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Vast suns, with burning satellites,
Burst on my wondering eyes:
Bewildered by their dazzling light,
I gazed in mute surprise.

"Tell me, celestial one," I said, "If thou mayst be addressed, Are not the brilliant orbs I see The dwellings of the blest?

"Can we the utmost limits search -
The heights of space attain?"
"When ends eternity," he cried,

"And Heaven shall cease to reign."

He spoke, then pointed to a star,
That far beyond us lay;

And swifter than on lightning's wing

We thither bent our way.

In robes of passing loveliness
Was Nature there arrayed,

The air was fragrant with the breath
Of flowers that never fade.

"Spirit," I asked, "can aught of grief These regions fair molest!

My pinions gladly would I fold,

In this bright land to rest."

'Mortal," he answered, "thou must pass

The portals of the dead;

For sacred are these verdant fields,
Where only spirits tread."

He ceased; then waved me back to earth:

I saw, I heard no more;

I woke as from a pleasing dream ;

The mystic spell was o'er.

VOICE OF THE TWILIGHT HOUR.

Voice of the twilight hour!

I list to thy heaven-breathed tone,
In the tender sigh of the closing flower
Or the soft wind's dying moan:
Thou speak'st of the hopes that smil'd
On the bright spring-time of youth,

When a mother knelt, and in language mild,
A lesson, though simple, she taught her child—
"Twas a lesson of artless truth.

Voice of the twilight hour,

How sweet is thy sound to me!

For my soul is entranced by thy soothing power

And its sorrows are lost in thee: Thou art heard in the trembling strings

Of the harp which the breezes wake; In the bird, as her farewell note she sings To the golden hues which the sunset flings O'er the breast of the silver lake.

Thou speak'st of a brighter land—

Of a far-off region fair,

And thy whispers are soft of a shadowy band, And I know that the loved are there.

Voice of the twilight hour!

Ere thy heaven-breathed tones depart, Oh, speak in the sigh of the closing flower, Or the winds that die in the green-wood bower Once more to my anxious heart.

Do those we have cherished here

In that land their love forget!

Though their home is a holier, happier sphere
Oh! say, do they guard us yet?

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But the twilight answer'd not;

And a voice from the distant hills
Replied as I stood on that lonely spot:

The friends thou hast cherished forget thee not,
And they love and they guard thee still.

"Twas the voice of the silent night—
And the earth and the ocean slept,
And the silent stars with their mellow light
O'er nature their vigils kept.

And I thought it were bliss to die,
To fade with the tints of even,
For gladly then would the spirit fly

On its angel wings to the realms on high,
And meet with the lost in Heaven.

MISS CYNTHIA BULLOCK.

AN AMERICAN AUTHORESS.

'Lo! heaven's bright bow is glad!
Lo! trees and flowers all clad!
In glory bloom!

And shall the immortal sons of God,
Be senseless as the trodden clod,
And darker than the tomb?

No! says God, our sire

Let souls have holy light within,

Let every form of grief and sin

Now feel its fire!

Truth-truth alone,

Is light, and hope, and life, and power;
Earth's deepest night from this blest hour,

The night of mind be gone!"

FAR inadequate is human wisdom, aside from di vine revelation, to foster the sacred ties that should bind our race in gentleness together. The arts, sciences, and multifarious schools of philosophy, in which the sages of antiquity won for themselves immortal fame, tended but to magnify the distinction between the lowly and privileged classes, and dry up the vein of sympathy between the opulent and de*ected. On Bethlehem's plains, by angelic hosts, was first announced on earth, the advent of humanity's

great Benefactor. When 'neath Eden's bowers, our primitive representatives invoked consuming wrath, His potent hand turned aside the stroke of death, and now came to raise the fallen, bind up the brokenhearted, and wipe the tear from the cheek of the disconsolate. His words imparted activity to the maimed, life to the dead, and sight to the blind. The injunctions that fell from his holy lips, attended by grace divine, have gently distilled upon the sterile heart of humanity, like the dews of heaven on the tender grass, and caused it to germ, and bring forth fruit to bless the afflicted. The many brilliant benevolent institutions that gem our land, like stars the ethereal blue, are but emanations from that glorious gospel that shall eventually restore primitive paradise

to man.

Though the votaries of learning of every nation, from a high antiquity, held in enthusiastic admiration the inimitable songs of sightless Homer, no institution for the benefit of this class, adorned the plains of Egypt, or crowned the sunny hills of Greece, or reflected the brightness of an Italian sky. It is from the fountain of christianity alone, that flow those benign principles that lead men, at the present day, to supply the want of sight, by means devised by mercy. One of the recipients of such public munificence, in whose soul was poured the light of gladness, is our present authoress. And, like Israel's poet, her lines glow with fervent thanks to God, the bountiful dispenser of temporal as well as spiritual blessings.

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