I own I like not Johnson’s turgid style,
  That gives an inch the importance of a mile;
  Casts of manure a wagon-load around
  To raise a simple daisy from the ground;
  Uplifts the club of Hercules—­for what?—­
  To crush a butterfly or brain a gnat;
  Creates a whirlwind from the earth to draw
  A goose’s feather or exalt a straw;
  Sets wheels on wheels in motion—­such a clatter! 
  To force up one poor nipperkin of water;
  Bids ocean labour with tremendous roar,
  To heave a cockle-shell upon the shore. 
  Alike in every theme his pompous art,
  Heaven’s awful thunder, or a rumbling cart!

New Monthly Magazine.

* * * * *

GAS LIGHTS.

We have now been so long accustomed to this new light in the streets, that, like all other terrene goods, we have almost become insensible to its blessings.  Yet let him who desires to know what he owes to chemistry and “Old Murdoch,” turn into any of the streets still lighted with oil, and then come back to the nocturnal day of the Strand or Pall Mall.  The parish oil lamps were like light-houses on the ocean; guides, not lights; the gas has become a perpetual full moon; and it may assuredly be pronounced one of the most splendid and valuable applications of chemistry.  Why has not old Murdoch his statue?  He deserves it even better than his master; for the master was well paid in solid pudding.  In other days, that statue would have equalled the Colossus at Rhodes, and the demi-philosopher would have breathed flame like the Chimera; in the fabulous ages before that, he would have come down to us a god, or a demi-god, the rival of Prometheus, Hercules, and Atlas.  Why not cast him in Achillean brass, the rival of the great hero of gunpowder and Waterloo, and make him breathe gas like the Dragon of Wantley, to illuminate the triumphal arch.  Ingrata Patria!

The new light! yes, much has been heard of its power and influence; but what has the new light of all the preachers done for the morality and order of London, compared to what has been effected by this new light.  Old Murdoch alone, has suppressed more vice than the Suppression Society; and has been a greater police officer into the bargain than old Colquhoun and Sir Richard Birnie united.  It is not only that men are afraid to be wicked when light is looking at them, but they are ashamed also; the reformation is applied to the right place.  Where does vice resort?  Where it can hide; in darkness, says the preacher, because its deeds are deeds of darkness.  Seek it in Pudding-lane, and Dyot-street, and the abysses of Westminster.  Why was not this new light preached to them long ago:  twenty bushels of it would have been of more value than as many chaldrons of sermons, and taking even the explosions of the inspector into the bargain.  But it is well, that this is at length to be compulsory; since it is never too