As on a bed of death? Some lodge in peace, Saved by His care who bade the tempest cease; And some, too heedless of past danger, court Fresh gales to waft them to the far-off port; But near, or hanging sea and sky between, Not one of all those wingèd powers is seen, Seen in her course, nor 'mid this quiet heard; Yet oh! how gladly would the air be stirred By some acknowledgment of thanks and praise, Soft in its temper as those vesper lays Sung to the Virgin while accordant oars Urge the slow bark along Calabrian shores; A sea-born service through the mountains felt Till into one loved vision all things melt: Or like those hymns that soothe with graver sound
The gulfy coast of Norway iron-bound; And, from the wide and open Baltic, rise With punctual care, Lutherian harmonies. Hush, not a voice is here! but why repine, Now when the star of eve comes forth to shine On British waters with that look benign? Ye mariners, that plough your onward way, Or in the haven rest, or sheltering bay, May silent thanks at least to God be given With a full heart; our thoughts are heard in
NOT in the lucid intervals of life
That come but as a curse to party strife; Not in some hour when Pleasure with a sigh Of languor puts his rosy garland by; Not in the breathing-times of that poor slav Who daily piles up wealth in Mammon's cave- Is Nature felt, or can be; nor do words, Which practised talent readily affords, Prove that her hand has touched responsive chords;
Nor has her gentle beauty power to move With genuine rapture and with fervent love The soul of Genius, if he dare to take Life's rule from passion craved for passion's sake;
Untaught that meekness is the cherished bent Of all the truly great and all the innocent.
But who is innocent? By grace divine, Not otherwise, O Nature! we are thine, Through good and evil thine, in just degree Of rational and manly sympathy.
To all that Earth from pensive hearts is stealing, And Heaven is now to gladdened eyes revealing, Add every charm the Universe can show Through every change its aspects undergo- Care may be respited, but not repealed; No perfect cure grows on that bounded field. Vain is the pleasure, a false calm the peace, If He, through whom alone our conflicts cease, Our virtuous hopes without relapse advance, Come not to speed the Soul's deliverance; To the distempered Intellect refuse His gracious help, or give what we abuse. 1834.
(BY THE SIDE OF RYDAL MERE.) THE linnet's warble, sinking towards a close, Hints to the thrush 'tis time for their repose: The shrill-voiced thrush is heedless, and again
The monitor revives his own sweet strain: But both will soon be mastered, and the copse Be left as silent as the mountain-tops, Ere some commanding star dismiss to rest The throng of rooks, that now, from twig or nest,
(After a steady flight on nome-bound wings, And a last game of mazy hoverings Around their ancient grove) with cawing noise Disturb the liquid music's equipoise.
O Nightingale! Who ever heard thy song Might here be moved, till Fancy grows so strong
That listening sense is pardonably cheated Where wood or stream by thee was never greeted.
Surely, from fairest spots of favoured lands, Were not some gifts withheld by jealous hands, This hour of deepening darkness here would be As a fresh morning for new harmony;
And lays as prompt would hail the dawn of Night:
A dawn she has both beautiful and bright, When the East kindles with the full moon's light;
Not like the rising sun's impatient glow Dazzling the mountains, but an overflow Of solemn splendour, in mutation slow.
Wanderer by spring with gradual progress led,
For sway profoundly felt as widely spread; To king, to peasant, to rough sailor, dear, And to the soldier's trumpet-wearied ear; How welcome wouldst thou be to this green Vale
Fairer than Tempe! Yet, sweet Nightingale ! From the warm breeze that bears thee or,
SOFT as a cloud is yon blue Ridge-the Mere Seems firm as solid crystal, breathless, clear, And motionless; and, to the gazer's eye, Deeper than ocean, in the immensity Of its vague mountains and unreal sky! But, from the process in that still retreat, Turn to minuter changes at our feet; Observe how dewy Twilight has withdrawn The crowd of daisies from the shaven lawn, And has restored to view its tender green, That, while the sun rode high, was lost beneath their dazzling sheen.
-An emblem this of what the sober Hour Can do for minds disposed to feel its power! Thus oft, when we in vain have wish'd away The petty pleasures of the garish day, Meek eve shuts up the whole usurping host
And sky that danced among those leaves, are still;
Rest smooths the way for sleep; in field and bower
Soft shades and dews have shed their blended power
On drooping eyelid and the closing flower; Sound is there none at which the faintest heart Might leap, the weakest nerve of superstition start;
Save when the Owlet's unexpected scream Pierces the ethereal vault; and (mid the gleam Of unsubstantial imagery, the dream, From the hushed vale's realities, transferred To the still lake) the imaginative Bird Seems, 'mid inverted mountains, not unheard. Grave Creature !-whether, while the moon shines bright
On thy wings opened wide for smoothest flight, Thou art discovered in a roofless tower, Rising from what may once have been a lady's bower;
Or spied where thou sitt'st moping in thy mew At the dim centre of a churchyard yew; Or, from a rifted crag or ivy tod
Deep in a forest, thy secure abode,
Thou giv'st, for pastime's sake, by shriek or shout,
A puzzling notice of thy whereabout
May the night never come, nor day be seen, When I shall scorn thy voice, or mock thy
In classic ages men perceived a soul Of sapience in thy aspect, headless Owl! Thee Athens reverenced in the studious grove; And, near the golden sceptre grasped by Jove, His Eagle's favourite perch, while round him
The Gods revolving the decrees of Fate, Thou, too, wert present at Minerva's side:Hark to that second larum !-far and wide The elements have heard, and rock and cave replied. 1834.
This Impromptu appeared, many years ago, among the Author's poems, from which, in subsequent editions, it was excluded. It is reprinted, at the request of the Friend in whose presence the lines were thrown off.]
THE Sun has long been set,
The stars are out by twos and threes, The little birds are piping yet
Among the bushes and trees; There's a cuckoo, and one or two thrushes, And a far-off wind that rushes, And a sound of water that gushes, And the cuckoo's sovereign cry Fills all the hollow of the sky. Who would " go parading In London, "and masquerading," On such a night of June
With that beautiful soft half-moon, And all these innocent blisses? On such a night as this is ! 1804.
COMPOSED UPON AN EVENING OF EXTRAORDINARY SPLENDOUR AND BEAUTY.
HAD this effulgence disappeared With flying haste, I might have sent, Among the speechless clouds, a look Of blank astonishment; But 'tis endued with power to stay, And sanctify one closing day, That frail Mortality may see- What is ?-ah no, but what can be! Time was when field and watery cove With modulated echoes rang,
While choirs of fervent Angels sang Their vespers in the grove;
Or, crowning, star-like, each some sovereign height,
Warbled, for heaven above and earth below, Strains suitable to both.-Such holy rite, Methinks, if audibly repeated now From hill or valley, could not move Sublimer transport, purer love, Than doth this silent spectacle-the gleam- The shadow-and the peace supreme!
No sound is uttered,-but a deep And solemn harmony pervades The hollow vale from steep to steep, And penetrates the glades. Far-distant images draw nigh, Called forth by wondrous potency Of beamy radiance, that imbues Whate'er it strikes with gem-like hues ! In vision exquisitely clear, Herds range along the mountain side; And glistening antlers are descried ; And gilded flocks appear.
Thine is the tranquil hour, purpureal Eve! But long as god-like wish, or hope divine, Informs my spirit, ne'er can I believe That this magnificence is wholly thine! -From worlds not quickened by the sun A portion of the gift is won;
An intermingling of Heaven's pomp is spread On ground which British shepherds tread!
And, if there be whom broken ties Afflict, or injuries assail, Yon hazy ridges to their eyes Present a glorious scale,
Climbing suffused with sunny air, To stop-no record hath told where ! And tempting Fancy to ascend, And with immortal Spirits blend! -Wings at my shoulders seem to play; But, rooted here, I stand and gaze
On those bright steps that heaven-ward raise Their practicable way.
Come forth, ye drooping old men, look abroad, And see to what fair countries ye are bound! And if some traveller, weary of his road, Hath slept since noon-tide on the grassy ground,
Ye Genii! to his covert speed;
And wake him with such gentle heed
As may attune his soul to meet the dower Bestowed on this transcendent hour! IV.
Such hues from their celestial Urn Were wont to stream before mine eye, Where'er it wandered in the morn Of blissful infancy.
This glimpse of glory, why renewed? Nay, rather speak with gratitude; For, if a vestige of those gleams Survived, 'twas only in my dreams.
Dread Power! whom peace and calmness
COMPOSED BY THE SEA-SHORE. WHAT mischief cleaves to unsubdued regret, How fancy sickens by vague hopes beset; How baffled projects on the spirit prey, And fruitless wishes eat the heart away, The Sailor knows; he best, whose lot is cast On the relentless sea that holds him fast On chance dependent, and the fickle star Of power, through long and melancholy war. O sad it is, in sight of foreign shores, Daily to think on old familiar doors, Hearths loved in childhood, and ancestral floors;
Or, tossed about along a waste of foam, To ruminate on that delightful home Which with the dear Betrothed was to come; Or came and was and is, yet meets the eye Never but in the world of memory; Or in a dream recalled, whose smoothest range
*The multiplication of mountain-ridges, described at the commencement of the third Stanza of this Ode, as a kind of Jacob's Ladder, leading to Heaven, is produced either by watery vapours, or sunny haze;-in the present instance by the latter cause. Allusions to the Ode, entitled "Intimations of Immortality," pervade the last stanza of the foregoing Poem.
Is crossed by knowledge, or by dread, of change,
And if not so, whose perfect joy makes sleep A thing too bright for breathing man to keep. Hail to the virtues which that perilous life Extracts from Nature's elemental strife; And welcome glory won in battles fought As bravely as the foe was keenly sought. But to each gallant Captain and his crew A less imperious sympathy is due, Such as my verse now yields, while moon- beams play
On the mute sea in this unruffled bay; Such as will promptly flow from every breast, Where good men, disappointed in the quest Of wealth and power and honours, long for
Which yet in thy behalf the Poet claims, An idolising dreamer as of yore !--
I slight them all; and, on this sea-beat shore Sole-sitting, only can to thoughts attend That tid me hail thee as the SAILOR'S FRIEND; So call thee for heaven's grace through thee made known
By confidence supplied and mercy shown, When not a twinkling star or beacon's light Abates the perils of a stormy night: And for less obvious benefits, that find Their way, with thy pure help, to heart and mind;
Both for the adventurer starting in life's prime; And veteran ranging round from clime to clime,
Long-baffled hope's slow fever in his veins, And wounds and weakness oft his labour's sole
The aspiring Mountains and the winding Streams,
Empress of Night! are gladdened by thy beams;
A look of thine the wilderness pervades, And penetrates the forest's inmost shades;
Thou, chequering peaceably the minster's gloom,
Guid'st the pale Mourner to the lost one's tomb; Canst reach the Prisoner-to his grated cell Welcome, though silent and intangible !- And lives there one, of all that come and go On the great waters toiling to and fro, One, who has watched thee at some quiet hour Enthroned aloft in undisputed power,
Or crossed by vapoury streaks and clouds that
Catching the lustre they in part reprove-- Nor sometimes felt a fitness in thy sway To call up thoughts that shun the glare of day, And make the serious happier than the gay?
Yes, lovely Moon! if thou so mildly bright Dost rouse, yet surely in thy own despite, To fiercer mood the phrenzy-stricken brain, Let me a compensating faith maintain; That there's a sensitive, a tender, part Which thou canst touch in every human heart, For healing and composure.-But, as least And mightiest billows ever haye confessed Thy domination; as the whole vast Sea Feels through her lowest depths thy sove- reignty;
So shmes that countenance with especial grace On them who urge the keel her plains to trace Furrowing its way right onward. The most rude,
Cut off from home and country, may have stood
Even till long gazing hath bedimmed his eye, Or the mute rapture ended in a sigh- Touched by accordance of thy placid cheer, With some internal lights to memory dear, Or fancies stealing forth to soothe the breast Tired with its daily share of earth's unrest, Gentle awakenings, visitations meek; A kindly influence whereof few will speak, Though it can wet with tears the hardiest cheek. And when thy beauty in the shadowy cave Is hidden, buried in its monthly grave; Then, while the Sailor, 'mid an open sea Swept by a favouring wind that leaves thought free,
Paces the deck-no star perhaps in sight, And nothing save, the moving ship's own light To cheer the long dark hours of vacant night- Oft with his musings does thy image blend, In his mind's eye thy crescent horns ascend, And thou art still, O Moon, that SAILOR'S FRIEND!
QUEEN of the stars!-so gentle, so benign, That ancient Fable did to thee assign, When darkness creeping o'er thy silver brow Warned thee these upper regions to forego, Alternate empire in the shades below-
From the close confines of a shadowy vale. Glory of night, conspicuous yet serene, Nor less attractive when by glimpses seen Through cloudy umbrage, well might that fair face,
And all those attributes of modest grace, In days when Fancy wrought unchecked by fear,
Down to the green earth fetch thee from thy sphere,
To sit in leafy woods by fountains clear !
O still belov'd (for thine, meek Power, are charms
That fascinate the very Babe in arms While he, uplifted towards thee, laughs outright,
Spreading his little palms in his glad Mother's sight)
O still belov'd, once worshipped! Time, that frowns In his destructive flight on earthly crowns, Spares thy mild splendour; still those far-shot beams
Tremble on dancing waves and rippling streams With stainless touch, as chaste as when thy praise
Was sung by Virgin-choirs in festal lays; And through dark trials still dost thou explore Thy way for increase punctual as of yore, When teeming Matrons-yielding to rude faith In mysteries of birth and life and death And painful struggle and deliverance-prayed Of thee to visit them with lenient aid. What though the rites be swept away, the fanes Extinct that echoed to the votive strains; Yet thy mild aspect does not, cannot, cease Love to promote and purity and peace; And Fancy, unreproved, even yet may trace Faint types of suffering in thy beamless face.
Then, silent Monitress! let us-not blind To worlds unthought of till the searching mind Of Science laid them open to mankind- Told, also, how the voiceless heavens declare God's glory; and acknowledging thy share In that blest charge; let us-without offence To aught of highest, holiest, influence- Receive whatever good 'tis given thee to dis- pense.
May sage and simple, catching with one eye The moral intimations of the sky,
Learn from thy course, where'er their own be taken,
"To look on tempests, and be never shaken;" To keep with faithful step the appointed way Eclipsing or eclipsed, by night or day, And from example of thy monthly range Gently to brook decline and fatal change; Meek, patient, stedfast, and with loftier scope, Than thy revival yields, for gladsome hope!
COMPOSED OR SUGGESTED DURING A TOUR, IN THE SUMMER OF 1833.
[Having been prevented by the lateness of the season, in 1831, from visiting Staffa and Iona, the author made these the principal objects of a short tour in the summer of 1833, of which the following series of poems is a Memorial. The course pursued was down the Cumberland river Derwent, and to Whitehaven; thence (by the Isle of Man, where a few days were passed) up the Frith of Clyde to Greenock, then to Oban, Staffa, Iona; and back towards England by Loch Awe, Inverary, Loch Goil-head, Greenock, and through parts of Renfrewshire, Ayrshire, and Dumfries-shire to Carlisle, and thence up the river Eden, and homewards by Ullswater.]
ADIEU, Rydalian Laurels! that have grown And spread as if ye knew that days might come When ye would shelter in a happy home, On this fair Mount, a Poet of your own, One who ne'er ventured for a Delphic crown To sue the God; but, haunting your green shade All seasons through, is humbly pleased to braid Ground-flowers, beneath your guardianship, self sown.
Farewell! no Minstrels now with harp new- strung
For summer wandering quit their household bowers;
Yet not for this wants Poesy a tongue To cheer the Itinerant on whom she pours Her spirit, while he crosses lonely moors, Or musing sits forsaken halls among.
Repine as if his hour were come too late? Not unprotected in her mouldering state, Antiquity salutes him with a smile, 'Mid fruitful fields that ring with jocund toil, And pleasure-grounds where Taste, refined Co-mate
Of Truth and Beauty, strives to imitate, Far as she may, primeval Nature's style. Fair Land! by Time's parental love made free, By Social Order's watchful arms embraced; With unexampled union meet in thee, For eye and mind, the present and the past; With golden prospect for futurity,
If that be reverenced which ought to last.
THEY called Thee MERRY ENGLAND, in old time;
A happy people won for thee that name With envy heard in many a distant clime; And, spite of change, for me thou keep'st the
Endearing title, a responsive chime
To the heart's fond belief; though some there
Whose sterner judgments deem that word a
For inattentive fancy, like the lime Which foolish birds are caught with. Can, I ask,
This face of rural beauty be a mask For discontent, and poverty, and crime; These spreading towns a cloak for lawless will! Forbid it, Heaven!-and MERRY ENGLAND still Shall be thy rightful name, in prose and rhyme !
TO THE RIVER GRETA, N.ZAR KESWICK. GRETA, what fearful listening! when huge
Rumble along thy bed, block after block : Or, whirling with reiterated shock, But if thou (like Cocytus from the moans Combat, while darkness aggravates the groans: Heard on his rueful margin) thence wert named The Mourner, thy true nature was defamed, And the habitual murmur that atones
For thy worst rage, forgotten. Oft as Spring Decks, on thy sinuous banks, her thousand thrones,
Seats of glad instinct and love's carolling, The concert, for the happy, then may vie With liveliest peals of birth-day harmony: To a grieved heart, the notes are benisons.
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