tude and importance of the themes upon which it is employed. The fastidious timidity of our pulpit orators, checks that strong action of the suggesting intellect which is necessary to excite a reciprocal degree of action in other minds. This is an evil which increasing familiarity with the master-spirits of the age, to which we have alluded, will doubtless powerfully tend to obviate, by insensibly leading our young preachers to imitate that variety and boldness of style, that vividness of conception, that richness of thought, and above all, that intense earnestness of feeling and oneness of purpose, which so eminently distinguish these noble models, and which lend such a freshness and force even to the caricatured imitations of a well-known Caledonian orator.

Although we are certainly not inclined to assign to JEREMY TAYLOR the highest rank among his gifted cotemporaries, yet we do not think he can, with justice, be placed very far below the first minds of his age. Unequal to OWEN in theological acumen; vastly inferior to Howe in the angelic clearness

of vision, and calm loftiness and purity of feeling, which form the characteristic attri. butes of that saintly man; he surpassed both in fervour of feeling; and for luxuriance of fancy, flexibility of imagination, extent of learning, and the command of exuberant and ever-varying diction, he must be placed next, longo proximus intervallo,'-to the unattainable MILTON. He possessed a powerful, though not always acute understanding; his disquisitions are often highly ingenious and methodical, and he occasionally exhibits great dexterity in unravelling the intricacies of a difficult question; yet, upon the whole, he is much less characterized by a strong and searching intellect, than by a fervid imagination and affluent genius. He is always filled with his subject, and catches his tone from the intrinsic grandeur and loftiness of his theme; and sometimes he absolutely pants and labours under the exuberance of his conceptions, and thick-coming fancies." He appears to speak from the inward and intimate persuasion of his own heart; hence his language is perpetually

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rising into the expression of holy and devout affection; here and there, indeed, a tendency towards pious mysticism, and even a tinge of superstition, betray themselves in his writings; yet there can be no doubt that the real tone of his mind was sound and vigorous. His perceptions of fitness and propriety, it must also be allowed, are not always remarkably just; and in the restlessness of his fancy, he frequently alights upon singularly incongruous images, and very imperceptible analogies. Still, in his most unsuccessful attempts, he is always superior to poverty, and often quite magnificent in amplification. Perhaps one of the most unpleasing features in the writings of this great and good man, is a certain tone of exaggerated sensibilityan occasional flush of unreal feeling-a tendency to push his emotions a great deal too far to vindicate them to our ordinary sympathies; and yet it may be safely affirmed, that he who was never moved by the pathos of JEREMY TAYLOR, never knew in what true pathos of thought and expression consists.

TO THE SOUL.

BY HENRY SAMUEL BAYNES.

EFFLUENCE divine!

A breath of God!

Of all this universe the Soul!

Stamping with endless worth a clod! The Lord of earth from pole to pole! 'Tis thine through boundless space for aye to

roam,

To scale on eagle's wings to heaven thy home; 'Tis thine to mount to heaven's eternal throne; "Tis thine to claim in God's eternal life, thine

own.

A beam of God! A heaven enkindled spark,
Flashed from the bright Infinity
Through the fell mists of nature's empire

It blazes there, its unveiled course to run,
When quench'd are all the stars, the moon, the

sun,

When earth a liquid fire, falls from her poles, And o'er her mighty chiefs its wave oblivion rolls.

Ethereal Fire!

Thy lightning course
No limit knows, no power can bind,
Spurning the leaden hand of force,

Rushing triumphant as the wind;

Thy uncurb'd race, thro' earth, thro' heaven extends;

Thy subtle ray, its beam through all distends; Curious to search the dark abyss below,

And bold the secrets of eternal truth to know.

Horizon bright! 'twixt earth and heaven!
A mortal's fellow! Angel's peer!
From God a deathless vagrant driven;
To hell, and yet to heaven how near !

Resplendent star! rise o'er yon orient plain,
Illustrious rise and join the shining train
In peerless skies where no rude storms disturb;
Go, bathe thee in the splendours of thy parent
Orb!