BOOK II.

SPRING-TIME.

Now that the Winter's gone, the earth hath lost

Her snow-white robes, and now no more the frost
Candies the grass, or calls an icy cream

Upon the silver lake or crystal stream;

But the warm sun thaws the benumbèd earth,
And makes it tender; gives a sacred birth
To the glad swallow; wakes in hollow tree
The drowsy cuckoo, and the humble bee ;
Now do a choir of chirping minstrels bring
In triumph to the world the youthful Spring;
And valleys, hills, and woods, in rich array,
Welcome the coming of the longed-for May.

-THOMAS CAREW

'Tis silence all,

And pleasing expectation.

Even mountains, vales,

And forests, seem impatient to demand

The promised sweetness. Man superior walks

Amid the glad creation, musing praise,

And looking lively gratitude.

-THOMSON.

T may be doubted whether many of the patrons of Mudie's are acquainted with the works of a philosopher, who, in his day, enjoyed no little fame-I mean, Robert Boyle (1627-1691),-and yet there are passages in them well worth attentive perusal, from the lucidity of their style and the soundness of their reflections. He has, for instance, some observations in his "Considerations on the Usefulness of Experimental Philosophy," which are germane to the general purport and tone of our little book. marks, that the contemplation of the vastness, beauty, and regular motions of the heavenly bodies, the excellent structure of animals and plants, besides a multi

He re

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LESSONS FROM NATURE.

tude of other phenomena of nature, and the subserviency of most of these to man, ought, certainly, to induce him, as a rational creature, to conclude that this vast, beautiful, orderly, and, in a word, many ways admirable, system of things, that we call the world, was framed by an Author supremely powerful, wise, and good.

The works of God, he adds, are so worthy of their Author, that, besides the impresses of His wisdom and goodness that are left, as it were, upon their surfaces, there are a great many more curious and excellent tokens and effects of Divine artifice in the hidden and innermost recesses of them; and these are not to be discovered by the perfunctory looks of oscitant and unskilful beholders; but require, as well as deserve, the most attentive and prying inspection of inquisitive and wellinstructed considerers. It is not by a slight survey, but by a diligent and skilful scrutiny of the works of God, that a man must be, by a rational and affective conviction, engaged to acknowledge, with the prophet, that the Author of nature is "wonderful in counsel, and excellent in working.'

That He is wonderful in counsel and excellent in working must be the conclusion of every devout student of the celestial phenomena; and to those we shall, therefore, devote the first portion of our Spring meditations.

What reception would formerly have been given to any poet who had dared to exclaim

"The bright face of the heavens contemplate,

And then, as in a mirror, you shall see,

Outlined, the figure of the rounded earth "?