The world as it hath been in ages past, The world as now it is, the world to come, Far as the eye of prophecy can pierce ;These I beheld, and still in memory's rolls They have their pages and their pictures; these, Another day, a nobler song may show.

Vain boast! another day may not be given;
This song may be my last; for I have reach'd
That slippery descent, whence man looks back
With melancholy joy on all he cherish'd ;

Around, with love unfeign'd, on all he's losing;
Forward, with hope that trembles while it turns
To the dim point where all our knowledge ends.
I am but one among the living; one
Among the dead I soon shall be; and one
Among unnumber'd millions yet unborn;
The sum of Adam's mortal progeny,
From Nature's birthday to her dissolution :
- Lost in infinitude, my atom-life

Seems but a sparkle of the smallest star
Amidst the scintillations of ten thousand,
Twinkling incessantly; no ray returning
To shine a second moment, where it shone
Once, and no more for ever:
- SO I pass.

The world grows darker, lonelier, and more silent,
As I go down into the vale of years;

For the grave's shadows lengthen in advance,
And the grave's loneliness appals my spirit,
And the grave's silence sinks into my heart,
Till I forget existence in the thought

Of non-existence, buried for a while
In the still sepulchre of my own mind,
Itself imperishable:- ah! that word,
Like the archangel's trumpet, wakes me up
To deathless resurrection. Heaven and earth
Shall pass away, but that which thinks within me
Must think for ever; that which feels must feel:
-I am, and I can never cease to be.

O thou that readest! take this parable Home to thy bosom; think as I have thought, And feel as I have felt, through all the changes, Which Time, Life, Death, the world's great actors, wrought,

While centuries swept like morning dreams before

me,

And thou shalt find this moral to my song:

Thou art, and thou canst never cease to be: What then are time, life, death, the world to thee? I may not answer; ask Eternity.

END OF THE NINTH AND LAST CANTO.

MISCELLANIES.

MISCELLANIES.

A VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD.

EMBLEM of eternity,
Unbeginning, endless sea!

Let me launch my soul on thee.

Sail, nor keel, nor helm, nor oar,

Need I, ask I, to explore

Thine expanse from shore to shore.

By a single glance of thought,

Thy whole realm's before me brought
Like the universe, from nought.

All thine aspects now I view,

Ever old, yet ever new,

Time nor tide thy power subdue.

All thy voices now I hear;

Sounds of gladness, grandeur, fear,

Meet and mingle in mine ear.