Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

by William Wordsworth

  An Eagle that could neither wail nor soar.

  Effigy of the Vanished—(shall I dare

  To call thee so?) or symbol of fierce deeds 10

  And of the towering courage which past times

  Rejoiced in—take, whate’er thou be, a share,

  Not undeserved, of the memorial rhymes

  That animate my way where’er it leads!

  XXVI.

  THE DUNOLLY EAGLE

  NOT to the clouds, not to the cliff, he flew;

  But when a storm, on sea or mountain bred,

  Came and delivered him, alone he sped

  Into the castle-dungeon’s darkest mew.

  Now, near his master’s house in open view

  He dwells, and hears indignant tempests howl,

  Kennelled and chained. Ye tame domestic fowl,

  Beware of him! Thou, saucy cockatoo,

  Look to thy plumage and thy life!—The roe,

  Fleet as the west wind, is for ‘him’ no quarry; 10

  Balanced in ether he will never tarry,

  Eyeing the sea’s blue depths. Poor Bird! even so

  Doth man of brother man a creature make

  That clings to slavery for its own sad sake.

  XXVII.

  WRITTEN IN A BLANK LEAF OF MACPHERSON’S OSSIAN

  OFT have I caught, upon a fitful breeze,

  Fragments of far-off melodies,

  With ear not coveting the whole,

  A part so charmed the pensive soul.

  While a dark storm before my sight

  Was yielding, on a mountain height

  Loose vapours have I watched, that won

  Prismatic colours from the sun;

  Nor felt a wish that heaven would show

  The image of its perfect bow. 10

  What need, then, of these finished Strains?

  Away with counterfeit Remains!

  An abbey in its lone recess,

  A temple of the wilderness,

  Wrecks though they be, announce with feeling

  The majesty of honest dealing.

  Spirit of Ossian! if imbound

  In language thou may’st yet be found,

  If aught (intrusted to the pen

  Or floating on the tongues of men, 20

  Albeit shattered and impaired)

  Subsist thy dignity to guard,

  In concert with memorial claim

  Of old grey stone, and high-born name

  That cleaves to rock or pillared cave

  Where moans the blast, or beats the wave,

  Let Truth, stern arbitress of all,

  Interpret that Original,

  And for presumptuous wrongs atone;—

  Authentic words be given, or none! 30

  Time is not blind;—yet He, who spares

  Pyramid pointing to the stars,

  Hath preyed with ruthless appetite

  On all that marked the primal flight

  Of the poetic ecstasy

  Into the land of mystery.

  No tongue is able to rehearse

  One measure, Orpheus! of thy verse;

  Musaeus, stationed with his lyre

  Supreme among the Elysian quire, 40

  Is, for the dwellers upon earth,

  Mute as a lark ere morning’s birth.

  Why grieve for these, though past away

  The music, and extinct the lay?

  When thousands, by severer doom,

  Full early to the silent tomb

  Have sunk, at Nature’s call; or strayed

  From hope and promise, self-betrayed;

  The garland withering on their brows;

  Stung with remorse for broken vows; 50

  Frantic—else how might they rejoice?

  And friendless, by their own sad choice!

  Hail, Bards of mightier grasp! on you

  I chiefly call, the chosen Few,

  Who cast not off the acknowledged guide,

  Who faltered not, nor turned aside;

  Whose lofty genius could survive

  Privation, under sorrow thrive;

  In whom the fiery Muse revered

  The symbol of a snow-white beard, 60

  Bedewed with meditative tears

  Dropped from the lenient cloud of years.

  Brothers in soul! though distant times

  Produced you nursed in various climes,

  Ye, when the orb of life had waned,

  A plenitude of love retained:

  Hence, while in you each sad regret

  By corresponding hope was met,

  Ye lingered among human kind,

  Sweet voices for the passing wind, 70

  Departing sunbeams, loth to stop,

  Though smiling on the last hill top!

  Such to the tender-hearted maid

  Even ere her joys begin to fade;

  Such, haply, to the rugged chief

  By fortune crushed, or tamed by grief;

  Appears, on Morven’s lonely shore,

  Dim-gleaming through imperfect lore,

  The Son of Fingal; such was blind

  Maeonides of ampler mind; 80

  Such Milton, to the fountain head

  Of glory by Urania led!

  XXVIII.

  CAVE OF STAFFA

  WE saw, but surely, in the motley crowd,

  Not One of us has felt the far-famed sight;

  How ‘could’ we feel it? each the other’s blight,

  Hurried and hurrying, volatile and loud.

  O for those motions only that invite

  The Ghost of Fingal to his tuneful Cave

  By the breeze entered, and wave after wave

  Softly embosoming the timid light!

  And by ‘one’ Votary who at will might stand

  Gazing and take into his mind and heart, 10

  With undistracted reverence, the effect

  Of those proportions where the almighty hand

  That made the worlds, the sovereign Architect,

  Has deigned to work as if with human Art!

  XXIX.

  CAVE OF STAFFA AFTER THE CROWD HAD DEPARTED

  THANKS for the lessons of this Spot—fit school

  For the presumptuous thoughts that would assign

  Mechanic laws to agency divine;

  And, measuring heaven by earth, would overrule

  Infinite Power. The pillared vestibule,

  Expanding yet precise, the roof embowed,

  Might seem designed to humble man, when proud

  Of his best workmanship by plan and tool.

  Down-bearing with his whole Atlantic weight

  Of tide and tempest on the Structure’s base, 10

  And flashing to that Structure’s topmost height,

  Ocean has proved its strength, and of its grace

  In calms is conscious, finding for his freight

  Of softest music some reponsive place.

  XXX.

  CAVE OF STAFFA

  YE shadowy Beings, that have rights and claims

  In every cell of Fingal’s mystic Grot,

  Where are ye? Driven or venturing to the spot,

  Our fathers glimpses caught of your thin Frames,

  And, by your mien and bearing knew your names;

  And they could hear ‘his’ ghostly song who trod

  Earth, till the flesh lay on him like a load,

  While he struck his desolate harp without hopes or aims.

  Vanished ye are, but subject to recall;

  Why keep ‘we’ else the instincts whose dread law 10

  Ruled here of yore, till what men felt they saw,

  Not by black arts but magic natural!

  If eyes be still sworn vassals of belief,

  Yon light shapes forth a Bard, that shade a Chief.

  XXXI.

  FLOWERS ON THE TOP OF THE PILLARS AT THE ENTRANCE OF THE CAVE

  HOPE smiled when your nativity was cast,

  Children of Summer! Ye fresh Flowers that b
rave

  What Summer here escapes not, the fierce wave,

  And whole artillery of the western blast,

  Battering the Temple’s front, its long-drawn nave

  Smiting, as if each moment were their last.

  But ye, bright Flowers on frieze and architrave

  Survive, and once again the Pile stands fast:

  Calm as the Universe, from specular towers

  Of heaven contemplated by Spirits pure 10

  With mute astonishment, it stands sustained

  Through every part in symmetry, to endure,

  Unhurt, the assault of Time with all his hours,

  As the supreme Artificer ordained.

  XXXII.

  IONA

  ON to Iona!—What can she afford

  To ‘us’ save matter for a thoughtful sigh,

  Heaved over ruin with stability

  In urgent contrast? To diffuse the WORD

  (Thy Paramount, mighty Nature! and Time’s Lord)

  Her Temples rose, ‘mid pagan gloom; but why,

  Even for a moment, has our verse deplored

  Their wrongs, since they fulfilled their destiny?

  And when, subjected to a common doom

  Of mutability, those far-famed Piles 10

  Shall disappear from both the sister Isles,

  Iona’s Saints, forgetting not past days,

  Garlands shall wear of amaranthine bloom,

  While heaven’s vast sea of voices chants their praise.

  XXXIII.

  IONA, UPON LANDING

  HOW sad a welcome! To each voyager

  Some ragged child holds up for sale a store

  Of wave-worn pebbles, pleading on the shore

  Where once came monk and nun with gentle stir,

  Blessings to give, news ask, or suit prefer.

  Yet is yon neat trim church a grateful speck

  Of novelty amid the sacred wreck

  Strewn far and wide. Think, proud Philosopher!

  Fallen though she be, this Glory of the west,

  Still on her sons, the beams of mercy shine; 10

  And “hopes, perhaps more heavenly bright than thine,

  A grace by thee unsought and unpossest,

  A faith more fixed, a rapture more divine,

  Shall gild their passage to eternal rest.”

  XXXIV.

  THE BLACK STONES OF IONA

  HERE on their knees men swore: the stones were black,

  Black in the people’s minds and words, yet they

  Were at that time, as now, in colour grey.

  But what is colour, if upon the rack

  Of conscience souls are placed by deeds that lack

  Concord with oaths? What differ night and day

  Then, when before the Perjured on his way

  Hell opens, and the heavens in vengeance crack

  Above his head uplifted in vain prayer

  To Saint, or Fiend, or to the Godhead whom 10

  He had insulted—Peasant, King, or Thane?

  Fly where the culprit may, guilt meets a doom;

  And, from invisible worlds at need laid bare,

  Come links for social order’s awful chain.

  XXXV

  HOMEWARD WE TURN. ISLE OF COLUMBA’S CELL

  HOMEWARD we turn. Isle of Columba’s Cell,

  Where Christian piety’s soul-cheering spark

  (Kindled from Heaven between the light and dark

  Of time) shone like the morning-star, farewell!—

  And fare thee well, to Fancy visible,

  Remote St. Kilda, lone and loved sea-mark

  For many a voyage made in her swift bark,

  When with more hues than in the rainbow dwell

  Thou a mysterious intercourse dost hold,

  Extracting from clear skies and air serene, 10

  And out of sun-bright waves, a lucid veil,

  That thickens, spreads, and, mingling fold with fold,

  Makes known, when thou no longer canst be seen,

  Thy whereabout, to warn the approaching sail.

  XXXVI.

  GREENOCK

  Per me si va nella Citta dolente.

  ‘WE’ have not passed into a doleful City,

  We who were led to-day down a grim dell,

  By some too boldly named “the Jaws of Hell:”

  Where be the wretched ones, the sights for pity?

  These crowded streets resound no plaintive ditty:—

  As from the hive where bees in summer dwell,

  Sorrow seems here excluded; and that knell,

  It neither damps the gay, nor checks the witty.

  Alas! too busy Rival of old Tyre,

  Whose merchants Princes were, whose decks were thrones; 10

  Soon may the punctual sea in vain respire

  To serve thy need, in union with that Clyde

  Whose nursling current brawls o’er mossy stones,

  The poor, the lonely, herdsman’s joy and pride.

  XXXVII

  THERE! SAID A STRIPLING, POINTING WITH MEET PRIDE

  “THERE!” said a Stripling, pointing with meet pride

  Towards a low roof with green trees half concealed,

  “Is Mosgiel Farm; and that’s the very field

  Where Burns ploughed up the Daisy.” Far and wide

  A plain below stretched seaward, while, descried

  Above sea-clouds, the Peaks of Arran rose;

  And, by that simple notice, the repose

  Of earth, sky, sea, and air, was vivified.

  Beneath “the random ‘bield’ of clod or stone”

  Myriads of daisies have shone forth in flower 10

  Near the lark’s nest, and in their natural hour

  Have passed away; less happy than the One

  That, by the unwilling ploughshare, died to prove

  The tender charm of poetry and love.

  XXXVIII.

  THE RIVER EDEN, CUMBERLAND

  EDEN! till now thy beauty had I viewed

  By glimpses only, and confess with shame

  That verse of mine, whate’er its varying mood,

  Repeats but once the sound of thy sweet name:

  Yet fetched from Paradise that honour came,

  Rightfully borne; for Nature gives thee flowers

  That have no rivals among British bowers;

  And thy bold rocks are worthy of their fame.

  Measuring thy course, fair Stream! at length I pay

  To my life’s neighbour dues of neighbourhood; 10

  But I have traced thee on thy winding way

  With pleasure sometimes by this thought restrained—

  For things far off we toil, while many a good

  Not sought, because too near, is never gained.

  XXXIX.

  MONUMENT OF MRS. HOWARD

  by Nollekens, IN WETHERAL CHURCH, NEAR CORBY, ON THE BANKS OF THE EDEN

  STRETCHED on the dying Mother’s lap, lies dead

  Her new-born Babe; dire ending of bright hope!

  But Sculpture here, with the divinest scope

  Of luminous faith, heavenward hath raised that head

  So patiently; and through one hand has spread

  A touch so tender for the insensate Child—

  (Earth’s lingering love to parting reconciled,

  Brief parting, for the spirit is all but fled)—

  That we, who contemplate the turns of life

  Through this still medium, are consoled and cheered; 10

  Feel with the Mother, think the severed Wife

  Is less to be lamented than revered;

  And own that Art, triumphant over strife

  And pain, hath powers to Eternity endeared.

  XL.

  SUGGESTED BY THE FOREGOING

  TRANQUILLITY! the sovereign aim wert thou

  In heathen schools of philosophic lore;

  Heart-stricken by stern destiny of yore

  The Tragic Muse thee served
with thoughtful vow;

  And what of hope Elysium could allow

  Was fondly seized by Sculpture, to restore

  Peace to the Mourner. But when He who wore

  The crown of thorns around his bleeding brow

  Warmed our sad being with celestial light,

  ‘Then’ Arts which still had drawn a softening grace 10

  From shadowy fountains of the Infinite,

  Communed with that Idea face to face:

  And move around it now as planets run,

  Each in its orbit round the central Sun.

  XLI.

  NUNNERY

  THE floods are roused, and will not soon be weary;

  Down from the Pennine Alps how fiercely sweeps

  CROGLIN, the stately Eden’s tributary!

  He raves, or through some moody passage creeps

  Plotting new mischief—out again he leaps

  Into broad light, and sends, through regions airy,

  That voice which soothed the Nuns while on the steeps

  They knelt in prayer, or sang to blissful Mary.

  That union ceased: then, cleaving easy walks

  Through crags, and smoothing paths beset with danger, 10

  Came studious Taste; and many a pensive stranger

  Dreams on the banks, and to the river talks.

  What change shall happen next to Nunnery Dell?

  Canal, and Viaduct, and Railway, tell!

  XLII.

  STEAMBOATS, VIADUCTS, AND RAILWAYS

  MOTIONS and Means, on land and sea at war

  With old poetic feeling, not for this,

  Shall ye, by Poets even, be judged amiss!

  Nor shall your presence, howsoe’er it mar

  The loveliness of Nature, prove a bar

  To the Mind’s gaining that prophetic sense

  Of future change, that point of vision, whence

  May be discovered what in soul ye are.

  In spite of all that beauty may disown

  In your harsh features, Nature doth embrace 10

  Her lawful offspring in Man’s art; and Time,

  Pleased with your triumphs o’er his brother Space,

  Accepts from your bold hands the proffered crown

  Of hope, and smiles on you with cheer sublime.

  XLIII.

  THE MONUMENT COMMONLY CALLED LONG MEG AND HER DAUGHTERS, NEAR THE RIVER EDEN