ST.

A merry monarch two years and four months old.

If we could have stood by when the world was a-making,--could have
sniffed the escaping gases, as they volatilized through the air,--could
have seen and heard the swash of the waves, when the whole world was, so
to speak, in hot water,--could have watched the fiery tumult gradually
soothing itself into shapely, stately palms and ferns, cold-blooded
Pterodactyles, and gigantic, but gentle Megatheriums, till it was
refined, at length, into sunshine and lilies and Robin Redbreasts,--we
fancy we should have been intensely interested. But a human soul is a
more mysterious thing than this round world. Its principles firmer than
the hills, its passions more tumultuous than the sea, its purity
resplendent as the light, its power too swift and subtile for human
analysis,--what wonder in heaven above or earth beneath can rival this
mystic, mighty mechanism? Yet it is formed almost under our eyes. The
voice of God, "Let there be light," we do not hear; the stir of matter
thrilled into mind we do not see; but the after-march goes on before our
gaze. We have only to look, and, lo! the mountains are slowly rising,
the valleys scoop their levels, the sea heaves against its barriers, and
the chaotic soul evolves itself from its nebulous, quivering light, from
its plastic softness, into a world of repose, of use, of symmetry, and
stability. This mysterious soul, when it first passed within our vision,
was only not hidden within its mass of fleshly life, a seed of
spirituality deep-sunk in a pulp of earthliness. Passing away from us in
ripened perfection, we behold a being but little lower than the angels,
heir of God and joint heir with Christ, crowned with glory and honor and
immortality.

Come up, then, Jamie, my King, into the presence of the great
congregation! There are poets here, and philosophers, wise men of the
East who can speak of trees, from the cedar-tree that is in Lebanon,
even unto the hyssop that springeth out of the wall: also of beasts, and
of fowl, and of creeping things, and of fishes. But fear them not,
little Jamie! you are of more value, even to science, than many fishes.
Wise as these Magi are, yesterday they were such as you, and such they
must become again or ever they shall enter the kingdom of heaven. Come
up, little Jamie, into the hall of audience! Blue eyes and broad brow,
sunny curls, red lips, and dainty, sharp teeth, stout little arm, strong
lit