ceeded; the old woman recovered her speech and, as so When the grandmother was buried, Stephan stood THE POOR AND THE POOR LAWS. suming that England is the greatest country in the world, we must by no means take pride to ourselves that we ALTHOUGH there may be unquestionable data for asfessedly much about us that is small, much from which we ought to endeavour to purge ourselves. Care should have all the attributes of a great people. There is conbe taken that we are not excessively humane on the one hand, or extremely cruel on the other-in fact, that we have not in our nature too great a mixture of good and therein names of which we are justly proud-Reynolds, Wilkie, Watt, Arkwright, Cavendish, Davy, and a thouevil. If we look into our Arts and Sciences, we have sand others whom we could name, are men whom any country would honour. As a literary nation we occupy writings will live for all time. If we examine our wealth we shall find that we are the richest nation in no mean position-England has produced men whose the world. Our exports, alone exceed in amount the whole revenue of many kingdoms, and our empire extends over one third of the globe. The sun never sets on our dominions-a company of British merchants rule, de facto, a country one of the richest and most extensive on the face of the globe. We are unquestionably masters of the ocean, and it is true what a celebrated foworld and you bully the other." But with all this brightness in our national picture, a terrible fact stares us in reigner once said to us-"You conquer one half of the the face. In the back-ground may be seen in unquesFrom the time of leaving their native village until possess beyond other nations of the world. How is this? they reached the place of their destination were they A country so magnanimously great and wealthy as to aftionable colours the glaring amount of destitution we conveyed from one kind hand to another, and they often ford shelter to the exiled foreigner-to give freedom to the silently blessed those who, out of no self-interest, but slave, and yet to possess the most poor. Impossible! one from pure human-kindness smoothed to them the sor-would say. But, alas! too true. It is a fact, a stubborn, rowful path of emigration. nity as been rolling against our own poor. A bad law and the apathy of its administrators to the wants and habits a great fact, and what is more, the tide of national humaof the poor have placed us in this dreadful position.What have they done? Have they suppressed mendicity? Look at the innumerable number of beggars that infest our streets and homes-see them clothed in nature's hideousness, until we are disposed to question whether they were originally intended to walk erect. dismayed by the harsh treatment of the poor? Alas! Is crime see the daily records of our police courts-magistrates assaulted in the open streets-windows belonging to the courts of justice broken! bread stolen! and for what? -that the poor wretches may obtain in gaol that protection which they are illegally denied by the authorities of unions and workhouses. These things are too true. They have all occurred within these few weeks.Where then our boasted greatness-in arts-in sciences -in literature-our vast empire !-Shame on us!-We should clothe ourselves "in sackcloth and ashes"-we should expunge from our national flag the lion rampant, and place in its stead the figure of a poor starving wretch dying from want at the door of an union workhouse. We have said that the tide of our national humanity has long been flowing against the poor. It is true-men in authority act on this principle. The Lord Mayor of London does so, while the City begrudges the sum of £4000, about one half the Lord Mayor's salary, for the support of the casual poor. Of what use are the daily examples of individual sacrifice for the public good? Men like Lord Ashley and Mr. Cabbell may spend their time and patience in mitigating the sufferings of the poor, but of what use are our hospitals and houses of refuge for the destitute while persons in authority act so inhumanly. Let us not be charged with a maudlin sentimentality in favour of the poor. We possess no such feelings. We say that it will be found to be the He had been saved out of the deepest temptations; he had become acquainted with himself and those who belonged to him through severe trial, and now he was in unity with himself and them. He could now with renewed courage prepare for a new life. The schoolmaster and Stephan had also a new bond of union between them; they had become acquainted with the prisons of their native land. Stephan had persevered in his scheme of emigration, but only in the same way that he ate his supper on the first evening when he made his acquaintance, only because he had determined to do so, and without its having a relish; now, however, there was a new excitement; he had endured a public punishment for a combat in his own heart. Stephan and the schoolmaster with their families were among the very first who were enabled, by aid of the society which was just then established for the protection of emigrants, to remove to North America. Stephan's youngest child, which bore the name of the grandmother, learned to run alone on American ground, and he loved to call it "Grandmother," and thus to keep alive the memory of the deceased. A VALENTINE. BY W. C. BENNETT. Prithee, said I, heart of mine, Nay, thy secret prithee tell, Said I, silly heart reveal Greenwich. 123 soundest principle of social economy to afford food and shelter to the deserving and destitute, but to punish the impostor. Why a worm would turn on us if cruelly treated, and inhuman conduct will rouse the most docile spirit. The same blood courses through the veins of the poor as the rich-their hearts and pulses beat alikenature made the same air for both, nor can the rich man respire oftener than his unfortunate fellow-creature. To look at the picture is most discouraging. To see the laws, and the dispensers of the laws very frequently declare against the interests of the poor is not a very hopeful sight. But things will yet change for the better, for although we find but one or two individuals sacrificing the whole of their time and money for the benefit of their fellow creatures, the seed which they are sowing must eventually bring forth fruits. It is to be hoped for the honour-for the interest of the nation-that we shall see our error in neglecting the interests of the poor. Our statesmen and our authorities should endeavour to find work for those who are able and willing to do it, and food for those who are in distress and unable to labour. Both are to be had-God never designed that men should live in idleness, nor that they should starve. He has given us abundance, and as Heaven has done its part, man should take care to do his also. While we are, as we ought to be, a great people, we should be so in every sense of the word. To be great we must be good to be good we must be humane-and to be humane we must have no more " Deaths from Starvation." They tell against the character of the nation. If the Poor Law is bad, and no one doubts it, let it be Ecclesia Dei: a Vision of the Church. London: Longamended. Literary Notices. A dying voice murmurs-" The worst of all sins, "Thou wretched hut-dweller, now give it a nameThis sin, without solace, must wed thee to shame ?" "Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis.” man & Co. HERE we have a little volume, written, as is very eviTo persevere in a headlong course of oppression to-dent, by a clergyman of the Established Church, at wards the poor is inconsistent with the interests of all once learned, zealous, and possessing great poetical and classes. The nation should be governed as if we were satirical powers; which deserves, and, we think, will all one family, and though the guilty should be punished, attract very marked attention. When the very servants we have no right to condemn the innocent. of the altar begin in strains so energetic, and unsparing as this, to denounce and expose the corrupt condition of that church, it is high time that those who have the power, should look to a resolute reform of the mischief. THE SIN OF SUFFERING. The author appears to be one of those who would be classed with the Puseyite party, but to our mind he must be classed with the best section of that party. He is evidently a man whose poetical and humane disposi BY WILLIAM KENNEDY. "WHAT call you that creature, dark couched in its tion leads him to regard everything which is connected lair?" with the dignity and beauty of his system of devotion, "It once was called woman”. and with the advantage of the people, with peculiar in"Why lurketh she there? terest. The fine old gothic architecture, and the music and chanting of the cathedral service have seized on all I hear a low moaning, the hovel within, the poetic sympathies of his nature. He deplores their An infant one crying-sure here must be sin!' neglect, and desecration, but he does not the less deplore the mercenary practice which, by pews, at once defaces the interior of our churches, and shuts out the poor from their proper enjoyment. He has an eye for the picturesque, the venerable, and the English in our old country-houses, parsonages, and deaneries, but he does not fail to lay lustily on the base spirits that have contrived to creep into them. The poetry has a fine musical rhythm, reminding us of the versification of Moile, and of Rogers, with the satiric vigour, and boldness of Churchill. He treats the bishops as they richly deserve, but he passes tenderly over the cause which makes them what they are, the immense and ill-distributed wealth of the church, and its unnatural alliance with the state. The Kingdom of Christ never was the Kingdom of this world, and never will be, let men do all they can to make it so. Secularize the church, and its bishops will secularize themselves. Make statesmen of them and they will become sorry shepherds of the flock of Christ. Make them very rich, and put them into nicely lined carriages, "To shame and to sorrow I'm wedded-a curse Lies on the poor baby, as well as its nurse!" A WELCOME TO EMERSON. To bear our spirits upward, and to mould "But name me the sin which to sorrow hath wedded Welcome thou clear discerner of the light, Beaming through the world's shadow upon man. Of purer thought and vision, and to scan Over our present, big with peace, and truth: Rung o'er all tyranny; we feel the youth Of the world's action in our spirits play, Welcome brave preacher, pointer of our way. and set them down to a continual feast, and cocker them up with all sorts of absurd titles, as, My Lord Bishop, and Right Reverend Father in God, and His Grace, and the like; enthrone them and bedizen them with fantastic robes; and set them up in Parliament before the whole body of temporal peers, and give them all sorts of worldly duties to perform, and worldly goods to take care of, and if you can make decent pastors of God's flock out of them, why then you may make an Elihu Burritt out of the Iron Duke, or you may do any other miracle that you have a mind to. But what says our able and candid author of the Bishops? here is a bit of his prose,-"A man may question the policy or the taste of thus charging home upon the Bishops of the Church the sad estate of the Church herself; but can any one deny the fact-the fact, I mean, of their being notoriously deficient in those gifts and graces which should be inseparable from a bishop and overseer of Christ's Church? Where is their gentleness? Where their kindness and other than bare civil courtesy, and cold hospitality to their humbler and poorer brethren of the clergy and laity of the church? Where their heartiness and zeal towards the church itself? The bishops of old time built, endowed, and "visited." The bishops of to-day meet in St. Martin's-place, and vote themselves houses with other people's money, and contract for cheap church fabrics which they never, or scarcely ever see-never, perhaps, but on the day of consecration--and "visit" in the sense of a continual personal interest and oversight not i at all. "If with the clergy, if with the churchwardens, if with the children of the parish, bishops did but know how greatly their kind and parental influence would act in the way of comfort, encouragement, and quickening of the spirit of love and good works, they would not artificially but naturally, not politically but spiritually, become through God's most present and ready grace, themselves the most popular of men. Whereas, what are they now? Almost unknown in their dioceses, save by some casually occurring confirmation or church meeting; or, at most, by a chance counter-signature of some formal Queen's letter of demand for money, which should, in justice, have been the alms of the church to the poor belonging thereto, and worshipping under the shelter of those walls within which the offertory was gathered. The writer of this has known a quire of boys walk voluntarily a very considerable distance to see a bishop, and make their dutiful obeisance to him, who, when he passed them close by, never deigned to look at them, and took no notice of them at all. How at variance was this with His precept and practice who said"Suffer little children to come unto me, and forbid them not, for of such is the kingdom of God." True, but then Christ made bishops in a very different way; and would expect nothing from such bishops as we make but what such bishops do. His bishops walked on foot, ours ride in carriages. His bishops sate on rocks, and fed the poor with loaves and fishes; ours sit on thrones and look after the loaves and fishes for themselves. His bishops were poor and humble, ours are rich and fat, and therefore proud. His bishops did all the good they could and suffered for it; ours do no good at all, and are rewarded for it. It surprises one to see clever men like our author-capital logicians and shrewd fellows altogether, expecting to gather grapes from thorns, and figs from thistles. Expecting that a thing shall be anything but the thing for which its material, construction, and circumstances form it. A steam-engine is not a wet-nurse nor a common milchcow, for reasons that everybody sees. They never were made to be such; they can be only what they are. Take an humble, pious, loving man, then, and put him into a pastoral charge with a modest income, and a clear understanding that he is to mind his spiritual duties, and nothing else, and you will have a good servant of God and man, call him what you will. Take another, and make him as rich as a Jew; let him be an aspiring adventurer naturally; and set all sorts of worldly grandeur and rivalries, and still loftier heights and prizes before him; dip him deep in the gall-fountain of politics, and you'll get-just such as you do get. Our author sees plainly what they are, and what the consequence is. He says, "Who so blind as not to see the estrangement of affection and alienation of heart which such palpable discrepancy and chilliness is calculated, and, indeed, almost sure to engender? This, indeed, is but a sample, yet it is a frequent sample of the manner in which the bishops forget themselves, their high office, their holy, yet humble brethren. But men do not, therefore, forget them. They see them without natural affection, or heart, or inclination for either the things or persons of the church, so they cease to love, begin to hate, and end in despising them, and disclaiming their jurisdiction and power. Then it is that the lay-peers vote them nuisances, the crown contemns, and the prime minister of the day, who may make laypeers by the score, with seats in Parliament, and no one find any fault with him therefor, excludes every new bishop from the house until some elder brother has died off to give him his seat." Such are bishops in our author's prose, what are they in his poetry? Again I say, what wonder is there, when Bishops be such, that such are meaner men? To him for rede or rule no brother goes; Keep Bishops out of sight, and great they seem; The author gives us a passing sample of the Bishop crew, and singles out Philpotts for a most vigorous and deserved onslaught. "Immortal Philpotts! man infatuate! From all such cruel step-fathers, may He But we must not be tempted too far. There are many sweet sketches of gabled deanery, minster library, and the like, as well as lusty flagellation of the clerkly tenants of "Epicurus' sty," but we will close our notice with one which is most English in two senses. English equally in the scenery and the character which it introduces. The volume is one as remarkable for its poetic merit as for its singular honesty and boldness. All those who love their country and wish well to it, both churchmen and others should read it. "Dear homes of England! dear unto mine heart! How glad we greet you, and how sad we part! When through the flower-crowned lodge we wind and pass Along the moss-way, over the soft grass; The path-way lies, at whose far end is seen Or at fresh fall of eve, or underneath the moon : To good of men on earth, to God in heaven. A fairy scene, in sooth, and false as fair; Great judge, of horse-flesh, oxen-flesh, and pelf; Like qualmy ice just rescued from a smelt. * Alas! that England's Island-homes should be The mansions of the Poulter family: That they should house them there who ought to dwell No where but in the sides of Dante's hell: Bred, at good things and honest men to rail, And gorge and swill much pudding and more ale." Sketches of Protestantism in Italy, Past and Present, with an account of the Waldenses. By ROBERT BAIRD, D.D., New York. Collins: Glasgow and London. THIS is a reprint of an American work, and in a compact form, contains a complete view of the past persecutions and present statistics of Protestantism in Italy. It would be well for those who are intending to visit that fine country, to read this volume ere setting out. THE POETICAL RECORD. MY BIRTH-DAY. BY D. FARISH, A VILLAGE TEACHER. Nobody notices my birth-day, The people are silent on my birth-day, No roaring of cannon, no rocket display, No bon-fires blaze on my birth-day. No barrels are broached on my birth-day, Round the smoking sirloin, on my birth-day. No music is heard on my birth-day, No tales are told on my birth-day, The world goes on in its jog-trot way, And never attends to my birth-day. No bard is inspired on my birth-day, But why this neglect on my birth-day? Of common respect on my birth-day ?— I cannot look back on a fair array Of Dukes and Earls on my birth-day. No lineage ennobles my birth-day, No broad lands smile on my birth-day, My sires no hides of land seized theyToo honest by half-for my birth-day! GOOD NIGHT. SONNET. BY H. F. F. "Good night," we say with careless lip and brow, If we again shall greet our fellow men, Or heaven dawn on our death-strengthened eyes; • Good night," perchance the night may soon be o'er, "Good night,”—perhaps good night, for evermore. WORK, NOT COMPLAINT. BY J. D. Man, grieve not though thine eye sees not Beyond the far horizon's bound: Complain not though thine intellect So weak and limited is found? From hill to hill, through vales make way The sun, the ruler of the heavens, Sees not at once the wide earth o'er : Shall man, a tenant of the earth, The heavens with a glance explore? It is, the cheerful English hearth, With friends all seated round. Stokesley. A SONG FOR THE CHRISTIAN MONOPOLIST. There's a voice on the breeze and its wailings are dread, For it comes from the land of the starving and dead. And it startles the wretch with his thousands untold, And he pities aud prays, but he sticks to his gold; And it sighs through the aisle in the Temple of God, But is mock'd with the cry 'tis His chastening rod !— And it steals on the slumber of Princes and Kings, And whispers forebodings of terrible things; Aud it sweeps o'er the hall where the mighty ones tread, And groans as it passes, "Give, Oh! give us bread!" There's a curse on the breeze for the man and his store, Who pilfers his wealth from the woes of the poor. A canker-worm crawls through the pleasure it buys, And it gnaws at his heart till, detested, he dies. |
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