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XLV.

See the great solar system whence you came,
'Now dwindled to a point, and scarcely seen,
And other systems, which no tongue can name,

More grand, more beautiful, and more serene,
Whose mild effulgence fills the wondrous scene
Of the wide universe. Each seems a toy,

And yet becomes, if nearly viewed and seen,

Vast worlds of light, and life, and love, and joy,

Which neither time, nor change, nor hell, can c'er destroy.

XLVI.

Yet this material universe of light,

Is but the shadow of God's beauteous thought! Whoso would see His image-glorious sight!'Must view the realm with mighty spirits fraught, 'With living spirits, in His likeness wrought

'Who made all worlds, even as He made these,From nothing into boundless being brought, 'By His omnific word, which makes with ease All beauteous things and good, Himself alone to please.

XLVII.

'O World of worlds! amazing scene of love!
In all thine orbs, in all thy rolling spheres,
That from the primal touch forever move,
No sin, no death, no evil thing appears,
'But bliss unbounded every being cheers.

Thus God designed the whole, and made it well,
For in this universe of endless years,

More heavens shine than myriad tongues can tell, While in the realms of space there groans a single hell.'

XLVIII.

As Una spake these words, she sweetly smiled,
And from her eyes shot a seraphic glow,
So bright with joy, so beautifully wild,

All things seemed fair; and I forget the woc,
Which tried my heart in the dark world below.

But when the mighty spell was past, it all
Came back again; and then I begged to know

How she would sing man's dark mysterious fall,
And show God's perfect love, beneath his funeral pall.

XLIX.

The Angel of the Earth,' she said, 'shall sing
That song, more than all songs of heaven sweet,
Whose deep impassioned tones shall swell and ring
Forever in all worlds, and then complete

The harmony and bliss of all, and greet

The dusky hosts of sin, and death, and hell,
With sad discomfiture and sore defeat.'

I saw that Angel then, and heard her tell

Why man was made, why tempted sore, and why he fell.

L.

Then Una touched my lips, for they were scaled
In mute astonishment and loving awe,
And bade me say, if all were now revealed
That I had wished to know, or if I saw,
In God's own beauteous World and perfect Law,
The dark obscurities which once were there?
I see it all,' I cried, from every flaw

His ways and works are free, and everywhere 'Perfection shines therein, as his own Essence fair.

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LI.

I see a lamp within the lofty dome

Of the dim world, whose radiance keen doth show Its awful beauty, and, through the wide gloom, Make all its obscure mystic symbols glow 'With pleasing light; that all may see and know 'Its form divine and its harmonious scheme,— 'Not as distorted in the mind below,

Nor in philosopher's, nor poet's dream,

But as it was, and is, high in the Mind Supreme.

LII.

The cloud of evil rolls beneath my feet,
'In peerless beauty rolls; for now 'tis sprent
With hues, than angel's eyes, or hopes, more sweet-
'Ten thousand hues in gorgeous glory blent!
The Eye of Reason, on its bosom bent,
'Doth permeate its gloom with light divine,
'And, even there, reveals the deep intent

'Of God's eternal love, whose grand design 'Makes reason shout for joy, and hell with beauty shine.

LIII.

'That was a darkness once which might be felt,
And hung, in dim eclipse, upon the throne
'Of God, and his fair World, but now doth melt.
'Beneath his smile, nor doth it melt alone,
For with ten thousand beauties now 'tis strewn,
'As Mercy's Eye, with steady, glowing beams
Irradiates its gloom: its darkness flown,

All loveliness and light the World outgleams,-

Most worthy of the Word from which its glory streams.

LIV.

'Hail glorious image of the Beauteous World! No spot or blemish in thy form appears; 'Where once the wheel of Fate so darkly whirled To the dim eye, and shook the soul with fears, Thy face, unveiled, the boundless prospect clears, And all is fair! O World of Love and Light! Thy beauty shines above thy peerless peers!

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'More ravishing than woman's love to sight, And more than wine thou wakest up the soul's delight!

LV.

Not in Calypso's isle, nor Tempe's vale, 'Nor yet Armida's blooming place of rest, Where Pleasures ever sing, and every gale 'Bears in its bosom bliss to beings blest, Nor in the bower, of all creations best, Where Bliss enthronéd sits, is aught so fair, 'So ravishing and sweet to mortal breast,

As but one glance of thine upon the air,

O World! or but one glimpse of thy pure bosom bare!"

ART. IX.-NOTICES OF BOOKS.

1. THE MONITIONS OF THE UNSEEN, AND OTHER POEMS. By Jean Ingelow. Boston: Roberts Brothers.

It may be, as yet, a mooted question among English readers of verse, to whom the place of honor left empty by the death of Mrs. Browning, of right belongs. We on this side of the water, seem to have settled the matter for ourselves, if popularity is allowed to be the test. It is scarce half a dozen years since the name of Jean Ingelow was first heard in England: and when we remember the slow recognition of Elizabeth Barrett, and the scoutings of the critics over Wordsworth's earlier works, and even the hesitating praise doled out to Tennyson at first, we may well be amazed at the suddenness with which this new aspirant has sprung, without drawback, into popular favor. We have but to look over the publishers' lists,-to note the number and the richly illustrated character of the many editions that pass so rapidly off, to convince ourselves that our author's reputation is as fixed here as it is in her own country, and probably more widely extended.

No sooner is a new volume announced as coming from her pen, than all readers of her former ones are on the qui vive to' ascertain if she be still able to make good the claims she has already established for herself. Her American publishers have forwarded to us advanced sheets of her forthcoming bookMonitions of the Unseen, and Other Poems; a work which we think ourselves safe in prdicting will in no degree detract from, but heighten, the estimation in which our author is already held. At first blush, the title of the book, taken from its most important and opening poem, made somewhat against its attractiveness, in our esteem: it seemed to offer too abstract and subjective a theme to commend it to the popular heart. But on reading the poem twice,-once did not satisfy us,-we were fain to withdraw our objection, and own ourselves mas