THE VILLAGE CHURCH.

AND is our country's father fled,

His car of fire can none recall? Be-here-his sacred spirit shed, Here-may his prophet mantle fall. Fain would I fill the vacant breach, Stand where he stood the plague to stay; In his prophetic spirit preach,

And in his hallowed accents pray.

It is not that on seraph's wing,

I hope to soar where he has soared ;—

This is the only claim I bring,

I love his church, I love his Lord.

I love the altar of my sires,

Firm as my country's rocks of steel;
And as I feed its sacred fires,
The present deity I feel.

I love to know that, not alone,
I meet the battle's angry tide;
That sainted myriads from the throne
Descend and combat at my side.
Mine is no solitary choice,-

See, here, the seal of saints impressed! The prayers of millions swell my voice; The mind of ages fills my breast.

I love the ivy-mantled tower,

Rocked by the storms of thousand years; The Grave, whose melancholy flower Was nourished by a martyr's tears, The sacred Yew, so feared in war,

Which, like the sword to David given,

Inflicted not a human scar,

But lent to man the arms of heaven.

I love the organ's joyous swell,—
Sweet echo of the joyous ode!
I love the cheerful village bell,—

Faint emblem of he call of God.
Waked by the sound, I bend my feet,
I bid my swelling sorrows cease;
I do but touch the mercy seat,

And hear the still small voice of peace.

And, as the ray of evening fades,

I love amidst the dead to stand, Where, in the chancel's deepening shades, I seem to meet the ghostly band. One comes;-Oh! mark his sparkling eye! I knew his faith, his strong endeavour; Another-Ah! I hear him sigh,

Alas! and is he gone for ever!

Another treads the shadowy aisle,

I know him 'tis my sainted sire ;I know his patient angel smile,

His shepherd voice, his eye of fire!— His ashes rest in yonder urn ;—

I saw his death;-I closed his eye;Bright sparks amidst those ashes burn, That death has taught me how to die.

Long be our Father's temple ours,-
Woe to the hand by which it falls ;
A thousand spirits watch its towers,
A cloud of angels guard its walls.
And be their shield by us possessed!
Lord, rear around thy blest abode,
The buttress of a holy breast,

The rampart of a present God'

Manchester Exchange Herald.

ADDRESS

TO THE EGYPTIAN MUMMY IN BELZONI'S EXHIBITION.

BY HORACE SMITH, ESQ.

AND thou hast walked about-how strange a story!—
In Thebes's streets three thousand years ago!
When the Memnonium was in all its glory,
And Time had not begun to overthrow
Those temples, palaces, and piles stupendous,
Of which the very ruins are tremendous !

Speak, for thou long enough hast acted Dummy!
Thou hast a tongue-come-let us hear its tune!
Thou'rt standing on thy legs, above-ground, Mummy!
Revisiting the glimpses of the Moon;

Not like thin ghosts or disembodied creatures,
But with thy bones, and flesh, and limbs and features.

Tell us for doubtless thou canst recollect,

To whom should we assign the Sphinx's fame?

Was Cheops, or Cephrenés architect

Of either Pyramid that bears his name?

Is Pompey's Pillar really a misnomer?

Had Thebes a hundred gates as sung by Homer?

Perhaps thou wert a Mason, and forbidden,

By oath, to tell the mysteries of thy trade,— Then say, what secret melody was hidden

In Memnon's statue, which at sunrise played? Perhaps thou wert a Priest-if so, my struggles Are vain, for priestcraft never owns its juggles.

Perchance that very hand, now pinioned flat,
Hath hob-a-nobbed with Pharoah, glass to glass;

Or dropped a halfpenny in Homer's hat;

Or doffed thine own to let Queen Dido pass :

Or held, by Solomon's own invitation,
A torch at the great Temple's dedication.

I need not ask thee if that hand, when armed,
Has any Roman soldier mauled and knuckled?
For thou wert dead, and buried, and embalmed,
Ere Romulus and Remus had been suckled:-
Antiquity appears to have begun

Long after thy primeval race was run.

Thou could'st develope, if that withered tongue
Might tell us what those sightless orbs have seen,
How the world looked when it was fresh and young,
And the great Deluge still had left it green!—
Or was it then so old that History's pages
Contained no record of its early ages?

Still silent! Incommunicative elf!

Art sworn to secrecy? then keep thy vows; But, prythee, tell us something of thyself,—

Reveal the secrets of thy prison-house;

Since in the world of spirits, thou hast slumbered,

What hast thou seen-what strange adventures numbered?

Since first thy form was in this box extended,

We have, above-ground, seen some strange mutations ;

The Roman Empire has begun and ended;

New worlds have risen,-we have lost old nations';

And countless kings have into dust been humbled,

While not a fragment of thy flesh has crumbled.

Didst thou not hear the pother o'er thy head

When the great Persian Conqueror, Cambyses,
Marched armies o'er thy tomb, with thundering tread,
O'erthrew Osiris, Orus, Apis, Isis,

And shook the Pyramids with fear and wonder,
When the gigantic Memnon fell asunder?

If the tomb's secrets may not be confessed,
The nature of thy private life unfold :—

A heart hath throbbed beneath that leathern breast,
And tears adown that dusty cheek have rolled.
Have children climbed those knees, and kissed that face?
What was thy name, and station, age, and race?

Statue of flesh!-Immortal of the dead!
Imperishable type of evanescence!

Posthumous man, who quitt'st thy narrow bed,
And standest undecayed within our presence,
Thou wilt hear nothing till the Judgment morning,
When the great Trump shall thrill thee with its warning.

Why should this worthless tegument endure,
If its undying guest be lost for ever?

O let us keep the soul embalmed and pure

In living virtue, that when both must sever, -Although corruption may our frame consume, The immortal spirit in the skies may bloom. New Monthly Magazine.

THE FORSAKEN HEART.

My heart is like a lonely lyre,
Whose melody hath died away:
The flame of a neglected fire,
Burning away.

And thou art as the careless fingers,

Which tore those tuneless strings away;
The gale, which as the last spark lingers,
Wastes it away.

The world, the senseless world remembers,
The music which hath passed away :

Its tears have steeped the cold, cold embers;
But thou art gay.

Literary Gazette.