were more than human! With the defence of his backslidings, which he hath himself more keenly scrutinized, more clearly discerned against, and more bitterly lamented than any of his censors, we do not charge ourselves; but if, when of these acts he became convinced, he be found less true to God, and to righteousness; indisposed to repentance and sorrow and anguish; exculpatory of himself; stout-hearted in his courses; a formalist in his penitence, or in any way less worthy of a spiritual man in those than in the rest of his infinite moods, then, verily, strike him from the canon, and let his Psalms become monkish legends, or what you please. But if these penitential Psalms discover the soul's deepest hell of agony, and lay bare the iron ribs of misery, whereon the very heart dissolveth; and if they, expressing the same in words, shall melt the soul that conceiveth and bow the head that uttereth them,-then, we say, let us keep these records of the Psalmist's grief and despondency as the most precious of his utterances, and sure to be needed in the case of every man who essayeth to live a spiritual life.

DER BABY.

So help me gracious, efery day
I laugh me wild to see der vay
My small young baby drie to play-
Dot funny leetle baby.

When I look on dhem lectle toes,
Und saw dot funny leetle nose,

Und heard der vay dot rooster crows,
I schmile like I was grazy.

Und vhen I heard der real nice vay
Dhem beoples to my wife dhey say,
"More like his fater* every day"
I vas so proud like blazes.

Sometimes dhere comes a leetle schquall,
Dot's when der vindy vind vill crawl
Righd in its leetle schtomach schmall,-
Dot's too bad for der baby.

*Dot vas me himself.

Dot makes him sing at night so schveet,
Und gorrybarric he must eat,

Und I must chumb shbry on my feet,
To help dot leetle baby.

He bulls my nose and kicks my hair,
Und grawls me ofer everywhere,
Und shlobbers me-but vat I care?

Dot vas my schmall young baby.

Around my head dot leetle arm
Vas schqueezin me so nice and varm—
Oh! may dhere never coom some harm
To dot schmall leetle baby.

THE SPIRITUAL TEMPLE.

"And the house, when it was in building, was built of stone made ready be fore it was brought thither: so that there was neither hammer nor axe nor any tool of iron heard in the house, while it was in building."-1 KINGS, vi. 7.

And whence, then, came these goodly stones 'twas Israel's pride to raise,

The glory of the former house, the joy of ancient days;
In purity and strength erect, in radiant splendor bright,
Sparkling with golden beams of noon, or silver smiles of
night?

From coasts the stately cedar crowns, each noble slab was brought,

In Lebanon's deep quarries hewn, and on its mountains wrought;

There rung the hammer's heavy stroke among the echoing rocks,

There chased the chisel's keen, sharp edge, the rude, unshapen blocks.

Thence polished, perfected, complete, each fitted to its place

For lofty coping, massive wall, or deep imbedded base,
They bore them o'er the waves that rolled their billowy swell
between
The shores

Tyre's imperial pride and Judah's hills of green.

With gradual toil the work went on, through days and months and years,

Beneath the summer's laughing sun, and winter's frozen tears;

And thus in majesty sublime and noiseless pomp it rose,Fit dwelling for the God of Peace,-a temple of repose!

Brethren in Christ! to holier things the simple type apply;
Our God himself a temple builds, eternal and on high,
Of souls elect; their Zion there-that world of light and
bliss;

Their Lebanon-the place of toil-of previous mouldingthis.

From nature's quarries, deep and dark, with gracious aim he hews

The stones, the spiritual stones, it pleaseth him to choose : Hard, rugged, shapeless at the first, yet destined each to shine,

Moulded beneath his patient hand, in purity divine.

Oh, glorious process! see the proud grow lowly, gentle, meek;

See floods of unaccustomed tears gush down the hardened

cheek:

Perchance the hammer's heavy stroke o'erthrew some idol

fond;

Perchance the chisel rent in twain some precious, tender bond.

Behold, he prays whose lips were sealed in silent scorn before,

Sighs for the closet's holy calmn, and hails the welcome door: Behold, he works for Jesus now, whose days weat idly past; Oh for more mouldings of the hand that, works a change so vast!

Ye looked on one, a well-wrought stone, a saint of God matured,

What chiselings that heart had felt, what chastening strokes endured!

But marked ye not that last soft touch, what perfect grace it

gave,

Ere Jesus bore his servant home across the darksome wave?

Home to the place his grace designed that chosen soul to fill,

In the bright temple of the saved, "upon his holy hill;"

Home to the noiselessness, the peace, of those sweet shrines above,

Whose stones shall never be displaced-set in redeeming love.

Lord! chisel, chasten, polish us, each blemish work away, Cleanse us with purifying blood, in spotless robes array; And thus, thine image on us stamped, transport us to the shore,

Where not a stroke is ever felt, for none is needed more.

THE SEXTON.-PARK BENJAMIN.

Nigh to a grave that was newly made,
Leaned a sexton old on his earth-worn spade;
His work was done, and he paused to wait
The funeral-train at the open gate.

A relic of by-gone days was he,

And his locks were gray as the foamy sea;

And these words came from his lips so thin:

66

I gather them in-I gather them in

Gather-gather-I gather them in.

"I gather them in; for man and boy,
Year after year of grief and joy,
I've builded the houses that lie around
In every nook of this burial ground.
Mother and daughter, father and son,
Come to my solitude one by one;
But come they stranger, or come they kin,
I gather them in-I gather them in.

"Many are with me, yet I'm alone;

I'm King of the Dead, and I make my throne
On a monument slab of marble cold-

My sceptre of rule is the spade I hold.

Come they from cottage, or come they from hall,
Mankind are my subjects, all, all, all!

May they loiter in pleasure, or toilfully spin,
I gather them in-Î gather them in.

"I gather them in, and their final rest

Is here, down here, in the earth's dark breast!"
And the sexton ceased as the funeral-train
Wound mutely over that solemn plain;
And I said to myself: When time is told,
A mightier voice than that sexton's old,
Will be heard o'er the last trump's dreadful din
"I gather them in-I gather them in-
Gather-gather-gather them in.”

A DIRGE.-GEORGE CROLY.

"Earth to earth, and dust to dust!"
Here the evil and the just,
Here the youthful and the old,
Here the fearful and the bold,
Here the matron and the maid,
In one silent bed are laid;
Here the vassal and the king
Side by side lie withering;

Here the sword and sceptre rust-
"Earth to earth, and dust to dust!"

Age on age shall roll along

O'er this pale and mighty throng;
Those that wept them, they that weep,
All shall with these sleepers sleep;
Brothers, sisters of the worm,
Summer's sun, or winter's storm,
Song of peace, or battle's roar,

Ne'er shall break their slumbers more;

Death shall keep his sullen trust"Earth to earth, and dust to dust!"

But a day is coming fast-
Earth, thy mightiest and thy last!
It shall come in fear and wonder,
Heralded by trump and thunder;
It shall come in strife and toil,
It shall come in blood and spoil;
It shall come in empires' groans,
Burning temples, ruined thrones;
Then, ambition, rue thy lust!
“Earth to earth, and dust to dust!”