he had refused to take the Covenant. Campbell says of him, 'He corresponded with Descartes, was the friend of Cudworth, and, as a divine and a moralist, was not only popular in his own time, but has been mentioned with admiration both by Addison and Blair.' One is rather amused at the latter clause. That a man of More's massive learning, noble eloquence, and divine genius should need the testimony of a mere elegant wordmonger like Blair, seems ludicrous enough; and Addison himself, except in wit and humour, was not worthy to have untied the shoelatchets of the old Platonist. We were first introduced to this writer by good Dr John Brown, late of Broughton Place, Edinburgh, and shall never forget hearing him, in his library, read some splendid passages from More's work, in those deep, mel low, antique tones which flavoured whatever he read, like the crust on old wine. His chief works are, 'A Discourse on the Immortality of the Soul,' 'The Mystery of Godliness,' 'The Mystery of Iniquity,' 'Divine Dialogues,' 'An Antidote against Atheism,' 'Ethical and Metaphysical Manuals,' &c. In writing such books, and pursuing the recondite studies of which they were the fruit, More spent his life happily. In 1661, he became a Fellow of the Royal Society. For twenty years after the Restoration, his works are said to have sold better than any of their day-a curious and unaccountable fact, considering the levity and licentiousness of the period. In September 1687, the fine old spiritualist, aged seventy-three, went away to that land of 'ideas' to which his heart had been translated long before.

More's prose writings give us, on the whole, a higher idea of his powers than his poem. This is not exactly, as a recent critic calls it, 'dull and tedious,' but it is in some parts prosaic, and in others obscure. The gleams of fancy in it are genuine, but few and far between. But his prose works constitute, like those of Cudworth, Charnock, Jeremy Taylor, and John Scott, a vast old quarry, abounding both in blocks and in gems-blocks of granite solidity, and gems of starry lustre. The peculiarity of More is in that poetico-philosophic mist which, like the autumnal gossamer, hangs in light and beautiful festoons over his thoughts, and which suggests pleasing memories of Plato and the Alexandrian school. Like all the followers of the Grecian sage,

he dwells in a region of 'ideas,' which are to him the only realities, and are not cold, but warm; he sees all things in Divine solution; the visible is lost in the invisible, and nature retires before her God. Surely they are splendid reveries those of the Platonic school; but it is sad to reflect that they have not cast the slightest gleam of light on the dark, frightful, faithshattering mysteries which perplex all inquirers. The old shadows of sin, death, damnation, evil, and hell, are found to darken the 'ideas' of Plato's world quite as deeply as they do the actualities of this weary, work-day earth, into which men have, for some inscrutable purpose, been sent to be, on the whole, miserable,- -so often to toil without compensation, to suffer without benefit, and to hope without fulfilment.

OPENING OF SECOND PART OF 'PSYCHOZOIA.'

1 Whatever man he be that dares to deem
True poets' skill to spring of earthly race,
I must him tell, that he doth mis-esteem
Their strange estate, and eke himself disgrace
By his rude ignorance. For there's no place
For forced labour, or slow industry,

Of flagging wits, in that high fiery chase;
So soon as of the Muse they quickened be,
At once they rise, and lively sing like lark in sky.

2 Like to a meteor, whose material

Is low unwieldy earth, base unctuous slime, Whose inward hidden parts ethereal Lie close upwrapt in that dull sluggish fime, Lie fast asleep, till at some fatal time Great Phoebus' lamp has fired its inward sprite, And then even of itself on high doth climb: That erst was dark becomes all eye, all sight, Bright star, that to the wise of future things gives light.

3 Even so the weaker mind, that languid lies,
Knit up in rags of dirt, dark, cold, and blind,
So soon that purer flame of love unties.
Her clogging chains, and doth her sprite unbind,
She soars aloft; for she herself doth find
Well plumed; so raised upon her spreaden wing,
She softly plays, and warbles in the wind,
And carols out her inward life and spring
Of overflowing joy, and of pure love doth sing.

EXORDIUM OF THIRD PART.

1 Hence, hence, unhallowed ears, and hearts more hard
Than winter clods fast froze with northern wind,
But most of all, foul tongue! I thee discard,
That blamest all that thy dark straitened mind
Cannot conceive: but that no blame thou find;
Whate'er my pregnant muse brings forth to light,
She'll not acknowledge to be of her kind,

Till eagle-like she turn them to the sight
Of the eternal Word, all decked with glory bright..

2 Strange sights do straggle in my restless thoughts, And lively forms with orient colours clad

Walk in my boundless mind, as men ybrought
Into some spacious room, who when they've had
A turn or two, go out, although unbade.

All these I see and know, but entertain
None to my friend but who's most sober sad;
Although, the time my roof doth them contain
Their presence doth possess me till they out again.

3 And thus possessed, in silver trump I sound
Their guise, their shape, their gesture, and array;
But as in silver trumpet nought is found

When once the piercing sound is passed away,
(Though while the mighty blast therein did stay,
Its tearing noise so terribly did shrill,

That it the heavens did shake, and earth dismay,)
As empty I of what my flowing quill

In needless haste elsewhere, or here, may hap to spill.

4 For 'tis of force, and not of a set will,
Nor dare my wary mind afford assent
To what is placed above all mortal skill;
But yet, our various thoughts to represent,
Each gentle wight will deem of good intent.
Wherefore, with leave th' infinity I'll sing
Of time, of space; or without leave; I'm brent
With eager rage, my heart for joy doth spring,
And all my spirits move with pleasant trembeling.

5 An inward triumph doth my soul upheave

And spread abroad through endless 'spersed air.
My nimble mind this clammy clod doth leave,
And lightly stepping on from star to star
Swifter than lightning, passeth wide and far,
Measuring th' unbounded heavens and wasteful sky;
Nor aught she finds her passage to debar,
For still the azure orb as she draws nigh

Gives back, new stars appear, the world's walls 'fore her fly.

1

DESTRUCTION AND RENOVATION OF ALL THINGS.

As the seas,

Boiling with swelling waves, aloft did rise,
And met with mighty showers and pouring rain
From heaven's spouts; so the broad flashing skies,
With brimstone thick and clouds of fiery bane,
Shall meet with raging Etna's and Vesuvius' flame.

2 The burning bowels of this wasting ball
Shall gallup up great flakes of rolling fire,
And belch out pitchy flames, till over all
Having long raged, Vulcan himself shall tire,

And (the earth an ash-heap made) shall then expire:
Here Nature, laid asleep in her own urn,

With gentle rest right easily will respire,
Till to her pristine task she do return

As fresh as Phoenix young under th' Arabian morn.

3 Oh, happy they that then the first are born,
While yet the world is in her vernal pride;
For old corruption quite away is worn,
As metal pure so is her mould well tried.
Sweet dews, cool-breathing airs, and spaces wide
Of precious spicery, wafted with soft wind:
Fair comely bodies goodly beautified.

4 For all the while her purged ashes rest,
These relics dry suck in the heavenly dew,
And roscid manna rains upon her breast,
And fills with sacred milk, sweet, fresh, and new,
Where all take life and doth the world renew;
And then renewed with pleasure. be yfed.

A green, soft mantle doth her bosom strew
With fragrant herbs and flowers embellished,
Where without fault or shame all living creatures bed.

A DISTEMPERED FANCY.

1 Then the wild fancy from her horrid womb
Will senden forth foul shapes. O dreadful sight!
Overgrown toads, fierce serpents, thence will come,
Red-scaled dragons, with deep burning light