VII.

THUS from a very early age

My thoughts by slow gradations had been drawn
To human kind, and to the good and ill

Of human life: Nature had led me on.

I HAD passed

The night in dancing, gaiety, and mirth.

retired

The cock had crowed, and now the eastern sky
Was kindling, not unseen, from humble copse

And open field, through which the pathway wound,
And homeward led my steps. Magnificent
The morning rose, in memorable pomp,
Glorious as e'er I had beheld,-in front
The sea lay laughing at a distance; near

The solid mountains shone, bright as the clouds,
Grain-tinctured, drenched in empyrean light;
And in the meadows and the lower grounds
Was all the sweetness of a common dawn—
Dews, vapours, and the melody of birds,
And labourers going forth to till the fields.

To the brim

My heart was full; I made no vows, but vows
Were then made for me; bond unknown to me
Was given, that I should be, else sinning greatly,
A dedicated Spirit. On I walked

In thankful blessedness which yet survives.

-The Prelude. Book IV.

IX.

WHAT want we? Have we not perpetual streams,
Warm woods and sunny hills, and fresh green fields,
And mountains not less green, and flocks and herds,
And thickets full of songsters, and the voice
Of lordly birds, and unexpected sound
Heard now and then from morn to latest eve,

Admonishing the man who walks below
Of solitude and silence in the sky?

These have we, and a thousand nooks of earth
Have also these, but nowhere else is found,
Nowhere (or is it fancy?) can be found ·
The one sensation that is here; 'tis here,
Here as it found its way into my heart
In childhood, here as it abides by day,
By night, here only; or in chosen minds
That take it with them hence, where'er they go.
-'Tis, but I cannot name it—'tis the sense
Of majesty, and beauty, and repose,
A blended holiness of earth and sky,
Something that makes this individual spot,
A termination and a last retreat,

A centre, come from wheresoe'er you will,
A whole without dependence or defect,
Made for itself and happy in itself,

Perfect contentment, Unity entire.

X.

-The Recluse.

(I HAVE)

Sate among the woods

Alone upon some jutting eminence,

At the first gleam of dawn-light, when the Vale,
Yet slumbering, lay in utter solitude.

How shall I seek the origin? where find

Faith in the marvellous things which then I felt ?
Oft in these moments such a holy calm
Would overspread my soul, that bodily eyes
Were utterly forgotten, and what I saw

Appeared like something in myself-a dream,
A prospect in the mind.

-Prelude. Book II.

OF that external scene which round me lay
Little, in this abstraction, did I see;

Remembered less; but I had inward hopes
And swellings of the spirit; was rapt and soothed;
Conversed with promises, had glimmering views
How life pervades the undecaying mind;

How the immortal soul with God-like power
Informs, creates, and thaws the deepest sleep

That time can lay upon her; how on earth,
Man, if he do but live within the light
Of high endeavours, daily spreads abroad
His being, armed with strength that cannot fail.
-The Prelude.

XI.

(I) WOULD speak

Of that interminable building reared

By observation of affinities

In objects where no brotherhood exists
To passive minds. . .

To inorganic natures were transferred

My own enjoyments; or the power of truth
Coming in revelation, did converse

With things that really are; I, at this time,
Saw blessings spread around me like a sea.

Book IV.

Thus, while the days flew by, and years passed on,
From Nature and her overflowing soul

I had received so much, that all my thoughts
Were steeped in feeling; I was only then
Contented, when with bliss ineffable

I felt the sentiments of Being spread

O'er all that moves and all that seemeth still;
O'er all that, lost beyond the reach of thought
And human knowledge, to the human eye
Invisible, yet liveth to the heart.

XII.

-The Prelude. Book II.

I FELT

What independent solaces were mine,
To mitigate the injurious sway of place
Or circumstance.

As if awakened, summoned, roused, constrained,
I looked for universal things; perused

The common countenance of earth and sky:
Earth nowhere unembellished by some trace

Of that first Paradise whence man was driven;
And sky, whose beauty and bounty are expressed
By the proud name she bears—the name of Heaven.
I called on both to teach me what they might;

Or turning the mind in upon herself,

Pored, watched, expected, listened, spread my thoughts, .. Felt

Incumbencies more awful, visitings

Of the Upholder of the tranquil soul,
That tolerates the indignities of Time,
And from the centre of Eternity

All finite motions overruling, lives
In glory immutable.

. . I was mounting now

To such community with highest truth..
To every natural form, rock, fruits, or flower,
Even the loose stones that cover the high-way
I gave a moral life; I saw them feel

Or linked them to some feeling: the great mass
Lay bedded in a quickening soul, and all
That I beheld respired with inward meaning.
Add that whate'er of Terror or of Love
Or Beauty, Nature's daily face put on
From transitory passion, unto this
I was as sensitive as waters are

To the sky's influence in a kindred mood
Of passion was obedient as a lute

That waits upon the touches of the wind.
Unknown, unthought of, yet I was most rich—
I had a world about me-'twas my own;

I made it, for it only lived to me,

And to the God who sees into the heart.

CALL ye these appearances—

Which I beheld of shepherds in my youth,
This sanctity of nature given to man-
A shadow, a delusion, ye who pore
On the dead letter, miss the spirit of things;
Whose truth is not a motion or a shape
Instinct with vital functions, but a block

Or waxen image which yourselves have made,
And ye adore!

-The Prelude. Book VIII.

XIV.

WERE I grossly destitute of all

Those human sentiments that make this earth
So dear, if I should fail with grateful voice
To speak of you, ye mountains, and ye lakes
And sounding cataracts, ye mists and winds
That dwell among the hills where I was born. . .

If in my youth I have been pure of heart,
If, mingling with the world, I am content
With my own modest pleasures, and have lived
With God and Nature communing—

The gift is yours,

Thou hast fed

Ye winds and sounding cataracts! 'tis yours,
Ye mountains! thine, O Nature!
My lofty speculations; and in thee
For this uneasy heart of ours, I find
A never-failing principle of joy
And purest passion.

XV.

-The Prelude. Book II.

WHAT we have loved,

Others will love, and we will teach them how;
Instruct them how the mind of man becomes
A thousand times more beautiful than the earth
On which he dwells, above this frame of things
(Which, 'mid all revolution in the hopes
And fears of men, doth still remain unchanged)
In beauty exalted, as it is itself

Of quality and fabric more divine.

-The Prelude. Book XIV.

THE LUCY POEMS.

WRITTEN IN GERMANY.

I.

STRANGE fits of passion have I known;
And I will dare to tell,

But in the lover's ear alone,

What once to me befell.

When she I loved was strong and gay,
And like a rose in June,

I to her cottage bent my way,
Beneath the evening moon.

Upon the moon I fixed my eye
All over the wide lea;

My horse trudged on, and we drew nigh
Those paths so dear to me.