I, loving freedom and untried

No sport of every random gust, Yet being to myself a guide

Too blindly have reposed my trust; And oft, when in my heart was heard Thy timely mandate, I deferred

The task, in smoother walks to stray;

But thee I now would serve more strictly, if I may.

Through no disturbance of my soul

Or strong compunction in me wrought, I supplicate for thy control,

But in the quietness of thought.

Me this unchartered freedom tires;
I feel the weight of chance desires;
My hopes no more must change their name,
I long for a repose that ever is the same.

Stern lawgiver! yet thou dost wear

The Godhead's most benignant grace, Nor know we anything so fair

As is the smile upon thy face.

Flowers laugh before thee on their beds,
And fragrance in thy footing treads;

Thou dost preserve the stars from wrong;

And the most ancient heavens, through thee, are fresh and strong.

To humbler functions, awful power,
I call thee I myself commend
Unto thy guidance from this hour;

O, let my weakness have an end!
Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;

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The confidence of reason give,

And in the light of truth thy bondman let me live!

TO A YOUNG LADY

WHO HAD BEEN REPROACHED FOR TAKING LONG WALKS IN THE COUNTRY.

DEAR child of Nature, let them rail!
There is a nest in a green dale,

A harbour and a hold,

Where thou, a wife and friend, shalt see
Thy own delightful days, and be
A light to young and old.

There, healthy as a shepherd-boy,
And treading among flowers of joy

Which at no season fade,

Thou, while thy babes around thee cling,
Shalt show us how divine a thing

A woman may be made.

Thy thoughts and feelings shall not die,
Nor leave thee, when gray hairs are nigh,
A melancholy slave;

But an old age serene and bright,.

And lovely as a Lapland night,
Shall lead thee to thy grave.

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ΤΟ

CHARACTER OF THE HAPPY WARRIOR.

WHO is the happy warrior? Who is he
That every man in arms should wish to be?
It is the generous spirit who, when brought
Among the tasks of real life, hath wrought
Upon the plan that pleased his boyish thought;
Whose high endeavors are an inward light
That makes the path before him always bright;
Who, with a natural instinct to discern
What knowledge can perform, is diligent to learn,
Abides by this resolve, and stops not there,
But makes his moral being his prime care;
Who, doomed to go in company with pain
And fear and bloodshed-miserable train !—
Turns his necessity to glorious gain;

In face of these doth exercise a power
Which is our human nature's highest dower;
Controls them and subdues, transmutes, bereaves
Of their bad influence, and their good receives;
By objects which might force the soul to abate
Her feeling rendered more compassionate;
Is placable, because occasions rise

So often that demand such sacrifice;
More skilful in self-knowledge, even more pure,
As tempted more; more able to endure
As more exposed to suffering and distress;
Thence, also, more alive to tenderness.
'Tis he whose law is reason; who depends
Upon that law as on the best of friends;
Whence, in a state where men are tempted still
To evil for a guard against worse ill,

And what in quality or act is best
Doth seldom on a right foundation rest,
He fixes good on good alone, and owes
To virtue every triumph that he knows:
Who, if he rise to station of command,
Rises by open means, and there will stand
On honourable terms, or else retire
And in himself possess his own desire;
Who comprehends his trust, and to the same
Keeps faithful with a singleness of aim,
And therefore does not stoop, nor lie in wait
For wealth or honours or for worldly state;
Whom they must follow, on whose head must fall
Like showers of manna, if they come at all;
Whose powers shed round him, in the common strife
Or mild concerns of ordinary life,

A constant influence, a peculiar grace;
But who, if he be called upon to face

Some awful moment to which Heaven has joined
Great issues, good or bad for human kind,
Is happy as a lover, and attired
With sudden brightness, like a man inspired;
And through the heat of conflict keeps the law
In calmness made, and sees what he foresaw;
Or if an unexpected call succeed,

Come when it will, is equal to the need:
He who, though thus endued as with a sense
And faculty for storm and turbulence,
Is yet a soul whose master-bias leans
To homefelt pleasures and to gentle scenes-
Sweet images! which, wheresoe'er he be,
Are at his heart, and such fidelity

It is his darling passion to approve;

More brave for this, that he hath much to love, 'Tis, finally, the man who, lifted high,

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