Than e'er by a dream was breathed, or driven Thro' a bosom, all suddenly filled with heaven. Oh! come ye from heaven ye blessed Things, Those gracious forms, on the verdant height Where Edith in her slumber lies, With calm face meeting the calm skies, God gives to us the sleeping maid !" An orphan in the wilderness! "O, happy child! who livest in mirth And joy of thine own on this sinful Earth, Whose heart, like a lonely stream, keeps singing, Or, like a holy bell, is ringing So sweetly in the silent wild Wilt thou come with us, thou happy child, Dreams ?" -A kiss as soft as moonlight seems near Fear not, for thou hast nought to fear! Then, come with us, sweet Edith! come "O waft me there, e'er my dream is gone, For dreams have a wild world all their own! And never was vision like to this O waft me away e'er I wake from bliss! Put into my bosom, and bade us be But who float back soon to each other's side! Yet we start at the shadows of mortal life; And with you will we fly, and trust in A sound of parting wings is heard, oak Hath ceased to shiver it's leaves so red Beneath the breeze that just touched it's head. The heath-flowers all are shining bright, Some silent spot secure from storms— Long years are past-and every stone O happy ye! who have flown afar Orphans were ye-but your lips were calm Glistening with many a lovely ray, The flowers that bloom there never die, Breathing forever thro' the calm A charm to its soul from the smiles of sorrow. Nor are the upper world and skies Withheld, when they list, from these Orphan's eyes The shadow of green trees on earth Doth often through the silence ring To shield them from the clouds of fear; On what doth the wondering shepherd gaze, It hangs, and to the green shore gliding mourn. We thought them dead, but at Heaven's command, For years have they lived in Fairy Land, And they glide back by night to their little cot, O absent long, but by none forgot!" The Boat with its snow-white sail is gone, And the Creatures it brought to shore are flown! Still the crowd of water-lilies shake, Of Edith and Nora comes o'er his heart. Fair Creatures! that no more were seen Over their lips, yet rosy red, And the bed she loves best is a winding sheet. Let the Coffin sink down soft and slowly, The motion of their now still feet! birth Never more were they seen on earth; But to young and old belief was given OF THE EFFECTS OF KNOWLEDGE UPON SOCIETY. TOWARDS the close of last century, it was thought by many philosophers, that the faults and vices of mankind arose chiefly from intellectual darkness, and that if prejudice and miscon→ ception were removed from the earth, moral evil would speedily depart also. The French metaphysicians seemed to consider man as a being in whom reason was the predominating faculty. They concluded, too hastily, that his desires and inclinations resulted from his opinions, and were posterior to the conclusions of his understanding. Their attention had been so much directed towards the evils which spring from prejudices of education, that they supposed the root and essence of the mischief lay in the prejudices themselves, and did not advert to the fact, that prejudices serve only as domicils for the elementary passions, which, although they may change their abode and their apparel, never change their nature. Opinion can do no more than transfer the operations of the passions from one object to another; and in doing so, it may effect either good or mischief, according to circumstances. Vanity and ambition, for instance, have always the same bent, namely, that of seeking after pre-eminence and distinction; but what constitutes distinction depends, in a great measure, upon the opinions of society. If value is set upon useless objects, so much human energy is expended to no purpose; if value is set on pernicious objects, so much ambition is turned to so much mischief; but if the palm is affixed to useful and noble objects, the nature of the ambitious man is improved in pursuing them, and society profits by his activity. For rendering service to society, vanity and ambition are much more to be depended on than the feeling of duty. They are personal sentiments, and therefore much more active and constant in their operation. But it is by the virtuous feelings of society at large that they are controled and guided towards beneficial ends. It would be the interest even of a profligate society, to reward nothing but service able and well directed ambition with admiration and consequence; but here That with Edith and Nora they went to the natural feelings of mankind are Heaven. N. found to work too powerfully against the calculations of their own interest. Men every where confer their admiration upon those things in which they themselves wish to excel, and accordingly a profligate society gives preminms to so many spurious kinds of ambition, that little of the useful sort is produced. Thus no ambitious man can ever be tempted to pursue a much more virtuous course than corresponds with the habits of thought prevalent in the society where he lives. The services done to society, through motives purely consciencious, must always be a precarious and uncertain fund, from what we know of the average constitution of human nature; and no nation can count upon great and meritorious exertions, until it has drawn into its service the personal passions, which constitute the main spring of activity in the minds of mankind. A degenerate and vicious society thus is constantly giving way to feelings which react perniciously upon itself. It is insincere or divided in its approbation of what is good; and therefore it is not rewarded by the growth of what is good. The good deeds which happen to be performed in such a society, by disinterested persons, are like contributions casually dropt into an alms-box. The more we reflect upon the nature of man, the more we shall be convinced, that what decides his fate is to be found chiefly within himself, and not in extrinsic circumstances. The philosophers of the last century overlooked the mechanism which nature implants in nations and individuals, and sought for the cause of every thing from without. They attributed an almost creative power to knowledge and to institutions. But there is reason to suspect, that the power exerted by mere intellect over human destiny is much less than they were inclined to suppose. Man is of a nature which includes part of the brute, and part of the percipient being; but the elements which decide his destiny are his passions and his moral sentiments. All that knowledge can do is to remove errors and mistakes. It operates as a guide in relation to the human character, but it has no productive power. It cannot create a single new moral impulse or propension which does not already exist within us. It is often of service in awakening the latent sentiments, VOL. IV. and making them acquainted with opportunities of action; but if the sentiments do not exist, its words are idle, and are of no more use than the compass is to the pilot when there is no wind to fill his sails. Forms of government are equally unproductive in the species of their influence. A free government only gives fair play to the human character, and allows national energies, talents, and virtues to manifest themselves in their greatest strength and beauty. A bad government stifles and oppresses the talents and energies of a nation, and exerts a destructive power; but a good government exerts no creative power, nor does more for mankind than is done for the different kinds of animals by free air and exercise, which perfect their natural qualities, but confer no new ones. To suppose that the intellectual calculation of utility can ever become the regulating principle of human existence, is to suppose that the elements of human nature exist in totally different proportions from the real ones. Remote views of interest, however clear, give way to the personal feelings of the moment; and it is only by the continual activity of just sentiments throughout society, that a nation can be sure of preserving itself from political disasters. Vainly do knowledge and foresight hope to regulate the course of moral events, by inves tigating into the sequence of causes and effects, if knowledge and foresight are unable, when the crisis arrives, to evoke those virtues and energies which would be necessary to form part of the chain upon which a fortunate result depends. In controling the movements of the physical world, man finds no scarcity of objects by which to act upon their objects, and accomplish his desires; but the causes which elevate or degrade the moral nature of his species can only be grasped now and then; and even when he does not appear" to ride on the whirlwind and direct the storm," it is scarcely by means of his own power that he assumes such an office, but rather because the whirlwind happens to stoop of its own accord, and take up the puny rider. When legislators succeed in establishing a good system of laws, they have to thank the course of events for presenting them with what was most essential to their enterprize L well as the other, requires virtuous sentiments to support it; and, if modern Europe is so fortunate as to obtain it, her children are not likely to aspire to any thing farther. Christianity has absorbed into itself all that towering and indefinite enthusiasm which of old exerted itself upon the worldly affairs of Greece and Rome. Human nature has now found a wider outlet for its hopes. They no longer embody themselves in the same objects as before; and hence the modern world presents fewer visible indications of the greatness of the human mind. The divine part of our nature has ceased to spend its force in creating monuments of its own power, or gilding the possessions of a transitory existence. The whole aspect of life is changed; and what is greatest in the world. is almost silent and invisible. Even national power is less majestic and more vulgar than during the ages of antiquity, because it is imbued with a smaller proportion of those emanations of the higher soul which confer dignity on whatever they mingle with, But to withdraw human aspirations from the channel which they have now found, and turn enthusiasm again adrift, to seck for the infinite upon earth, would evidently be to make a preposterous exchange. The notion of the perfectibility of man sprung up as natural succedaneum, after men had quarrelled with Christianity; and the desire of such a succedaneum was a favourable indication of the quantity of sentiment which remained behind. But what need chiefly now be dreaded is, that the human soul may become dwarfish, and remain contented without great hopes or aims of any kind. namely, a set of people sufficiently virtuous or sufficiently docile to concur in supporting their system. Any improvements that are offered on the moral nature of man, by means of institutions, go on slowly, and lie at the mercy of so many collateral trains of events, originating from unforeseen sources, that they can hardly be said to be under human control. The character of modern European nations has been disciplined all along by the falling out of events, and not by any legislating influence, except Christianity, which rather affects the private nature of individuals, than operates directly upon the laws of their political aggregation. The minds of European nations have grown up and ripened, as they best could, under institutions not originally planned by reason, but worked out of circumstances by the blind contentions of the different members of the body politic. Even England herself has owed her advantages to the propitious movements of her inborn energies, which have made room for themselves. Bad fortune may have had its share in retarding the progress of the other nations, but there is reason to believe that the moral elements produced within them have been of inferior quality. The common stock of European reflection, and the wisdom produced by experience, have now inspired the nations with a philosophical love of liberty; but all sentiments, resulting from the exercise of the understanding, are weaker and less to be depended upon than those which develope theinselves spontaneously; and therefore, while the nations justly rejoice in the advantages of knowledge as an antidote against despotism, they should remember that their endeavours after liberty will be successful chiefly in proportion as they are connected with the demands of their sentiments and passions. The love of liberty breaks forth in its most beautiful and dignified form, when the soul, having become pregnant with great as pirations and lofty desires, finds it necessary to have a theatre adapted to the illimitability of their nature. But this is only the beautiful ideal of liberty. There is another species of the love of freedom, more homely in its nature, and which is founded merely upon enlightened views concerning the every-day rights and worldly interests of mankind. This kind of liberty, as In the history of every race of mankind there seems to be always some era when their character unfolds its greatest vigour, and teems with the most energetic sentiments. This era does not coincide with the period of a nation's highest civilization, nor yet of its greatest knowledge. Yet in the history of Greece these periods were not far distant from each other. Has modern Europe already developed the most energetic sentiments she will ever give birth to, or is there something greater still to come? If greater things are yet to come, it is to be suspected that we must look for them from those European nations which have hitherta |