LESSON LIV. A Thought on Death.-MRS. Barbauld.* WHEN life as opening buds is sweet, When scarce is seized some valued prize, How awful then it is to die! When, one by one, those ties are torn, Ah! then, how easy 'tis to die! When trembling limbs refuse their weight, 'Tis nature's precious boon to die! When faith is strong, and conscience clear, And visioned glories half appear, 'Tis joy, 'tis triumph, then to die! LESSON LV. The Old Man's Funeral.-Bryant. I SAW an aged man upon his bier: His hair was thin and white, and on his brow A record of the cares of many a year; Cares that were ended and forgotten now. And there was sadness round, and faces bowed, And women's tears fell fast, and children wailed aloud. * Written after she had passed her eightieth year. Then rose another hoary man, and said, In faltering accents, to that weeping train, "Why mourn ye that our aged friend is dead? Ye are not sad to see the gathered grain, Nor when their mellow fruit the orchards cast, Nor when the yellow woods shake down the ripened mast. "Ye sigh not when the sun, his course fulfilled,His glorious course, rejoicing earth and sky, In the soft evening, when the winds are stilled, Sinks where the islands of refreshment lie, And leaves the smile of his departure, spread O'er the warm-coloured heaven and ruddy mountain head. "Why weep ye then for him, who, having run The bound of man's appointed years, at last, Life's blessings all enjoyed, life's labours done, Serenely to his final rest has passed? While the soft memory of his virtues yet Lingers, like twilight hues, when the bright sun is set. "His youth was innocent; his riper age Marked with some act of goodness every day; Cheerful he gave his being up, and went "That life was happy; every day, he gave To mock him with her phantom miseries. "And I am glad that he has lived thus long; When his weak hand grew palsied, and his eye * A chronic disease is one of long duration. † Pron. nun. LESSON LVI. Sunday Evening.-BowRING. How shall I praise thee, Lord of light? And life and beauty glow around. How shall my thoughts expression find, How shall I seek, thou infinite Mind, Whose power and wisdom, love and grace, Gently the shades of night descend; In all their loveliest robes were dressed. Dost claim earth's children for thy own, LESSON LVII. The Star of Bethlehem.-J. G. PERCIVAL. BRIGHTER than the rising day, On the guilty world below, The Star that rose in Bethlehem. When our eyes are dimmed with tears, Grief's dark clouds may o'er us roll, And sorrow's tears in torrents flow; The Star that rose in Bethlehem. When we cross the rearing wave When we look into the grave, And wander through this world no more; This, the lamp whose genial ray, The Star that rose in Bethlehem. Let the world be sunk in sorrow, We can see a fair to-morrow Smiling in the rosy west; This, her beacon, Hope displays; When this gloomy life is o'er, LESSON LVIII. The Funeral of Maria.-MACKENzie. MARIA was in her twentieth year. To the beauty of her form, and excellence of her natural disposition, a parent, equally indulgent and attentive, had done the fullest justice. To accomplish her person, and to cultivate her mind, every endeavour had been used, and had been attended with that success which parental efforts commonly meet with, when not prevented by mistaken fondness, or untimely vanity. Few young ladies have attracted more admiration; none ever felt it less: with all the charms of beauty, and the polish of education, the plainest were not less affected, nor the most ignorant less assuming. She died when every tongue was eloquent of her virtues, when every hope was ripening to reward them. It is by such private and domestic distresses, that the softer emotions of the heart are most strongly excited. The fall of more important personages is commonly distant from our observation; but, even where it happens under our immediate notice, there is a mixture of other feelings, by which our compassion is weakened. The eminently great, or extensively useful, leave behind them a train of interrupted views, and disappointed expectations, by which the distress is complicated beyond the simplicity of pity. But the death of one, who, like Maria, was to shed the influence of her virtues over the age of a |