By minding us of what thou art

The type till lighter thoughts depart,

And on divinest themes the heart

In quiet broods.

Oh! sad it is that aught so fair
Should e'er be made to minister

To deeds unholy;

Which e'en our fallen nature shame

Deeds which do ask a harsher name

Than that of folly.

THE OLIVE.

OLEA.

“And he stayed yet other seven days: and again he sent forth the dove out of the ark.

"And the dove came in to him in the evening; and, lo, in her mouth was an olive leaf plucked off: so Noah knew that the waters were abated from off the earth."

the

SUCH is our first introduction to the olive; which seems to be on earth what the bow is in the sky, harbinger and the token of peace.

Whether from the event which the sacred text records is not certain, but its pacific character has been acknowledged in all times, and among all nations; it is, however, more than probable that it owes its celebrity in this point of view to traditionary lore, for many ancient customs and notions among the heathen have so close an affinity to transactions related in the Bible, that, however changed and blended with fable, it is almost beyond conjecture that they were originally derived from that sacred source.

In this character, as the symbol of peace, it is noticed by innumerable authors, ancient and modern.

"Now suppliants from Laurentum sent demand

A truce, with olive branches in their hand."

So sings Virgil. It is noticed by a very early author of our own country, one of the morning stars of our poetical hemisphere, R. Gloucester:

"His right hand did the peaceful olive wield."

And Shakspeare in many passages; a few of which must suffice. The following is from Antony and Cleopatra :

"The time of universal peace is near:

Prove this a prosperous day, the three-nooked world

Shall bear the olive freely."

In Timon of Athens

"Bring me into your city,

And I will use the olive with my sword:

Make war breed peace, make peace stint war."

And in the Twelfth Night, Viola, in declaring her mission to Olivia, says,

"I bring no overture of war, no taxation of homage; I hold the olive in my hand my words are as full of peace as matter."

Milton associates it with holier recollections, and brings us back to the Flood.

"Forthwith from out the ark a raven flies,

And after him, the surer messenger,

A dove, sent forth once and again to spy

Green tree or ground whereon his foot may light:

The second time returning in his bill

An olive-leaf he brings, pacific sign."

He introduces it again, most beautifully, in his Ode on the Nativity :

fies

"But he her fears to cease,

Sent down the meek-eyed Peace,

She, crown'd with olive-green, came softly gliding

Down through the turning sphere,

His ready harbinger

With turtle wing the amorous clouds dividing."

Pope, in the "Messiah," thus appropriately personi

peace:

"All crimes shall cease, and ancient frauds shall fail,

Returning Justice lift aloft her scale;

Peace o'er the world her olive wand extend,

And white-rob'd Innocence from heaven descend."

And again with similar allusions in his "Windsor Forest." In Prior's "Solomon," are the following beautifully expressive lines:

"The winds fall silent, and the waves decrease,

The dove brings quiet, and the olive peace."

But nowhere is the olive more touchingly alluded to than in these stanzas by a living author, whose lyre, we could wish, were oftener tuned to such strains :

:

We must now, however, leave the poetical notices of this tree, of which, perhaps, we have been too lavish, and give a sketch of its history in prose. The olive, as we have already stated, was held in the highest