his skill may fail to do justice. Here is no apology for neglecting to do many things from a sense of our incapacity, for what deed does not fall maimed and imperfect from our hands? but only a warning to bungle less.

The satires of Persius are the farthest possible from inspired; evidently a chosen, not imposed subject. Perhaps I have given him credit for more earnestness than is apparent; but certain it is, that that which alone we can call Persius, which is forever independent and consistent, was in earnest, and so sanctions the sober consideration of all. The artist and his work are not to be separated. The most wilfully foolish man cannot stand aloof from his folly, but the deed and the doer together make ever one sober fact. The buffoon may not bribe you to laugh always at his grimaces; they shall sculpture themselves in Egyptian granite, to stand heavy as the pyramids on the ground of his character.

T.

THE SHIELD.

THE old man said, "Take thou this shield, my son,
Long tried in battle, and long tried by age,
Guarded by this thy fathers did engage,
Trusting to this the victory they have won."

Forth from the tower Hope and Desire had built,
In youth's bright morn I gazed upon the plain, —
There struggled countless hosts, while many a stain
Marked where the blood of brave men had been spilt.

With spirit strong I buckled to the fight,
What sudden chill rushes through every vein?
Those fatal arms oppress me — - all in vain
My fainting limbs seek their accustomed might.

Forged were those arms for men of other mould,
Our hands they fetter, cramp our spirits free,
I throw them on the ground and suddenly
Comes back my strength -

returns my spirit bold.

I stand alone, unarmed, yet not alone,
Who heeds no law but what within he finds,
Trusts his own vision, not to other minds,

He fights with thee - Father, aid thou thy son.

VOL. I. NO. I.

16

J.

THE PROBLEM.

I LIKE a church, I like a cowl,
I love a prophet of the soul,
And on my heart monastic aisles
Fall like sweet strains or pensive smiles,
Yet not for all his faith can see
Would I that cowled churchman be.

Why should the vest on him allure,
Which I could not on me endure?

Not from a vain or shallow thought
His awful Jove young Phidias brought;
Never from lips of cunning fell
The thrilling Delphic oracle;

Out from the heart of nature rolled
The burdens of the Bible old;

The litanies of nations came,

Like the volcano's tongue of flame,

Up from the burning core below, -
The canticles of love and wo.

The hand that rounded Peter's dome,

And groined the aisles of Christian Rome,
Wrought in a sad sincerity.

Himself from God he could not free;

He builded better than he knew,

The conscious stone to beauty grew.

Know'st thou what wove yon wood-bird's nest
Of leaves, and feathers from her breast;
Or how the fish outbuilt her shell,
Painting with morn each annual cell;
Or how the sacred pine tree adds
To her old leaves new myriads?
Such and so grew these holy piles,
Whilst love and terror laid the tiles.
Earth proudly wears the Parthenon
As the best gem upon her zone;
And Morning opes with haste her lids
To gaze upon the Pyramids;
O'er England's Abbeys bends the sky
As on its friends with kindred eye;
For, out of Thought's interior sphere
These wonders rose to upper air,
And nature gladly gave them place,
Adopted them into her race,
And granted them an equal date
With Andes and with Ararat.

These temples grew as grows the grass,
Art might obey but not surpass.

The passive Master lent his hand
To the vast Soul that o'er him planned,
And the same power that reared the shrine,
Bestrode the tribes that knelt within.

Ever the fiery Pentecost

Girds with one flame the countless host,
Trances the heart through chanting quires,
And through the priest the mind inspires.

The word unto the prophet spoken,
Was writ on tables yet unbroken;
The word by seers or sybils told
In groves of oak or fanes of gold,
Still floats upon the morning wind,
Still whispers to the willing mind.
One accent of the Holy Ghost
The heedless world hath never lost.
I know what say the Fathers wise, -
The Book itself before me lies,
Old Chrysostom, best Augustine,
And he who blent both in his line,
The younger Golden Lips or mines,
Taylor, the Shakspeare of divines;
His words are music in my ear,
I see his cowled portrait dear,
And yet for all his faith could see,
I would not the good bishop be.

COME MORIR?

He leaves the earth, and says, enough and more
Unto thee have I given, oh Earth. - For all
With hand free and ungrudging gave I up,
But now I leave thy pale hopes and dear pains,
The rude fields where so many years I've tilled,
And where no other feeling gave me strength,
Save that from them my home was aye in view,
For only transient clouds could hide from me
My spirit's home, whence it came, where should go; —
Enough, more than enough, now let me rest.

I SLEPT, and dreamed that life was Beauty;
I woke, and found that life was Duty.
Was thy dream then a shadowy lie?
Toil on, sad heart, courageously,
And thou shalt find thy dream to be
A noonday light and truth to thee.

J.

THE CONCERTS OF THE PAST WINTER.

MUSIC has made a decided progress in our city this last winter. This has appeared in the popularity of the concerts, compared with other amusements, and in the unusual amount of good music, which has not been wholly thrown away upon us. Of course many a lover of the art could not but look skeptically upon all this; could not fail to see that people were determined to this or that concert by fashion rather than by taste, and that the cheap contrivances of Russell always carried away the crowd, while the artist sang or played to the few. We cannot flatter ourselves for a moment that we of Boston are, or shall be for years to come, a musical people. The devoted lover of the art is only beginning to be countenanced and recognised as one better than an idler. He must still keep apologizing to his incredulous, practical neighbors for the heavenly influence which haunts him. He does not live in a genial atmosphere of music, but in the cold east wind of utility; and meets few who will acknowledge that what he loves has anything to do with life. Still we are confident we feel a progress. There is a musical element in the people; for there is certainly a religious sentiment, a restlessness, which craves more than the actual affords, an aspiration and yearning of the heart for communion, which cannot take place through words and thoughts, but only through some subtler medium, like music. It is not nature's fault, if we want the musical sense or organ. Slow, but sure development, under proper culture, will prove this. Singing is taught in schools embracing thousands, without much consciousness, to be sure, of the higher meaning of music, but with great success in producing quick and correct ears, and pure, flexible voices, and in making the number of those who can sing and read music, and of those who can enjoy and appreciate it, vastly greater than it was. This creates audiences for the oratorios and concerts; there is a looking that way; and the art bids fair sooner or later to have justice done it.

Next to thorough drilling in the rudiments, we want inspiring models. We want to hear good music. In the

schools the surface of the soil is loosened: it is time that good seeds should be dropped into it. The Psalmody of the country choir and the dancing master's fiddle, the waltzes and variations of the music-shop, Russell's songs, and "Jim Crow," and "Harrison Melodies," are not apt to visit the popular mind with the deep emotions of true music. Handel should be heard more, and Haydn, and Mozart, and Beethoven. The works of true genius, which cannot be too familiar, since they are always new like nature, should salute our ears until the nobler chords within our souls respond. We should be taught the same reverence for Bach and Handel as for Homer; and, having felt the spell of their harmonies upon us, should glow at the mention of their names. Every opportunity of hearing good music is to be hailed as an angel's visit in our community. It is in this view that we look back with pleasure upon the concerts of the past season.

That music of any kind draws crowds, is encouraging. But we have been more than encouraged, on looking over our old concert bills, which we have kept through the winter as a record of pleasant hours, to see how much genuine classic music has been brought out, with more or less success, at the various concerts: music, which the few devoutly musical had heard of, and longed to hear, with but a faint hope that they should soon be so blest ; — music, which introduces us within the charmed precincts of genius, like Beethoven's. In attempting to single out the most significant from such a multitude of performances, we shall of course omit much that was praiseworthy; for our opportunity of hearing was limited, nor is our memory sure, nor our space sufficient.

Most worthy of mention were the Oratorios of the Handel and Haydn Society. We had "The Messiah" twice, and "The Creation" several times. Neukomm's "David" had the greatest run, as usual. It is brilliant and variegated, and had been more thoroughly practised and learned than the other pieces. But as a composition it should not be mentioned with them. Its interest fades away, when it is repeated beyond a certain point, while that of "The Messiah" steadily increases. To the former we owe some bright hours, to the latter an influence for life. We feel tempted to call "The Messiah" the only Oratorio, and to doubt if