night Paul and Silas prayed, and sang praises unto God." The rigour of her persecutions, in our opinion, conveys a strong censure against her zealous but misguided opponents. But the case is by no means solitary. The world is always indulgent to the errors of our practice, but severe to the errors of our creed. True policy and humanity would have suggested a different course. Extravagances, when left to themselves, generally work their own cure; but, when visited with persecution, acquire dignity and importance, and never fail to awaken sympathy for the sufferers.

After her long imprisonment, Madame Guion lived a retired life for more than seven years a Blois, where she died June 9, 1717, in the seventieth year of her age, celebrated for her misfortunes and devotion, though her principles, which once convulsed France, and awakened the thunders of the Vatican, are now nearly forgotten.

The following selection from her poems, executed by Cowper, is highly devotional and may be read with interest and edification. It exhibits a happy specimen of her religious views in their best form; and Cowper has given to them the charms of versification, united with a taste and discrimination that ensure their popularity. The poem on the Nativity is a sublime and bold composition, and proves that the piety which warms the heart, seldom fails to enlarge and invigorate the faculties of the mind.

THE NATIVITY.

'Tis folly all-let me no more be told
Of Parian porticos, and roofs of gold;
Delightful views of nature, dress'd by art,
Enchant no longer this indifferent heart;
The Lord of all things, in his humble birth,
Makes mean the proud magnificence of earth;
The straw, the manger, and the mouldering wall.
Eclipse its lustre; and I scorn it all.

Canals, and fountains, and delicious vales,
Green slopes and plains, whose plenty never fails;
Deep-rooted groves, whose heads sublimely rise,
Earth-born, and yet ambitious of the skies;
The abundant foliage of whose gloomy shades,
Vainly the sun in all its power invades ;
Where warbled airs of sprightly birds resound,
Whose verdure lives while Winter scowls around;
Rocks, lofty mountains, caverns dark and deep,
And torrents raving down the rugged steep;
Smooth downs, whose fragrant herbs the spirits cheer;
Meads crown'd with flowers; streams musical and

clear.

Whose silver waters, and whose murmurs, join
Their artless charms, to make the scene divine;
The fruitful vineyard, and the furrow'd plain,
That seems a rolling sea of golden grain:
All, all have lost the charms they once possess'd;
An infant God reigns sovereign in my breast; A
From Bethlehem's bosom I no more will rove;
There dwells the Saviour, and there rests my love.
Ye mightier rivers, that, with sounding force,
Urge down the valleys your impetuous course!
Winds, clouds, and lightnings! and, ye waves, whose
heads,

Curl'd into monstrous forms, the seaman dreads!
Horrid abyss, where all experience fails,

Spread with the wreck of planks and shatter'd sails;
On whose broad back grim Death triumphant rides,
While havoc floats on all thy swelling tides,
Thy shores a scene of ruin strew'd around
With vessels bulged, and bodies of the drown'd!
Ye fish, that sport beneath the boundless waves,
And rest, secure from man, in rocky caves;
Swift-darting sharks, and whales of hideous size,
Whom all the aquatic world with terror eyes!
Had I but faith immoveable and true,

I might defy the fiercest storm, like you:
The world, a more disturb'd and boisterous sea,
When Jesus shows a smile, affrights not me;
He hides me, and in vain the billows roar,
Break harmless at my feet, and leave the shore.