OCTOGENARY REFLECTIONS.

SAY, ye who through this round of eighty years
Have proved its joys and sorrows, hopes and fears,-

Say, what is life, ye veterans, who have trod,
Step following step, its flowery, thorny road?

Enough of good to kindle strong desire,
Enough of ill to damp the rising fire,

Enough of love and fancy, joy and hope,

To fan desire and give the passions scope.
Enough of disappointment, sorrow, pain,
To seal the wise man's sentence, All is vain,-
And quench the wish to live those years again.
Science for man unlocks her various store,

And gives enough to urge the wish for more;

Systems and suns lie open to his gaze,

Nature invites his love, and God his praise;

Yet doubt and ignorance with his feelings sport,

And Jacob's ladder is some rounds too short.
Yet still to humble hope enough is given

Of light from reason's lamp, and light from heaven,

To teach us what to follow, what to shun,

To bow the head and say " Thy will be done!"

THE DEATH OF THE VIRTUOUS.

SWEET is the scene when Virtue dies!

When sinks a righteous soul to rest,

How mildly beam the closing eyes,

How gently heaves the' expiring breast!

So fades a summer cloud away;

So sinks the gale when storms are o'er;

So gently shuts the eye of day;

So dies a wave along the shore.

Triumphant smiles the victor brow,
Fanned by some angel's purple wing;-
Where is, O Grave! thy victory now?

And where, insidious Death! thy sting?

Farewell, conflicting joys and fears,

Where light and shade alternate dwell;

How bright the' unchanging morn appears ! Farewell, inconstant world, Farewell!

Its duty done, as sinks the clay,
Light from its load the spirit flies;
While heaven and earth combine to say,
"Sweet is the scene when Virtue dies!"

HYMN S.

HYMN I.

JEHOVAH reigns: let every nation hear,

And at his footstool bow with holy fear;

Let heaven's high arches echo with his name, And the wide peopled earth his praise proclaim; Then send it down to hell's deep glooms resounding, Through all her caves in dreadful murmurs sounding.

He rules with wide and absolute command
O'er the broad ocean and the steadfast land:
Jehovah reigns, unbounded, and alone,

And all creation hangs beneath his throne:
He reigns alone; let no inferior nature

Usurp, or share the throne of the Creator.