"I know the banker I deal with, or the physician I usually call in"-[There is no need, cried Dr. Slop, (waking) to call in any physician in this case.]

66

-To be neither of them men of much religion: I hear them make a jest of it every day, and treat all its sanctions with so much scorn as to put the matter past doubt. Well, notwithstanding this, I put my fortune into the hands of the one ;-and, what is dearer still to me, I trust my life to the honest skill of the other.

"Now let me examine what is my reason for this great confidence. Why, in the first place, I believe there is no probability that either of them will employ the power I put into their hands to my disadvantage. I consider that honesty serves the purposes of this life ;-I know their success in the world depends upon the fairness of their characters. In a word, I am persuaded that they cannot hurt me, without hurting themselves more.

"But put it otherwise; namely, that interest lay, for once, on the other side :—that a case should happen wherein the one, without stain to his reputation, could secrete my fortune, and leave me naked in the world;-or that the other could send me out of it, and enjoy an estate by my death, without dishonor to himself or his art :-In this case, what hold have I of either of them!-Religion, the strongest of all motives, is out of the question ;-Interest, the next most powerful motive in the world, is strongly against me:What have I left to cast into the opposite scale to balance this temptation?-Alas! I have nothing, but what is lighter than a bubble-I must lie at the mercy of Honor, or some such capricious principle-Strait security for two of the most valuable blessings-my property and myself.

"As therefore we can have no dependence upon morality without religion,-so, on the other hand, there is nothing better to be expected from religion without morality;nevertheless, 'tis no prodigy to see a man whose real moral character stands very low, who yet entertains the highest notion of himself, in the light of a religious man.

"He shall not only be covetous, revengeful, implacable, -but even wanting in points of cominon honesty; yet in as much as he talks aloud against the infidelity of the age,-is zealous for some points of religion,-goes twice a-day to church, attends the săc'raments,--and amuses himself with a few instrumental parts of religion, shall cheat his conscience into a judgment, that for this he is a religious man

and has discharged truly his duty to God: and you wil. find that such a man, through force of this delusion, generally looks down with spiritual pride upon every other man who has less affectation of piety, though, perhaps, ten times more real honesty than himself.

"This likewise is a sore evil under the sun: and, I believe, there is no one mistaken principle, which, for its time, has wrought more serious mischiefs.

"For a general proof of this, examine the history of the Romish church."

"

[Well, what can you make of that? cried Dr. Slop,]see what scenes of cruelty, murder, răpine, bloodshed,' [They may thank their own obstinacy, cried Dr. Slop,"have all been sanctified by religion not strictly governed by morality.

"In how many kingdoms of the world has the rusading sword of this misguided Saint-errant, spared neither age, nor merit, nor sex, nor condition ?-and, as he fought under the banners of a religion which set him loose from justice and humanity, he shewed none; mercilessly trampled upon both, -heard neither the cries of the unfortunate, nor pitied their distresses-"

[I have been in many a battle, an't please your honor, quoth Trim, sighing, but never in so melancholy a one as this. I would not have drawn a trigger in it against these poor souls, to have been made a general officer. Why, what do you understand of the affair? said Dr. Slop, (looking towards Trim, with something more of contempt than the Corporal's honest heart deserved)-What do you know friend, about this battle you talk of ?-I know, replied Trim, that I never refused quarter in my life to any man who cried out for it—but to a woman or a child, continued Trim, before I would level my musket at them, I would lose my life a thousand times.-Here's a crown for thee, Trim, to drink with Obadiah to-night, quoth my uncle Toby.—God bless your honor, replied Trim-I had rather these poor women and children had it.-Thou art an honest fellow, quoth my uncle Toby. My father nodded his head, as much as to say -and so he is.]

LESSON CLXIX.

Dirge of Al'aric, the Visigoth,

Who stormed and spoiled the city of Rome, and was afterwards buried in the channel of the river Busentius, the water of which had been diverted from its course that the body might be interred.—EVERETT.

WHEN I am dead, no pageant* train
Shall waste their sorrows at my bier,
Nor worthless pomp of homage vain,
Stain it with hypocritic tear;
For I will die as I did live,
Nor take the boon I cannot give.

Ye shall not raise a marble bust

Upon the spot where I repose;
Ye shall not fawn before my dust,
In hollow circumstance of woes :
Nor sculptured clay, with lying breath,
Insult the clay that moulds beneath.

Ye shall not pile, with servile toil,
Your monuments upon my breast,
Nor yet within the common soil

Lay down the wreck of Power to rest;
Where man can boast that he has trod
On him, that was "the scourge of God."

But

ye the mountain stream shall turn,
And lay its secret channel bare,
And hollow, for your sovereign's urn,
A resting-place for ever there:
Then bid its everlasting springs
Flow back upon the King of Kings;
And never be the secret said,
Until the deep give up his dead.

My gold and silver ye shall fling

Back to the clods, that gave them bir
The captured crowns of many a king,
The ransom of a conquered earth;
For e'en though dead will I control
The trophies of the capitol.

But when beneath the mountain tide,
Ye've laid your monarch down to rot,

* Pron. pad ́-junt.

+ See the note on page 390.

Ye shall not rear upon its side

Pillar or mound to mark the spot;
For long enough the world has shook
Beneath the terrors of my look;
And now that I have run my race,
The astonished realms shall rest a space.

My course was like a river deep,
And from the northern hills I burst,
Across the world in wrath to sweep,

And where I went the spot was cursed, Nor blade of grass again was seen Where Alaric and his hosts had been.*

See how their haughty barriers fail
Beneath the terror of the Goth,
Their iron-breasted legions quail
Before my ruthless sabaoth,
And low the Queen of empires kneels,
And grovels at my chariot-wheels.
Not for myself did I ascend

In judgment my triumphal car;
'Twas God alone on high did send
The avenging Scythian to the war,
To shake abroad, with iron hand,
The appointed scourge of his command.t
With iron hand that scourge I reared
O'er guilty king and guilty realm;
Destruction was the ship I steered,

And vengeance sat upon the helm, When, launched in fury on the flood, I ploughed my way through seas of blood, And in the stream their hearts had spilt Washed out the long arrears of guilt.

Across the everlasting Alp

I poured the torrent of my powers, And feeble Cæsars shrieked for help

In vain within their seven-hilled towers I quenched in blood the brightest gem That glittered in their diadem,

And struck a darker, deeper die
In the purple of their majesty,
*See the note on page 390.

ta as in far.

And både my northern banners shine
Upon the conquered Palatine.

I

My course is run, my errand done :
go to Him from whom I came ;
But never yet shall set the sun

Of glory. that adorns my name;
And Roman hearts shall long be sick,
When men shall think of Alaric.

My course is run, my errand done—
But darker ministers of fate
Impatient, round the eternal throne,
And in the caves of vengeance, wait:
And soon mankind shall blench away
Before the name of Attila.*

LESSON CLXX.

Lines written on visiting the beautiful burying-ground at New Haven.-N. FROTHINGHAM.

()! WHERE are they, whose all that earth could give
Beneath these senseless marbles disappeared?
Where even they, who taught these stones to grieve;
The hands that hewed them, and the hearts that reared?
Such the poor bounds of all that's hoped or feared,
Within the griefs and smiles of this short day!
Here sunk the honored, vanished the endeared;

This the last tribute love to love could pay,
An idle păgeant pile to graces passed away.

Attila was the king of the Huns, and, for many years, in the first half of the fifth century, was the terror both of Constantinople and Rome. Not ong after the death of Alaric, he invaded the Roman empire, at the head of half a million of barbarians, and with fire and sword laid waste many of its most fertile provinces. Into the bold sketch of Alaric, which is given in this Dirge, the poet, in the license of his art, has thrown sonic of the distinguishing features of Attila. It may be well to advise the youthful reader, that, as a matter of sober history, it was Attila, and not Alaric, who used to say that the grass never grew where his horse had trod; and that it was not Alaric, but Attila, who was called the Scourge of God. With this appellation the king of the Huns was so well pleased that he adopted it as one of his titles of honor.