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Of self-congratulation, to the heart

Of each recalling his peculiar boons,

His charters and exemptions; and, perchance,
Though he to no one give the fortitude
And circumspection needful to preserve
His present blessings, and to husband up
The respite of the season, he, at least,
And 't is no vulgar service, makes them felt.

Yet further.

Many, I believe, there are

Who live a life of virtuous decency,
Men who can hear the Decalogue and feel
No self-reproach; who of the moral law
Established in the land where they abide
Are strict observers; and not negligent
In acts of love to those with whom they dwell,
Their kindred, and the children of their blood.
Praise be to such, and to their slumbers peace!

But of the poor man ask, the abject poor;
Go, and demand of him, if there be here,
In this cold abstinence from evil deeds,
And these inevitable charities,

Wherewith to satisfy the human soul?

No, man is dear to man; the poorest poor

Long for some moments in a weary life

When they can know and feel that they have been,
Themselves, the fathers and the dealers-out

Of some small blessings; have been kind to such
As needed kindness, for this single cause,

That we have all of us one human heart.

Such pleasure is to one kind being known,

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My neighbor, when with punctual care each week,
Duly as Friday comes, though pressed herself
By her own wants, she from her store of meal
Takes one unsparing handful for the scrip
Of this old mendicant, and from her door
Returning with exhilarated heart,

Sits by her fire, and builds her hope in heaven.

Then let him pass, a blessing on his head!
And while, in that vast solitude to which
The tide of things has borne him, he appears
To breathe and live but for himself alone,
Unblamed, uninjured, let him bear about
The good which the benignant law of Heaven
Has hung around him; and while life is his,
Still let him prompt the unlettered villagers
To tender offices and pensive thoughts.

- Then let him pass, a blessing on his head!
And long as he can wander, let him breathe
The freshness of the valleys; let his blood
Struggle with frosty air and winter snows;
And let the chartered wind that sweeps the heath
Beat his gray locks against his withered face.
Reverence the hope whose vital anxiousness
Gives the last human interest to his heart.
May never HOUSE, misnamed of INDUSTRY,
Make him a captive ! -- for that pent-up din,
Those life-consuming sounds that clog the air,
Be his the natural silence of old age!
Let him be free of mountain solitudes,
And have around him, whether heard or not,

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The pleasant melody of woodland birds.
Few are his pleasures: if his eyes have now
Been doomed so long to settle upon earth
That not without some effort they behold
The countenance of the horizontal sun,
Rising or setting, let the light at least

Find a free entrance to their languid orbs.

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And let him, where and when he will, sit down
Beneath the trees, or on a grassy bank

Of highway side, and with the little birds
Share his chance-gathered meal; and, finally,

As in the eye of Nature he has lived,
So in the eye of Nature let him die!

ANIMAL TRANQUILLITY AND DECAY. 1798.- 1798.

THE little hedge-row birds,

That peck along the road, regard him not.
He travels on, and in his face, his step,
His gait, his one expression,- every limb,
His look and bending figure, all bespeak

A man who does not move with pain, but moves
With thought. He is insensibly subdued

To settled quiet; he is one by whom

All effort seems forgotten; one to whom
Long patience hath such mild composure given
That patience now doth seem a thing of which
He hath no need. He is by Nature led
To peace so perfect that the young behold
With envy what the old man hardly feels.

ΤΟ

NUTTING.

1799. - 1800.

It seems a day

(I speak of one from many singled out),
One of those heavenly days that cannot die;
When, in the eagerness of boyish hope,
I left our cottage threshold, sallying forth
With a huge wallet o'er my shoulders slung,
A nutting-crook in hand, and turned my step
Toward some far-distant wood, a figure quaint,
Tricked out in proud disguise of cast-off weeds,
Which for that service had been husbanded,
By exhortation of my frugal dame,-
Motley accoutrement, of power to smile

At thorns, and brakes, and brambles, and, in truth,
More ragged than need was! O'er pathless rocks,
Through beds of matted fern and tangled thickets,
Forcing my way, I came to one dear nook
Unvisited, where not a broken bough
Drooped with its withered leaves, ungracious sign
Of devastation; but the hazels rose
Tall and erect, with tempting clusters hung,
A virgin scene! A little while I stood,
Breathing with such suppression of the heart
As joy delights in; and with wise restraint,
Voluptuous, fearless of a rival, eyed

The banquet; or beneath the trees I sate

Among the flowers, and with the flowers I played, —

ΙΟ

20

A temper known to those who, after long
And weary expectation, have been blest
With sudden happiness beyond all hope.
Perhaps it was a bower beneath whose leaves
The violets of five seasons reappear
And fade, unseen by any human eye;
Where fairy water-breaks do murmur on
Forever; and I saw the sparkling foam,

And, with my cheek on one of those green stones
That, fleeced with moss, under the shady trees,
Lay round me, scattered like a flock of sheep,
I heard the murmur and the murmuring sound,
In that sweet mood when pleasure loves to pay
Tribute to ease; and of its joy secure,
The heart luxuriates with indifferent things,
Wasting its kindliness on stocks and stones,
And on the vacant air. Then up I rose,

And dragged to earth both branch and bough, with crash
And merciless ravage; and the shady nook

Of hazels, and the green and mossy bower,
Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up
Their quiet being: and unless I now
Confound my present feelings with the past,
Ere from the mutilated bower I turned
Exulting, rich beyond the wealth of kings,
I felt a sense of pain when I beheld

The silent trees, and saw the intruding sky.
Then, dearest maiden, move along these shades
In gentleness of heart; with gentle hand

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