And strews them o’er the barren glebe,
    In withered heaps to lie
  The sport of many a wintry storm,
    As it comes surging by.

  So man, with earthly honor,
    Stands proudly forth, to-day,—­
  To-morrow Death’s untimely frost
    His glory sweeps away.

  And down in Death’s dark chambers,
    With folded hands he lies;
  The things of earth excluded
    Forever from his eyes.

Life Compared to the Seasons.

  Loud blows the stern December blast;
  The snow is falling thick and fast;
  And all around so cold and drear,—­
  Proclaims the winter of the year. 
  Touched by the finger of decay,
  Summer beauties passed away—­
  Her fragrant flowers forgot to bloom,
  And slept within their winter tomb. 
  The butterfly, that airy thing,
  That floated on its gilded wing,
  And birds that with their music rare,
  Warbling filled the summer air;
  Dewdrops that gemm’d the morning flower,
  All—­all were pageants of an hour,—­
  The trappings of a summer day,
  That sank with her into decay. 
  But though bleak winter reigns around,—­
  Nor fruit, nor flower adorns the ground,
  We know that Spring will wake again
  All the pageant Summer train. 
  And Winter has its store of mirth,
  Its studies and its social hearth,
  And by nature seems designed
  To elevate the human mind. 
  The seed committed to its trust
  Will not decay, and sink to dust,—­
  It will not with the summer die,
  And dormant through the winter lie;
  But ever fruitful, it will be,
  Even through eternity.

Writing Composition.

Well, here I am, sitting down with inkstand, pen and paper all before me, to write a composition.  And what is composition?  It is thought drawn from the resources of the mind, and portrayed upon the unsullied page.  The mind, that mysterious, unfathomable, undying, immortal part of man; that immaterial essence, which contemplates upon past and future scenes, from which emanates all our thoughts and passions—­and all our happiness or misery.  If we would have our composition correct, the mind must be well cultivated, for that, like a well cultivated garden, will produce fine fruit and beautiful flowers, where no noxous weed should be allowed to intrude, or delicate plant wither and die for want of culture.  The mind should be strengthened and nourished by solid reading, well digested.  The rich volume of nature lies open before us, where all who will read, may improve the intellect.

Do we seek for the beautiful? we see it around us in the gently sloping hill, the verdant vale, the fragrant flowers, and the whispering rill, and the ten thousand varied beauties with which nature is decked.  Or seek we for the sublime, we must contemplate the whirlwind in its fury, the vivid lightning’s flash, and the deep toned thunder, reverberating peal on peal, the mountain torrent, dashing down the stupendous height, and hurrying to embosom itself in the ocean below; or the forest, standing unbroken in its silent majesty, till the thoughts instinctively rise from the sublimities of nature, to nature’s God, the maker and former of them all.