bible. This, Mr Bowles indeed knows as well as we do; and how gloriously he expresses it! "Therefore, without a comment, or a note, We love the Bible, and we prize the more The spirit of its pure unspotted page, As pure from the infectious breath, that stains, Like a foul fume, its hallow'd light, we hail example, most disgusting and loathsome, to hear some broad-backed, thick-calved, greasy-faced, well-fed, and not-badly-drunk caitiff, of some canting caste, distinguished in private and public life for the gross greediness with which they gobble up every thing eatable within reach of their hairy fists, preaching, and praying, and exhorting young people, full of flesh and blood of the purest and clearest quality, to forsake and forswear the world,-to quell within them all mortal vanities, and appetites, and lusts? To whom is the hound haranguing? What means he by lusts, while the sweet face is before him of that innocent girl of fifteen or twenty? For what are years to her, into whose eyes God and the Saviour have put that light angelical? -that ineffable loveliness, as pure from taint, as the beauty of the rose blushing on her lily breast, which she The radiant car of Heav'n, amidst the gathered in the dewy garden a few clouds Of mortal darkness, and of human mist, Sole, as the Sun in Heav'n !" We know not a more certain symptom of hypocrisy in religion, than in minds, themselves obviously worldly in the extreme, an exaggerated condemnation of all little worldlinesses in all other honest people, gravely jogging, or gaily skipping along their path of life. Those people are often the least worldly, on whom they who make the loudest boast of their unworldliness, seek basely to affix that opprobrious epithet. For they walk the world with a heart pure as it is cheerful; they are, by that unpretending purity, saved from infection; and as there are as many fair and healthy faces to be seen in the smoke and stir of cities, as in the rural wilds, so also are there as many fair and healthy spirits. The world-the wicked world-has not that power over us Christians, that the canters say; and as for the mere amusements of the world,-frivolous as they may too often be,-little or no power have they over that which is "so majestical." Yet, to listen to some folks, you would think that all the boys and girls one sees," like gay creatures of the element," dancing under a chandelier pendant from the roof, like some starry constellation, were quadrilling away to the sound of music, into the bottomless pit. Is it not, for hours ago, among the earliest songs of birds, while yet the pensive expression had not time to leave her countenance, still lingering there from the piety of her soul-breathed prayers? Shocking, to hear the ugly monster coarsely canting to such a creature of her-corruption! She knows that she belongs to a fallen nature. Oftentimes her tears have flowed to think how undeserving she was of all the goodness showered on her head from Heaven. Often hath she looked on the lilies of the field, and envied their innocence. Meek and humble is she, even in her most joyful happiness; contrite and repentant even over the shadows of sin, that may have crossed her spirit, as the shadows of clouds suddenly over “a stationary spot of sunshine." Even for her sake, she knows that "Jesus wept." With what a reverent touch do these delicate hands of hers turn over the leaves of the New Testament! Her father and her mother intensely feel themselves to be Christians, while she reads to them the story of the crucifixion. She remembers not the time, when she knew not Him who died to save sinners. For her parents were instructed by these words,-" Suffer little children to be brought unto me, and forbid them not; for of such is the kingdom of heaven." Fine are all the threads of holy feeling, by which her pure thoughts are linked and allied, as the lines of gossamer floating with their dew-drops all over the flower-garden, from which she culls garlands for those she loves, her young companions, and her aged friends! The clown breaks through them all, with the slang of his tongue and his eye; and frightens her as with the bellowing of some wild and unclean beast in the bowers of paradise. And why will parents suffer such hoofs within their gates? Is not his rank smell sufficient to sicken the family? Are not the roses and the lilies insulted by his fetid breath? And Flora put to flight as by a Satyr? Forsake the world, indeed! Who made it?-who fitted us for it? who placed us in it ?-what duties lie out of it? Not one. For love to our fellow-creatures is of God, and love to God is of our fellow-creatures, and both alike draw breath from "this bright and breathing world." We must not forsake the world, even though it should have been darkened by the sins of ourselves and others; birds of calm are often seen in storm; the primrose smiles on the brow of the windiest hill, nor cares for sleet or snow; and hath not a Christian soul the same power to preserve itself from scathe, which has been given to insensate and inanimate things? And then what sort of a world is to be substituted for the one we are wickedly bid to abandon? A dark, narrow world, indeed,-yet, narrow as it is, haunted by thoughts that can, and too often do, debase and terrify in to idiocy or madness. For nature thwarted, must dwindle into decay or distortion, the very shape of the soul becomes deformed,-its lineaments ghastly, as with premature age; the spring is struck out of life; the gracious law of her seasons is disobeyed; and on the tree of knowledge we are to look for fruits before blossoms! Bad philosophy, and worse religion. Commend us to such Christianity as Mr Bowles preaches so eloquently in this poem. To use his own words, no priest is he, "Who deems the Almighty frowns upon his Throne, Because two pair of harmless Dowagers, Whose life has lapsed without a stain, beguile An evening hour with cards; who deems that Hell Burns fiercer for a Saraband.” We dare say Mr Bowles, like ourselves, has long given up dancing— and that though he may occasionally join in a rubber of whist for sixpenny points, he is, like ourselves, no evening we laid aside our crutch, and very assiduous card-player. T'other tried, not unsuccessfully, to stand up in a quadrille, rather than that fifteen ed of their dos-à-dos-and we acquityoung people should be disappointted ourselves like a Lancer. Same evening, we faced an old lady at whist-and with the exception of a single revoke, which had like to bring down an old house about our ears, we played to the delight of Hoyle's ghost, who kept looking all the while victorious card in our irresistible over our shoulder, pointing to each hand. Surely there was no sin in that, Dr Cantwell? Mr Bowles truly professed Puritan, most truly the says, that the two great crimes of a "NOMINAL" Christian, are, and have been, from the time of the Manicheans, the DRAMA and the DANCE. To these abominations, such Christians constantly add CARD-PLVYING, without with the spirit of gaming. It is easy, distinguishing whether accompanied he adds, to conceive the reason why the old Fathers were so horror-struck at dancing, considering the licentious character of the Eastern dance. But what resemblance is there in a social meeting of this kind, to which a father and a mother bring their sons youth they have taken part, without and daughters, and of which in their one evil thought or feeling? He who pure feeling, certainly had better stay can view such a meeting with imaway; but what must be the impurity in his heart to confess such ideas? cludes, is as much like the spirit of The spirit of Puritanism, he conChristianity, as the mermaid, which sisting of an ass's head and fish's tail, was carried about for a show, conis like a beautiful woman. The worthy Rector waxes uncommonly facetious on the idolatrous the charge of the youths of this age. practices laid by the Cantwells to "There is a certain wicked and most idolatrous machine, called a Round-about ; and though we are commanded not to make the likeness of any thing above the earth, or under the earth,' this machine has a number of idolatrous images, in wood, representing horses! But, far worse than this, boys and girls-instead of precocious edification, in the mysteries of destiny and decrees (to the horror of this age, of the march of intellect,' be it spoken)-boys and girls together are found riding round, with the most impious tranquillity, and apparent sedate satisfaction, one after the other, on the same wooden likenesses of little horses !" In pleasant accordance with such views of the perfect harmlessness of many of the gaieties of this life, humble or high, Mr Bowles sketches a beautiful picture of a little rural festival, which ended, as we know, though we were not there to see, with a choral flower-dance: "If we would see the fruits of charity, Look at that village group, and paint the Blessing them in the silence of her heart. Against what sins, then, ought the Christian preacher to denounce the judgments of offended Heaven? Listen to our Christian Poet: From man's indignant sight! Thou Hy. pocrite, Trample in dust thy mask, nor cry Faith Making it but a hollow tinkling sound, Look not upon the face of that sweet child, With thoughts which Hell would tremble to conceive! Oh shallow, and oh senseless!—in a world Where rank offences turn the good man pale Who leave the Christian's sternest code, to vent Their petty ire on petty trespasses If trespasses they are-when the wide world Groans with the burden of offence, when crimes Stalk on, with front defying, o'er the land, Whilst, her own cause betraying, Christian zeal Thus swallows camels, straining at a gnat!!" " That is fine vigorous writing; but the Poet rises into yet a loftier flight, and he takes us along with him on his wings: "Oh! whilst the car Of God's own glory rolls along in light, We join the loud song of the Christian host, (All puny systems shrinking from the blaze,) "Hosannah, to the car of light! Roll on! Saldanna's rocks have echoed to the hymns Of Faith, and Hope, and Charity! Roll on ! Till the wild wastes of inmost Africa, Where the long Niger's track is lost, respond, 'Hosannah, to the car of light!' Roll on!- From realm to realm, from shore to far Till the poor widow, from the burning pile Starting, shall lift her hands to heaven, and weep That she has found a Saviour, and has heard The sounds of Christian love!'-Oh! horrible, The pile is smoking!-the bamboos lie there, gle shook some of the worthy Rector's most esteemed friends; and deservedly praising "Generous Hoare," the owner of the "Elysian Temple of Stourhead" -the Reverend Mr Skurray, "distributor Of bounties large, yet falling silently As dews on the cold turf” That held her down when the last strug- the excellent Earl of Cork and Orrery at Marston-Mrs Heneage of Compton-House, The blazing pile! Hasten, oh! car of light! Alas! for suffering nature! Jaggernaut, Arm'd, in his giant car, goes also forthGoes forth, amid his red and reeling priests, While thousands gasp and die beneath the wheels, As they go groaning on, 'mid cries, and drums, And flashing cymbals, and delirious songs If so he may, the Sun in the mid Heaven! Ascending, in its silence, o'er a world Of Godliness, till Godliness itself Shrinks; while the ranting rout, as they march on, Mock Heaven with hymns, till, see-pale "who never turn'd her look From others' sorrows-on whose lids the tear Shines yet more lovely than the light of youth" Mrs Methuen of Corsham-House, "fair as Charity's own form," and the Rev. Charles Hoyle, vicar of Overton, near Marlborough, of whom our Poet speaks with more than common affection and esteem ;-a man, we believe, of genius, learning, and virtue. And so endeth Part Second of Banwell Hill. Part Third is entitled The Spectre and Prayer-Book, a Tale of a Cornish Maid, versified from an extraordinary and striking fact in Mr Polwhele's History of Cornwall. It has many touches true to nature, and is throughout elegantly written; but it is overlaid with ornament, and does not storm the heart through the imagination. Crabbe could have told the story far better in far fewer words; by merely keeping to it-grasping the soul of it-and scorning all unessential adjuncts. But no manno Poet can at once be a Bowles and a Crabbe-any more than a Coleridge and a Wordsworth-a Campbell and a Moore-a Byron and a Scott. Let every man and poet stand on his own legs-a single pair; but let him take warning by Mr Atherstone, and beware of stilts. Mr Bowles (we charged him some pages back with an occasional fib) would fain make us believe that it had been raining all the while he was telling a Tale of a Cornish Maid. That was a plumper. Yet we forgive the fib for his beautiful way of telling it. Part Fourth thus opens: "The show'r is pass'd-the heath-bell, at our feet, Looks up, as with a smile, tho' the cold dew Hangs yet within its cup, like Pity's tear waves Gleams, while the passing show'r above our head Sheds its last silent drops, amid the hues Of the fast-fading rainbow,—such is life! Let us go forth-the redbreast is abroad, And, dripping in the sunshine, sings again." Pity indeed, that one who thus loves nature, and is by nature thus beloved, and rewarded by inspiration, should occasionally have so little regard to truth! This shower, however, so exquisitely described in its death, has not only refreshed earth and sea, but Mr Bowles's genius, till it glows as green as emerald." We cannot, at this late hour of the night, ("ae wee sma' hour ayont the twal,)" accompany him in all his rambles along sea-shore, and through inland wood. But during all those descriptions, never has the influence of that shower-real or ideal-been out of his imagination, till at last it absolutely causes another Deluge. To be serious-we know not where to look in Modern Poetry-in Wordsworth, Southey, or James Montgomery, for a descriptive passage, fuller of feeling and fancy, than the following" Vision of the Deluge." "The Vision of the Deluge! Harka trump! It was the trump of the Archangel! Stern He stands, while the awak'ning thunder rolls Beneath his feet! Stern, and alone, he stands Upon Immaus' height! No voice is heard Come deep'ning o'er the world!— once, The song, the shout, the cries of violence, The groan of the oppress'd, and the deep curse Of Blasphemy, that scowls upon the clouds, And mocks the deeper thunder! Hark! a voice'Perish!' Again the thunder rolls-the She kisses it, and at her father's word, The dove flies on! In lonely flight Oh! let me in, she seems to say, For long and lone hath been my way; Oh! once more, gentle mistress, let me rest, And dry my dripping plumage on thy breast. So the bird flew to her who cherished it. She sent it forth again out of the ark; Earth |