"Such is the term of existence," said I "so end our joys and our pains." But higher and higher in my soul swelled the song of the forest, until I cried, "This is the voice of God, and he cannot lie:" and entering into myself I understood at last the merciful and providential law that governs nature, attaching to each suffering a consolation, to each pang a hope. To what was my contempt of life leading me? To the gradual debasement of my being, to a forgetfulness of the duties that God imposes on his creatures. Man is made for struggle, and he who deserts the field is a coward. If his strength fails, can he not draw fresh force from prayer? Does our Heavenly Father ever forget his weary children? Yes, life is a hard, rough road, but it leads straight to a goal where the sanctified soul shall find reward and rest. My poor owl might well feel sour and exasperated, since death meant to him only the peace of nothingness; but man has other destinies, and rebellion is for him unjustifiable revolt. What matter passing trials to him who is to possess eternity? Should we not blush at our cowardice when we remember that the infinite God is our consoler?
And all these grave thoughts anent a poor bird of whom nothing is left but a bunch of feathers! Well! there are days when a slight emotion makes the human heart spill over, like a full vase overflowed by one drop too much.
ORIGINAL.
SONNET.
And thou wouldst live for ever, poet soul
In love of human kind! What must thou do?
Look o'er the past, scan well whose worth is true—
Not those mere forms that with the ages roll—
And say what readst of them on Time's bright scroll:—
"Names faint or fading, save a fadeless few,
Like rare Etruscan colors, ever new."
Yet tell me, seer, how shine the favored whole:—
"Some glitter as the icy mountain peak
Remote, whence flow a thousand generous streams:
Some glow as morn or even, or blushing cheek
Of one beloved, or angels known in dreams;
These touch upon the universal—speak—
Lo! Nature, Love, Religion, are the themes."