Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

testant churches, and especially to that church which formally and explicitly adopts them among its standards." These homilies, not having been in general circulation for many years, will doubtless be acceptable to the orthodox, pious, and inquiring Churchman. An eloquent SERMON, by bishop Horsley; several valuable ESSAYS, DISQUISITIONS, and EXTRACTS, succeed; together with REVIEWS OF NEW PUBLICATIONS; SELECTED POETRY; LITERARY AND PHILOSOPHICAL INTELLIGENCE; a list of NEW PUBLICATIONS; RELIGIOUS INTELLIGENCE, both FOREIGN and DOMESTIC; and a GENERAL VIEW OF PUBLIC AFFAIRS in Europe.

The intended statement of DOMESTIC political occurrences, is necessarily omitted, the proposed limits of the magazine having been considerably exceeded by the preceding rich variety of interesting matter: but the editor states it to be his "intention to give such a detail in the next and future numbers of the work, commencing that detail with the first day of the present year, and so to continue furnishing his readers with a retrospect at once concise and lucid, that will assist the memory in referring to the past events of this great and growing empire."

We shall conclude these brief and condensed remarks, by a short comment upon that part of the PROSPECTUS which relates to the Articles of the church of England, adopted by the protestant episcopal church in America. It supposes that the private opinions of the English reformers were Calvanistic, although they did not introduce them into the authoritative institutions of the church. This will be considered by some readers as a mistake; and the proof adduced in support of it, by referring to documents of the reign of queen Elizabeth, irrelevant. If the binding authority of the articles and the liturgy were in question, doubtless they rest at present in England on the thirteenth of that queen, when they were reenacted, after having been set aside in the reign of Mary. But, when a question is raised concerning their sense, and recourse is had to opinions less authoritative, they should be such as are found in Edward's reign, and not in Elizabeth's; at which period, those concerned in framing the Articles and Lturgy were no longer living. The writer of this article is of opinion, that if a complete and candid investiga

tion of the subject from such documents were made, it would be found, that far from being framed according to the system of Calvin, they were studiously modled after the Lutheran in opposi tion to the Romish tenets of that day; the system of Calvin being then little known and less regarded in England.

SELECTED POETRY.

ROKEBY, A POEM-BY WALTER SCOTT, ESQ.

THE very rapid glance which we have been able to obtain of a part of this new and beautiful offspring of the muse of Scott, has not qualified us for an examination of its character, or even a description of its features; and we must therefore reserve any details till our next number, when it will have issued from the American press. The poem is founded on a wild story, the scene of which is laid in the north of England, during the civil distur bances in the time of Cromwell, and is embellished with all the incidents of feudal war, of chivalric gallantry, of romantic affec tion, and of bloody vengeance, on which the genius of Walter Scott has so often dwelt with poetical enthusiasm. It opens with the description of Oswald Wycliffe's anxious suspence, as he was waiting the return of a soldier whom he had bribed to assassinate his kinsman, Philip of Mortham.

THE Moon is in her summer glow,

But hoarse and high the breezes blow,
And, racking o'er her face, the cloud
Varies the tincture of her shroud;

On Barnard's towers, and Tees's stream,
She changes as a guilty dream,
When Conscience, with remorse and fear,
Goads sleeping Fancy's wild career.
Her light seem'd now the blush of shame,
Seem'd now fierce anger's darker flame,
Shifting that shade to come and go,
Like apprehension's hurried glow;

VOL. I.

Then sorrow's livery dims the air,
And dies in darkness, like despair.
Such varied hues the warder sees
Reflected from the woodland Tees,
Then from old Baliol's tower looks forth,
Sees the clouds mustering in the north,
Hears, upon turret-roof and wall,

By fits the plashing rain-drop fall,
Lists to the breeze's boding sound,
And wraps his shaggy mantle round.

Those towers, which in the changeful gleam
Throw murky shadows on the stream,
Those towers of Barnard hold a guest,
The emotions of whose troubled breast,
In wild and strange confusion driven,
Rival the flitting rack of heaven.
Ere sleep stern OSWALD's senses tied,
Oft had he changed his weary side,
Composed his limbs, and vainly sought
By effort strong to banish thought.
Sleep came at length, but with a train
Of feelings real and fancies vain;
Mingling, in wild disorder cast,
The expected future with the past.
Conscience, anticipating time,
Already rues the unacted crime,
And calls her furies forth, to shake

The sounding scourge and hissing snake;
While her poor victim's outward throes-

Bear witness to his mental woes,
And show what lesson may be read

Beside a sinner's restless bed.

Thus Oswald's labouring feelings trace

Strange changes in his sleeping face,
Rapid and ominous as these

With which the moon-beams tinge the Tees.

There might be seen, of shame the blush,

There anger's dark and fiercer flush,

While the perturbed sleeper's hand
Seem'd grasping dagger-knife, or brand.

SS

Relaxed that grasp, the heavy sigh,
The tear in the half-opening eye,
The pallid cheek and brow, confessed
That grief was busy in his breast;
Nor paused that mood-a sudden start
Impelled the life-blood from the heart;
Features convulsed, and mutterings dread,
Show terror reigns in sorrow's stead;
That pang the painful slumber broke,
And Oswald with a start awoke.

He woke, and feared again to close
His eye-lids in such dire repose;

He woke, to watch the lamp, and tell,
From hour to hour the castle-bell,

Or listen to the owlet's cry,

Or the sad breeze that whistles by,

Or catch, by fits, the tuneless rhyme
With which the warder cheats the time,
And envying think, how, when the sun
Bids the poor soldier's watch be done,
Couch'd on his straw, and fancy-free,
He sleeps like careless infancy.

The character of Oswald's son, Wilfrid, an amiable youth, a poet, and the unsuccessful lover of Matilda, contains a lively picture, which none but a poet could have drawn, of the danger of indulging to excess the enthusiastic dreams of poetical sensibility.

But Wilfrid, docile, soft, and mild,

Was Fancy's spoiled and wayward child;
In her bright car she bade him ride,
With one fair form to grace his side,
Or, in some wild and lone retreat,
Flung her high spells around his seat,
Bathed in her dews his languid head,
Her fairy mantle o'er him spread;
For him her opiates gave to flow,
Which be who tastes can ne'er forego,
And placed him in her circle, free -

From every stern reality,

Till, to the visionary, seem

Her day-dreams truth, and truth a dream.

Wo to the youth whom Fancy gains,
Winning from Reason's hand the reins,
Pity and wo! for such a mind

Is soft, contemplative, and kind;
And wo to those who train such youth,
And spare to press the rights of truth,
The mind to strengthen and anneal,
While on the stithy glows the steel!
O teach him, while your lessons last,
To judge the present by the past;
Remind him of each wish pursued,
How rich it glowed with promised good;
Remind him of each wish enjoyed,
How soon his hopes possession cloyed!
Tell him, we play unequal game,
Whene'er we shoot by Fancy's aim;
And, ere he strip him for her race,
Show the conditions of the chace.
Two sisters by the goal are set,
Cold Disappointment and Regret;
One disenchants the winner's eyes,
And strips of all its worth the prize,
While one augments its gaudy show,
More to enhance the loser's wo.
The victor sees his fairy gold
Transformed, when won, to drossy mold,
But still the vanquished mourns his loss,
And rues, as gold, that glittering dross.

More wouldst thou know-yon tower survey,
Yon couch unpressed since parting day,
Yon untrimmed lamp, whose yellow gleam
Is mingling with the cold moon-beam,
And yon thin form!-the hectic red
On his pale cheek unequal spread;
The head reclined, the loosened hair,
The limbs relaxed, the mournful air.-
See, he looks up;-a woful smile
Lightens his wo-worn cheek awhile,-

« AnteriorContinuar »