RT. REV. J. L. SPALDING, D. D.

(HENRY HAMILTON.)

WOHN LANCASTER SPALDING, Bishop of

iant Americans of our generation. He comes by his ability naturally, being one of the Spalding family of Kentucky, his uncle, the late Archbishop, having earned a literary reputation among men of all religious opinions which places him in the same line as the publicist, Orestes A. Brownson.

Bishop Spalding had added to great natural gifts all that could be acquired by the best modern systems of education. He was graduated from the University Louvain, and has been enabled by favorable circumstances to take advantage of every means of higher culture offered in Europe and America. As a prose writer, he has added to his reputation by frequent articles in The NorthAmerican Review, The Forum, and all the important periodicals of the day. And, when any great social question is raised, and opinions needed from representative men, Bishop Spalding's name naturally arises among those to be first called on to defend Christian dogmas and the practical results of Christian dogmas. His “Education and the Higher Life".is gradually becoming an invaluable book among Christians of all opinions. As an incisive writer in Professor Butler's Educational Review remarks, the man that wrote it must have a "large heart and a broad culture." It has the best of Emerson and Ruskin, improved by a trenchant Christian spirit, enfolded by a style which is more musical than that of the one and less full of merely ornamental verbiage than that of the other. John Lancaster Spalding was born at Lebanon, Ky., on June 2, 1840. He was ordained a priest, by special dispensation because of his youth, on December 19, 1863. He was stationed at the Cathedral in Louisville, Ky., for a time. In 1870 he took charge of a church for colored Catholics. He was next placed in New York, at the Church of St. Michael. His reputation grew; his versatility and earnestness, his high literary culture and solid theological knowledge, his oratorical gifts and his "moderness," his uncompromising Americanism and his deep sympathy with other nationalities, marked him as a leader. In 1877 he was named Bishop of Peoria, Ill. He was consecrated by Cardinal McCloskey, in the Cathedral of New York, May 1st of that year. Since that time, Bishop Spalding has been in the van of every great national movement for the benefit of the people of America. He gave all his strength to the Colonization Movement, which has resulted in

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withdrawing many people from crowded cities to the farms of the West. He helped to create the great Catholic University of America, at Washington, and no good cause has lacked the support of his services.

The last Duke of Wellington, who seems, by all accounts, to have been weak-minded and pompous, feared that somebody would call him a sonneteering Duke. He implied that a form of poetry in which the great Dante delighted, was beneath the dignity of a "hereditary legislator" capable of scribbling a few album verses. Bishop Spalding, being neither weak-minded nor pompous, but the contrary, evidently regards the title of poet as only second to that of priest. Under the pen name of "Henry Hamilton," Bishop Spalding has written two books, which have excited much attention from the critics of both Europe and America. "Poetry is, as Aristotle says, the most philosophic of all writing. It is thought transfused with the glow of emotion, and consequently thought made beautiful, attractive, contagious." This, said by Bishop Spalding, in "Education and the Higher Life," is true of the poetry in his books, "America" and "The Poet's Praise." Perhaps Wordsworth has influenced "Henry Hamilton's" poems more than any other poet. It is hard to trace any other influence, for he is so individual, so sincere, so philosophical, at once brilliant and glowing; and it cannot be said that religion has cramped his art, for it has broadened and perfected it,-made it as serene and pure among earthly things as the lady in Milton's "Comus." M. F. E.

LUST AND LOVE.

LUST in a moment turns to hate,

But love is love forevermore; Lust is of loathing the twin mate,

But love, love never yet foreswore.

Of the pure soul true love is born,

And not of tingling nerves of sense; And it is fair as a spring morn

To hearts kept young by innocence.

Sweet as the breath of new-blown flowers,
And fresh as dew-drops hanging there;
It makes of homes angelic bowers,
Holy as shrines where saints repair.

It lies deep in a mother's heart, Tender as the soft skies that bend

Who to all truth lends an impartial ear,

And back of law still sees God's hidden grace
Like a dim milky way when night is clear
And all the stars look on the young moon's face.

THE WILD-FLOWER.

V.

THERE is a little wild-flower grows
Hidden in forest deep,

The fairest flower I know that blows
Where fainting zephyrs sleep:
Pale blue and white,

Dear as the light

Of stars at night,

Its image still I keep.

Its name I never cared to know,
When, roving a glad boy

Through woods with richest light aglow,
It peeped at me with joy

From out its nook,

Close by the brook,

On me a child, 'Mid rovings wild, It sweetly smiled, Fresh as the dawn and fair.

And then my heart goes back again
To the sweet home where I
Was sheltered both in joy and pain,
And love was ever nigh;

And I can hear

The voices clear

Of all the dear

Who in their dark graves lie.

GENEROSITY.

A generous heart asks no reward;
It is, like conscience, clear,

A feast, where all best gifts are stored,
And guests have all good cheer,
And with glad song

In happy throng

The hours prolong,

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With loving friends whose presence makes life dear. -“America."

GOD.

Upraise thy heart and seek the highest thought
Which can reflect itself in human soul!
Where ever-moving wings of time grow weak,
And droop, and fall into eternity;

Where utmost bounds of all-embracing space,
Shrink to a point within the limitless,-
There arms of the Infinite Spirit stretch,
Upbear and hold the Universal All.

Upon His breast all men and angels rest;

And the wide-gleaming seas of light and worlds
Lie, like a glittering drop, within His hand.
Amid the rush of countless spheres unmoved,
In burning heat of myriad suns untouched,
Through cycles myriad-fold of time unchanged,
He looks in nature's vat of life and death-
The seething and world-wide ferment that spawns
All forms of living things and swallows them;
His eye rests on the ever-changing scene;
The many pass, and He alone remains-
Eternal, holy, true, infinite God.

-God and the Soul.

With modest look, Like a pure maiden coy.

And still when balmy breath of spring
Sheds fragrance through the air,
And happy birds in concert sing,
I see my flower just where,

RELIGION.

Religion is akin to poetry,

Both look into the deepest heart of things, And both see God whence all true beauty springs, Whatever say cold, dull philosophy.

-Ibid.