When outward loveliness was index fair
Of purity within: but oft, alas!

The bloom was on the skin alone; and when
She saw, sad sight! the roses on her cheek
Wither, and heard the voice of fame retire
And die away, she heaved most piteous sighs,
And wept most lamentable tears; and whiles,
In wild delirium, made rash attempt,
Unholy mimickry of Nature's work!

To re-create, with frail and mortal things,
Her wither'd face. Attempt how fond and vain!
Her frame itself, soon mouldered down to dust;
And in the land of deep forgetfulness,

Her beauty and her name were laid beside
Eternal silence, and the loathsome worm;
Into whose darkness flattery ventured not;

Where none had ears to hear the voice of Fame. vol.i. pp. 107-114. That happiest period of man's history, the Millennium, is afterwards described, with much beauty. Images of love and friendship, of patriotism and domestic virtue, are brought successively before us, with great felicity; and we should gladly rest, did our limits permit, among these soothing objects of contemplation. The following, however, is too sweet to be omitted; and when it is recollected that the speaker is one who is looking back through eternity on the scenes of his earthly existence, we are filled with interesting thoughts. We have no doubt that the faithful servants of God will enjoy the heaven in which the bard is represented as abiding; and it is most consonant with the few ideas we can have on such a subject, that every past period of existence, whether on earth or in heaven, will be capable of recal.

Nor unremembered is the hour when friends
Met; friends but few on earth, and therefore dear.
Sought oft, and almost sought as oft in vain :
Yet always sought; so native to the heart,

So much desired and coveted by all.

Nor'wonder thou-thou wonder'st not, nor need'st;
Much beautiful, and excellent, and fair

Was seen beneath the sun; but nought was seen
More beautiful, or excellent, or fair

Than face of faithful friend; fairest when seen
In darkest day. And many sounds were sweet,
Most ravishing, and pleasant to the ear;
But sweeter none than voice of faithful friend;
Sweet always, sweetest heard in loudest storm.
Some I remember, and will ne'er forget;
My early friends, friends of my evil day
Friends in my mirth, friends in my misery too;
Friends given my God in mercy and in love;
My counsellors, my comforters, and guides;
My joy in grief, my second bliss in joy;

Companions of my young desires; in doubt
My oracles, my wings in high pursuit.
O, I remember, and will ne'er forget,
Our meeting spots, our chosen sacred hours;
Our burning words, that uttered all the soul;
Our faces beaming with unearthly love ;-
Sorrow with sorrow sighing, hope with hope
Exulting, heart embracing heart entire.
As birds of social feather helping each
His fellow's flight, we soared into the skies,
And cast the clouds beneath our feet, and earth,
With all her tardy leaden-footed cares,

And talked the speech, and ate the food of heaven.
These I remember, these selectest men;
And would their names record-but what avails
My mention of their name; before the throne
They stand illustrious 'mong the loudest harps,
And will receive thee glad, my friend and theirs.
For all are friends in heaven; all faithful friends;
And many friendships in the days of Time
Begun, are lasting here, and growing still:
So grows ours evermore, both theirs and mine.
Nor is the hour of lonely walk forgot,
In the wide desert, where the view was large.
Pleasant were many scenes, but most to me
The solitude of vast extent, untouched

By hand of art, where nature sowed, herself,

And reaped her crops;-whose garments were the clouds;
Whose minstrels, brooks; whose lamps, the moon and stars;
Whose organ quire, the voice of many waters;

Whose banquets, morning dews; whose heroes, storms ;

Whose warriors, mighty winds; whose lovers, flowers;
Whose orators, the thunderbolts of God;

Whose palaces, the everlasting hills;

Whose ceiling, heaven's unfathomable blue;

And from whose rocky turrets battled high,

Prospect immense spread out on all sides round;

Lost now between the welkin and the main,

Now walled with hills that slept above the storm. vol. i.pp.212–215. Every other part of the description relating to this glorious period is worked up with equal beauty; and were it not that Mr. Pollok's genius is more eminently fitted for the sublime portion of his subject, we should probably have remained longer in the happy contemplation of Millennial peace and virtue. In no part, however, of his work, has our author shewn more true poetical skill, than in his transition from the calm and beautiful style which he has used to depict the previous state of tranquillity, to that which he has employed in announcing the approach of the great and terrible day of the Lord. The note of preparation is struck with a heart-thrilling eloquence. It is as if we heard the putting on of the armour, and the first appalling sounds of the busy conflict.

The Jubilee

Is ended; and the sun begins to fade.
Satan is loose, and Violence is heard,
And Riot in the street, and Revelry
Intoxicate, and Murder, and Revenge.

vol. ii. p.

9.

The abrupt interrogation which follows, is also remarkably fine. We almost see the clouds and thick darkness enveloping the troubled earth.

Whence comes that darkness? whence those yells of wo?
What thunderings are these, that shake the world?
Why fall the lamps from heaven as blasted figs?
Why tremble righteous men? why angels pale?
Why is all fear? what has become of hope?
God comes! God in his car of vengeance comes!
Hark! louder on the blast, come hollow shrieks
Of dissolution; in the fitful scowl

Of night, near and more near, angels of death
Incessant flap their deadly wings, and roar
Through all the fevered air: the mountains rock;
The moon is sick; and all the stars of heaven
Burn feebly; oft and sudden gleams the fire,
Revealing awfully the brow of wrath.

vol. ii. pp. 10, 11.

The state of mankind during this period is delineated with an awful solemnity of diction; and when the bard pauses in his song, to join the evening chorus of the angelic hosts, the change is felt as if it had taken place in our own condition. Several passages here might be marked as imitations; but they may be pardoned, as resulting immediately from the subject. It would, however, have better preserved the originality of the poem, had the whole of the description respecting the employment of the saints been omitted. Other and more original ideas might have been employed for filling up the pause. But we continue. The time allotted for Satan's reign was now complete. The last of the redeemed ones had been born, and the last prophecy fulfilled. Revenge, and all the furies of the human heart, had glutted themselves with their lusts. Avarice slept upon his gold, and Ambition on his throne. Both the natural and the moral world seemed dissolving in the deceitful calm of sin. The prodigies of Heaven passed unheeded. And at length the day arrived when Time was to be no longer. It dawned in light and beauty, as in the spring-tide of creation; and the infidel might well have laughed at the idea that the universe was breaking up at its foundations.

In customed glory bright, that morn the sun
Rose, visiting the earth with light, and heat,
And joy; and seemed as full of youth, and strong
To mount the steep of heaven, as when the stars
Of morning sung to his first dawn, and night

Fled from his face: the spacious sky received
Him blushing as a bride, when on her looked
The bridegroom: and spread out beneath his eye
Earth smiled. Up to his warm embrace the dews,
That all night long had wept his absence, flew :
The herbs and flowers, their fragrant stores unlocked,
And gave the wanton breeze, that newly woke,
Revelled in sweets, and from its wings shook health,
A thousand grateful smells: the joyous woods
Dried in his beams their locks, wet with the drops
Of night and all the sons of music sung
Their matin song; from arboured bower, the thrush
Concerting with the lark that hymned on high:
On the green hill the flocks, and in the vale
The herds rejoiced: and light of heart the hind
Eyed amorously the milk-maid as she passed,
Not heedless, though she looked another way.
No sign was there of change: all nature moved
In wonted harmony: men as they met
In morning salutation, praised the day,
And talked of common things: the husbandman
Prepared the soil, and silver-tongued hope,
Promised another harvest: in the streets,
Each wishing to make profit of his neighbour,
Merchants assembling, spoke of trying times,
Of bankruptcies, and markets glutted full:
Or crowding to the beach, where, to their ear,
The oath of foreign accent, and the noise
Uncouth of trade's rough sons, made music sweet,
Elate with certain gain, beheld the bark,
Expected long, enriched with other climes,
Into the harbour safely steer; or saw,
Parting with many a weeping farewell sad,
And blessing uttered rude, and sacred pledge,
The rich laden carack, bound to distant shore;
And hopefully talked of her coming back
With richer fraught: or sitting at the desk,
In calculation deep and intricate,
Of loss and profit balancing, relieved,

At intervals, the irksome task, with thought
Of future ease, retired in villa snug.

*

*

No sign of change appeared; to every man
That day seemed as the past. From noontide path
The sun looked gloriously on earth, and all

Her scenes of giddy folly smiled secure.
When suddenly, alas, fair Earth! the sun
Was wrapt in darkness, and his beams returned
Up to the throne of God; and over all

The earth came night, moonless and starless night.
Nature stood still: the seas and rivers stood,
And all the winds; and every living thing.
The cataract, that like a giant wroth,
Rushed down impetuously, as seized, at once,
By sudden frost with all his hoary locks,

Stood still and beasts of every kind stood still.
A deep and dreadful silence reigned alone !

Hope died in every breast; and on all men

Came fear and trembling: none to his neighbour spoke ;
Husband thought not of wife; nor of her child

The mother; nor friend of friend; nor foe of foe. vol. ii. pp. 52–57. The description which follows is splendid in the extreme, and the imagination trembles at the terrible distinctness with which the awful pageant passes before it. It is not easy to submit the mind to a cool exercise of critical judgment while reading such passages, or we should object to certain expressions that are used, as in bad taste. Light, for example, is represented as " walking with penetration;" and we should more strongly object to so palpable an imitation of Milton's awful description of the convulsions of nature at the Fall, as is to be found in this part of Mr. Pollok's poem. Our ears ring with the very measure of the elder bard while we read some of the verses in the "Course of Time." The effects, however, of the great and mighty changes which had been wrought upon the world by the appearing of the Lord, are described with so powerful a pencil, that our author, it will be seen, may safely rest on his own genius for success. We have never read any thing more beautiful than the passage which describes the mariners, far out at sea, as undergoing the change which had been experienced in the earth.

That morning, thou, that slumbered not before,
Nor slept, great Ocean! laid thy waves to rest,
And hushed thy mighty minstrelsy. No breath
Thy deep composure stirred, no fin, no oar;
Like beauty newly dead, so calm, so still,
So lovely, thou, beneath the light that fell
From angel-chariots sentineled on high,
Reposed, and listened, and saw the living change,
Thy dead arise. Charybdis listened, and Scylla;
And savage Euxine on the Thracian beach
Lay motionless; and every battle ship
Stood still; and every ship of merchandise,
And all that sailed, of every name, stood still.
Even as the ship of war, full fledged, and swift,
Like some fierce bird of prey, bore on her foe,
Opposing with as fell intent, the wind

Fell withered from her wings, that idly hung;
The stormy bullet, by the cannon thrown
Uncivilly against the heavenly face

Of men, half sped, sunk harmlessly, and all
Her loud, uncircumcised, tempestuous crew,

How ill prepared to meet their God! were changed
Unchangeable-the pilot at the helm

Was changed, and the rough captain, while he mouthed
The huge enormous oath. The fisherman,
That in his boat expectant watched his lines,
Or mended on the shore his net, and sung,