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joyment from some source, and, so long as he manifests no inclination to return, it cannot be supposed that his enjoyments are of the nature of those which are found in mingling our pleasures and interests with those of our fellow-creatures They must, then, be of a grosser or purer kind. He must be "a wild beast or a god;" and if we have such strange human beings in our world, it would be well to stop and look at them.

The savage wanderer apparently derives his highest gratification from ranging his native woods, and seems to possess a share of that wildness which characterizes the original occupants of these solitary regions. His happiness, indeed, results principally from the gratification of his corporeal appetites, and those fierce passions which make human beings so much resemble the wild beasts of the forest; and yet the Indian can hardly be persuaded to exchange his retreat for the pleasures of civilized life. But a character like this, we are ready to say, can never be formed in the midst of social life. The man, however, who quits society, unless his mind be elevated above the mass of human beings, derives his chief enjoyment from the gratification of passions as degrading, at least, if not as wild, as those which the Savage exhibits He has, for some reason, become disgusted with society, and prefers the low-lived pleasure of brooding over his real or imaginary sufferings, and the solitary and uninturrupted indulgence of his sloth and the malignant passions of his soured and discontented mind, to all the luxury attending the free exercise of the generous feelings of our nature. Or his mind may possess that cold and spiritless character, which renders him incapable of participating in social enjoyment, and better fits him for the life of a beast.

Notwithstanding, however, there is satisfactory evidence that a great majority of those instances of voluntary exile, which occur in the world, arise from the most unworthy motives; yet we hazard nothing in asserting that, occasionally, a choice spirit "is delighted in solitude," purely from the exercise of his intellectual and moral powers. Where the course of life results from choice, in the one case as well as in the other, it

must lay open some source of enjoyment. The peculiar kind can only be ascertained from the character of the individual; and, surely, these choice spirits must be uncommonly elevated in their views, and occupied with subjects which afford very high gratification, or they would not be unwilling to have their solitude interrupted, occasionally at least, by the pleasures of society. There is something in their character which, in some measure, assimilates them to the Divinity.

But however vigorous the exercise of the mental faculties, and however wide the compass of thought on subjects merely intell- ctual, the pleasure becomes low and debasing when compared with that refined and soul-ravishing delight which contemplations purely spiritual create. Surely when the soul holds communion with Deity himself, some sacred emanations must lastingly impress the divine image. It must receive impressions which partake, in a greater or less degree, of the character of God himself. It has an unction from on high. The divine image is stamped on the very heart, and the sacred lineaments of the Divinity appear in the whole character. The Revelator, while on the solitary isle of Patmos, undoubtedly found enjoyments far more exquisite than at any other period of his life; and they were certainly of the most heavenly kind, for they resulted from immediate intercourse with heaven, and discoveries of the glory of God. And here we should recollect, that, from the very constitution of the human mind, habits of solitary devotion have a very powerful influence in bringing into exercise, and cherishing, those emotions which make man heavenly-minded and godlike. Such habits cannot be too early or too assiduously cultivated, and we should remember too, that nothing so much degrades the human character, and destroys rational enjoyment, as the indulgence of those passions which put us out of humour with the world, and prompt us to withdraw from the society of our own species. But the sentiment at the bottom of this short but pithy saying, is by no means exclusively exemplified in the character of those who shut themselves entirely from the world. The stronger the passion for solitude, the

more are its votaries assimilated to the Divinity, or the ferocious beast of the forest, but it not unfrequently happens, that those who cultivate the purer pleasures of retirement, possess a high relish for society, and after participating in its enjoyments, can return to their beloved and chosen solitude, with a keener appetite for its appropriate pursuits and peculiar delights. W.

66 THE MOON AND STARS, A FABLE."

"ON the fourth day of Creation, when the sun, after a glorious but solitary course, went down in the evening, and darkness began to gather over the face of the uninhabited globe already arrayed in exuberance of vegetation, and prepared by the diversity of land and water for the abode of uncreated animals and man,-a star, single and beautiful, stept forth into the firmament. Trembling with wonder and delight in newfound existence, she looked abroad, and beheld nothing in heaven or on earth resembling herself. But she was not long alone, now one, then another, here a third, and there a fourth, resplendent companion had joined her, till light after light stealing through the gloom, in the lapse of an hour, the whole hemisphere was brilliantly bespangled.

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The planets and stars, with a superb comet flaming in the zenith, for a while contemplated themselves and each other; and every one from the largest to the least was so perfectly well pleased with himself, that he imagined the rest only partakes of his felicity,—he being the central luminary of his own universe, and all the hosts of heaven beside displayed around him in graduated splendour. Nor were any undeceived with regard to themselves, though all saw their associates in their real situations and relative proportions, selfknowledge being the last knowledge acquired either in the sky or below it,-till bending over the ocean in their turns, they discovered what they imagined, at first to be a new heaven, peopled with beings of their

own species; but when they perceived further that no sooner had any one of their company touched the horizon than he instantly disappeared, they then recognized themselves in their individual forms, reflected beneath according to their places and configurations above, from seeing others whom they previously knew, reflected in like manner. By an attentive but mournful self-examination in that mirror, they slowly learned humility, but every one learned it only for himself, none believing what others insinuated respecting their own inferiority, till they reached the western slope from whence they could identify their true images in the nether element. Nor was this very surprising,-stars being only visible points, without any distinction of limbs, each was all eye, and though he could see others most correctly, he could neither see himself, nor any part of himself—till he came to reflection! The comet, however, having a long train of brightness streaming sunward, could review that, and did review it with ineffable self-complacency:-indeed, after all pretentions to precedence, he was at length acknowledged king of the hemisphere, if not by the universal assent, by the silent envy of all his rivals."

"But the object which attracted most attention and astonishment, too, was a slender thread of light, that scarcely could be discerned through the blush of evening, and vanished soon after nightfall, as if ashamed to appear in so scanty a form, like an unfinished work of creation. It was the moon,--the first new moon:-timidly, she looked round upon the glittering multitude, that crowded through the dark serenity of space, and filled it with life and beauty. Minute indeed they seemed to her, but perfect in symmetry, and formed to shine for ever; while, she was unshapen, incomplete, and evanescent. In her humility, she was glad to hide herself from their keen glances in the friendly bosom of the ocean, wishing for immediate extinction. When she was gone, the stars looked one at another with inquisitive surprise, as much as to say, "What a figure!" It was so evident, that they all thought alike, and thought contemptuously of the ap

parition, (though at first they almost doubted whether they should not be frightened,) that they soon began to talk freely concerning her, of course, not with audible accents, but in the language of intelligent sparkles, in which stars are accustomed to converse with telegraphic precision from one end of Heaven to the other, and which no dialect on earth so nearly resembles as the language of eyes,-the only one, probably, that has survived in its purity, not only the confusion of Babel, but the revolutions of all ages. Her crooked form, which they deemed a violation of the order of nature, and her shyness, equally unlike the frank intercourse of stars, were ridiculed and censured from pole to pole; for what good purpose such a monster could have been created, not the wisest could conjecture; yet, to tell the truth, every one, though glad to be countenanced in the affection of scorn by the rest, had secret misgivings concerning the stranger, and envied the delicate. brilliancy of her light, while she seemed but the fragment of a sunbeam,-they, indeed, knew nothing about the sun,-detached from a long line, and exquisitely bended."

"All the gay company, however, quickly returned to the admiration of themselves and the inspection of each other. What became of them, when they descended into the ocean, they could not determine; some imagined that they ceased to be; others that they transmigrated into new forms, while a third party thought it probable, as the earth was evidently convex, that their departed friends travelled through an under-arching sky, and might hereafter re-ascend from the opposite quarter. In this hypothesis they were confirmed by the testimony of the stars that came from the east, who unanimously asserted, that they had been pre-existent for several hours in a remote region of sky, over continents and seas now invisible to them; and, moreover, that when they rose here they had actually seemed to set there. Thus the first night passed away. But when the east began to dawn, consternation seized the whole army of celestials, each feeling himself fainting into invisibility, and as he feared into nothingness, while hîs

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