A lover of the meadows and the woods,
And mountains, and of all that we behold
From this green earth; of all the mighty world
Of eye and ear, both what they half create
And what perceive; well pleased to recognise
In Nature and the language of the sense,
The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul
Of all my moral being.
If I were not thus taught, should I the more
Suffer my genial spirits to decay :
For thou art with me, here upon the banks
Of this fair river: thou, my dearest friend,
My dear, dear friend; and in thy voice I catch
The language of my former heart, and read
My former pleasures in the shooting lights
Of thy wild eyes. O yet a little while
May I behold in thee what I was once,
My dear, dear Sister! and this prayer I make,
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege
Through all the years of this our life to lead
From joy to joy: for she can so inform
The mind that is within us, so impress
With quietness and beauty, and so feed
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues,
Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men,
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all
The dreary intercourse of daily life,
Shall e'er prevail against us, or disturb
Our cheerful faith, that all which we behold
Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;
And let the misty mountain winds be free
To blow against thee: and in after years,
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured
Into a sober pleasure, when thy mind
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place
For all sweet sounds and harmonies; O then,
If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,
Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,
And these my exhortations!
If I should be where I no more can hear
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams
Of past existence, wilt thou then forget
That on the banks of this delightful stream
We stood together; and that I, so long
A worshipper of Nature, hither come
Unwearied in that service: rather say,
With warmer love, O with far deeper zeal
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget
That after many wanderings, many years
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs,
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me
More dear, both for themselves and for thy sake!
W. WORDSWORTH
155.-TAKE, O TAKE THOSE LIPS AWAY
TAKE, O take those lips away
That so sweetly were forsworn,
And those eyes, the break of day,
Lights that do mislead the morn :
But my kisses bring again,
Seals of love, but sealed in vain,
Sealed in vain!
W. SHAKSPEARE
156.-ELEGY ON ELIZABETH DRURY, WHO DIED "AT NOT FIFTEEN "
(FROM "THE Progress of the Soul”)
NOTHING Could make me sooner to confess
That this world had an everlastingness,
Than to consider that a year is run
Since both this lower world's and the sun's Sun, The lustre and the vigour of this All,
Did set: 'twere blasphemy to say, did fall.
She, to whom all this world was but a stage,
Where all sat hearkening how her youthful age
Should be employed, because in all she did
Some figure of the Golden Times was hid;
Who could not lack whate'er this world could give,
Because she was the form 1 that made it live;
1 In its older sense, of the "idea" or soul of a thing. So Spenser
"For soul is form, and doth the body make."
Nor could complain that this world was unfit
To be staid in, then, when she was in it;
She that first tried indifferent desires
By virtue, and virtue by religious fires;
She to whose person Paradise adhered
As courts to princes; she, whose eyes ensphered
Starlight enough to have made the South control,
Had she been there, the star-full Northern Pole: 1
She, she is gone.
She, whose fair body no such prison was
But that a soul might well be pleased to pass
An age in her; she, whose rich beauty lent
Mintage to other beauties, for they went
But for as much as they were like to her;
She in whose body, if we dare prefer
This low world to so high a mark as she,
The Western treasure, Eastern spicery,
Europe and Africa, and the unknown rest
Were easily found, or what in them was best;
She, of whose soul, if we may say 'twas gold,
Her body was the electrum,2 and did hold
Many degrees of that (we understood
Her by her sight: her pure and eloquent blood
Spoke in her cheeks, and so distinctly wrought
That one might almost say her body thought):
She, she thus richly and largely housed, is gone,
And chides us slow-paced snails, who crawl upon
Our prison's prison, Earth, nor think us well,
Longer than whilst we bear our brittle shell.
1 Here, of course, hemisphere.
2 Used of gold in its native state, when alloyed with
Then, soul, to thy first pitch work up again :
Know that all lines which circles do contain,
For once that they the centre touch, do touch
Twice the circumference, and be thou such:
Double on Heaven thy thoughts on Earth em-
ployed.
All will not serve; only who have enjoyed
The sight of God in fulness can think it;
For it is both the object and the wit;
'Tis such a full and such a filling good,
Had th' Angels once looked on Him, they had stood.
To fill the place of one of them or more,
She whom we celebrate is gone before;
She, who had here as much essential joy
As no chance could distract, much less destroy;
Who with God's Presence was acquainted so
Hearing and speaking to Him, as to know
His Face in any natural stone or tree
Better than when in images they be;
Who kept by diligent devotion
God's image in such reparation
Within her heart, that what decay was grown
Was her first Parents' fault and not her own;
Who, being solicited to any act,
Still heard God pleading His safe precontract;
Who by a faithful confidence was here
Betrothed to God, and now is married there;
Whose twilights were more clear than our midday ;
Who dreamed devoutlier than most use to pray;
Who, being here filled with grace, yet strove to be
Both where more grace and more capacity
At once is given, she to Heaven is gone.
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