'Margarita. Callias. Or one by harsh and jarring fingers touch'd, Alas! alas! my father, To lead thy feeble steps, where the warm sun 'Prove it, And for thy father's love forswear this faith. But die and leave me. Or dissemble; any thing • Margarita. 'Who disown their Lord Callias. On earth, will he disown in heaven. Hard heart! Credulous of all but thy fond father's sorrows, 'I dare not disbelieve • Whence learnt thou this? Tell me, my child; for sorrow's weariness Nor rave. Come, sit we down on this coarse straw, Thy only couch-thine, that wert wont to lie On the soft plumage of the swan, that shamed not 'Dost thou not remember Withstood his entrance to the Christian church, Callias. Callias. To cruel death. Serene the old man walk'd The murmur of that voice remote, and touch'd Lay wrapt in wonder, how that meek old man Insatiate of thy father's misery, 'Away! Wouldst have the torturers wring the few chill drops Margarita. I'd have thee with me in the changeless heavens, • Margarita. Callias. What means that music? Oh, I used to love 'I hear The maids; beneath the twilight they are thronging 'Thou canst not go. Margarita. Callias. • Thou must breathe here the damp and stifling air. They call us hence.-Ah me, Cling not round me thus. We have not room to give the Evening Song of the Maidens,' which is one of the most elegant and pleasing pieces in the volume. The worst thing in it is, the funeral anthem,' or rather ballad, beginning, Brother thou art gone before us, and thy saintly soul is flown.' This poem confirms us in the suspicion that Mr. Milman's ear is defective: the rhythm is execrable, and there is nothing to atone for it. The other lyrical pieces are of unequal merit, but not one of them will bear comparison with the hymn of Miriam in the Fall of Jerusalem. We shall, in justice to Mr. Milman, however, insert the following hymn, which possesses considerable beauty. For thou didst die for me, oh Son of God! Alone, on God's right hand, Before the ages were, the Eternal, eldest born. * Vide Eclectic Review, N. S. Vol. XIV. p. 91. Thou, that wert wont to dwell In peace, tongue cannot tell, Nor heart conceive the bliss of thy celestial state. They dragg'd thee to the Roman's solemn hall, Thy doom of death from human lips to wait; - In final ruin hurled, With all mankind to hear their everlasting fate. Thou wert alone in that fierce multitude, The Seraphim had heard, And adamantine arms from all the heavens broke out. They bound thy temples with the twisted thorn, Was the unapproached light, The sandal of whose foot the rapid hurricane. They smote thy cheek with many a ruthless palm, The draught of bitterest gall was all the balm. They gave, t'enhance thy unslaked, burning thirst: Did pain and anguish cease, And the long buried dead their bonds of slumber burst. **Low bowed thy head convulsed, and, droop'd in death, : 1 Slow struggled from thy breast the parting breath, That head whose veil-less blaze Fill'd angels with amaze When at that voice sprang forth the rolling suns on high. • And thou wert laid within the narrow tonib, Thy clay-cold limbs with shrouding grave-clothes bound, The sealed stone confirm'd thy mortal doom; Lone watchmen walk'd thy desert burial ground, Nor th immeasureable plain le VOL. XVII. N. S. ! T 'For us, for us thou didst endure the pain, And thy meek spirit bow'd itself to shame, By saving worlds from sin, Nor aught of glory add to thy all-glorious name." Art. IV. An Appeal to the Public in Defence of the Spitalfields Act : with Remarks on the Causes which have led to the Miseries and moral Deterioration of the Poor. By William Hale. Svo, pp. 46. London. 1822. THERE is something very captivating in those general pro positions which seem to offer, in familiar language, a rule for deciding at once upon intricate questions. That things will find their level, that demand and supply will regulate each other, that production and exchange will, if left to themselves, fall into the most profitable channels, short, pithy axioms like these gain an easy assent even from many individuals who but imperfectly understand their bearings. And when persons think they have made good thus far their progress in the most bothering of all sciences, and that they stand upon undisputed ground, if you venture to disturb their general reasonings by considerations in the humble form of exceptions to a rule, or qualifying positions drawn from existing circumstances, you are in some danger of being set down as a mere man of detail, unacquainted with abstract principles, or a dull reasoner. The pamphlet which has occasioned this prompt and most efficient reply, is built on one of these specious half-truths; for general truths, which, in order to be universally valid, require to be qualified by other general truths, are of this description. Labour,' says the Writer alluded to, like every other marketable commodity, will find its value.' This is either a truism, or it is an error. If by value is meant market price, then, that Labour will, if left to itself, find its market price, may intend two distinct positions: either that wages in the same branch of production, have a tendency to find their level, that is, to become equalized, or, that Labour will find its fair market price, by the mere operation of competition. The first of these positions is true; the second, as we shall shew, is not true. For, if by value be meant that which must ultimately regulate price-the intrinsic value or cost, Labour does not admit of being compared in this respect to any other marketable commodity. Wages, or the price of Labour, must be admitted to depend on the proportion between population and employment. In this |