• to make my exit with a fortitude becoming those sacred principles to which I have adhered.'

Here, with a tender confusion in his looks, he abruptly left the place, and gave me leisure to reflect on the odd conversation that had passed. But as visionary as some part of it appears, I would fain believe the soft confession he made is no fiction; for I find myself excessively in love. But this shall be a secret to the young enthusiast, till he has got over this splenetic fit; which, as whimsical as it appears, gives me a secret uneasiness. He has certainly infected me with some religious panics. I have lost my taste for every kind of diversion. Company is molesting, and solitude tiresome. Self-reflection distracts me: whether I look forward or backward, the prospect is all confusion. But I shall expose myself, by owning these weaknesses to one of your character. Adieu, &c.

LAURA.

LETTER VI.

OH! my Aurelia! I have surprising things to tell you! The lovely Philocles is dead. His presages were too certain. About a week after our last interview, I heard the melancholy tidings, that Sir Harry Lizzard had lost his only son by a sudden death. The charming youth was impatient of mortality, and is gone to converse with his kindred angels.

You will wonder to hear me treat those subjects seriously which I have till now ridiculed. It is a change that I myself can hardly credit. I never imagined my inclinations were so tenderly engaged, nor that any kind of adversity could have made such an alteration on my temper.

After the first emotions of grief were over, I recollected the appointment we had made; but rather wished than believed such an interview possible. However my mind was prepared for conviction. I began to reason with Cato,

If there's a pow'r above,

He must delight in virtue;

And that which he delights in must be happy.”

I found myself now interested in the truths of Christianity. The firm belief of a life everlasting would in this exigence have been my greatest consolation. My hopes and fears prevailed by intervals, and kept me in the most tormenting suspense, while I waited for the decisive hour. As soon as it came, without any con

sternation, I attended at the appointed place.

་

Every

It was a charming retreat, where art and luxurious nature displayed their various beauties. The evening was still; the sun in golden splendour, descending to the western skies, glittered through the trees. thing looked gay; new life and beauty appeared on alt the vernal prospect; the plants put on a fresher green, the flowers displayed a brighter hue, and diffused ambrosial fragrancy. Nature seemed animated with a conscious joy, as gladdened at the approach of some heavenly power.

An unusual alacrity inspired my thoughts, and soothed my soul with a secret delight; while a soft melodibus sound, rising by just degrees, filled the region round with transporting harmony.

In the height of these agreeable agitations, as the rosy morning breaks from a cloud, the charming Philocles stood apparent before me. There was something in his aspect so serene and beneficent, such a sweetness and affability, that banished every thought of fear, and filled my breast with divine tranquillity. Ineffable pleasure sparkled in his eyes; youth in eternal triumph sat on his brow, and painted his face with a rosy bloom. His temples were circled with a wreath of celestial roses; which were mingled among his flowing hair with a sort of ornamental negligence.

After a short pause, he began with a voice that would have allayed the anguish of death, and charmed the wildest discord into calm attention; every accent breathed celestial love and harmony, while he described the bowers of bliss, the soft recesses and mansions of im

mortal pleasure. But it is impossible for me to paint the beautiful ideas, or imitate the emphasis of his language. The powers of eloquence sat on his tongue, and commanded all the motions of my soul, which, at that blissful period, seemed enlarged in its superior faculties; every word was penetrating and significant, his manner perfectly graceful and transporting in his des criptions I saw the glories, I felt the joys of immortality. But, in the midst of my attention to the sparkling orator, I could not help observing, that he often cast his eye on the shadow of a dial, which was placed on the top of a little marble pedestal, on which, with a becoming gesture, he leaned with his right hand. I fancied his time was limited, for at the last glance, I saw him cast on the dial, he vanished, and with him all my joys. This momentary view of celestial beauty has obscured all earthly glory. Never will the sun disclose a scene of pleasure to my sight; the vanities which lately amused me, have lost their charms; my thoughts are fixed on superior objects; a divine and immortal ardour inspires my soul, and determines all its motions. With the evidence I now have of a future existence, my notions of happiness are refined and enlarged, my hopes bright and unlimited,

Adieu, my dear Aurelia I am not without hopes, that this relation will have the same effect on your practice, as the heavenly vision has on that of

Madam,

Your most humble servant,

LAURA.

Amoret to Corsica.

FROM the black regions, from the mournful plains,

Where horror in eternal triumph reigns:
From the low caves of hell, the dens of night,

Far from the frontiers of celestial light;

This from the wretched Amoret receive,
And at my cost these dreadful truths believe.
That 'tis no fiction pious men adore,
But there's indeed a just almighty Power;
That human spirits after death survive,
And to interminable ages live;

That fields of light, and blest ethereal plains,
Are no conceits of visionary brains :

But there are happy bowers, and shades of love,
With pure exhaustless springs of joy above;
Immortal crowns the virt'ous to reward,
And glorious triumphs for the just prepar❜d.
Nor question the surprising truths I tell,
While I the secrets of the deep reveal;
For hell is no enthusiastic dream,

No statesman's trick, nor poet's fab'lous theme;
No pious fraud, or mercenary lie

Of subtle priests, to gain the conscience by.
'Tis all too sadly true which they maintain,
And far beyond whate'er the poets feign,
Of streams of liquid fire, and burning lakes,
Infernal gibbets, and eternal racks,

Gorgons, chimeras, furies, and their snakes.
No mortal can a just conception frame,
Nor find for half the terrors here a name.

Then shun the flow'ry paths that downward tend;
To hell they lead, and in damnation end.
Fly from the snares of that enchanting sin,
Whose fatal joys have my perdition been.
Like thee, with all the pride of beauty gay,
In loose delights, I lately spent the day;
Like thee accomplish'd, and like thee admir'd,
My eyes the savage and polite inspir'd.

Whene'er I spoke, my wit new conquest won;
Thousands come here, by my soft airs undone ;
With wild surprise, my alter'd looks they view,
And with loud curses still my flight pursue.
For learn, before too late, licentious fair,
Each face does here an equal horror wear,
And, undistinguish'd, youth and age appear.

}

Depriv'd of ev'ry charm, and ev'ry grace,
We all descend to this detested place,
Illustrious Helen, once the Grecian pride,
In folding shades her hated form would hide;
And conscious Thais fears to be descry'd,
I saw them lately by the trembling gleams,
The pale blue light of inauspicious flames;
No blushes paint their cheeks, their wanton eyes
No more with love's contagious darts surprise.
Rash Cleopatra mourns her hasty doom,
And glides a hideous spectre through the gloom,
Fam'd Julia thro' the crowd's no longer known;
Ev'n Ovid's eyes her blasted charms disown.
Curs'd be the arts that did my soul betray,
And led my easy virtue first astray.

}

'Tis pastand my repentance comes too late.
But thou may'st yet avoid this cruel fate.
Perfidious beauty, quit the roads of vice;
Its smooth descents to certain death entice.
Like Dives, from th' infernal coasts I send,
To warn my careless unbelieving friend.
For thou, while yet a lovely guiltless maid,
To sin, by my example, was betray'd:
And shouldst thou to these mournful regions come,
'Twould vastly aggravate my heavy doom.

To Cleone.

FROM the bright realms, and happy fields above, The seats of pleasure and immortal love, Where joys no more on airy chance depend, All health to thee from those gay climes I send. For thee my tender passion is the same, Nor death itself has quench'd the noble flame; For charms like thine, for ever fix the mind, And with eternal obligations bind.