"It is not good to be alone-- Not fit for any living one-- There's nothing single save the sun. "Beasts, fishes, birds--yea, atoms mate, Acknowledging an ordered fate: What dost thou in a single state?" "O, Soul!" I bitterly replied, For I was full of haughty pride, "Would in my birth that I had died! "I feel what thou hast said is truth; But I am past the bloom of youth, And Beauty's eye has lost its ruth. "I languish for some gentle heart To throb with mine, devoid of art, Perfect and pure in every part-- "Some innocent heart whose pulse's tone Should beat in echo of mine own, Where I might reign and reign alone." "All this, and more, thy love might win," My spirit urged, "poor Child of Sin, That sickenest in this rude world's din. "Love is a way-side plant: go forth And pluck--love has no thorns for worth-- The blossom from its place of birth. "Perchance, on thee may Beauty's queen, And Fortune's, look, with smiling mien-- With eyes, whose lids hold love between." "Spirit, I am of little worth," Said I--"an erring child of earth: Yet fain would own a happy hearth. "Mere beauty, though it drowns my soul With sunshine, may not be my goal; And love despises gold's control. "Better the riches of the mind-- A spirit toward the spheres inclined-- A heart that veers not with the wind. "She might be beautiful, and gold Might clasp her in its ruddy fold-- Have lands and tenements to hold: "She might be poor--it were the same If lofty, or of lowly name, If famous, or unknown to fame: "But she must feel the brotherhood I feel for man--the love of good;-- Life is at best an interlude, "And we must act our parts so here, That, when we reach a loftier sphere, Our memories shall not shed a tear. "With such a one, if fair or brown-- Gracing a cottage, or a throne-- Soul, I could live and love unknown! "Yes, gazing upward in her eye, Scan what was passing in its sky, And swoon, and dream, and, dreaming, die." "There is none such," my spirit sighed. "Seek glory: woo her for thy bride. And perish, and be deified!" "Why, Soul," I said, "the thought of fame, Of winning an exalted name, Might woo me, but my heart would blame "The coldness that compelled me forth. No: somewhere on this lower earth The angel that I seek has birth. "If not, I will so worship here Her type, that I shall joy, not _fear_-- To meet her in her holier sphere." MARY WARNER. OR THE HEAD AND THE HEART. BY MRS. E. L. B. COWDERY. "What a happy girl is Mary Warner," said an elderly lady, as a bright laughing girl turned into another room. "And so exceedingly lively and cheerful, for one of her years," rejoined another. "Years! How old is she?"