"TO HUMBLENESS OF HEART DESCENDS THIS PRESCIENCE FROM ON HIGH-WORDSWORTH)

494

66 CONFIRM THE SPIRIT GLORYING TO PURsue-(wordsWORTH)

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

daughter of these, the stable child of visible and invisible subtlety, made to
live in both, and shape its steady course between their varying and con-
flicting forces-if her ideal was modelled between the flap of airy pinions
and the long-ranging flow of the serpent water-how could the lines of her
form fail of grace?"-G. MACDONALD, Alec Forbes, i., 267, 268.]

X. WITHIN.

MOST sweet it is with unuplifted eyes

To pace the ground, if path there be or none,
While a fair region round the Traveller lies
Which he forbears again to look upon;
Pleased rather with some soft ideal scene-
The work of Fancy-or some happy tone
Of meditation, slipping in between

The beauty coming and the beauty gone.-
If Thought and Love desert us, from that day
Let us break off all commerce with the Muse:
With Thought and Love companions of our way—
Whate'er the senses take or may refuse-

The Mind's internal heaven shall shed her dews
Of inspiration on the humblest lay.

XI. ART AND DEVOTION.

TAX not the royal Saint* with vain expense,
With ill-matched aims the architect who planned
(Albeit labouring for a scanty band

Of white-robed scholars only) this immense
And glorious work of fine intelligence!

Give all thou canst; high Heaven rejects the lore
Of nicely-calculated less or more.—

So deemed the man who fashioned for the sense

*King Henry VI., founder of King's College, Cambridge.

SOME PATH OF STEEP ASCENT AND LOFTY AIM."-WORDSWORTH.

THE FAITH THAT ELEVATES THE JUST, BEFORE AND WHEN THEY DIE."-WORDSWORTH.

"SOFT IS THE MUSIC THAT WOULD CHARM FOR EVER;-WORDSWORTH)

These lofty pillars, spread that branching roof
Self-poised, and scooped into ten thousand cells
Where light and shade repose-where music dwells

Lingering and wandering on as loth to die,

Like thoughts whose very sweetness yieldeth proof

That they were born for immortality.

[This sonnet was suggested by King's College Chapel, Cambridge; one of the finest specimens extant of the later Gothic architecture.]

"GOD, WHO INSTRUCTS THE BRUTES TO SCENT ALL CHANGES OF THE ELEMENT, WHOSE WISDOM FIXED THE SCALE

OF NATURES, FOR OUR WANTS PROVIDES BY HIGHER, SOMETIMES HUMBLER, GUIDES, WHEN REASON FAILS."-WORDSWORTH.

THE FLOWER OF SWEETEST SMELL IS SHY AND LOWLY."-WORDSWORTH.

"DELICIOUS IS THE LAY THAT SINGS THE HAUNTS OF HAPPY LOVERS-WILLIAM WORDSWORTH)

BRIGHT AS THE GLIMPSES OF ETERNITY-(W. WORDSWORTH)

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

Or is it some more humble lay,
Familiar matter of to-day?
Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain,
That has been, and may be again!

THE PATH THAT LEADS THEM TO THE GROVE, THE LEAFY GROVE THAT COVERS."-WORDSWORTH.

[The reader's attention may here be called to the masterly skill with which the poet has employed the effect of distance, the beauty of his

TO SAINTS ACCORDED IN THEIR MORTAL HOUR."-WORDSWORTH.

"TIS NOT IN BATTLES THAT FROM YOUTH WE TRAIN THE GOVERNOR WHO MUST BE WISE AND GOOD;-(WORDSWORTH)

ON EARTH BELOW, THEY BEST CAN SERVE TRUE GLADNESS

images being much increased by their remoteness. The nightingale sing-
ing in the Arabian desert, and the cuckoo among the far-off Hebrides, call
up a succession of magical pictures in the mind, and to the inner eye of

the reader.]

AND TEMPER WITH THE STERNNESS OF THE BRAIN THOUGHTS WOMANLY, AND MEEK AS WOMANHOOD."-WORDSWORTH.

TO THE CUCKOO.
BLITHE new-comer! I have heard,

I hear thee and rejoice:

O Cuckoo shall I call thee Bird,
Or but a wandering Voice?

While I am lying on the grass,

Thy twofold shout I hear;
From hill to hill it seems to pass,

At once far off and near.

Though babbling only to the vale

Of sunshine and of flowers,
Thou bringest unto me a tale
Of visionary hours.

Thrice welcome, darling of the Spring!

Even yet thou art to me;
No bird, but an invisible Thing,
A Voice, a Mystery.

The same whom in my school-boy days
I listened to; that cry

Which made me look a thousand ways

In bush, and tree, and sky.

To seek thee did I often rove
Through woods and on the green;
And thou wert still a hope, a love;

Still longed for, never seen!

WHO MEET MOST FEELINGLY THE CALLS OF SADNESS."-WORDSWORTH.

"WISDOM DOTH LIVE WITH CHILDREN ROUND HER KNEES: BOOKS, LEISURE, PERFECT FREEDOM, AND THE TALK

"NE'ER CAN THE WAY BE IRKSOME OR FORLORN-(WORDSWORTH)

MAN HOLDS WITH WEEK-DAY MAN IN THE HOURLY WALK OF THE MIND'S BUSINESS."-WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

"To seek thee did I often rove through woods."]

And I can listen to thee yet;
Can lie upon the plain
And listen, till I do beget
That golden time again.

O blessed bird! the earth we pace

Again appears to be

THAT WINDS INTO ITSELF FOR SWEET RETURN."-WORDSWORTH.