If grandeur's guilty bribe they spurned, And home to virtue's lap returned; The spirit's way henceforth shall be The glorious pathway of the free!

FLOWERS.

"Consider the lilies of the field."

YE beauteous things, I love to stray
Among you in your verdant beds,
And see you shake the dews away,
As joyous wave your brilliant heads.

The voice of music, birds employ
To speak the full heart's happiness;
But, in your case, exuberant joy

Bursts forth, perhaps, in pomp of dress.

Yes-clad in beauty's liveliest robe,
To every eye enjoyment giving,
And scattering fragrance round the globe,
You doubtless feel delight in living.

"Twas said by one,* that ye have wasted,
Unseen, your sweets on desert air,
Because, alas! by man untasted-

Though bird, beast, insect, might be there.

O! modest and profound decision,

That man alone your worth observes;
As though naught else was blest with vision,
Or system of olfactory nerves.

Pray, how knew he that all man misses

Is wasted on the desert air?

Or that the bee-like bird that kisses
The blossom, sees no beauty there?

But there's no desert-air and earth
With hum of sentient being rings;
The spot that gives a flow'ret birth

Is quickly fanned by insect wings.

Yes, beauteous things, I love to stray
Among you in your verdant bed,
To mark your Heaven-ordained array,

And breathe the sweetness round you spread.

* Gray's Elegy:

"Full many a flower is born to blush unseen,

And waste its sweetness on the desert air."

And oft among you when I wander,

Will serious thought expand her wings,

And taught by you my spirit ponder

On higher and on holier things.

Proofs of our Heavenly Father's love,
Who clad you in a garb so fair,
Ye bid me hope that I may prove
An object of his guardian care.

Ye bid me hope that He who wrought Such glorious robes for fading grass; Will not cast off, if humbly sought,

His creature of a nobler class.

PIERPONT.

BENEVOLENCE.

BENEVOLENCE is that emotion of the mind, which inclines us to sympathise with the feelings of others, and prompts to the relief of suffering. It is manifested not only in desiring to confer happiness, but in avoiding every thing which would give unnecessary pain. Like every other affection of the mind, its healthful state depends upon its proper exercise and direction. If, instead of sympathising with real distress, it is expended in mourning over fictitious and imaginary sorrows, or if, when the sorrow is real, it is unaccompanied by prompt and corresponding action, benevolence degenerates into a sickly sensibility, unproductive of good either to ourselves or others. It is a common error with the young, to overlook the little every day occasions for the exercise of this virtue, while they lament that they are