That in ourselves our safety must be sought; That by our own right hands it must be wrought;

That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low.

O dastard whom such foretaste doth not cheer!

We shall exult, if they who rule the land
Be men who hold its many blessings dear,
Wise, upright, valiant; not a servile band,
Who are to judge of danger which they
fear,

And honour which they do not understand.

ADDRESS TO A CHILD

DURING A BOISTEROUS WINTER EVENING

BY MY SISTER

Written at Town-end, Grasmere.

WHAT way does the wind come? What way does he go?

He rides over the water, and over the snow, Through wood, and through vale; and, o'er rocky height

Which the goat cannot climb, takes his sounding flight;

He tosses about in every bare tree,

As, if you look up, you plainly may see; But how he will come, and whither he goes, There's never a scholar in England knows.

He will suddenly stop in a cunning nook And ring a sharp 'larum ;-but, if you should look,

There's nothing to see but a cushion of snow Round as a pillow, and whiter than milk, And softer than if it were covered with silk. Sometimes he'll hide in the cave of a rock, Then whistle as shrill as the buzzard cock; -Yet seek him, and what shall you find

in the place?

Nothing but silence and empty space;
Save, in a corner, a heap of dry leaves,
That he's left, for a bed, to beggars or
thieves!

As soon as 'tis daylight to-morrow, with me You shall go to the orchard, and then you will see

That he has been there, and made a great rout, [about; And cracked the branches, and strewn them 1 See Note.

Heaven grant that he spare but that one upright twig

That looked up at the sky so proud and big
All last summer, as well you know,
Studded with apples, a beautiful show!

Hark! over the roof he makes a pause,
And growls as if he would fix his claws
Right in the slates, and with a huge rattle
Drive them down, like men in a battle:
-But let him range round; he does us no
harm,

We build up the fire, we're snug and warm; Untouched by his breath see the candle shines bright,

And burns with a clear and steady light; Books have we to read, but that halfstifled knell,

Alas! 'tis the sound of the eight o'clock bell.

-Come now we'll to bed! and when we

are there

He may work his own will, and what shall we care?

He may knock at the door,--we'll not let him in;

May drive at the windows, we'll laugh at

his din;

Let him seek his own home wherever it be; Here's a cozie warm house for Edward and me.

ODE

INTIMATIONS OF

FROM

1806.

IMMORTALITY

RECOLLECTIONS OF

EARLY CHILDHOOD

This was composed during my residence at Town-end, Grasmere. Two years at least passed between the writing of the four first stanzas and the remaining part. To the attentive and competent reader the whole sufficiently explains itself; but there may be no harm in adverting here to particular feelings or experiences of my own mind on which the structure of the poem partly rests. Nothing was more difficult for me in childhood than to admit the notion of death as a state applicable to my own being. I have said elsewhere

"A simple child,

That lightly draws its breath,
And feels its life in every limb,

What should it know of death!"

But it was not so much from feelings of animal vivacity that my difficulty came as from a sense

of the indomitableness of the Spirit within me. I used to brood over the stories of Enoch and Elijah, and almost to persuade myself that, whatever might become of others, I should be translated, in something of the same way, to heaven. With a feeling congenial to this, I was often unable to think of external things as having external existence, and I communed with all that I saw as something not apart from, but inherent in, my own immaterial nature. Many times while going to school have I grasped at a wall or tree to recall myself from this abyss of idealism to the reality. At that time I was afraid of such processes. In later periods of life I have deplored, as we have all reason to do, a subjugation of an opposite character, and have rejoiced over the remembrances, as is expressed in the lines

"Obstinate questionings

Of sense and outward things, Fallings from us, vanishings;" etc. To that dream-like vividness and splendour which invest objects of sight in childhood, every one, I believe, if he would look back, could bear testimony, and I need not dwell upon it here: but having in the poem regarded it as presumptive evidence of a prior state of existence, I think it right to protest against a conclusion, which has given pain to some good and pious persons, that I meant to inculcate such a belief. It is far too shadowy a notion to be recommended to faith, as more than an element in our instincts of immortality. But let us bear in mind that, though the idea is not advanced in revelation, there is nothing there to contradict it, and the fall of Man presents an analogy in its favour. Accordingly, a preexistent state has entered into the popular creeds of many nations; and, among all persons acquainted with classic literature, is known as an ingredient in Platonic philosophy. Archimedes said that he could move the world if he had a point whereon to rest his machine. Who has not felt the same aspirations as regards the world of his own mind? Having to wield some of its elements when I was impelled to write this poem on the "Immortality of the Soul," I took hold of the notion of pre-existence as having sufficient foundation in humanity for authorising me to make for my purpose the best use of it I could as a poet.

"The Child is Father of the Man;

And I could wish my days to be
Bound each to each by natural piety."
See p. 171.

I

THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,

The fulness of your bliss, I feel--I feel it all.
Oh evil day! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning,

This sweet May-morning,
And the Children are culling

On every side,

In a thousand valleys far and wide, Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm,

And the Babe leaps up on his Mother's

arm :

I hear, I hear, with joy I hear! -But there's a Tree, of many, one, A single Field which I have looked upon, Both of them speak of something that is

gone:

The Pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:

Whither is fled the visionary gleam? Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

V

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting,

And cometh from afar: Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God, who is our home: Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close Upon the growing Boy,

But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,

He sees it in his joy;

The Youth, who daily farther from the east
Must travel, still is Nature's Priest,
And by the vision splendid
Is on his way attended;

At length the Man perceives it die away,
And fade into the light of common day.

VI

Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind, And, even with something of a Mother's mind,

And no unworthy aim,

The homely Nurse doth all she can To make her Foster-child, her Inmate Man, Forget the glories he hath known, And that imperial palace whence he came.

VII

Behold the Child among his new-born blisses,

A six years' Darling of a pigmy size! See, where 'mid work of his own hand he lies,

Fretted by sallies of his mother's kisses, With light upon him from his father's eyes! See, at his feet, some little plan or chart, Some fragment from his dream of human life,

Shaped by himself with newly-learned art; A wedding or a festival,

A mourning or a funeral;

And this hath now his heart,
And unto this he frames his song:
Then will he fit his tongue

To dialogues of business, love, or strife;
But it will not be long

Ere this be thrown aside,

And with new joy and pride The little Actor cons another part; Filling from time to time his humorous stage"

With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
That Life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

VIII

Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie
Thy Soul's immensity;

Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep
Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind,
That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal
deep,
Haunted for ever by the eternal mind,-
Mighty Prophet! Seer blest!

On whom those truths do rest,
Which we are toiling all our lives to find,
In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave;
Thou, over whom thy Immortality
Broods like the Day, a Master o'er a Slave,
A Presence which is not to be put by;
Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might
Of heaven-born freedom on thy being's
height,

Why with such earnest pains dost thou provoke

The years to bring the inevitable yoke, Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife? Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight,

And custom lie upon thee with a weight, Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life!

IX

O joy! that in our embers

Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!

The thought of our past years in me doth breed

Perpetual benediction: not indeed

For that which is most worthy to be blest-
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his
breast:-

Not for these I raise

The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realised,
High instincts before which our mortal
Nature

Did tremble like a guilty Thing surprised:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain light of all our day,
Are yet a master light of all our seeing;
Uphold us, cherish, and have power to
make

Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake,

To perish never;

Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,

Nor Man nor Boy,

Nor all that is at enmity with joy,

Can utterly abolish or destroy !

Hence in a season of calm weather
Though inland far we be,

Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,

Can in a moment travel thither, And see the Children sport upon the shore, And hear the mighty waters rolling ever

more.

X

Then sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a joyous song!

And let the young Lambs bound
As to the tabor's sound!

We in thought will join your throng,
Ye that pipe and ye that play,

Ye that through your hearts to-day
Feel the gladness of the May!

What though the radiance which was once so bright

Be now for ever taken from my sight,

Though nothing can bring back the hour Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the flower;

We will grieve not, rather find
Strength in what remains behind;
In the primal sympathy

Which having been must ever be;
In the soothing thoughts that spring,
Out of human suffering;

In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind.

XI

And O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and
Groves,

Forebode not any severing of our loves!
Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might;
I only have relinquished one delight
To live beneath your more habitual sway.
I love the Brooks which down their channels
fret,

Even more than when I tripped lightly as they;

The innocent brightness of a new-born Day Is lovely yet;

The Clouds that gather round the setting sun Do take a sober colouring from an eye That hath kept watch o'er man's mortality; Another race hath been, and other palms

THOUGHT OF A BRITON ON THE SUBJUGATION OF SWITZERLAND

This was composed while pacing to and fro between the Hall of Coleorton, then rebuilding, and the principal Farm-house of the Estate, in which we lived for nine or ten months. I will here mention that the Song on the Restoration of Lord Clifford, as well as that on the feast of Brougham Castle, were produced on the same ground.

Two Voices are there; one is of the sea, One of the mountains; each a mighty Voice:

In both from age to age thou didst rejoice, They were thy chosen music, Liberty! There came a Tyrant, and with holy glee Thou fought'st against him; but hast vainly

striven:

Thou from thy Alpine holds at length art driven,

Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee. Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft :

Then cleave, O oleave to that which still is left;

For, high-souled Maid, what sorrow would it be

That Mountain floods should thunder as

before,

And Ocean bellow from his rocky shore, And neither awful Voice be heard by thee!