'd, and nations bless'd the sight.
Pile rocks on rocks, bid woods and mountains rise,
Eclipse her native shades, her native skies;--
'Tis vain! thro' Ether's pathless wilds she goes,
And lights at last where all her cares repose.
Sweet bird! thy truth shall Harlem's walls attest, [t]
And unborn ages consecrate thy nest.
When, with the silent energy of grief,
With looks that ask'd, yet dar'd not hope relief,
Want, with her babes, round generous Valour clung,
To wring the slow surrender from his tongue,
'Twas thine to animate her closing eye;
Alas! 'twas thine perchance the first to die,
Crush'd by her meagre hand, when welcom'd from the sky.
Hark! the bee winds her small but mellow horn, [u]
Blithe to salute the sunny smile of morn.
O'er thymy downs she bends her busy course,
And many a stream allures her to its source.
'Tis noon, 'tis night. That eye so finely wrought,
Beyond the search of sense, the soar of thought.
Now vainly asks the scenes she left behind;
Its orb so full, its vision so confin'd!
Who guides the patient pilgrim to her cell?
Who bids her soul with conscious triumph swell?
With conscious truth retrace the mazy clue
Of varied scents, that charm'd her as she flew?
Hail, MEMORY, hail! thy universal reign
Guards the least link of Being's glorious chain.

THE PLEASURES OF MEMORY

PART II.

Delle cose custode, e dispensiera.
TASSO.

ANALYSIS OF THE SECOND PART.

The Memory has hitherto acted only in subservience to the senses, and
so far man is not eminently distinguished from other animals: but,
with respect to man, she has a higher province; and is often busily
employed, when excited by no external cause whatever. She preserves,
for his use, the treasures of art and science, history and
philosophy. She colours all the prospects of life: for 'we can only
anticipate the future, by concluding what is possible from what is
past.' On her agency depends every effusion of the Fancy, whose
boldest effort can only compound or transpose, augment or diminish
the materials which she has collected and retained.

When the first emotions of despair have subsided, and sorrow has
softened into melancholy, she amuses with a retrospect of innocent
pleasures, and inspires that noble confidence which results from the
consciousness of having acted well. When sleep has suspended the
organs of sense from their office, she not only supplies the mind
with images, but assists in th