"Ranged on stools, there they sit,
Bench of fools, full of wit:
Bench of zanies keen as knives,
Free of tongue, on all archives.

There they sit from age to age:
Leathern socs of the world's stage:
And for every hour they sit,
They do spoil the nation's wit.

And on all sides lo! they look
With a vision like a cook,

When she bastes a venison haunch,
Fatly for a monarch's paunch.

And the beauty of their dream,

As upon their bench they seem,

Is old justice, fat and flavoured,

Carved for them, and by them savoured.

Lo! the logic skeletons

Serve them for their meat with stones,

And for reasonings they try

How the logic-stones will fry.

They have ghosts of actors poor
For their guardian angels sure,
And their brains like dresses worn,
Are sieves held for public corn.

Lord, how long shall these offend?

And what is their latter end?—

They shall live on bench of glee,
Long as human cruelty.

They shall date with quarrel, years:

Time, with hypocritic tears:

Long as luxury hath tether,

They shall warm their arid leather.

And Adam knew the sign:
And started from his couch :
And Eve was there divine,
Her blessing to avouch:
And in the bower of Eden
They wed the earth with sky,
And marriage so was laden
With loves' eternity.

"And she shall have her rights,
Born new from age to age:
And she shall miss her plights,
And she shall fire the sage,
And blood and bone is man,
That wars for woman's side:
And in Redemption's Plan

She is Redemption's Bride."

The "Horse of Flesh," p. 34, is thus introduced :

"This night the song that doth belong,

Is state of man, when he doth plan
To sing for pride, and high to ride."

I quote a portion of it, as his own vindication for departing from the ordinary process of poetic composition :

:

"The globe of poets then,
The choir of angel-men,
Each sing a different song,
That doth to each belong,
Yet the songs one and all,
Are of a single call,

And make one body free,
Doth with itself agree.

Then in society,

Rises an anthem high,

'Tis as a perfume cast

From all flowers far and fast;

* "Tails sig. scientific sensual principles. . . . Ap. Ex. 559, &c. "Fish sig. sensual affections which are the ultimate affections of the natural man. Also, those who are in common truths, which are also ultimates of the natural man. Also those who are in external falses. A.R. 405. Fishes sig. scientifics. A.C. 42; 991. Fishes (Hab. i. 14-16) sig. those who are in faith separate from charity. A. R. 405. To make as the fishes of the sea, sig. to make altogether sensual. A. R. 991."—A pretty kettle of fish for the reader's digestion.

...

improve the poetry. Passing over some interesting but rather long pieces, we come to "E. B.," p. 75:—

Like golden stars in a green night."-Andrew Marvell.

and bright golden globes

Of fruit, suspended in their own green heaven."-Shelley.

Was "the Spirit" reminiscent of these "stony-bosomed" singers, or merely accordant with them?

Then walk up to the casket,

Thy life is near the door, 'Twill open if you ask it, And o'er thee, spirit pour.

Thou art not far from heaven,
Thou art not far from love;
Thy dower is sevenfold seven,
Thy hopes are fixed above.

Yet earth does well to keep thee,
For thy good deeds are needed :
We only yet would steep thee
In spirit-powers: unheeded.

Thy husband oft is with thee, dear,
And he has led thee on:

One day thou shalt see all things clear,
For home will then be won,

And separation's day be done."

"The Birth of Aconite," p. 77, is very powerful, both in conception and execution; of a somewhat similar strain, though in blank verse, to Part iii. of Shelley's "Sensitive Plant." But how the doctor reconciles it with his science and theology I cannot understand. I presume he believes that God created the aconite no less than He created the olive, the palm, and the vine; yet he writes as if it were created by the devil. This sort of loose undefined Manicheism, which Plato, by-the-bye, explicitly sets forth in the Timæus, is very common among Christians, in spite of the great monotheistic text (Isa. xlv. 5-7): “I am the Lord; and there is none else, there is no god beside Me. . . . I form the light and create darkness I make peace, and create evil: I the Lord do