Genius Waking.—PERCIVAL.

SLUMBER's heavy chain hath bound thee-
Where is now thy fire?

Feebler wings are gathering round thee-
Shall they hover higher?
Can no power, no spell, recall thee
From inglorious dreams?

O, could glory so appal thee,

With his burning beams!

Thine was once the highest pinion
In the midway air;

With a proud and sure dominion,

Thou didst upward bear.

Like the herald, winged with lightning,
From the Olympian throne,

Ever mounting, ever brightening,

Thou wert there alone.

Where the pillared props of heaven
Glitter with eternal snows,
Where no darkling clouds are driven,
Where no fountain flows-
Far above the rolling thunder,
When the surging storm
Rent its sulphury folds asunder,
We beheld thy form.

O, what rare and heavenly brightness
Flowed around thy plumes,

As a cascade's foamy whiteness
Lights a cavern's glooms!

Wheeling through the shadowy ocean,
Like a shape of light,

With serene and placid motion,

Thou wert dazzling bright.

From that cloudless region stooping,
Downward thou didst rush,
Not with pinion faint and drooping
But the tempest's gush.

Up again undaunted soaring,

Thou didst pierce the cloud,

When the warring winds were roaring
Fearfully and loud.

Where is now that restless longing
After higher things?

Come they not, like visions, thronging
On their airy wings?

Why should not their glow enchant thee
Upward to their bliss?

Surely danger cannot daunt thee

From a heaven like this.

But thou slumberest; faint and quivering Hangs thy ruffled wing;

Like a dove in winter shivering,

Or a feebler thing.

Where is now thy might and motion,
Thy imperial flight?

Where is now thy heart's devotion?

Where thy spirit's light?

Hark! his rustling plumage gathers

Closer to his side,

Close, as when the storm-bird weathers Ocean's hurrying tide.

Now his nodding beak is steady

Wide his burning eye

Now his opening wings are ready,

And his aim-how high!

Now he curves his neck, and proudly
Now is stretched for flight-
Hark! his wings-they thunder loudly,
And their flash-how bright!
Onward-onward over mountains,
Through the rock and storm,

Now, like sunset over fountains,
Flits his glancing form.

Glorious bird, thy dream has left thee-
Thou hast reached thy heaven-
Lingering slumber hath not reft thee
Of the glory given.

With a bold, a fearless pinion,

On thy starry road,

None, to fame's supreme dominion,
Mightier ever trode.

The Spirit of Poetry.-LONGFELLOW.

THERE is a quiet spirit in these woods,

That dwells where'er the gentle south wind blows-
Where, underneath the white-thorn, in the glade,
The wild flowers bloom, or, kissing the soft air,
The leaves above their sunny palms outspread.
With what a tender and impassioned voice
It fills the nice and delicate ear of thought,
When the fast-ushering star of morning comes
O'er-riding the gray hills with golden scarf;
Or when the cowled and dusky-sandaled eve,
In mourning weeds, from out the western gate,
Departs with silent pace! That spirit moves
In the green valley, where the silver brook,
From its full laver, pours the white cascade,
And, babbling low amid the tangled woods,

Slips down through moss-grown stones with endless laughte
And frequent, on the everlasting hills,

Its feet go forth, when it doth wrap itself
In all the dark embroidery of the storm,
And shouts the stern, strong wind.

And here, amid

The silent majesty of these deep woods,
Its presence shall uplift thy thoughts from earth,
As to the sunshine and the pure bright air
Their tops the green trees lift.

-Hence gifted bards
Have ever loved the calm and quiet shades.
For them there was an eloquent voice in all
The sylvan pomp of woods-the golden sun-
The flowers-the leaves-the river on its way-
Blue skies-and silver clouds-and gentle winds—
The swelling upland, where the sidelong sun
Aslant the wooded slope, at evening, goes-
Groves, through whose broken roof the sky looks in-
Mountain-and shattered cliff-and sunny vale-
The distant lake-fountains-and mighty trees-
In many a lazy syllable repeating

Their old poetic legends to the wind.

And this is the sweet spirit that doth fill

The world; and, in these wayward days of youth,

My busy fancy oft imbodies it,

As a bright image of the light and beauty

That dwell in nature-of the heavenly forms

We worship in our dreams, and the soft hues

That lie i' the wild bird's wing, and flush the clouds
When the sun sets. Within her eye

The heaven of April, with its changing light,

And when it wears the blue of May, was hung,

And on her lip the rich red rose.

Her hair

Was as the summer tresses of the trees,

When twilight makes them brown, and on her cheek
Blushed all the richness of an autumn sky,

With its ever-shifting beauty. Then her breath

It was so like the gentle air of spring,

As, from the morning's dewy flowers, it comes
Full of their fragrance, that it was a joy

To have it round us-and her silver voice

Was the rich music of a summer bird,

Heard in the still night, with its passionate cadence.

Incomprehensibility of God.*-MISS ELIZABETH TOWNSEND.

"I go forward, but he is not there; and backward, but I cannot perceive him."

WHERE art thou?-THOU! Source and Support of all That is or seen or felt; Thyself unseen,

Unfelt, unknown,-alas! unknowable!

I look abroad among thy works-the sky,

Vast, distant, glorious with its world of suns,—

Life-giving earth, and ever-moving main,—
And speaking winds, and ask if these are Thee!
The stars that twinkle on, the eternal hills,
The restless tide's outgoing and return,
The omnipresent and deep-breathing air-

*To meet with such a piece of poetry as this, which we find in the fifth volume of the Unitarian Miscellany, would repay us for the toil of looking through whole libraries. It is equal in grandeur to the celebrated produc tion of Bryant-" Thanatopsis ; nor will it suffer by a comparison with the most sublime pieces either of Wordsworth or of Coleridge. The latter (with a feeling akin to the elevated inspiration which animates these noble lines) has said,

"For never guiltless may I speak of Him,
The Incomprehensible! save when with awe

I praise Him, and with Faith, that inly feels;
Who with his saving mercies healed me,
A sinful and most miserable man.'

ED.

Though hailed as gods of old, and only less-
Are not the Power I seek; are thine, not Thee!
I ask Thee from the past; if in the years,
Since first intelligence could search its source,
Or in some former unremembered being,

(If such, perchance, were mine) did they behold Thee? And next interrogate futurity

So fondly tenanted with better things

Than e'er experience owned-but both are mute;

And past and future, vocal on all else,

So full of memories and phantasies,

Are deaf and speechless here! Fatigued, I turn

From all vain parley with the elements;

And close mine eyes, and bid the thought turn inward. From each material thing its anxious guest,

If, in the stillness of the waiting soul,

He may vouchsafe himself-Spirit to spirit!

O Thou, at once most dreaded and desired,

Pavilioned still in darkness, wilt thou hide thee?
What though the rash request be fraught with fate,
Nor human eye may look on thine and live?
Welcome the penalty! let that come now,

Which soon or late must come. For light like this
Who would not dare to die?

Peace, my proud aim,
And hush the wish that knows not what it asks.

Await his will, who hath appointed this,

With every other trial. Be that will

Done now, as ever. For thy curious search,
And unprepared solicitude to gaze

On Him-the Unrevealed-learn hence, instead,
To temper highest hope with humbleness.
Pass thy novitiate in these outer courts,
Till rent the veil, no longer separating
The Holiest of all-as erst, disclosing
A brighter dispensation; whose results
Ineffable, interminable, tend

E'en to the perfecting thyself—thy kind—
Till meet for that sublime beatitude,
By the firm promise of a voice from heaven
Pledged to the pure in heart!