THE LAST MAN.

All worldly shapes shall melt in gloom,

The sun himself must die,

Before this mortal shall assume

Its immortality!

I saw a vision in my sleep,

That gave my spirit strength to sweep
Adown the gulf of time!

I saw the last of human mould,
That shall creation's death behold,
As Adam saw her prime!

The sun's eye had a sickly glare,

The earth with age was wan, The skeletons of nations were

Around that lonely man! Some had expired in fight,-the brands Still rusted in their bony hands;

In plague and famine some! Earth's cities had no sound nor tread; And ships were drifting with the dead

To shores where all was dumb!

Yet, prophet like, that lone one stood,
With dauntless words and high,
That shook the sere leaves from the wood

As if a storm passed by,

Saying, we are twins in death, proud sun,
Thy face is cold, thy race is run,
'Tis mercy bids thee go;

For thou ten thousand thousand years
Hast seen the tide of human tears,
That shall no longer flow.

What though beneath thee man put forth His pomp, his pride, his skill;

And arts that made fire, flood and earth
The vassals of his will;-

Yet mourn I not thy parted sway,
Thou dim discrowned king of day:

For all those trophied arts
And triumphs that beneath thee sprang,
Healed not a passion or a pang
Entailed on human hearts.

Go, let oblivion's curtain fall
Upon the stage of men,
Nor with thy rising beams recall
Life's tragedy again.

Its piteous pageants bring not back,
Nor waken flesh, upon the rack
Of pain anew to writhe;
Stretched in disease's shapes abhorred,

Behold not me expire.
My lips that speak thy dirge of death-
Their rounded gasp and gurgling breath
To see thou shalt not boast.

The eclipse of nature spreads my pall,
The majesty of darkness shall
Receive my parting ghost.

3

The spirit shall return to him
That gave its heavenly spark;
Yet think not, Sun, it shall be dim

When thou thyself art dark!
No! it shall live again, and shine
In bliss unknown to beams of thine,
By him recalled to breath,
Who captive led captivity,

Who robbed the grave of victory,-
And took the sting from death!

Go, Sun, while mercy holds me up
On nature's awful waste,
To drink this last and bitter cup

Of grief that man shall taste-
Go, tell the night that hides thy face,
Thou sawest the last of Adam's race,

On earth's sepulchral clod,
The darkening universe defy
To quench his immortality,

Or shake his trust in God!

THE BROKEN HEART.

Ah! little I thought, when with thrilling delight,

of thine eye;

I watched the fond gaze

That so soon thou would'st fade like a dream from our

sight,

Heart-broken, to linger and die.

'Twas mournful to sit by thy pillow and mark

The paleness that dwelt on thy cheek;

Thy cold marble brow with its ringlets so dark,
Thy patience so holy and meek.

'Twas awful to list to thy musical voice,

Like a lute heard by night from the wave; And think that the tones which made others rejoice, So soon should be quenched in the grave. I saw thee, sweet girl! worn down to a shade, How changed from what thou wert before; All the magical glow of thy features decayed, Like a rainbow when tempests are o’er.—

'Tis past!-thou art laid in the cold silent tomb, And often with desolate heart,

All lonely I stray in the dim twilight gloom
To the turf in whose bosom thou art.

Thy sorrows are ended-thy pilgrimage o'er,
Thy woes and thy wishes have rest,

In the Sabbath of peace, 'mid the joys of that shore,
Where the stainless in spirit are blest.—

But woe unto him who could bask in the glow,
Of thy trusting and innocent heart,

Could add balm to thy blisses, partake of thy woe,
And become of thy being a part.—

VOL. III.

G