JOHN PIERPONT,

THE author of the "Airs of Palestine," is a native of Litchfield, Connecticut, and was born on the sixth of April, 1785. Having embarked in business which resulted disastrously, in 1816 he sought a solace in literary pursuits, and in the same year published "The Airs of Palestine." Soon afterwards he entered seriously upon the study of theology, first by himself, in Baltimore, and afterwards as a member of the theological school connected with Harvard College. He left that seminary in October, 1818, and in April, 1819, was ordained as minister of the Hollis-street Unitarian Church, in Boston, as successor to the Rev. Dr. Holley, who had recently been elected to the presidency of the Transylvania University, in Kentucky. In 1835 and 1836, in consequence of impaired health, he spent a year abroad, passing through the principal cities in England, France, and Italy, and extending his tour into the East, visiting Smyrna, the ruins of Ephesus, in Asia Minor, Constantinople, and Athens, Corinth, and some of the other cities of Greece; of his travels in which, traces will occasionally be found in some of the short poems which he has written since his return. Many of his hymns, odes, and other brief poems, are remarkably spirited and melodious. Several of them, distinguished alike for energy of thought and language, were educed by events connected with the moral and religious enterprises of the time. Mr. Pierpont-now sixty-three years of age is settled in Troy, New York.

MY CHILD.

I CANNOT make him dead!

His fair sunshiny head

Is ever bounding round my study chair;
Yet, when my eyes, now dim
With tears, I turn to him,

The vision vanishes-he is not there!

I walk my parlor floor,
And, through the open door,

I hear a footfall on the chamber stair;
I'm stepping towards the hall

To give the boy a call;

And then bethink me that he is not there!

I thread the crowded street;

A satchelled lad I meet,

With the same beaming eyes and colored hair:
And, as he's running by,
Follow him with my eye,
Scarcely believing that-he is not there!

I know his face is hid
Under the coffin lid;

Closed are his eyes; cold is his forehead;
My hand that marble felt;

O'er it in prayer I knelt;

Yet my heart whispers that he is not there!

I cannot make him dead!
When passing by the bed,

So long watched over with parental care,
My spirit and my eye

Seek it inquiringly,

Before the thought comes that he is not there!

When, at the cool, gray break

Of day, from sleep I wake,

With my first breathing of the morning air

My soul goes up, with joy,

To Him who gave my boy,

Then comes the sad thought that he is not there!

When at the day's calm close,

Before we seek repose,

I'm with his mother, offering up our prayer,
Whate'er I may be saying,

I am, in spirit, praying

For our boy's spirit, though-he is not there!

Not there!-Where, then, is he?

The form I used to see

Was but the raiment that he used to wear.
The grave, that now doth press

Upon that cast-off dress,

Is but his wardrobe locked;-he is not there!

He lives!—In all the past

He lives; nor, to the last,

Of seeing him again will I despair;
In dreams I see him now;

And, on his angel brow,

I see it written, "Thou shalt see me there!"

Yes, we all live to God!

FATHER, thy chastening rod

So help us, thine afflicted ones, to bear,
That, in the spirit-land,

Meeting at thy right hand,

"Twill be our heaven to find that-he is there!

HER CHOSEN SPOT.

WHILE yet she lived, she walked alone
Among these shades. A voice divine
Whispered, "This spot shall be thine own;
Here shall thy wasting form recline,
Beneath the shadow of this pine."

"Thy will be done!" the sufferer said.

This spot was hallowed from that hour;
And, in her eyes, the evening's shade
And morning's dew this green spot made
More lovely than her bridal bower.

By the pale moon-herself more pale

And spirit-like-these walks she trod; And, while no voice, from swell or vale, Was heard, she knelt upon this sod And gave her spirit back to God.

That spirit, with an angel's wings,

Went up from the young mother's bed: So, heavenward, soars the lark and sings. She's lost to earth and earthly things; weep not, for she is not dead,

But "

She sleepeth!" Yea, she sleepeth here,
The first that in these grounds hath slept.
This grave, first watered with the tear
That child or widowed man hath wept,
Shall be by heavenly watchmen kept.

The babe that lay on her cold breast

A rosebud dropped on drifted snow— Its young hand in its father's pressed, Shall learn that she, who first caressed Its infant check, now sleeps below.

And often shall he come alone,

When not a sound but evening's sigh
Is heard, and, bowing by the stone
That bears his mother's name, with none
But God and guardian angels nigh,

Shall say,

"This was my mother's choice For her own grave: O, be it mine! Even now, methinks, I hear her voice Calling me hence, in the divine And mournful whisper of this pine."

JERUSALEM.

JERUSALEM, Jerusalem,

How glad should I have been,
Could I, in my lone wanderings,
Thine aged walls have seen!—
Could I have gazed upon the dome
Above thy towers that swells,

And heard, as evening's sun went down,
Thy parting camels' bells:-

Could I have stood on Olivet,

Where once the Saviour trod,

And, from its height, looked down upon
The city of our God;

For is it not, Almighty God,
Thy holy city still,—

Though there thy prophets walk no more,—
That crowns Moriah's hill?

Thy prophets walk no more, indeed,

The streets of Salem now,

Nor are their voices lifted up

On Zion's saddened brow;
Nor are their garnished sepulchres
With pious sorrow kept,

Where once the same Jerusalem,
That killed them, came and wept.

But still the seed of Abraham
With joy upon it look,
And lay their ashes at its feet,
That Kedron's feeble brook
Still washes, as its waters creep
Along their rocky bed,

And Israel's God is worshipped yet

Where Zion lifts her head.

Yes; every morning, as the day

Breaks over Olivet,

The holy name of Allah comes

From every minaret;

At every eve the mellow call

Floats on the quiet air,

"Lo, God is God! Before him come,
Before him come, for prayer!"

I know, when at that solemn call
The city holds her breath,

That Omar's mosque hears not the name
Of Him of Nazareth;

But Abraham's God is worshipped there

Alike by age and youth,

And worshipped,-hopeth charity,"In spirit and in truth."