Not the tranquillest air that the winds ever blew,
Not the silvery lapse of the summer-eve dew,
Were as sweet as the breeze, or as bright as the foam
Of the wave that would carry your wanderer home!

LOVE AND REASON.

'Quand l'homme commence à raisonner, il cesse de sentir.'-J. J. Rousseau.

"TWAS in the summer-time so sweet,

When hearts and flowers are both in season,
That-who, of all the world, should meet,
One early dawn, but Love and Reason!

Love told his dream of yesternight,

While Reason talked about the weather;
The morn, in sooth, was fair and bright,
And on they took their way together.

The boy in many a gambol flew,
While Reason like a Juno stalked,
And from her portly figure threw
A lengthened shadow as she walked.
No wonder Love, as on they passed,
Should find the sunny morning chill,
For still the shadow Reason cast

Fell on the boy, and cooled him still.

In vain he tried his wings to warm,
Or find a pathway not so dim,
For still the maid's gigantic form
Would pass between the sun and him!

"This must not be,' said little Love

The sun was made for more than you.'
So, turning through a myrtle grove,
He bid the portly nymph adieu!

Now gaily roves the laughing boy

O'er many a mead, by many a stream;
In every breeze inhaling joy,

And drinking bliss in every beam.

From all the gardens, all the bowers,

He culled the many sweets they shaded,
And ate the fruits and smelt the flowers,
Till taste was gone and odour faded !

But now the sun, in pomp of noon,
Looked blazing o'er the parched plains;
Alas! the boy grew languid soon,

And fever thrilled through all his veins !

The dew forsook his baby brow,

No more with vivid bloom he smiledOh! where was tranquil Reason now, To cast her shadow o'er the child?

Beneath a green and aged palm,

His foot at length for shelter turning,
He saw the nymph reclining calm,
With brow as cool as his was burning!

Oh! take me to that bosom cold,'
In murmurs at her feet he said;
And Reason oped her garment's fold,
And flung it round his fevered head.

He felt her bosom's icy touch,

And soon it lulled his pulse to rest; For, ah! the chill was quite too much, And Love expired on Reason's breast!

TO FANNY.

NAY, do not weep, my Fanny dear!
While in these arms you lie;
The world hath not a wish, a fear,
That ought to claim one precious tear
From that beloved eye!

The world-ah, Fanny! Love must shun
The path where many rove;

One bosom to recline upon,
One heart, to be his only one,

Are quite enough for Love!

What can we wish, that is not here
Between your arms and mine?
Is there on earth a space so dear,
As that within the blessed sphere
Two loving arms entwine?

For me, there's not a lock of jet
Along your temples curled,
Within whose glossy, tangling net,
My soul doth not, at once, forget
All, all the worthless world!

"Tis in your eyes, my sweetest love!
My only worlds I see;

Let but their orbs in sunshine move,
And earth below, and skies above

May frown or smile for me!

ASPASIA.

"TWAS in the fair Aspasia's bower,
That Love and Learning many an hour
In dalliance met, and Learning smiled
With rapture on the playful child,
Who wanton stole to find his nest
Within a fold of Learning's vest!

There, as the listening statesman hung
In transport on Aspasia's tongue,
The destinies of Athens took
Their colour from Aspasia's look.
Oh, happy time! when laws of state,
When all that ruled the country's fate,
In glory, quiet, or alarms,

Was planned between two snowy arms!

Sweet times! you could not always last-
And yet, oh! yet, you are not past;
Though we have lost the sacred mould
In which their men were cast of old,
Woman, dear woman, still the same,
While lips are balm and looks are flame,
While man possesses heart or eyes,
Woman's bright empire never dies!

Fanny, my love, they ne'er shall say
That beauty's charm hath passed away;
No-give the universe a soul

Attuned to woman's soft control,

And Fanny hath the charm, the skill,
To wield a universe at will!

THE GRECIAN GIRI'S DREAM OF THE BLESSED ISLAND.

TO HER LOVER.

όχι τε καλος

Πυθαγόρης, όσσοι τε χορον στήριξαν ερωτος.

AπоÀÀшν пερι ПArivov.-Oracul. Metric, a Joan. Opsop, collec

WAS it the moon, or was it morning's ray,

That called thee, dearest, from these arms away?
I lingered still, in all the murmuring rest,

The languor of a soul too richly blest!
Upon my breath thy sigh yet faintly hung;
Thy name yet died in whispers o'er my tongue;

1 It was imagined by some of the ancients that ingly, we find that the word kеavos was somethere is an ethereal ocean above us, and that the times synonymous with anp, and that death was sun and moon are two floating luminous islands, not unfrequently called Okeavolo mopos, or the in which the spirits of the blessed reside. Accord-passage of the ocean.'

I heard thy lyre, which thou hadst left behind,
In amorous converse with the breathing wind;
Quick to my heart I pressed the shell divine,
And with a lip yet glowing warm from thine,
I kissed its every chord, while every kiss
Shed o'er the chord some dewy print of bliss.
Then soft to thee I touched the fervid lyre,
Which told such melodies, such notes of fire,
As none but chords that drank the burning dews
Of kisses dear as ours could e'er diffuse !
Oh love! how blissful is the bland repose
That soothing follows upon rapture's close,
Like a soft twilight, o'er the mind to shed
Mild melting traces of the transport fled !

While thus I lay, in this voluptuous calm,
A drowsy languor steeped my eyes in balm,
Upon my lap the lyre in murmurs fell,
While, faintly wandering o'er its silver shell,
My fingers soon their own sweet requiem played,
And slept in music which themselves had made!
Then, then my Theon, what a heavenly dream!
I saw two spirits on the lunar beam,
Two winged boys, descending from above,
And gliding to my bower with looks of love,
Like the young genii, who repose their wings
All day in Amatha's luxurious springs,1
And rise at midnight, from the tepid rill,
To cool their plumes upon some moonlight hill!
Soft o'er my brow, which kindled with their sighs,
Awhile they played; then gliding through my eyes
(Where the bright babies for a moment hung,
Like those thy lip hath kissed, thy lyre hath sung),
To that dim mansion of my breast they stole,
Where, wreathed in blisses, lay my captive soul.
Swift at their touch dissolved the ties that clung
So sweetly round her, and aloft she sprung!
Exulting guides, the little genii flew

Through paths of light, refreshed with starry dew,
And fanned by airs of that ambrosial breath,
On which the free soul banquets after death!

Thou know'st, my love, beyond our clouded skies,
As bards have dreamed, the spirits' kingdom lies,
Through that fair clime a sea of ether rolls,

Gemmed with bright islands, where the hallowed souls,
Whom life hath wearied in its race of hours,
Repose for ever in unfading bowers!

author of the Dii Fatidizi, p. 160) illos esse loci Genios:' which words, however, are not in Eunapius.

1 Eunapius, in his Life of Jamblichus, tells us of two beautiful little spirits or loves, which Jamblichus raised by enchantment from the warm springs at Gadara; 'dicens astantibus (says the I find from Cellarius, that Amaths, in the

That very orb, whose solitary light

So often guides thee to my arms at night,
Is no chill planet, but an isle of love,

Floating in splendour through those seas above!
Thither, I thought, we winged our airy way,
Mild o'er its valleys streamed a silvery day,
While all around, on lily beds of rest,
Reclined the spirits of the immortal Blest!1
Oh! there I met those few congenial maids,
Whom love hath warmed, in philosophic shades;
There still Leontium,2 on her sage's breast,
Found lore and love, was tutored and caressed;
And there the twine of Pythia's3 gentle arms
Repaid the zeal which deified her charms!
The Attic Master, in Aspasia's eyes,
Forgot the toil of less endearing ties;
While fair Theano innocently fair,

Played with the ringlets of her Samian's hair,"
Who, fixed by love, at length was all her own,
And passed his spirit through her lips alone!
Oh Samian sage! whate'er thy glowing thought
Of mystic Numbers hath divinely wrought,
The One that's formed of Two who dearly love.
Is the best number Heaven can boast above!

neighbourhood of Gadara, was also celebrated for its warm springs, and I have preferred it as a more poetical name than Gadara.

There were various opinions among the ancients with respect to their lunar establishment: some made it an elysium, and others a purgatory; while some supposed it to be a kind of entrepot between heaven and earth, where souls which had left their bodies, and those that were on their way to join them, were deposited in the valleys of Hecate, and remained till further orders. Τοις περι σεληνην αέρι λέγειν αυτας κατοικείν, και απ' αυτής κατω χωρείν εις την TEDLYCLOV YEVEO.-Stob. lib. i. Eclog. Physic.

2 The pupil and mistress of Epicurus, who called her his dear little Leontium' (Acorraptor), as appears by a fragment of one of his Letters in Laertius. This Leontium was a woman of talent; she had the impudence (says Cicero) to write against Theophrastus; and, at the same time, Cicero gives her a name which is neither polite

nor translateable. Meretricula etiam Leontium contra Theophrastum scribere ausa est.'- De Natur. Deor. She left a daughter, called Danae, who was just as rigid an Epicurean as her mother; something like Wieland's Danae in Agathon.

It would sound much better, I think, if the name were Leontia, as it occurs the first time in Laertius; but M. Menage will not hear of this reading.

3 Pythia was a woman whom Aristotle loved, and to whom, after her death, he paid divine honours, solemnizing her memory by the same sacrifices which the Athenians offered to the goddess Ceres. For this impious gallantry the

philosopher was of course censured. It would be well, however, if some of our modern Stagyrites had a little of this superstition about the memory of their mistresses.

Socrates, who used to console himself in the society of Aspasia for those 'less endearing ties' which he found at home with Xantippe. For an account of this extraordinary creature, Aspasia, and her school of erudite luxury at Athens, see L Histoire de l'Académie, etc., tom. xxxi. p. 69. Ségur rather fails on the subject of Aspasia. Les Femmes, tom. i. p. 122.

The author of the Voyage du Monde de Descartes has also placed those philosophers in the moon, and has allotted Seigneuries to them, as well as to the astronomers (part 2, p. 143); but he ought not to have forgotten their wives and mistresses; quunt.'

• cura non ipsa in morte relin

the name of this fair Pythagorean. They are

There are some sensible letters extant under

addressed to her female friends upon the education of children, the treatment of servants, ete. One, in particular, to Nicostrata, whose husband had given her reasons for jealousy, contains such truly considerate and rational advice, that it ought to be translated for the edification of all married ladies. See Gale's Opuscul. Myth. Phys. p. 741.

"Pythagoras was remarkable for fine hair, and Dr. Thiers (in his Histoire des Perruques) seems to take for granted it was all his own, as he has not mentioned him among those ancients who were obliged to have recourse to the 'coma apposititia.'-L'Hist. des Perruques, chap. 1.