ward. The rich expostulator for place, preceded us in entering the room, and I could hear her again whispering to her consort, “Do speak to the landlord; it is too bad." Seward's place, by the by, as he afterwards told me, was equally interfered with by the tormentor of this poor sufferer, but he quietly seated himself without any outcry. His interest with the government procured me a seat Opposite was a Dutch baron, as he called himself, who understood English badly, and spoke it worse. He was perpetually falling into blunders, into which Seward acting upon Addison's humane rule, was perpetually plunging him deeper. near. CHAPTER V. As budding branches round a tree,- MEADE. THE sun had just set, and the evening breeze was freshening from the waters, when I went out to pay my respects to the ocean. Upon the whole, perhaps, I would as lief have gone alone, but encountering accidentally on my way a person whom I had formerly known well and esteemed very highly, I proposed to him to join my ram» ble. He assented and we went forward together. William Herand, was one of my earliest acquaintances at school, and without any very tender feelings upon either side, there existed a tolerably warm friendship between us during the whole period of our connexion as fellow-students. From some poetical compositions of his which I had seen, the production of his youngest years, I had formed a high opinion of his genius; and I was accustomed to think of him, when in subsequent days my memory recurred to our former acquaintance, as one, who if occasion were propitious, would probably be distinguished in after life. He was one of those persons that we occasionally meet with, who seem formed for pre-eminence, and to have that pre-eminence yielded by all; one whose frank and cordial character excited so warm a personal regard and interest, that in admitting or asserting his claims to superiority, each seemed to be gratifying his own private pride. He was undoubtedly the most admired of all who were at the school while I remained there; and his perfectly good temper and constant readiness to engage in amusement rendered him also the most popular. To tasks requiring either original genius, or acquired learning, he seemed equally fitted; he appeared to reach by a certain instinct of mind, that familiarity with difficult and unusual subjects, which others by the most plodding diligence, less successfully attained. With decided and unquestionable poetical powers, he united none of that moodiness of feeling and that lawlessness of passion, which the history of Lord Byron, and the theories of Mr. Moore, have taught the world to consider indispensable attributes of the poetical character. If the practice of one member of a profession could have justified a doubt of the necessity of those qualities which are usually demanded from the rest, I might have believed from the evidence which he afforded me, that one might still be a bard without ceasing to be a man of honour, of principle, and of decency, and that, after all, there was no such inevitable divorcement between the writing of verses and the performance of the reasonable duties of life. As we walked on to the shore, we passed a large party of men and women, who were loudly pronouncing the sea and the sky to be "very fine," while a female of the company was repeating with an air of Pythonessan inspiration, what she called "those sweet lines of Buyron," "Oh! that the desert were my dwelling-place!" "O that it were, indeed!" cried Herand; “ you cannot wish it more devoutly than I do. Gracious Heaven! If these vulgar and illiterate admirers of Lord Byron could imagine the ineffable disgust with which that haughty poet would regard them, were he again alive, I think that their enthusiasm would be somewhat cooled. Pish! let us escape from these romantic fools, who realize the Per sian description of a sacred animal of that country, whose ears are so long that when he lies upon his side, one of them serves for a mattress, and the other for a coverlet." "He must indeed be greedy of admiration,” said I, “who can relish the morsel from so foul a plate. One is almost reconciled to insignificance when it is among the penalties of distinction to excite such applause. A man may be content to allow his skiff to lie dry upon the beach, when he sees what wretched parasital shell-fish cling about the keel of those vessels which have ventured on the ocean, in numbers sometimes great enough to break up the voyage." We presently reached a retired part of the beach, where the broad expanse of the waters extended before the eye in all their silent majesty. The sentinel surges gleamed far along the shore like a white-plumed triple line of soldiers, to guard the rest of the deep. "It is a glad and glorious pastime to the spirit," said my companion, "to look upon this type and token of Almighty power-to wrestle with the living thoughts which dwell like things amid the stir and strife of these eternal waters to encounter the strong breathlessness of awe which is dashed upon the soul as we inhale at a glance the vastness of the scene. Upon the face of the deep, the spirit of eternity still is brooding: as we pause before this wide unbarriered space, and our naked mind stands bold against the unveiled, eternal universe, a silent thought of homage swells through the endless space; and that thought is God. The ocean is the material image of the Almighty: what attribute of Deity is not here substantial? Power, of an infinite fulness;-beauty, of that particular pervadingness of essence, that rain and tempest, and the beaks of winds evolve and not efface it;-life, abstract and indestructible, that never wearies and that never wastes-whose days know not repose, and upon whose bosom the cloud of nightly slumber never weighs. If the dancing water brook should cease to chant his praises who inspired its gladness,-or if the infuriate storm-blast as it gnashes through the forest, should burst from its bands, and disown its Maker ;-if men should ever gaze upon the western sun, and forget whose countenance its brightness mirrors, or rest upon the mountain turf, nor own from whose omnipotence the strength of the hills has sprung;-if the knowledge of the Infinite One shall ever pass away from the earth, the roar of the ocean will thunder it back. It was the sublime intention of Nicholas Ferrar that a perpetual chant or solemn service of music should be established at Little Gidding, to be sustained by generation after generation, and continued to the end of time without the interruption of a moment. He wished that, whatever might be the condition of men or the character of the times, the voice of praise might ever be ascending; that it should rise amid the roar of contest, like a smiling lotus through a tangled ruin, and be the blended harmony of all the thoughts of peace; that the ancestor and his descendant might unite in the same song of thanksgiving, and century be bound to century by an all-embracing stream of worship. What the saint designed, the sea performs. There are times perhaps in which from human lips throughout the broad extent of the earth, no sound of prayer or praise is heard; but the listening seraph who looks out from the windows of heaven, hears the organ of the waters peal everlastingly. It is not without an influence which may be termed holy,-for its beginning is fear and its effect is cleansing,-that we muse within this great cathedral of the sky-roofed deep. When first seen by man, it gives him a thought and a disturbance, which though nothing can have ever before started such emotions within him, seem strangely familiar to his feelings. And when we claim instinctive brotherhood with that which stretches back, like a broad sheet of light, to the first moment that the gush of sun-beams flowed down upon the waves, and forwards till the depth of the heavens shall be opened, we realize one of those moments of existence in which man feels his immortality and trembles at it. There are thoughts of mystery and dreams of magic floating around this scene; and there are those who have feasted on them till they have become maddened, and their life has turned to parching thirst for the fulness of these unearthly sentiments. But such thoughts are the food of heaven; and while I would labour for their recognition as the proof of heaven, I would postpone their en joyment to another life, and abide in hope till the veil of the flesh which dims them, is withdrawn." "There are," said I, "many faculties of the heart whose true sphere of exercise is not in this world, and which bear in the fact of their being, unequivocal testimony that the intellectual frame wherein they are lodged, is destined for employment in another field of existence. And you have indicated truly the use which should be made of them: we should question them of their secret, elicit from them the truth which they have to impart, and then dismiss them to be more fully developed in the due revolution of time. And I cannot help thinking that much of the scheme of practical Christianity has the same prospective reference. We do wrong in supposing that to the earth, only, or even chiefly, is confined the application of the requisitions of the Scriptures; that this globe is the only acting theatre of man, and that the future is but a scene of calm and impassive enjoyment. Our preachers err in limiting to this small arena a struggle and an endeavour which will last through eternity,-in confining within mundane limits, a mystery which fills immensity. Instead of a benignant blessing to man it were a bitter mockery of his helplessness, to expect him to attain the full measure of that perfection, than which no more belongs to consummate purity: to demand of him to familiarize to his bosom and to expound by his conduct a system before whose unfathomable obscurity angel and archangel bow in humility; to comprehend which, cherubic wisdom must pray for added intelligence; to fulfil which, seraphic ardour is not too sufficient. My opinion is, that those commands which are enjoined upon us here, are intended in their completeness to apply to our conduct in future worlds, when by cumulative energy through successive stages we shall arrive at a moral vigour in some measure adequate to the task. And in the very mode of the exposition of these matters in the Scriptures, I read a confirmation of this opinion; for the doctrine of faith is therein fully and satisfactorily laid open, but the precepts of practice are imperfectly and in many cases impracticably developed; giving glimpses, as it were, of that complete scheme, whose revelation is reserved for other spheres. For spiritual existence in the great archipelago |