• Came upon an inner glade,
The holiest place that human eyes might see;
For all that vale was like a temple made

By Nature's hand, and this the sanctuary;
Where in its bed of living rock, the Rood
Of man's redemption firmly-planted stood,
And at its foot the never failing Well

Of Life profusely flowed that all might drink.
Most blessed water! Neither tongue can tell

The blessedness thereof, nor heart can think,
Save only those to whom it hath been given
To taste of that divinest gift of Heaven.
There grew a goodly Tree this Well beside,

Behold a branch from Eden planted here,
Plucked from the Tree of Knowledge, said my guide.

O Child of Adam, put away thy fear,
In thy first father's grave it hath its root;
Taste thou the bitter, but the wholesome fruit.
In awe I heard, and trembled, and obeyed:

The bitterness was even as of deatlı;
I felt a cold and piercing thrill pervade

My loosened limbs, and losing sight and breath,
To earth I should have fallen in my despair,
Had I not clasped the Cross, and been supported there.
My heart, I thought, was bursting with the force

Of that most fatal fruit; soul-sick I felt,
And tears ran down in such continuous course,

As if the very eyes themselves should melt,
But then I heard my heavenly teacher say,
Drink, and this mortal stound will pass away.
I stoopt and drank of that divinest Well,

Fresh from the Rock of Ages where it ran.
It had a heavenly quality to quell

My pain :-I rose a renovated man,
And would not now when that relief was known
For worlds the needful suffering have foregone.
Even as the Eagle (ancient storyers say)

When faint with years she feels her flagging wing, Soars up toward the mid sun's piercing ray,

Then filled with fire into some living spring
Plunges, and casting there her aged plumes,
The vigorous strength of primal youth resumes:
Such change in me that blessed Water wrought:

The bitterness which from its fatal root,
The tree derived with painful healing fraught,

Passed clean away ; and in its place the fruit Producea by virtue of that wondrous wave, The savour which in Paradise it gave.

1

Now, said the heavenly Muse, thou mayst advance,

Fitly prepared toward the mountain's height.
O Child of Man, this necessary trance

Hath purified from flaw thy mortal sight,
That with

scope

unconfined of vision free,
Thou the beginning and the end mayst see.
She took me by the hand and on we went;

Hope urged me forward and my soul was strong.
With winged speed we scaled the steep ascent,

Nor seemed the labour difficult or long,
Ere on the summit of the sacred hill
Upraised I stood, where I might gaze my fill.
Below me lay, unfolded like a scroll,

The boundless region where I wandered late,
Where I might see realms spread and oceans roll,

And mountains from their cloud-surmounting state
Dwarfed like a map beneath the excursive sight,
So ample was the range from that commanding height.
Eastward with darkness round on every side,
An

eye of light was in the farthest sky.
Lo, the beginning !-said my heavenly Guide :

The steady ray which there thou canst descry,
Comes from lost Eden, from the primal land
Of man “ waved over by the fiery brand.”
Look now toward the end! no mists obscure,

Nor clouds will there impede the strengthened sight:
Unblenched thine eye the vision may endure.

I looked, surrounded with effulgent light
More glorious than all glorious hues of even,
The Angel Death stood there in the open Gate of Heaven,'

pp. 156—162. The last section is entitled — The Hopes of Man. In this, Mr. S., with all the eloquence of a poet and all the warmth of a patriot, dwells on the high prerogatives, the distinguished privileges, the duties, and the brightening prospects of Britain. We should have been disposed to think the picture too highly coloured, and the confidence expressed too insecurely founded, had the political circumstances of the country been the theme. Mr. Southey views the contest in which we were engaged against the tyrant of Europe, as a struggle between good and evil principles. He considers the victory of Waterloo as supremely important to the best interests of human nature; as leaving England in security and peace.

. In no age and in no country has man ever existed under circumstances so favourable to the full development of his moral and intellectual faculties, as in England at this time. The peace which she has won by the battle of Waterloo, leaves her at leisure to pursue the

us.

great objects and duties of bettering her own condition, and diffusing the blessings of civilization and Christianity.'

There is surely something far more noble and far more Christian in this language, than in the desponding speculations of our second-sighted politicians. The errors and the crimes of different governments-indeed, the whole system of European policy, for the last twenty years, may with much reason excite, on the retrospect, sentiments of a painful and indignant nature. It is not to be forgotten, that the contests in which during that period this country has been engaged, have not all been with a military despot; have not all been a struggle between good and evil principles.

We have loved war better than peace, our policy being evil, and we are now reaping the bitter, bitter fruits of that unnatural excitation which war occasions. The victory of Waterloo was achieved by a last desperate effort of feverish strength; it has left us without an enemy, but it has also left us impoverished, spiritless, in the weakness of exhaustion. Still, amid all the present distresses, there are in the moral features of the times, indications of the future good which awaits

We deem it immoral to despond. We warmly participate in the confidence expressed by Mr. Southey, with respect to the hopes of man, and we call upon at least every believer in the promises of inspiration, to discard those morbid feelings of impatience and distrust which the too exclusive contemplation of human agency is apt to engender, and to rejoice that the Lord • God Omnipotent reigneth.'

• Here under freedom's tutelary wing,

Deliberate courage fears no human foe;
Here undefiled as in their native spring

The living waters of religion flow;
Here like a beacon the transmitted light

Conspicuous to all nations burneth bright.'
Mr. Southey thus nobly celebrates the noblest triumph of
Britain.

• The landscape changed ;-a region next was seen,

Where sable swans on rivers yet unfound
Glided thro' broad savannahs ever-green ;

Innumerous flocks and herds were feeding round,
And scattered farms appeared and hamlets fair,
And rising towns which made another Britain there.
Then thick as stars which stud the moonless sky,

Green islands in a peaceful sea were seen;
Darkened no more with blind idolatry,

Nor curst with hideous usages obscene,
But healed of leprous.crimes, from butchering strife
Delivered, and reclaimed to moral life.

Around the rude Morai, the temple now

Of truth, hosannahs to the Holiest rung :
There from the Christian's equal marriage-vow,

In natural growth the household virtues sprung:
Children were taught the paths of heavenly peace,
And

age in hope looked on to its release.
The light those happy Islanders enjoyed,

Good messengers from Britain had conveyed ;
(Where might such bounty wiselier be employed?)

One people with their teachers were they made,
Their arts, their language, and their faith the same,
And blest in all, for all they blest the British name.
Then rose a different land, where loftiest trees

High o'er the grove their fan like foliage rear;
Where spicy bowers upon the passing breeze

Diffuse their precious fragrance far and near ;
And yet untaught to bend his massive knee,
Wisest of brutes, the elephant roams free.
Hlinistrant there to health and public good,

The busy axe was heard on every. side,
Opening new channels, that the noxious wood

With wind and sunshine might be purified,
And that wise Government, the general friend,
Might every where its eye and arm extend.
The half-brutal Bedah came from his retreat,

To human life by human kindness won;
The Cingalese beheld that work compleat

Which Holland in her day had well begun;
The Candian, prospering under Britain's reign,
Blest the redeeming hand which broke his chain.
Colours and castes were heeded there no more :

Laws which depraved. degraded, and opprest,
Were laid aside, for on that happy shore

All men with equal liberty were blest ;
And thro' the land, the breeze upon its swells
Bore the sweet music of the sabbath bells

pp. 184-187.

• Enough! the Goddess cried; with that the cloud

Obeyed, and closed upon the magic scene :
Thus much, quoth she, is to thine hopes allowed;

Ills may impede, delays may intervene,
But scenes like these the coming age will bless,

If England but pursue the course of righteousness. pp. 191. We shall adopt the last stanza of the poem in conclusion, as a parting address to Mr. Southey.

And thou to whom in spirit at this hour

The vision of thy country's bliss is given, Vol. VI. N. S.

С

Who feelest that she holds her trusted power

To do the will and spread the word of Heaven,...
Hold fast the fate which animates thy mind,
And in thy songs proclaim the hopes of human kind.

Art. II. Travels into various Countries of Europe, Asia, and Africa.

By Edward Daniel Clarke, LL.D. Part II Greece, Egypt, and the Holy Land. Section Second, 4to. pp. about 850. Price 41. 14s. 6d. Cadell and

Davies. 1814. Section Third. To which is added a Supplement, respecting the

Author's Journey from Constantinople to Vienna ; containing his Account of the Gold Mines of Transylvania and Hungary, 4to.

pp. 750. Price 41. 14s. 6d. 1816. [The Two Volumes contain (including Maps and Charts) 56 En

gravings of the full Size, and 48 Vignettes.] THESE are the third and fourth massive volumes of Dr.

Clarke's splendid performance. The latter of thein constitutes the last section of the second part. It brings the Author back, after so long a sojourn, to the shores of his native country.

No conjecture is given as to the probable extent of the portion yet in reserve, and of which the subjects are to be Denmark, Norway, Sweden, Lapland, and Finland. Its preparation, we may presume, will be carried on without intermission.

We cannot think without some degree of envy of the continuous interest attending such a process as that of our Author's work. Froin one main cause of anxiety in authorship he is totally exempt, the necessity of inventing or collecting materials, with a constant uncertainty whether exactly the desirable ones will occur, and a doubt still haunting, at each step of the progress, whether something much better might not have been found than that of which the composition is actually made to consist. In a case like the present, the writer is, beforehand, quite certain of his materials; they are ready, in full existence and abundance in his papers; they are absolutely his own; and he knows that a large proportion are such as inevitably will and must be interesting to the intelligent public--that they will be so in a considerable degree even independently of the manner in which they shall be drawn out to view. Whatever of excellence therefore he may evince in execution, whatever judgement,.taste, and elegance, in the complicated task of selection, arrangement, and composition, will be received, not indeed as quite gratuitous, but with the pleasure imparted by a handsome way of presenting a good thing. The very considerable labour of the operation is thus exhilarated by the full confidence that between the merits of matter and of manner he cannot labour in vain.