UNKNOWN he came. He went a Mystery- Her freight half-given to the world. To die He longed, nor feared to meet the great "I AM.” Fret not. God's mystery is solved to him. He quarried Truth all rough-hewn from the earth, And chiselled it into a perfect gem— A rounded Absolute. Twain at a birth — Science with a celestial halo crowned, And Heavenly Truth - God's Works by His Word illumed— These twain he viewed in holiest concord bound. Reason outsoared itself. His mind consumed By its volcanic fire, and frantic driven, He dreamed himself in hell and woke in heaven. EDINBURGH, December, 1856. MEMORIALS OF THE DEATH AND CHARACTER OF HUGH MILLER, WITH AN ACCOUNT OF HIS FUNERAL OBSEQUIES. NEAR the end of last autumn the American publishers of Hugh Miller's works received from him, through his Edinburgh publishers, the offer of a new work from his pen. The offer was accepted and a contract was at once closed. Soon the ad vance sheets began to come; and as successive portions were received and perused, it became more and more evident that the work was destined not only to extend his fame, but to establish for him new and special claims to the admiration and gratitude of mankind. In the midst of these anticipations, and ere more than half the sheets had been received, the publishers and the public here were startled by the news that Mr. Miller had come to a violent death. The paragraph conveying the intelligence was such as to leave the mind in a state of painful suspense. But the next steamer from Europe brought full details of the lamentable event. It appeared that in a momentary fit of mental aberration he had died by his own hand, on the night of December 23d, 1856. The cause was over much brain-work. He had been long and incessantly engaged in preparing the present work for the press, when, just as he had given the last touches to the eloquent, the immortal record, reason abandoned her throne, and in the brief interregnum, that great light of science was quenched forever. The event caused universal lamentation throughout the British Isles. It was treated as a public calamity. The British press, from the London Times to the remotest provincial newspaper, gave expression to the general sorrow in strains of unwonted eloquence; and in so doing recounted his great services to the cause of science, and paid homage to his genius. Some of the articles which the event thus called forth have seemed to the American publishers worthy of preservation, from the authentic facts which they embody, the judgments which they express, and the literary excellence by which they are marked. They have therefore determined to print them in connection with this work as permanent Memorials of its distinguished and lamented author. The first piece appeared in the Edinburgh Witness of December 27th, 1856, -the paper of which Mr. Miller had been the editor from its establishment in 1840. It presents an authentic account of the circumstances attending his death, and is understood to be from the pen of the REV. WILLIAM HANNA, L.L. D., the son-in-law and biographer of Dr. Chalmers, and sometime editor of the North British Review. In the belief that nothing touching the character and memory of such a man can be regarded with other than the deepest interest, the friends of Mr. Hugh Miller have thought it due at once to his great name and to the cause of truth, to lay fully before the public a statement of the most mournful circumstances under which he has departed from this life. For some months past his overtasked intellect had given evidence of disorder. He became the prey of false or exaggerated alarms. He fancied-if, indeed, it was a fancy that occasionally, and for brief intervals, his faculties quite failed him,—that his mind broke down. He was engaged at this time with a treatise on the "Testimony of the Rocks," upon which he was putting out all his strength,—working at his topmost pitch of intensity. That volume will in a few weeks be in the hands of many of our readers; and while they peruse it with the saddened impression that his intellect and genius poured out their latest treasures in its composition, they will search through it in vain for the slightest evidence of feebleness or decaying power. Rather let us anticipate the general verdict that will be pronounced upon it, and speak of it as one of the ablest of all his writings. But he wrought at it too eagerly. Hours after midnight the light was seen |