Literary Cadet And Rhode Island Statesman

DEATH.

"If death can at one time, assume a more haggard aspect than at another, it is when he assails the lovers of humanity and prostrates with the earth, female excellence and beauty."

Watts on Death.

My Lord, I could have borne on the midst of my afflictions, all but this. But alas! Portia is dead;— tears will not restore her—why then should we repine.

Otway's Genevieve.

There is nothing that can restore to the world, those we venerate, or those we love, when the grasp of the Iron Clad Monarch is laid upon them, and they slumber beneath the turfed mound, and repose to the melancholy melody of the graves. Though sensible of this truism, still, the bleeding and lacerated heart of humanity, pants for the restoration of those it loved; and whilst it bleeds afresh, and utters its melancholy sighs for the virtuous and venerated dead, still hope flies from us; and as we linger round the secluded spot, where all we once loved lies low, we grieve as those who have no hope, and whose all is buried beneath the gloom of the valley of the city of the dead.

"It is a dreadful thing to die;"—the mere contemplation of that awful hour, when the soul bids farewell to this tenement of clay, and flies to unknown and undiscovered worlds. fills the bosom with dismay, and the heart shrinks back with horror;—the fevered brain and bewildered imagination. would gladly escape the gloomy contemplation; but yet they cannot; and as they linger over the prospects before them; —contemplate the dark and unfathomable abysses through which they are doomed to pass, hope is abandoned, happiness is destroyed, and wretched mortality is taught, how dreadful it is to die.

Whilst we escape the grasp of Death. ourselves, we may indeed look curiously on, and behold his shafts piercing the bosoms of those with whom we once delighted to rove among the happy circles of society, without an emotion of anguish; yet when we behold young, lovely, and beauteous female excellence, bowing before the stern decrees of the King of Terrors, and in the spring tide of life, descending to the valley of the shadow of death, all the sympathies are awakened; the stern heart melts in pity, and in the bitterness of grief we weep for the fall of the hapless fair one, who, sent too young, too lovely and too good, was cut off, like the opening rose, and consigned to those unexplored regions, about which we know nothing

What scene can be more painful, or more pregnant with bitter anguish, than that which is presented to the mind, when beholding on the death touch, an expiring female: It is then that we behold, all that was lovely, excellent and virtuous her upon whom fond parents hung with enthusiastic fondness—her who was the delight of society, the pride of her relatives, and the honor of her sex, and the cruel agonies of unsparing death, breathing her life out; and, though yielding to the decrees of Heaven, still grasping the last remaining hope; and supplicating mercy, as the scalding tear-drops flow from the soft blue eye, and the feebly palpitating heart, reluctantly ceases its wonted pulsations!—Though we may possess the blessed assurances, which christianity affords, that the falling fair one, departs for "another and a better world," to dwell with saints and angels, and just spirits made perfect, yet these assurances, cannot console us;—they are as vapors, fleeting. evanescent and unsatisfactory, and yield nothing that can heal the lacerated heart.

Stoics may declaim, and Philosophers may talk about manly fortitude, and christian resignation; they may labour to teach us submission to the decrees of fate, but it is in vain that they attempt by their sophisms, and arguments, to afford us consolation, or to heal the wound the heart sustains, when witnessing the last moments and expiring breath of beauteous woman! And where is the man, Whose heart is so cold and dead, as not to be affected and subdued, in witnessing the separation of female soul and body! Where is the man that can see her, on the dying pillow, bidding a long and last farewell to the world, and all its enjoyments—bestowing a parting benediction on her relatives and friends—sadly resigning the joys of society, and with

"Her hands clasped firm, her eyes upturned
Shedding their tears like moonlight rain."

that will not pray for her rescue; and, melting into pity, weep and deplore her hard fate.—

But alas! all our joys are fleeting and evanescent; the ways of Heaven are dark and mysterious, though wise and just, and though we would deprecate them, still must we submit;— and submitting. we should remember, that Death in his marches, regards not the crowned monarch, the lonely peasant, or the humble slave;—all, all must fall at his approach; and all must submit to his solemn decrees.

But though we may call philosophy to our aid, still we cannot resign ourselves to the demise of female excellence; and adopting the language of Bishop Cranmer. we will add, "I have beheld, in the course of a long life, many scenes, pregnant with distress and affliction; I have seen the cup of human suffering filled to the brim, and I have tasted of its bitter draught: but I never witnessed a scene that so completely wrought up my feelings, and pierced my heart, as the death bed of a virtuous woman!'"