Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

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by William Wordsworth


  Is so unearthly, and what shape so fair?

  So richly decked in variegated down,

  Green, sable, shining yellow, shadowy brown,

  Tints softly with each other blended,

  Hues doubtfully begun and ended; 20

  Or intershooting, and to sight

  Lost and recovered, as the rays of light

  Glance on the conscious plumes touched here and there?

  Full surely, when with such proud gifts of life

  Began the pencil’s strife,

  O’erweening Art was caught as in a snare.

  A sense of seemingly presumptuous wrong

  Gave the first impulse to the Poet’s song;

  But, of his scorn repenting soon, he drew

  A juster judgment from a calmer view; 30

  And, with a spirit freed from discontent,

  Thankfully took an effort that was meant

  Not with God’s bounty, Nature’s love to vie,

  Or made with hope to please that inward eye

  Which ever strives in vain itself to satisfy,

  But to recall the truth by some faint trace

  Of power ethereal and celestial grace,

  That in the living Creature find on earth a place.

  1845.

  WHY SHOULD WE WEEP OR MOURN, ANGELIC BOY

  WHY should we weep or mourn, Angelic boy,

  For such thou wert ere from our sight removed,

  Holy, and ever dutiful—beloved

  From day to day with never-ceasing joy,

  And hopes as dear as could the heart employ

  In aught to earth pertaining? Death has proved

  His might, nor less his mercy, as behoved—

  Death conscious that he only could destroy

  The bodily frame. That beauty is laid low

  To moulder in a far-off field of Rome; 10

  But Heaven is now, blest Child, thy Spirit’s home:

  When such divine communion, which we know,

  Is felt, thy Roman-burial place will be

  Surely a sweet remembrancer of Thee.

  1846.

  WHERE LIES THE TRUTH? HAS MAN, IN WISDOM’S CREED

  WHERE lies the truth? has Man, in wisdom’s creed,

  A pitiable doom; for respite brief

  A care more anxious, or a heavier grief?

  Is he ungrateful, and doth little heed

  God’s bounty, soon forgotten; or indeed,

  Must Man, with labour born, awake to sorrow

  When Flowers rejoice and Larks with rival speed

  Spring from their nests to bid the Sun good morrow?

  They mount for rapture as their songs proclaim

  Warbled in hearing both of earth and sky; 10

  But o’er the contrast wherefore heave a sigh?

  Like those aspirants let us soar—our aim,

  Through life’s worst trials, whether shocks or snares,

  A happier, brighter, purer Heaven than theirs.

  1846.

  I KNOW AN AGED MAN CONSTRAINED TO DWELL

  I KNOW an aged Man constrained to dwell

  In a large house of public charity,

  Where he abides, as in a Prisoner’s cell,

  With numbers near, alas! no company.

  When he could creep about, at will, though poor

  And forced to live on alms, this old Man fed

  A Redbreast, one that to his cottage door

  Came not, but in a lane partook his bread.

  There, at the root of one particular tree,

  An easy seat this worn-out Labourer found 10

  While Robin pecked the crumbs upon his knee

  Laid one by one, or scattered on the ground.

  Dear intercourse was theirs, day after day;

  What signs of mutual gladness when they met!

  Think of their common peace, their simple play,

  The parting moment and its fond regret.

  Months passed in love that failed not to fulfil,

  In spite of season’s change, its own demand,

  By fluttering pinions here and busy bill;

  There by caresses from a tremulous hand. 20

  Thus in the chosen spot a tie so strong

  Was formed between the solitary pair,

  That when his fate had housed him ‘mid a throng

  The Captive shunned all converse proffered there.

  Wife, children, kindred, they were dead and gone;

  But, if no evil hap his wishes crossed,

  One living Stay was left, and on that one

  Some recompence for all that he had lost.

  Oh that the good old Man had power to prove,

  By message sent through air or visible token, 30

  That still he loves the Bird, and still must love;

  That friendship lasts though fellowship is broken!

  1846.

  HOW BEAUTIFUL THE QUEEN OF NIGHT

  HOW beautiful the Queen of Night, on high

  Her way pursuing among scattered clouds,

  Where, ever and anon, her head she shrouds

  Hidden from view in dense obscurity.

  But look, and to the watchful eye

  A brightening edge will indicate that soon

  We shall behold the struggling Moon

  Break forth,—again to walk the clear blue sky.

  1846.

  EVENING VOLUNTARIES: TO LUCCA GIORDANO

  GIORDANO, verily thy Pencil’s skill

  Hath here portrayed with Nature’s happiest grace

  The fair Endymion couched on Latmos-hill;

  And Dian gazing on the Shepherd’s face

  In rapture,—yet suspending her embrace,

  As not unconscious with what power the thrill

  Of her most timid touch his sleep would chase,

  And, with his sleep, that beauty calm and still.

  Oh may this work have found its last retreat

  Here in a Mountain-bard’s secure abode, 10

  One to whom, yet a School-boy, Cynthia showed

  A face of love which he in love would greet,

  Fixed, by her smile, upon some rocky seat;

  Or lured along where greenwood paths he trod.

  RYDAL MOUNT, 1846.

  WHO BUT IS PLEASED TO WATCH THE MOON ON HIGH

  WHO but is pleased to watch the moon on high

  Travelling where she from time to time enshrouds

  Her head, and nothing loth her Majesty

  Renounces, till among the scattered clouds

  One with its kindling edge declares that soon

  Will reappear before the uplifted eye

  A Form as bright, as beautiful a moon,

  To glide in open prospect through clear sky.

  Pity that such a promise e’er should prove

  False in the issue, that yon seeming space 10

  Of sky should be in truth the stedfast face

  Of a cloud flat and dense, through which must move

  (By transit not unlike man’s frequent doom)

  The Wanderer lost in more determined gloom.

  1846.

  ILLUSTRATED BOOKS AND NEWSPAPERS

  DISCOURSE was deemed Man’s noblest attribute,

  And written words the glory of his hand;

  Then followed Printing with enlarged command

  For thought—dominion vast and absolute

  For spreading truth, and making love expand.

  Now prose and verse sunk into disrepute

  Must lacquey a dumb Art that best can suit

  The taste of this once-intellectual Land.

  A backward movement surely have we here,

  From manhood,—back to childhood; for the age— 10

  Back towards caverned life’s first rude career.

  Avaunt this vile abuse of pictured page!

  Must eyes be all in all, the tongue and ear

  Nothing? Heaven keep us from a lower stage!

  1846.

  THE UNRE
MITTING VOICE OF NIGHTLY STREAMS

  THE unremitting voice of nightly streams

  That wastes so oft, we think, its tuneful powers,

  If neither soothing to the worm that gleams

  Through dewy grass, nor small birds hushed in bowers,

  Nor unto silent leaves and drowsy flowers,—

  That voice of unpretending harmony

  (For who what is shall measure by what seems

  To be, or not to be,

  Or tax high Heaven with prodigality?)

  Wants not a healing influence that can creep 10

  Into the human breast, and mix with sleep

  To regulate the motion of our dreams

  For kindly issues—as through every clime

  Was felt near murmuring brooks in earliest time;

  As at this day, the rudest swains who dwell

  Where torrents roar, or hear the tinkling knell

  Of water-breaks, with grateful heart could tell.

  1846.

  SONNET: TO AN OCTOGENARIAN

  AFFECTIONS lose their object; Time brings forth

  No successors; and, lodged in memory,

  If love exist no longer, it must die,—

  Wanting accustomed food, must pass from earth,

  Or never hope to reach a second birth.

  This sad belief, the happiest that is left

  To thousands, share not Thou; howe’er bereft,

  Scorned, or neglected, fear not such a dearth.

  Though poor and destitute of friends thou art,

  Perhaps the sole survivor of thy race, 10

  One to whom Heaven assigns that mournful part

  The utmost solitude of age to face,

  Still shall be left some corner of the heart

  Where Love for living Thing can find a place.

  1846.

  ON THE BANKS OF A ROCKY STREAM

  BEHOLD an emblem of our human mind

  Crowded with thoughts that need a settled home,

  Yet, like to eddying balls of foam

  Within this whirlpool, they each other chase

  Round and round, and neither find

  An outlet nor a resting-place!

  Stranger, if such disquietude be thine,

  Fall on thy knees and sue for help divine.

  1846.

  ODE ON THE INSTALLATION OF HIS ROYAL HIGHNESS PRINCE ALBERT AS CHANCELLOR OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CAMBRIDGE, JULY 1847

  INTRODUCTION AND CHORUS

  FOR thirst of power that Heaven disowns,

  For temples, towers, and thrones,

  Too long insulted by the Spoiler’s shock,

  Indignant Europe cast

  Her stormy foe at last

  To reap the whirlwind on a Libyan rock.

  SOLO—(TENOR)

  War is passion’s basest game

  Madly played to win a name;

  Up starts some tyrant, Earth and Heaven to dare,

  The servile million bow;

  But will the lightning glance aside to spare

  The Despot’s laurelled brow?

  CHORUS

  War is mercy, glory, fame,

  Waged in Freedom’s holy cause;

  Freedom, such as Man may claim

  Under God’s restraining laws.

  Such is Albion’s fame and glory:

  Let rescued Europe tell the story.

  RECIT. (accompanied)—(CONTRALTO)

  But lo, what sudden cloud has darkened all

  The land as with a funeral pall?

  The Rose of England suffers blight,

  The flower has drooped, the Isle’s delight,

  Flower and bud together fall—

  A Nation’s hopes lie crushed in Claremont’s desolate hall.

  AIR—(SOPRANO)

  Time a chequered mantle wears;—

  Earth awakes from wintry sleep;

  Again the Tree a blossom bears—

  Cease, Britannia, cease to weep!

  Hark to the peals on this bright May morn!

  They tell that your future Queen is born.

  SOPRANO SOLO AND CHORUS

  A Guardian Angel fluttered

  Above the Babe, unseen;

  One word he softly uttered—

  It named the future Queen:

  And a joyful cry through the Island rang,

  As clear and bold as the trumpet’s clang,

  As bland as the reed of peace—

  “VICTORIA be her name!”

  For righteous triumphs are the base

  Whereon Britannia rests her peaceful fame.

  QUARTET

  Time, in his mantle’s sunniest fold,

  Uplifted in his arms the child;

  And, while the fearless Infant smiled,

  Her happier destiny foretold:—

  “Infancy, by Wisdom mild,

  Trained to health and artless beauty;

  Youth, by pleasure unbeguiled

  From the lore of lofty duty;

  Womanhood is pure renown,

  Seated on her lineal throne:

  Leaves of myrtle in her Crown,

  Fresh with lustre all their own.

  Love, the treasure worth possessing,

  More than all the world beside,

  This shall be her choicest blessing,

  Oft to royal hearts denied.”

  RECIT. (accompanied)—(BASS)

  That eve, the Star of Brunswick shone

  With stedfast ray benign

  On Gotha’s ducal roof, and on

  The softly flowing Leine;

  Nor failed to gild the spires of Bonn,

  And glittered on the Rhine—

  Old Camus, too, on that prophetic night

  Was conscious of the ray;

  And his willows whispered in its light,

  Not to the Zephyr’s sway,

  But with a Delphic life, in sight

  Of this auspicious day:

  CHORUS

  This day, when Granta hails her chosen Lord,

  And proud of her award,

  Confiding in the Star serene,

  Welcomes the Consort of a happy Queen.

  AIR—(CONTRALTO)

  Prince, in these Collegiate bowers,

  Where Science, leagued with holier truth,

  Guards the sacred heart of youth,

  Solemn monitors are ours.

  These reverend aisles, these hallowed towers,

  Raised by many a hand august,

  Are haunted by majestic Powers,

  The memories of the Wise and Just,

  Who, faithful to a pious trust,

  Here, in the Founder’s spirit sought

  To mould and stamp the ore of thought

  In that bold form and impress high

  That best betoken patriot loyalty.

  Not in vain those Sages taught,—

  True disciples, good as great,

  Have pondered here their country’s weal,

  Weighed the Future by the Past,

  Learned how social frames may last,

  And how a Land may rule its fate

  By constancy inviolate,

  Though worlds to their foundations reel

  The sport of factious Hate or godless Zeal.

  AIR—(BASS)

  Albert, in thy race we cherish

  A Nation’s strength that will not perish

  While England’s sceptred Line

  True to the King of Kings is found;

  Like that Wise ancestor of thine

  Who threw the Saxon shield o’er Luther’s life,

  When first above the yells of bigot strife

  The trumpet of the Living Word

  Assumed a voice of deep portentous sound,

  From gladdened Elbe to startled Tiber heard.

  CHORUS

  What shield more sublime

  E’er was blazoned or sung?

  And the PRINCE whom we greet

  From its Hero is sprung.

  Resound, resound the strain, />
  That hails him for our own!

  Again, again, and yet again,

  For the Church, the State, the Throne!

  And that Presence fair and bright,

  Ever blest wherever seen,

  Who deigns to grace our festal rite,

  The pride of the Islands, VICTORIA THE QUEEN.

  The Prose Works

  Allan Bank, Grasmere — Wordsworth’s home from 1808 till 1811. As Dove Cottage was too small to accommodate the large family and long-staying guests, the Wordsworths moved to this large house that the poet had previously condemned as an ‘eyesore’.

  LIST OF PROSE WORKS

  CONTENTS

  VOLUME I: POLITICAL AND ETHICAL.

  I. POLITICAL.

  I. APOLOGY FOR THE FRENCH REVOLUTION. 1793.

  II. THE CONVENTION OF CINTRA 1809.

  III. VINDICATION OF OPINIONS IN THE TREATISE ON THE ‘CONVENTION OF CINTRA’

  IV. TWO ADDRESSES TO THE FREEHOLDERS OF WESTMORELAND. 1818.

  V. OF THE CATHOLIC RELIEF BILL, 1829.

  II. ETHICAL.

  I. OF LEGISLATION FOR THE POOR, THE WORKING CLASSES, AND THE CLERGY: APPENDIX TO POEMS.

  II. ADVICE TO THE YOUNG.

  III. OF EDUCATION.

  (A) ON THE EDUCATION OF THE YOUNG.

  (B) OF THE PEOPLE, THEIR WAYS AND NEEDS.

  (C.) EDUCATION.

  (D) EDUCATION OF DUTY.

  (E) SPEECH ON LAYING THE FOUNDATION-STONE OF THE NEW SCHOOL IN THE VILLAGE OF BOWNESS, WINDERMERE, 1836.

  VOLUME II: AESTHETICAL AND LITERARY.

  I. OF LITERARY BIOGRAPHY AND MONUMENTS.

  (A) A LETTER TO A FRIEND OF ROBERT BURNS.

  (B) OF MONUMENTS TO LITERARY MEN.

  (C) OF SIR THOMAS BROWNE, A MONUMENT TO SOUTHEY, &C.

  II. UPON EPITAPHS.

  (A) UPON EPITAPHS.

  (B) THE COUNTRY CHURCH-YARD, AND CRITICAL EXAMINATION OF ANCIENT EPITAPHS

  (C) CELEBRATED EPITAPHS CONSIDERED.

  III. ESSAYS, LETTERS, AND NOTES ELUCIDATORY AND CONFIRMATORY OF THE POEMS.

  (A) OF THE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY AND THE ‘LYRICAL BALLADS’ (1798-1802).

  (B) OF POETIC DICTION.

  (C) POETRY AS A STUDY.

  (D) OF POETRY AS OBSERVATION AND DESCRIPTION.

  (E) OF ‘THE EXCURSION.’

  (F) LETTERS TO SIR GEORGE AND LADY BEAUMONT AND

  (G) LETTER TO THE RIGHT HON. CHARLES JAMES FOX.

  (H) OF THE PRINCIPLES OF POETRY AND HIS OWN POEMS.

  IV. DESCRIPTIVE.

 

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