O man! while in thy early years,

How prodigal of time!
Mis-spending all thy precious hours,

Thy glorious youthful prime!
Alternate follies take the sway;

Licentious passions burn;
Which tenfold force give Nature's law,

That man was made to mourn.
Look not alone on youthful prime,

Or manhood's active might:
Man then is useful to his kind,

Supported is his right.
But see him on the edge of life,

With cares and sorrows worn,
Then age and want, oh! ill-matched pair!

Show man was made to mourn.
A few seem favorites of fate,

In pleasure's lap carest;
Yet, think not all the rich and great

Are likewise truly blest.
But, oh! what crowds, in every land,

Are wretched and forlorn;
Through weary life this lesson learn,

That man was made to mourn.
Many and sharp the numerous ills

Inwoven with our frame!
More pointed still we make ourselves,

Regret, remorse, and shame!
And man, whose heaven-erected face

The smiles of love adorn,
Man's inhumanity to man

Makes countless thousands mourn!
See yonder poor, o'erlabor d wight,

So abject, mean, and vile,
Who begs a brother of the earth,

To give him leave to toil:
And see his lordly fellow-worm

The poor petition spurn,
Unmindful, though a weeping wife

And helpless offspring mourn.
If I'm design'd yon lordling's slave-

By Nature's law design d,
Why was an independent wish

Eer planted in my mind ?
If not, why am I subject to

His cruelty or scorn?
Or why has man the will and power

To make his fellow mourn?
Yet, let not this too much, my son,

Disturb thy youthful breast.
This partial view of human-kind

Is surely not the last!

The poor, oppressed, honest man,

Had never, sure, been born,
Had there not been some recompense

To comfort those that mourn!
O Death! the poor man's dearest friend,

The kindest and the best!
Welcome the hour my aged limbs

Are laid with thee at rest!
The great, the wealthy, fear thy blow,

From pomp and pleasure torn;
But, oh! a blest relief to those

That weary-laden mourn!

EDMUND BURKE. 1730—1797. Tuis most distinguished writer and statesman was born at Dublin on the 1st of January, 1730. On his mother's side he was connected with the poet Spenser, from whom, it is said, he received his Christian name.

He was educated at Ballitore in the county of Kildare, at a classical academy under the management of Abraham Shackleton, a Quaker of superior talents and learning. Here, according to his own testimony, Burke acquired the most valuable of his mental habits; he ever felt the deepest gratitude for his early instructor, and with his only son, Richard, the successor in the school, he preserved an intimate friendship to the end of his life. In 1744 he entered Trinity College, Dublin, and in 1750 he was entered as a law-student at the Middle Temple, London: but his thoughts were soon entirely turned to literature and politics, to which, henceforth, all his time, and talents, and energies were devoted. His first publication was anonymous, entitled, “ A Vindication of Natural Society, in a Letter to Lord by a Noble Lord." It was such an admirable imitation of the style of Lord Bolingbroke, that many were deceived by it, and deemed it a posthumous publication of that nobleman, who had been dead but five years. It was ironical throughout, endeavoring to prove that the same arguments with which that nobleman had attacked revealed religion, might be applied with equal force against all civil and political institutions whatever.

In the next year, Burke published his « Essay on the Sublime and Beautiful,” which, by the elegance of its language, and the spirit of philosophical investigation displayed in it, placed him at once in the very first class of writers on taste and criticism. His object is to show that terror is the prin. cipal source of the sublime, and that beauty is the quality in objects wbich excites love or affection. The fame acquired by this work introcluced the author to the best literary acquaintances, among whoin were Sir Joshua Rey. nolds and Dr. Johnson. In 1758 he suggested to Dodsley the plan of the Annual Register, and engaged, himself, to furnish the chief historical matter, which he continued to do for very many years, and which has made that work the most valuable repository of historical knowledge of the times.

In 1765, on the accession to power of the Marquis of Rockingham, he was appointed by that minister his private secretary, and was brought into parliament for the borough of Wendover. It would be impossible, in the limited space assigned to these biographical sketches, to give an outline of his subse

quent parliamentary and political career, or to enumerate all his various publications. His life is a history of those eventful times,- for in them he acted a part more conspicuous than any other man. His able and eloquent opposition to those infatuated measures of the ministry which led to and prolonged the contest between England and our own country-his advocacy of the freedom of the press of an improved libel law-of Catholic emancipation of economical reform-of the abolition of the slave-trade-his giant efforts in the impeachment of Warren Hastings and his most eloquent and uncompromising bostility to the French Revolution, in his speeches in parliament and in his well-known “Reflections on the Revolution in France,"—all these will ever cause him to be viewed as one of the warmest and ablest friends of man.

In 1794, his son, who had just been elected to parliament, took ill and died;-a blow so severe to the father, that he never recovered from it; and it doubtless hastened his own end, which took place on the 9th of July, 1797.

As an eloquent and philosophic political character, Burke stands alone. His intellect was at once exact, minute, and comprehensive, and his imagination rich and vigorous. As to his style, he is remarkable for the copiousness and freedom of his diction, the splendor and great variety of his imagery, his astonishing command of general truths, and the ease withi which he seems to wield those fine weapons of language, which most writers are able to manage only by the most anxious care. The following remarks of an able critic3 are as beautiful as they are just :

“There can be no hesitation in according to Mr. Burke a station among the most extraordinary men that have ever appeared; and we think there is now but little diversity of opinion as to the kind of place which it is fit to assign him. He was a writer of the first class, and excelled in almost every kind of prose composition. Possessed of most extensive knowledge, and of the most various description; acquainted alike with what different classes of men knew, each in his own province, and with much that hardly any one ever thought of learning; he could either bring his masses of information to bear directly upon the subjects to which they severally belonged or he could avail himself of them generally to strengthen his faculties and enlarge his views or he could turn any portion of them to account for the purpose of illustrating his theme, or enriching his diction. Hence, when he is handling any one matter, we perceive that we are conversing with a reasoner or a teacher, to whom almost every other branch of knowledge is familiar: his

1 Those who are not well read in the history of those times can hardly have an idea of the deep, bitter, malignant hostility, which the early English abolitionists, Sharp, Clarkson, Wilberforce, and others, had to encounter. Even Lord Chancellor Thurlow said, in his place in the House of Lords, on the 18th of June, 1788, that "it was unjust that this sudden fit of philanthropy, which was but a few days old, should be allowed to disturb the public mind, and become the occasion of bringing men to the metropolis, who were engaged in the trade, with tears in their eyes and horror in their countenances, to deprecate the ruin of their property, which they had embarked on the faith of parliament;" and the Earl of Westmoreland considered that “as much attention was due to our property and manufactures as to a false humanity."

The devotion of Burke to the best interests of man caused Abraham Shackleton to write of him thus: “The memory of Edmund Burke's philanthropic virtues will outlive the period when his shining political talents will cease to act. New fashions of political sentiment will exist: but Phtlanthropy-IMMORTALE MANET."

2 "The immortality of Burke," says Grattan, " is that which is common to Cicero or to Bacon, that which can never be interrupted while there exists the beauty of order or the love of virtue, and which can fear no death except what barbarity may impose on the globe." 8 Read the article in vol. xlvi. of the Edinburgh Review: also, his Life by James Prior.

views range over all the cognate subjects; his reasonings are derived from principles applicable to other theories as well as the one in hand: arguments pour in from all sides, as well as those which start up under our feet, the natural growth of the path he is leading us over; while to throw light round our steps, and either explore its darker places, or serve for our recreation, illustrations are fetched from a thousand quarters; and an imagination marvellously quick to descry unthought-of resemblances, points to our use the stores, which a lore yet more marvellous has gathered from all ages, and nations, and arts, and tongues. We are, in respect of the argument, reminded of Bacon's multifarious knowledge and the exuberance of his learned fancy; while the many-lettered diction recalls to mind the first of English poets, and his immortal verse, rich with the spoils of all sciences and all times." !

1 The following comparison between Burke and Johnson is taken from Cumberland's "Retrospection."

Nature gave to each
Powers that in some respects may be compared,
For both were Orators--and could we now
Canvass the social circles wbere they mix'd,
The palm for eloquence, by general vote,
Would rest with him whose thunder never shook
The senate or the bar. When Burke harangued
The nation's representatives, methought
The fine machinery that his fancy wrought,
Rich but fantastic, sometimes would obscure
That symmetry which ever should uphold
The dignity and order of debate.
'Gainst orator like this had Johnson rose,
So clear was his perception of the truth,
So grave his judgment, and so high the swell
or his full period, I must think bis speech
Had charm'd as many and enlighten'd more.

Johnson, if right I judge, in classic lore
Was more diffuse than deep: he did not dig
So many fathoms down as Bentley dug
In Grecian soll, but far enough to find
Truth ever at the bottom of his shaft.
Burke, borne by genius on a lighter wing,
Skimm'd o'er the flowery plains of Greece and Rome,
And, like the bee returning to its hive,
Brought nothing home but sweets : Johnson would dash
Through sophist or grammarian ankle-keep,
And rummage in their mud to trace a date,
Or hunt a dogma down, that gave offence
To his philosophy:-

Both had a taste
For contradiction, but in mode unlike:
Johnson at once would doggedly pronounce
Opinions false, and after prove them such.
Burke, not less critical, but more polite,
With ceaseless volubility of tongue
Play'd round and round his subject, til at length,
Content to find you willing to admire,
He ceased to urge, or win yon to assent.

Splendor of style, fertility of thought,
And the bold use of metaphor in both,
Strike us with rival beauty: Burke display'd
A copious period, that with curious ski

TERROR A SOURCE OF THE SUBLIME.

No passion so effectually robs the mind of all its powers of acting and reasoning as fear; for fear being an apprehension of pain or death, it operates in a manner that resembles actual pain. Whatever therefore is terrible with regard to sight, is sublime too, whether this cause of terror be endued with greatness of dimensions or not ; for it is impossible to look on any thing as trifling or contemptible, that may be dangerous. There are many animals, who, though far from being large, are yet capable of raising ideas of the sublime, because they are considered as objects of terror; as serpents and poisonous animals of almost all kinds. Even to things of great dimensions, if we annex any adventitious idea of terror, they become without comparison greater. An even plain of a vast extent of land, is certainly no mean idea : the prospect of such a plain may be as extensive as a prospect of the ocean; but can it ever fill the mind with any thing so great as the ocean itself? This is owing to several causes, but it is owing to none more than to this, that the ocean is an object of no small terror.

SYMPATHY A SOURCE OF THE SUBLIME.

It is by the passion of sympathy that we enter into the concerns of others; that we are moved as they are moved, and are never suffered to be indifferent spectators of almost anything which men can do or suffer. For sympathy must be considered as a sort of substitution, by which we are put into the place of another man, and affected in a good measure as he is affected ; so that this passion may either partake of the nature of those which regard self-preservation, and turning upon pain may be a source of the sublime; or it may turn upon ideas of pleasure, and then,

And ornamental epithet drawn out,
Was, like the singer's cadence, sometimes apt,
Although melodious, to fatigue the ear:
Johnson, with terms unnaturalized and rude,
And Latinisms forced into his line,
Like raw, undrill'd recruits, would load his text
High sonnding and uncouth: yet if you cull
His happier pages, you will find a style
Quintilian might have praised. Stiu I perceive
Nearer approach to purity in Burke,
Though not the full accession to that grace,
That chaste simplicity, which is the last

And best attainment author can possess. Sir Joshua Reynolds, who was on the most intimate terms with both, thought that Dr. Johnson pose sessed a wonderful strength of mind, but that Mr. Burke had a more comprehensive capacity, a more exact judgment, and also that his knowledge was more extensive: with the most profound respect for the talents of both, he therefore decided that Mr. Burke was the superior character.