beggar, bankrupt in estate, in love, in friendship, and, worst of all, in self-esteem. Yet the faith with which it was commenced has ripened into certainty, and the sad knowledge of what I am feelingly informs me what I might have been.

"This day, too, I beheld the first snowdrop, the earliest primrose. Nature begins to revive, and why should not I commence a new year from this day?

"A woeful thing it is to find

No trust secure in weak mankind;
But ten-fold woe betide the elf

Who knows not how to trust himself.

What then remains?

Can oath or vow,

Or formal protest aid me?

Ah! no, for if I make them now,

Next week they will upbraid me:

For what I am, oh! shame and sorrow,
I cannot hope to be to-morrow.

If I am weak, yet God is strong,

If I am false, yet God is true.

Old things are past, or right or wrong,

And every day that comes is new.
To-morrow then fresh hope may bring,
And rise with healing on its wing.

"This vile doggrel, hoarse and melancholy as the wind that moans without, dull as the embers of the dying fire, and like to be as the month now past-forgotten! 'Tis now February, and yet, a solitary comrade of midnight, fearing like a thief the tardy dawn,

"Which new-born pleasure brings to happier men,'

I scribble with an aching head and trembling hand."

"It has been a lovely day; the rain has fallen like a blessing on herb, and tree, and flower. The fields, the hills, the lake, so fickle, yet so constant in its commingling transitions

from light to shade, were possessed in the unity of peaceful gladness, now rejoicing in the soft yellow sunbeams, now pensive, not sad, as the clouds floated leisurely along the sky. The birds, who love in their seasons, and know not the collapse of despair, nor the fighting chaos of jealousy, nor the shame, the uneasy silence, the self-condemned yet cherished longing of forbidden hope, sang as if there were no evil upon the earth.

"He bids me hope, vow, pray; but Hope obeys nor man's nor spirit's bidding, and to resolve is but to fetter flame with cords of flax. To vow-to enter my own, condemnation in the book of Heaven. To pray-oh! that I could pray! that I could lift up my heart to Him that heareth prayer, were it but with the heavings of agony.

"He spake to me calmly, and his talk was of high matters. Ofth, the soul's prime energy-that is to man the life of

power, strength to the weak, and sight to the blind, whereby we know that God is in us, and in all and above all; whereby the soul receives capacity even as the sea to contain the many streams of Divine grace. He spake too of mysterious instincts-prophetic impulses, yearnings which our universe could not satisfy; which nevertheless crave for the most unsubstantial of earth's kickshaws, for dreams, omens, auguries, stellar configurations, and mystic signatures on stone or flower. Vain folly all, which yet bears testimony to a hidden wisdom."

And again, after an interval of five years :—

"When I received this volume small,

My years were barely seventeen;

When it was hoped I should be all

Which once, alas! I might have been.

And now my years are thirty-five,

And every mother hopes her lamb,

And every happy child alive,

May never be what now I am.

But yet should any chance to look
On the strange medley scribbled here,
I charge thee, tell them, little book,
I am not vile as I appear.

Oh! tell them though my purpose lame,
In fortune's race, was still behind,-
Though earthly blots my name defiled,
They ne'er abused my better mind.

Of what men are, and why they are
So weak, so woefully beguiled,
Much I have learned, but, better far,
I know my soul is reconciled."

The following is a similar strain :

:

"I need a cleansing change within,
My life must once again begin ;
New hope, new love, and youth renewed,
And more than human fortitude.

I must be washed in purer streams
Than e'er reflected Dian's gleams.

Ah! why did fabling poets tell
That Lethe only flows in hell?
It is the only fount of bliss

That springs in the waste wilderness..
It is the true Bethesda, solely
Endued with healing might, and holy.

Not once a year, but now and ever
It is the blest undying river,
That descending from the skies,
Waters earthly paradise.

But its well, unseen, unknown,
Is hid beneath Jehovah's throne.

Woe for him that, fettered fast
In the dim dungeon of the past,
Cannot stir a limb or sinew,
Nor a course of hope begin new;
It is useless to regret-

Teach, oh! teach me to forget."*

He sought strength by a divine renewal. He wished, he prayed, that the former things might pass away-that he might be disentangled and set free from himself. But with this clear perception and full acceptance of evangelical truth, he had not been led sufficiently to regard the Christian. life in its disciplinary aspect, or perhaps to set a due value on those means and processes of selfregulation, which are accommodated to this view. His short-comings were obvious,-open to all eyes: yet if all could be known, it may well be questioned whether he did not differ as much from ordinary men in the bitterness of his self-reproach, as in the extent of his failings.

A few months before his death, he wrote the following affecting lines in a copy of his poems, alluding to his intention of publishing another volume :

"FOLLOWED BY ANOTHER.'

"Oh! woeful impotence of weak resolve,
Recorded rashly to the writer's shame.

These lines were afterwards remodelled, and published under the title Regeneration (Vol. i., p. 133).

Days pass away, and Time's large orbs revolve,
And every day beholds me still the same,
Till oft neglected purpose loses aim,
And hope becomes a flat unheeded lie,

And conscience, weary with the work of blame,
In seeming slumber droops her wistful eye,
As if she would resign her unregarded ministry."

His last years, though not marked by any decided change in his state of mind, exhibited upon the whole an increase of activity,—of the wish and effort to make his labours profitable, and exert his talents to advantage. His mind became more cheerful,-at least his memoranda are less desponding. He appears conscious of a progress in himself, which he records, inter alia, with his usual humility, but with a certain. satisfaction.

17th.-Sunday,-At Rydal chapel. Alas! I have been Parcus Deorum cultor et infrequens of late. Would I could say with assurance, Nunc iterare cursus cogor relictos. I never saw Axiologus (Wordsworth) look so venerable. His cape cloak has such a gravity about it. Old gentlemen should never wear light great coats unless they be military; and even then Uncle Toby's Roquelaure would be more becoming than all the frogs in Styx. On the other hand, loose trowsers should never invest the nether limbs of eld. It looks as if the Septuagenarian were ashamed of a diminished calf. The sable silk is good and clerical, so are the grey pearl and the partridge. I revere grey worsted and ridge and furrow for å μakapiτns his sake, but perhaps the bright white lamb's wool doth most set off the leg of an elderly man. The hose should be drawn over the knees,

VOL. I.

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