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Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song!
And let the young Lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound!

We in thought will join your throng,
Ye that pipe and ye that play,
Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of this May!

What though the radiance which was once so bright
Be now for ever taken from my sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour
Of splendour in the grass, or glory in the flower;
We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy

Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring
Out of human suffering;

In the faith that looks through death,
In years that bring the philosophic mind.

And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hill, and Groves,
Forebode not any severing of our loves!

Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;
I only have relinquished one delight

To live beneath your more habitual sway.

I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,
Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;
The innocent brightness of a new-born Day

Is lovely yet;

The Clouds that gather round the setting sun
Do take a sober colouring from an eye
That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;

Another race hath been, and other palms are won.
Thanks to the human heart by which we live,
Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.

Wordsworth.

An "Atheist's" Religion.-What a divine religion might be found out, if charity were really made the principle of it, instead of faith.-Shelley.

The worst of all fallen angels we take to be those who have fallen out of antipathies, and not out of sympathies.-Leigh Hunt.

Man.-In any point of Space, in any section of Time, let there be a living man, and there is an Infinitude above and beneath him, and an Eternity encompasses him on this side and that; and tones of Sphere Music, and tidings from loftier worlds, will flit around him if he can but listen, and visit him with holy influences, even in the thickest press of trivialities, or the din of busiest life.-Edinburgh Review.

THE MOON-WORSHIPPER.
Thou gentlest One, how beautiful thou art!
Thy soft smile kisseth me: Dear Lady Moon,
That pallid grace foldeth in my still heart
A passionate melody, which seems to part
Life from annoyance; a delicious swoon,
Wherein as phantom clouds fade in thy light
Devouring them continually-the might
Of shadowy sorrow quaileth trancedly!
Fair Majesty, that steepest the calm night
In the music of thy loveliness, till sky
And earth and sea embrace voluptuously-
Be thou an Omnipresence in my sight;
Companion me with the intense delight
Of thine abiding pure tranquillity!

Z.

RELIGION.

IN the depth of the dim wood, in some grey cave, on the wild sea-shore, or on the balmy mountain top, in some sweet solitude, beautiful as the passed Life, peaceful as that life's rest, would Love lay the ashes of the Loved. With his own hands would he fashion her last couch. Unannoyed by the obtrusiveness of strangers, by the heedlessness of hirelings; unaided save by the loving and lamenting, the Widowed would perform the last office for the dust that needeth no service. There would his grief seek comfort, communing in silence and tranquillity with that loveliness wherein the Most Beautiful yet might seem to linger: sure that no unholy tread should profane the hallowed earth; that no unmoistened eye should laugh to scorn the heart's fidelity; that no rude hand should rend the flowers drooping o'er that purest breast, wherefrom their gentle being drew light, and fragrance, and an echoing of melodious beauty. Why is the trampling of hirelings in the house of mourning? Why do not the hands, that smoothed the pillow of sickness, bear the outworn to the couch of rest? Why should the utterance of the most solenm parting be the bought and formal words of cold-hearted or careless strangers and hirelings? If the awed silence of grief must be broken, when earth receives back her own, and the spirit returns to God, and the place of the Lovely is vacant-who should speak the words of consolation but those whose affection has been already ministrant; who should say, Farewell! but the One most wishful for the traveller's welfare?-What hindereth this? what unpitying hate mocketh the thrall of grief, trampling on the sorrow-broken? It is the World's Religion! It is the world's command that human thoughts and human passions shall bow down before accustomed forms. The world's irreligious forms! RELIGION is not custom; it is no legal ordinance; it is not line upon line, or precept upon precept; it is not a changeful thing of Time, a habit of Yesterday. True Religion is the melody that dwelleth in all things, omnipresent and eternal, whose manifestations and ministerings are the echoings of that BEAUTY which is the soul of the Universe. What have forms and ceremonies, arbitrarily established, and to be bought and sold, and forced or counterfeited, to do with Religion? Shall we be content with wearing the form of a heart? Alas that the services from humanity to humanity, which should be rendered freely and lovingly, should be shut up in a den of thieves, in the poor storehouses of Commerce, only to be bought when spoiled and worthless! There is no religion in a hired and prescribed service. It is not religious to buy a few hypocritical phrases to throw into the grave of the Beloved. The pompous

hearse, the feathers and the mutes, the pall, the passing under an arched roof where unconcerned officials prate by rote, the crowding of sorrow and curiosity, of pity and trade, around the grave, the reading of appointed words, the indecent and business-like lowering of the coffin, the trampling over the dead to disentangle ropes, the after refreshment at some hostelry, and the distribution of gloves and hatbands-these are not religious forms, but formal insults cast at the religion of humanity, at the poetry of the human heart.

The law-ordained mummery is over. Priests and bearers are laughing over the wages of their trouble. The grass is growing over the grave. In some confined corner, where the dead are thrust, as if the living would forget them; amid the many monuments of ostentation and hypocrisy, which make burialgrounds like masons' show-rooms; there is one record that lieth not. It needs no epitaph. Enough, that the Loved was there laid to rest. There is no marble monument exquisitely and elaborately sculptured, but living things are drooping over that grave; and the Religion of Sorrow is there. The little children, carelessly sporting among the tombs, gay as the flowers upon the green hillocks-seem they with their lightheartedness to profane this worship? Theirs too is a religious service: the thanksgiving laugh of healthful childhood on the very lap of Death. Doth the flower-bearing and buoyant Spring insult the bygone Winter? Do not the fair Wind-flowers bloom amid the dead leaves of last Autumn's scattering? Not in the carelessness of inexperienced childhood, but in the heedlessness of observant manhood (or manhood which ought to be observant), is the insult to religion. The children have approached the grave. Their merriment is hushed at the sight of tears. Wondering, yet in simplicity and faith, they pay the religious homage of Pity. O, thou strict religionist! which is the better form-the pious earnestness of the paid priest, or the promise of the little child that she will tend the flowers upon the grave, and keep her playmates from injuring them? Dry thine eyes, dear Child! Resume thy truthful laugh! It is the solemnity of the unpitying stranger that is offensive.

Why linger we in the place of graves? Away, over the sunny fields, to the forest glades! Is there not religion there? Listen to the sky-piercing lark !

"Like a star of heaven,

In the broad day-light

Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight."

Hear, and heed! for the bird's song is a holier hymn than the organ-aided Te Deum. The air is filled with the words of innumerable thanksgivings. Not alone the Love-music of the birds, the melodious hummings of the bees, which greet the ears even of those who listen not; from the busy ant-world ariseth the multitudinous echoing of the myriad footfalls, the rustling as of far voices; the warm winds are whispering in the tree tops. There is enjoyment everywhere: and Enjoyment is thankfulness, is Religion. There is music everywhere: and Harmony is Religion. Follow the gurgling brook that dances over the pebbles to the sound of its own mirth; and if thou hast Poetry— which is Religion-in thy soul, learn from that how holy is melody! If thou hast poetry!-Who can be destitute of the Spirit of God? Were we not all made in God's image, in the likeness of the Spiritual? Then are the Poets God's Prophets, they alone the Redeemers of mankind, they the most devout worshippers of Nature's Spirit; whose earnest contemplations find

"Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in everything."

See the stream gushing over yon ledge of mossy rock: the wayfarer halteth there to slake his thirst. Tired with his day's march, yet more worn with his life's journeying, is the traveller. He is a man of trade-of craft and guile : but, as he drinks the clear water from the hollow of his hand, a smile of gratitude leapeth from his grey eyes, through the veil of the accustomed caution; and he passeth on his way, a better man for that momentary devotion.

Let him sell his wares as honestly as the despotic Rules of Commerce will allow! What beareth he? Linen for priests' vestments; fine linen for the altars' covering. What! are even the things dedicated to God matters of dishonest speculation? In the purchased garment (perhaps the very money which purchased it having been stolen-why not violence as well as the fraud of traffic?) God's Minister stands between God's altar and God's children. They may not utter the feelings which demand expression: he must speak, not the meaning of their thoughts, but a monotonous form of words, which, perhaps, suits not the feelings of any. He stands between the people and the altar. Alas! even the altar is covered with an unclean altar-cloth; and the inscription thereupon is hidden from the worshippers. "God is a spirit: and they, who worship him, must worship him in spirit and in truth." Thou, who callest thyself the Priest of the Holy One! why liest thou to the people? why hidest thou the inscription of the altar? Is the senseless jargon of an antiquated ritual, a worship of the spirit? Can there be truth in the worship. of the multitude, when the same inexpressive words are put into the mouths of all, their circumstances so widely differing? (Thanksgiving for the oppressed and sorehunted; calm looking to God for the oppressor; contrition, bewailing of enormities, confession of intolerable misery, from the innocent and happy; and promises of blessing for the selfish and unrelenting.) Is it religion to enact laws that only upon certain days the Supreme Beneficence shall be worshipped, that only in certain forms he shall be permitted to receive worship? Though their words were of divinest eloquence, yet marvel not that this wordreligion rules not the lives of those from whose hearts it proceeded not. Marvel not, that those, who are compelled hypocrites before God, should be liars to their fellow-men; that the curse of their blasphemy against the Holy Spirit pursueth them to their homes; that they live without faith, without hope, saying with the fool-There is no God; all men are liars; all things are a mockery!

Back again to the forest haunts! Out of the world's war sometimes, lest thy heart be possessed by hypocrisy, and the worship of Nature and Truth become an undesired thing!

"It is a beauteous evening, calm and free;

The holy time is quiet as a Nun
Breathless with adoration."

There has been heavy rain; and the parched earth has been refreshed, even as a fierce passion is relieved in tears. In the dreamy twilight the beautiful spirits of the olden fables are again apparent-spirits of mist, and wierd forms wandering through the long tree-aisles, Dryad and Oread, "in the dim dis tance fugitive."

"From one lonely cloud

The moon rains out her beams, and heaven is overflow'd."

O thou most beautiful, thou that pourest calm into the night-watcher's troubled heart! who, that thou smilest on, is not religious? There is music in the universal silence, and the silent expression of religious sympathy with the beauty in which the night is steeped. Not silent long.

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Are not these God's worshippers? Are not they, too, religious-yon love-stricken youth and maiden, in whose hearts is the burden of a hymn of sweet accord, more musical than the moonlight or that thrilling melody. He is one whose

brows have been sealed with the kiss of Love, one chosen to bear Love's name through the battle of Life; and she-look into those deep blue eyes, that meet the moon's gaze with answering beauty! What need is there of words? Beauty communeth with Beauty: the Beautiful is never silent. Spirit of Love! this is thy holiest worship; this thine own religion. Priest and Devotee! be silent. Here is a better creed than ye have ever taught or learned! THE BEST RELIGION IS LOVE: THE BEST WORSHIP IS HAPPINESS! In the heart-thrill that echoes that impassioned embrace, there is a melody most grateful to the Universal Harmony; in that intense gaze, which seeth a home in the far world, is the expression of the holiest faith that ever passed o'er mortal lips. These are God's appointed priests; these have entered the Holy of Holies; ever, in the truthfulness of their hearts' religion, are they devoted to the service of the Eternal: these are Ministers of Good to Humanity equally with the Apostle of the Beautiful, the Messenger of LOVE, to prepare His way before Him, who, from grey youth to dim age, beareth the Good Tidings over the fearful earth; unarmoured, for his heart is bare; homeless, save when he resteth him from his long travail in the farspreading shadow of the Accomplished; and uncompanioned, save by the Spirit of his own Destiny, whose severe eyes look lovingly upon him, who guideth him through the untracked wilderness, upstaying his feebleness, cheering him with words of the Hidden Melody, and leading him equally and gently to the mooned night of Death-the portal of the Morrow's Life.

RELIGION IS NOT FORM, BUT HEART-WORSHIP.

REVELATIONS OF TRUTH.

CHAP. XVIII.

CHRISTIANS! for what purpose enter ye into the Temple of God? Is it not to thank and praise him for his goodness; to petition him for a continuance of his blessing; to contemplate the magnificence of his glory? There the rich and poor meet together: the Lord is the maker of them all. Ay! they meet together, and under the same roof; but they are sorted and divided as if the poor man were of an inferior clay: he must stand aloof from his rich and well-dressed brother; his touch would contaminate, his very presence is an abomination.

What! shall the patched or ragged garment of poverty sit by the side of silks and feathers; shall the tattered gown profane with its foul contact the superior sanctity of yon gorgeous mantle? Reserve a corner for the unfortunates:-There stand, ye poor ones! and thank your scornful masters that their grace so much accords you!

Why are not these miserable distinctions forgotten in the presence of your God?

Behold how high the heaven is in comparison with the earth: can ye compare earth's loftiest with the Infinite? How less than little, then, the difference between the emperor and the most humble.

Are not ye all of the same form, having the same senses, and wants and passions? Is the proud man fearless of the lightning; beareth he hunger better than the woe-worn beggar; or doth he more despise, or is he more free from, infirmity and pain?

Is the noble wiser or better for the accident of his birth? Is the poet ploughman inferior to the inane and debauched aristocrat; the virtuous peasant less honourable than the royal harlot?

And if the noble is wise and virtuous, what is it that ennobleth him, his title or his virtue? Is an empty name better than wisdom; or esteem more to be desired than worth?

There is no nobility but virtue: and virtue striveth not for the place of precedence.

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