within sound of the murmur of those sea waves that he had loved so well. A simple marble cross marks his grave. Such was the kindly, simple, uneventful life, such was the bright, happy death of Henry Francis Lyte. His character is to be gathered from his life. His was a genial, refined, sensitive nature. He courted retirement, he shrank from the vulgar turmoil of political and religious strifes, he contented himself with an earnest and effectual attempt to do his duty, desiring to obtain the approbation of his heavenly Master rather than the vain and fleeting plaudits of men. He reaped the advantage of such a character in the enjoyment of a Christian life, and in the attainment of a Christian death. He reaped the disadvantage, as far as this world is concerned, in the disregard of his claims to preferment by those in authority. He lived and died a poor parish priest, while every pulpit Boanerges, political intriguer, platform orator, and violent partisan were promoted to positions of dignity and emolument. It is possible that if Canning, who had heard him preach with delight at Saltram Chapel, in 1827, on the text, "Without GOD in the world," had survived, he might have received some preferment from the Crown, but in 1827 that brilliant statesman expired after only a few months' tenure of the Premiership. To say that none of those who occupy positions of dignity in the Anglican Church are pious, able, learned, and zealous men would be discourteous as well as untrue, but it is assuredly the fact that such men obtain their promotion not in virtue of their merits, but in spite of them. Note the clergy who during the present century have affected in any way the spirit of the age, who have originated new schools of thought, be these schools correct or erroneous in their tenets, who have won ardent disciples, and influenced greatly the souls of men. Have they been dignitaries of the Church? Are the names of Martyn and Simeon, of Neale and Pusey, of Maurice and Robertson, of Kingsley and Brooke, of Lyte and Keble, to be found on the roll of our Anglican Bishops or Deans? Was any of them even selected to be that Bishop's eye, sometimes a very sleepy one, known as an Archdeacon? Even to the imposing and awful dignity of a Rural Dean not one of them was ever nominated. They were all systematically neglected by those in authority, but they might have consoled themselves with the assurance that their influence was felt throughout the country, and their characters were esteemed and loved by those who knew them best. Lyte in many ways resembled Keble. Both were honoured but simple country pastors, both loved books and retired seclusion, both were zealous Christian men, both were scholars, both were sacred poets. Keble's mind, however, from his early training possessed a greater tinge of Anglicanism than Lyte's, his poetical style was more elaborate and involved, his chain of reasoning and his mode of thought were more subtle. No poems in the Christian Year will ever be as popular with the general public as some of the hymns of Lyte have become. No songs of Lyte will ever have such an attraction for the meditative cultivated Churchman as some of the more finished poems of Keble possess. If we were to compare the writings of these two gifted Christian poets in a few words we should say that those of Keble show a more elaborate culture, and those of Lyte a greater poetical fervour. Like Burns in his "Cotter's Saturday Night," Lyte often almost spoiled a beautiful hymn by some unnecessary allusion, or some unnecessary phrase. In the most popular of all his hymns, "Abide with me," there are three verses of much inferior beauty to the rest of the hymn, in which verses an almost dictatorial manner is assumed towards the LORD, Who is as it were advised concerning the manner in which He should appear to His faithful servant. These words are omitted in the version of the hymn given in Hymns Ancient and Modern. Had he possessed a greater critical discernment, he would have often applied the pruning-knife to cut down the redundancies of expressions in which some of his poems abound. On the other hand, had he been more of a cold critic he would probably have been less of an ardent poet. We must take him then as he was, and recognise in him, with reverence and love, a spirit of whom the Anglican branch of the Church Catholic may justly be proud. To Hymns Ancient and Modern Lyte contributes six hymns, which are numbered in the latest edition 27, 284, 218, 298, 240, and 245. All these hymns are well known. They are to be found in nearly all hymnals, and are continually sung in the public services of the Church. We would wish to select some passage from his writings that might be less well known to the general public. There are his "Thoughts in Weakness," divided into three parts, "Encouragement,' sion," and "Action." There is his poem entitled "The Dying Christian to his Soul," a poem that will favourably compare with that of Pope on the same subject. From this, as from any of his other poems, passages of much beauty might be culled. We prefer to cite, as a specimen of his style, a poem called "Declining Days," because the wishes ""Submis that he expresses in it may be considered to have been fulfilled in his own saintly life and hallowed writings. That still small voice forbids me to despond, 'Tis not then earth's delights From which my spirit feels so loath to part, No, 'tis the thought that I, My lamp so low, my sun so nearly set, Have lived so useless, so unmiss'd should die, I would not be the wave That swells and ripples up to yonder shore, That drives impulsive on, the wild wind's slave, I would not be the breeze That murmurs by me in its viewless play; No, not like wave or wind, Be my career across the earthly scene, To come and go and leave no trace behind I want not vulgar fame, I ask not to survive on brass or stone, Hearts may not kindle when they hear my name, But might I leave behind Some blessing for my fellows, some fair trust When I was in the dust: Within my narrow bed Might I not wholly mute or useless be, Might my poor lips but give head Some simple strain, some spirit-moving lay Might verse of mine inspire One virtuous aim, one high resolve impart, Death would be sweeter then, More calm my slumber, 'neath the silent sod Why do we ever lose As judgment ripens our diviner powers? Why do we only learn our gifts to use O Thou Whose touch can lend Life to the dead, Thy quickening grace supply, [By an error in our January number, Great Berkhampstead is described as the birthplace of Bishop Ken. It should have been Little Berkhampstead, a village near Hertford.] 224 ROUMANIA AND GREECE. THE inhabitants of Moldavia and Wallachia, now known as Roumania, retained till the beginning of the eighteenth century, the privilege of electing their own hospodars or chiefs, and on being then deprived of it by their suzerain of Constantinople, the office was sold by the Sultans to the highest bidder, who repaid himself by extortionate taxation, and was generally a Greek. As soon as the hospodar had amassed a fortune, some pretext was found for deposing him and confiscating his wealth; and during eighty years from the middle of the last century to the year 1807, sixty of these chiefs had been deposed, and twenty-five of them suffered death by order of the Divan. "By treaty," wrote an English officer in 1827, "these provinces are only tributary to the Porte, in effect they have been abjectly enslaved and ruinously plundered. Thus the population has dwindled to 900,000, while under any tolerable government they might be 15,000,000." In 1792, when the Empress Catherine of Russia concluded peace with Turkey, one of the articles gave her a certain protectorate over these provinces, and the Christian subjects of the Porte; and another stipulated that the hospodars of Wallachia and Moldavia should only be elected and deposed in concert with Russia. In 1806 Napoleon meditating the conquest of Prussia, tried to prevent the Czar from coming to her aid, by stirring up a war between Russia and Turkey. At his request the Sultan Selim III. deposed the two hospodars, (one of whom, Prince Ipsilanti, was beheaded at Constantinople, though eighty-five years of age, while his son escaped to Russia,) and the Turks also seized several Russian merchant vessels in the Black Sea, yet at that very moment the French held the Turkish provinces, as they were then, of Albania and Dalmatia, and one of the terms required by the Czar in a peace he was negotiating with France, was the restoration of these provinces to Turkey. A Turkish army was also sent to lay waste Moldavia and Wallachia, on which a Russian force was ordered to occupy them, and Selim III. at once declared war with Russia. The Servians joined the Russians who defeated the Turks in several engagements, and before the end of the year they possessed the whole north of the Danube, and laid siege to Belgrade, which was garrisoned by Turks. Nothing could be more inopportune than this campaign to Russia, as it employed her best |