THE TELESCOPE AND THE MICROSCOPE.

ABOUT the time of the invention of the telescope, another instrument was formed which laid open a scene no less wonderful, and rewarded the inquisitive spirit of man with discoveries no less important; it was the microscope. The one led me to see a system in every star; the other leads me to see a world in every atom. The one taught me that this mighty globe, with the whole burden of its countries and its peoples, is but a grain of sand in the field of immensity; the other teaches me that every grain of sand may harbour within it tribes and families. The one told me of the insignificance of the world I tread upon; the other redeems it from all that insignificance, for it tells me that in the leaves of the forest, in the flowers of the garden, in the waters of the rivulet, there are worlds teeming with life, and numberless as are the glories of the firmament.

The one has suggested to me that, beyond and above all that is visible to man, there may be fields of creation which sweep immeasurably along, and carry this impress of the Almighty's hand to the remotest parts of the universe; the other suggests to me that, within and beneath all that minuteness which the unaided eye of man can explore, there may be a region of invisibles; and that, could we draw aside the mysterious curtain which shrouds it from our senses, we might see a

theatre of as many wonders as astronomy has unfolded, a universe within a point so small as to elude the powers of the microscope, but where the wonder-working God finds room for the exercise of His attributes, where He can raise another mechanism of worlds, and fill them with the evidences of His glory.

By the telescope we have discovered that no magnitude, however vast, is beyond the grasp of the Divinity; by the microscope we have also discovered that no minuteness, however shrunk from the notice of the human eye, is beneath His regard. Every addition to the powers of the one instrument extends the limit of His visible dominions; but by every addition to the powers of the other, we see each part of them more crowded than before with the wonders of His unwearying hand. By the one I am told that the Almighty is now at work in regions more distant than geometry has ever measured, and among worlds more numerous than numbers have ever reached; but by the other I am also told that, with a mind to comprehend the whole in the vast compass of its generality, He has also a mind to concentrate a close and a separate attention on each and all of its particulars; and that the same God who sends forth His upholding influence among the orbs and movements of astronomy, can fill the recesses of every single atom with the intimacy of His presence, and travel in all the greatness of His attributes upon every one spot and corner of the universe He has formed.

They, therefore, who say that God will not put forth such a power and such a goodness, in behalf of this

world, as are ascribed to Him in the New Testament, because He has so many other worlds to attend to, think of Him as a man; they confine their views to the informations of the telescope, and forget those of the other instrument. They find room in their minds for His one attribute of a large and general superintendence, and keep out of their remembrance the equally impressive proofs we have for His other attribute of a minute and multiplied attention to all the diversity of operations where it is He that worketh all in all.

And when I think that as one of the instruments of philosophy has heightened every impression of the first of these attributes, so another has no less heightened our impression of the second of them, then I can no longer resist the conclusion that it would be a transgression of sound argument, as well as a daring impiety, to draw a limit around the doings of this unsearchable God. And should a revelation from Heaven tell me of an act of condescension in behalf of some separate world 30 wonderful that angels desire to look into it, and the Eternal Son of Glory had to move from His seat of glory to carry it into accomplishment, all I ask is the evidence of such revelation; for, let it tell me as much as it may of God letting Himself down for the benefit of one small portion of His dominions, this is no more than what I see lying scattered in numberless examples before me, running through the whole line of my recollections, and meeting me in every walk of observation to which I can betake myself. And now that the microscope has unfolded the wonders of

another region, I see strewed around me, with a profusion which baffles my every attempt to comprehend it, the evidence that there is no one portion of the universe of God too minute for His notice, or too humble for the visitations of His care.

CHALMERS.

THE EVE OF QUATRE BRAS.

THERE was a sound of revelry by night,
And Belgium's capital had gathered then
Her Beauty and her Chivalry, and bright
The lamps shone o'er fair women and brave men ;
A thousand hearts beat happily; and when
Music arose with its voluptuous swell,

Soft eyes looked love to eyes which spake again,
And all went merry as a marriage bell;

But hush hark! a deep sound strikes like a rising knell !

Did ye not hear it ?-No; 'twas but the wind,
Or the car rattling o'er the stony street;

On with the dance! let joy be unconfined;

No sleep till morn, when Youth and Pleasure meet
To chase the glowing hours with flying feet.
But hark!-that heavy sound breaks in once more,
As if the clouds its echo would repeat;

And nearer, clearer, deadlier than before!

Arm! arm it is-it is-the cannon's opening roar!

Within a windowed niche of that high hall
Sate Brunswick's fated chieftain; he did hear
That sound the first amidst the festival,

And caught its tone with Death's prophetic ear;
And when they smiled because he deemed it near,
His heart more truly knew that peal too well

Which stretched his father on a bloody bier, And roused the vengeance blood alone could quell: He rushed into the field, and, foremost fighting, fell.

Ah! then and there was hurrying to and fro,
And gathering tears, and tremblings of distress,

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