Ah, no! 'tis gone, 'tis gone, and never
Mine such waking bliss can be:
Oh, I would sleep, would sleep forever,
Could I thus but dream of thee!

JOHN PIERPONT.

JOHN PIERPONT was born in Litchfield, Connecticut, on the 6th of April, 1785, and received his collegiate education at Yale College, where he graduated in 1804. The next year he went to South Carolina, and was private tutor in the family of Colonel William Allston, where he commenced his legal studies. In 1809, he returned home, entered the celebrated law-school of his native town, and in 1812, having been admitted to the bar of Essex County, Massachusetts, opened an office in Newburyport. He soon, however, as other poets have done, abandoned the law, determining to find his pleasure and his occupation in literary pursuits; and in 1816 he published The Airs of Palestine, which was received with very great favor. At the close of that year, he entered the theological school of Harvard University, determined to devote himself to the ministry, and in April, 1819, was ordained as pastor of the Hollis Street Church, in Boston. In 1835 and 1836, he visited Europe for his health, going through the principal cities of England, France, and Italy, and extending his tour to the East, visiting Athens, Corinth, Constantinople, and Asia Minor. Soon after his return home, he collected and published, in 1840, all his poems, in one volume, in the preface to which he says, "If poetry is always fiction, there is no poetry in this book. It gives a true, though an all too feeble, expression of the author's feelings and faith,—of his love of right, freedom, and man, and of his correspondent and most hearty hatred of every thing that is at war with them; and of his faith in the providence and gracious promises of God." The longest poem of the volume is The Airs of Palestine. The subject is music, principally as connected with sacred history, but with occasional digressions into the land of mythology and romance. It has no unity of plan, but consists of a succession of brilliant pictures. Though this subject, so congenial to the "poet's verse," had been often handled, from Pindar to Gray, yet our author, nothing daunted, did not shrink from trying his own powers upon it. It is enough to say that he has succeeded. For beauty of language, finish of versification, richness of classical and sacred allusions, and harmony of numbers, we consider that it takes rank among the very first of American poems and will be among those that will survive their century. But Mr. Pierpont has aimed at something more than gratifying his own scholarly tastes and charming his readers with the love of the beautiful. He is a reformer, a whole-hearted and a fearless one; and a large number of his fugitive pieces have been written to promote the holy causes of temperance and freedom. Mr. Pierpont has also prepared an excellent series of reading-books for schools:-The Little Learner, The Young Reader, Introduction to National Reader, National Reader, and The Ame rican First Class Book.

CLASSICAL AND SACRED THEMES FOR MUSIC.

Where lies our path ?-though many a vista call,
We may admire, but cannot tread them all.
Where lies our path ?-a poet, and inquire

What hills, what vales, what streams, become the lyre?
See, there Parnassus lifts his head of snow;
See at his foot the cool Cephissus flow;
There Ossa rises; there Olympus towers;
Between them, Tempè breathes in beds of flowers,
Forever verdant; and there Peneus glides
Through laurels, whispering on his shady sides.
Your theme is Music: yonder rolls the wave
Where dolphins snatch'd Arion from his grave,
Enchanted by his lyre: Citharon's shade
Is yonder seen, where first Amphion play'd
Those potent airs, that, from the yielding earth,
Charm'd stones around him, and gave cities birth.
And fast by Hamus, Thracian Hebrus creeps
O'er golden sands, and still for Orpheus weeps,
Whose gory head, borne by the stream along,
Was still melodious, and expired in song.
There Nereids sing, and Triton winds his shell;
There be thy path,-for there the muses dwell.
No, no,-a lonelier, lovelier path be mine:
Greece and her charms I leave for Palestinė.
There, purer streams through happier valleys flow,
And sweeter flowers on holier mountains blow.
I love to breathe where Gilead sheds her balm;
I love to walk on Jordan's banks of palm;

I love to wet my foot on Herion's dews;
I love the promptings of Isaiah's muse;
In Carmel's holy grots I'll court repose,

And deck my mossy couch with Sharon's deathless rose.

SONG OF THE SHEPHERDS.

While thus the shepherds watch'd the host of night,
O'er heaven's blue concave flash'd a sudden light.
The unrolling glory spread its folds divine
O'er the green hills and vales of Palestine;
And, lo! descending angels, hovering there,
Stretch'd their loose wings, and in the purple air
Hung o'er the sleepless guardians of the fold:
When that high anthem, clear, and strong, and bold,
On wavy paths of trembling ether ran:-
"Glory to God,-Benevolence to man,-

Peace to the world:"-and in full concert came,
From silver tubes and harps of golden frame,
The loud and sweet response, whose choral strains
Linger'd and languish'd on Judea's plains.

Yon living lamps, charm'd from their chambers blue
By airs so heavenly, from the skies withdrew:

All?-all, but one, that hung and burn'd alone,
And with mild lustre over Bethlehem shone.
Chaldea's sages saw that orb afar

Glow unextinguish'd;-'twas Salvation's Star.

LICENSE-LAWS.

"We license thee for so much gold,"

Says Congress,-they're our servants there,-
"To keep a pen where men are sold
Of sable skin and woolly hair;
For public good' requires the toil
Of slaves on freedom's sacred soil."
"For so much gold we license thee"-

So say our laws-" a draught to sell,
That bows the strong, enslaves the free,
And opens wide the gates of hell;
For public good' requires that some
Should live, since many die, by rum."
Ye civil fathers! while the foes

Of this destroyer seize their swords,
And Heaven's own hail is in the blows

They're dealing,-will YE cut the cords
That round the falling fiend they draw,
And o'er him hold your shield of law?
And will ye give to man a bill

Divorcing him from Heaven's high sway;
And, while God says, "Thou shalt not kill,"
Say ye, for gold, "Ye may,-ye may”?
Compare the body with the soul!
Compare the bullet with the bowl!

In which is felt the fiercer blast

Of the destroying angel's breath?

Which binds its victim the more fast?

Which kills him with the deadlier death?

Will ye the felon fox restrain,

And yet take off the tiger's chain?

The living to the rotting dead

The God-contemning Tuscan' tied,

Till, by the way, or on his bed,

The poor corpse-carrier droop'd and died,—

Lash'd hand to hand, and face to face,

In fatal and in loathed embrace.

Less cutting, think ye, is the thong

That to a breathing corpse, for life,

Four hundred dollars is the sum prescribed by Congress-the local legislature of the District of Columbia-for a license to keep a prison-house and market for the sale of men, women, and children. See Jay's View of the Action of the Federal Government in Behalf of Slavery," p. 87.

2 Mezentius. See Virgil, Eneid, viii. 481-491.

Lashes, in torture loathed and long,

The drunkard's child, the drunkard's wife?
To clasp that clay, to breathe that breath,
And no escape! Oh, that is death!

Are ye not fathers? When your sons
Look to you for their daily bread,
Dare ye, in mockery, load with stones
The table that for them ye spread?
How can ye hope your sons will live,
If ye, for fish, a serpent give?

O holy God! let light divine

Break forth more broadly from above,
Till we conform our laws to thine,
The perfect law of truth and love;
For truth and love alone can save
Thy children from a hopeless grave.

HYMN.1

O Thou, to whom in ancient time
The lyre of Hebrew bards was strung,
Whom kings adored in song sublime,

And prophets praised with glowing tongue;

Not now on Zion's height, alone,

Thy favor'd worshipper may dwell;
Nor where, at sultry noon, thy Son
Sat, weary, by the Patriarch's well.

From every place below the skies,

The grateful song, the fervent prayer-
The incense of the heart-may rise

To heaven, and find acceptance there.

In this, thy house, whose doors we now
For social worship first unfold,
To thee the suppliant throng shall bow,
While circling years on years are roll'd.

To thee shall Age, with snowy hair,
And Strength and Beauty, bend the knee,
And Childhood lisp, with reverent air,
Its praises and its prayers to thee.

O thou, to whom in ancient time

The lyre of prophet-bards was strung,

To thee, at last, in every clime

Shall temples rise, and praise be sung.

Written for the Opening of the Independent Congregational Church in Barton Square, Salem, December 7, 1824.

MY CHILD.

I cannot make him dead!
His fair sunshiny head

Is ever bounding round my study-chair;
Yet, when my eyes, now dim
With tears, I turn to him,
The vision vanishes,-he is not there!

I walk my parlor floor,

And through the open door,

I hear a footfall on the chamber stair;
I'm stepping toward the hall

To give the boy a call;

And then bethink me that he is not there!

I thread the crowded street;

A satchell'd lad I meet,

With the same beaming eyes and color'd hair,
And, as he's running by,

Follow him with my eye,

Scarcely believing that he is not there!

I know his face is hid
Under the coffin-lid;

Closed are his eyes; cold is his forehead fair;
My hand that marble felt;

O'er it in prayer I knelt;

Yet my heart whispers that he is not there!

I cannot make him dead!
When passing by the bed,

So long watch'd over with parental care,

My spirit and my eye

Seek it inquiringly,

Before the thought comes that he is not there!

When, at the cool, gray break

Of day, from sleep I wake,

With my first breathing of the morning air

My soul goes up, with joy,

To Him who gave my boy;

Then comes the sad thought that he is not there

When at the day's calm close,

Before we seek repose,

I'm with his mother, offering up our prayer,

Whate'er I may be saying,

I am, in spirit, praying

For our boy's spirit, though-he is not there!

Not there! Where, then, is he?

The form I used to see

Was but the raiment that he used to wear;
The grave, that now doth press

Upon that cast-off dress,

Is but his wardrobe lock'd;-he is not there!