And marked with many a sign of woe,
Deals around its fated blow:

Unseen by mortal eye, thy hand
Bids it travel through the land,
And mow down nations at a sweep,
Whene'er to appease the Almighty's ire,
The fierce Destroyer walks in fire;
And heard in awful accents deep,
Thy voice proclaims the vengeance nigh,

The fixed decree of Jove, and mandate of the sky.

In vain beneath the sheltering robe

Of darkness, Vice her form atrocious veils,

Or walks, with forehead unabashed the globe: "Tis thine, to mark her close disguise,

With keen observant glance to trace

The varying features of her face,

(Which Falsehood's mask but ill conceals)

And with prompt speed the sorceress chase

Through all her tortuous paths, and foul obliquities.
Immersed in tenfold shades of night,

The assassin hears thee knocking at his heart;
Transfixed by fell Remorse's dart,

Inward upon himself his eyes

He turns exploring by thy light,
The guilty stains of scarlet hue,
That glare portentous on his view,

While conscious fears his soul affright;

And storms of wrath and indignation dread,

Seem ready to displode, irruptive, on his head.

Yet oft', in their preposterous mood

The impious triumph; while they dream
Of acts nefarious that defy

The sovereignty that sways the sky,
That thou dost nothing deem,

And with their taunts insult the good:

Inflated with presumptuous pride
The lingering thunders they deride,
And mock at him whose upright thought
But meditates the thing it ought:
Indulging their insensate hope,
On thy strong buckler's bosses wide
They rush regardless; bold to dare
Thy terrors, and provoke the war,
As if their feeble arm could cope
With power supernal. Heaven surveys
With scorn the vauntings of the unjust;
And with the breath of her displeasure lays
Their trophies in the dust.

Daughter of sempiternal Jove,
Divine ASTREA! Blest is he
By no vain hopes or fears misled,
Who dares in thy firm footsteps tread,
And by thy dictates sage approve
Each act, determined to be free:
Lord of the movements of his soul,
Who by no partial views confined,
Bids in diffusive currents roll
Thy liberal gifts that bless mankind;
What though round Merit's lustrous mien
Detraction dart her arrows keen,

And Persecution's monster-brood
Imbrue their victim's steps in blood;

What though awhile thy children mourn

Midst Being's thorny wilds forlorn:

Not always shall the Just complain,

Nor heaven's high will to man be certified in vain.

For lo, thou comest! In mid air,

Thy throne a thousand seraphs bear

In long progressive order through the skies,
The courts of thy Great Father! On the day
Of final retribution thou shalt rise

To judge with righteousness the earth, and take
Vengeance on the transgressors; on their head
Thou shalt pour out the vials dread

Of fierce displeasure; and within them wake
Remorse, and tenfold anguish, and dismay;
Through countless periods doomed to feel
The iron scourge and torturing wheel,
In that dark gulph Tartarean chained,
Which Nemesis of old ordained:

Then shall the faithful triumph: they that stood
The firm assertors of thy laws,

And loved thy hallowed mandates high,
With joy and holy transport shall appear
Surviving this diurnal sphere,

The heirs of immortality!

Honoured with approbation, and applause
From THE SUPREME: Unfolding 'midst a flood
Of light, and lucid order, Heaven's design
Consummated at length, shall throw
New splendours o'er this scene below,
And bid 'midst Glory's circlet shine
The wisdom of the Eternal Cause ;
Who ere He Earth's foundations laid,
Or Ocean in his balance weighed,
Willed, that from thy immortal source
Each godlike act should take its course,
Combining in one perfect plan

The dignity, the rank, and happiness of Man.

*Whose iron scourge, and torturing hour.

GRAY'S ODE TO ADVERSITY.

THE RUINED ORPHAN.

BY LAURA SOPHIA TEMPLE,

THE Wizard of Winter is rouz'd from his sleep,
In anger he comes o'er the waves of the deep;
In anger he comes,-but I heed not his roar,
For the Wizard of Winter can vex me no more,
The sea fowl retires to her desolate home,
His fury has warn'd her no longer to roam;
But I may the frown of his vengeance defy,
For it never can wither my blossoms of joy.

Lo! he comes to the bed of the fragrant flow'r,
And roots up the beautiful child of an hour.
Now wildly he rides through the regions of air,
Destroying whatever is goodly and fair.
But harmless to me is the blast of his wing;
The bolts of his wrath he is welcome to fling;
For my callous bosom he never can bruise;
And I have no soul-valued treasures to lose.

'Tis the morning of Summer that wakes me to pain
'Tis the soft song of pleasure that maddens my brain;
For Summer may come in the pride of her bloom,
May give to the woodlands their wonted perfume,
And the vallies may echo with songs of delight,
And unmark'd the moments pursue their gay flight;
Yet Summer to me shall no image present
But the image of bliss that was long ago spent.

For, often has Nature her vestments renew'd,
And often the South-wind his wild flight pursued,
Since that moment arriv'd which was big with my fate,
Which condemn'd me to wander, to mourn, and to hate;
That moment when villainy doom'd me to shame,
And from Purity's register struck out my name;
That moment, when Falsehood withdrew from my sight,
And my soul plung'd aghast 'mid the darkness of night.

The storm has blown o'er!-but its traces are left;
Like a wave-shatter'd vessel my bosom is reft.
As the roe from the hunter, I fly from mankind,
Or the shrunk leaf of autumn when chac'd by the wind.
For the world is my foe, its cold glance of disdain
Would scowl on my grief, and would scoff at my pain;
Fair maidens would turn from this eye of despair,
As tho' the foul Fiend of Infection dwelt there.

Yet once there were eyes that would smile upon mine,
But the Angel of Death has forbade them to shine;
There were lips that could chace from my bosom her woe,
And the purest of kisses were wont to bestow;
There were arms to whose shelter I fled when opprest,
That were always my home, and my haven of rest:
But quickly from Joy's narrow door I was thrust ;-
The best and the loveliest now moulders in dust.

Yet blest to escape-the dark whirlwind's rude swell
Would have rent thy proud soul when my innocence fell;
Yes;-blest to the earth's darkling womb to return,
Ere thy cheek had been taught by my follies to burn;
Ere the whispers of Rumour had poison'd thine ear
With the tale of my ruin,-the source of my tear;
Ere the glare of conviction had taught thee to prove
That the foe of thy peace was the child of thy love