Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

by William Wordsworth

  Of flitting pleasures tempt him from his path;

  The wandering beggars propagate his name,

  Dumb creatures find him tender as a nun,

  And natural or supernatural fear,

  Unless it leap upon him in a dream,

  Touches him not. To enhance the wonder, see

  How arch his notices, how nice his sense 310

  Of the ridiculous; not blind is he

  To the broad follies of the licensed world,

  Yet innocent himself withal, though shrewd,

  And can read lectures upon innocence;

  A miracle of scientific lore,

  Ships he can guide across the pathless sea,

  And tell you all their cunning; he can read

  The inside of the earth, and spell the stars;

  He knows the policies of foreign lands;

  Can string you names of districts, cities, towns, 320

  The whole world over, tight as beads of dew

  Upon a gossamer thread; he sifts, he weighs;

  All things are put to question; he must live

  Knowing that he grows wiser every day

  Or else not live at all, and seeing too

  Each little drop of wisdom as it falls

  Into the dimpling cistern of his heart:

  For this unnatural growth the trainer blame,

  Pity the tree.—Poor human vanity,

  Wert thou extinguished, little would be left 330

  Which he could truly love; but how escape?

  For, ever as a thought of purer birth

  Rises to lead him toward a better clime,

  Some intermeddler still is on the watch

  To drive him back, and pound him, like a stray,

  Within the pinfold of his own conceit.

  Meanwhile old grandame earth is grieved to find

  The playthings, which her love designed for him,

  Unthought of: in their woodland beds the flowers

  Weep, and the river sides are all forlorn. 340

  Oh! give us once again the wishing-cap

  Of Fortunatus, and the invisible coat

  Of Jack the Giant-killer, Robin Hood,

  And Sabra in the forest with St. George!

  The child, whose love is here, at least, doth reap

  One precious gain, that he forgets himself.

  These mighty workmen of our later age,

  Who, with a broad highway, have overbridged

  The froward chaos of futurity,

  Tamed to their bidding; they who have the skill 350

  To manage books, and things, and make them act

  On infant minds as surely as the sun

  Deals with a flower; the keepers of our time,

  The guides and wardens of our faculties,

  Sages who in their prescience would control

  All accidents, and to the very road

  Which they have fashioned would confine us down,

  Like engines; when will their presumption learn,

  That in the unreasoning progress of the world

  A wiser spirit is at work for us, 360

  A better eye than theirs, most prodigal

  Of blessings, and most studious of our good,

  Even in what seem our most unfruitful hours?

  There was a Boy: ye knew him well, ye cliffs

  And islands of Winander!—many a time

  At evening, when the earliest stars began

  To move along the edges of the hills,

  Rising or setting, would he stand alone

  Beneath the trees or by the glimmering lake,

  And there, with fingers interwoven, both hands 370

  Pressed closely palm to palm, and to his mouth

  Uplifted, he, as through an instrument,

  Blew mimic hootings to the silent owls,

  That they might answer him; and they would shout

  Across the watery vale, and shout again,

  Responsive to his call, with quivering peals,

  And long halloos and screams, and echoes loud,

  Redoubled and redoubled, concourse wild

  Of jocund din; and, when a lengthened pause

  Of silence came and baffled his best skill, 380

  Then sometimes, in that silence while he hung

  Listening, a gentle shock of mild surprise

  Has carried far into his heart the voice

  Of mountain torrents; or the visible scene

  Would enter unawares into his mind,

  With all its solemn imagery, its rocks,

  Its woods, and that uncertain heaven, received

  Into the bosom of the steady lake.

  This Boy was taken from his mates, and died

  In childhood, ere he was full twelve years old. 390

  Fair is the spot, most beautiful the vale

  Where he was born; the grassy churchyard hangs

  Upon a slope above the village school,

  And through that churchyard when my way has led

  On summer evenings, I believe that there

  A long half hour together I have stood

  Mute, looking at the grave in which he lies!

  Even now appears before the mind’s clear eye

  That self-same village church; I see her sit

  (The throned Lady whom erewhile we hailed) 400

  On her green hill, forgetful of this Boy

  Who slumbers at her feet,—forgetful, too,

  Of all her silent neighbourhood of graves,

  And listening only to the gladsome sounds

  That, from the rural school ascending, play

  Beneath her and about her. May she long

  Behold a race of young ones like to those

  With whom I herded!—(easily, indeed,

  We might have fed upon a fatter soil

  Of arts and letters—but be that forgiven)— 410

  A race of real children; not too wise,

  Too learned, or too good; but wanton, fresh,

  And bandied up and down by love and hate;

  Not unresentful where self-justified;

  Fierce, moody, patient, venturous, modest, shy;

  Mad at their sports like withered leaves in winds;

  Though doing wrong and suffering, and full oft

  Bending beneath our life’s mysterious weight

  Of pain, and doubt, and fear, yet yielding not

  In happiness to the happiest upon earth. 420

  Simplicity in habit, truth in speech,

  Be these the daily strengtheners of their minds;

  May books and Nature be their early joy!

  And knowledge, rightly honoured with that name—

  Knowledge not purchased by the loss of power!

  Well do I call to mind the very week

  When I was first intrusted to the care

  Of that sweet Valley; when its paths, its shores,

  And brooks were like a dream of novelty

  To my half-infant thoughts; that very week, 430

  While I was roving up and down alone,

  Seeking I knew not what, I chanced to cross

  One of those open fields, which, shaped like ears,

  Make green peninsulas on Esthwaite’s Lake:

  Twilight was coming on, yet through the gloom

  Appeared distinctly on the opposite shore

  A heap of garments, as if left by one

  Who might have there been bathing. Long I watched,

  But no one owned them; meanwhile the calm lake

  Grew dark with all the shadows on its breast, 440

  And, now and then, a fish up-leaping snapped

  The breathless stillness. The succeeding day,

  Those unclaimed garments telling a plain tale

  Drew to the spot an anxious crowd; some looked

  In passive expectation from the shore,

  While from a boat others hung o’er the deep,

  Sounding with grappling irons and long poles.

  At las
t, the dead man, ‘mid that beauteous scene

  Of trees and hills and water, bolt upright

  Rose, with his ghastly face, a spectre shape 450

  Of terror; yet no soul-debasing fear,

  Young as I was, a child not nine years old,

  Possessed me, for my inner eye had seen

  Such sights before, among the shining streams

  Of faery land, the forest of romance.

  Their spirit hallowed the sad spectacle

  With decoration of ideal grace;

  A dignity, a smoothness, like the works

  Of Grecian art, and purest poesy.

  A precious treasure had I long possessed, 460

  A little yellow, canvas-covered book,

  A slender abstract of the Arabian tales;

  And, from companions in a new abode,

  When first I learnt, that this dear prize of mine

  Was but a block hewn from a mighty quarry—

  That there were four large volumes, laden all

  With kindred matter, ‘twas to me, in truth,

  A promise scarcely earthly. Instantly,

  With one not richer than myself, I made

  A covenant that each should lay aside 470

  The moneys he possessed, and hoard up more,

  Till our joint savings had amassed enough

  To make this book our own. Through several months,

  In spite of all temptation, we preserved

  Religiously that vow; but firmness failed,

  Nor were we ever masters of our wish.

  And when thereafter to my father’s house

  The holidays returned me, there to find

  That golden store of books which I had left,

  What joy was mine! How often in the course 480

  Of those glad respites, though a soft west wind

  Ruffled the waters to the angler’s wish,

  For a whole day together, have I lain

  Down by thy side, O Derwent! murmuring stream,

  On the hot stones, and in the glaring sun,

  And there have read, devouring as I read,

  Defrauding the day’s glory, desperate!

  Till with a sudden bound of smart reproach,

  Such as an idler deals with in his shame,

  I to the sport betook myself again. 490

  A gracious spirit o’er this earth presides,

  And o’er the heart of man; invisibly

  It comes, to works of unreproved delight,

  And tendency benign, directing those

  Who care not, know not, think not, what they do.

  The tales that charm away the wakeful night

  In Araby, romances; legends penned

  For solace by dim light of monkish lamps;

  Fictions, for ladies of their love, devised

  By youthful squires; adventures endless, spun 500

  By the dismantled warrior in old age,

  Out of the bowels of those very schemes

  In which his youth did first extravagate;

  These spread like day, and something in the shape

  Of these will live till man shall be no more.

  Dumb yearnings, hidden appetites, are ours,

  And ‘they must’ have their food. Our childhood sits,

  Our simple childhood, sits upon a throne

  That hath more power than all the elements.

  I guess not what this tells of Being past, 510

  Nor what it augurs of the life to come;

  But so it is; and, in that dubious hour—

  That twilight—when we first begin to see

  This dawning earth, to recognise, expect,

  And, in the long probation that ensues,

  The time of trial, ere we learn to live

  In reconcilement with our stinted powers;

  To endure this state of meagre vassalage,

  Unwilling to forego, confess, submit,

  Uneasy and unsettled, yoke-fellows 520

  To custom, mettlesome, and not yet tamed

  And humbled down—oh! then we feel, we feel,

  We know where we have friends. Ye dreamers, then,

  Forgers of daring tales! we bless you then,

  Impostors, drivellers, dotards, as the ape

  Philosophy will call you: ‘then’ we feel

  With what, and how great might ye are in league,

  Who make our wish, our power, our thought a deed,

  An empire, a possession,—ye whom time

  And seasons serve; all Faculties to whom 530

  Earth crouches, the elements are potter’s clay,

  Space like a heaven filled up with northern lights,

  Here, nowhere, there, and everywhere at once.

  Relinquishing this lofty eminence

  For ground, though humbler, not the less a tract

  Of the same isthmus, which our spirits cross

  In progress from their native continent

  To earth and human life, the Song might dwell

  On that delightful time of growing youth,

  When craving for the marvellous gives way 540

  To strengthening love for things that we have seen;

  When sober truth and steady sympathies,

  Offered to notice by less daring pens,

  Take firmer hold of us, and words themselves

  Move us with conscious pleasure.

  I am sad

  At thought of rapture now for ever flown;

  Almost to tears I sometimes could be sad

  To think of, to read over, many a page,

  Poems withal of name, which at that time

  Did never fail to entrance me, and are now 550

  Dead in my eyes, dead as a theatre

  Fresh emptied of spectators. Twice five years

  Or less I might have seen, when first my mind

  With conscious pleasure opened to the charm

  Of words in tuneful order, found them sweet

  For their own ‘sakes’, a passion, and a power;

  And phrases pleased me chosen for delight,

  For pomp, or love. Oft, in the public roads

  Yet unfrequented, while the morning light

  Was yellowing the hill tops, I went abroad 560

  With a dear friend, and for the better part

  Of two delightful hours we strolled along

  By the still borders of the misty lake,

  Repeating favourite verses with one voice,

  Or conning more, as happy as the birds

  That round us chaunted. Well might we be glad,

  Lifted above the ground by airy fancies,

  More bright than madness or the dreams of wine;

  And, though full oft the objects of our love

  Were false, and in their splendour overwrought, 570

  Yet was there surely then no vulgar power

  Working within us,—nothing less, in truth,

  Than that most noble attribute of man,

  Though yet untutored and inordinate,

  That wish for something loftier, more adorned,

  Than is the common aspect, daily garb,

  Of human life. What wonder, then, if sounds

  Of exultation echoed through the groves!

  For, images, and sentiments, and words,

  And everything encountered or pursued 580

  In that delicious world of poesy,

  Kept holiday, a never-ending show,

  With music, incense, festival, and flowers!

  Here must we pause: this only let me add,

  From heart-experience, and in humblest sense

  Of modesty, that he, who in his youth

  A daily wanderer among woods and fields

  With living Nature hath been intimate,

  Not only in that raw unpractised time

  Is stirred to ecstasy, as others are, 590

  By glittering verse; but further, doth receive,

  In measure only dealt out to himself,

  Knowl
edge and increase of enduring joy

  From the great Nature that exists in works

  Of mighty Poets. Visionary power

  Attends the motions of the viewless winds,

  Embodied in the mystery of words:

  There, darkness makes abode, and all the host

  Of shadowy things work endless changes,—there,

  As in a mansion like their proper home, 600

  Even forms and substances are circumfused

  By that transparent veil with light divine,

  And, through the turnings intricate of verse,

  Present themselves as objects recognised,

  In flashes, and with glory not their own.

  BOOK SIXTH

  CAMBRIDGE AND THE ALPS

  THE leaves were fading when to Esthwaite’s banks

  And the simplicities of cottage life

  I bade farewell; and, one among the youth

  Who, summoned by that season, reunite

  As scattered birds troop to the fowler’s lure,

  Went back to Granta’s cloisters, not so prompt

  Or eager, though as gay and undepressed

  In mind, as when I thence had taken flight

  A few short months before. I turned my face

  Without repining from the coves and heights 10

  Clothed in the sunshine of the withering fern;

  Quitted, not loth, the mild magnificence

  Of calmer lakes and louder streams; and you,

  Frank-hearted maids of rocky Cumberland,

  You and your not unwelcome days of mirth,

  Relinquished, and your nights of revelry,

  And in my own unlovely cell sate down

  In lightsome mood—such privilege has youth

  That cannot take long leave of pleasant thoughts.

  The bonds of indolent society 20

  Relaxing in their hold, henceforth I lived

  More to myself. Two winters may be passed

  Without a separate notice: many books

  Were skimmed, devoured, or studiously perused,

  But with no settled plan. I was detached

  Internally from academic cares;

  Yet independent study seemed a course

  Of hardy disobedience toward friends

  And kindred, proud rebellion and unkind.

  This spurious virtue, rather let it bear 30

  A name it now deserves, this cowardice,

  Gave treacherous sanction to that over-love

  Of freedom which encouraged me to turn

  From regulations even of my own

  As from restraints and bonds. Yet who can tell—

  Who knows what thus may have been gained, both then

  And at a later season, or preserved;

  What love of nature, what original strength

  Of contemplation, what intuitive truths

  The deepest and the best, what keen research, 40