Have wakened up in peaceful families strife,
Have urged the husband on to hate the wife,

And the child bade against its parents rise.
The thief I prompted to his villany;
The adult'rous flame was kindled hot by me;
I turned the glances of malignant eyes;
As sower, sowed in families mistrust;
And Friendship cankered I with Envy's rust;
The murderer I prompted to his deed

I roused the insatiable money greed

Mens' eyes I dazzled with the blink of gold,
And taught that Heaven could be bought and sold;
And faith I staggered, planting weeds of doubt.
The sland'rous lie by me was deftly wrought;
Pure minds I sullied with polluting thought,
Working like leaven.'

Here fiercely he laughed out,

A hideous burst of wild discordant laughter

Shaking the wall, and quivering in each rafter,

And flung in echoes all along the roof.

The old confessor starting, terrified,

Said: In the sacred Name of Him who died,
Profane one! outrage not the holy rite!'

'Pardon me, father, pray; my breast I smite.

I have convulsions, but at thy reproof
The fit is passed. And now let me proceed.'
Then he unfolded many a godless deed,

And muttered on an hour, and was not done,
So the confessor stopped him, saying, 'Son,
Thou couldst not crowd these many actions in
A hundred years of unremitted sin.'
'A hundred times ten hundred, rather say,
Labouring at crime, unflagging, night and day,
Through all the ages from the hour I fell.'
Shuddered the priest and made the holy sign:
'In the Name of God, and of His Son divine,
Who art thou? answer.'

'A spirit lost of hell.'

The priest leaped up with an affrighted cry :
'Angels of Jesus, stand me succouring by.'
Then he relapsed, and laid aside his dread :
'Why hast thou sought this sacrament?' he said;
'Wherefore these horrors to my ear reveal?'

'I saw thee vested with a wondrous might,
To make the sons of darkness heirs of light,
Blackest of souls become as drifted snow;
And, to the sentence of the priest below

The Judge of all things setteth to His seal.

Then thought I: Oh! if shattered were my chain,

I might the gates of Paradise regain.

Say, is there any gleam of hope for me?'

'I know the mercy of the Crucified Is very lofty, deep, exceeding wide; Then if thy sorrow only be sincere,

In the Lord's name, I bid thee have no fear; The blood of Christ will reach as far as thee.'

Father, why question thou my strong desire

To fly the abysses of eternal fire,

And from keen misery obtain release,

And refuge in the home of endless peace?
There comes a thrill on me, as now I grope,
With feeble glimmer for a thread of hope.'

'Son, ere I utter the absolving word, Of thy contrition I must be assured; Therefore on thee a penance I impose.' 'Give me ten thousand of acutest woes,

And from my purpose, mark you, if I swerve,

Bid me be bound upon a flaming wheel,

Set with the sharpest blades of tempered steel,

Bid it revolve in fire at whirlwind speed,

Parch me, and lacerate, and make me bleed

And suffer with the finest mortal nerve. Turn into flaming drops my coursing tears, Bid me thus writhe through fifty thousand years, And I will hug the woe and not repine.'

'Son,' said the pastor, 'no such test be thine. As thou didst fall through thy unbounded pride, Bow to the figure of the Crucified

But once, and utter with a broken sigh,— "I am not worthy to look up to heaven; Oh, be free pardon to the rebel given."

'What?' said the Devil, with an angry cry, 'Bow to a God so lost to sense of shame, As to take human nature and man's name ! Bow to a God who could Himself demean To suck the breast, and sweep the kitchen clean, And saw up chips for Joseph ? One who died. Upon a gallows with a mangled side!

Ha! when another twist of Fortune's wheel Would have sent me up, and cast Him below! Ha! To the Son of Mary shall I bow?'

And with a curse, he turned upon his heel.

THE BUILDING OF S. SOPHIA.

JUSTINIAN, Emperor and Augustus, bent
On the imperial city's due embellishment,
Whilst musing, sudden started up, and cried:
'There is no worthy minster edified
Unto the Ruler of earth, sea and skies,

The One eternal, and the only wise.

Solomon the Great a temple built of old
To the Omnipotent, at cost untold.

Great was his power, but mine must his surpass

As ruddy gold excels the yellow brass.

I too a costly church will dedicate,

To preach God's Majesty and tell my state.'

Then called the Emperor an artist skilled,
With sense of beauty and proportions filled,
And said, 'In the name of Wisdom, build.