172 THE JOURNEYMAN. 



'' There reigned a king in ancient time, 



The wisest ever swayed a sceptre ; 

 His deep sly saws, and songs sublime, 



Shine bright on the fair page o' Scripture. 

 And he, the wyliest sure o' men, 



For bliss tried ilka scheme o' living, 

 But he found at length his labours vain, 



And life a scene o' crime and grieving.' 



Light, however, breaks through. In a tone of earnest- 

 ness which contrasts strongly with his references to 

 religion in his earlier productions, prose or verse, he 

 exclaims 



' Hark ! wherefore bursts that rapturous swell ? 



Why are the night's dark shadows riven ? 

 " A Saviour sought the depths o' hell, 



That such as thee might rise to heaven." 



' My cares, my hopes, my wishes climb 



To reach that Friend who reigns above me ; 

 Truth's best perfection dwells in Him, 

 And He has sworn to aid and love me.' 



The composition of these stanzas is connected with a 

 revolution which has been silently transacting itself in 

 the mind and character of Hugh Miller, and which 

 will come under our notice as we review his corre- 

 spondence of this period with John Swanson. 



We have seen that, from his childhood, he had dis- 

 played a fine natural disposition ; that he was fearless, 

 unselfish, affectionate. Of the baser passions, avarice 

 and cruelty, he never exhibited a trace ; and of that 

 less ignoble passion which has frequently co-existed 

 with high and generous attributes of character, but 

 which has frequently also, as in Mirabeau, Burns, and 

 Byron, made wreck of the palaces of the soul, he was 

 singularly destitute. The extravagances of his boyhood, 

 the pranks of a wild, free, gipsying life, reaching 

 their climax of wickedness in robbery of an orchard 

 and rebellion against an uncle, would not be regarded 



