Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

by William Wordsworth

  Even the great Newton’s own ethereal self,

  Seemed humbled in these precincts thence to be

  The more endeared. Their several memories here

  (Even like their persons in their portraits clothed 270

  With the accustomed garb of daily life)

  Put on a lowly and a touching grace

  Of more distinct humanity, that left

  All genuine admiration unimpaired.

  Beside the pleasant Mill 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,

  Chosen by the Muses for their Page of State—

  Sweet Spenser, moving through his clouded heaven 280

  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,

  Stood almost single; uttering odious truth—

  Darkness before, and danger’s voice behind,

  Soul awful—if the earth has ever lodged

  An awful soul—I seemed to see him here

  Familiarly, and in his scholar’s dress

  Bounding before me, yet a stripling youth—

  A boy, no better, with his rosy cheeks 290

  Angelical, keen eye, courageous look,

  And conscious step of purity and pride.

  Among the band of my compeers was one

  Whom chance had stationed in the very room

  Honoured by Milton’s name. O temperate Bard!

  Be it confest that, for the first time, seated

  Within thy innocent lodge and oratory,

  One of a festive circle, I poured out

  Libations, to thy memory drank, till pride

  And gratitude grew dizzy in a brain 300

  Never excited by the fumes of wine

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

  From the assembly; through a length of streets,

  Ran, ostrich-like, to reach our chapel door

  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,

  The place itself and fashion of the rites. 310

  With careless ostentation shouldering up

  My surplice, through the inferior throng I clove

  Of the plain Burghers, who in audience stood

  On the last skirts of their permitted ground,

  Under the pealing organ. Empty thoughts!

  I am ashamed of them: and that great Bard,

  And thou, O Friend! who in thy ample mind

  Hast placed me high above my best deserts,

  Ye will forgive the weakness of that hour,

  In some of its unworthy vanities, 320

  Brother to many more.

  In this mixed sort

  The months passed on, remissly, not given 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,

  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 330

  Of contemplation almost failed to beat.

  Such life might not inaptly be compared

  To a floating island, an amphibious spot

  Unsound, of spongy texture, yet withal

  Not wanting a fair face of water weeds

  And pleasant flowers. The thirst of living praise,

  Fit reverence for the glorious Dead, the sight

  Of those long vistas, sacred catacombs,

  Where mighty ‘minds’ lie visibly entombed,

  Have often stirred the heart of youth, and bred 340

  A fervent love of rigorous discipline.—

  Alas! such high emotion touched not me.

  Look was there none within these walls to shame

  My easy spirits, and discountenance

  Their light composure, far less to instil

  A calm resolve of mind, firmly addressed

  To puissant 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: 350

  For I, bred up, ‘mid Nature’s luxuries,

  Was a spoiled child, and, rumbling like the wind,

  As I had done in daily intercourse

  With those crystalline rivers, solemn heights,

  And mountains, ranging like a fowl of the air,

  I was ill-tutored for captivity;

  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, 360

  Which, wrought upon instinctively, had found

  A freshness in those objects of her love,

  A winning power, beyond all other power.

  Not that I slighted books,—that were to lack

  All sense,—but other passions in me ruled,

  Passions more fervent, making me less prompt

  To in-door study than was wise or well,

  Or suited to those years. Yet I, though used

  In magisterial liberty to rove,

  Culling such flowers of learning as might tempt 370

  A random choice, could shadow forth a place

  (If now I yield not to a flattering dream)

  Whose studious aspect should have bent me down

  To instantaneous service; should at once

  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, by thoughtful Fancy built,

  Should spread from heart to heart; and stately groves, 380

  Majestic edifices, should not want

  A corresponding dignity within.

  The congregating temper that pervades

  Our unripe years, not wasted, should be taught

  To minister to works of high attempt—

  Works which the enthusiast would perform with love.

  Youth should be awed, religiously possessed

  With a conviction of the power that waits

  On knowledge, when sincerely sought and prized

  For its own sake, on glory and on praise 390

  If but by labour won, and fit to endure

  The passing day; should learn to put aside

  Her trappings here, should strip them off abashed

  Before antiquity and stedfast truth

  And strong book-mindedness; and over all

  A healthy sound simplicity should reign,

  A seemly plainness, name it what you will,

  Republican or pious.

  If these thoughts

  Are a gratuitous emblazonry

  That mocks the recreant age ‘we’ live in, then 400

  Be Folly and False-seeming free to affect

  Whatever formal gait of discipline

  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 persists to drive

  A flock that thirsts not to a pool disliked?

  A weight must surely hang on days begun

  And ended with such mockery. Be wise,

  Ye Presidents and Deans, and, till the spirit 410

  Of ancient times revi
ve, and youth be trained

  At home in pious service, to your bells

  Give seasonable rest, for ‘tis a sound

  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

  In daily sight of this irreverence,

  Is smitten thence with an unnatural taint, 420

  Loses her just authority, falls beneath

  Collateral suspicion, else unknown.

  This truth escaped me not, and I confess,

  That having ‘mid my native hills given loose

  To a schoolboy’s vision, I had raised a pile

  Upon the basis of the coming time,

  That fell in ruins round me. Oh, what joy

  To see a sanctuary for our country’s youth

  Informed with such a spirit as might be

  Its own protection; a primeval grove, 430

  Where, though the shades with cheerfulness were filled,

  Nor indigent of songs warbled from crowds

  In under-coverts, yet the countenance

  Of the whole place should bear a stamp of awe;

  A habitation sober and demure

  For ruminating creatures; a domain

  For quiet things to wander in; a haunt

  In which the heron should delight to feed

  By the shy rivers, and the pelican

  Upon the cypress spire in lonely thought 440

  Might sit and sun himself.—Alas! Alas!

  In vain for such solemnity I looked;

  Mine eyes were crossed by butterflies, ears vexed

  By chattering popinjays; the inner heart

  Seemed trivial, and the impresses without

  Of a too gaudy region.

  Different sight

  Those venerable Doctors saw of old,

  When all who dwelt within these famous walls

  Led in abstemiousness a studious life;

  When, in forlorn and naked chambers cooped 450

  And crowded, o’er the ponderous books they hung

  Like caterpillars eating out their way

  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.

  O seat of Arts! renowned throughout the world!

  Far different service in those homely days

  The Muses’ modest nurslings underwent 460

  From their first childhood: in that glorious time

  When Learning, like a stranger come from far,

  Sounding through Christian lands her trumpet, roused

  Peasant and king; when boys and youths, the growth

  Of ragged villages and crazy huts,

  Forsook their homes, and, errant in the quest

  Of Patron, famous school or friendly nook,

  Where, pensioned, they in shelter might sit down,

  From town to town and through wide scattered realms

  Journeyed with ponderous folios in their hands; 470

  And often, starting from some covert place,

  Saluted the chance comer on the road,

  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

  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 480

  Are not so pure by nature that they needs

  Must keep to all, as fondly all believe,

  Their highest promise. If the mariner,

  When at reluctant distance he hath passed

  Some tempting island, could but know the ills

  That must have fallen upon him had he brought

  His bark to land upon the wished-for shore,

  Good cause would oft be his to thank the surf

  Whose white belt scared him thence, or wind that blew

  Inexorably adverse: for myself 490

  I grieve not; happy is the gowned youth,

  Who only misses what I missed, who falls

  No lower than I fell.

  I did not love,

  Judging not ill perhaps, the timid course

  Of our scholastic studies; could have wished

  To see the river flow with ampler range

  And freer pace; but more, far more, I grieved

  To see displayed among an eager few,

  Who in the field of contest persevered,

  Passions unworthy of youth’s generous heart 500

  And mounting spirit, pitiably repaid,

  When so disturbed, whatever palms are won.

  From these I turned to travel with the shoal

  Of more unthinking natures, easy minds

  And pillowy; yet not wanting love that makes

  The day pass lightly on, when foresight sleeps,

  And wisdom and the pledges interchanged

  With our own inner being are forgot.

  Yet was this deep vacation not given up

  To utter waste. Hitherto I had stood 510

  In my own mind remote from social life,

  (At least from what we commonly so name,)

  Like a lone shepherd on a promontory

  Who lacking occupation looks far forth

  Into the boundless sea, and rather makes

  Than finds what he beholds. And sure it is,

  That this first transit from the smooth delights

  And wild outlandish walks of simple youth

  To something that resembles an approach

  Towards human business, to a privileged world 520

  Within a world, a midway residence

  With all its intervenient imagery,

  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

  To higher things; more naturally matured,

  For permanent possession, better fruits,

  Whether of truth or virtue, to ensue. 530

  In serious mood, but oftener, I confess,

  With playful zest of fancy, did we note

  (How could we less?) the manners and the ways

  Of those who lived distinguished by the badge

  Of good or ill report; or those with whom

  By frame of Academic discipline

  We were perforce connected, men whose sway

  And known authority of office served

  To set our minds on edge, and did no more.

  Nor wanted we rich pastime of this kind, 540

  Found everywhere, but chiefly in the ring

  Of the grave Elders, men unscoured, grotesque

  In character, tricked out like aged trees

  Which through the lapse of their infirmity

  Give ready place to any random seed

  That chooses to be reared upon their trunks.

  Here on my view, confronting vividly

  Those shepherd swains whom I had lately left

  Appeared a different aspect of old age;

  How different! yet both distinctly marked, 550

  Objects embossed to catch the general eye,

  Or portraitures for special use designed,

  As some might seem, so aptly do they serve

  To illustrate Nature’s book of rudiments—

  That book upheld as with maternal care

  When she would enter on her tender scheme

  Of teaching compre
hension with delight,

  And mingling playful with pathetic thoughts.

  The surfaces of artificial life

  And manners finely wrought, the delicate race 560

  Of colours, lurking, gleaming up and down

  Through that state arras woven with silk and gold;

  This wily interchange of snaky hues,

  Willingly or unwillingly revealed,

  I neither knew nor cared for; and as such

  Were wanting here, I took what might be found

  Of less elaborate fabric. At this day

  I smile, in many a mountain solitude

  Conjuring up scenes as obsolete in freaks

  Of character, in points of wit as broad, 570

  As aught by wooden images performed

  For entertainment of the gaping crowd

  At wake or fair. And oftentimes do flit

  Remembrances before me of old men—

  Old humourists, who have been long in their graves,

  And having almost in my mind put off

  Their human names, have into phantoms passed

  Of texture midway between life and books.

  I play the loiterer: ‘tis enough to note

  That here in dwarf proportions were expressed 580

  The limbs of the great world; its eager strifes

  Collaterally pourtrayed, as in mock fight,

  A tournament of blows, some hardly dealt

  Though short of mortal combat; and whate’er

  Might in this pageant be supposed to hit

  An artless rustic’s notice, this way less,

  More that way, was not wasted upon me—

  And yet the spectacle may well demand

  A more substantial name, no mimic show,

  Itself a living part of a live whole, 590

  A creek in the vast sea; for, all degrees

  And shapes of spurious fame and short-lived praise

  Here sate in state, and fed with daily alms

  Retainers won away from solid good;

  And here was Labour, his own bond-slave; Hope,

  That never set the pains against the prize;

  Idleness halting with his weary clog,

  And poor misguided Shame, and witless Fear,

  And simple Pleasure foraging for Death;

  Honour misplaced, and Dignity astray; 600

  Feuds, factions, flatteries, enmity, and guile,

  Murmuring submission, and bald government,

  (The idol weak as the idolater),

  And Decency and Custom starving Truth,

  And blind Authority beating with his staff

  The child that might have led him; Emptiness

  Followed as of good omen, and meek Worth

  Left to herself unheard of and unknown.

  Of these and other kindred notices

  I cannot say what portion is in truth 610

  The naked recollection of that time,

  And what may rather have been called to life

  By after-meditation. But delight