Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

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by William Wordsworth


  A congregation in its budding-time

  Of health, and hope, and beauty, all at once

  So many divers samples of the growth

  Of life’s sweet season, could have seen unmoved 225

  That miscellaneous garland of wild flowers

  Upon the matron temples of a place

  So famous through the world? To me at least

  It was a goodly prospect; for, through youth,

  Though I had been trained up to stand unpropped, 230

  And independent musings pleased me so

  That spells seemed on me when I was alone,

  Yet could I only cleave to solitude

  In lonesome places — if a throng was near

  That way I leaned by nature, for my heart 235

  Was social and loved idleness and joy.

  Not seeking those who might participate

  My deeper pleasures — nay, I had not once,

  Though not unused to mutter lonesome songs, 240

  Even with myself divided such delight,

  Or looked that way for aught that might be clothed

  In human language — easily I passed

  From the remembrances of better things,

  And slipped into the weekday works of youth, 245

  Unburthened, unalarmed, and unprofaned.

  Caverns there were within my mind which sun

  Could never penetrate, yet did there not

  Want store of leafy arbours where the light

  Might enter in at will. Companionships, 250

  Friendships, acquaintances, were welcome all;

  We sauntered, played, we rioted, we talked

  Unprofitable talk at morning hours,

  Drifted about along the streets and walks,

  Read lazily in lazy books, went forth 255

  To gallop through the country in blind zeal

  Of senseless horsemanship, or on the breast

  Of Cam sailed boisterously, and let the stars

  Come out, perhaps without one quiet thought.

  Such was the tenor of the opening act 260

  In this new life. Imagination slept,

  And yet not utterly: I could not print

  Ground where the grass had yielded to the steps

  Of generations of illustrious men,

  Unmoved; I could not always lightly pass 265

  Through the same gateways, sleep where they had slept,

  Wake where they waked, range that enclosure old,

  That garden of great intellects, undisturbed.

  Place also by the side of this dark sense

  Of nobler feeling, that those spiritual men, 270

  Even the great Newton’s own etherial self,

  Seemed humbled in these precincts, thence to be

  The more beloved, invested here with tasks

  Of life’s plain business, as a daily garb —

  Dictators at the plough — a change that left 275

  All genuine admiration unimpaired.

  Beside the pleasant mills of Trompington

  I laughed with Chaucer; in the hawthorn shade

  Heard him, while birds were warbling, tell his tales

  Of amorous passion. And that gentle bard 280

  Chosen by the Muses for their Page of State,

  Sweet Spencer, moving through his clouded heaven

  With the moon’s beauty and the moon’s soft pace —

  I called him brother, Englishman, and friend.

  Yea, our blind poet, who, in his later day 285

  Stood almost single, uttering odious truth,

  Darkness before, and danger’s voice behind —

  Soul awful, if the earth hath ever lodged

  An awful soul — I seemed to see him here

  Familiarly, and in his scholar’s dress 290

  Bounding before me, yet a stripling youth,

  A boy, no better, with his rosy cheeks

  Angelical, keen eye, courageous look,

  And conscious step of purity and pride.

  Among the band of my compeers was one, 295

  My class-fellow at school, whose chance it was

  To lodge in the apartments which had been

  Time out of mind honored by Milton’s name —

  The very shell reputed of the abode

  Which he had tenanted. O Temperate bard! 300

  One afternoon, the first time I set foot

  In this they innocent nest and oratory,

  Seated with others in a festive ring

  Of commonplace convention, I to thee

  Poured out libations, to thy memory drank 305

  Within my private thoughts, till my brain reeled,

  Never so clouded by the fumes of wine

  Before that hour, or since. Thence, forth I ran

  From that assembly, through a length of streets

  Ran ostrich-like to reach our chapel door 310

  In not a desperate or opprobrious time,

  Albeit long after the importunate bell

  Had stopped, with wearisome Cassandra voice

  No longer haunting the dark winter night.

  Call back, O friend, a moment to thy mind 315

  The place itself and fashion of the rites.

  Upshouldering in a dislocated lump

  With shallow ostentatious carelessness

  My surplice, gloried in and yet despised,

  I clove in pride through the inferior throng 320

  Of the plain burghers, who in audience stood

  On the last skirts of their permitted ground,

  Beneath the pealing organ. Empty thoughts,

  I am ashamed of them; and that great bard,

  And thou, O friend, who in thy ample mind 325

  Hast stationed me for reverence and love,

  Ye will forgive the weakness of that hour,

  In some of its unworthy vanities

  Brother of many more.

  In this mixed sort 330

  The months passed on, remissly, not giving up

  To wilful alienation from the right,

  Or walks of open scandal, but in vague

  And loose indifference, easy likings, aims

  Of a low pitch — duty and zeal dismissed, 335

  Yet Nature, or a happy course of things,

  Not doing in their stead the needful work.

  The memory languidly revolved, the heart

  Reposed in noontide rest, the inner pulse

  Of contemplation almost failed to beat. 340

  Rotted as by a charm, my life became

  A floating island, an amphibious thing,

  Unsound, of spungy texture, yet withal

  Not wanting a fair face of water-weeds

  And pleasant flowers. The thirst of living praise, 345

  A reverence for the glorious dead, the sight

  Of those long vistos, catacombs in which

  Perennial minds lie visibly entombed,

  Have often stirred the heart of youth, and bred

  A fervent love of rigorous discipline. 350

  Alas, such high commotion touched not me;

  No look was in these walls to put to shame

  My easy spirits, and discountenance

  Their light composure — far less to instil

  A calm resolve of mind, firmly addressed 355

  To pleasant efforts. Nor was this the blame

  Of others, but my own; I should in truth,

  As far as doth concern my single self,

  Misdeem most widely, lodging it elsewhere.

  For I, bred in Nature’s lap, was even 360

  As a spoiled child; and, rambling like the wind

  As I had done in daily intercourse

  With those delicious rivers, solemn heights,

  And mountains, ranging like a fowl of the air,

  I was ill-tutored for captivity — 365

  To quit my pleasure, and from month to month

  Take up a station calmly on the perch

 
Of sedentary peace. Those lovely forms

  Had also left less space within my mind,

  Which, wrought upon instinctively, had found 370

  A freshness in those objects of its love,

  A winning power beyond all other power.

  Not that I slighted books — that were to lack

  All sense — but other passions had been mine,

  More fervent, making me less prompt perhaps 375

  To indoor study than was wise or well,

  Or suited to my years. Yet I could shape

  The image of a place which — soothed and lulled

  As I had been, trained up in paradise

  Among sweet garlands and delightful sounds, 380

  Accustomed in my loneliness to walk

  With Nature magisterially — yet I

  Methinks could shape the image of a place

  Which with its aspect should have bent me down

  To instantaneous service, should at once 385

  Have made me pay to science and to arts

  And written lore, acknowledged my liege lord,

  A homage frankly offered up like that

  Which I had paid to Nature. Toil and pains

  In this recess which I have bodied forth 390

  Should spread from heart to heart; and stately groves,

  Majestic edifices, should not want

  A corresponding dignity within.

  The congregating temper which pervades

  Our unripe years, not wasted, should be made 395

  To minister to works of high attempt,

  Which the enthusiast would perform with love.

  Youth should be awed, possessed, as with a sense

  Religious, of what holy joy there is

  In knowledge if it be sincerely sought 400

  For its own sake — in glory, and in praise,

  If but by labour won, and to endure.

  The passing day should learn to put aside

  Her trappings here, should strip them off abashed

  Before antiquity and stedfast truth, 405

  And strong book-mindedness; and over all

  Should be a healthy sound simplicity,

  A seemly plainness — name it as you will,

  Republican or pious.

  If these thoughts 410

  Be a gratuitous emblazonry

  That does but mock this recreant age, at least

  Let Folly and False-seeming (we might say)

  Be free to affect whatever formal gait

  Of moral or scholastic discipline 415

  Shall raise them highest in their own esteem;

  Let them parade among the schools at will,

  But spare the house of God. Was ever known

  The witless shepherd who would drive his flock

  With serious repetition to a pool 420

  Of which ‘tis plain to sight they never taste?

  A weight must surely hang on days begun

  And ended with worst mockery. Be wise,

  Ye Presidents and Deans, and to your bells

  Give seasonable rest, for ‘tis a sound 425

  Hollow as ever vexed the tranquil air,

  And your officious doings bring disgrace

  On the plain steeples of our English Church,

  Whose worship, ‘mid remotest village trees,

  Suffers for this. Even science too, at hand 430

  In daily sight of such irreverence,

  Is smitten thence with an unnatural taint,

  Loses her just authority, falls beneath

  Collateral suspicion, else unknown.

  This obvious truth did not escape me then, 435

  Unthinking as I was, and I confess

  That — having in my native hills given loose

  To a schoolboy’s dreaming — I had raised a pile

  Upon the basis of the coming time

  Which now before me melted fast away, 440

  Which could not live, scarcely had life enough

  To mock the builder. Oh, what joy it were

  To see a sanctuary for our country’s youth

  With such a spirit in it as might be

  Protection for itself, a virgin grove, 445

  Primaeval in its purity and depth —

  Where, though the shades were filled with chearfulness,

  Nor indigent of songs warbled from crowds

  In under-coverts, yet the countenance

  Of the whole place should wear a stamp of awe — 450

  A habitation sober and demure

  For ruminating creatures, a domain

  For quiet things to wander in, a haunt

  In which the heron might delight to feed

  By the shy rivers, and the pelican 455

  Upon the cypress-spire in lonely thought

  Might sit and sun himself. Alas, alas,

  In vain for such solemnity we look;

  Our eyes are crossed by butterflies, our ears

  Hear chattering popinjays — the inner heart 460

  Is trivial, and the impresses without

  Are of a gaudy region.

  Different sight

  Those venerable doctors saw of old 465

  When all who dwelt within these famous walls

  Led in abstemiousness a studious life,

  When, in forlorn and naked chambers cooped

  And crowded, o’er their ponderous books they sate

  Like caterpillars eating out their way 470

  In silence, or with keen devouring noise

  Not to be tracked or fathered. Princes then

  At matins froze, and couched at curfew-time,

  Trained up through piety and zeal to prize

  Spare diet, patient labour, and plain weeds. 475

  O seat of Arts, renowned throughout the world,

  Far different service in those homely days

  The nurslings of the Muses underwent

  From their first childhood. In that glorious time

  When Learning, like a stranger come from far, 480

  Sounding through Christian lands her trumpet, rouzed

  The peasant and the king; when boys and youths,

  The growth of ragged villages and huts,

  Forsook their homes and — errant in the quest

  Of patron, famous school or friendly nook, 485

  Where, pensioned, they in shelter might sit down —

  From town to town and through wide scattered realms

  Journeyed with their huge folios in their hands,

  And often, starting from some covert place,

  Saluted the chance comer on the road, 490

  Crying, ‘An obolus, a penny give

  To a poor scholar’; when illustrious men,

  Lovers of truth, by penury constrained,

  Bucer, Erasmus, or Melancthon, read

  Before the doors or windows of their cells 495

  By moonshine through mere lack of taper light.

  But peace to vain regrets. We see but darkly

  Even when we look behind us; and best things

  Are not so pure by nature that they needs

  Must keep to all — as fondly all believe — 500

  Their highest promise. If the mariner,

  When at reluctant distance he hath passed

  Some fair enticing island, did but know

  What fate might have been his, could he have brought

  His bark to land upon the wished-for spot, 505

  Good cause full often would he have to bless

  The belt of churlish surf that scared him thence,

  Or haste of the inexorable wind.

  For me, I grieve not; happy is the man

  Who only misses what I missed, who falls 510

  No lower than I fell. I did not love,

  As hath been notice heretofore, the guise

  Of our scholastic studies — could have wished

  The river to have had an ampler range

  And freer pace. But this I tax not; far, 5
15

  Far more I grieved to see among the band

  Of those who in the field of contest stood

  As combatants, passions that did to me

  Seem low and mean — from ignorance of mine,

  In part, and want of just forbearance; yet 520

  My wiser mind grieves now for what I saw.

  Willingly did I part from these, and turn

  Out of their track to travel with the shoal

  Of more unthinking natures, easy minds

  And pillowy, and not wanting love that makes 525

  The day pass lightly on, when foresight sleeps,

  And wisdom and the pledges interchanged

  With our own inner being, are forgot.

  To books, our daily fare prescribed, I turned

  With sickly appetite; and when I went, 530

  At other times, in quest of my own food,

  I chaced not steadily the manly deer,

  But laid me down to any casual feast

  Of wild wood-honey; or with truant eyes

  Unruly, peeped about for vagrant fruit. 535

  And as for what pertains to human life,

  The deeper passions working round me here —

  Whether of envy, jealousy, pride, shame,

  Ambition, emulation, fear, or hope,

  Or those of dissolute pleasure — were by me 540

  Unshared, and only now and then observed,

  So little was their hold upon my being,

  As outward things that might administer

  To knowledge or instruction. Hushed meanwhile

  Was the under-soul, locked up in such a calm, 545

  That not a leaf of the great nature stirred.

  Yet was this deep vacation not given up

  To utter waste. Hitherto I had stood

  In my own mind remote from human life,

  At least from what we commonly so name, 550

  Even as a shepherd on a promontory,

  Who, lacking occupation, looks far forth

  Into the endless sea, and rather makes

  Than finds what he beholds. And sure it is,

  That this first transit from the smooth delights 555

  And wild outlandish walks of simple youth

  To something that resembled an approach

  Towards mortal business, to a privileged world

  Within a world, a midway residence

  With all its intervenient imagery, 560

  Did better suit my visionary mind —

  Far better, than to have been bolted forth,

  Thrust out abruptly into fortune’s way

  Among the conflicts of substantial life —

  By a more just gradation did lead on 565

  To higher things, more naturally matured

  For permanent possession, better fruits,

  Whether of truth or virtue, to ensue.

  In playful zest of fancy did we note —

  How could we less? — the manners and the ways 570

 

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