Of goodness in the human soul
Might wickedness efface.

Alas! unknowing what he doth,
A judgment-seat man rears,
A stern tribunal throned within,
Before which he appears;
And conscience, minister of wrath,
Approves him or condemns,
He knoweth not the fearful risk,

Who inward light contemns.

"O veil thy face, pure child of God,"

With solemn tone she said,

"And judge not thou, but lowly weep, That virtue should be dead.

Weep thou with prayer and holy fear,
That o'er thy brother's soul,
Effacing life, and light and love,
Polluting waves should roll.

Weep for the fettered slave of sense,
For passion's minion weep-
For him who nurtureth the worm,
In death that may not sleep;
And tears of blood, if it may be,

For him, who plunged in guilt,
Perils his own and victim's soul,
When human blood is spilt.
For him no glory may abide

In earth or tranquil sky-
Fearful to him the human face,
The searching human eye.
A light beams on him everywhere;
Revealing in its ray,

An erring, terror-stricken soul,

Launched from its orb away.

Turn where he will, all day he meets
That cold and leaden stare;
His victim pale, and bathed in blood,
Is with him everywhere;
He sees that shape upon the cloud,
It glares from up the brook--
The mist upon the mountain side,
Assumes that fearful look.

He sees, in every simple flower,
Those dying eyes gleam out;
And starts to hear that dying groan,
Amid some merry shout.

The phantom comes to chill the warmth

Of every sunlight ray,

He feels it slowly glide along,

Where forrest shadows play.

And when the solemn night comes down,
With silence dark and drear,
His curdling blood and crawling hair
Attest the victim near.

With hideous dreams and terrors wild,

His brain from sleep is kept-
For on his pillow, side by side,
That gory form hath slept."

"O Eva, Eva, say no more,
For I am filled with fear;
Dim shadows move along the wall;
Dost thou not see them here?-

Dost thou not mark the gleams of light,
The shadowy forms move by?"
"Yes, mother, beautiful to see!
And they are always nigh.

Oh, would the veil for thee were raised

That hides the spirit-land

For we are spirits draped in flesh,

Communing with that band;
And it were weariness to me,
Were only human eyes

To meet my own with tenderness,
In earth or pleasant skies."

PART IV.

The widow, awe-struck at the revealments of her daughter, is desirous to learn more; for it is the nature of the soul to search into its own mysteries: however dim may be its spiritual perception, it still earnestly seeks to look into the deep and the hidden. The light is within itself, and it becomes more and more clear at every step of its progress, in search of the true and the beautiful. The widow, hardly discerning this light, which is to grow brighter and brighter to the perfect day, calls for the material lights that minister to the external eye; that thus she may be hid from those other lights that delight the vision of her child. Eva tells of that mystic book-the human soul-upon which, thoughts, shaped into deeds, whether externally or only in its own secret chambers, inscribes a character that must be eternal. But it is not every character that is thus clearly defined as good or evil. Few indeed seize upon thought, and bring its properties palpably before them. Impressions come and go with a sort of lethargic indifference, leaving no definite lines behind, but only a moral haziness. The widow recollects the story of old Richard, and Eva supplies portions unknown to her mother, and enlarges upon the power of conscience, that fearful judge placed by the Infinite within the soul, with the two-fold power of decision, and punishment.

"Then trim the lights, my strange, strange child, And let the faggots glow;

For more of these mysterious things
I fear, yet long, to know.

I glory in thy lofty thought,

Thy beauty and thy worth,
But, Eva, I should love thee more,
Did'st thou seem more like earth."

A pang her words poor Eva gave,
And tears were in her eye-
She kissed her mother's anxious brow,
And answered with a sigh
"Alas! I may not hope on earth
Companionship to find,

Alone must be the pure in heart,

Alone the great in mind.

We toil for earth, its shadowy veil
Envelops soul and thought,
And hides that discipline and life,
Within our being wrought.

We chain the thought, we shroud the soul,
And backward turn our glance,
When onward should its vision be,
And upward its advance.

I may not scorn the spirit's rights,

For I have seen it rise,

All written o'er with thought, thought, thoughtAs with a thousand eyes

The records dark of other years,

All uneffaced remain ; Unchecked desire, forgotten long, With its eternal stain.

Recorded thoughts, recorded deeds,

Its character attest-
No garment hides the startling truth,
Nor screens the naked breast.
The thought, fore-shaping evil deeds,
The spirit may not hide-

It stands amid that searching light,
Which sin may not abide.

And never may the spirit turn
From that effulgent ray,
It lives forever in the glare

Of an eternal day;

Lives in that penetrating light,
A kindred glow to raise,
Or every withering sin to trace
Within its searching blaze.

Few, few the shapely temple rear,
For God's abiding place-

That mystic temple, where no sound
Within the hallowed space
Reveals the skill of builder's hand-

Yet with a silent care
That holy temple riseth up,

And God is dwelling there.

Then never weep when the infant lies

In its small grave to rest,

With the scented flowerets springing up
From out its baby breast;

A pure, pure soul to earth was given,
Yet may not thus remain ;
Rejoice that it is rendered back,
Without a single stain.

Bright cherubs bear the babe away
With many a fond embrace,
And beauty, all unknown to earth,
Upon its features trace.

They teach it knowledge from the fount,

And holy truth and love;

The songs of praise the infant learns,
As angels sing above."

The widow rose, and on the blaze

The crackling faggots threwAnd then to her maternal breast

Her gentle daughter drew.
"Dear Eva! when old Richard died,
In madness fierce and wild,

Why did he in his phrenzy rave
About a murdered child!

He died in beggary and rags,
Friendless and grey, and old;

Yet he was once a thriving man,
Light-hearted, too, I'm told.

Dark deeds were whispered years ago,
But nothing came to light;

He seemed the victim of a spell,

That nothing would go right.

His young wife died, and her last words
Were breathed to him alone,

But 'twas a piteous sound to hear

Her faint, heart-rending moan.
Some thought, in dreams he had divulged
A secret hidden crime,

Which she concealed with breaking heart,
Unto her dying time.

From that day forth he never smiled; Morose and silent grown,

He wandered unfrequented ways,

A moody man and lone.

The schoolboy shuddered in the wood,
When he old Richard passed,

And hurried on, while fearful looks
He o'er his shoulder cast.

And nought could lure him from his mood, Save his own trusting child,

Who climb'd the silent father's neck,

And kissed his cheek and smiled.
That gentle boy, unlike a child,
Companions never sought-
Content to share his father's crust,
His father's gloomy lot.

With weary foot and tattered robe,
Beside him, day by day,

He roamed the forest and the hill,
And o'er the rough highway;
And he would prattle all the time

Of things to childhood sweet;
Of singing bird, of lovely flower,
That sprang beneath their feet.
Sometimes he chid the moody man,
With childhood's fond appeal:-
'Dear father, talk to me awhile-
How very lone I feel!

My mother used to smile so sad,
And talk and kiss my cheek,
And sing to me such pretty songs;
So low and gently speak :'

Then Richard took him in his arms

With passionate embrace,

And with an aching tenderness

He gazed upon his face ;

Tears rushed unto his glazed eyes,

He murmured soft and wild,

And kissed with more than woman's love,
The fond but frightened child.

He died, that worn and weary boy;
And those that saw him die,
Said, on his father's rigid brow,
Was fixed his fading eye.
His little stiffening hand was laid

Within poor Richard's grasp;-
And when he stooped for one last kiss,
He took his dying gasp.

It crazed his brain, poor Richard rose

A maniac fierce and wild,

Who mouthed, and muttered every where, About a murdered child."

"And well he might," young Eva said,

That undesired child of shame,
Brought comfort to her heart,

A childlike smile to her pale lip,
By its sweet baby art.

And yet, as years their passage told,
Faint shadows slowly crept
Upon the blighted maiden's mind,
That oft she knelt and wept
Unknowing why, her wavy form
So thin and reed-like grew,
And so appealing her blue eyes,

They tears from others drew.

Years passed away, and, Lucy's child
A noble stripling grown;

A daring boy with chesnut hair,
And eyes of changing brown,
Had won the love of every heart,
So gentle was his air-
All felt, whate'er might be his birth,
A stainless heart was there.

The boy was missing, none could tell
Where last he had been seen;-
They searched the river many a day,
And every forest screen-

But never more his filial voice

Poor Lucy's heart might cheer;
Pale in her grief, and dull with woe,
She never shed a tear.

And every day, whate'er the sky,
With head upon her knees,
And hair neglected, streaming out
Upon the passing breeze,
She sat beneath a slender tree

That near the river grew,

And on the stream its pendent limbs
Their penciled shadows threw.

The matron left her busy toil,

And called the child from play,
And gifts for that lone mourner there
She sent with him away.

The boy with nuts and fruit returned,
He sought in forest deep,
A portion of his little store
Would for poor Lucy keep.

That tree with wonder, all beheld,
Its growth was strange and rare;
The wintry winds, that wailing passed,
Scarce left its branches bare,
And round its roots a verdant spot

Knew neither change nor blight,
And so poor Lucy's resting place
Was always green and bright.

Some said its bole more rapid grew
From Lucy's bleeding heart,

For, sighs from out the heart, 'tis said,

A drop of blood will start.*

*It is a common belief amongst the vulgar, that a sigh always forces a drop of blood from the heart, and many curious stories are told to that effect; as, for instance: a man wishing to be rid of his wife, in order to marry one more seductive, promised her the gift of six new dresses, and sundry other articles of female finery, provided she would sigh three times every morning before breakfast, for three months. She complied, and before the time had expired, was in her grave. Many others of a like import might be recorded.

It was an instinct deep and high
That led that mother there,
And that tall tree aspiring grew,

By more than dew or air.

The winds were hushed, the little bird
Scarce gave a nestling sound,
The warm air slept along the hill,
The blossoms drooped around;
The shrill-toned insect scarcely stirred
The dry and crisped leaf-
The laborer laid his sickle down
Beside the bending sheaf.

A dark, portentous cloud is seen
To mount the eastern sky,
The deep-toned thunder rolling on,
Proclaims the tempest nigh.

And now it breaks with deafening crash,
And lightnings livid glow;

The torrents leap from mountain crags
And wildly dash below.

Behold the tree! its strength is bowed,

A shattered mass it lies.

What brings old Richard to the spot,
With wild and blood-shot eyes?
Poor Lucy's form is lifeless there,
And yet he turns away,

To where a heap of mouldering bones
Beneath the strong roots lay.

Why takes he up, with shrivelled hands,
The riven root and stone,

And spreads them with a trembling haste
Upon each damp, grey bone?

It may not be, the whirlwind's rage
Again hath left them bare-
Earth hides no more the horrid truth,
A murdered child lies there.

Of wife, and child, and friends berest-
And all that inward light,

Which calmly guides the white-haired man,
Who listens to the right;

Old Richard laid him down to die,
Himself his only foe,-

His wronged nature groaning out
Its weight of inward woe."

PART V.

The storm is raging without the dwelling of the widow, but all is tranquil within. Eva hath gone forth in spiritual vision, and beheld the cruelty engendered by wealth and luxury-the cruelty of a selfish and unsympathizing heart. She relates what she has seen to her mother. Certain qualities of the heart are of such a nature, that, when in excess, they shape themselves into appropriate forms, and thus haunt the vision. The injurer is always fearful of the injured. No wrong is ever done with a sense of security; far less wrong to the innocent and unoffending. The little child is a mystery of gentleness and love, while it is preserved in its own atmosphere; and it is a fearful thing to turn its young heart to bitterness; to infuse sorrow and fear, where the elements should be only joy and faith.

The loud winds rattled at the door

The shutters creaked and shook, While Eva, by the cottage hearth,

Sat with abstracted look. With every gust, the big rain-drops Upon the casement beat,

How doubly, on a night like this, Are home and comfort sweet!

The maiden slowly raised her eyes,

And pressed her pallid brow:-
"Dear mother! I have been far hence;
My sight is absent now,-
O mother! 'tis a fearful thing,
A human heart to wrong-
To plant a sadness on the lip,
Where smiles and peace belong.

In selfishness or callous pride,
The sacred tear to start-
Or lightest finger dare to press
Upon the burdened heart.
And doubly fearful, when a child
Lifts its imploring eye,
And deprecates the cruel wrath

With childhood's pleading cry.

The child is made for smiles and joy,
Sweet emigrant from heaven-
The sinless brow and trusting heart,
To lure us there, were given.
Then who shall dare its simple faith
And loving heart to chill-
Or its meek, upward, beaming eye
With sorrowing tears to fill!

I look within a gorgeous room—
A lofty dame behold-

A lady with forbidding air,

And forehead, high and cold-
I hear an infant's plaintive voice,

For grief hath brought it fears--
None soothe it with a kind caress,
Nor wipe away its tears.

His sister hears with pitying heart
Her brother's wailing cry,
And to the stately matron turns
Her earnest, tearful eye.
'O mother, chilling is the air,
And fearful is the night-
Dear brother fears to be alone-
I'll bring him to the light.

On our dead mother hear him call;
I hear him weeping say,
Sweet mother, kiss poor Eddy's cheek,
And wipe his tears away.'
Red grew the lady's brow with rage,
And yet she feels a strife

Of anger and of terror too,

At thought of that dead wife.

Wild roars the wind, the lights burn blue,
The watch-dog howls with fear-
Loud neighs the steed from out the stall:
What form is gliding near?

No latch is raised, no step is heard,
But a phantom glides within,-
A sheeted spectre from the dead,
With a cold and leaden skin.

What boots it that no other eye
Beheld the shade appear!
The guilty lady's guilty soul
Beheld it plain and clear,-

It slowly glides within the room,

And sadly looks around

And stooping, kissed her daughter's cheek, With lips that gave no sound.

Then softly on the lady's arm

She laid a death-cold hand-
Yet it hath scorched within the flesh
Like to a burning brand.

And gliding on with noiseless foot,

O'er winding stair and hall,

She nears the chamber where is heard
Her infant's trembling call.

She smoothed the pillow where he lay,
She warmly tucked the bed-

She wiped his tears, and stroked the curls
That clustered round his head.
The child, caressed, unknowing fear,
Hath nestled him to rest;

The mother folds her wings beside-
The mother from the blest.

Fast by the eternal throne of God
Celestial beings stand,-
Beings, who guide the little child
With kind and loving hand-
And woe to him who dares to turn
The infant foot aside,-

Or shroud the light that ever should
Within his soul abide."

PART VI.

It is the noon of summer, and the noonday of Eva's earthly existence. She hath held communion with all that is great and beautiful in nature, till it hath become a part of her being; till her spirit hath acquired strength and maturity, and been reared to a beautiful and harmonious temple, in which the true and the good delight to dwell. Then cometh the mystery of womanhood; its gentle going forth of the affections seeking for that holiest of companion ship, a kindred spirit, responding to all its finer essences, and yet lifting it above itself. Eva had listened to this voice of her woman's nature; and sweet visions had visited her pillow. Unknown to the external vision, there was one ever present to the soul; and when he erred, she had felt a lowly sorrow that, while it still more perfected her own nature, went forth to swell likewise the amount of good in the great universe of God. At length Albert Linne, a gay youth, whose errors are those of an ardent and inexperienced nature, rather than of an assenting will, meets Eva sleeping under the canopy of the great woods, and he is at once awed by the purity that enshrouds her. He is lifted to the contemplation of the good-to a sense of the wants of his better nature. Eva awakes and recognizes the spirit that forever and ever is to be one with hers; that is to complete that mystic marriage, known in the Paradise of God; that marriage of soul with soul, that demandeth no external right. Eva the pure minded, the lofty in thought, and great in soul, recoiled not from the errors of him who was to be made mete for the kingdom of Heaven, through her gentle agency; for the mission of the good and the lovely, is not to the good, but to the sinful. The mission of woman, is to the erring of man.

'Tis the summer prime, when the noiseless air

In perfumed chalice lies,

And the bee goes by with a lazy hum

Beneath the sleeping skies:

When the brook is low, and the ripples bright,

As down the stream they go;

The pebbles are dry on the upper side,

And dark and wet below.

The tree that stood where the soil is thin,
And the bursting rocks appear,

Hath a dry and rusty colored bark,

And its leaves are curled and sear. But the dog-wood and the hazel bush,

Have clustered round the brookTheir roots have stricken deep beneath, And they have a verdant look.

To the juicy leaf the grasshopper clings,
And he gnaws it like a file-
The naked stalks are withering by,
Where he has been ere while.

The cricket hops on the glistering rock,
Or pipes in the faded moss-

From the forest shade the voice is heard
Of the locust shrill and hoarse.

The widow donn'd her russet robe,
Her cap of snowy hue,

And o'er her staid maternal form

A sober mantle threw ;

And she, while fresh the morning light,
Hath gone to pass the day,
And ease an ailing neighbor's pain
Across the meadow way.

Young Eva closed the cottage door;
And wooed by bird and flower,
She loitered on beneath the wood,
Till came the noon-tide hour.
The sloping bank is cool and green,
Beside the tinkling rill;

The cloud that slumbers in the sky,
Is painted on the hill.

The angels poised their purple wings
O'er blossom, brook and dell,
And loitered in the quiet nook
As if they loved it well.
Young Eva laid one snowy arm
Upon a violet bank,

And pillow'd there her downy cheek
While she to slumber sank.

A smile is on her gentle lip,

For she the angels saw,

And felt their wings a covert make
As round her head they draw.

A maiden's sleep, how pure it is!
The soul's inwrought repose-
It enters to its chamber in,

Then onward stronger goes.

A huntsman's whistle, and anon
The dogs come fawning round-
And now they raise the pendent ear,
And crouch along the ground.
The hunter leapt the shrunken brook,
The dogs hold back with awe,
For they upon the violet bank

The slumbering maiden saw.

A reckless youth was Albert Linne,
With licensed oath and jest,
Who little cared for woman's fame,
Or peaceful maiden's rest.

Light things to him, were broken vows-
The blush, the sigh, the tear;
What hinders he should steal a kiss,
From sleeping damsel here?

He looks, yet stays his eager foot;
For, on that spotless brow,

And that closed lid, a something rests
He never saw till now;

He gazes, yet he shrinks with awe
From that fair wondrous face,
Those limbs so quietly disposed,
With more than maiden grace.

He seats himself upon the bank
And turns his face away-
And Albert Linne, the hair-brained youth,
Wished in his heart to pray.

But thronging came his former life,
What once he called delight-
The goblet, oath, and stolen joy,
How palled they on the sight.
He looked within his very soul,
Its hidden chamber saw,
Inscribed with records dark and deep

Of many a broken law.

No more he thinks of maiden fair,
No more of ravished kiss-
Forgets he that pure sleeper nigh

Hath brought his thoughts to this.
Now Eva opes her childlike eyes

And lifts her tranquil head, And Albert, like a guilty thing,

Had from her presence fled. But Eva held her kindly hand

And bade him stay awhile;-
He dared not look upon her eyes,
He only marked her smile;

And that, so pure and winning beamed,
So calm and holy too,

That o'er his troubled thoughts at once
A quiet charm it threw.

Light thoughts, light words were all forgot-
He breathed a holier air-

He felt the power of womanhood-
Its purity was there.

And soft beneath their silken fringe
Beamed Eva's dovelike eyes-

In hue and softness made to hold
Communion with the skies.
Her gentle voice a part did seem,
Of air, and brook, and bird-
And Albert listened, as if he
Such music only heard.

O Eva! thou the pure in heart,
Why falls thy trembling voice?
A blush is on thy maiden cheek,
And yet thine eyes rejoice.
Another glory wakes for thee

Where'er thine eyes may rest;
And deeper, holier thoughts arise
Within thy peaceful breast.

Thine eyelids droop in tenderness,
New smiles thy lips combine,
For thou dost feel another soul
Is blending into thine.

Thou upward raisest thy meck eyes,
And it is sweet to thee;

To feel the weakness of thy sex,

Is more than majesty.

To feel thy shrinking nature claim

The stronger arm and brow

Thy weapons, smiles, and tears, and prayers, And blushes such as now.

A woman, gentle Eva thou,

Thy lot were incomplete,