went forth, and the learned, the revered Patriarch died by the bowstring of a tyrant, and his body was hurled in the wave over which they strangled him.

She who wrote, and he who preserved the priceless work, have slumbered long in death. Their dust is scattered by the wind, and the foot of the traveller perchance treads over the spot where they were laid. But their names live. Tradition with her thousand voices hath told of Thecla the Nun, who died in her labor of love, that grateful posterity might read the pure word of a revealed God; and memory shall strike anew the notes of praise that tradition hath waked, and future ages shall echo the same thrilling notes with a voice of joy and love.

THE CALL.

PICTURE OF A QUEEN KNEELING NEAR A STATUE.

"Praeterea fuit in tectis de marmore templum,
Conjugis antiqui.

Hinc exaudiri voces et verba vocantis,

Visa viri."-VIRGIL

Was it a dream? or did her name sound clear,

From those cold chiselled lips? Hath marble broken

The silence of full many a weary year?

Hath buried faith unloosed its chain and spoken?

Darkly the funeral wreath

Those statue temples pressed,

And more than the fixed chill of death,

Each lineament possessed.

Yet mournfully and sternly clear her name

Seemed whispered through the midnight stillness, where
Mid scattered wreaths and lamps of incense flame,

She knelt alone-unmasked in her despair

Too highly wrought for tears,
Low drooped her beating brow-
Thou might'st have saved in other years,
Strange voice! Why call her now?

Too late thy low reproach-she broke the chain
Of vows that bound her to her dead, and gave
Her whole deep soul to one illusion vain-
An ocean with the sun on every wave-
One moment-then she stood

With pale revenge and fear,
Each pulse a heart of fiery blood,
The mystic voice to hear!

She heard-and flung aside her heavy crown,
And wrapped her in a regal robe of flame,

While through dim ages breathed, melodious down,
Struck from a master lyre, we know her name.

ATHENAE.

METAPHYSICAL FRAGMENTS.

NUMBER TWO.

THE RELATIONS OF MATTER TO THE SPIRIT OF MAN.

WE have gazed on Nature in her progressive formations, and beheld the Infinite Mind embodying itself-God becoming objective to his intelligent creatures. We have contemplated these formations developing their nature, and attaining the end of their being; and loved the revealed mind and heart of God.

We have passed along the chain of second causes till we arrived at the First. He was alone in eternity. Happy in himself-happy in the blessed society of the Trinity. Our earth existed in states of his mind and heart, He purposed to create-to create for the sake of intelligent creatures to whom he could reveal himself. To accomplish this end, matter arose from nought, and was moulded into the multiplied formations of earth and heaven, as the medium of his revelations.

We have seen that He cannot reveal himself directly to his creatures, so as to communicate truth. It is true, He can act directly upon them; but this action only produces an emotion by which, and a necessary, consequent desire, He is known as the unknown cause of this emotion. Hence the necessity of a passive medium. Matter and its formations, as the medium of the revelations of mind to mind. This view is corroborated by the united voice of tradition and Scripture. And why should we reject the instruction of this voice? Why, when we receive the axiom that the mind of man can know nothing but what exists, or what has been suggested by something that does exist?

Prophecy was given through a medium. Why, if a medium was not absolutely necessary? The fact that a medium was used, is at least presumptive evidence that it was the only way.

The scenes

passed before the eye of the mind as a revolving panorama, and made their impressions. Hence the prophetic names. Thus nabhia is one who utters oracles in view of the impressions produced by the embodied events of the future. The prophet is supposed to be passive. The events throng upon his heart till it is filled with their inspiration -and then, like a fountain, it gushes forth in the impassioned raptures of inspiration. But we should not overlook the truth, that during the action of the objective upon the heart of the prophet, there was also a direct action, exciting and sustaining a proper emotion. Thus roe, the most ancient name of the prophet, signifies one who sees as if with the sensible eye, the revealed and embodied scenes. They passed before him in vision, clothed in the habit and drapery of the

actual, wearing the characteristics and fulfilling the relations of real existence. Thus hhoze, is one who beholds with the mental eye, as in imagination, or in a figure of personification.

In harmony with this, the Scriptures speak of a hidden and revealed God. He dwelleth in light unapproachable. The only-begotten Son who is in the bosom of the Father, he hath revealed him. He hath exegeticised he hath brought him forth into objective existence. Thus the numen of the Latins, and the io of the Greeks, relate to the revealed God. The traditions and worship of all nations are full of this distinction. It is the basis of their worship. The revealed is distinguished from the invisible Jehovah. Thus on the Saïtic temple of Isis is written, ἐγώ εἰμε το γεγονὸς καὶ εἰς και ἐσόμενον. A beautiful paraphrase of the word Jehovah. Again: "I am he who has been, is, and always shall be; and no one hath drawn aside my veil." This is the voice of the nations of the earth.

This view is full of loveliness to the spirit of man. It represents God coming forth from inaccessible light, and creating a world of matter in order that he may reveal himself to his intelligent creatures. It represents him as a kind Father, inventing a way by which he may correspond with his children-they with him-and with one another. God then creates, and uses matter to construct the states of his mind, and embody the feelings of his heart.

Now, there may be, and there are, different degrees of clearness in his revelations. His revelations in a plant are not so clear as his revelations in man. The eye is richer in design than the moss of the silken rose-bud. His revelations in the human body are not so clear as his revelations in the spirit. The impulses of the appetites do not speak the heart of God so clearly as the tremulous pulsations of retiring love. In the body, there is mind and heart revealed; but in the spirit, they possess moral character.

But it is possible for God to make a clearer revelation of himself. We cannot suppose that these revelations have exhausted the resources of his power and wisdom; and if they have not, neither can we suppose that his love is wearied in making known itself to adoring creatures. He is the Father of our spirits. Why should he be content to reveal himself in hieroglyphics? Why converse geometrically to those who know nothing of numbers; or philosophically, to those who have scarcely begun to make observations? Why not come forth, and like a kind Father, condescend to lisp his will, in the language of his children? This is reasonable, when we remember that we were created for his glory-that glory is manifested excellence, and that in proportion to the clearness of his revelations, will we be able to glorify him.

It is possible, then-it is probable-yea, it is to be expected, that God will make a clearer revelation of himself than that through irrational matter; yea, than that through our own consciousness.

A father, who should fill his house with the works of his hands, and a volume with the thoughts, feelings, and purposes of his heart, for his children to see and contemplate in his absence, does much. But he can do more. These works-this volume-are the embodied mind and heart of the father; but they are not the father. They reveal

and keep him before the mind. They are not like the children. There is no direct sympathy. Let the father return. Let the same thoughts, feelings, and purposes, fall from a tongue like theirs-in tones that they are accustomed to use, and there is perfect sympathy. The states of his mind and heart are infused into their spirits, and become their own.

It is so with God. His works are full of him. But he-where is he? They are only his embodied states. Let him come nearer. Let the same states of mind and heart that are embodied in the formations of matter, be uttered by lips like ours, and fall on our ears in tones that we are wont to hear, and God is perfectly revealed.

But such a revelation demands an assumption of human nature. Is this impossible? How? The infinity of his perfections makes it probable-yea, to be expected. Nor is it very mysterious. He who can act directly upon the heart, can unite himself to it. He who made the mind, and gave laws to its powers, can reveal himself through the exercises of these powers, so that the revelation will be one with the human, or may transcend it. Is this mysterious? Behold the same mystery in the union of the spirit with the animal soul. But such a revelation has been made. Behold it in the person of Christ!

We now proceed to the finite spirit. What is the relation of matter to it? It exists; and there is an objective world. How can it affect the finite spirit, so as to reveal to it the embodied states of the infinite mind? or how can the finite spirit discover the infinite in the objective world? The states are embodied in the formations of matter. To discover these states, we must perceive the forms in which they are embodied, just as we must discover the lines and angles of a proportion, in order to discover the proposition itself-in order to discover the intellectual states as they exist objectively. The lines and angles are the materials-their positions, the elements, and their perceptions, the condition of arriving at the proposition, which is a judgment. Thus, matter is the material-its formations, their nature and end, the elements; and their discovery, the condition on which we arrive at truth, which is the identity of the objective and subjective. But how are the material formations preserved? They cannot affect directly the spirit; for as material and animal, they can act only according to material and animal laws, and affect objects. and beings of corresponding susceptibility. But the spirit has no such susceptibility, and consequently cannot be affected by the external or objective world.

Neither can the finite spirit affect directly the external, and discover God in his objective existence. There is not a corresponding adaptation between the material world and the spirit. But there is a greater difficulty. The finite spirit cannot, except on conditions, begin and perpetuate action. To suppose it can, is to suppose it moved by some feeling. But feeling implies an object; and by the nature of the case, there is none, But it may be said, that the Infinite Mind can act directly upon the finite, and thus give the condition on which it may affect the external, and discover the Infinite Mind through its objective existence. We answer, no, We have shown that God

can act directly upon the finite spirit, and produce an emotion-and only an emotion. But there is no condition here, by which the finite spirit can act directly or indirectly upon the external. An emotion is excited. It is perceived. It is followed by desire, which appears to be the reaction or craving of our nature, arising from the subsidence of the emotion. This is perceived; and with it, the me, and the not me-a judgment which refers the emotion to an external cause. If so, how baseless is the fabric of idealism! A medium between the finite spirit and the external, is necessary-a medium of such a nature as to affect and to be affected by the external world. This medium is the body; so that we see that matter, as it exists in the external world, is related to the finite spirit, as the material in which mind is embodied, and the elements and conditions by which it may be known. And matter, as existing in the body, as the means and instrument by which it is affected and affects, and the conditions upon which it knows and is known. The body demands our attention. How is the spirit called into action? We have an objective world —a medium and a finite spirit. How does the world pass into the spirit and affect it? How does the spirit pass out to and affect the world?

The external acts upon the senses. Sensation arises, which is a state of the animal soul. Its nature is pleasurable or painful. It is followed by a propensity, or its contrary. The former inclines the animal nature to the exciting object. The latter disinclines it. Sensation and propensity are like action and reaction. It is a law of animal being, and may be seen in instincts. I have seen it beautifully developed by a spider. But all this has taken place in the animal soul; and that before there was any definite or well-defined development of the spirit. This is clear to the observer of the infancy of children.

But the spirit is not unaffected. Sensation in the animal nature was followed by an emotion in the spiritual; and propensity in the animal, by a desire in the spiritual. Thus the animal is developed before the spiritual, and is literally and emphatically the pedagogue of the spirit, calling it from its seclusion and solitude, and leading it forth to the school of Nature, to study God in his objective existence.

Thus we see that knowledge enters by the sensibilities (the heart ;) and these are developed by the body. Hence the relation of the body to the spirit is manifest. It is the means of exciting emotions and calling out desires. Without it, the mind would remain for ever in the solitude of absolute seclusion and inactivity, unless touched by the Spirit of God, having the capacity to act and perpetuate action, but only on the condition of an objective.

But we are dependent on the body, not only for exciting emotions and calling out desires, but also for their expressions, and the revelations of their nature to ourselves and to others. In the pure spirit there are emotion and desire. These are the original elements of all passions. But what are they to the Spirit? A pleasurable or a painful emotion, and an instinctive shrinking or longing for the exciting object for the unknown cause. They are the objects of perception,