Then takes the eggs of fire, and bashful eyes,
And puts them in a countenance that's wise.
Cuts in a lemon of the sharpest wit,
Discretion, as a knife, is us'd for it.

A handful of chaste thoughts, double refin'd,
Six spoonfuls of a noble and gentle mind;
A grain of mirth to give't a little taste,
Then takes it off, for fear the substance waste,
And puts it in a basin of good health,

And with this meat, doth Nature please herself.

A HEART DRESSED.

Life takes a heart, and passions puts therein,
And covers it with a dissembling skin.
Takes anger, which like pepper keen doth bite,
And vinegar, that 's sharp, and made of spight;
Ginger of revenge, grated in, is flung,

To which she adds a lying, cloven tongue.
A lazy flake of mace, which lies down flat,
Some salt of slander, she doth put to that;
Then serves it up with sauce of jealousie
In dishes of most careful industrie.

A TART.

Life took some flour of white complexions made,
Churn'd nourishment, as butter she did add,
And knead it well-then on a board it plac'd,
And roll'd it off,-until a pie was rais'd.
Then she did take some lips, like cherries red,
And the black eyes from a fair virgin's head;

And strawberry teats from the bank of each white breast,
And fingers-ends, like juice from raspes, prest:

These she put in the pie, and did it bake,

Within a heart, which she straight hot did make.
Then drew it out with reason's peel, to send

It up-this meat did Nature much commend.

THE HUNTING OF THE HARE.

Betwixt two ridges of plow'd land sate Wat,

Whose body, press'd to the earth, lay close and squat.
His nose upon his two fore feet do lie,
With his gray eyes he glances obliquely,
His head he always set against the wind;

His tail, when turned, his hair blew up behind,
And made him to get cold! but he being wise,
Doth keep his coat still down, so warm he lies.
Thus rests he all the day, till th' sun hath set,
Then up he riseth, his relief to get.
And walks about until the sun doth rise,
Then coming back in 's former posture lies.
At last poor Wat was found, as he then lay,

By huntsmen, which came with their dogs that way;
Whom seeing, he got up and fast did run,
Hoping, some way, the cruel dogs to shun.
But they, by nature, had so quick a scent,
That by the nose they trac'd what way he went,
And with their deep wide mouths set forth a bay,
Which answer'd was, by echo, in the sky.
Then Wat was struck with terror and with fear,
Seeing each shadow, thought the dogs were there,
And turning out some distance from their cry
To hide himself, his thoughts he did employ.
Under a clod of earth, in sand-pit wide,
Poor Wat sate close, hoping himself to hide.

There long he had not been, but straight in 's ears,
The winding horns and crying dogs he hears.
Then starting up with fear he leapt, and such
Swift speed he made, the grounds he scarce did touch.
Into a great thick wood straightway he gat,
And underneath a broken bough he sate.
When every leaf that with the wind did shake,
Brought him such terror, that his heart did ache.
That place he left, to champagne plains he went,
Winding about, for to deceive their scent.
And while they snuffling were to find his track,
Poor Wat being weary his swift pace did slack.
On his two hinder legs for ease he sat,
His forefeet rubb'd his face from dust and sweat;
Licking his feet, he wip'd his ears so clean,
That none could tell that Wat had hunted been.
But casting round about his fair gray eyes,
The hounds, in full career, he near him spies.
To Wat it was so terrible a sight,

Fear gave him wings and made his body light,
Though he was tired before, by running long,
Yet now his breath he never felt more strong.
Like those that dying are, think health returns,
When 'tis but a faint blast which life outburns.
For spirits seek to guard the heart about,
Striving with death, but death doth quench them out.
The hounds so fast came on and with such cry,
That he no hopes had left, nor hopes could spy.
With that, the Winds did pity poor Wat's case,

And with their breath, the scent blew from that place.
Then every nose was busily employed,

And every nostril was set open wide;

And every hound did seek a several way,

To find the grass or track where the scent lay.

For witty industry is never slack,

'Tis like to witchcraft, and brings lost things back.
But though the wind had tied the scent up close,

A busie dogge thrust in his snuffling nose

And drew it out-with that did foremost run,
The horns blew loud, the rest to follow on.
The great slow hounds their throats did set a base,
The fleet swift hounds, as tenors next in place;
The little beagles did a treble sing,

And through the air their voices round did ring.
Which made such consort as they ran along,
That, had they spoken words, it had been a song.
The horns kept time, the men did shout for joy,
And seem'd most valiant, poor Wat to destroy.
Spurring their horses to a full career,
Swam rivers deep, leap'd ditches, without fear
Endanger'd life and limbs, so fast they ride,
Only to see how patiently Wat died.

At last the dogs so near his heels did get,

That their sharp teeth they in his brush did set.
Then tumbling down he fell, with weeping eyes

Gave up his ghost, and thus poor Wat-he dies :
Men hooping loud, such acclamations made,
As if the devil they imprison'd had, &c. &c.

The Pastime and Recreation of the Queen of the Fairies in Fairy Land,
the centre of the Earth.

Queen Mab and all her company
Dance on a pleasant mole-hill high

To small straw pipes, wherein great plea

sure,

REVIEW OF NEW PUBLICATIONS.

BICKERSTETH'S Practical Guide to the Prophecies, &c. 5th Edition.
BROOKS's Elements of Prophetical Interpretation.

WE highly commend the practice of studying the Sacred Scriptures with a view to a more clear, extended, and solid interpretation of the Prophecies so far as it is possible to ascertain their true and momentous significations; yet as we know that there are but few persons who are really competent to such an undertaking, by reason of those events which should evidence their completion being either wanting, or at a remote distance, or too indefinite to decide upon with much precision; so we are compelled, by the same rationale, to draw the line of distinction between those persons who may be deemed competent interpreters by the weight of evidence which they produce, and those who may not for the want of such evidence. Now it may be certified, as a general rule, that, persons whose writings abound with whimsical and absurd speculations, plausible conceits of their own inventing, and who tell us of a 'pre-millennial personal Advent' of Christ, (or a personal Advent of Christ before the Millennium,) to this renewed Earth;' of 'the Visible Kingdom of God on Earth,' in this Generation;' of the political destinies of this, and of every other kingdom of the world; (like Mr. Thorpe, in his 'Destinies of the British Empire;') together with many other gross absurdities, and that with as much freedom and composure of mind as though they had been the Prophets themselves, or as though they had been literally eyewitnesses of the events of which they make mention, are no safe guides to the interpretation of unfulfilled Prophecy. Of this class, is Mr. Bickersteth (with a variety of other pre-millennial advent writers of the present age); and, therefore, "we do well to take heed," and seriously to caution our readers against the plausibility and speciousness of such sentiments as are contained in his Practical Guide to Prophecies, with reference to their Interpretation and Fulfilment;' warning

1 Practical Guide, chap. xviii. p. 304. ii. Caution 3. p. 33.

GENT. MAG, VOL. VIII.

them, and all Christian men, that they "be not soon shaken in mind" by the introduction of such anti-scriptural novelties, which are most certainly calculated to mislead many of our unwary brethren, especially young students in Divinity, and general readers of Prophecy (to say nothing of those who are constantly sitting under the sound of such opinions), who may not as yet be sufficiently well-grounded in sound biblical knowledge, to ward off with ease such pseudo-prophetical interpretations; for, it must be here noticed, that they are brought forward under an evidently pious, devotional, and practical strain of religious argumentation, which constitutes the principal moral excellency of the work. We are, nevertheless, thoroughly convinced that the new and strange hypothesis of a Pre-millennial personal Advent' of Christ, to come to pass 'in this Generation,' is utterly untenable by Scripture proof, or solid argument, being wholly inconsistent with any chronological data of revealed Truth; and consequently we believe that Mr. Bickersteth is now labouring under a most serious and lamentable delusion of his mind on this particular subject, which we doubly infer from the necessary (though unjustifiable) adoption of a literal2 mode of interpretation, and which his particular system both involves and requires, although such a mode is clearly contrary to the well-known symbolical, figura tive, parabolical, typical, spiritual, and enigmatical style of interpreting the prophetical Scriptures, and is, most certainly, at variance with all former methods of interpretation, which Mr. Bickersteth admits.3 "Do not be offended (says he) with the reproaches to which the professed expectation of the coming of Christ exposes you from all classes of men. It is the Generation Truth, that is, the One which is peculiarly important in this generation, and opposes the whole stream and