HE SLEPT.

THEY said he died ;-it seems to me
That after hours of pain and strife
He slept, one even, peacefully,
And woke to everlasting life.

TO AN INFANT IN HEAVEN.

THOU bright and star-like spirit!
That, in my visions wild,
I see mid heaven's seraphic host-
O! canst thou be my child?

My grief is quenched in wonder,
And pride arrests my sighs;
A branch from this unworthy stock
Now blossoms in the skies.

Our hopes of thee were lofty,
But have we cause to grieve?
O! could our fondest, proudest wish
A nobler fate conceive?

The little weeper, tearless,

The sinner, snatched from sin;

The babe, to more than manhood grown,

Ere childhood did begin.

And I, thy earthly teacher,

Would blush thy powers to see;
Thou art to me a parent now,

And I a child to thee!

What bliss is born of sorrow!
'Tis never sent in vain-

The heavenly Surgeon wounds to save,
He gives no useless pain.

Our God, to call us homeward,
His only Son sent down:

And now, still more to tempt our hearts,
Has taken up our own.

THOMAS WArd.

EPITAPH ON FOUR INFANTS.

BOLD infidelity, turn pale and die!
Beneath this stone, four infants' ashes lie ;

Say, are they lost, or saved?

If death's by sin, they sinned, because they 're here; If heaven's by works, in heaven they can't appear. Reason, ah! how depraved!

Revere the sacred page, the knot's untied;

They died, for Adam sinned:-they live, for Jesus

died.

REV. R. ROBINSON.

CHILDREN TAKEN IN MERCY.

IT may be your affliction is the loss of children. Well, have you not read such a message sent to a godly man, as that in 1 Samuel ii. : 33 ?" The son of thine whom I shall not cut off shall be to consume thine eyes, and to grieve thine heart." It is possible that, if thy child had lived, it might have made thee the father of a fool, or (that I may speak to the sex that is most unable to bear this trial) the mother of a shame. It is a very ordinary thing for one living child to occasion more trouble than ten dead ones. However, your spiritual interests may be exceedingly injured by the temporal delights which you desire; you may rue what you wish, because it may be an idol, which will render your souls like the "barren heath in the wilderness before the Lord." It was the very direful calamity of the ancient Israelites, in Psalm cvi. 15. "The Lord gave them their request, but sent leanness into their souls." A lean soul, a wretched soul, a soul pining away in its iniquities, is oftentimes the effect of those fine things which we dote upon. It is a blasted soul that sets up a creature in the room, on the throne of the great God, that gives unto a creature those affections and cares which are due unto the great God alone. idolatry the soul is too frequently by prosperity We are told, in Proverbs i. 32,

seduced into.

Such

"The prosperity of fools destroys them;" many a fool is thus destroyed. O fearful case! A full table and a lean soul! A high title and a lean soul! A numerous posterity and a soul even like the kine in Pharaoh's dream! Madness is in our hearts if we tremble not at this; soul calamities are sore calamities.

Let not then the death of your children cause any inconsolable grief. The loss of children, did I say?-nay, let me recall so harsh a word. The children we count lost, are not so. The death of our children is not the loss of our children. They are not lost, but given back; they are not lost, but sent before.

COTTON MATHER.

AN INFANT'S DEATH.

BE-rather than be called-a child of God,"
Death whispered. With assenting nod,

Its head upon its mother's breast,
The baby bowed without demur;
Of the kingdom of the blest,
Possessor-not inheritor.

COLERIDGE.

WEEP NOT FOR HER.

WEEP not for her!-O she was far too fair,
Too pure to dwell on this guilt-tainted earth!
The sinless glory and the golden air

Of Zion seemed to claim her from her birth! A spirit wandering from its native zone,

Which, soon discovering, took her for its own :
Weep not for her!

Weep not for her!-Her span was like the sky,
Whose thousand stars shine beautiful and bright;
Like flowers that know not what it is to die ;
Like long-link'd shadeless months of Polar light;
Like music floating o'er a waveless lake,
While Echo answers from the flowery brake,
Weep not for her!

THE LOST JEWEL.

DR. PAYSON, when engaged in paying pastoral visits to his spiritual flock, happened one day to enter "the house of mourning," and there he found a disconsolate mother, whose darling child had just been taken from the evil to come," whom he thus addressed: Suppose, now, some one was making a beautiful crown for you to wear; and you knew it