96. PART II.—XXXVI.
96. PART II.—XXXVI.
Composed upon Westminster Bridge, September 3, 1802.
Earth has not anything to show more fair:Dull would be he of soul who could pass byA sight so touching in its majesty:This City now doth, like a garment, wearThe beauty of the morning; silent, bare,Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lieOpen unto the fields, and to the sky;All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.Never did sun more beautifully steepIn his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!The river glideth at his own sweet will:Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;And all that mighty heart is lying still!
Earth has not anything to show more fair:Dull would be he of soul who could pass byA sight so touching in its majesty:This City now doth, like a garment, wearThe beauty of the morning; silent, bare,Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lieOpen unto the fields, and to the sky;All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.Never did sun more beautifully steepIn his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!The river glideth at his own sweet will:Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;And all that mighty heart is lying still!
97.To aHighland Girl, at Inversneyde, upon Loch Lomond.
Sweet Highland Girl, a very showerOf beauty is thy earthly dower!Twice seven consenting years have shedTheir utmost bounty on thy head:And these gray rocks; that household lawn;Those trees, a veil just half withdrawn;This fall of water that doth makeA murmur near the silent lake;This little bay; a quiet roadThat holds in shelter thy Abode—In truth together do ye seemLike something fashioned in a dream;Such Forms as from their covert peepWhen earthly cares are laid asleep!But, O fair Creature! in the lightOf common day, so heavenly bright,I bless Thee, Vision as thou art,I bless thee with a human heart;God shield thee to thy latest years!Thee, neither know I, nor thy peers;And yet my eyes are filled with tears.With earnest feeling I shall prayFor thee when I am far away:For never saw I mien, or face,In which more plainly I could traceBenignity and home-bred senseRipening in perfect innocence.Here scattered, like a random seed,Remote from men, Thou dost not needThe embarrassed look of shy distress,And maidenly shamefacedness:Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clearThe freedom of a Mountaineer:A face with gladness overspread!Soft smiles, by human kindness bred!And seemliness complete, that swaysThy courtesies, about thee plays;With no restraint, but such as springsFrom quick and eager visitingsOf thoughts that lie beyond the reachOf thy few words of English speech:A bondage sweetly brooked, a strifeThat gives thy gestures grace and life!So have I, not unmoved in mind,Seen birds of tempest-loving kind—Thus beating up against the wind.What hand but would a garland cullFor thee who art so beautiful.O happy pleasure! here to dwellBeside thee in some heathy dell;Adopt your homely ways, and dress,A Shepherd, thou a Shepherdess!But I could frame a wish for theeMore like a grave reality:Thou art to me but as a waveOf the wild sea; and I would haveSome claim upon thee, if I could,Though but of common neighbourhood.What joy to hear thee, and to see!Thy elder Brother I would be,Thy Father—anything to thee!Now thanks to Heaven! that of its graceHath led me to this lonely place.Joy have I had; and going henceI bear away my recompense.In spots like these it is we prizeOur Memory, feel that she hath eyes:Then, why should I be loth to stir?I feel this place was made for her;To give new pleasure like the past,Continued long as life shall last.Nor am I loth, though pleased at heart,Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part;For I, methinks, till I grow old,As fair before me shall behold,As I do now, the cabin small,The lake, the bay, the waterfall;And Thee, the Spirit of them all!
Sweet Highland Girl, a very showerOf beauty is thy earthly dower!Twice seven consenting years have shedTheir utmost bounty on thy head:And these gray rocks; that household lawn;Those trees, a veil just half withdrawn;This fall of water that doth makeA murmur near the silent lake;This little bay; a quiet roadThat holds in shelter thy Abode—In truth together do ye seemLike something fashioned in a dream;Such Forms as from their covert peepWhen earthly cares are laid asleep!But, O fair Creature! in the lightOf common day, so heavenly bright,I bless Thee, Vision as thou art,I bless thee with a human heart;God shield thee to thy latest years!Thee, neither know I, nor thy peers;And yet my eyes are filled with tears.
With earnest feeling I shall prayFor thee when I am far away:For never saw I mien, or face,In which more plainly I could traceBenignity and home-bred senseRipening in perfect innocence.Here scattered, like a random seed,Remote from men, Thou dost not needThe embarrassed look of shy distress,And maidenly shamefacedness:Thou wear'st upon thy forehead clearThe freedom of a Mountaineer:A face with gladness overspread!Soft smiles, by human kindness bred!And seemliness complete, that swaysThy courtesies, about thee plays;With no restraint, but such as springsFrom quick and eager visitingsOf thoughts that lie beyond the reachOf thy few words of English speech:A bondage sweetly brooked, a strifeThat gives thy gestures grace and life!So have I, not unmoved in mind,Seen birds of tempest-loving kind—Thus beating up against the wind.
What hand but would a garland cullFor thee who art so beautiful.O happy pleasure! here to dwellBeside thee in some heathy dell;Adopt your homely ways, and dress,A Shepherd, thou a Shepherdess!But I could frame a wish for theeMore like a grave reality:Thou art to me but as a waveOf the wild sea; and I would haveSome claim upon thee, if I could,Though but of common neighbourhood.What joy to hear thee, and to see!Thy elder Brother I would be,Thy Father—anything to thee!
Now thanks to Heaven! that of its graceHath led me to this lonely place.Joy have I had; and going henceI bear away my recompense.In spots like these it is we prizeOur Memory, feel that she hath eyes:Then, why should I be loth to stir?I feel this place was made for her;To give new pleasure like the past,Continued long as life shall last.Nor am I loth, though pleased at heart,Sweet Highland Girl! from thee to part;For I, methinks, till I grow old,As fair before me shall behold,As I do now, the cabin small,The lake, the bay, the waterfall;And Thee, the Spirit of them all!
98.TheSolitary Reaper.
Behold her, single in the field,Yon solitary Highland Lass!Reaping and singing by herself;Stop here, or gently pass!Alone she cuts and binds the grain,And sings a melancholy strain;O listen! for the Vale profoundIs overflowing with the sound.No Nightingale did ever chauntMore welcome notes to weary bandsOf travellers in some shady haunt,Among Arabian sands:A voice so thrilling ne'er was heardIn spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,Breaking the silence of the seasAmong the farthest Hebrides.Will no one tell me what she sings?—Perhaps the plaintive numbers flowFor old, unhappy, far-off things,And battles long ago: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?Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sangAs if her song could have no ending;I saw her singing at her work,And o'er the sickle bending;—I listened, motionless and still;And, as I mounted up the hill,The music in my heart I bore,Long after it was heard no more.
Behold her, single in the field,Yon solitary Highland Lass!Reaping and singing by herself;Stop here, or gently pass!Alone she cuts and binds the grain,And sings a melancholy strain;O listen! for the Vale profoundIs overflowing with the sound.
No Nightingale did ever chauntMore welcome notes to weary bandsOf travellers in some shady haunt,Among Arabian sands:A voice so thrilling ne'er was heardIn spring-time from the Cuckoo-bird,Breaking the silence of the seasAmong the farthest Hebrides.Will no one tell me what she sings?—Perhaps the plaintive numbers flowFor old, unhappy, far-off things,And battles long ago: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?
Whate'er the theme, the Maiden sangAs if her song could have no ending;I saw her singing at her work,And o'er the sickle bending;—I listened, motionless and still;And, as I mounted up the hill,The music in my heart I bore,Long after it was heard no more.
99.Intimations of Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood.
The Child is father of the Man;And I could wish my days to beBound each to each by natural piety.
The Child is father of the Man;And I could wish my days to beBound each to each by natural piety.
I.There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,The earth, and every common sight,To me did seemApparelled in celestial light,The glory and the freshness of a dream.It is not now as it hath been of yore;—Turn wheresoe'er I may,By night or day,The things which I have seen I now can see no more.II.The Rainbow comes and goes,And lovely is the Rose,The Moon doth with delightLook round her when the heavens are bare,Waters on a starry nightAre beautiful and fair;The sunshine is a glorious birth;But yet I know, where'er I go,That there hath past away a glory from the earth.III.Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,And while the young lambs boundAs to the tabor's sound,To me alone there came a thought of grief:A timely utterance gave that thought relief,And I again am strong:The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,And all the earth is gay;Land and seaGive themselves up to jollity,And with the heart of MayDoth every Beast keep holiday;Thou Child of Joy,Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy!IV.Ye blessèd Creatures, I have heard the callYe to each other make; I seeThe heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;My heart is at your festival,My head hath its coronal,The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.O evil day! if I were sullenWhile Earth herself is adorning,This sweet May-morning,And the Children are cullingOn every side,In a thousand valleys far and wide,Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm:—I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!—But there's a Tree, of many, one,A single Field which I have looked upon,Both of them speak of something that is gone:The Pansy at my feetDoth the same tale repeat:Whither is fled the visionary gleam?Where is it now, the glory and the dream?V.Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,Hath had elsewhere its setting,And cometh from afar:Not in entire forgetfulness,And not in utter nakedness,But trailing clouds of glory do we comeFrom God, who is our home:Heaven lies about us in our infancy!Shades of the prison-house begin to closeUpon the growing Boy,But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,He sees it in his joy;The Youth, who daily farther from the eastMust travel, still is Nature's Priest,And by the vision splendidIs on his way attended;At length the Man perceives it die away,And fade into the light of common day.VI.Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,And, even with something of a Mother's mind,And no unworthy aim,The homely Nurse doth all she canTo make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,Forget the glories he hath known,And that imperial palace whence he came.VII.Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,A six years' Darling of a pigmy size!See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,With light upon him from his father's eyes!See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,Some fragment from his dream of human life,Shaped by himself with newly-learned art;A wedding or a festival,A mourning or a funeral;And this hath now his heart,And unto this he frames his song:Then will he fit his tongueTo dialogues of business, love, or strife;But it will not be longEre this be thrown aside,And with new joy and prideThe little Actor cons another part;Filling from time to time his 'humorous stage'With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,That Life brings with her in her equipage;As if his whole vocationWere endless imitation.VIII.Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belieThy Soul's immensity;Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keepThy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,—Mighty Prophet! Seer blest!On whom those truths do rest,Which we are toiling all our lives to find,In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;Thou, over whom thy ImmortalityBroods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave,A Presence which is not to be put by;To whom the graveIs but a lonely bed without the sense or sightOf day or the warm light,A place of thought where we in waiting lie;Thou little Child, yet glorious in the mightOf heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,Why with such earnest pains dost thou provokeThe years to bring the inevitable yoke,Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,And custom lie upon thee with a weightHeavy as frost, and deep almost as life!IX.O joy! that in our embersIs something that doth live,That nature yet remembersWhat was so fugitive!The thought of our past years in me doth breedPerpetual benediction: not indeedFor that which is most worthy to be blest;Delight and liberty, the simple creedOf Childhood, whether busy or at rest,With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:—Not for these I raiseThe song of thanks and praise;But for those obstinate questioningsOf sense and outward things,Fallings from us, vanishings;Blank misgivings of a CreatureMoving about in worlds not realised,High instincts before which our mortal NatureDid tremble like a guilty Thing surprised:But for those first affections,Those shadowy recollections,Which, be they what they may,Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;Uphold us, cherish, and have power to makeOur noisy years seem moments in the beingOf the eternal Silence: truths that wake,To perish never:Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,Nor Man nor Boy,Nor all that is at enmity with joy,Can utterly abolish or destroy!Hence in a season of calm weatherThough inland far we be,Our Souls have sight of that immortal seaWhich brought us hither,Can in a moment travel thither,And see the Children sport upon the shore,And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.X.Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song!And let the young Lambs boundAs to the tabor's sound!We in thought will join your throng,Ye that pipe and ye that play,Ye that through your hearts to-dayFeel the gladness of the May!What though the radiance which was once so brightBe now for ever taken from my sight,Though nothing can bring back the hourOf splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;We will grieve not, rather findStrength in what remains behind;In the primal sympathyWhich having been must ever be;In the soothing thoughts that springOut of human suffering;In the faith that looks through death,In years that bring the philosophic mind.XI.And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,Forebode not any severing of our loves!Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;I only have relinquished one delightTo live beneath your more habitual sway.I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;The innocent brightness of a new-born DayIs lovely yet;The Clouds that gather round the setting sunDo take a sober colouring from an eyeThat hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;Another race hath been, and other palms are won.Thanks to the human heart by which we live,Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,To me the meanest flower that blows can giveThoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.Hutchinson's Text.
I.
There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,The earth, and every common sight,To me did seemApparelled in celestial light,The glory and the freshness of a dream.It is not now as it hath been of yore;—Turn wheresoe'er I may,By night or day,The things which I have seen I now can see no more.
II.
The Rainbow comes and goes,And lovely is the Rose,The Moon doth with delightLook round her when the heavens are bare,Waters on a starry nightAre beautiful and fair;The sunshine is a glorious birth;But yet I know, where'er I go,That there hath past away a glory from the earth.
III.
Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song,And while the young lambs boundAs to the tabor's sound,To me alone there came a thought of grief:A timely utterance gave that thought relief,And I again am strong:The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep;No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,The Winds come to me from the fields of sleep,And all the earth is gay;Land and seaGive themselves up to jollity,And with the heart of MayDoth every Beast keep holiday;Thou Child of Joy,Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy!
IV.
Ye blessèd Creatures, I have heard the callYe to each other make; I seeThe heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;My heart is at your festival,My head hath its coronal,The fulness of your bliss, I feel—I feel it all.O evil day! if I were sullenWhile Earth herself is adorning,This sweet May-morning,And the Children are cullingOn every side,In a thousand valleys far and wide,Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's arm:—I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!—But there's a Tree, of many, one,A single Field which I have looked upon,Both of them speak of something that is gone:The Pansy at my feetDoth the same tale repeat:Whither is fled the visionary gleam?Where is it now, the glory and the dream?
V.
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,Hath had elsewhere its setting,And cometh from afar:Not in entire forgetfulness,And not in utter nakedness,But trailing clouds of glory do we comeFrom God, who is our home:Heaven lies about us in our infancy!Shades of the prison-house begin to closeUpon the growing Boy,But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,He sees it in his joy;The Youth, who daily farther from the eastMust travel, still is Nature's Priest,And by the vision splendidIs on his way attended;At length the Man perceives it die away,And fade into the light of common day.
VI.
Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own;Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind,And, even with something of a Mother's mind,And no unworthy aim,The homely Nurse doth all she canTo make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man,Forget the glories he hath known,And that imperial palace whence he came.
VII.
Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,A six years' Darling of a pigmy size!See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses,With light upon him from his father's eyes!See, at his feet, some little plan or chart,Some fragment from his dream of human life,Shaped by himself with newly-learned art;A wedding or a festival,A mourning or a funeral;And this hath now his heart,And unto this he frames his song:Then will he fit his tongueTo dialogues of business, love, or strife;But it will not be longEre this be thrown aside,And with new joy and prideThe little Actor cons another part;Filling from time to time his 'humorous stage'With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,That Life brings with her in her equipage;As if his whole vocationWere endless imitation.
VIII.
Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belieThy Soul's immensity;Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keepThy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep,Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,—Mighty Prophet! Seer blest!On whom those truths do rest,Which we are toiling all our lives to find,In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;Thou, over whom thy ImmortalityBroods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave,A Presence which is not to be put by;To whom the graveIs but a lonely bed without the sense or sightOf day or the warm light,A place of thought where we in waiting lie;Thou little Child, yet glorious in the mightOf heaven-born freedom on thy being's height,Why with such earnest pains dost thou provokeThe years to bring the inevitable yoke,Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife?Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,And custom lie upon thee with a weightHeavy as frost, and deep almost as life!
IX.
O joy! that in our embersIs something that doth live,That nature yet remembersWhat was so fugitive!The thought of our past years in me doth breedPerpetual benediction: not indeedFor that which is most worthy to be blest;Delight and liberty, the simple creedOf Childhood, whether busy or at rest,With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:—Not for these I raiseThe song of thanks and praise;But for those obstinate questioningsOf sense and outward things,Fallings from us, vanishings;Blank misgivings of a CreatureMoving about in worlds not realised,High instincts before which our mortal NatureDid tremble like a guilty Thing surprised:But for those first affections,Those shadowy recollections,Which, be they what they may,Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;Uphold us, cherish, and have power to makeOur noisy years seem moments in the beingOf the eternal Silence: truths that wake,To perish never:Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,Nor Man nor Boy,Nor all that is at enmity with joy,Can utterly abolish or destroy!Hence in a season of calm weatherThough inland far we be,Our Souls have sight of that immortal seaWhich brought us hither,Can in a moment travel thither,And see the Children sport upon the shore,And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.
X.
Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song!And let the young Lambs boundAs to the tabor's sound!We in thought will join your throng,Ye that pipe and ye that play,Ye that through your hearts to-dayFeel the gladness of the May!What though the radiance which was once so brightBe now for ever taken from my sight,Though nothing can bring back the hourOf splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;We will grieve not, rather findStrength in what remains behind;In the primal sympathyWhich having been must ever be;In the soothing thoughts that springOut of human suffering;In the faith that looks through death,In years that bring the philosophic mind.
XI.
And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves,Forebode not any severing of our loves!Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;I only have relinquished one delightTo live beneath your more habitual sway.I love the Brooks which down their channels fret,Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;The innocent brightness of a new-born DayIs lovely yet;The Clouds that gather round the setting sunDo take a sober colouring from an eyeThat hath kept watch o'er man's mortality;Another race hath been, and other palms are won.Thanks to the human heart by which we live,Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears,To me the meanest flower that blows can giveThoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
Hutchinson's Text.
Hutchinson's Text.
100.On his Mistress, the Queen of Bohemia.
You meaner beauties of the night,That poorly satisfy our eyes,More by your number, than your light,You common people of the skies;What are you when the moon shall rise?You curious chanters of the wood,That warble forth Dame Nature's lays,Thinking your passions understoodBy your weak accents; what's your praise,When Philomel her voice shall raise?You violets that first appear,By your pure purple mantles known,Like the proud virgins of the year,As if the spring were all your own;What are you when the rose is blown?So, when my mistress shall be seenIn form and beauty of her mind,By virtue first, then choice, a Queen,Tell me if she were not design'dTh' eclipse and glory of her kind?1845 Edition.
You meaner beauties of the night,That poorly satisfy our eyes,More by your number, than your light,You common people of the skies;What are you when the moon shall rise?
You curious chanters of the wood,That warble forth Dame Nature's lays,Thinking your passions understoodBy your weak accents; what's your praise,When Philomel her voice shall raise?
You violets that first appear,By your pure purple mantles known,Like the proud virgins of the year,As if the spring were all your own;What are you when the rose is blown?
So, when my mistress shall be seenIn form and beauty of her mind,By virtue first, then choice, a Queen,Tell me if she were not design'dTh' eclipse and glory of her kind?
1845 Edition.
Transcriber's Note
Poem titles found in the original Table of Contents have been added to the blank poem numbers within the text, and sonnet numbers found in the original text have been added in the Table of Contents, for consistency.