William Wordsworth

Arran! a single-crested Teneriffe,
A St. Helena next in shape and hue,
Varying her crowded peaks and ridges blue;
Who but must covet a cloud-seat, or skiff
Built for the air, or winged Hippogriff?
That he might fly, where no one could pursue,
From this dull Monster and her sooty crew;
And, as a God, light on thy topmost cliff.
Impotent wish! which reason would despise
If the mind knew no union of extremes,
No natural bond between the

I
Thy functions are ethereal,
As if within thee dwelt a glancing mind,
Organ of vision! And a Spirit aerial
Informs the cell of Hearing, dark and blind;
Intricate labyrinth, more dread for thought
To enter than oracular cave;
Strict passage, through which sighs are brought,
And whispers for the heart, their slave;
And shrieks, that revel in abuse
Of shivering flesh; and warbled air,
Whose piercing sweetness can unloose
The chains of frenzy, or entice a smile
Into the ambush of

Is then no nook of English ground secure
From rash assault? Schemes of retirement sown
In youth, and ‘mid the busy world kept pure
As when their earliest flowers of hope were blown,
Must perish; how can they this blight endure?
And must he too the ruthless change bemoan
Who scorns a false utilitarian lure
‘Mid his paternal fields at random thrown?
Baffle the threat, bright Scene, from Orresthead
Given to the pausing traveler’s rapturous glance:
Plead for thy

(The Final Submission Of The Tyrolese)

Ye Storms, resound the praises of your King!
And ye mild Seasons, in a sunny clime,
Midway on some high hill, while father Time
Looks on delighted, meet in festal ring,
And loud and long of Winter’s triumph sing!
Sing ye, with blossoms crowned, and fruits, and flowers,
Of Winter’s breath surcharged with sleety showers,
And the dire flapping of his hoary wing!
Knit the blithe dance upon the soft green grass;
With

Oh! gather whencesoe’er ye safely may
The help which slackening Pity requires;
Nor deem that he perforce must go astray
Who treads upon the footmarks of his sires.

When in the antique age of bow and spear
And feudal rapine clothed with iron mail,
Came ministers of peace, intent to rear
The Mother Church in yon sequestered vale;

Then, to her Patron Saint a previous rite
Resounded with deep swell and solemn close,
Through unremitting vigils of the night,
Till

Though I beheld at first with blank surprise
This Work, I now have gazed on it so long
I see its truth with unreluctant eyes;
O, my Beloved! I have done thee wrong,
Conscious of blessedness, but, whence it sprung,
Ever too heedless, as I now perceive:
Morn into noon did pass, noon into eve,
And the old day was welcome as the young,
As welcome and as beautiful, in sooth
More beautiful, as being a thing more

Say, ye far-traveled clouds, far-seeing hills
Among the happiest-looking homes of men
Scattered all Britain over, through deep glen,
On airy upland, and by forest rills,
And o’er wide plains cheered by the lark that trills
His sky-born warblings, does aught meet your ken
More fit to animate the Poet’s pen,
Aught that more surely by its aspect fills
Pure minds with sinless envy, than the Abode
Of the good Priest: who, faithful through all hours
To his high

“Late, late yestreen I saw the new moone
Wi’ the auld moone in hir arme.”
‘Ballad of Sir Patrick Spence, Percy’s Reliques.’

Once I could hail (howe’er serene the sky)
The Moon re-entering her monthly round,
No faculty yet given me to espy
The dusky Shape within her arms imbound,
That thin memento of effulgence lost
Which some have named her Predecessor’s ghost.

Young, like the Crescent that above me shone,
Nought I perceived within it dull or dim;
All

Ye sacred Nurseries of blooming Youth!
In whose collegiate shelter England’s Flowers
Expand, enjoying through their vernal hours
The air of liberty, the light of truth;
Much have ye suffered from Time’s gnawing tooth:
Yet, O ye spires of Oxford! domes and towers!
Gardens and groves! your presence overpowers
The soberness of reason; till, in sooth,
Transformed, and rushing on a bold exchange,
I slight my own beloved Cam, to range
Where silver Isis leads my stripling feet;
Pace the

Shame on this faithless heart! that could allow
Such transport, though but for a moment’s space;
Not while, to aid the spirit of the place
The crescent moon clove with its glittering prow
The clouds, or night-bird sang from shady bough;
But in plain daylight: She, too, at my side,
Who, with her heart’s experience satisfied,
Maintains inviolate its slightest vow!
Sweet Fancy! other gifts must I receive;
Proofs of a higher sovereignty I claim;
Take from ‘her’ brow

O’er the wide earth, on mountain and on plain,
Dwells in the affections and the soul of man
A Godhead, like the universal PAN;
But more exalted, with a brighter train:
And shall his bounty be dispensed in vain,
Showered equally on city and on field,
And neither hope nor steadfast promise yield
In these usurping times of fear and pain?
Such doom awaits us. Nay, forbid it Heaven!
We know the arduous strife, the eternal laws
To which

O’erweening Statesmen have full long relied
On fleets and armies, and external wealth:
But from ‘within’ proceeds a Nation’s health;
Which shall not fail, though poor men cleave with pride
To the paternal floor; or turn aside,
In the thronged city, from the walks of gain,
As being all unworthy to detain
A Soul by contemplation sanctified.
There are who cannot languish in this strife,
Spaniards of every rank, by whom the good
Of such high course was felt

Pelion and Ossa flourish side by side,
Together in immortal books enrolled:
His ancient dower Olympus hath not sold;
And that inspiring Hill, which “did divide
Into two ample horns his forehead wide,”
Shines with poetic radiance as of old;
While not an English Mountain we behold
By the celestial Muses glorified.
Yet round our sea-girt shore they rise in crowds:
What was the great Parnassus’ self to Thee,
Mount Skiddaw? In his natural sovereignty
Our British Hill is nobler

I
I am not One who much or oft delight
To season my fireside with personal talk.
Of friends, who live within an easy walk,
Or neighbours, daily, weekly, in my sight:
And, for my chance-acquaintance, ladies bright,
Sons, mothers, maidens withering on the stalk,
These all wear out of me, like Forms, with chalk
Painted on rich men’s floors, for one feast-night.
Better than such discourse doth silence long,
Long, barren silence, square with my desire;
To sit without

A TALE

What’s in a ‘Name’?
. . . . .
Brutus will start a Spirit as soon as Caesar!

PROLOGUE

There’s something in a flying horse,
There’s something in a huge balloon;
But through the clouds I’ll never float
Until I have a little Boat,
Shaped like the crescent-moon.

And now I ‘have’ a little Boat,
In shape a very crescent-moon
Fast through the clouds my boat can sail;
But if perchance your faith should fail,
Look up and you shall see

PART FIRST

ALL by the moonlight river side
Groaned the poor Beast alas! in vain;
The staff was raised to loftier height,
And the blows fell with heavier weight
As Peter struck and struck again.

“Hold!” cried the Squire, “against the rules
Of common sense you’re surely sinning;
This leap is for us all too bold;
Who Peter was, let that be told,
And start from the beginning.”

“A Potter, Sir, he was by trade,”
Said I, becoming quite collected;
“And wheresoever

PART SECOND

We left our Hero in a trance,
Beneath the alders, near the river;
The Ass is by the river-side,
And, where the feeble breezes glide,
Upon the stream the moonbeams quiver.

A happy respite! but at length
He feels the glimmering of the moon;
Wakes with glazed eve. and feebly signing
To sink, perhaps, where he is lying,
Into a second swoon!

He lifts his head, he sees his staff;
He touches ’tis to him a treasure!
Faint recollection seems

PART THIRD

I’ve heard of one, a gentle Soul,
Though given to sadness and to gloom,
And for the fact will vouch, one night
It chanced that by a taper’s light
This man was reading in his room;

Bending, as you or I might bend
At night o’er any pious book,
When sudden blackness overspread
The snow-white page on which he read,
And made the good man round him look.

The chamber walls were dark all round,
And to his book

What’s in a ‘Name’?
. . . . .
Brutus will start a Spirit as soon as Caesar!

PROLOGUE

There’s something in a flying horse,
There’s something in a huge balloon;
But through the clouds I’ll never float
Until I have a little Boat,
Shaped like the crescent-moon.

And now I ‘have’ a little Boat,
In shape a very crescent-moon
Fast through the clouds my boat can sail;
But if perchance your faith should fail,
Look up and you shall see me

Amid a fertile region green with wood
And fresh with rivers, well doth it become
The Ducal Owner, in his Palace-home
To naturalise this tawny Lion brood;
Children of Art, that claim strange brotherhood,
Couched in their Den, with those that roam at large
Over the burning wilderness, and charge
The wind with terror while they roar for food.
But these are satiate, and a stillness drear
Calls into life a more enduring fear;
Yet is the Prophet calm,

Now when the primrose makes a splendid show,
And lilies face the March-winds in full blow,
And humbler growths as moved with one desire
Put on, to welcome spring, their best attire,
Poor Robin is yet flowerless; but how gay
With his red stalks upon this sunny day!
And, as his tufts of leaves he spreads, content
With a hard bed and scanty nourishment,
Mixed with the green, some shine not lacking power
To rival summer’s brightest scarlet

An Orpheus! an Orpheus! yes, Faith may grow bold,
And take to herself all the wonders of old;
Near the stately Pantheon you’ll meet with the same
In the street that from Oxford hath borrowed its name.

His station is there; and he works on the crowd,
He sways them with harmony merry and loud;
He fills with his power all their hearts to the brim,
Was aught ever heard like his fiddle and him?

What an

In desultory walk through orchard grounds,
Or some deep chestnut grove, oft have I paused
The while a Thrush, urged rather than restrained
By gusts of vernal storm, attuned his song
To his own genial instincts; and was heard
(Though not without some plaintive tones between)
To utter, above showers of blossom swept
From tossing boughs, the promise of a calm,
Which the unsheltered traveler might receive
With thankful spirit. The descant, and the wind
That seemed to play

Presentiments! they judge not right
Who deem that ye from open light
Retire in fear of shame;
All ‘heaven-born’ Instincts shun the touch
Of vulgar sense, and, being such,
Such privilege ye claim.

The tear whose source I could not guess,
The deep sigh that seemed fatherless,
Were mine in early days;
And now, unforced by time to part
With fancy, I obey my heart,
And venture on your praise.

What though some busy foes to good,
Too potent over nerve and

Forth rushed from Envy sprung and Self-conceit,
A Power misnamed the spirit of reform,
And through the astonished Island swept in storm,
Threatening to lay all orders at her feet
That crossed her way. Now stoops she to entreat
License to hide at intervals her head
Where she may work, safe, undisquieted,
In a close Box, covert for Justice meet.
St, George of England! keep a watchful eye
Fixed on the Suitor; frustrate her request
Stifle her hope; for,