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JAMES GATES PERCIVAL.

[Born, 1795.]

MR. PERCIVAL was born in Berlin, near Hart- | he intimates that its highest office is the creation ford, in Connecticut, on the fifteenth of September, 1795. His father, an intelligent physician, died in 1807, and he was committed to the care of a guardian. His instruction continued to be carefully attended to, however, and when fifteen years of age he entered Yale College. The condition of his health, which had been impaired by too close application to study, rendered necessary a temporary removal from New Haven, but after an absence of about a year he returned, and in 1815 graduated with the reputation of being the first scholar of his class. He subsequently entered the Yale Medical School, and in 1820 received the degree of Doctor of Medicine.

of beauty, and that there are certain unchanging principles of taste, to which all works of art, all "linked sounds of most elaborate music," must be conformable, to give more than a feeble and transient pleasure.

He began to write verses at an early age, and in his fourteenth year is said to have produced a satire in aim and execution not unlike Mr. BRYANT'S "Embargo." In the last year of his college life he composed a dramatic piece to be spoken by some of the students at the annual commencement, which was afterwards enlarged and printed under the title of "Zamor, a Tragedy." He did not appear as an author before the public, however, until 1821, when he published at New Haven, with some minor poems, the first part of his "Prometheus," which attracted considerable attention, and was favourably noticed in an article by Mr. EDWARD EVERETT, in the North American Re

view.

In 1822 he published two volumes of miscellaneous poems and prose writings under the title of "Clio," the first at Charleston, South Carolina, and the second at New Haven. They contain "Consumption," "The Coral Grove," and other pieces which have been regarded as among the finest of his works. In the same year they were followed by an oration, previously delivered before the Phi Beta Kappa Society of Yale College, « On Some of the Moral and Political truths Derivable from History," and the second part of "Prometheus." The whole of this poem contains nearly four hundred stanzas in the Spenserian measure. An edition of his principal poetical writings, embracing a few original pieces, appeared soon after in New York and was reprinted in London.

In 1824 Dr. PERCIVAL was appointed an assistant-surgeon in the army, and stationed at West Point with orders to act as Professor of Chemistry in the Military Academy. He had supposed that the duties of the office were so light as to allow him abundant leisure for the pursuit of his favourite studies, and when undeceived by the experience of a few months, he resigned his commission and went to Boston, where he passed in various literary avocations the greater portion of the year 1825. In this period he wrote his poem on the mind, in which

Early in 1827 he published in New York the third volume of "Clio," and was afterwards engaged nearly two years in superintending the printing of the first quarto edition of Dr. WEBSTER's American Dictionary, a service for which he was eminently qualified by an extensive and critical acquaintance with ancient and modern languages. His next work was a new translation of MALTEBRUN's Geography, from the French, which was not completed until 1843.

From his boyhood Dr. PERCIVAL has been an earnest and constant student, and there are few branches of learning with which he is not familiar. Perhaps there is not in the country a man of more thorough and comprehensive scholarship. In 1835 he was employed by the government of Connecticut to make a geological survey of that state, which he had already very carefully explored on his own account. His Report on the subject, which is very able and elaborate, was printed in an octavo volume of nearly five hundred pages, in 1842. While engaged in these duties he published poetical translations from the Polish, Russian, Servian, Bohemian, German, Dutch, Danish, Swedish, Italian, Spanish, and Portuguese languages, and wrote a considerable portion of "The Dream of Day and other Poems," which appeared at New Haven in 1843. This is his last volume; it embraces more than one hundred and fifty varieties of measure, and its contents generally show his familiar acquaintance with the poetical art, which in his preface he observes, "requires a mastery of the riches and niceties of a language; a full knowledge of the science of versification, not only in its own pe culiar principles of rhythm and melody, but in its relation to elocution and music, with that delicate natural perception and that facile execution which render the composition of verse hardly less easy than that of prose; a deep and quick insight into the nature of man, in all his varied faculties, intellectual and emotive; a clear and full perception of the power and beauty of nature, and of all its various harmonies with our own thoughts and feelings; and, to gain a high rank in the present age, wide and exact attainments in literature and art in general. Nor is the possession of such faculties and attainments all that is necessary; but such a sustained and self-collected state of mind as gives one the mastery of his genius, and at the same time presents to him the ideal as an immediate reality, not as a remote conception."

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There are few men who possess these high qualities in a more eminent degree than PERCIVAL; but with the natural qualities of a great poet, and his comprehensive and thorough learning, he lacks the executive skill, or declines the labour, without which few authors gain immortality. He has considerable imagination, remarkable command of language, and writes with a facility rarely equalled; but when his thoughts are once committed to the page, he shrinks from the labour of revising,

correcting, and condensing. He remarks in one of his prefaces, that his verse is "very far from bearing the marks of the file and the burnisher," and that he likes to see "poetry in the full ebullition of feeling and fancy, foaming up with the spirit of life, and glowing with the rainbows of a glad inspiration." If by this he means that a poet should reject the slow and laborious process by which a polished excellence is attained, very few who have acquired good reputations will agree with him

CONCLUSION OF THE DREAM OF A
DAY.

A SPIRIT Stood before me, half unseen,
Majestic and severe; yet o'er him play'd
A genial light-subdued though high his mien,
As by a strong collected spirit sway'd-
In even balance justly poised between
Each wild extreme, proud strength by feeling
[stay'd-
Dwelling in upper realms serenely bright,
Lifted above the shadowy sphere of night.
He stood before me, and I heard a tone,

Such as from mortal lips had never flow'd,
Soft yet commanding, gentle yet alone,

It bow'd the listener's heart-anon it glow'd Intensely fervent, then like wood-notes thrown

On the chance winds, in airy lightness rodeNow swell'd like ocean surge, now pausing fell Like the last murmur of a muffled bell.

"Lone pilgrim through life's gloom," thus spake the shade,

"Hold on with steady will along thy way:
Thou, by a kindly favouring hand wert made-
Hard though thy lot, yet thine what can repay
Long years of bitter toil-the holy aid

Of spirit aye is thine, be that thy stay:
Thine to behold the true, to feel the pure,
To know the good and lovely-these endure.
Hold on-thou hast in thee thy best reward;

Poor are the largest stores of sordid gain,
If from the heaven of thought thy soul is barr'd,
If the high spirit's bliss is sought in vain:
Think not thy lonely lot is cold or hard,

The world has never bound thee with its chain;
Free as the birds of heaven thy heart can soar,
Thou canst create new worlds-what wouldst thou
more?

The future age will know thee-yea, even now

Hearts beat and tremble at thy bidding, tears
Flow as thou movest thy wand, thy word can bow
Even ruder natures, the dull soul uprears
As thou thy trumpet blast attunest-thou

Speakest, and each remotest valley hears:
Thou hast the gift of song-a wealth is thine,
Richer than all the treasures of the mine.

Hold on, glad spirits company thy path

They minister to thee, though all unseen: Even when the tempest lifts its voice in wrath,

Thou joyest in its strength; the orient sheen
Gladdens thee with its beauty; winter hath

A holy charm that soothes thee, like the green
Of infant May-all nature is thy friend,
All seasons to thy life enchantment lend.
Man, too, thou know'st and feelest-all the springs
That wake his smile and tear, his joy and sorrow,
All that uplifts him on emotion's wings,

Each longing for a fair and blest to-morrow,
Each tone that soothes or saddens, all that rings

Joyously to him, thou canst fitly borrow
From thy own breast, and blend it in a strain,
To which each human heart beats back again.
Thine the unfetter'd thought, alone controll'd
By nature's truth; thine the wide-seeing eye,
Catching the delicate shades, yet apt to hold

The whole in its embrace-before it lie
Pictured in fairest light, as chart unroll'd,

Fields of the present and of destiny:
The voice of truth amid the senseless throng
May now be lost; 'tis heard and felt ere long.
Hold on-live for the world-live for all time-
Rise in thy conscious power, but gently bear
Thy form among thy fellows; sternly climb

The spirit's alpine peaks; mid snow towers there
Nurse the pure thought, but yet accordant chime

With lowlier hearts in valleys green and fair,—
Sustain thyself yield to no meaner hand,
Even though he rule awhile thy own dear land.
Brief is his power, oblivion waits the churl
Bound to his own poor self; his form decays,
But sooner fades his name.
Thou shalt unfurl
Thy standard to the winds of future days-
Well mayest thou in thy soul defiance hurl

On such who would subdue thee; thou shalt raise
Thy name, when they are dust, and nothing more :
Hold on-in earnest hope still look before.
Nerved to a stern resolve, fulfil thy lot-

Reveal the secrets nature has unveil'd thee;
All higher gifts by toil intense are bought-
Has thy firm will in action ever fail'd thee?
Only on distant summits fame is sought-

Sorrow and gloom thy nature has entail'd thee,
But bright thy present joys, and brighter far
The hope that draws thee like a heavenly star."
The voice was still-its tone in distance dying
Breathed in my ear, like harp faint heard at even,

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