SECTION XCI.

MACHIAVEL―JEROME.....Blackwood's Magazine.

Machiavel. HA! Jerome, are you there? Reach me your hand once more. It is all over with me.

Jerome. This despondency should not be allowed so easy a victory. You have been enjoying the advantage of sleep.

I

Mach. Scarcely. I had a strange fancy just now. thought I was standing at a certain place, from whence there was a view of the road which leads up to the gates of paradise, and also of the road which leads down to the infernal regions. Upon each of these roads I saw a crowd passing along, and felt much interest in observing of what sort of individuals it was composed.

Jer. What sort of persons were those on the road leading to paradise?

Mach. Poor ill-favoured rogues-half-starved, weatherworn, ragged, and thin-blooded. The very refuse of the earth, at least what are counted so. They seemed as if they had but newly escaped from a hail-storm of earthly misery and contempt, which had bent down their shoulders, and rent their garments to tatters. Beggars, slaves, and simple fools, who had remained honest after being counted knaves; homely rustics, who could scarcely have out-witted their own watch-dogs; sober mechanics, such as are known to the world only by the shoes they produce; bellmen of convents; but few priors; and, in short, such a company as brought me in mind of the text, "Beati pauperes quoniam ipsorum est regnum cælorum.' Jer. But what had these persons done, more than others, to entitle them to admission at St. Peter's gate.

Mach. The same question occurred to myself, when I saw the apostle stretch forth his hands to such a homely group, and, with a smiling countenance, help such as were feeble and drooping to ascend the few steps which led up to his massive portal.

Jer. And was your curiosity satisfied?

Mach. The valves were thrown open, and a breeze rushing out upon the new comers, suddenly removed the squalor and sickliness of their appearance, so that they went in, as fresh and joyous as so many winged children painted by Correggio. In the meantime, the apostle, perceiving my

astonishment, cried out to me, "The principal merit of these people consists in having spent their lives without betraying any turn for mischief. Persons like them are the only ones capable of allowing paradise to remain a paradise after their arrival. As to the plainness of their understandings it is no disadvantage, since it enables them to be happy without asking how or wherefore; and because, in heaven, there is no need of circumventing each other.

Jer. Certainly not. But whom did you see upon the

other road?

Mach. Let me first tell what more conversation I had with St. Peter. I asked him if all the searching faculties, and ambitious stirrings of human nature, must then be considered as pernicious, and if so, why was man endowed with them? He replied, he knew not how man came to be endowed with them, but that we had an opportunity of feeling their effects upon earth, and were able to judge of them for ourselves.

Jer. Alas! it is true that the history of mankind says little in their favour.

Mach. When he had replied in this manner, I was piqued at the notion that happiness could only be found among persons of humble spirits and shallow understandings; and I turned away from the apostle to look at those who were passing along the other road.

Jer. Well, and who were they?

Mach. Popes, cardinals, kings, heroes, counsellors, and ambitious persons of every sort. The road shone with gold and purple, and these venerable figures, with long beards, did nothing but discourse of state affairs as they went along. All of them had the appearance of profound sagacity, and carried great wrinkled foreheads to the place of their destination. A company so august had evidently vacated many palaces and cabinets. There was no individual in the procession who had not left mankind smarting, to make them remember him, and preserve his busts, portraits, and medallions.

Jer. Did you observe any of your contemporaries among them?

Mach. I observed no person there, who would have done good elsewhere.

Jer. And what thought you, upon witnessing this spectacle, so different from the last?

Mach. I turned again to St. Peter, and cried with a loud voice, that surely there would be more satisfaction in

conversing with an assemblage of men, so noble, wise, and famous, than with a common herd of mechanics and simpletons.

Jer. Right. There lies the problem.

Mach. The apostle replied, that these men could not endure a state of repose; and having no longer the humble and well-meaning part of their species to practise upon, they would infallibly become the tormentors of each other. Jer. Did you perceive where their march terminated? Mach. Yes. Their path, as they advanced, grew more and more rugged, bursting into cracks, from whence issued infernal fire; and the crowd which formerly walked with decorum, and in good order, was now seen hurrying along, arm in arm with fiends and demons. I heard loud huzzas and outcries, and the whole was soon lost in obscurity.

Jer. You have been reflecting with distaste upon some of the occupations of your past life, and your chagrin has produced this feverish dream.

Mach. No, Jerome, my nature is the same as ever; and unless Heaven mend me, I suspect I shall hardly gain admittance to the abode of St. Peter.

SECTION XCII.

SAMMAEL'S ADDRESS TO THE FALLEN ANGELS.
Anonymous.

SPIRITS, whose birth-place is the highest heaven,
Whose home is in Gehenna's awful star,
Usurpers of earth's altars-earthly gods!
Or how shall I address you ?-Revellers?
Minions of gaudy light, who love the sun,
And dare to bask ye in his beams of glory?
Or fiends of darkness?-for like such ye look-
Ye have of late forgotten whose ye are,
Your proper functions and dark destiny;
Ye have become ambitious and refined;
Genii of virtues and moralities-
Spirits of pomps and places-deities
Of actions, passions, elements;-array'd

In all that charms the eye and soothes the sense.
Ye ransack nature for ambrosial tastes,

And decompose the sun-beams for attire.

Courting repose and vain forgetfulness,

Ye slumber on soft breezes and fresh flowers ;-
And dwell apart, or meeting as earth's gods,
Make honour mean, with mutual reverence-
Rarely with man-or, if ye walk the world,
'Tis to seek fanes and votarists, not victims.
Was it for this, Spirits accurst!—for this
I lost celestial empire ?-To establish
On earth a sensual sty for craven fiends!—
Was it for this? that ye may dwell secure
In light, I may not look unwither'd on.
Earth lacks not revellers; that such as you
Should lift their owl eyes to the glorious day,
And mock its noon of beauty with most foul
And phantom aspects !-Denizens of hell,
Ye are not for this earth, or earth for you;
Your proper home awaits her truant sons
With love, though long forgotten, unconsumed.
'Tis not the fuming altar, festal chant,
The solemn pomp, the wreathed sacrifice,
Can make ye that ye are not-heroes-gods.
Can flattery vanquish fate, and lies repel
The eternal edict, which, once heard, even yet
Rings o'er the gulf of many a thousand years
Redemption to our victims,-wo to us?
In vain ye blind the superstitious gentiles;
Unless our empire be establish'd here,
O'er Salem's mount, and fated Galilee,
Earth's empire is as dust before the wind!.
But this high end demands far other means
Than the poor play of mock divinity.

Ye must abandon pride-spurn empty honour-
Shake off the sloth of sensual hours; by these
Man is our victim-and with thriftless zeal
Stakes on their worth his soul's futurity,

And finds them worthless, and is lost for ever!-
Watch with enduring toil-your foe sleeps not,

But from heaven's height laughs with immortal scorn,
To see his foes thus purblind at the brink

Of the unfathom'd pit !-Behold ye not.

The footstseps dread of your arch-enemy

Stampt on the ground ye tread? Do not your pleasures Proclaim the hand that forgeth pains for you?

When ye behold, at morn, yon granite hills

Bask in their Lord's serene and silent sunshine,

When ye inhale the sweet fresh atmosphere,
Which mantles with life's breath the rolling world,—
Oh! can ye dare be joyful? Dare ye raise
Your phantom eyes to yon sidereal host,
Which throngs infinitude with fearful brightness,
And hope your darkness may defy his light,
Or fiends exult at noonday?-Know ye not
His eye-beam and his spirit compass you,
His thunders dwell around you? Yet ye sleep!
Now speak ye like yourselves: But this I know
That ye are evil. I did only wonder

That so much wickedness becomes abortive,
By your strange vanity. Enacting gods,

I've known ye sink the fiend, and preach good morals,
That men might deem you good. But this I pass,
For it is thus sin fitliest clothes itself,

In sounding apophthegms-while mortals, duped
By the false semblance of a seeming good,
Confide in fabled virtues, and abandon

Their better trust in heaven. I now repeat not
Your love of pleasures, which degrade all natures,
Making the best corrupt-vice impotent :-
But your vain malice, fiends! the ebullition
Of evil natures, furious to no end

But to defeat its object, and recoil
From the scared victim to his torturer :

For thus repentance from your fiery rack

Oft mounts to the eternal arbiter,

And grace comes earthward hovering, to impart
Peace to the penitent and weary breast.

SECTION XCIII.

THE SAME, CONTINUED.

Av-ye are weak, because ye seek oblivion,
And drown hell's nerving hate with human follies.
Touch'd with the frail taint of humanity,

Ye do forget your very selves, and feebly
Talk as if fiends had conscience.

Yet for this

Ye
may not gain one moment from perdition;
Weak ye may be,-ye must be evil still,

W