I came among these hills: when like a roe
I bounded o'er the mountains, by the sides
Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,
Wherever nature led: more like a man
Flying from something that he dreads, than one
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days,
And their glad animal movements all gone by)
To me was all in all.-I cannot paint

The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,
Their colours and their forms, were then to me
An appetite; a feeling and a love,
That had no need of a remoter charm,
By thought supplied, nor any interest

Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past,
And all its aching joys are now no more,
And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this
Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur; other gifts
Have followed; for such loss, I would believe,
Abundant recompense.
For I have learned

To look on nature, not as in the hour

Of thoughtless youth; but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,

Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man :
A motion and a spirit, that impels

All thinking things, all objects of all thought,

And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still
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.

Nor perchance,

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. Oh! 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,

108. The language of the sense, the knowledge of external objects conveyed by the senses. 'I am rejoiced to feel that there is in nature and the knowledge of nature an influence to keep me true to my noblest conceptions, to foster, direct, and guard my best affections, and to preserve within me a calm and quiet conscience.'

112. Even if I had not learned to contemplate nature in a sympathetic, meditative, and devout spirit.'Thus, refers to lines 88-102.

113. Genial spirits, natural cheerfulness of disposition. Lat. genialis, pleasant; genius, the good attendant spirit of one's life.

114. Thou, his only sister, Dorothy, to whom he was tenderly attached, and who, to the day of her death, was his constant and congenial companion. She, too, was an ardent lover of nature; and as she gazes with him now on the

110

115

120

125

scenery of the 'silvan Wye,' he discerns
in her gleaming eyes the glow of those
'dizzy raptures' by which, in earlier
years, his own soul had been moved
in presence of these beauteous forms;
and he anticipates for her what he had
himself received-that lofty mood
which unites profound emotion with
intense repose.

122. 'Nature never deserts or proves faithless to her worshipper.'

123. Privilege, a right she enjoys and exercises. Lat. privilegium, a law regarding a single personprivus, single; lex, a law.

125. From aching joy' (line 84) to the chastened 'joy of elevated thoughts' (line 94).—Inform, give form to, mould.

126, 127. Impress, stamp; feed, nourish and strengthen. These verbs are transitive, their object being 'mind.'

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,

130

135

140

Thy memory be as a dwelling-place

For all sweet sounds and harmonies; oh! then,

If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,

Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts
Of tender joy wilt thou remember me,

145

And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance-
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 came

134. Therefore, that is, 'since this is the result of communion with nature.'

138. Wild ecstasies, 'dizzy raptures' (line 85), intense joy. Gr. ek, out, stasis, a standing. Cf. 'transport,' that which carries us, 'rapture' or 'ravishment,' that which snatches us out of and above ourselves.

139. Sober, quiet, subdued; opposed to wild ecstasies.' Lat. se, apart,

not; ebrius, drunk.

140. Mansion, abiding-place. Lat. manere, to remain.

150

143. 'How mournfully, ere life ended, were those wild eyes darkened!' Miss Wordsworth's passion for nature led her into mountain rambles, which were beyond her strength. In 1832, she had a serious illness, which left her with her intellect painfully impaired, and her bright nature permanently overclouded.'-Myers, Wordsworth. 144. Healing, consolatory. Her memory thus richly stored, and her heart and mind thus moulded by nature, she would have within her an unfailing source of consolation in hours of solitude and distress.

149. Of past existence, that is, which remind me of what I once thought and felt. Cf. lines 115-117.

151. That I [who had been] so long.

Unwearied in that service: rather say
With warmer love-oh! 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!

155

ODE TO DUTY.

Jam non consilio bonus, sed more eò perductus, ut non tantum rectè facere possim, sed nisi rectè facere non possim.'

[This Ode, written in 1805, has for its model Gray's Ode to Adversity, which begins:

'Daughter of Jove, relentless power,
Thou tamer of the human breast.'

The Latin motto means, 'No longer good by resolve, but so educated by habit, that not only am I able to act rightly, but I am unable to act otherwise than rightly.]

STERN Daughter of the Voice of God!

O Duty! if that name thou love

Who art a light to guide, a rod
To check the erring, and reprove ;

Thou, who art victory and law
When empty terrors overawe;

5

153. Rather say [that I came] | lit. ' what we ought to do'-a code of with

159. For thy sake, that is, because he knew that they would be to her, as they had been to him, a source of blessing.

1. Stern, inexorable, relentless. Voice of God, expression of the Divine will. Duty, the impersonation to us of the immutable will of God, instructs the ignorant ('a light to guide'), and restrains and corrects the erring ('a rod").

2-4. If that name . . . reprove. A complex conditional clause parenthetical. -That name, namely, 'Duty.'-Duty (Lat. debere, to owe);

right actions. Here it means the divine power which prescribes right actions. Within us this power is represented by conscience, which has been called 'God's vicegerent in the soul.'

5-8. Thou is subject of 'dost set.' He who is guided by duty has a courage, protection, and repose of soul unknown to those who act as the humour or interest of the moment dictates. The powers of evil threaten him in vain; temptations have no power to allure him from the right path; and he feels within himself 'a pcace above all earthly dignities-a still and quiet conscience.'