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The Excursion · The Excursion

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  Book one, the Wanderer twas summer and the sun had mounted high southward.
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  The landscaped indistinctly glared through a pale steam, But all the northern downs and
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  clearest air ascending showed far off a surface dappledoor, with shadows flung from brooding
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  clouds, shadows that lay in spots determined and unmoved, with steady beams of
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  bright and pleasant sunshine interposed to him most pleasant, who on soft cool moss
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  extends his careless limbs along the front of some huge cave, whose rocky ceiling
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  casts the twilight of its own an ample shade, where the ren warbles,
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  while the dreaming man, half conscious of the soothing melody, with sidelong eye,
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  looks out upon the scene by power of that impending covert thrown to finer
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  distance, Mine was at that hour far other lot, yet with good hope
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  that soon under a shade as grateful, I should find rest and be welcomed
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  there to life clear a joy. Across a bare wide common, I was
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  toiling with languid steps that, by the slippery turf, were baffled. Nor
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  could my weak arm disperse the host of insects gathering round my face and ever
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  with me. As I paced along, upon that open moorland stood a grove
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  the wished for port, to which my course was bound. Thither I came,
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  and there, amid the gloom spread by a brotherhood of lofty elms,
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  appeared a roofless hut, four naked walls that stared upon each other. I
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  looked round, and to my wish and to my hope, espied the friend.
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  I sought, a man of reverend age, but stout and hail for
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  travel unimpaired. There was he seen upon the cottage bench, recumbent in the
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  shade, as if asleep. An iron pointed staff lay at his side.
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  Him had I marked the day before, alone and stationed in the public way,
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  with face turned toward the sun then setting, while that staff afforded to
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  the figure of the man detained for contemplation or repose graceful support. His countenance
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  as he stood was hidden from my view, and he remained unrecognized, but
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  stricken by the sight. With slackened footsteps, I advanced, and soon a
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  glad congratulation we exchanged at such unthought of meeting for the night we parted nothing
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  willingly, and now he by appointment waited for me. Here under the covert
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  of these clustering elms, we were tried friends amid a pleasant veil in the
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  antique market village, where was past my school time an apartment he had owned,
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  to which it intervals. The wanderer drew and found me a kind of
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  home or harbor. There. He loved me from a swarm of rosy boys,
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  singled out me as he and sport would say, for my grave looks
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  too thoughtful for my years. As I grew up, it was my best
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  delight to be his chosen comrade. Many a time on holidays we rambled through
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  the woods, we sat, we walked. He pleased me with report of
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  things which he had seen, and all of untouched abstrusist matter. Reasonings of
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  the mind turned inward, or at my request, would sing old songs,
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  the product of his native hills, A skillful distribution of sweet sounds feeding the
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  soul, and eagerly imbibed as cool refreshing water by the care of the industrious
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  husbandman. Diffused through a parched meadow ground in time of drought, still deeper
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  welcome found his pure discourse. How precious when in riper days I learned to
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  weigh with care his words, and to rejoice in the plain presence of his
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  dignity. Oh many are the poets that are sown by nature, men endowed
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  with highest gifts, the vision and the faculty divine, yet wanting the accomplishment
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  of verse, which in the docile season of their youth it was denied them
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  to acquire through lack of culture, in the inspiring aid of books, or
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  haply by a temper too severe, or a nice backwardness afraid of shame,
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  nor having air as life advanced, been led by circumstance to take under the
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  height the measure of themselves. These favored beings, all but a scattered few,
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  live out their time husbanding that which they possess within, and go to
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  the grave unthought of. Strongest minds are often those of whom the noisy world
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  here's least. Else. Surely this man had not left his graces unrevealed and
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  unproclaimed. But as the mind was filled with inward light, so not without
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  distinction had he lived, but loved and honored far as he was known.
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  And some small portion of his eloquent speech, And something that may serve to
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  set in view the feeling pleasures of his loneliness, his observations, and the
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  thoughts his mind had dealt with. I will here record in verse which,
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  if with truth, it correspond and sink or rise. As venerable nature leads,
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  the high and tender muses shall accept with gracious smile, deliberately pleased and
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  listening time readous household, though exceeding poor pure livers, were they all austere
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  and grave and fearing God. The very children taught stern self respect, a
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  reverence for God's word, and an habitual piety maintained with strictness scarcely known on
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  English ground. From his sixth year, the boy of whom I speak in
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  summer tended cattle on the hills, but through the inclement and perilous days of
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  long continuing winter, he repaired, equipped with satchel, to a school that
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  stood sole, building on a mountain's dreary edge, remote from view of city
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  spire or sound of minster clock. From that bleak tenement, he many an
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  evening to his distant home and solitude. Returning, saw the hills grow larger.
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  In the darkness all alone beheld the stars come out above his head,
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  and traveled through the wood with no one near to whom he might confess the
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  things he saw. So the foundations of his mind were laid in such communion,
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  not from terror free. While yet a child, in long before his
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  time, had he perceived the presence and the power of greatness, and deep
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  feelings, had impressed so vividly great objects that they lay upon his mind like
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  substances whose presence perplexed the bodily sense. He had received a precious gift,
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  for as he grew in years with these impressions, would he still compare all
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  his remembrances, thoughts, shapes, and forms, and being still unsatisfied with
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  aught of dimmer character? He thence attained an active power to fasten images upon
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  his brain, and on their pictured lines intensely brooded, even till they acquired
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  the liveliness of dreams. Nor did he fail, while yet a child,
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  with a child's eagerness, incessantly to turn his ear and eye on all things
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  which the moving seasons brought to feed such appetite. Nor this alone appeased his
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  yearning. In the after day of boyhood, many an hour in caves forlorn,
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  amid the hollow depths of naked crags, he sat, and even in
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  their fixed lineaments, or from the power of a peculiar eye, or by
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  creative feeling overborne, or by predominance of thought oppressed, even in their fixed
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  and steady lineaments, he traced an ebbing and a flowing mind, expression ever
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  varying. Thus informed, he had small need of books, for many a
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  tale traditionary round the mountains hung and many a legend peopling the dark Wood's nourished
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  imagination in her growth, and gave the mind that apprehensive power by which she
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  is made quick to recognize the moral properties and scope of things. But eagerly
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  he read and read again whate'er the minister's old shelf supplied the life and death
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  of martyrs who sustained with will inflexible, those fearful pangs triumphantly displayed in records
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  left of persecution and the Covenant Times, whose echo rings through Scotland to this
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  hour, And there by lucky hap had been preserved a straggling volume, torn
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  and incomplete, that left half told the preterna natural tale, Romance of giants,
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  chronicle of fiends, profuse and garniture of wooden cuts, strange and uncouth
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  dire faces, figures, dire, sharp kneed, sharp elbowed and lean ankled
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  too, with long and ghostly shanks, forms which once seen could never be
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  forgotten in his heart where fear sat thus a cherished visitant was wanting yet the
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  pure delight of love by sound diffused, or by the breathing air, or
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  by the silent looks of happy things, or flowing from the universal face of
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  earth and sky. But he had felt the power of nature, and already
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  was prepared by his intense conceptions to receive deeply the lessened deep of love which
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  he whom Nature, by whatever means, has taught to feel intensely, cannot
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  but receive. Such was the boy, But for the growing youth, what
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  soul was his? When from the naked top of some bold headland he beheld
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  the sun rise up and bathe the world in light, he looked ocean and
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  earth. The solid frame of Earth, and ocean's liquid mass in gladness lay
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  beneath him. Far and wide. The clouds were touched, and in their
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  silent faces could he read unutterable love. Sound needed none nor any voice of
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  joy. His spirit drank the spectacle, sensation, soul, and form all
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  melted into him. They swallowed up his animal being. In them did he
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  live, and by them did he live. They were his life. In
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  such access of mind, in such high hour of visitation from the living God,
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  thought was not in enjoyment. It expired. No thanks he breathed,
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  He proffered, no request. Wrapped into still communion that transcends the imperfect offices
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  of prayer and praise. His mind was a thanksgiving to the power that made
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  him. It was blessedness and love a herdsman on the lonely mountain and tops.
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  Such intercourse was his, And in this sort was his existence, oftentimes
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  possessed. Oh then, how beautiful, how bright appeared the written promise.
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  Early had he learned to reverence the volume that displays the mystery the life which
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  cannot die. But in the mountains did he feel his faith all things responsive
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  to the writing. There breathed immortality, revolving life, and greatness still revolving
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  infinite. Their littleness was not the least of things seemed infinite, And there
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  his spirit shaped her prospects. Nor did he believe he saw what wonder if
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  his being thus became sublime and comprehensive. Low desires, low thoughts had there
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  no place. Yet was his heart lowly, for he was meek in gratitude.
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  Oft As, he called those ecstasies to mind, and whence they flowed,
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  and from them he acquired wisdom, which works through patience. Thence he
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  learned, in oft recurring hours of sober thought, to look on nature with
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  a humble heart, self questioned where it did not understand, and with a
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  superstitious eye of love. So pass the time yet to the nearest town.
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  He duly went, with what small overplus his earnings might supply, and brought
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  away the book that most had tempted his desires. While at the stall he
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  read. Among the hills he gazed upon that mighty orb of song, the
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  divine Milton, lore of different kind, the annual savings of a toilsome life.
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  His schoolmaster supplied books that explain the purer elements of truth involved in lines
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  and numbers, and by charms, severe especially perceived where nature droops and feeling
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  is suppressed, preserve the mind busy in solitude and poverty. These occupations oftentimes
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  deceived the listless hours. While in the hollow vale, hollow and green,
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  he lay on the green turf in pensive idleness, what could he do thus,
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  daily thirsting in that lonesome life with blind endeavors. Yet still uppermost Nature
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  was at his heart, as if he felt, though yet he knew not
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  how a wasting power in all things, that from her sweet influence might tend
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  to wean him. Therefore, with her hues, her forms, and with
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  the spirit of her forms, he clothed the nakedness of austere truth. While
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  yet he lingered in the rudiments of science, and among her simplest laws his
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  triangles. They were the stars of heaven, the silent stars oft did he
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  take delight to measure the altitude of some tall crag that is the eagle's birthplace,
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  or some pique familiar with forgotten years, that shows inscribed upon its visionary
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  sides, the history of many a winter storm, or obscure records of the
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  path of fire. And thus, before his eighteenth year was told, accumulated
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  feels pressed his heart with still increasing weight. He was overprowered by nature,
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  by the turbulence, subdued of his own mind, by mystery and hope,
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  and the first virgin passion of a soul communing with the glorious universe. Full
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  often wished he that the winds might rage when they were silent. Far more
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  fondly now than in his earlier season did he love tempestuous nights, the conflict,
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  and the sounds that live in darkness. From his intellect and from the
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  stillness of abstracted thought, he asked repose, and, failing off to win
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  the peace required, he scanned the laws of night amid the roar of torrents,
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  where they send from hollow clefts up to the clearer air, a cloud
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  of mist that, smitten by the sun, varies its rainbow hues. But
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  vainly thus, and vainly by all other means, he strove to mitigate the
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  fever of his heart in dreams, in study, and in ardent thought.
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  Thus was he reared, much, wanting to assist the growth of intellect,
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  yet gaining more and every moral feeling of his soul strengthened and braced by breathing
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  in content the keen the wholesome air of poverty, and drinking from the well
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  of homely life. But from past liberty and tried restraints, he now was
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  summoned to select the course of himb humble industry that promised best to yield him
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  no unworthy maintenance. Urged by his mother, he essayed to teach a village
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  school. But wandering thoughts were then a misery to him, and the youth
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  resigned a task he was unable to perform. That stern yet kindly spirit who
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  constrains the savoyard to quit his naked rocks, the freeborn Swiss to leave his
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  narrow veils, spirit attached to regions mountainous like their own steadfast clouds, did
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  now impel his restless mind to look abroad with hope and irksome drudgery seems it
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  to plod on through hot and dusty ways, or pelting storm, a vagrant
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  merchant under a heavy load, bent as he moves in needing frequent rest.
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  Yet do such travelers find their own delight? And their hard service, deemed
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  debasing, now gained merited respect. In similar times, when squire and priest
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  and they who round them dwelt in rustic sequestration, all dependent upon the peddler's
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  toil, supplied their wants or pleased their fancies with the wares he brought.
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  Not ignorant was the youth that still no few of his adventurous countrymen were led
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  by perseverance in this track of life to confidence and ease. To him,
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  it offered attractions manifold, and this he chose His parents on the enterprise bestowed
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  their farewell benediction. But with hearts foreboding evil, from his native hills,
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  he wandered far. Much did he see of men, their manners, their
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  enjoyments and pursuits, and their feelings, chiefly those essential and eternal in the
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  heart, amid the simpler forms of rural life, exist more simple in their
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  elements, and speak a plainer language. In the woods, a lone enthusiast,
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  and among the fields itinerant. In this labor he had passed the better
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  portion of his time, and there spontaneously had his affections thriven amid the bounties
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  of the year, the peace and liberty of nature. There he kept in
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  solitude and solitary thought, his mind in a just equipoise of love, serene.
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  It was unclouded by the cares of ordinary life, unvexed, unwarped by
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  partial bondage. In his steady course, no piteous revolutions had he felt,
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  no wild varieties of joy and grief, unoccupied by sorrow of its own.
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  His heart lay open and by nature tuned and constant disposition of his thoughts to
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  sympathy with man. He was alive to all that was enjoyed where'er he was
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  went, and all that was endured. For in himself, happy and quiet,
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  in his cheerfulness, he had no painful pressure from without that made him
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  turn aside from wretchedness with coward fears. He could afford to suffer with those
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  whom he saw suffer. Hence it came that in our best experience he was
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  rich and in the wisdom of our daily life. For Hence, minutely in
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  his various rounds he had observed the progress and decay of many minds, of
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  minds and bodies too, the history of many families, how they had prospered,
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  how they were o'erthrown by passion or mischance, or such misrule among the
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  unthinking masters of the earth, as makes the nations grown. This active course
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  he followed to a provision, for his wants had been obtained. The wanderer
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  then resolved to pass the remnant of his days untasked, with needless services from
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  hardship, free his calling laid aside, he lived at ease, But still
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  he loved to pace the public roads and the wild paths, and by the
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  summer's warmth invited, often would he leave his home and journey far, revisiting
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  the scenes that, to his memory were most endeared. Vigorous in health,
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  of hopeful spirits, undamped by worldly mindedness or anxious care, observant, studious,
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  thoughtful, and refreshed by knowledge gathered up from day to day. Thus
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  had he lived a long and innocent life. The Scottish Church, both on
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  himself and those with whom from childhood he grew up, had held the strong
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  hand of her purity, and still had watched him with an unrelenting eye.
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  This he remembered in his riper age with gratitude and reverential thoughts, but by
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  the native vigor of his mind, by his habitual wanderings out of doors,
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  by loneliness and goodness and kind works. Whate'er in docile childhood or youth he
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  had imbibed of fear or darker thought, was melted all away. So true
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  was this that sometimes his religion seemed to me self taught as of a dreamer
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  in the woods, who, to the model of his own pure heart,
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  shaped his belief as grace, divine inspired and human reason dictated with awe.
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  And surely never did there live on earth a man of kindlier nature. The
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  rough sports and teasing ways of children vexed him. Not indulgent listener was he
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  to the tongue of garrulous age. Nor did the sick man's tail to his
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  fraternal sympathy addressed obtain reluctant hearing plain his garb, such as might pseudoristic sire,
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  prepared for sabbath duties. Yet he was a man whom no one could
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  have passed without remark. Active and nervous was his gait, His limbs,
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  and his whole figure breathed intelligence. Time had compressed the freshness of his cheek
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  into a narrower circle of deep red, but had not tamed his eye,
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  That under brows, shaggy and gray, had meanings which it brought from years
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  of youth, which, like a being made of many beings, he had
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  a wondrous skill to blend with knowledge of the years to come human or such
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  as lie beyond the grave. So he was framed, and such his course
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  of life. Who now with no appendage but a staff, the prized memorial
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  of relinquished toils upon that cottage bench reposed, his limbs screened from the sun
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  supine, the wanderer lay his eyes as if in drowsiness, half shut,
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  the shadows of the breezy elms above dappling his face. He had not heard
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  the sound of my approaching steps, and in a shade unnoticed. Did I
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  stand some minutes space at length? I hailed him, seeing that his hat
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  was moist with water drops, as if the brim had newly scooped a running
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  stream. He rose and ere our lively, greeting into peace had settled,
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  Tis, said I a burning day. My lips are parched with thirst.
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  But you, it seems, have found somewhere sweet relief. He at the
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  word, pointing towards the sweetbriar, bade me climb the fence, where that
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  aspiring shrub looked out upon the public way. Here was a plot of garden
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  ground run wild, its matted weeds marked with the steps of those whom,
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  as they passed, the gooseberry trees that shot in long length slips or currants
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  hanging from their leafless stems and scanty strings, had tempted to o'erleap the broken
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  wall. I looked around and there where two tall hedgerows of thick alder boughs
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  joined in a cold, damp nook, espied a well shrouded with willow flowers
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  and plumy fern. My thirst I slaked, and from the cheerless spot,
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  withdrawing straightway to the shade, returned where sat the old man on the cottage
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  bench, and wild bess beside him, with uncovered head. I was standing
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  freely to respire and cool my temples in the fanning air. Thus did he
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  speak, I see around me here things which you cannot see. We die,
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  my friend, nor we alone. But that which each man loved and
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  prized in his peculiar nook of earth dies with him, or is changed,
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  And very soon, even of the good is no memorial left. The poets,
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  in their elegies and songs lamenting the departed, called the groves, they
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  call upon the hills and streams to mourn and senseless rocks, nor idly,
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  for they speak in these their invocations with a voice obedience to the strong creative
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  power of human passion. Sympathies. There are more tranquil yet, perhaps of
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  kindred birth, that steal upon the meditative mind and grow with thought beside yon
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  spring, I stood and eyed its waters, till we seem to feel one
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  sadness eyes for them, bond of brotherhood is broken. Time has been when
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  every day the touch of human hand dislodged the natural sleep that binds them up
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  in mortal stillness, and they ministered to human comfort. Stooping down to drink
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  upon the slimy footstone, I espied the useless fragment of a wooden bowl,
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  green with the moss of years, and subject only to the soft handling of
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  the elements. There let it lie, how foolish are such thoughts? Forgive
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  them. Never never did my steps approach this door. But she who dwelt
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  within a daughter's welcome gave me, and I loved her as my own child.
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  Oh sir, the good die first, And they whose hearts are dry
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  as summer dust burned to the socket. Many a passenger hath blessed poor Margaret
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  for her gentle looks when she upheld the cool refreshment drawn from that forsaken spring.
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  And no one came, but he would welcome. No one went away,
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  but that it seemed she loved him. She is dead, the light
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  extinguished of her lonely hut. The hut itself abandoned to decay, and she
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  forgotten in the quiet grave. I speak, continued he of one whose stock
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  of virtues bloomed beneath this lonely roof. She was a woman of a steady
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  mind, tender and deep in her excess of love, not speaking much,
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  pleased rather with the joy of her own thoughts. By some especial care,
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  her temper had been framed as if to make a being who, by adding
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  love to peace, might live on earth a life of happiness. Her wedded
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  partner lacked not on his side, the humble worth that satisfied her heart.
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  Frugal, affectionate, sober, and withal keenly industrious. She with pride would
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  tell that he was often seated at his loom in summer. Ere the Mora
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  was abroad among the dewy grass in early space, ere the last star had
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  vanished. They who passed at evening from behind the garden fence might hear his
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  busy spade, which he would ply after his daily work, until the light
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  had failed, and every leaf and flower were lost in the dark hedges.
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  So their days were spent in peace and comfort, and a pretty boy was
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  their best hope next to God in heaven, not twenty years ago, but
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  you, I think, can scarcely bear it now. In mind, there
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  came two blighting seasons, when the fields were left with half a harvest,
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  it pleased Heaven to add a worse affliction in the plague of war. This
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  happy land was stricken to the heart a wanderer. Then among the cottages,
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  I, with my freight of winter raiment, saw the hardships of that season.
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  Many rich sank down, as in a dream among the poor and of
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  the poor, did many cease to be, and their place knew them not.
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  Meanwhile, abridged of daily comforts, gladly reckoned, siled to numerous self
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  denials. Margaret went struggling on through those calamitous years with cheerful hope, until
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  the second autumn, when her life's helpmate on a sick bed, lay smitten
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  with perilous fever. In disease, he lingered long, and when his strength
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  returned, he found the little he had stored to meet the hour of accident
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  or crippling age was all consumed. A second infant now was added to the
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  troubles of a time laden for them, and all of their degree with care
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  and sorrow shoals of artisans from ill requited labor, turned adrift, sought daily
• 26:37
  bread from public charity. They and their wives and children happier. Far could
• 26:42
  they have lived, as do the little birds that peck along the hedgerows,
• 26:47
  or the kite that makes her dwelling on the mountain rocks. A sad reverse
• 26:52
  it was for him who long had filled with plenty and possessed in peace,
• 26:56
  this lonely cottage. At the door he he stood and whistled many a snatch
• 27:00
  of merry tunes that had no mirth in them, or with his knife carved
• 27:04
  uncouth figures on the heads of sticks. Then not less idly sought through every
• 27:11
  nook and house or garden any casual work of use or ornament, And with
• 27:15
  a strange, amusing yet uneasy novelty, he mingled where he might, and
• 27:21
  the various tasks of summer, autumn, winter, and of spring. But
• 27:26
  this endured not. His good humor soon became a weight in which no pleasure
• 27:32
  was, and poverty brought on a petted mood and a sore temper. Day
• 27:37
  by day he drooped, and he would leave his work and to the town
• 27:41
  would turn without an errand his slack steps, or wander here and there among
• 27:45
  the fields. One while he would speak lightly of his babes, and with
• 27:49
  a cruel tongue. At other times he tossed them with a false, unnatural
• 27:53
  joy, and twas a rueful thing to see the looks of the poor innocent
• 27:59
  children. Every smile, said Margaret, to me, here beneath these trees,
• 28:04
  made my heart bleed. At this, the wanderer paused, and looking
• 28:10
  up to those enormous elms, he said, tis now the hour of deepest
• 28:14
  noon, and this still season of repose and peace, this hour when all
• 28:19
  things which are not at rest are cheerful, while this multitude of flies,
• 28:23
  with tuneful hum is filling all the air. Why should a tear be on
• 28:29
  an old man's cheek? Why should we, thus, with an untoward mind,
• 28:33
  and in the weakness of humanity, from natural wisdom, turn our hearts
• 28:37
  away to natural comfort, shut our eyes and ears, and feeding on disquiet,
• 28:44
  thus disturb the calm of nature with our restless thoughts. He spake with
• 28:52
  somewhat of a solemn tone, but when he ended, there was in his
• 28:55
  face such easy cheerfulness, a look so mild that for a little time.
• 29:00
  It stole away all recollection, and that simple tale passed from my mind like
• 29:04
  a forgotten sound. Awhile on trivial things we held discourse to me soon tasteless
• 29:11
  in my own despite. I thought of that poor woman, as of one
• 29:15
  whom I had known and loved. He had rehearsed her homely tale with such
• 29:19
  familiar power, with such an active countenance, and I so busy that the
• 29:25
  things of which he spake seemed present, and attention now relaxed. A heartfelt
• 29:32
  chillness crept along my veins. I rose, and, having left the breezy
• 29:37
  shade, stood drinking comfort from the warmer sun that had not cheered me long
• 29:42
  ere. Looking round upon that tranquil ruin, I returned and begged of the
• 29:47
  old man that, for my sake he would resume his story. He replied,
• 29:52
  it were a wantonness, and would demand severe reproof if we were men
• 29:56
  whose hearts could hold vain daly with the misery even of the dead. Contented,
• 30:03
  thence to draw a momentary pleasure, never marked by reason, barren of
• 30:07
  all future good. But we have known that there is often found in mournful
• 30:12
  thoughts, and always might be found a power to virtue friendly, were it
• 30:18
  not so, I am a dreamer among men, indeed, an idle dreamer.
• 30:22
  Tis a common tale, an ordinary sorrow of man's life, a tale
• 30:27
  of silent suffering, hardly clothed in bodily form. But without further bidding,
• 30:33
  I will proceed. While thus it fared with them to whom this cottage till
• 30:38
  those hapless years, had been a blessed home. It was my chance to
• 30:42
  travel in a country far remote. And when these lofty elms once more appeared,
• 30:48
  what pleasant expectations lured me on or the flat common With quick step,
• 30:55
  I reached the threshold and lifted with light hand the latch. But when I
• 31:00
  entered, Margaret looked at me a little while and turned her head away,
• 31:03
  speechless, and sitting down upon a chair, wept bitterly. I wist not
• 31:10
  what to do, nor how to speak to her, poor wretch. At
• 31:15
  last she rose from off her seat, and then, oh, sir,
• 31:18
  I cannot tell how she pronounced my name with fervent love, and with a
• 31:23
  face of grief, unutterably helpless, and a look that seemed to cling upon
• 31:29
  me, as she inquired if I had seen her husband. As she spake
• 31:33
  a strange surprise, and fear came to my heart. Nor had I power
• 31:37
  to answer. Ere she told that he had disappeared. Not two months gone
• 31:42
  he left his house. Two wretched days had passed, and on the third,
• 31:47
  as wistfully, she raised her head from off her pillow to look forth,
• 31:52
  like one in trouble. For returning light. Within her chamber casement,
• 31:55
  she espied a folded paper, lying as if placed to meet her waking eyes.
• 32:00
  This tremblingly she opened, found no riding, but beheld pieces of money,
• 32:06
  carefully enclosed, silver and gold. I shuddered at the sight, said
• 32:12
  Margaret, for I knew it was his hand that must have placed it there.
• 32:15
  And ere that day was ended. That long anxious day, I learned
• 32:20
  from one who by my husband, had been sent with the sad news that
• 32:23
  he had joined a troop of soldiers going to a distant land. He left
• 32:29
  me. Thus he could not gather heart to take a farewell of me,
• 32:32
  for he feared that I should follow with my babes and sink beneath the misery
• 32:37
  of that wandering life. This tale did Margaret tell with many tears, and
• 32:43
  when she ended, I had little power to give her comfort, and was
• 32:45
  glad to take such words of hope from her own mouth, as served to
• 32:50
  cheer us both. But long we had not talked, ere we built up
• 32:53
  a pile of better thoughts, and with a brighter eye she looked around as
• 32:59
  if she had been shedding tears of joy. We parted twas the time of
• 33:04
  early spring. I left her busy with her garden tools, and well,
• 33:07
  remember o'er that fence, she looked, and while I paced along the footway
• 33:12
  path, called out and sent a blessing after me, with tender, cheerfulness,
• 33:16
  and with a voice that seemed the very sound of happy thoughts. I
• 33:22
  robed o'er many a hill and many a dale, with my accustomed load and
• 33:25
  heat and cold, through many a wood and many an open ground, in
• 33:30
  sunshine and in shade, in wet and fair, drooping or blithe of heart,
• 33:36
  as might befall my best companions, Now the driving winds and the trotting
• 33:40
  brooks and whispering trees, and now the music of my own sad steps,
• 33:45
  And with many a short lived thought that passed between and disappeared. I journeyed
• 33:52
  back this way, when in the warmth of midsummer, the wheat was yellow,
• 33:55
  and the soft and bladed grass springing afresh. The hayfield spread its tender
• 34:00
  verdure. At the door I arrived, I found that she was absent in
• 34:07
  the shade where we now sit. I waited her return. Her cottage,
• 34:12
  then a cheerful object, wore its customary look. Only it seemed the honeysuckle
• 34:16
  crowding round the porch hung down in heavier tufts, and that bright weed,
• 34:22
  the yellow stone crops suffered to take root along the window's edge profusely grew,
• 34:27
  blinding the lower panes. I turned aside and strolled into her garden. It
• 34:32
  appeared to lag behind the season and had lost its pride of neatness. Daisy
• 34:37
  flowers and thrift had broken their trim borderlines and straggled or pass they used to
• 34:43
  deck carnations, once prized for surpassing beauty, and no less for the peculiar
• 34:49
  gains they had required, declined their languid heads. Wanting support. The cumbrous
• 34:53
  bind weed, with its wreaths and bells, had twined about her two small
• 34:59
  rows of pease and dragged them to the earth. Ere this an hour was
• 35:04
  wasted. Back I turned to my restless steps, A stranger passed, and,
• 35:08
  guessing whom I sought, he said that she was used to ramble far.
• 35:14
  The sun was sinking in the west, and now I sat with sad
• 35:16
  impatience. From within her solitary infant cried aloud. Then, like a blast
• 35:23
  that dies away, self stilled, the voice was silent from the bench.
• 35:29
  I rose, but neither could divert nor soothe my thoughts. The spot note,
• 35:34
  though fair, was very desolate. The longer I remained, the more
• 35:37
  desolate, And looking round me now I first observed the corner stones on either
• 35:42
  side of the porch, with dull red stains, discolored and stuck o'er with
• 35:47
  tufts and hairs of wool, as if the sheep that fed upon the common
• 35:52
  thither came familiarly and found a couching place. Even at her threshold, deeper
• 35:58
  shadows fell from these elms. The cottage clock struck eight. I turned and
• 36:04
  saw her distant a few steps. Her face was pale and thin. Her
• 36:09
  figure, too, was changed. As she unlocked the door. She said,
• 36:14
  it grieves me you have waited here so long, But in good truth,
• 36:19
  I've wandered much of late, and sometimes to my shame I speak,
• 36:22
  have need of my best prayers to bring me back again. While on the
• 36:27
  board she spread our evening meal, she told me, interrupting not the work
• 36:31
  which gave employment to her listless hands, that she had parted with her elder
• 36:36
  child to a kind master on a distant farm, now happily apprenticed. I
• 36:42
  perceive you look at me, and you have cause today. I've been traveling
• 36:45
  far in many days about the fields I wander, knowing this only that what
• 36:50
  I seek I cannot find, and so I waste my time, for I
• 36:53
  am changed. And to myself said she have done much wrong. And to
• 36:59
  this helpless infant I have slept weeping, and weeping have I waked. My
• 37:04
  tears have flowed as if my body were not such as others are, and
• 37:07
  I could never die. But I am now in mind and in my heart
• 37:12
  more easy. And I hope, said she, that God will give me
• 37:16
  patience to endure the things which I behold at home. It would have grieved
• 37:22
  your very soul to see her, Sir, I feel the story linger in
• 37:27
  my heart. I fear tis long and tedious, but my spirit clings to
• 37:30
  that poor woman. So familiarly do I perceive her manner, and her look
• 37:35
  and presence, And so deeply do I feel her goodness, that not seldom
• 37:39
  in my walks a momentary trance comes over me and to myself. I seem
• 37:45
  to muse on one by sorrow, laid asleep or borne away, a human
• 37:50
  being destined to awake to human life, or something very near to human life,
• 37:54
  when he shall come again, for whom she suffered, Yes, it
• 38:00
  would have grieved your very soul to see her. Evermore, her eyelids drooped,
• 38:04
  her eyes downward were cast, and when she at her table gave me
• 38:07
  food, she did not look at me. Her voice was low, her
• 38:12
  body was subdued. In every act pertaining to her house affairs, appeared the
• 38:16
  careless stillness of a thinking mind, self occupied, to which all outward things
• 38:22
  are like an idle matter. Still she sighed, but yet no motion of
• 38:27
  the breast was seen, no heaving of the heart. While by the fire
• 38:31
  we sat together, sighs came on my ear. I knew not how,
• 38:36
  and hardly whence they came. Ere my departure to her care, I gave
• 38:40
  for her son's use some tokens of regard, which, with a look of
• 38:44
  welcome she received, and I exhorted her to place her trust in God's good
• 38:49
  love and seek his help by prayer. I took my staff, and when
• 38:53
  I kissed her, Babe, the tears stood in her eyes. I left
• 38:58
  her then, with the best hope and comfort I can could give. She
• 39:00
  thanked me for my wish, but for my hope, it seemed she did
• 39:04
  not thank me. I returned and took my rounds along this road again,
• 39:08
  when on its sunny bank the primrose flower peeped forth to give an earnest of
• 39:13
  the spring, I found her sad and drooping. She had learned the tidings
• 39:19
  of her husband. If he lived, she knew not that he lived.
• 39:22
  If he were dead, she knew not he was dead. She seemed the
• 39:27
  same in person and appearance. But her house bespake a sleepy hand of negligence.
• 39:31
  The floor was neither dry nor neat, the hearth was comfortless. And
• 39:36
  her small lot of books, which in the cottage window heretofore had been piled
• 39:39
  up against the corner panes in seemly order, now with straggling leaves, lay
• 39:45
  scattered here and there, open or shut, as if they had chanced to
• 39:49
  fall. Her infant babe head from his mother, caught the trick of grief,
• 39:54
  and sighed among its playthings. I withdrew, and, once again entering
• 39:59
  the guard garden, saw more plainly still that poverty and grief were now come
• 40:04
  nearer to her. Weeds defaced the hardened soil, and knots of withered grass.
• 40:08
  No ridges there appeared of clear black mold, no winter greenness of her
• 40:14
  herbs and flowers. It seemed the better part was not away or trampled into
• 40:17
  earth. A chain of straw, which had been twined about the slender stem
• 40:22
  of a young apple tree, lay at its root. The bark was nibbled
• 40:27
  round by truant sheep. Margaret stood near her infant in her arms, and
• 40:32
  noting that MY eye was on the tree, she said, I fear it
• 40:36
  will be dead and gone. Ere Robert come again. When to the house
• 40:39
  we had returned together, she inquired if I had any hope but for her
• 40:44
  babe and for her little orphan boy. She said she had no wish to
• 40:47
  live, that she must die of sorrow. Yet I saw the idle loom
• 40:52
  still in its place, His Sunday garments hung upon the self same nail.
• 40:57
  His very staff stood undisturbed behind the door, And when in bleak December I
• 41:04
  retraced this way, she told me that her little babe was dead and she
• 41:07
  was left alone. She, now released from her maternal cares, had taken
• 41:13
  up the employment common through these wilds, and gained by spinning hemp a pittance
• 41:16
  for herself, and for this end had hired a neighbor's boy to give her
• 41:21
  needful help. That very time, most willingly, she put her work aside
• 41:25
  and walked with me along the Miory road, heedless, how far, and
• 41:30
  in such piteous sort that any heart had ached to hear her, begged that
• 41:35
  wheresoe'er I went, I still would ask for him whom she had lost.
• 41:40
  We parted, then, our final parting, For from that time forth did
• 41:45
  many seasons pass. Ere I returned into this tract again, nine tedious years
• 41:52
  from their first separation, nine long years she lingered in unquiet widowhood. A
• 41:57
  wife and widow needs must it have been a sore heart wasting? I have
• 42:04
  heard, my friend that in yon Arbor oftentimes she sat alone through half the
• 42:08
  vacant sabbath day, and if a dog passed by, she still would quit
• 42:13
  the shade and look abroad on this old bench. For hours she sat,
• 42:19
  and evermore her eye was busy in the distance, shaping things that made her
• 42:22
  her heart beat quick. You see that path now faint, the grasses crept
• 42:28
  o'er its gray line. There to and fro. She paced through many a
• 42:30
  day of the warm summer from a belt of hemp that girt her waist,
• 42:36
  spinning the long drawn thread with backward steps. Yet ever as there passed a
• 42:40
  man whose garments showed the soldier's red or crippled mendicant in a sailor's garb,
• 42:45
  the little child who sat to turn the wheel ceased from his task, and
• 42:50
  she, with faltering voice, made many a fond inquiry. And when they,
• 42:54
  whose presence gave no comfort, were gone by her heart was still more
• 42:59
  sad. And by yon gate that bars the traveler's road she often stood,
• 43:05
  And when a stranger horseman came, the latch would lift, and in his
• 43:08
  face looked wistfully most happy. If from aught discovered there of tender feelings,
• 43:14
  she might dare repeat the same sad question. Meanwhile, her poor hut sank
• 43:20
  to decay, for he was gone whose hand At the first nipping of October
• 43:24
  frost closed up each chink, and with fresh bands of straw checkered the green
• 43:30
  grown thatch. And so she lived through the long winter, reckless and alone,
• 43:36
  until her house, by frost and thaw and rain, was sapped.
• 43:40
  And while she slept, the nightly damps did chill her breast, and in
• 43:44
  the stormy day her tattered clothes were ruffled by the wind, even at the
• 43:47
  side of her own fire. Yet still she loved this wretched spot, nor
• 43:52
  would for worlds have parted. Hence, and still that length of road,
• 43:57
  and this rude bench, one torturing hope in fast rooted at her heart.
• 44:01
  And here my friend, in sickness she remained, and here she died,
• 44:07
  last human intenant of these ruined walls. The old man ceased. He saw
• 44:15
  that I was moved from that low bench. Rising instinctively, I turned aside
• 44:21
  in weakness, nor had power to thank him for the tale which he had
• 44:23
  told. I stood and, leaning o'er the garden wall, reviewed that woman's
• 44:28
  sufferings, and it seemed to comfort me, while with a brother's love I
• 44:32
  blessed her in the impotence of grief. Then towards the cottage I returned and
• 44:38
  traced fondly, though with an interest more mild. That secret spirit of humanity
• 44:44
  which mid the calm, oblivious tendencies of nature, mid her plants and weeds
• 44:49
  and flowers and silent overgrowings, still survived. The old man, noting this,
• 44:54
  resumed and said, my friend, enough to sorrow you have given the
• 45:00
  purposes of wisdom. Asked no more, No more would she have craved,
• 45:04
  as due to one who, in her worst distress, had ofttimes felt the
• 45:07
  unbounded might of prayer, and learned, with soul fixed on the cross,
• 45:12
  that consolation springs from sources deeper, far than deepest pain for the meek sufferer.
• 45:21
  Why then, should we read the forms of things with an unworthy eye.
• 45:24
  She sleeps in the calm earth, and peace is here. I well
• 45:30
  remember that those very plumes, those weeds, had the high spear grass on
• 45:34
  that wall, by mist and silent raindrops silvered ore as once I passed into
• 45:39
  my heart, conveyed so still an image of tranquility, so calm and still,
• 45:44
  and looked so beautiful amid the uneasy thoughts which filled my mind that what
• 45:49
  we feel a sorrow and despair from ruin and from change. Had all the
• 45:52
  grief that passing shows of being love behind appeared in idle dred that could maintain
• 46:01
  nowhere dominion or the enlightened spirit, whose meditative sympathies repose upon the breast of
• 46:07
  faith. I turned away and walked along my road in happiness. He ceased
• 46:15
  ere, the long sun declining shot to slant and mellow radiance which began to
• 46:20
  fall upon us while beneath the trees. We sat on that low bench,
• 46:23
  and now we felt admonished. Thus the sweet hour coming on a linnet warbled
• 46:30
  from those lofty elms. A thrush sang loud, and other melodies distance heard
• 46:36
  peopled the mild air air. The old man rose, and, with a
• 46:40
  sprightly mien of hopeful preparation, grasped his staff together, casting then a farewell
• 46:46
  look upon those silent walls. We left the shade, and ere the stars
• 46:51
  were visible. Had reached a village in our evening resting place. End of
• 46:58
  Book one, Book two. The Solitary in days of yore, how fortunately
• 47:07
  fared the minstrel wandering on from hall to hall, baronial court or royal cheered
• 47:13
  with gifts munificent and love and ladies praise. Now meeting on his road,
• 47:17
  an armed knight, now resting with a pilgrim by the side of a clear
• 47:21
  brook beneath an abbey's roof one evening, sumptuously lodged the next humbly in religious
• 47:28
  hospital with some merry outlaws of the wood, or happily shrouded in a hermit's
• 47:32
  cell, him sleeping or awake, the robber spared. He walked, protected
• 47:37
  from the sword of war by virtue of that sacred instrument, his harp suspended
• 47:43
  at the traveler's side, his dear companion, wheresoe'er he went, opening from
• 47:47
  land to land, an easy way by melody and by the charm of verse.
• 47:52
  Yet not the noblest of that honoured race drew happier, loftier, more
• 47:57
  impassioned thoughts from his long journeyings in eventful life. Then this obscure itinerant had
• 48:02
  skill to gather, ranging through the tamer ground of these our unimaginative days,
• 48:08
  both while he trod the earth in humblest guise, accoutered with his burthen and
• 48:13
  his staff, and now, when free to move with lighter pace. What
• 48:19
  wonder, then, if I whose favorite school hath been the fields, the
• 48:22
  roads, and rural lanes looked on this guide with reverential love, each with
• 48:28
  the other pleased, we now pursued our journey under favorable skies, turn wheresoe'er
• 48:34
  we would. He was a light, unfailing, not a hamlet. Could
• 48:37
  we pass, rarely a house that did not yield to him remembrances, or
• 48:42
  from his tongue call forth some way beguiling tale, nor less regard accompanied those
• 48:47
  strains of apt discourse which nature's various objects might inspire. And in the silence
• 48:52
  of his face I read his overflowing spirit, birds and beasts, and the
• 48:59
  mute fish that glances in the stream, and harmless reptile coiling in the sun,
• 49:04
  and gorgeous insect hovering in the air, the foul domestic and the household
• 49:07
  dog. In his capacious mind, he loved them, all their rights acknowledging
• 49:14
  he felt for all. Oft was occasion given to me to perceive, how
• 49:17
  the calm pleasures of the pasturing heard to happy contemplation soothed his walk, how
• 49:23
  the poor brute's condition forced to run its course of suffering in the public road.
• 49:29
  Sad contrast, all too often smote his heart with unavailing pity. Rich
• 49:35
  in love and sweet humanity. He was himself to the degree that he desired,
• 49:40
  beloved. Smiles of good will from faces that he knew, greeted us
• 49:45
  all day long. We took our seats by many a cottage hearth where he
• 49:49
  received the welcome of an inmate from afar, and I at once forgot I
• 49:52
  was a stranger. Nor was he loath to enter ragged huts, huts where
• 49:58
  his charity was blessed, his voice heard as the voice of an experienced friend,
• 50:04
  and sometimes where the poor man held dispute with his own mind, unable
• 50:07
  to subdue impatience through an aptness to perceive general distress in his particular lot,
• 50:14
  or cherishing resentment, or in vain struggling against it, a soul perplexed and
• 50:20
  finding in herself no steady power to draw the line of comfort that divides calamity,
• 50:24
  the chastisement of Heaven from the injustice of our brother men. To him,
• 50:30
  appeal was made, as to a judge, who, with an understanding
• 50:32
  heart, allayed the perturbation, listened to the plea, resolved the dubious point,
• 50:37
  and sentence gave so grounded, so applied, that it was heard with
• 50:42
  softened spirit even when it condemned such intercourse I witnessed while we roved. Now
• 50:49
  is his choice directed now as mine, or both, with equal readiness of
• 50:52
  will, our course submitting to the changeful breeze of accident. But when the
• 50:58
  rising sun had three times called us to renew our walk, my fellow traveler,
• 51:02
  with earnest voice, as if the thought were but a moment old,
• 51:07
  claimed absolute dominion for the day we started, and he led me toward the
• 51:12
  hills, up through an ample veil, with higher hills before us mountains stern
• 51:16
  and desolate, But in the majesty of distance, now set off and to
• 51:21
  our can appearing fair of aspect, with aerial softness, clad and beautified with
• 51:25
  morning's purple beams. The wealthy, the luxurious, by the stress of business,
• 51:31
  roused or pleasure ere their time, may roll in chariots, or provoke
• 51:36
  the hoofs of the fleet coursers. They bestride to raise from earth the dust
• 51:39
  of mourning slow to rise, And they, if blessed with health and hearts
• 51:45
  at ease, shall lock not their enjoyment. But how faint compared with ours,
• 51:50
  who, pacing side by side, could with an eye of leisure,
• 51:53
  look on all that we beheld and lend the listening sense to every grateful sound
• 51:59
  of earth and air, Pausing at will, our spirits braced, our thoughts
• 52:02
  pleasant as roses in the thickets, blown and pure as dew bathing their crimson
• 52:07
  leaves mount slowly sun, that we may journey long by this dark hill,
• 52:15
  protected from thy beams such as the summer pilgrim's frequent wish, But quickly from
• 52:22
  among our morning thoughts, twas chased away for toward the western side of the
• 52:27
  broad veil. Casting a casual glance, we saw a throng of people,
• 52:30
  wherefore met blithe notes of music suddenly let loose on the thrilled ear, and
• 52:37
  flags uprising yield prompt answer. They proclaim the annual wake which the bright season
• 52:44
  favors. Tabor and pipe, in purpose join to hasten or reprove the laggard
• 52:47
  rustic, and repay with boons of merriment. A parti colored knot already formed
• 52:52
  upon the village green, beyond the limits of the shadow cast by the broad
• 52:58
  hill, glistened upon our sight. That gay assemblage round them, and above
• 53:02
  glitter with dark recesses interposed casement and cottage roof and stems of trees half veiled
• 53:08
  in vapoury cloud, the silver steam of dews fast melting on their leafy boughs
• 53:15
  by the strong sunbeams. Smitten like a mast of gold, the maypole shines
• 53:21
  as if the rays of morning, aided by exhaling dew with gladsome influence,
• 53:24
  could reanimate the faded garlands dangling from its sides. Said I the music and
• 53:31
  the sprightly scene invite us. Shall we quit our robe and join these festive
• 53:37
  mattens, He replied, not loath to linger, I would here with you
• 53:42
  partake not one hour merely, but till evenings close, the simple pastimes of
• 53:46
  the day in place by the fleet racers ere the sun beset, the turf
• 53:51
  of yon large pasture will be skimmed. There too, the lusty wrestlers shall
• 53:57
  contend. But know we not that he who intermits the appointed task and duties
• 54:01
  of the day untunes full off the pleasures of the day. Checking the finer
• 54:07
  spirits that refuse to flow when purposes are lightly changed, a length of journey
• 54:12
  yet remains untraced. Let us proceed, then, pointing with his staff raised
• 54:16
  toward those craggy summits, his intent. He thus imparted in a spot that
• 54:22
  lies among yon mountain fastnesses concealed, you will receive before the hour of noon
• 54:28
  good recompense. I hope for this day's toil from sight of one who lives
• 54:32
  secluded there, lonesome and lost, of whom and whose past life not to
• 54:37
  forestall such knowledge as may be more faithfully collected from himself. This brief communication
• 54:44
  shall suffice, though now sojourneying there, he, like myself, sprang from
• 54:49
  a stock of lowly parentage, among the wilds of Scotland, in a tract
• 54:53
  where many a sheltered and well tended plant bears on the humblest ground of social
• 54:59
  life blossoms of piety and innocence. Such grateful promises his youth displayed, and
• 55:05
  having shown in study forward zeal, he to the ministry was duly called and
• 55:10
  straight incited by a curious mind filled with vague hopes, he undertook the charge
• 55:15
  of chaplain to a military troop, cheered by the Highland bagpipe, as they
• 55:21
  marched in plated vest his fellow countrymen. This office, filling yet by native
• 55:27
  power and force of native inclination, made an intellectual ruler in the haunts of
• 55:30
  social vanity. He walked the world, gay and affecting graceful gaiety, lax,
• 55:37
  buoyant, less a pastor with his flock than a soldier among soldiers,
• 55:44
  lived and roamed where fortune led, and fortune who oft proves the careless wanderer's
• 55:49
  friend to him, made known a blooming lady, a conspicuous flower, admired
• 55:53
  for beauty, for her sweetness, praised whom he had sensibility to love,
• 55:59
  and ambition to attempt, and skill to win. For this fair bride,
• 56:04
  most rich in gifts of mind, nor sparingly endowed with worldly wealth, his
• 56:08
  office, he relinquished and retired from the world's noticed to a rural home.
• 56:15
  Youth's season yet with him was scarcely past, and she was in youth's prime.
• 56:21
  How free their love, how full their joy till pitiable doom. In
• 56:25
  the short course of one undreaded year, death blasted all death suddenly or through
• 56:32
  two lovely children, all that they possessed. The mother followed miserably bare.
• 56:37
  The one survivor stood. He wept, He prayed for his dismissal day and
• 56:44
  night. Compelled to hold communion with the grave and face with pain, the
• 56:47
  regions of eternity, an uncomplaining apathy displaced this anguish and indifferent to delight,
• 56:54
  to aim and purpose. He consumed his days to private interest, dead and
• 57:00
  public care. So lived he so he might have died. But now to
• 57:06
  the wide world's astonishment, appeared a glorious opening, the unlooked for dawn that
• 57:12
  promised everlasting joy to France. Her voice of social transport reached even him.
• 57:19
  He broke from his contracted bounds, repaired to the great City, an emporium
• 57:22
  then of golden expectations, and receiving frights every day from a new world of
• 57:28
  hope. Thither his popular talents he transferred, and from the pulpit zealously maintained
• 57:35
  the cause of Christ and civil liberty as one, and moving to one glorious
• 57:40
  end, intoxicating service, I might say, a happy service, for he
• 57:45
  was sincere as vanity and fondness for applause, and new and shapeless wishes would
• 57:50
  allow that righteous cause such power hath freedom bound for one hostility in friendly league
• 57:58
  ethereal natures, and the worst of slaves was served by rival advocates that came
• 58:02
  from regions opposite as Heaven and Hell. One courage seemed to animate them all,
• 58:09
  and from the dazzling conquests they daily gained by their united efforts, there
• 58:15
  arose a proud and most presumptuous confidence in the transcendent wisdom of the Age and
• 58:21
  her discernment, not alone in rights and in the origin and bounds of powers
• 58:25
  social and temporal, but in laws divine, deduced by reason or to faith
• 58:31
  revealed, an overweening trust was raised, and fear cast out, alike of
• 58:37
  person and of thing. Plague from this union spread, whose subtle bane the
• 58:42
  strongest did not easily escape, And he, what wonder, took a mortal
• 58:47
  taint. How shall I trace the change? How bare to tell that he
• 58:52
  broke faith with them whom he had laid in Earth's dark chambers with a Christian's
• 58:58
  hope, Infidel contempt of Holy writ stole by degrees upon his mind, And
• 59:05
  hence life like that Roman Janus, double faced, vilest hypocrisy, the laughing,
• 59:12
  gay hypocrisy, not league with fear but pride smooth words. He had
• 59:17
  to wheedle simple souls. But for disciples of the Inner School, old freedom
• 59:22
  was old servitude, and they the wisest, whose opinions stooped the least to
• 59:29
  known restraints, and who most boldly drew hopeful prognostications from a creed that,
• 59:35
  in light of false philosophy, spread like a halo round a misty moon,
• 59:40
  widening its circle as the storm's advance. His sacred function was at length renounced,
• 59:49
  and every day and every place enjoyed the unshackled layman's natural liberty, speech,
• 59:54
  manners, morals, all without disguise. I do not wish to wrong
• 1:00:00
  him, though the course of private life licentiously displayed at unhallowed actions planted like
• 1:00:07
  a crown upon the insolent, aspiring brow, of spurious notions worn as open
• 1:00:12
  signs of prejudice subdued, Still he retained, amid much abasement, what he
• 1:00:16
  had received from nature, an intense and glowing mind. Wherefore, when humble
• 1:00:23
  liberty grew weak and mortal sickness on her face appeared, he colored objects to
• 1:00:29
  his own desire, as with a lover's passion. Yet his moods of pain
• 1:00:34
  were keen as those of better men, nay keener as his fortitude was less,
• 1:00:38
  and he continued when worse days were come, to deal about his sparkling
• 1:00:44
  eloquence. Struggling against the strange reverse, with zeal that showed like happiness.
• 1:00:50
  But in despite of all this outside bravery, within he neither felt encouragement nor
• 1:00:54
  hope. For moral dignity and strength of mind, were wanting and simplicity of
• 1:01:00
  life, and reverence for himself, and last and best confiding thoughts through love
• 1:01:07
  and fear of him, before whose sight the troubles of this world are vain
• 1:01:10
  as billows in a tossing sea, the glory of the times fading away,
• 1:01:17
  The splendor which had given a festal air to self importance, hallowed it and
• 1:01:22
  veiled from his own sight. This gone, he forfeited all joy in human
• 1:01:27
  nature, was consumed and vexed, and chafed by levity and scorn and fruitless
• 1:01:31
  indignation, galled by pride, made desperate by contempt of men who throve before
• 1:01:37
  his sight in power or fame, and one without desert what he desired,
• 1:01:43
  weak men too weak even for his envy or his hate. Tormented. Thus,
• 1:01:47
  after a wandering course of discontent, and inwardly oppressed with malady in part
• 1:01:52
  i fear provoked by weariness of life, he fixed his home, or rather
• 1:01:58
  say, sat down, by very chance, among these rugged hills, where
• 1:02:02
  now he dwells and wastes the sad remainder of his hours, steeped in a
• 1:02:07
  self indulging spleen that wants not its own voluptuousness. On this resolved with this
• 1:02:15
  content, that he will live and die forgotten, at a safe distance from
• 1:02:20
  a world not moving to his mind. These serious words closed the preparatory notices
• 1:02:28
  that served my fellow traveler to beguile the way while we advanced up that wide
• 1:02:32
  veil, diverging now as if his quest had been some secret of the mountains,
• 1:02:37
  cavern fall of water, or some lofty eminence renowned for splendid prospect far
• 1:02:43
  and wide. We scaled, without a track to ease our steps, a
• 1:02:46
  steep ascent, and reached a dreary plain with a tumultuous waste of huge hilltops
• 1:02:53
  before us, savage region which I paced dispirited, when all at once behold
• 1:03:00
  beneath our feet a little lowly veil, a lowly veil, and yet uplifted
• 1:03:05
  high among the mountains, even as if the spot had been from eldest time
• 1:03:09
  by wish of their so placed to be shut out from all the world urn
• 1:03:15
  like it was in shape, deep as in urn, with rocks encompassed,
• 1:03:20
  save that to the south was one small opening, where a heath clad ridge
• 1:03:24
  supplied a boundary less abrupt and close, a quiet, treeless nook with two
• 1:03:30
  green fields, a liquid pool that glittered in the sun, and one bare
• 1:03:35
  dwelling one abode no more. It seemed the home of poverty and toil,
• 1:03:40
  though not of want. The little fields, made green by husbandry of many
• 1:03:45
  thrifty years, pay cheerful tribute to the moorland house. There crows the cock
• 1:03:51
  single in his domain. The small birds find in spring no thicket there to
• 1:03:54
  shroud them. Only from the neighboring vales. The cuckoo strake up to the
• 1:04:00
  hilltops, shouteth faint tidings of some gladder place. Ah, what a sweet
• 1:04:06
  recess, thought, I is here, instantly throwing down my limbs at ease
• 1:04:12
  upon a bed of heath full. Many a spot of hidden beauty have I
• 1:04:15
  chanced to a spy among the mountains. Never one like this, so lonesome
• 1:04:19
  and so perfectly secure, not melancholy, no, for it is green and
• 1:04:24
  bright and fertile, furnished in itself with a few needful things that life requires.
• 1:04:30
  In rugged arms, How softly does it lie, how tenderly protected?
• 1:04:33
  Far and near? We have an image of the pristine Earth, the planet
• 1:04:38
  in its nakedness. Were this man's only dwelling soul appointed seat first, last
• 1:04:43
  and single in the breathing world, it could not be more quiet. Peace
• 1:04:47
  is here or nowhere, days unruffled by the gale of public news or private
• 1:04:54
  years that pass forgetfully, uncalled upon to pay the common penalties of mortal life,
• 1:05:00
  thickness or accident, or grief or pain, of these and kindred thoughts.
• 1:05:04
  Intent I lay in silence, musing by my comrade's side. He also
• 1:05:09
  silent, when from out the heart of that profound abyss, a solemn voice,
• 1:05:15
  or several voices in one solemn sound was heard, ascending, mournful,
• 1:05:19
  deep and slow, the cadence as of psalms, a funeral dirge. We
• 1:05:26
  listened, looking down upon the hut, but seeing no one. Meanwhile,
• 1:05:30
  from below, the strain continued spiritual as before, and now distinctly could I
• 1:05:34
  recognize these words? Shall in the grave thy love be known? In death,
• 1:05:41
  thy faithfulness God rest his soul, said the old man, abruptly,
• 1:05:45
  breaking silence. He is departed and finds peace at last. This scarcely spoken
• 1:05:54
  and those holy strains not ceasing forth appeared in view a band of rustic persons
• 1:06:00
  from behind the hut, bearing a coffin in the midst with which they shaped
• 1:06:04
  their course along the sloping side of that small valley, singing as they moved.
• 1:06:10
  A sober company, and few the men, bareheaded, and all decently
• 1:06:14
  attired some steps. When they had thus advanced, the dirge ended, and
• 1:06:19
  from the stillness that ensued. Recovering to my friend, I said, you
• 1:06:24
  spake methought, with apprehension that these rites are paid to him upon whose shy
• 1:06:29
  retreat this day we proposed to intrude. I did so, But let us
• 1:06:35
  hence that we may learn the truth. Perhaps it is not heat, but
• 1:06:39
  someone else for whom this pious services performed, some other tenant of the solitude.
• 1:06:45
  So to a steep and difficult descent. Trusting ourselves, we wound from
• 1:06:49
  crag to crag where passage could be won. And as the last of the
• 1:06:55
  mute train, behind the healthy top of that off sloping outlet disappeared, I,
• 1:07:01
  more impatient in my downward course, had landed upon easy ground, and
• 1:07:05
  there stood waiting for my comrade, when behold an object that enticed my steps
• 1:07:12
  aside A narrow winding entry opened out into a platform that lay sheepfold wise inclosed
• 1:07:18
  between an upright mass of rock and one old moss grown wall. A cool
• 1:07:25
  recess and fanciful for where the rock and wall met in an angle, hung
• 1:07:30
  a penthouse, framed by thrusting two rude staves into the wall and overlaying them
• 1:07:34
  with mountain sods to weather fend a little turf built seat whereon a full grown
• 1:07:41
  man might rest, nor dread the burning sunshine or a transient shower. But
• 1:07:45
  the hole plainly wrought by children's hands, whose skill had thronged the floor with
• 1:07:50
  a proud show of baby houses curiously arranged, nor wanting ornament of walks between,
• 1:07:58
  with mimic trees inserted in the turf, and gardens interposed. Pleased with
• 1:08:03
  the sight, I could not choose, but beckoned to my guide, who,
• 1:08:06
  entering round him through a careless glance, impatient to pass on, when
• 1:08:10
  I exclaimed, Lo, what is here, and stooping down, drew forth
• 1:08:15
  a book that, in the midst of stones and moss and wreck of parti
• 1:08:18
  colored earthenware aptly disposed, had lent its help to raise one of those petty
• 1:08:25
  structures his, it must be exclaimed, The wanderer cannot be but his,
• 1:08:30
  and he is gone. The book, which in my hand had opened of
• 1:08:35
  itself, for it was swollen with searching damp, and seemingly had lain to
• 1:08:40
  the injurious elements exposed from week to week I found to be at work in
• 1:08:45
  the French tongue a novel of Voltaire, his famous optimist, unhappy man,
• 1:08:50
  exclaimed, My friend here then, has been to him retreat within retreat,
• 1:08:56
  a sheltering place. Within how deep a shelter he had fits even to the
• 1:09:00
  last of genuine tenderness, and loved the haunts of children here, no doubt
• 1:09:05
  pleasing and pleased, he shared their simple sports, or sat companionless. And
• 1:09:11
  here the book left and forgotten in his careless way, must by the cottish
• 1:09:15
  children have been found. Heaven bless them and their inconsiderate work. To What
• 1:09:19
  odd purpose have the darlings turned this sad memorial of their hapless friend? Me,
• 1:09:26
  said, I most doth it surprise to find such a book in such
• 1:09:30
  a place? A book it is, he answered to the person suited well
• 1:09:34
  the little suited to surrounding things too strange, I grant, and strangers still
• 1:09:40
  had been to see the man who owned it, dwelling here with one poor
• 1:09:43
  shepherd, far from all the world. Now, if our errand hath been
• 1:09:47
  thrown away, as from these intimations, I forebode grieved. Shall I be
• 1:09:54
  less for my sake than yours, and least of all for him who is
• 1:09:57
  no more? By this the book was in the old man's hand, and
• 1:10:02
  he continued glancing on the leaves and eye of scorn. The lover said he
• 1:10:08
  doomed to love when hope hath failed him, whom no depth of privacy is
• 1:10:12
  deep enough to hide hath yet his bracelet or his lock of hair, And
• 1:10:15
  that is joy to him. When change of times hath summoned kings to scaffold,
• 1:10:23
  Do but give the faithful servant, who must hide his head. Henceforth,
• 1:10:26
  in whatsoever nook he may a kerchief sprinkled with his master's blood, And
• 1:10:30
  he too hath his comforter. How poor, beyond all poverty, how destitute
• 1:10:38
  must that man have been left, who, hither, driven flying or seeking,
• 1:10:43
  could yet bring with him no dearer relic, and no better stay and
• 1:10:46
  this dull product of a scoffer's pen impure conceits discharging from a heart hardened by
• 1:10:54
  impious pride. I did not fear to tax you with this journey, mildly,
• 1:11:00
  said my venerable friend. As forth we stepped into the presence of the
• 1:11:03
  cheerful light. For I acknowledge that you do not shrink from moving spectacles.
• 1:11:10
  But let us on. So speaking on he went, and at the word,
• 1:11:15
  I followed till he made a sudden stand for full in view. Approaching
• 1:11:20
  through a gate that opened from the enclosure of green fields into the rough,
• 1:11:24
  uncultivated ground, Behold the man whom he had fancied dead. I knew from
• 1:11:30
  his deportment, mean in dress that it could be no other. A pale
• 1:11:35
  face, a meager person, tall and in a garb, not rustic,
• 1:11:40
  dull and faded like himself. He saw us, not though distant, but
• 1:11:45
  few steps, for he was busy dealing from a store upon a broad leaf,
• 1:11:49
  carried choicest strings of red ripe currents, gift by which he strove with
• 1:11:56
  intermixture of endearing words to soothe the child who walked beside him, weeping as
• 1:12:00
  if disconsolate. They to the grave are bearing him, my little one,
• 1:12:05
  he said, to the dark pit. But he will feel no pain.
• 1:12:11
  His body is at rest, his soul in heaven. More might have followed,
• 1:12:15
  but my honored friend broke in upon the speaker with a frank and cordial
• 1:12:19
  greeting. Vivid was the light that flashed and sparkled from the other's eyes.
• 1:12:25
  He was all fire. No shadow on his brow remained, nor sign of
• 1:12:29
  sickness on his face. Hans joined he with his visitant a grasp, an
• 1:12:34
  eager grasp, and many moments space when the first glow of pleasure was no
• 1:12:40
  more, and of the sad appearance which it once had vanished, much was
• 1:12:44
  come and coming back an amicable smile retained the life which it had unexpectedly received.
• 1:12:49
  Upon his hollow cheek, How kind, he said, Nor could your
• 1:12:55
  coming have been better timed? For this, you see, is in our
• 1:12:59
  narrow world a day of sorrow. I have here a charge and speaking thus,
• 1:13:03
  he patted tenderly the sun burnt forehead of the weeping child, a little
• 1:13:08
  mourner, whom it is yet my task to comfort. But how came ye?
• 1:13:14
  If ye on track with duch at once befriend us and betray conducted hither
• 1:13:18
  your most welcome feet, Ye could not miss the funeral train. They yet
• 1:13:23
  have scarcely disappeared. This blooming child, said, The old man is of
• 1:13:30
  an age to weep at any grave or solemn spectacle, inly distressed or overpowered
• 1:13:34
  with awe. He knows not wherefore, but the boy to day, perhaps
• 1:13:40
  his shedding orphans tears. You also must have sustained a loss hand of death,
• 1:13:46
  he answered, has been here, but could not well have fallen more
• 1:13:50
  lightly if it had not fallen upon myself. The other left these words unnoticed.
• 1:13:58
  Thus continuing from yon Crag, down whose steep sides we dropped into the
• 1:14:02
  vale, we heard the hymn they sang, a solemn sound heard anywhere,
• 1:14:06
  But in a place like this tis more than human. Many precious rites and
• 1:14:12
  customs of our rural ancestry are gone, and stealing from us this I hope
• 1:14:16
  will last forever. Oft on my way have I stood still, though but
• 1:14:21
  a casual passenger, so much I felt the awfulness of life in that one
• 1:14:27
  moment when the course is lifted in silence with a hush of decency. Then
• 1:14:31
  from the threshold moves with song of peace and confidential yearnings towards its home,
• 1:14:36
  its final home on earth. What traveler, who how farsoe'er stranger, does
• 1:14:43
  not own the bond of brotherhood when he sees them go a mute procession on
• 1:14:47
  the houseless road, or passing by some single tenement or clustered dwellings, where
• 1:14:53
  again they raised the monitory voice. But most of all it touches, it
• 1:14:59
  confirms, and elevates. Then, when the body soon to be consigned ashes
• 1:15:03
  to ashes, dust bequeathed to dust, is raised from the church aisle and
• 1:15:09
  forward, borne upon the shoulders of the next in love, the nearest,
• 1:15:12
  in affection or in blood, yea by the very mourners who had knelt beside
• 1:15:16
  the coffin, resting on its lid, in silent grief, their uplifted heads,
• 1:15:21
  and heard meanwhile the psalmest mournful plaint, and that most awful scripture which
• 1:15:27
  declares, we shall not sleep, but we shall all be changed. Have
• 1:15:32
  not seen ye likewise may have seen son, husband, brothers, brothers side
• 1:15:38
  by side, and son and father also side by side, rise from that
• 1:15:42
  posture, and in concert move on the green turf, following the vested priest.
• 1:15:47
  Four dear supporters of one's senseless weight, from which they do not shrink,
• 1:15:53
  and under which they faint not, but advance towards the open grave,
• 1:15:57
  step after step, together with their firm, unhidden faces. He that suffers
• 1:16:02
  most, he outwardly and inwardly, perhaps the most serene, with most undaunted
• 1:16:09
  eye. Oh blest are they who live and die like these? Loved with
• 1:16:14
  such love and with such sorrow. Mourned that poor man taken hence to day
• 1:16:20
  replied the solitary with a faint, sarcastic smile, which did not please me,
• 1:16:26
  must be deemed I fear of the unblest, For he will surely sink
• 1:16:30
  into his mother earth without such pomp of grief, depart without occasion given by
• 1:16:35
  him, For such a ray of fortitude full seventy winters hath he lived,
• 1:16:42
  and mark this simple child will mourn this one short hour, and I shall
• 1:16:47
  miss him scanty tribute. Yet this wanting he would leave the sight of men,
• 1:16:53
  if love were his sole claim upon their care, like a ripe date
• 1:16:57
  which in the desert falls without a hand to gather it. At this I
• 1:17:01
  interposed, though loath to speak, and said, can it be thus among
• 1:17:06
  so small a band? As ye must needs be here in such a place,
• 1:17:11
  I would not willingly, methinks, lose sight of a departing cloud,
• 1:17:15
  twas not for love, answered the sick man, with a careless voice,
• 1:17:18
  that I came hither. Neither have I found among associates who have power of
• 1:17:23
  speech, nor in other such converse as is here, temptations so prevailing as
• 1:17:28
  to change that mood or undermine my first resolve. Then, speaking in like
• 1:17:33
  careless sort, he said to my benign companion, pity tis that fortune did
• 1:17:39
  not guide you to this house a few days earlier. Then you would have
• 1:17:42
  seen what stuff the dwellers in a solitude that seems, by nature hollowed out
• 1:17:45
  to be the seat and bosom of pure innocence, are made of an ungracious
• 1:17:50
  matter, this which, for truth's sake. Yet, in remembrance too,
• 1:17:56
  of past discussions with this zealous friend and advocate of humble life, I now
• 1:18:00
  will force upon his notice, undeterred by the example of his own pure course,
• 1:18:05
  and that respect and deference which a soul may fairly claim by niggard age,
• 1:18:10
  enriched in what she most doth value, love of God and his frail
• 1:18:15
  creature man. But ye shall hear I talk, and ye are standing in
• 1:18:18
  the sun without refreshment. Quickly had he spoken, and with light steps still
• 1:18:25
  quicker than his words, led toward the cottage. Homely was the spot,
• 1:18:30
  and to my feeling, ere we reached the door had almost a forbidding nakedness
• 1:18:34
  less fair, I grant, even painfully less fair than it appeared when from
• 1:18:38
  the beetling rock we had looked down upon it. All within, as left
• 1:18:43
  by the departed company, was silent, save the solitary clock that on mine
• 1:18:47
  ear ticked with a mournful sound. Following our guide, we cloned the cottage
• 1:18:53
  stairs and reached a small apartment, dark and low, which was no sooner
• 1:18:58
  entered than our host said gaily, this is my domain, my cell my
• 1:19:02
  hermitage, my cabin. What you will, I love it better than a
• 1:19:06
  snail his house. But ye shall be feasted with our best. So with
• 1:19:14
  more ardor than an unripe girl left one day mistress of her mother's stores,
• 1:19:17
  he went about his hospitable task. My eyes were busy, and my thoughts
• 1:19:23
  no less and pleased. I looked upon my gray haired friend, as if
• 1:19:27
  to thank him. He returned that look, cheered plainly and yet serious,
• 1:19:31
  What a wreck had we about us? Scattered was the floor, and in
• 1:19:35
  like sort, chair, window, seat, and shelf with books, maps,
• 1:19:39
  fossiled, withered plants and flowers, and tufts of mountain moss. Mechanic
• 1:19:44
  tools lay intermixed with scraps of paper, some scribbled with verse. A broken
• 1:19:48
  angling rod and shattered telescope, together linked by cobwebs, stood within a dusty
• 1:19:54
  nook. And instruments of music, some half made, some in disgrace,
• 1:19:59
  hung dangling from the walls. But speedily the promise was fulfilled, a feast
• 1:20:04
  before us, and a courteous host inviting us in glee to sit and eat
• 1:20:10
  a napkin white as foam as of that rough brook by which it had been
• 1:20:14
  bleached or spread the board, and was itself half covered with a store of
• 1:20:18
  dainties, oaten, bread, curd, cheese and cream, and cakes of
• 1:20:24
  butter, curiously embossed butter that had imbibed from mountain meadows, a golden hue
• 1:20:30
  delicate as their own, faintly reflected in a lingering stream, nor lacked for
• 1:20:35
  more delight. On that warm day, our table, small parade of garden
• 1:20:40
  fruits and whortleberries from the mountain side. The child, who long ere this
• 1:20:45
  had stilled his sobs, was now a help to his late comforter, and
• 1:20:47
  moved a willing page, as he was bid ministering to our need in genial
• 1:20:54
  mood, while at our pastoral banquet. Thus we sat fronting the window of
• 1:20:57
  that little cell, I could not ever and anon forbear to glance an upward
• 1:21:02
  look on two huge peaks that from some other veil peered into this. Those
• 1:21:09
  lusty twins, exclaimed our host. If here it were your lot to dwell,
• 1:21:14
  would soon become your prized companions. Many are the notes which in his
• 1:21:17
  tuneful course the wind draws forth from rocks, woods, caverns, heaths and
• 1:21:23
  dashing shores. And well, those lofty brethren bear their part in the wild
• 1:21:29
  concert, chiefly when the storm rides high. Then all the upper air they
• 1:21:33
  fill with roaring sound that ceases not to flow, like smoke along the level
• 1:21:38
  of the blast and mighty current. Theirs, too is the song of stream
• 1:21:43
  and headlong flood that seldom fails. And in the grim and breathless hour of
• 1:21:48
  noon, methinks that I have heard them echo back the thunders greeting. Nor
• 1:21:54
  have Nature's laws left them ungifted with a power to yield music of finer to
• 1:22:00
  a harmony. So do I call it, though it be the hand of
• 1:22:03
  silence, though there be no voice. The clouds, the mist, the
• 1:22:08
  shadows, light of golden sun's motions of moonlight all come thither, touch and
• 1:22:15
  have an answer. Thither, come and shape a language not unwelcome to sick
• 1:22:18
  hearts and idle spirits. There the sun himself, at the calm close of
• 1:22:25
  summer's longest day, rests his substantial orb between those heights, and on the
• 1:22:31
  top of either pinnacle, more keenly than elsewhere in Knight's blue vault, sprinkle
• 1:22:35
  the stars as of their station. Proud thoughts are not busier in the mind
• 1:22:42
  of man than the mute agents stirring there alone. Here do I sit and
• 1:22:46
  watch a fall of voice, regretted, like the nightingale's last note had scarcely
• 1:22:51
  closed this high wrought strain of rapture. Ere with inviting smile, the wanderer
• 1:22:57
  said, now for the tale with which you threatened us, In truth,
• 1:23:02
  the threat escaped me unawares. Should the tale tire you? Let this challenge
• 1:23:06
  stand for my excuse, dissevered from mankind as to your eyes and thoughts we
• 1:23:13
  must have seen when ye look down upon us from the crag islanders mid a
• 1:23:16
  stormy mountain sea. We are not so perpetually. We touch upon the vulgar
• 1:23:23
  ordinances of the world. And he whom this our cottage hath to day relinquished
• 1:23:28
  lived, depended for his bread upon the laws of public charity. The housewife,
• 1:23:34
  tempted by such slender gains as might from that occasion be distilled, opened
• 1:23:39
  as she before had done for me her doors to admit this homeless pensioner the
• 1:23:45
  portion gave of coarse but wholesome fare, which appetite required a blind, dull
• 1:23:50
  nook, such as she had not the kennel of his rest. This in
• 1:23:55
  itself not ill would yet have been ill born in earlier life, but his
• 1:24:00
  was now the still contentedness of seventy years calm did he sit under the wide
• 1:24:05
  spread tree of his old age, and yet less calm and meek, winningly
• 1:24:11
  meek, or venerably calm than slow and torpid, paying in this wise a
• 1:24:15
  penalty, if penalty it were, for spendthrift feats excesses of his prime.
• 1:24:20
  I loved the old man, for I pitied him a task. It was
• 1:24:24
  I owned to whole discourse with one so slow in gathering up his thoughts.
• 1:24:29
  But he was a cheap pleasure to my eyes, mild, inoffensive, ready
• 1:24:32
  in his way, and helpful to his utmost power. And there our housewife
• 1:24:38
  knew full well what she possessed. He was her vassal of all labor,
• 1:24:43
  tilled her garden from the pasture fetched her kind, and one among the orderly
• 1:24:48
  array of haymakers beneath the burning sun maintained his place or heedfully pursued his course
• 1:24:54
  on Errand's bound to other vales, leading sometimes an inexperienced child, too young
• 1:25:00
  for any profitable task, so moved he like a shadow that performed substantial service.
• 1:25:08
  Mark me now, and learn for what reward. The moon, her
• 1:25:12
  monthly round, had not completed since our dame, the queen of this one
• 1:25:15
  cottage and this lonely dale, into my little sanctuary, rushed voice to a
• 1:25:19
  rueful treble, humanized and features in deplorable dismay. I treat the matter lightly,
• 1:25:26
  but alas it is most serious. Persevering rain had fallen in Torrents.
• 1:25:30
  All the mountain tops were hidden, and black vapors coursed their sides. Thus
• 1:25:35
  had I seen and saw, but till she spake, was wholly ignorant that
• 1:25:40
  my ancient friend, who, at her bidding early and alone, had clom
• 1:25:44
  aloft to delve the moorland turf for winter fuel to his noontide meal, returned
• 1:25:48
  not and now happily on the heights lay at the mercy of this raging storm.
• 1:25:54
  Inhuman said, I was an old man's life, not worth the trouble
• 1:25:58
  of a thought. Alas this note as comes too late. With joy,
• 1:26:01
  I saw her husband enter from a distant veil. We sallied forth. Together
• 1:26:06
  found the tools which the neglected veteran had dropped, but through all quarters looked
• 1:26:11
  for him. In vain we shouted, but no answer. Darkness fell without
• 1:26:15
  remission of the blast or shower, and fears of our own safety drove us
• 1:26:19
  home. I, who weep little did I will confess the moment I was
• 1:26:26
  seated here alone, honor my little cell, with some few tears which anger
• 1:26:30
  and resentment could not dry. All night the storm endured, and soon his
• 1:26:35
  help had been collected from the neighboring veil. With morning we renewed our quest.
• 1:26:40
  The wind was fallen, the rain abated, but the hills lay shrouded
• 1:26:44
  in impenetrable mist, and long and hopelessly we sought, in vain till,
• 1:26:48
  chancing on that lofty ridge, to pass a heap of ruin, almost without
• 1:26:51
  walls and wholly without roof, the bleached remains of a small chapel, where
• 1:26:56
  in ancient time the peasants of these lonely valleys used to meet for work.
• 1:27:00
  On that central height, we there espied the object of our search, lying
• 1:27:04
  full three parts, buried among tufts of heath plant under and above him,
• 1:27:09
  strewn to baffle as he might the watery storm. And there we found him,
• 1:27:14
  breathing peaceably, snug as a child that hides itself in sport, mid
• 1:27:18
  a green haycock in a sunny field. We spake. He made reply,
• 1:27:23
  but would not stir at our entreaty, less from want of power than apprehension
• 1:27:28
  and bewildering thoughts. So he was lifted gently from the ground, and with
• 1:27:32
  their freight homeward, the shepherds moved through the dull mist. I following when
• 1:27:36
  a step, a single step that freed me from the skirts of the blind
• 1:27:42
  vapor opened to my view glory beyond all glory ever seen, by waking sense
• 1:27:47
  or by the dreaming soul. The appearance, instantaneously disclosed was of a mighty
• 1:27:55
  city, boldly say, a wilderness of building, sinking far and self withdraw
• 1:28:00
  into a boundless depth, far, sinking into splendor without end fabric. It
• 1:28:05
  seemed of diamond and of gold, with alabaster domes and silver spires, and
• 1:28:11
  blazing terrace upon terrace high uplifted here, serene pavilions, bright in avenues,
• 1:28:16
  disposed there towers burgirt with battlements that on their restless fronts bore stars. Illumination
• 1:28:23
  of all gems by earthly nature. Had the effect been wrought upon the dark
• 1:28:28
  materials of the storm, now pacified on them, and on the coves and
• 1:28:32
  mountain steeps and summits, whereunto the vapors had receded, taking there their station
• 1:28:39
  under a cerulean sky. Oh, twas an unimaginable sight, clouds, mists,
• 1:28:45
  streams, watery rocks, and emerald turf, clouds of all tincture rocks
• 1:28:49
  and sapphire sky confused, commingled mutually, inflamed molten together and composing thus each
• 1:28:57
  lost in each, that marvelous array of temple, palace, citadel, and
• 1:29:01
  huge, fantastic pomp of structure without name, in fleecy folds, voluminous and
• 1:29:06
  wrapped right in the midst where inner space appeared of an open court, an
• 1:29:13
  object like the throne under a shining canopy of state stood fixed and fixed resemblances
• 1:29:18
  were seen to implements of ordinary use, but vast in size, in substance
• 1:29:23
  glorified, such as by Hebrew prophets, were beheld in vision forms uncouth of
• 1:29:29
  mightiest power, for admiration and mysterious awe. This little veil, a dwelling
• 1:29:33
  place of man, lay low beneath my feet, twas visible. I saw
• 1:29:38
  not, but I felt that it was there. That which I saw was
• 1:29:42
  the revealed abode of spirits. In beatitude, my heart swelled in my breast.
• 1:29:47
  I have been dead, I cried, And now I live. Oh,
• 1:29:51
  wherefore do I live? And with that pang, I prayed to be
• 1:29:56
  no more. But I forget our charges utterly. I then forgot him.
• 1:30:00
  There I stood and gazed. The apparition faded not away, and I descended.
• 1:30:06
  Having reached the house, I found its rescued inmates, safely lodged and
• 1:30:12
  in serene possession of himself beside a fire, whose genial warmth seemed met by
• 1:30:17
  a faint shining from the heart, A gleam of comfort spread over his pallid
• 1:30:21
  face. Great show of joy the housewife made, and truly was glad to
• 1:30:27
  find her conscience set at ease, and not less glad for sake of her
• 1:30:30
  good name, that the poor sufferer had escaped with life. But though he
• 1:30:35
  seemed at first to have received no harm, and uncomplaining as before, went
• 1:30:41
  through his usual tasks, a silent change soon showed itself. He lingered three
• 1:30:45
  short weeks, and from the cottage hath been born to day. So ends
• 1:30:51
  my dolorous tale, And glad I am that it is ended. At these
• 1:30:57
  words he turned, and with blithe air of open fire, fellowship brought from
• 1:31:00
  the covered wine, and stouter cheer, like one who would be merry seeing
• 1:31:04
  this, my gray haired friend said, courteously, nay, nay, you
• 1:31:09
  have regaled us as a hermit. Ought. Now let us forth into the
• 1:31:13
  sun. Our host rose, though reluctantly, and forth we went. End
• 1:31:18
  of book, Second book, third Despondency. A humming bee, a little
• 1:31:27
  tinkling rill, a pair of falcons wheeling on the wing in clamorous agitation round
• 1:31:32
  the crest of a tall rock, there airy citadel. By each and all
• 1:31:36
  of these, The pensive ear was greeted in the silence that ensued when through
• 1:31:41
  the cottage threshold we had passed, and deep within that lonesome valley stood once
• 1:31:46
  more beneath the concave of a blue and cloudless sky. Hanon exclaimed our host,
• 1:31:54
  triumphantly, dispersing with the taunt the shade of discontent which on his brow
• 1:31:59
  had gathered. Ye have left my cell. But see how nature hems you
• 1:32:03
  in with friendly arms, and by her help he are my prisoners. Still,
• 1:32:10
  But which way shall I lead you? How contrive in spot? So
• 1:32:13
  parsimoniously endowed that the brief hours which yet remain may reap some recompense of knowledge
• 1:32:19
  or delight. So, saying round, he looked as if perplexed. And
• 1:32:25
  to remove those doubts, my gray haired friend said, shall we take this
• 1:32:29
  pathway for our guide? Upward? It winds as if in summer heats.
• 1:32:32
  Its line had first been fashioned by the flock seeking a place of refuge at
• 1:32:38
  the root of yon black yew tree, whose protruded boughs darken the silver bosom
• 1:32:43
  of the crag from which she draws her meager sustenance. There in commodious shelter,
• 1:32:48
  may we rest or let us trace this streamlet to its source. Feebly
• 1:32:54
  it tinkles with an earthly sound, and a few steps may bring us to
• 1:32:59
  the spot where happen. Crowned with flowerts and green herbs, the mountain,
• 1:33:02
  infant to the sun, comes forth, like human life from darkness. A
• 1:33:09
  quick turn through a straight passage of encumbered ground proved that such hope was vain.
• 1:33:14
  For now we stood shut out from prospect of the open veil, and
• 1:33:16
  saw the water that composed this rill descending disembodied and diffused o'er the smooth surface
• 1:33:23
  of an ample crag, lofty and steep, and naked as a tower.
• 1:33:30
  All further progress here was barred. And who thought I, if master of
• 1:33:33
  a vacant hour here, would not linger willingly detained whether the such wild objects
• 1:33:39
  he were led when copious rains have magnified the stream into a loud and white
• 1:33:43
  robed waterfall, or introduced at this more quiet time upon a semi circ of
• 1:33:50
  turf clad ground, the hidden nook discovered to our view a mass of rock
• 1:33:56
  resembling as it lay right at the foot of that moist precipice, a strain
• 1:34:00
  ship with keel upturned, that rests fearless of winds and waves. Three several
• 1:34:05
  stones stood near, of smaller size, and not unlike two monumental pillars.
• 1:34:13
  And from these some little space disjoined. A pair were seen that, with
• 1:34:16
  united shoulders, bore aloft of fragment like an altar, flat and smooth baren
• 1:34:23
  the tablet. Yet thereon appeared a tall and shining holly that had found an
• 1:34:27
  hospitable chink, and stood upright, as if inserted by some human hand in
• 1:34:32
  mockery, to wither in the sun, or lay its beauty flat before a
• 1:34:36
  breeze. The first that entered, but no breeze did now find entrance high
• 1:34:43
  or low, appeared no trace of motion, save the water that descended diffused
• 1:34:47
  adown that barrier of steep rock, and softly creeping, like a breath of
• 1:34:50
  air, such as is sometimes seen, and hardly seen, to brush the
• 1:34:56
  still breast of a crystal lake. Behold a cabinet for sages, built which
• 1:35:02
  kings might envy. Praise to this effect broke from the happy old man's reverend
• 1:35:08
  lip, who to the solitary turned and said in sooth, with love's familiar
• 1:35:14
  privilege, you have decried the wealth which is your own. Among these rocks
• 1:35:18
  and stones, methinks I see more than the heedless impress that belongs to lonely
• 1:35:24
  nature's casual work. They bear a semblance strange of power, intelligent and of
• 1:35:30
  design, not wholly worn away, boldest of plants that ever faced the wind,
• 1:35:35
  How gracefully that slender shrub looks forth from its fantastic birthplace. And I
• 1:35:41
  own some shadowy intimations haunt me here that in these shows a chronicle survives of
• 1:35:46
  purposes akin to those of man, but wrought with mightier arm than now prevails
• 1:35:54
  voiceless. The stream descends into the gulf with timid laps and lo while in
• 1:35:59
  this straight I stand. The chasm of sky above my head is Heaven's profoundest
• 1:36:04
  azure, no domain for fickle, short lived clouds to occupy or to pass
• 1:36:10
  through, but rather an abyss in which the everlasting stars abide, and whose
• 1:36:16
  soft gloom and boundless depth might tempt the curious eye to look for them.
• 1:36:21
  By day hail contemplation from the stately towers reared by the industrious hand of human
• 1:36:29
  art, to lift THEE high above the misty air and turbulence of murmuring cities
• 1:36:33
  vast from academic grows that have for THEE been planted. Hither come and find
• 1:36:40
  a lodge to which thou mayst resort for holier peace, from whose calm center
• 1:36:45
  Thou, through height or depth, mayst penetrate wherever truth shall lead, measuring
• 1:36:53
  through all degrees, until the scale of time and unconscious nature disappear, lost
• 1:36:59
  in unset searchable eternity. A pause ensued, and with minuter care we scanned
• 1:37:06
  the various features of the scene, and soon the tenant of that lonely veil
• 1:37:11
  with courteous voice. Thus spake I should have grieved hereafter, not escaping self
• 1:37:17
  reproach, if from my poor retirement ye had gone, leaving this nook unvisited.
• 1:37:23
  But in sooth, your unexpected presence had so roused my spirits that they
• 1:37:28
  were bent on enterprise. And like an ardent hunter, I forgot, or
• 1:37:32
  shall I say, disdained, the game that lurks at my own door.
• 1:37:39
  The shapes before our eyes, and their arrangement, doubtless must be deemed the
• 1:37:43
  sport of nature, aided by blind chance rudely to mock the works of toiling
• 1:37:47
  man, and hence this upright shaft of unhewn stone from fancy willing to set
• 1:37:55
  off her stores by sounding titles, hath acquired the name of Pompey's pillar,
• 1:38:00
  that I gravely style my theban obelisk, And there behold a druid cromlech.
• 1:38:08
  Thus I entertain the antiquarian humor, and am please to skim along the surfaces
• 1:38:13
  of things beguiling harmlessly the listless hours. But if the spirit be oppressed by
• 1:38:19
  sense of instability, revolt, decay, and change in emptiness, these freaks
• 1:38:26
  of nature and her blind helper chance do then suffice to quicken and to aggravate,
• 1:38:31
  to feed pity and scorn and melancholy pride, not less than that huge
• 1:38:36
  pile from some abyss of mortal power, unquestionably sprung, whose hoary diadem of
• 1:38:43
  pendant rocks confines the shrill voiced whirlwind round and round, eddying within its vast
• 1:38:49
  circumference on Sarum's naked plains. Then pyramid of Egypt unsubverted, undissolved, or
• 1:38:57
  Syria's marble ruins towering high above the sea andy desert in the light of sun,
• 1:39:00
  or moon raised your minds to an exalted pitch. The self same cause,
• 1:39:14
  different effect producing is for me fraught rather with depression than delight. Though
• 1:39:18
  shame it were. Could I not look around by the reflection of your pleasure,
• 1:39:23
  pleased yet happier in my judgment even than you, with your bright transports
• 1:39:28
  fairly may be deemed the wandering herbalist, who clear alike from vain and at
• 1:39:34
  worse evil vexing thoughts cass if he ever chanced to enter here upon these uncouth
• 1:39:41
  forms a slight regard of transitory interest, and peeps round for some rare flowert
• 1:39:46
  of the hills or plant of craggy fountain. What he hopes for winds or
• 1:39:51
  learns at least that tis not to be won. Then, keen and eager
• 1:39:57
  as a fine nosed hound by sole engrossing instincts, driven along through wood or
• 1:40:02
  open field, the harmless man departs intent upon his onward quest. Nor is
• 1:40:09
  that fellow wanderer so deem I less to be envied. You may trace him
• 1:40:13
  off by scars which his activity has left beside our roads and pathways. Though
• 1:40:16
  thank Heaven, this covert milk reports not of his hand. He who with
• 1:40:21
  pocket hammer smites the edge of luckless rock or prominent stone disguised in weather stains
• 1:40:28
  or crusted, or by nature with her first growths, detaching by the stroke
• 1:40:32
  a chip or splinter, to resolve his doubts, and with that ready answer
• 1:40:38
  satisfied the substance classes by some barbarous name, and hurries on or from the
• 1:40:45
  fragments, picks his specimen, if but haply intervened with sparkling mineral, or
• 1:40:49
  should crystal cube lurk in its cells, and thinks himself enriched, wealthier,
• 1:40:55
  and doubtless wiser than before, intrusted safely each to his pursuit, earnest alike,
• 1:41:01
  Let both from hill to hill range, if it please them, speed
• 1:41:04
  from clime to climb. The mind is full and free from pain their pastime.
• 1:41:13
  Then, said I, interposing one is near who cannot but possess in
• 1:41:15
  your esteem place worthier still of envy, May I name without offense, that
• 1:41:20
  fair faced cottage boy, Dame Nature's pupil of the lowest form, youngest apprentice
• 1:41:27
  in the school of art him. As we entered from the open glen,
• 1:41:30
  you might have noticed busily engaged heart, soul and hands in mending the defects
• 1:41:35
  left in the fabric of a leaky dam raised for enabling this penurious stream to
• 1:41:41
  turn a slender rill, that new made plaything for his delight, the happiest
• 1:41:45
  he of all, far happiest, answered the desponding man. If such as
• 1:41:53
  now he is, he might remain, Ah what avails imagination high or question
• 1:41:59
  deep? What profits all that earth or Heaven's blue vaults suffered to put forth
• 1:42:04
  of impulse or allurement? For the soul to quit the beaten track of life,
• 1:42:09
  and soar far as she finds a yielding element in past or future,
• 1:42:15
  far as she can go through time or space. If neither in the one,
• 1:42:18
  nor in the other region, nor in aught that fancy dreaming or the
• 1:42:21
  map of things hath placed beyond these penetrable bounds, words of assurance can be
• 1:42:27
  heard. If nowhere a habitation for consummate good or for progressive virtue by the
• 1:42:32
  search can be attained, a better sanctuary from doubt and sorrow than the senseless
• 1:42:38
  grave. Is this? The gray haired wanderer mildly said the voice which we
• 1:42:45
  so lately overheard to that same child, addressing tenderly the consolations of a hopeful
• 1:42:50
  mind. His body is at rest, his soul in heaven. These were
• 1:42:56
  your words, and verily methinks wisdom is ofttimes nearer when we stoop than when
• 1:43:02
  we soar. The other, not displeased, promptly replied, my notion is
• 1:43:09
  the same, and I, without reluctance, could decline all active inquisition.
• 1:43:14
  Whence we rise? And what when breath has ceased we may become? Here
• 1:43:18
  are we in a bright and breathing world? Our origin? What matters it?
• 1:43:26
  In lack of worthier explanations, say at once with the American a thought
• 1:43:30
  which suits the place where now we stand that certain men leaped out together from
• 1:43:35
  a rocky cave, and these were the first parents of mankind. Or if
• 1:43:41
  an different image be recalled by the warm sunshine and the jockun voice of insects
• 1:43:46
  chirping out their careless lives on these soft beds of time besprinkled turf, choose
• 1:43:53
  with the gay Athenian a conceit a sound, blithe race whose mantles were bedecked
• 1:43:58
  with golden grasshoppers, in sign that they had sprung, like those bright creatures,
• 1:44:02
  from the soil whereon their endless generations dwelt, But stop these theoretic fancies
• 1:44:10
  jar on serious minds. Then, as the Hindus draw their holy Ganges from
• 1:44:15
  a skyey fount, even so deduce the stream of human life from seats of
• 1:44:19
  power, divine and hope, or trust that our existence winds her stately course
• 1:44:28
  beneath the sun like ganges, to make part of a living concern, or
• 1:44:32
  to sink engulfed like Niger, in impenetrable sands and utter darkness thought which may
• 1:44:41
  be faced though comfortless. Not of myself I speak such acquiescence. Neither doth
• 1:44:46
  imply in me a meekly bending spirit, soothed by natural piety, nor a
• 1:44:51
  lofty mind by philosophic discipline, prepared for calm subjection to acknowledged law, pleased
• 1:44:59
  to have ben contented not to be such palms I boast not know to me
• 1:45:05
  who find reviewing my past way much to condemn, little to praise, and
• 1:45:10
  nothing to regret, save some resemblances of dreamlike joys that scarcely seem to belong
• 1:45:16
  to me. If I must take my choice between the pair that rule alternately,
• 1:45:21
  the weary hours night is than day more acceptable sleep doth in my estimate
• 1:45:28
  of good appear a better state than waking death than sleep. Feelingly sweet is
• 1:45:34
  stillness after storm, though undercovered of the wormy ground. Yet be it said
• 1:45:40
  in justice to myself that in more genial times, when I was free to
• 1:45:45
  explore the destiny of human kind, not as an intellectual gain, pursued with
• 1:45:48
  curious subtlety from wish to cheat irksome sensations, but by love of truth urg
• 1:45:56
  dawn or haply, by intense delight in feeding thought wherever thought could feed,
• 1:46:00
  I did not rank with those two dull or nice, For to my judgment,
• 1:46:05
  such they then appeared, are too aspiring, thankless at the best,
• 1:46:10
  who, in this frame of human life perceive an object whereunto their souls are
• 1:46:14
  tied in discontented wedlock. Nor did air from me those dark, impervious shades
• 1:46:19
  that hang upon the region whither we are bound exclude a power to enjoy the
• 1:46:25
  vital beams of present sunshine, deities that float on wings, angelic spirits I
• 1:46:30
  could muse, or what from eldest time we have been told of your bright
• 1:46:35
  forms and glorious faculties. And with the imagination rest content, not wishing more
• 1:46:42
  repining not to tread the little sinuous path of earthly care, by flowers embellished,
• 1:46:48
  and by springs refreshed, blow winds of autumn. Let your chilling breath
• 1:46:55
  take the live herbage from the mead, and strip the shady forest of its
• 1:46:59
  green at And let the bursting clouds to fury rouse the gentle brooks, your
• 1:47:04
  desolating sway sheds, I exclaimed, no sadness upon me, and no disorder
• 1:47:10
  in your rage. I find what dignity, what beauty in this change from
• 1:47:15
  mild to angry, and from sad to gay, alternate and revolving, How
• 1:47:19
  benign, how rich in animation and delight, How bountiful these elements compared with
• 1:47:25
  aught as more desirable and fair devised by fancy for the golden age, or
• 1:47:30
  the perpetual warbling that prevails in arcity beneath unaltered skies, through the long year,
• 1:47:38
  in constant quiet, bound night hushed as night, and day serene as
• 1:47:42
  day. But why this tedious record age we know is garrulous and solitude,
• 1:47:49
  is apt to anticipate the privilege of age from far ye come, and surely
• 1:47:57
  with a hope of better entertainment, loath to forsake the spot, and still
• 1:48:03
  more loath to be diverted from our present theme, I said, my thoughts,
• 1:48:08
  agreeing, sir, with yours, would push this censure farther. For
• 1:48:13
  if smiles of scornful pity be the just reward of poesy, thus courteously employed
• 1:48:16
  in framing models to improve the scheme of man's existence and recast the world,
• 1:48:23
  why should not grave philosophy be styled herself a dreamer of a kindred stock,
• 1:48:29
  a dreamer yet more spiritless and dull. Yes, shall the fine immunities she
• 1:48:33
  boasts establish sounder titles of esteem for her, who all too timid and reserved
• 1:48:39
  for onset, for resistance, too inert, too weak for suffering, and
• 1:48:43
  for hope too tame. Placed among flowery gardens, curtained round with world excluding
• 1:48:48
  groves, the brotherhood of soft Epicureans taught, if they the ends of being
• 1:48:56
  would secure and win the crown of wisdom, to yield up their souls to
• 1:49:00
  a voluptuous unconcern, preferring tranquility to all things. Or is she I cried,
• 1:49:06
  more worthy of regard the power who, for the sake of stern or
• 1:49:11
  quiet, closed the stoic's heart against the vain approach of admiration and all sense
• 1:49:16
  of joy. His countenance gave notice that my zeal accorded little with his present
• 1:49:23
  mind. I ceased, and he resumed. Ah, Gentle sir, slight
• 1:49:29
  if you will the means, but spare to slight the end of those who
• 1:49:32
  did by system rank as the prime object of a wise man's aim, security
• 1:49:39
  from shock of accident, release from fear, and cherished peaceful days for their
• 1:49:44
  own sakes, as mortal life's chief good and only reasonable felicity. What motive
• 1:49:50
  drew? What impulse? I would ask, through a long course of later
• 1:49:54
  ages, drove the hermit to his cell in forest wide? Or what did
• 1:49:59
  it take him till his closing eyes took their last Farewell of the sun and
• 1:50:02
  stars, fast anchored in the desert, not alone, dread of the persecuting
• 1:50:09
  sword, remorse, wrongs unredressed or insults, unavenged and unavengeable, defeated,
• 1:50:15
  pride, prosperity subverted, maddening want, friendship betrayed, affection, unreturned,
• 1:50:21
  love with despair or grief, in agony, not always from intolerable pangs.
• 1:50:28
  He fled, but compassed round by pleasure, sighed for independent happiness, craving
• 1:50:34
  peace. The central feeling of all happiness, not as a refuge from distress
• 1:50:41
  or pain, a breathing time, vacation, or a truce, but for
• 1:50:45
  its absolute self, a life of peace, stability, without regret or fear,
• 1:50:50
  that hath been, is and shall be evermore. Such the reward he
• 1:50:56
  sought and wore out his life. There were on few few external things his
• 1:51:00
  heart was set, and those his own, or if not his subsisting under
• 1:51:05
  nature's steadfast law. What other yearning was the master tie of the monastic brotherhood
• 1:51:13
  upon rock aerial or in green secluded vale, one after one, collected from
• 1:51:17
  afar and undissolving fellowship. What but this the universal instinct of repose, the
• 1:51:25
  longing for confirmed tranquility inward and outward, humble yet sublime, the life where
• 1:51:31
  hope and memory are as one, where Earth is quiet and her face unchanged
• 1:51:36
  save by the simplest toil of human hands or season's difference, the immortal soul,
• 1:51:42
  consistent in self rule and heaven revealed to meditation in that quietness. Such
• 1:51:48
  was their scheme. And though the wished for end by multitudes was missed,
• 1:51:54
  perhaps attained by none, they, for the attempt and pains employed do in
• 1:52:00
  my present censures stand redeemed from the unqualified disdained that once would have been cast
• 1:52:06
  upon them by my voice, delivering her decisions from the seat of forward youth,
• 1:52:12
  that scruples not to solve doubts and determine questions by the rules of inexperienced
• 1:52:16
  judgment, ever prone to overweening faith, and is inflamed by courage to demand
• 1:52:23
  from real life the test of act, and suffering to provoke hostility, how
• 1:52:28
  dreadful when it comes, whether affliction be the foe or guilt. A child
• 1:52:33
  of Earth, I rested in that stage of my past course to which these
• 1:52:38
  thoughts advert upon Earth's native energies, forgetting that mine was a condition which required
• 1:52:45
  nor energy nor fortitude, a calm without vicissitude, which, if the like
• 1:52:50
  had been presented to my view elsewhere, I might have even been tempted to
• 1:52:55
  despise. But no, for the serene was also bright enlivened happiness with joy
• 1:53:01
  or flowing with joy. And oh, that memory should survive to speak the
• 1:53:06
  word with rapture, Nature's boon, life's genuine inspiration, happiness above what rules
• 1:53:14
  can teach, or fancy fane abused, as all possessions are abused that are
• 1:53:20
  not prized according to their worth? And yet what worth? What good is
• 1:53:26
  given to men? More solid than the gilded clouds of heaven? What joy
• 1:53:30
  more lasting than a vernal flower? None tis the general plaint of humankind in
• 1:53:36
  solitude, and mutually addressed from each to all for wisdom's sake. This truth
• 1:53:43
  the priest announces from his holy seat, and crowned with garlands in the summer
• 1:53:47
  grove, the poet fits it to his pensive lyre Yet ere that final resting
• 1:53:54
  place be gained. Sharp contradictions may arise by doom of this same life,
• 1:54:00
  compelling us to grieve that the prosperities of love and joy should be permitted,
• 1:54:04
  oft times to endure so long, and be at once cast down forever,
• 1:54:11
  Oh tremble ye to whom hath been assigned a course of days composing happy months,
• 1:54:16
  and they as happy years. The present still so like the past,
• 1:54:20
  and both so firm a pledge of a congenial future, that the wheels of
• 1:54:26
  pleasure move without the aid of hope, For mutability is nature's bane and slighted
• 1:54:31
  hope will be avenged, And when ye need her favors, ye shall find
• 1:54:36
  her not But in her stead fear, doubt, and agony. This was
• 1:54:45
  the bitter language of the heart. But while he spake, look gesture tone
• 1:54:48
  of voice, though discomposed and vehement, where such as skill and graceful nature
• 1:54:54
  might suggest to a proficient of the tragic scene. Standing before the multitude set
• 1:55:00
  with dark events, desirous to divert or stem the current of the speaker's thought,
• 1:55:05
  we signified a wish to leave that place of stillness and close privacy,
• 1:55:11
  a knook that seemed for self examination, made or for confession in the sinner's
• 1:55:16
  need, hidden from all men's view. To our attempt, he yielded,
• 1:55:20
  not but pointing to a slope of mossy turf, defended from the sun,
• 1:55:25
  and on that couch, inviting us to rest full on that tender hearted man.
• 1:55:30
  He turned a serious eye, and his speech thus removed. He never
• 1:55:35
  saw your eyes, never did look on the bright form of her whom once
• 1:55:41
  I loved her. Silver voice was heard upon the earth, a sound unknown
• 1:55:45
  to you else, honored friend, Your heart had borne a pitiable share of
• 1:55:50
  what I suffered when I wept that loss, and suffer now not seldom from
• 1:55:57
  the thought that I remember and can weep no more stripped as I am of
• 1:56:02
  all the golden fruit of self esteem, and by the cutting blasts of self
• 1:56:08
  reproach familiarly assailed. Yet would I not be of such wintry barrenness, but
• 1:56:15
  that some leaf of your regard should hang upon my naked branches. Lively thoughts
• 1:56:19
  give birth full often to unguarded words. I grieve that in your presence,
• 1:56:25
  from my tongue, too much of frailty hath already dropped, But that too
• 1:56:30
  much demands still more, you know, reverend compatriot, And to you,
• 1:56:36
  kind sir, not to be deemed a stranger as you come following the guidance
• 1:56:41
  of these welcome feet to our secluded veil, that my demerits did not sue
• 1:56:45
  in vain to one on whose mild radiance many gazed with hope and all with
• 1:56:50
  pleasure. This fair bride, in the devotedness of youthful love, preferring me
• 1:56:57
  to parents and the choir of gay compas to the natal roof at all known
• 1:57:01
  places and familiar sights, resigned with sadness, gently weighing down her trembling expectations.
• 1:57:08
  But no more than did to her due honor and to me yielded that
• 1:57:12
  day a confidence sublime in what I had to build upon this bride, young,
• 1:57:18
  modest, meek and beautiful. I led to a low cottage in a
• 1:57:23
  sunny bay, where the salt sea innocuously breaks and the sea breeze as innocently
• 1:57:30
  breathes on Devon's leafy shores, a sheltered hold in a soft clime, encouraging
• 1:57:35
  the soil to a luxuriant bounty. As our steps approached the embowered abode,
• 1:57:42
  our chosen seat, sea rooted in the earth, her kindly bed, the
• 1:57:46
  unendangered myrtle, decked with flowers before the threshold, stands to welcome us.
• 1:57:53
  While in the flowering myrtle's neighborhood, not overlooked, but courting no regard,
• 1:57:58
  those native plants, the holly and du gave modest intimation to the mind,
• 1:58:02
  how willingly their aid they would unite with the green myrtle to endear the hours
• 1:58:06
  of winter and protect that pleasant place. While were the walks upon those lonely
• 1:58:13
  downs, track leading it to track, how marked, how worn into bright
• 1:58:17
  verdure between fern and gorse, winding away its never ending line on their smooth
• 1:58:23
  surface. Evidence was none but there lay open to our daily haunt, a
• 1:58:29
  range of unappropriated earth, where youth's ambitious feet might move at large. Whence,
• 1:58:35
  unmolested wanderers, we beheld the shining giver of the day, diffuse his
• 1:58:41
  brightness or attract of sea and land, gay as our spirits, free as
• 1:58:45
  our desires, as our enjoyments. Boundless from those heights, we dropped at
• 1:58:53
  pleasure into sylvan combs, where arbors of impenetrable shade and mossy seats deta aimed
• 1:59:00
  us side by side, with hearts at ease, and knowledge in our hearts
• 1:59:03
  that all the grove and all the day was ours. Oh happy time,
• 1:59:11
  Still happier was at hand, for nature called my partner to resign her share
• 1:59:15
  in the pure freedom of that life enjoyed by us, in common to my
• 1:59:19
  hope, to my heart's wish. My tender mate became the thankful captive of
• 1:59:25
  maternal bonds, and those wild paths were left to me alone. There could
• 1:59:30
  I meditate on Folly's past, and, like a weary voyager escaped from risk
• 1:59:35
  and hardship, inwardly retrace a course of vain delights and thoughtless guilt and self
• 1:59:41
  indulgence, without shame, pursued there undisturbed, could think of and could thank
• 1:59:47
  her whose submissive spirit was to me rule and restraint, my guardian. Shall
• 1:59:53
  I say that earthly providence, whose guiding love within a port of rest had
• 1:59:58
  lodged me safe, safe from temptingation and from danger. Far strains followed of
• 2:00:03
  acknowledgment, addressed to an authority enthroned above the reach of sight, from whom,
• 2:00:09
  as from their source, proceeded all visible ministers of good that walk the
• 2:00:13
  earth, Father of Heaven and Earth, Father and King and judge adored and
• 2:00:18
  feared. These acts of mind and memory and heart and spirit, interrupted and
• 2:00:25
  relieved by observations transient as the glance of flying sunbeams, or to the outward
• 2:00:30
  form, cleaving with power inherent and intense, as the mute insect fixed upon
• 2:00:36
  the plant on whose soft leaves it hangs, and from whose cup it draws
• 2:00:41
  its nourishment. Imperceptibly endeared my wanderings, and the mother's kiss in infant smile
• 2:00:47
  awaited my return. In privacy, we dwelt a wedded pair, companions daily,
• 2:00:54
  often all day long, not placed by fortune, within easy reach of
• 2:00:59
  various inns, nor wishing aught beyond the allowance of our own fireside. The
• 2:01:04
  twain within our happy cottage, born inmates and heirs of our united love,
• 2:01:11
  graced mutually by difference of sex, and with no wider interval of time between
• 2:01:15
  their several berths than served for one to establish something of a leader's sway,
• 2:01:21
  yet left them joined by sympathy and age equals in pleasure, fellows in pursuit
• 2:01:27
  on these two pillars, rested, as in air our solitude. It soothes
• 2:01:32
  me to perceive your courtesy withholds not from my words attentive audience, but o
• 2:01:39
  gentle friends, as times of quiet and unbroken peace. Though for a nation
• 2:01:45
  times of blessedness give back faint echoes from the historian's page. So in the
• 2:01:49
  imperfect sounds of this discourse depressed, I hear, how faithless is the voice
• 2:01:56
  which those most blissful days reverberate? What special record can or need be given
• 2:02:02
  to rules and habits whereby much was done, but all within the sphere of
• 2:02:06
  little things, of humble Though to us important cares and precious interests smoothly did
• 2:02:14
  our life advance, swerving not from the path prescribed her annual her diurnal round
• 2:02:19
  alike, maintained with faithful care. And you divine the worst effects that our
• 2:02:26
  conditions saw. If you imagine changes slowly wrought and in their progress unperceivable,
• 2:02:31
  not wished for, sometimes noticed with a sigh what air of good or lovely
• 2:02:35
  they might bring, sighs of regret for the familiar good and loveliness endeared which
• 2:02:42
  they removed. Seven years of occupation, undisturbed established seemingly a right to hold
• 2:02:48
  that happiness and use and habit gave to what an alien's spirit had acquired a
• 2:02:54
  patrimonial sanctity, And thus, with thoughts and wishes, bounded to this world.
• 2:02:59
  I lived and breathed. Most grateful if to enjoy without repining or desire
• 2:03:04
  for more, for different lot, or change to higher sphere only except some
• 2:03:10
  impulses of pride with no determined object, though upheld by theories with suitable support.
• 2:03:15
  Most grateful, if in such wise to enjoy be proof of gratitude for
• 2:03:18
  what we have else I allow, most thankless. But at once, from
• 2:03:25
  some dark seat of fatal power was urged a claim that shattered all our blooming
• 2:03:31
  girl caught in the grip of death with such brief time to struggle in as
• 2:03:39
  scarcely would allow her cheek to change its color, was conveyed from us to
• 2:03:44
  inaccessible worlds, to regions where height or depth admits not the approach of living
• 2:03:49
  man. Though longing to pursue with even as brief a warning, and how
• 2:03:56
  soon, with what short interval of time between, I tremble yet to say,
• 2:04:00
  think of our last prop our happy life's only remaining stay. The brother
• 2:04:05
  followed and was seen no more calm as a frozen lake when ruthless winds blow
• 2:04:13
  fiercely, agitating earth and sky. The Mother now remained as if in her
• 2:04:19
  who to the lowest region of the soul, had been erewhile unsettled and disturbed.
• 2:04:24
  This second visitation had no power to shake, but only to bind up
• 2:04:29
  and seal, and to establish thankfulness of heart in Heaven's determinations. Ever,
• 2:04:33
  just the eminence whereon her spirit stood, mine was unable to attain immense the
• 2:04:41
  space that severed us. But as the sight communicates with Heaven's ethereal orbs incalculably
• 2:04:47
  distant, so I felt that consolation may descend from far, and that is
• 2:04:54
  intercourse and union too. While overcome with speechless gratitude and with the holy love
• 2:05:00
  inspired. I looked on her, at once superior to my woes and partner
• 2:05:04
  of my loss. Oh, heavy change, dimness, o'er this clear luminary
• 2:05:11
  crept insensibly the immortal and divine yielded to mortal reflux her pure glory, as
• 2:05:20
  from the pinnacle of worldly state. Wretched ambition, drops astounded, fell into
• 2:05:26
  a gulf obscure of silent grief and keen heart, anguish of itself, ashamed
• 2:05:32
  yet obstinately cherishing itself, and so consumed. She melted from my arms and
• 2:05:40
  left me on this earth, disconsolate. What followed cannot be reviewed in thought,
• 2:05:46
  much less retraced in words. If she of life, blameless, so
• 2:05:51
  intimate with love and joy, in all the tender motions of the soul had
• 2:05:55
  been supplanted, could I hope to stand infirm, dependent, and now destitute.
• 2:06:01
  I called on dreams and visions to disclose that which has veiled from waking
• 2:06:06
  thought, conjured eternity, as men constrain a ghost to appear in answer to
• 2:06:13
  the grave, I spake imploringly, looked up and asked the heavens if angels
• 2:06:18
  traversed their Cerulian floors, if fixed or wandering star could tidings yield of the
• 2:06:25
  departed spirit, what abode it occupies, what consciousness retains of former loves and
• 2:06:30
  interests. Then my soul turned inward to examine of what stuffed times fetters are
• 2:06:35
  composed, and life was put to inquisition, long and profitless by pain of
• 2:06:43
  heart, now checked and now impelled. The intellectual power through words and things,
• 2:06:47
  when sounding on a dim and perilous way, And from those transports and
• 2:06:54
  these toils abstruse some trace, And am I enabled to retain of time else
• 2:06:59
  laws existing unto me only by records in myself not found from that abstraction,
• 2:07:06
  I was roused, And how even as a thoughtful shepherd, by a flash
• 2:07:12
  of lightning startled in a gloomy cave of these wild hills. For lo,
• 2:07:17
  the dread bastille, with all the chambers in its horrid towers, fell to
• 2:07:23
  the ground by violence overthrone of indignation, and with shouts that drowned the crash
• 2:07:28
  it made. In falling from the wreck, a golden palace rose, or
• 2:07:30
  seemed to rise, the appointed seat of equitable law and mild paternal sway.
• 2:07:38
  The potent shock I felt transformation I perceived as marvelously seized, as in that
• 2:07:45
  moment when from the blind mistissuing I beheld glory beyond all glory ever seen,
• 2:07:50
  confusion infinite of heaven and earth, dazzling the soul. Meanwhile, prophetic harps
• 2:07:58
  in every grove were ringing, war shall cease? Did ye not hear that
• 2:08:03
  conquest is abjured? Bring garlands, Bring forth choicest flowers to deck the tree
• 2:08:07
  of liberty. My heart rebounded my melancholy voice. The chorus joined, be
• 2:08:15
  joyful, allienations in all lands, ye that are capable of joy, be
• 2:08:18
  glad. Henceforth, whate'er is wanting to yourselves and others, ye shall promptly
• 2:08:24
  find, and all enriched by mutual and reflected wealth, shall with one heart
• 2:08:28
  honor their common kind. Thus was I reconverted to the world. Society became
• 2:08:37
  my glittering bride, and airy hopes my children From the depths of natural passion
• 2:08:41
  seemingly escaped. My soul diffused herself in wide embrace of institutions and the forms
• 2:08:48
  of things as they exist in mutable array upon life's surface. What though in
• 2:08:56
  my veins there flowed no gallic blood, nor had I breathed the air of
• 2:09:00
  france, not less than galaxeal kindled and burnt among the sapless twigs of my
• 2:09:05
  exhausted heart. If busy men in sober conclave met to weave a web of
• 2:09:11
  amity, whose living threads should stretch beyond the seas into the farthest pole,
• 2:09:18
  there did I sit assisting. If with noise and acclamation, crowds in open
• 2:09:22
  air expressed the tumult of their minds. My voice there mingled, heard or
• 2:09:26
  not the powers of song I left not uninvoked, And in still groves,
• 2:09:33
  where mild enthusiasts tuned a pensive lay of thanks and expectation. In accord with
• 2:09:39
  their belief, I sang Saturnian rule, returned a progeny of golden years,
• 2:09:45
  permitted to descend and bless mankind with promises the Hebrew Scripture's teem. I felt
• 2:09:52
  their invitation and resumed a long suspended office in the house of public worship,
• 2:09:58
  where the glowing phrase of ancient inn inspirations serving me. I promised, also
• 2:10:01
  with undaunted trust foretold and added prayer to prophecy, the admiration winning of the
• 2:10:07
  crowd, the help desiring of the pure, devout, scorn and contempt forbid
• 2:10:15
  me to proceed. But history time's slavish scribe will tell how rapidly the zealots
• 2:10:20
  of the cause disbanded or in hostile ranks appeared, some tired of honest service,
• 2:10:26
  these outdone, disgusted therefore, or appalled by aims of fiercer zealots.
• 2:10:33
  So confusion reigned, and the more faithful were compelled to exclaim, as Brutus
• 2:10:37
  did, to virtue liberty. I worship THEE and find THEE. But a
• 2:10:43
  shade such recantation had for me no charm, Nor would I bend to it.
• 2:10:50
  Who should have grieved at aught? However fair that bore the mien of
• 2:10:54
  a conclusion or catastrophe. Why then conceal that, when a simply good and
• 2:11:00
  timid selfishness withdrew, I sought other support, not scrupulous? Whence it came,
• 2:11:05
  and by what compromise it stood? Not nice, even if notions seemed
• 2:11:11
  to be high pitched and quantities determined among men. So character did I maintain
• 2:11:16
  a strife, hopeless and still more hopeless every hour. But in the process
• 2:11:22
  I began to feel that if the emancipation of the world were missed, I
• 2:11:26
  should at least secure my own and be in part compensated for rights widely inveterately
• 2:11:33
  usturbed upon, I spake with vehemence and promptly seized all that abstraction furnished for
• 2:11:39
  my needs and purposes, nor scrupled to proclaim and propagate, by liberty of
• 2:11:43
  life, those new persuasions. Not that I rejoiced or even found pleasure in
• 2:11:50
  such vagrant course for its own sake, but farthest from the walk which I
• 2:11:56
  had trod in happiness and peace was most inviting to a troubled mind, that,
• 2:12:01
  in a struggling and distempered world saw seductive image of herself. Yet mark
• 2:12:07
  the contradictions on which man is still the sport. Here nature was my guide,
• 2:12:13
  the nature of the dissolute, but thee O fostering nature I rejected,
• 2:12:18
  smiled at other's tears, in pity and in scorn at those which thy soft
• 2:12:22
  influence sometimes drew from my unguarded heart. The tranquil shores of Britain circumscribed me.
• 2:12:28
  Else, perhaps I might have been entangled among deeds which now is infamous.
• 2:12:33
  I should abhor despise as senseless, for my spirit relished strangely the exasperation
• 2:12:39
  of that land which turned an angry beak against the down of her own breast,
• 2:12:45
  confounded into hope of disencumbering thus her fretful wings. But all was quieted
• 2:12:52
  by iron bonds of the military sway, the shifting aims, the moral interests,
• 2:12:58
  the creative might, the varied functions and high attributes of civil action yielded
• 2:13:03
  to a power formal and odious and contemptible. In Britain ruled a panic dread
• 2:13:09
  of change. The week were praised, rewarded, and advanced. And from
• 2:13:13
  the impulse of a just disdain once more did I retire into myself. There,
• 2:13:20
  feeling no contentment, I resolved to fly for safeguard to some foreign shore,
• 2:13:24
  remote from Europe, from her blasted hopes, her fields of carnage and
• 2:13:28
  polluted air fresh blew the wind. When o'er the Atlantic Maine, the ship
• 2:13:33
  went gliding with her thoughtless crew. And who among them but in exile,
• 2:13:39
  freed from discontent, indifferent, pleased to sit among the busily employed, not
• 2:13:43
  more with obligation, charged with service taxed than the loose pendant to the idle
• 2:13:48
  wind upon the tall masted streaming. But ye powers of soul and sense mysteriously
• 2:13:56
  allied, Oh never let the wretched, if a choice be left him,
• 2:14:00
  trust the freight of his distress to a long voyage on the silent deep.
• 2:14:05
  For like a plague, will memory break out, and in the blank and
• 2:14:07
  solitude of things upon his spirit with a fever strength, will conscience pray?
• 2:14:13
  Feebly? Must they have felt, who in old time attired with snakes and
• 2:14:18
  whips, the vengeful furies, beautiful regards were turned on me the face of
• 2:14:24
  her I loved the wife and mother, pitifully fixing tender reproaches insupportable. Where
• 2:14:31
  now that boasted liberty no welcome from unknown objects I received, and those known
• 2:14:37
  and familiar, which the vaulted sky did in the placid clearness of the night
• 2:14:41
  disclose, had accusations to prefer against my peace. Within the cabin stood that
• 2:14:48
  volume as a compass for the soul revered among the nations. I implored its
• 2:14:54
  guidance, But the infallible support of faith was wanting tell me why refuse to
• 2:15:01
  won by storms, annoyed and adverse winds, perplexed with currents of his weakness,
• 2:15:07
  sick, a vain endeavors, tired and by his own and by his
• 2:15:11
  nature's ignorance, dismayed long wished foresight, the western world appeared, and when
• 2:15:18
  the ship was moored, I leaped ashore, indignantly, resolved to be a
• 2:15:22
  man who, having o'er the past no power, would live no longer in
• 2:15:26
  subjection to the past, with abject mind from a tyrannic lord, inviting penance,
• 2:15:31
  fruitlessly endured, so like a fugitive whose feet have cleared some boundary which
• 2:15:37
  his followers may not cross in prosecution of their deadly chase. Respiring, I
• 2:15:43
  looked round, How bright the sun, the breeze, How soft can anything
• 2:15:48
  produced in the old world? Compare thought I for power and majesty with this
• 2:15:52
  gigantic stream sprung from the desert, And behold a city, the fresh,
• 2:16:00
  youthful, and aspiring, what are these to me? Or I to them,
• 2:16:05
  as much at least as he desires that they should be, whom winds
• 2:16:09
  and waves have wafted to this distant shore, in the condition of a damaged
• 2:16:13
  seed whose fibers cannot if they would take root. Here may our roam at
• 2:16:18
  large? My business is roaming at large to observe and not to feel,
• 2:16:24
  and therefore not to act. Convinced that all which bears the name of action
• 2:16:28
  houseoeer beginning ends in servitude, still painful and mostly profitless, and sooth to
• 2:16:35
  say. On nearer view, a motley spectacle appeared of high pretensions, unreproved,
• 2:16:41
  but by the obstreperous voice of higher still big passion, strutting on a
• 2:16:46
  petty stage, which a detached spectator may regard not unamused but ridicule, demands
• 2:16:52
  quick change of objects, and to laugh alone at a composing distance from the
• 2:16:58
  haunts of strife and folly. Though it be a treat as choice as musing
• 2:17:03
  leisure can bestow, yet in the very center of the crowd, to keep
• 2:17:07
  the secret of a poignant scorn, howe'er to ery deemon suitable of all unsocial
• 2:17:13
  courses, is least fit for the gross spirit of mankind, the one that
• 2:17:18
  soonest fails to please and quickleest turns into vexation. Let us, then,
• 2:17:24
  I said, leave this unknit republic to the scourge of her own passions,
• 2:17:28
  and to region's haste, whose shades have never felt the encroaching acts or soil
• 2:17:35
  endure to transfer in the mart of dire rapacity. There man abides primeval nature's
• 2:17:41
  child, a creature weak in combination wherefore Elles driven back so far, and
• 2:17:48
  of his old inheritance so easily deprived. But for that cause, more dignified
• 2:17:52
  and stronger in himself, whether to act, judge, suffer, or enjoy
• 2:17:58
  true the inti religence of social art, hath overpower his forefathers, and soon
• 2:18:03
  will sweep the remnant of his line away. But contemplations worthier and nobler,
• 2:18:09
  far than her destructive energies attend his independence. But along the side of Mississippi,
• 2:18:15
  or that northern stream that spreads into successive seas, he walks, please
• 2:18:20
  to perceive his own unshackled life and his innate capacities of soul there imaged.
• 2:18:26
  Or when having gained the top of some commanding eminence which yet intruder ne'er beheld,
• 2:18:31
  he thence surveys regions of wood and wide savannah, vast expanse of unappropriated
• 2:18:37
  earth, with mind that sheds a light on what he sees, free as
• 2:18:41
  the sun, and lonely as the sun, pouring above his head its radiance
• 2:18:46
  down upon a living and rejoicing world. So westward toward the unviolated woods,
• 2:18:54
  I bent my way, and, roaming far and wide, failed not to
• 2:18:58
  greet the merry mocking bird, and while the melancholy muckawiss, the sportive bird's
• 2:19:03
  companion in the grove repeated or in ore with his plaintive cry. I sympathized
• 2:19:09
  at leisure with the sound. But that pure archetype of human greatness I found
• 2:19:15
  him not. There in his stead appeared a creature, squalid, vengeful and
• 2:19:20
  impure, remorseless and submissive to no law, but superstitious fear and abject sloth.
• 2:19:28
  Enough is told here am I ye have heard what evidence I seek,
• 2:19:33
  and vainly seek what from my fellow beings I require? And either they have
• 2:19:37
  not to give, or I lack virtue to receive what I myself, too
• 2:19:41
  oft by wilful forfeiture, have lost, nor can regain. How aanguidly I
• 2:19:48
  look upon this visible fabric of the world may be divined, perhaps it have
• 2:19:52
  been said, But spare your pity, if there be in me ought that
• 2:19:56
  deserves respect, for I, within myself not comfortless the tenor which my life
• 2:20:03
  holds, he readily may conceive. Whoe'er hath stood to watch a mountain brook
• 2:20:07
  in some still passage of its course, and seen within the depths of its
• 2:20:11
  capacious breast, inverted trees, rocks, clouds, and azure sky, or
• 2:20:16
  on its glassy surface, specks of foam and congobulated blubbles, undissolved numerous as
• 2:20:24
  stars, that, by their onward lapse, betray to sight the motion of
• 2:20:28
  the stream else imperceptible. Meanwhile, is heard a softened roar or murmur.
• 2:20:35
  And the sound, though soothing, and the little floating aisles, though beautiful,
• 2:20:39
  are both by nature charged with the same pensive office, and make known
• 2:20:45
  through what perplexing labyrinths, abrupt precipitations, and untoward straits, the earth born
• 2:20:52
  wanderer hath passed, and quickly that respitore like traverses and toils, he must
• 2:20:58
  again and counter. Such a stream is human life. And so the spirit
• 2:21:05
  fares in the best quiet to her course aloud and such as mine, save
• 2:21:09
  only for a hope that my particular current will soon reach the unfathomable gulf where
• 2:21:16
  all is still. End of Book three of the Excursion. Book four despondency
• 2:21:26
  corrected. Here closed the tenant of that lonely veil. His mournful narrative commenced
• 2:21:31
  in pain, in pain, commenced and ended without peace. Yet tempered not
• 2:21:37
  unfrequently with strains of native feeling grateful to our minds and yielding surely some relief
• 2:21:43
  to his. While we sat listening with compassion, do a pause of silence,
• 2:21:48
  followed, then with voice that did not falter, though the heart was
• 2:21:52
  moved. The wanderer said, one adequate support for the calamities of mortal life
• 2:21:58
  exists only an assured belief that the procession of our fate, howe'er sad or
• 2:22:05
  disturbed, is ordered by a being of infinite benevolence and power, whose everlasting
• 2:22:11
  purposes embrace all accidents, converting them to good. The darts of anguish fix
• 2:22:18
  not where the seat of suffering hath been thoroughly fortified by acquiescence in the will
• 2:22:22
  supreme for time and for eternity, by faith, faith absolute in God,
• 2:22:30
  including hope, and the defense that lies in boundless love of His perfections,
• 2:22:35
  with habitual dread of aught, unworthily conceived, endured, impatiently, ill done,
• 2:22:41
  or left undone to the dishonor of His Holy name. Soul of our
• 2:22:46
  souls and safeguard of the world sustain Thou only canst the sick of heart restore
• 2:22:52
  their languid spirits and recall their lost of affections unto THEE and Thine. Thus,
• 2:23:01
  as we issued from that covert nook, he thus continued lifting up his
• 2:23:05
  eyes to heaven. How beautiful this dome of sky and the vast hills in
• 2:23:09
  fluctuation fixed at thy command? How awful shall the soul, human and rational
• 2:23:16
  report of THEE. Even less than these be mute? Who will? Who
• 2:23:20
  can? Yet? I will praise THEE with impassioned voice. My lips that
• 2:23:26
  may forget THEE in the crowd cannot forget THEE. Here where thou hast built
• 2:23:30
  for thy own glory in the wilderness me didst thou constitute a priest of Thine
• 2:23:35
  in such a temple as we now behold, reared for Thy presence? Therefore
• 2:23:41
  am I bound to worship here and everywhere, as one not doomed to ignorance.
• 2:23:46
  Though forced to tread from childhood up the ways of poverty, from unreflecting
• 2:23:50
  ignorance preserved and from debasement rescued by Thy grace, the particle divine remained unquenched.
• 2:23:58
  Amid the wild weeds of a rugged soil. Thy bounty caused to flourish
• 2:24:03
  deathless flowers from paradise transplanted wintry age impens, the frost will gather round my
• 2:24:11
  heart. If the flowers wither, I am worse than dead. Come labor
• 2:24:16
  when the worn out frame requires perpetual sabbath, Come disease and want and sad
• 2:24:22
  exclusion through decay of sense. But leave me unabated trust in thee and let
• 2:24:30
  thy favor to the end of life inspire me with ability to seek, repose
• 2:24:33
  and hope among eternal things, Father of heaven and earth, And I am
• 2:24:39
  rich and will possess my portion in content? And what are things eternal powers
• 2:24:46
  depart? The gray haired wanderer steadfastly replied, answering the question which himself had
• 2:24:52
  asked. Possessions vanish, and opinions change, and passions hold a fluctuating seat.
• 2:25:00
  But by the storms of circumstance, unshaken and subject neither to eclipse nor
• 2:25:03
  wane, duty exists immutably survive for our support the measures and the forms which
• 2:25:11
  an abstract intelligence supplies, whose kingdom is where time and space are not of
• 2:25:16
  other converse, which minds, soul, and heart do with united urgency,
• 2:25:22
  require what more that may not perish Thou dread source, prime, self,
• 2:25:28
  existing, cause and end of all that in the scale of being, fill
• 2:25:31
  their place above our human region or below set and sustained. Thou, who
• 2:25:37
  didst wrap the cloud of infancy around us, that thyself therein with our simplicity,
• 2:25:43
  while mightst hold on earth communion undisturbed, Who, from the anarchy of
• 2:25:48
  dreaming sleep, or from its deathlike void, with punctual care and touch as
• 2:25:54
  gentle as the morning light, restorest us daily to the powers of sense and
• 2:25:58
  reais and steadfast rule. Thou, thou alone art, everlasting, and the
• 2:26:03
  blessed spirits which thou includest as the sea her waves for adoration, Thou endurest
• 2:26:11
  endure for consciousness, the motions of thy will for apprehension, those transcendent truths
• 2:26:18
  of the pure intellect that stand as laws submission, constituting strength and power even
• 2:26:24
  to Thy being's infinite majesty. This universe shall pass away a work glorious,
• 2:26:28
  because the shadow of Thy might a step or link for intercourse with thee Ah.
• 2:26:35
  If the time must come in which my feet no more shall stray.
• 2:26:39
  Where meditation leads by flowing stream through wood or craggy wild love haunts like these,
• 2:26:46
  the unimprisoned mind may yet have scope to range among her own, her
• 2:26:50
  thoughts, her images, her high desires. If the dear faculty of sight
• 2:26:56
  should fail still, it may be allowed me to remember what visionary powers of
• 2:27:00
  eye and soul in youth were mine. When stationed on the top of some
• 2:27:03
  huge hill, expectant I beheld the sun rise up from distant climes, returned
• 2:27:09
  darkness to chase and sleep and bring the day his bounteous gift, or saw
• 2:27:15
  him toward the deep sink with a retinue of flaming clouds attended. Then my
• 2:27:20
  spirit was entranced with joy, exalted to beatitude. The measure of my soul
• 2:27:26
  was filled with bliss and holiest love as earth see air with light, with
• 2:27:31
  pomp, with glory, with magnificence. Those fervent raptures are forever flown,
• 2:27:37
  and since their date my soul hath undergone change, manifold for better or for
• 2:27:41
  worse. Yet, cease I not to struggle and aspire heavenward, and chide
• 2:27:46
  the part of me that flags through sinful choice or dread necessity on human nature
• 2:27:52
  from above. Imposed tis by comparison an easy task Earth to despise, but
• 2:27:58
  to converse with heaven this is not easy. To relinquish all we have or
• 2:28:03
  hope of happiness and joy, and stand in freedom loosened from this world.
• 2:28:09
  I deem not arduous, but must needs confess that'tis a thing impossible to
• 2:28:13
  frame conceptions equal to the soul's desires, and the most difficult of tasks to
• 2:28:20
  keep heights which the soul is competent to gain. Man is of dust.
• 2:28:24
  Ethereal hopes are his, which, when they should sustain themselves, aloft,
• 2:28:30
  wont due consistence. Like a pillar of smoke that with majestic energy from Earth
• 2:28:35
  rises, but having reached the thinner air, melts and dissolves, and is
• 2:28:39
  no longer seen. From this infirmity of mortal kind, sorrow proceeds which else
• 2:28:46
  were not. At least, if grief be something hallowed and ordained, if
• 2:28:50
  in proportion, it will be just and meet. Yet through this weakness of
• 2:28:54
  the general heart is it enabled to maintain its hold in that excess which conscience
• 2:29:01
  disapproves For who could sink and settle to that point of selfishness so senseless?
• 2:29:05
  Who could be as long and perseveringly to mourn for any object of his love
• 2:29:11
  removed from this unstable world, if he could fix a satisfying view upon that
• 2:29:16
  state of pure, imperishable blessedness which reason promises and wholly writ insures to all
• 2:29:24
  believers. Yet mistrust is of such incapacity, methinks, no natural branch despondency.
• 2:29:31
  Far less and least of all is absolute despair. And if there be
• 2:29:37
  whose tender frames have drooped even to the dust, apparently through weight of anguish
• 2:29:43
  unrelieved and lack of power in agonizing sorrow to transmute deem, not that proof
• 2:29:48
  is here of hope withheld when wanted, most a confidence impaired so pitiably that,
• 2:29:54
  having ceased to see with bodily eyes, they are borne down by love
• 2:29:56
  of what is lost and perished through regret. Oh. No, the innocent
• 2:30:01
  sufferer often sees too clearly, feels too vividly, and longs to realize the
• 2:30:07
  vision with intense and over constant yearning. There there lies the excess by which
• 2:30:13
  the balance is destroyed. Two. Too contracted are these walls of flesh,
• 2:30:18
  the svital warmth too cold, These visual orbs, though inconceivably endowed, too
• 2:30:24
  dim for any passion of the soul, that leads to ecstasy, and all
• 2:30:28
  the crooked paths of time and change, disdaining takes its course along the line
• 2:30:33
  of limitless desires. Ay, speaking now from such disorder, free nor rapt
• 2:30:39
  nor craving, but in settled peace, I cannot doubt that they whom you
• 2:30:43
  deplore are glorified, or if they sleep, shall wake from sleep and dwell
• 2:30:48
  with God in endless love. Hope. Below this consists not with belief in
• 2:30:54
  mercy carried infinite degrees beyond the tenderness of human hearts. Hope. Below this
• 2:31:00
  consists not with belief in perfect wisdom, guiding mightiest power that finds no limits
• 2:31:05
  but her own pure will. Here then we rest not fearing for our creed
• 2:31:11
  the worst that human reasoning can achieve to unsettle or perplex it. Yet with
• 2:31:16
  pain, acknowledging and grievous self reproach that, though immovably convinced, we want
• 2:31:24
  zeal and the virtue to exist by faith. As soldiers live by courage,
• 2:31:28
  as by strength of heart, the sailor fights with roaring seas, alas the
• 2:31:35
  endowment of immortal power is matched unequally with custom, time and domineering faculties of
• 2:31:41
  sense in all, in most with superadded foes, idle temptations, open vanities,
• 2:31:46
  ephemeral offspring of the unblushing world, and in the private regions of the
• 2:31:52
  mind, ill governed passions, ranklings of despite immoderate wishes, pining, discontent,
• 2:31:58
  distress, and care, What then remains to seek those helps for his
• 2:32:03
  occasions, ever near, who lacks not will to use them, vows renewed
• 2:32:09
  on the first motion of a holy thought, vigils of contemplation, praise and
• 2:32:15
  prayer, a stream which from the fountain of the heart, issuing, however
• 2:32:18
  feebly nowhere flows without access of unexpected strength. But above all, the victory
• 2:32:24
  is most sure for him who, seeking faith by virtues, strives to yield
• 2:32:30
  entire submission to the law of conscience, conscience reverenced and obeyed as God's most
• 2:32:35
  intimate presence in the soul and his most perfect image in the world. Endeavor
• 2:32:41
  thus to live these rules, regard these helps solicit, and a steadfast seat
• 2:32:46
  shall then be yours among the happy few who dwell on earth yet breathe imperial
• 2:32:52
  air suns of the morning. For your nobler part ere, disencumbered of her
• 2:32:56
  mortal chains doubt shall be quelled, and trouble chased away, with only such
• 2:33:03
  degree of sadness left as may support longings of pure desire and strength and love,
• 2:33:09
  rejoicing secretly in the sublime attractions of the grave. While in this strain
• 2:33:16
  the venerable Sage poured forth his aspirations and announced his judgments. Near that lonely
• 2:33:20
  house, we paced a plot of greensward, seemingly preserved by nature's care,
• 2:33:26
  from wreck of scattered stones and from encroachment of encircling heath, small space,
• 2:33:33
  but for reiterated steps, smooth and commodious, as a stately deck which to
• 2:33:37
  and fro the mariner is used to tread for pastime, talking with his mates,
• 2:33:41
  or haply thinking of far distant friends. While the ship glides before a
• 2:33:46
  steady breeze, stillness prevailed around us, and the voice that spake was capable
• 2:33:52
  to lift the soul toward regions yet more tranquil. But methought that he whose
• 2:33:58
  fixed despondency had given impulse and motive to that strong discourse, was less upraised
• 2:34:03
  in spirit than abashed, shrinking from admonition, like a man who feels that
• 2:34:09
  to exhort is to reproach, yet not to be diverted from his aim.
• 2:34:13
  The sage continued for that other loss, the loss of confidence in social man
• 2:34:20
  by the unexpected transports of our age, carried so high that every thought which
• 2:34:24
  looked beyond the temporal destiny of the kind, to many seemed superfluous, as
• 2:34:28
  no cause could err for such exalted confidence exist. So none is now for
• 2:34:33
  fixed despair. The two extremes are equally disowned by reason. If with sharp
• 2:34:39
  recoil from one you have been driven far as its opposite between them, seek
• 2:34:46
  the point whereon to build sound expectations, So doth he advise, who shared
• 2:34:50
  at first the illusion, but was soon cast from the pedestal of pride by
• 2:34:54
  shocks which nature gently gave in in woods and fields, nor unreproved by providence.
• 2:35:01
  Thus speaking to the inattentive children of the world, vain glorious generation,
• 2:35:07
  What new powers on you have been conferred? What gifts withheld from your progenitors
• 2:35:13
  have ye received fit recompense of new dessert? What claim are ye prepared to
• 2:35:18
  urge that my decrees for you should undergo a sudden change? And the weak
• 2:35:24
  functions of one busy day reclaiming and extirpating perform what all the slowly moving years
• 2:35:31
  of time, with their united force, have left undone by nature's gradual processes.
• 2:35:37
  Be taught by story, be confounded. Ye aspire rashly to fall once
• 2:35:43
  more. And that false fruit which to your overweening spirits yields hope of a
• 2:35:48
  flight celestial, will produce misery and shame. But wisdom of her sons shall
• 2:35:56
  not the less, though late, be justified. Such timely warning, said
• 2:36:01
  the Wanderer, gave that visionary voice. And at this day, when a
• 2:36:05
  tartarian darkness overspreads the groaning nations, when the impious rule by will or by
• 2:36:11
  establish ordinance their own dire agents, and constrain the good to acts which they
• 2:36:18
  abhor. Though I bewail this triumph, yet the pity of my heart prevents
• 2:36:22
  me not from owning that the law by which mankind now suffers is most just
• 2:36:28
  for by superior energies, more strict affiance in each other, faith, more
• 2:36:35
  firm in their unhallowed principles, the bad have fairly earned a victory, or
• 2:36:39
  the weak the vacillating, inconsistent good, therefore not unconsoled. I wait in
• 2:36:46
  hope to see the moment when the righteous cause shall gain defenders zealous and devout
• 2:36:50
  as they who have opposed her, in which virtue will to her efforts tolerate
• 2:36:56
  no bounds that are not lofty as her rights, hiring by impulse of her
• 2:37:01
  own ethereal zeal. That spirit only can redeem mankind. And when that sacred
• 2:37:07
  spirit shall appear, then shall our triumph be complete as theirs. Yet should
• 2:37:13
  this confidence prove vain, the wise have still the keeping of their proper peace,
• 2:37:18
  are guardians of their own tranquility. They act, or they recede,
• 2:37:24
  observe, and feel, knowing the heart of man is set to be the
• 2:37:28
  center of this world, about the which those revolutions of disturbances still roll,
• 2:37:35
  where all the aspects of misery predominate. Whose strong effects are such as he
• 2:37:39
  must bear, being powerless to redress, and that unless above himself he can
• 2:37:46
  erect himself. How poor a thing is man. Happy is he who lives
• 2:37:52
  to understand not human nature only, but explores all natures to the end that
• 2:37:56
  he may find the law that governs each and where begins the union, the
• 2:38:01
  partition, where that makes kind and degree among all visible beings, The constitutions,
• 2:38:07
  powers and faculties which they inherit cannot step beyond, and cannot fall beneath,
• 2:38:13
  that do assign to every class its station and its office, through all
• 2:38:18
  the mighty commonwealth of things, up from the creeping plant to sovereign man.
• 2:38:24
  Such converse, if directed by a meek, sincere and humble spirit, teaches
• 2:38:30
  love, for knowledge is delight, and such delight breeds love. Yet suited
• 2:38:35
  as it rather is to thought and to the climbing intellect, it teaches less
• 2:38:39
  to love than to adore, if that be not indeed the highest love.
• 2:38:45
  Yet said I tempted here to interpose the dignity of life is not impaired by
• 2:38:50
  aught that innocently satisfies the humbler cravings of the heart. And he is still
• 2:38:54
  a happier man, who, for those heights of speculation, not unfit ends
• 2:39:01
  and such benign affections, cultivates among the inferior kinds, not merely those that
• 2:39:05
  he may call his own, and which depend as individual objects of regard upon
• 2:39:11
  his care, from whom he also looks for signs and tokens of a mutual
• 2:39:15
  bond, but others, far beyond this narrow sphere, whom, for the
• 2:39:20
  very sake of love, he loves. Nor is it a mean praise of
• 2:39:24
  rural life and solitude that they do favor most most frequently, call forth and
• 2:39:30
  best sustain. These pure sensations that can penetrate the obstreperous city on the barren
• 2:39:35
  seas are not unfelt, and much might recommend how much they might in spirit
• 2:39:41
  and endear the loneliness of this sublime retreat, Yes, said the sage,
• 2:39:46
  resuming the discourse again directed to his downcast friend. If with the froward will
• 2:39:52
  and groveling soul of man offended liberty, is here an invitation every hour renewed
• 2:39:56
  to mark their placid state. Who never heard of a command which they have
• 2:40:01
  power to break, or rule which they are tempted to transgress. These with
• 2:40:05
  a soothed or elevated heart, may we behold their knowledge, register observe their
• 2:40:11
  ways, and, free from envy, find complaisance there. But wherefore this
• 2:40:18
  to you, I guess that welcome to your lonely hearth. The red breast,
• 2:40:22
  ruffled up by winter's cold into a feathery bunch, feeds at your hand.
• 2:40:26
  A box, perchance, is from your casement, hung for the small
• 2:40:31
  wren to build in, not in vain the barriers, disregarding that surround this
• 2:40:35
  deep, abiding place before your sight, mounts on the breeze the butterfly and
• 2:40:39
  soars, small creature as she is, from Earth's bright flowers into the dewy
• 2:40:46
  clouds. Ambition rains in the waste wilderness. The soul ascends, drawn towards
• 2:40:50
  her native firmament of heaven. When the fresh eagle in the month of May
• 2:40:56
  upborne at evening on replenished wing, that shaded valley leaves and leaves the dark
• 2:41:01
  and purpled hills, conspicuously renewing a proud communication with the sun low sunk beneath
• 2:41:07
  the horizon. List I heard from yon huge breast of rock a voice sent
• 2:41:13
  forth, as if the visible mountain made the cry again. The effect upon
• 2:41:18
  the soul was such as he expressed from out the mountain's heart. The solemn
• 2:41:22
  voice appeared to issue, startling the blank air, for the region all around
• 2:41:26
  stood empty of all shape of life, and silent, save for that single
• 2:41:31
  cry, the unanswered bleat of a poor lamb left somewhere to itself. The
• 2:41:37
  plaintive spirit of the solitude. He paused, as if unwilling to proceed through
• 2:41:43
  consciousness. That silence in such place was best the most affecting eloquence. But
• 2:41:48
  soon his thoughts returned upon themselves, and in soft tone of speech, thus
• 2:41:52
  he resumed. Ah. If the heart too confidently raised, perchance too lightly
• 2:41:58
  occupied, lulled, too easily despise, or overlook the vassalage that binds her
• 2:42:03
  to the earth, her sad dependence upon time, and all the trepidations of
• 2:42:07
  mortality. What place so destitute and void? But there the little flower,
• 2:42:13
  her vanity shall check the trailing worm, reprove her thoughtless pride, These craggy
• 2:42:20
  regions, these chaotic wilds. Does that benignity purveyed that warms the mole contented
• 2:42:26
  with her darksome walk in the wool cold ground, and to the emmet gives
• 2:42:31
  her foresight, an intelligence that makes the tiny creatures strong. By social league
• 2:42:37
  supports the generations, multiplies their tribes, till we behold a spacious plain or
• 2:42:41
  grassy bottom, all with little hills, their labor covered as a lake with
• 2:42:46
  waves. Thousands of cities in the desert place built up of life and food
• 2:42:50
  and means of life. Nor wanting here to entertain the thought creatures that in
• 2:42:56
  communities exist less as might seen from aneral guardianship, or through dependence upon mutual
• 2:43:03
  aid, than by participation of delight and a strict love of fellowship combined.
• 2:43:09
  What other spirit can it be that prompts the gilded summer flies to mix and
• 2:43:13
  weave their sports together in the solar beam, or in the gloom of twilight,
• 2:43:16
  hum their joy. More obviously, the self same influence rules the feathered
• 2:43:22
  kinds, the fieldfare's pensive flock, the cawing rooks and sea mews from afar,
• 2:43:28
  hovering above these inland solitudes by the rough wind, unscattered at whose call
• 2:43:33
  up through the trenches of the long drawn veils, their voyage was begun,
• 2:43:37
  nor its power unfelt among the sedentary fowl that seek yon pool, and there
• 2:43:43
  prolong their stay in silent congress, or together roused to take flight, while
• 2:43:50
  with their clang the air resounds, And overall in that ethereal vault is the
• 2:43:56
  mute company of changeful clouds. Bright apparition suddenly put forth the rainbow smiling on
• 2:44:03
  the faded storm, the mild assemblage of the starry heavens, and the great
• 2:44:07
  sun, Earth's universal Lord. How bountiful is nature? He shall find who
• 2:44:15
  seeks not, And to him who hath not asked, large measures shall be
• 2:44:20
  dealt. Three sabbath days are scarcely told, since on a service bend of
• 2:44:24
  mere humanity, you clone those heights, and what a marvelous and heavenly show
• 2:44:30
  was suddenly revealed. The swains moved on and heeded not. You lingered,
• 2:44:33
  You perceived and felt deeply as living man could feel. There is a luxury
• 2:44:39
  and self dispraise, and inward self disparagement affords to meditative spleen a grateful feast.
• 2:44:46
  Trust me, pronouncing on your own desert, you judge unthankfully distempered nerves
• 2:44:52
  infect the thoughts. The languor of the frame depresses the soul's vigor. Your
• 2:45:00
  couch cleave not so fondly to your moody cell, nor let the hallowed powers
• 2:45:05
  that shed from Heaven's stillness, and rest with disapproving eye, look down upon
• 2:45:09
  your taper through a watch of midnight hours, unseasonably twinkling in this deep hollow,
• 2:45:13
  like a sullen star dimly reflected in a lonely pool. Take courage and
• 2:45:20
  withdraw yourself from ways that run not parallel to nature's course. Rise with the
• 2:45:26
  lark, your mattens shall obtain grace. Be their composition what it may,
• 2:45:30
  if but with hers performed, Climb once again, Climb every day those ramparts
• 2:45:35
  meet the breeze upon their tops, adventurous as a bee that from your garden
• 2:45:39
  thither sores to feed on new blown heath. Let yon, commanding, rock
• 2:45:45
  be your frequented watch tower. Roll the stone in thunder down the mountains with
• 2:45:50
  all your might, chase the wild goat. And if the bold red deer
• 2:45:54
  fly to those harbors, driven by hound and horn, loud echoing, add
• 2:45:58
  your speed to the pursuit. So wearied to your hut, shall you return
• 2:46:03
  and sink at evening into sound, repose the solitary lifted toward the hills.
• 2:46:09
  A kindling eye, accordant feelings rushed into my bosom. Whence these words broke
• 2:46:15
  forth, Oh what a joy it were in vigorous health to have a body
• 2:46:20
  this Our vital frame was shrinking, sensibility endued in all the nice regards of
• 2:46:24
  flesh and blood, And to the end elements surrender it as if it were
• 2:46:28
  a spirit. How divine the liberty for frail, for mortal man to roam
• 2:46:33
  at large among unpeopled glens and mountainous retreats only trod by devious footsteps. Regions
• 2:46:39
  consecrate to oldest time and reckless of the storm that keeps the raven quiet in
• 2:46:45
  her nest, be as a presence or a motion one among the many there.
• 2:46:48
  And while the mists flying and rainy vapors call out shapes and phantoms from
• 2:46:52
  the crags and solid earth as fast as a musician scatters sounds out of an
• 2:46:56
  instrument. And while the streams, as at a first creation, and in
• 2:47:01
  haste to exercise their untried faculties, descending from the region of the clouds,
• 2:47:07
  and starting from the hollows of the earth, more multitudinous every moment rend their
• 2:47:11
  way before them, What a joy to rome and unequal among mightiest energies.
• 2:47:16
  And haply, sometimes with articulate voice amid the deafening tumults, scarcely heard by
• 2:47:22
  him that utters it, exclaim aloud, rage on ye elements, Let moon
• 2:47:26
  and stars their aspects lend and mingle in their turn with this commotion, ruinous
• 2:47:33
  though it be, from day to night, from night to day, prolonged,
• 2:47:37
  Yes, said the wanderer, taking from my lips the strain of transport,
• 2:47:41
  whosoe'er in youth has, through ambition of his soul, given way to
• 2:47:45
  such desires, and grasped that such delight shall feel congenial stirrings late and long.
• 2:47:50
  In spite of all the weakness that life brings its cares and sorrows,
• 2:47:56
  He, though taught to own the tranquilizing power of time, shall wake wake
• 2:47:58
  some times times to a noble restlessness, loving the sports which once he gloried
• 2:48:03
  in compatriot friend. Remote our Garry's hills, the streams far distant of your
• 2:48:11
  native glen, Yet it is there form an image here expressed with brotherly resemblance.
• 2:48:16
  Turn your steps wherever fancy leads. By day by night are various engines
• 2:48:22
  working, not the same as those with which your soul and youth was moved,
• 2:48:26
  but by the great artificer, endowed with no inferior power. You dwell
• 2:48:31
  alone, you walk, you live, you speculate alone. Yet doth remembrance
• 2:48:35
  like a sovereign prince for you a stately gallery maintain of gay or tragic pictures.
• 2:48:41
  You have seen, have acted, suffered, traveled far observed with no
• 2:48:46
  incurious eye. And books are yours, within whose silent chambers, treasure lies
• 2:48:52
  preserved from age to age, more precious far than that accumulated store of gold
• 2:48:56
  and orient gems, which for a day of need the Sultan hides deep in
• 2:49:01
  ancestral tombs. These hordes of truth you cannot lock at will, And music
• 2:49:09
  waits upon your skillful touch, sounds which the wandering shepherd from these heights hears
• 2:49:15
  and forgets his purpose furnished. Thus, how can you droop if willing to
• 2:49:18
  be upraised? End of Book four, Book four, Part two. A
• 2:49:26
  piteous lot it were to flee from man, yet not rejoice in nature.
• 2:49:31
  He whose hours are by domestic pleasures, uncressed and unenlivened, who exists whole
• 2:49:35
  years apart from benefits received or done mid the transactions of the bustling crowd,
• 2:49:41
  who neither hears nor feels a wish to hear of the world's interests. Such
• 2:49:46
  a one hath need of a quick fancy and an active heart, that for
• 2:49:48
  the day's consumption books may yield food, not unwholesome Earth and air correct his
• 2:49:54
  morbid humor with delight supplied or solace, varying as the season's change. Truth
• 2:50:01
  has her pleasure grounds her haunts of ease and easy contemplation, kay parterres and
• 2:50:07
  labyrinthine walks, her sunny glades and shady groves, and studied contrast each for
• 2:50:13
  recreation, leading into each these may he range, if willing to partake their
• 2:50:18
  soft indulgences, and in due time may issue thence recruited for the tasks and
• 2:50:24
  course of service Truth requires from those who tend her altars, weigh upon her
• 2:50:28
  throne and guard her fortresses. Who thinks and feels and recognizes ever and anon
• 2:50:35
  the breeze of nature stirring in his soul? Why need such man go desperately
• 2:50:39
  astray and nurse the dreadful appetite of death. If tired with systems, each
• 2:50:45
  in its degree substantial, and all crumbling in their turn, let him build
• 2:50:48
  systems of his own, and smile at the fond work demolished with a touch.
• 2:50:54
  If unreligious, let him be at once among ten thousand innocents enrolled a
• 2:50:58
  pupil in the many chambered school where superstition weaves her airy dreams life's autumn past.
• 2:51:07
  I stand on winter's verge and daily lose what I desire to keep.
• 2:51:13
  Yet rather would I instantly decline to the traditionary sympathies of a most rustic ignorance,
• 2:51:18
  and take a fearful apprehension from the owl or death watch, and as
• 2:51:24
  readily rejoice if two auspicious magpies crossed my way to this would rather bend than
• 2:51:30
  see and hear the repetitious wearisome of sense. Where soul is dead and feeling,
• 2:51:35
  hath no place where knowledge ill begun in cold remark on outward things with
• 2:51:41
  formal inference ends, or if the mind turn inward, she recoils at once,
• 2:51:46
  or not recoiling, is perplexed, lost in a gloom of uninspired research.
• 2:51:52
  Meanwhile, the heart within the heart, the seat where peace and happy
• 2:51:54
  consciousness should dwell, on its own axis, restlessly revolving seeks, yet can
• 2:52:01
  nowhere find the light of truth. Upon the breast of new created earth,
• 2:52:07
  man walked, and when and wheresoe'er he moved alone or mated? Solitude was
• 2:52:13
  not? He heard? Borne on the wind, the articulate voice of God
• 2:52:16
  and angels to his sight appeared crowning the glorious hills of paradise, or through
• 2:52:22
  the groves, gliding like morning mist enkindled by the sun. He sat and
• 2:52:28
  talked with winged messengers, who daily brought to his small island in the ethereal
• 2:52:33
  deep tidings of joy and love from those pure heights, whether of actual vision,
• 2:52:39
  sensible to sight and feeling, or that in this sort have condescendingly been
• 2:52:43
  shadowed. Forth communications spiritually maintained, and intuitions moral and divine fell human kind
• 2:52:52
  to banishment, condemned, that flowing years repealed not, and distress and grief
• 2:52:58
  spread wide, but man escaped the doom of destitution. Solitude was not Jehovah,
• 2:53:05
  shapeless power above all powers, single and one, the omnipresent God,
• 2:53:09
  by vocal utterance or blaze of light or cloud of darkness, localized in heaven
• 2:53:13
  on Earth, enshrined within the wandering arc or out of Zion, thundering from
• 2:53:18
  his throne between the Cheriobim on the chosen race, showered miracles and ceased not
• 2:53:24
  to dispense judgment that filled the land from age to age with hope and love
• 2:53:28
  and gratitude and fear, and with amazement, smote thereby to assert his scorned
• 2:53:35
  or unacknowledged sovereignty. And when the one ineffable of name of nature, indivisible
• 2:53:41
  withdrew from mortal adoration or regard. Not then was deity engulfed, nor man
• 2:53:46
  the rational creature left to feel the weight of his own reason, without sense
• 2:53:50
  or thought of higher reason and a purer will to benefit and bless through mightier
• 2:53:54
  power. Whether the Persian, zealous to reject altar image in the inclusive walls
• 2:54:01
  and roofs of temples built by human hands, to loftiest heights, ascending from
• 2:54:05
  their tops, with myrtle wreathed tiara on his brow, presented sacrifice to moon
• 2:54:11
  and stars, and to the winds and mother elements and the whole circle of
• 2:54:16
  the heavens. For him a sensitive existence and a God with lifted hands invoked
• 2:54:20
  and songs of praise, or less reluctantly to bonds of scense yielding his soul.
• 2:54:26
  The Babylonian, framed for influence, undefined a personal shape, and from
• 2:54:31
  the plain with toil imments a reared tower eight times planted on the top of
• 2:54:35
  tower that bellus nightly to his splendid couch, descending there might rest upon that
• 2:54:43
  height, pure and serene, diffused to overlook winding euphrates and the city vast
• 2:54:48
  of his devoted worshipers, far stretched with their grove and field and garden,
• 2:54:54
  interspersed their town and fruitful region for support against the pressure of beliefing war.
• 2:55:01
  Chaldean shepherds, ranging trackless fields beneath the concave of unclouded skies, spread like
• 2:55:07
  a sea in boundless solitude, looked on the polar stars on a guide and
• 2:55:11
  guardian of their course that never closed his steadfast eye, the planetary five with
• 2:55:18
  a submissive reverence. They beheld, watched from the center of their sleeping flocks,
• 2:55:22
  those radiant mercuries that seemed to move, carrying through ether in perpetual round
• 2:55:28
  decrees and resolutions of the gods, and by their aspects signifying works of dim
• 2:55:35
  futurity to man, revealed the imaginative faculty was lord of observations natural, and
• 2:55:41
  thus led on those shepherds made report of stars and set rotation, passing to
• 2:55:46
  and fro between the orbs of our apparent sphere and its invisible counterpart, adorned
• 2:55:52
  with answering constellations under Earth, removed from all approach of living sight, but
• 2:55:58
  present to the dead, whoso they deemed, like those celestial messengers beheld all
• 2:56:03
  accidents and judges were of all the lively Grecian in a land of hills,
• 2:56:09
  rivers, and fertile plains and sounding shores, under a cope of sky more
• 2:56:13
  variable could find commodious space for every god, promptly received, as prodigally brought
• 2:56:20
  from the surrounding countries at the choice of all adventures, with unrivaled skill,
• 2:56:26
  as nicest observation, furnished hints for studious fancy, his quick hand bestowed on
• 2:56:31
  fluent operations of fixed shape metal or stone, idolatrously served and yet triumphant,
• 2:56:37
  Or this pompous show of art, this palpable array of sense on every side,
• 2:56:43
  encountered in despite of the grossed fictions chanted in the streets by wandering rhapsodists,
• 2:56:48
  and can contempt of doubt and bold denial hourly urged amid the wrangling schools,
• 2:56:54
  a spirit hung beautiful region, or thy towns and farms, statues and
• 2:57:00
  temples, and memorial tombs and emanations were perceived, and acts of immortality in
• 2:57:05
  nature's course exemplified by mysteries that were felt as bonds on grave philosopher, imposed
• 2:57:11
  and armed warrior. And in every grove a gay or pensive tenderness prevailed when
• 2:57:16
  piety more awful had relaxed, Take running river, take these locks of mind.
• 2:57:24
  Thus would the votaries say, this severed hair, my vow fulfilling,
• 2:57:28
  do I here present, thankful for my beloved child's return? Thy banks cephasus,
• 2:57:35
  He again hath trod, thy murmurs, heard and drunk the crystal lymph
• 2:57:39
  with which thou dost refresh the thirsty lip, and all day long moistened these
• 2:57:43
  flowery fields. And doubtless sometimes when the hair was shed upon the flowing stream,
• 2:57:50
  a thought arose of life continuous, being, unimpaired, that hath been,
• 2:57:54
  is and where it was, and is there shall endure existence on a
• 2:58:00
  exposed to the blind walk of mortal accident, from diminution, safe and weakening
• 2:58:05
  age, while man grows old and dwindles and decays, and countless generations of
• 2:58:09
  mankind depart and leave no vestige where they trod. We live by admiration,
• 2:58:16
  hope, and love, And even as these are well and wisely fixed in
• 2:58:20
  dignity of being, we ascend. But what is error? Answer he who
• 2:58:26
  can the skeptic someone haughtily exclaimed love, hope, and admiration? Are they
• 2:58:33
  not mad? Fancies? Favorite vassals does not life, use them full oft
• 2:58:37
  as pioneers to ruin guide's to destruction. Is it well to trust imagination's light
• 2:58:43
  when reason fails? The unguarded taper, where the guarded faints, stoop from
• 2:58:48
  those heights, and soberly declare what error is? And of our errors which
• 2:58:54
  doth most debase the mind? The genuine seats of power? Where are they
• 2:58:58
  who shall regulate with truth? The scale of intellectual rank methinks persuasively, The
• 2:59:05
  sage replied that for this arduous office you possess some rare advantages. Your early
• 2:59:13
  days a grateful recollection must supply of much as exalted good by Heaven, vouchsafed
• 2:59:18
  to dignify the humblest state. Your voice hath in my hearing often testified that
• 2:59:24
  poor men's children, they and they alone, by their condition taught, can
• 2:59:28
  understand the wisdom of the prayer that daily asks for daily bread. A consciousness
• 2:59:33
  is yours. How feelingly, religion may be learned in smoky cabins from a
• 2:59:39
  mother's tongue heard while the dwelling vibrates to the din of the contiguous torrent,
• 2:59:43
  gathering strength at every moment, and with strength increase of fury or while snow
• 2:59:50
  is at the door, assaulting and defending, and the wind a sightless laborer
• 2:59:52
  whistles at his work fearful, but resignation tempers fear, and piety is sweet
• 2:59:58
  to infant mindindes the shepherd lad that in the sunshine carves on the green turf
• 3:00:03
  a dial to divide the silent hours, and who to that report can portion
• 3:00:09
  out his pleasures and adapt throughout a long and lonely summer's day. His round
• 3:00:13
  of pastoral duties is not left with less intelligence for moral things of gravest import
• 3:00:20
  Early he perceives within himself a measure and a rule which, to the sun
• 3:00:24
  of truth he can apply that shines for him and shines for all mankind.
• 3:00:31
  Experience daily fixing his regards on nature's wants, he knows how few they are
• 3:00:35
  and where they lie. How answered and appeased this knowledge ample recompense affords for
• 3:00:41
  manifold privations. He refers his notions to this standard. On this rock rests
• 3:00:48
  his desires, and hence in after life soul strengthening patience and sublime content.
• 3:00:56
  Imagination not permitted here to waste her powers as in the world. Worldling's mind
• 3:01:01
  on fickle pleasures and superfluous cares and trivial ostentation is left free and poissant to
• 3:01:07
  range the solemn walks of time and nature, girded by a zone that,
• 3:01:11
  while it binds, invigorates and supports acknowledge. Then that, whether by the
• 3:01:18
  side of his poor hut, or on the mountain top or in the cultured
• 3:01:22
  field, a man so bred take from him what you will upon the score
• 3:01:26
  of ignorance or illusion, lives and breathes for noble purposes of mind. His
• 3:01:31
  heart beats to the heroic song of ancient days, his eye distinguishes, his
• 3:01:37
  soul, creates and those illusions which excite the scorn or move the pity of
• 3:01:43
  unthinking minds. Are they not mainly outward ministers of inward conscience, with whose
• 3:01:48
  service charged they come and go, appeared and disappear, diverting evil purposes,
• 3:01:54
  remorse, awakening, chastening and intemperate grief or pride of heart abating, and
• 3:01:58
  whene'er for less important ends those phantoms move who would forbid them if their presence
• 3:02:03
  serve on thinly peopled mountains and wild heaths, filling a space else vacant to
• 3:02:09
  exalt the forms of nature and enlarge her powers once more to distant ages of
• 3:02:15
  the world. Let us revert and placed before our thoughts the face which rural
• 3:02:18
  solitude might wear to the unenlightened swains of pagan grease. In that fair clime,
• 3:02:24
  the lonely herdsman, stretched on the soft grass through half a summer's day
• 3:02:28
  with music lulled his indolent repose, and in some fit of weariness, if
• 3:02:35
  he, when his own breath was silent, chanced to hear a distant strain
• 3:02:37
  far sweeter than the sounds which his poor skill could make. His fancy fetched
• 3:02:43
  even from the blazing chariot of the sun. A beardless youth who touched a
• 3:02:48
  golden lute and filled the illumined groves with ravishment. The nightly hunter, lifting
• 3:02:52
  a bright eye up towards the crescent moon, with grateful heart, called on
• 3:02:56
  the lovely wanderer, who bestowed that timely light, to share his joyous sport.
• 3:03:03
  And hence a beaming goddess with her nymphs across the lawn and through the
• 3:03:07
  darksome grove, not unaccompanied with tuneful notes by echo multiplied from rock or cave,
• 3:03:13
  swept in the storm of chase, as moon and stars glance rapidly along
• 3:03:16
  the clouded heaven. When winds are blowing strong, the traveler slaked his thirst
• 3:03:22
  from real or gushing fount and thanked the Naiad sunbeams upon distant hills. Gliding
• 3:03:30
  apace with shadows in their train, might, with a small help from fancy,
• 3:03:33
  be transformed into fleet oreads, sporting visibly. The zephyrs, fanning as
• 3:03:39
  they passed. Their wings lacked not for love, fair objects whom they wooed
• 3:03:43
  with gentle whisper Withered boughs grotesque stripped of their leaves and twigs by hoary age
• 3:03:50
  from death of shaggy covert, peeping forth in the low vale or on steep
• 3:03:56
  mountain side, and sometimes intermixed with stirring horns of the live deer or goat's
• 3:04:01
  depending beard. These were the lurking Sathirs, a wild brood of games and
• 3:04:05
  deities, or Pan himself the ship simple shepherd's awe inspiring god. The strain
• 3:04:13
  was aptly chosen, and I could mark its kindly influence, or the yielding
• 3:04:18
  brow of our companion gradually diffused. While listening, he had paced the noiseless
• 3:04:24
  turf, like one whose untired ear, a murmuring stream detains, but tempted
• 3:04:28
  not to interpose, he with a smile, exclaimed, tis well, you
• 3:04:33
  speak at a safe distance from our native land, from the mansions where our
• 3:04:37
  youth was taught, the true descendants of those godly men who swept from Scotland
• 3:04:41
  in a flame of zeal, shrine alter image in the massy piles that harbored
• 3:04:46
  them, the souls retaining yet the churlish features of that after race, who
• 3:04:50
  fled to woods, caverns and jutting rocks in deadly scorn of superstitious rites,
• 3:04:56
  or what their scruples construed to be such. I think you would they tolerate
• 3:05:01
  this scheme of fine propensities that tends, if urged, far as it might
• 3:05:05
  be urged, to so afresh the weeds of Romish fantasy in vain uprooted,
• 3:05:11
  would reconsecrate our wells to good Saint Fillan and to fair Saint Anne, and
• 3:05:16
  from long banishment, recall Saint Giles to watch again with tutelary love, or
• 3:05:20
  stately Edinburgh throned on crags, a blessed restoration, to behold the patron on
• 3:05:28
  the shoulders of his priests. Once more parading through her crowded streets, now
• 3:05:33
  simply guarded by the sober powers of science and philosophy and sense. This answer
• 3:05:39
  followed, You have turned my thoughts upon our brave progenitors, who rose against
• 3:05:45
  idolatry with a warlike mind, and shrunk from vain observances to lurkin woods,
• 3:05:50
  and dwell under impending rocks, ill, sheltered and oft, wanting fire and
• 3:05:54
  food. Why for this very reason that they felt and did acknowledge, where
• 3:06:00
  so where they moved a spiritual presence oft times misconceived by still a high dependence
• 3:06:05
  of divine bounty and government, that filled their hearts with joy and gratitude,
• 3:06:09
  and fear and love. And from their fervent lips drew hymns of praise that
• 3:06:15
  through the desert rang, though favored less, far less than these, Yet
• 3:06:20
  such in their degree were those bewildered pagans of old time, beyond their own
• 3:06:24
  poor natures, and above they looked, were humbly thankful for the good which
• 3:06:28
  the warm sun solicited and earth bestowed. Were gladsome, and their moral sense
• 3:06:33
  they fortified with reverence for the gods, and they had hopes that overstepped the
• 3:06:37
  grave. Now shall our great discoverers, he exclaimed, raising his voice,
• 3:06:43
  triumphantly obtain from sense and reason less than these obtained, though far misled.
• 3:06:48
  Shall men for whom our age unbaffled powers of vision hath prepared to explore the
• 3:06:54
  world without and world within, be joyless as the blind, ambitious spirits whom
• 3:06:58
  earth had. If this late season hath produced to regulate the moving spheres and
• 3:07:03
  weigh the planets in the hollow of their hand. And they who rather die
• 3:07:07
  than sore, whose pains have solved the elements or analyzed the thinking principle,
• 3:07:13
  shall they in fact prove a degraded race, and what avails renown If their
• 3:07:18
  presumption make them such, Oh, there is laughter at their work in heaven.
• 3:07:24
  Inquire of ancient wisdom, go demand of mighty nature. If twas ever
• 3:07:28
  meant that we should pry far off yet be unraised, that we should pour
• 3:07:35
  and dwindle as we pour, viewing all objects unremittingly in disconnection, dead and
• 3:07:39
  spiritless, and still dividing and dividing, still break down, all grandeur still
• 3:07:45
  unsatisfied with a perverse attempt, while littleness may yet become more little waging.
• 3:07:50
  Thus an impious warfare with the very life of our own souls. And if
• 3:07:56
  indeed there be an all pervading spirit upon whom our dark foundation's rest, could
• 3:08:01
  he design that this magnificent effect of power, the earth we tread, the
• 3:08:05
  sky that we behold by day, and all the pomp which night reveals that
• 3:08:09
  these and that superior mystery are vital frame so fearfully devised, and the dread
• 3:08:16
  soul within it should exist only to be examined, pondered, searched, probe
• 3:08:20
  vexed, and criticized. Accuse me not of arrogance, unknown wanderer as I
• 3:08:26
  am, if having walked with nature threescore years and offered far as frailty,
• 3:08:30
  would allow my heart a daily sacrifice to truth, I now affirm of nature
• 3:08:35
  and of truth whom I have served, that their divinity revolts, offended at
• 3:08:39
  the ways of men, swayed by such motives to such ends employed philosophers,
• 3:08:46
  who, though the human soul be of a thousand faculties composed and twice ten
• 3:08:50
  thousand interests, do yet prize this soul and a transcendent universe, no more
• 3:08:56
  than as a mirror that reflects to proud self love her own own intelligence that
• 3:09:01
  one poor finite object in the abyss of infinite being twinkling restlessly, nor higher
• 3:09:09
  place can be assigned to him and his compeers. The laughing Sage of France
• 3:09:16
  crowned. He was, if my memory do not err with Laurel planted upon
• 3:09:22
  hoary hairs, in sight of conquest by his wit achieved and benefits his wisdom,
• 3:09:26
  hath conferred his stooping body, tottered with wreaths of flowers, oppressed,
• 3:09:31
  far less becoming ornaments than spring off twines about a moldering tree. Yet so
• 3:09:37
  it pleased a fond, vain old man, and a most frivolous people him,
• 3:09:43
  I mean, who penned to ridicule confiding faith, this sorry legend,
• 3:09:46
  which by chance we found piled in a knook through malice, as might seem
• 3:09:50
  among more innocent rubbish. Speaking thus, with a brief notice when and how
• 3:09:56
  and where we had espied the book, he drew it forth and courteously,
• 3:10:00
  as if the act removed at once all traces from the good man's heart of
• 3:10:03
  unbeign aversion or contempt, restored it to its owner, gentle friend. Herewith
• 3:10:09
  he grasped the solitary's hand. You have known lights and guides better than these.
• 3:10:16
  Ah Let not aught amiss within dispose of noble mind to practice on herself,
• 3:10:20
  and tempt opinion to support the wrongs of passion. Whatsoe'er befelt or feared
• 3:10:26
  from higher judgment seats make no appeal to lower. Can you question that the
• 3:10:31
  soul inherits an allegiance, not by choice to be cast off upon an oath
• 3:10:35
  proposed by each new upstart notion. In the ports of levity, no refuge
• 3:10:41
  can be found, no shelter for a spirit in distress. He who,
• 3:10:46
  by wilful disesteem of life and proud ins his sensibility to hope, affronts the
• 3:10:50
  eye of solitude, shall learn that her mild nature can be terrible, that
• 3:10:54
  neither she nor silence lack the power to avenge their own insulted magicy. Oh
• 3:11:01
  blessed seclusion. When the mind admits the law of duty and can therefore move
• 3:11:05
  through each vicissitude of loss and gain linked in entire complaisance within her choice,
• 3:11:13
  When youth's presumptuousness is mellowed down and manhood's vain anxiety dismissed, When wisdom shows
• 3:11:20
  her seasonable fruit upon the boughs of sheltering leisure, hung in sober plenty,
• 3:11:24
  when the spirit stoops to drink with gratitude the crystal stream of unreproved enjoyment,
• 3:11:30
  and is pleased to muse and be saluted by the air of meek repentance,
• 3:11:35
  wafting wallflower scents from out the crumbling ruins of fallen pride and chambers of transgressions.
• 3:11:39
  Now forlorn O, calm, contented days and peaceful nights, who,
• 3:11:46
  when such good can be obtained, would strive to reconcile his manhood to a
• 3:11:50
  couch soft as may seem. But under that disguise, stuffed with the thorny
• 3:11:54
  substance of the past for fixed annoyance and full oft, was set with floating
• 3:12:00
  dreams, black and disconsolate, the vapory phantoms of futurity within the soul.
• 3:12:07
  A faculty abides that with interpositions which would hide and darken, so can deal
• 3:12:13
  that they become contingencies of pomp and serve to exalt her native brightness. As
• 3:12:18
  the ample moon in the deep stillness of a summer, even rising behind a
• 3:12:22
  thick and lofty grove, burns like an unconsuming fire of light in the green
• 3:12:28
  trees and kindling on all sides. Their leafy umbrage turns the dusky veil into
• 3:12:33
  a substance glorious as her own. Yea with her own incorporated by power,
• 3:12:39
  capacious and serene like power, abides in man's celestial spirit. Virtue thus sets
• 3:12:48
  forth and magnifies herself. Thus feeds a calm, a beautiful and silent fire,
• 3:12:54
  from the encumbrances of mortal life, from air disappointment, nay, from
• 3:12:56
  guilt, and sometimes so relie unting justice wills, from palpable oppressions of despair.
• 3:13:05
  The solitary, by these words, was touched with manifestest motion and exclaimed.
• 3:13:09
  But how begin and whence the mind is free resolve? The haughty mortalist
• 3:13:15
  would say, this single act is all that we demand. Alas such,
• 3:13:18
  wisdom bids a creature fly, whose very sorrow is that time hath shorn his
• 3:13:24
  natural wings to friendship. Let him term for succor. But perhaps he sits
• 3:13:28
  alone on stormy waters, tossed in a little boat that holds but him and
• 3:13:33
  can contain no more. Religion tells of amity sublime, which no condition can
• 3:13:39
  preclude of one who sees all suffering, comprehends all wants, all weakness.
• 3:13:43
  Fathoms can supply all needs. But is that bounty absolute his gifts? Are
• 3:13:50
  they not still in some degree rewards for acts of service? Can his love
• 3:13:54
  extend to hearts that own not him? Will showers of grace when in the
• 3:13:58
  sky I no promise may be seen, fall to refresh a parched and withered
• 3:14:03
  land. Or shall the groaning spirit cast her load at the Redeemer's feet?
• 3:14:09
  In rueful tone, with some impatience in his mien, he spake back to
• 3:14:13
  my mind, rushed all that had been urged to calm the sufferer. When
• 3:14:16
  his story closed, I look for counsel as an unbending now, but a
• 3:14:20
  discriminating sympathy stooped to this apt reply. As men from men do in the
• 3:14:26
  constitution of their souls, differ by mystery not to be explained. And as
• 3:14:31
  we fall by various ways and sink one deeper than another, self condemned through
• 3:14:35
  manifold degrees of guilt and shame, so manifold and various are the ways of
• 3:14:41
  restoration, fashioned to the steps of all infirmity, intending all to the same
• 3:14:46
  point attainable by all peace in ourselves and union with our God. For you,
• 3:14:52
  assuredly a hopeful road lies open. We have heard from you a voice
• 3:14:56
  at every moment, softened in its course by tenderness of heart. Have seen
• 3:15:00
  your eye, even like an altar lit by fire from heaven. Kindle before
• 3:15:03
  us your discourse this day, that, like the fabled leathy, wished to
• 3:15:09
  flow in creeping sadness through oblivious shades of death and night, has caught at
• 3:15:13
  every turn the colors of the sun. Access for you is yet preserved to
• 3:15:20
  principles of truth, which the imaginative will upholds in seats of wisdom, not
• 3:15:24
  to be approached by the inferior faculty that molds with her minute and speculative pains,
• 3:15:31
  opinion ever changing. I have seen a curious child who dwelt upon a
• 3:15:37
  tract of inland ground, applying to his ear the convolutions of a smooth lipped
• 3:15:41
  shell, to which in silence hushed. His very soul listened intensely, and
• 3:15:46
  his countenance soon brightened with joy, for from within were heard murmurings, whereby
• 3:15:52
  the monitor expressed mysterious union with its native sea. Even such a shell the
• 3:15:58
  universe itself is to the ear of faith, And there are times I doubt
• 3:16:03
  not when to you it doth impart authentic tidings of invisible things of ab and
• 3:16:07
  flow, and ever during power and central peace, subsisting at the heart of
• 3:16:13
  endless agitation. Here you stand, adore and worship when you know it not
• 3:16:18
  pious beyond the intention of your thought, devout above the meaning of your will.
• 3:16:24
  Yes, you have felt, and may not cease to feel. The
• 3:16:28
  estate of man would be indeed forlorn if false conclusions of the reasoning power made
• 3:16:33
  the eye blind and closed the passages through which the ear converses with the heart.
• 3:16:39
  Has not the soul the being of your life received a shock of awful
• 3:16:43
  consciousness in some calm season, when these lofty rocks at night's approach bring down
• 3:16:48
  the unclouded sky to rest upon their circumambient walls, a temple framing of dimensions
• 3:16:54
  vast and yet not too enormous for the sound of human anthems, choral song,
• 3:17:01
  or burst sublime of instrumental harmony to glorify the eternal. What if these
• 3:17:07
  did never break the stillness that prevails here, If the solemn nightingale be mute
• 3:17:13
  and the soft woodlark here did never chant her vespers. Nature fails not to
• 3:17:18
  provide impulse and utterance. The whispering air sends inspiration from the shadowy heights and
• 3:17:24
  blind recesses of the caverned rocks. The little rills and waters, numberless inaudible
• 3:17:31
  by daylight, blend their notes with the loud streams, and often at the
• 3:17:35
  hour when issue forth the first pale stars is heard within the circuit of this
• 3:17:39
  fabric. Huge one voice, the solitary raven, flying athwart the concave of
• 3:17:46
  the dark blue dome, unseen perchance above all power of sight and iron knell,
• 3:17:52
  with echoes from afar, faint and still fainter as the cry with which
• 3:17:56
  the wanderer accompanies her flight to the calm region fades upon the air, diminishing
• 3:18:01
  by distance till it seemed to expire, yet from the abysses, caught again
• 3:18:07
  and yet again recovered. But descending from these imaginative heights that yield far stretching
• 3:18:13
  views into eternity, acknowledge that to Nature's humbler power, your cherished sullenness is
• 3:18:18
  forced to bend, even here where her amenities are sown with sparing hand.
• 3:18:24
  Then trust yourself abroad to range her blooming bowers and spacious fields, where on
• 3:18:31
  the labors of the happy throng she smiles, including in her wide embrace city
• 3:18:35
  and town, and tower and sea, with ships sprinkled be our companion,
• 3:18:41
  while we track her rivers populace with gliding life, While free as air or
• 3:18:46
  printless sands, we march or pierce the gloom of her majestic woods, roaming
• 3:18:52
  or resting under grateful shade, in peace and meditative cheerfulness, where living things
• 3:18:56
  and things inanimate do speak at Heaven's command to eye and ear, and speak
• 3:19:03
  to social reason's innercense with inarticulate language. For the man who in this spirit
• 3:19:09
  communes with the forms of nature, who with understanding heart both knows and loves
• 3:19:15
  subch objects as excite, no morbid passions, no disquietude, no vengeance,
• 3:19:20
  and no hatred, needs must feel the joy of that pure principle of love
• 3:19:24
  so deeply that, unsatisfied with aught less, pure and exquisite, he cannot
• 3:19:28
  choose but seek for objects of a kindred love and fellow natures and a kindred
• 3:19:33
  joy. Accordingly, he by degrees perceives his feelings of aversion softened down,
• 3:19:39
  a holy tenderness pervaded his frame. His sanity of reason not impaired. Say,
• 3:19:46
  rather, all his thoughts now flowing clear from a clear fountain, flowing
• 3:19:52
  he looks round and seeks for good, and finds the good he seeks,
• 3:19:56
  until abhorrence and contempt are things he only knows by name. And if he
• 3:20:00
  hear from other mouths the language which they speak, he is compassionate and has
• 3:20:05
  no thought, no feeling which can overcome his love. And further, by
• 3:20:09
  contemplating these forms in the relations which they bear to man, he shall discern
• 3:20:15
  how through the various means which silently they yield, are multiplied the spiritual presences
• 3:20:20
  of absent things. Trust me that for the instructed time will come when they
• 3:20:26
  shall meet no object, but may teach some acceptable lesson to their minds of
• 3:20:30
  human suffering or of human joy. So shall they learn, while all things
• 3:20:35
  speak of man, their duties from all forms and general laws in local accidents,
• 3:20:39
  shall tend alike to rouse, to urge, and with the will confer
• 3:20:43
  the ability to spread the blessings wide of true philanthropy, the light of love,
• 3:20:50
  not failing perseverance from their steps departing, not for them shall be confirmed
• 3:20:54
  the glorious habit by which senses made subservient still to moral purposes, auxiliar to
• 3:21:01
  divine, that change shall clothe the naked spirit, ceasing to deplore the burthen
• 3:21:07
  of existence. Science then shall be a precious visitant, and then, and
• 3:21:11
  only then, be worthy of her name. For then her heart shall kindle,
• 3:21:16
  her dull eye, dull and inanimate, no more shall hang chain to
• 3:21:20
  its object in brute's slavery, but taught with patient interest to watch the processes
• 3:21:24
  of things and serve the cause of order and distinctness. Not for this shall
• 3:21:30
  it forget, that its most noble use, its most illustrious province, must
• 3:21:33
  be found in furnishing clear guidance, a support not treacherous to the mind's excursive
• 3:21:39
  power. So we build up the being that we are thus deeply drinking in
• 3:21:45
  the soul of things. We shall be wise perforce, and while inspired by
• 3:21:50
  choice, and conscious that the will is free, shall move unswerving, even
• 3:21:56
  as if impelled by strict necessity along the path of oora and of good.
• 3:22:01
  Whate'er we see or feel shall tend to quicken and refine, shall fix in
• 3:22:05
  calmer seats of moral strength, earthly desires, and raise to loftier heights of
• 3:22:11
  divine love. Our intellectual soul here closed the sage that eloquent harangue poured forth
• 3:22:18
  with fervor and continuous streams, such as remote mid savage wilderness. An Indian
• 3:22:24
  chief discharges from his breast into the hearing of assembled tribes in open circle,
• 3:22:28
  seated round and hushed as the unbreathing air. When not a leaf stirs in
• 3:22:33
  the mighty woods. So did he speak. The words he uttered shall not
• 3:22:37
  pass away, dispersed like music that the wind takes up by snatches and lets
• 3:22:41
  fall to be forgotten. No, they sank into me the bounteous gift of
• 3:22:48
  one whom time and nature had made wise, gracing his doctrine with authority which
• 3:22:54
  hostile spirits silently allow of one accustomed to desires that feed on fruitage gathered from
• 3:23:00
  the tree of life, to hopes on knowledge and experience, built of one
• 3:23:05
  in whom persuasion and belief had ripened into faith, and faith become a passionate
• 3:23:09
  intuition. Whence the soul, though bound to earth by ties of pity and
• 3:23:15
  love from all injurvious servitude was free. The sun, before his place of
• 3:23:22
  rest were reached, had yet to travel far, but unto us, to
• 3:23:24
  us who stood low in that hollow dell, he had become invisible, a
• 3:23:28
  pomp leaving behind of yellow radiance spread over the mountain sides, in contrast,
• 3:23:33
  bold with ample shadows, seemingly no less than those resplendent lights, his rich
• 3:23:39
  bequest, a dispensation of his evening power. Adown the path that from the
• 3:23:43
  glen had led the funeral train, the shepherd and his mate were seen descending
• 3:23:48
  forth to greet them, ran our little page. The rustic pair approached,
• 3:23:54
  and in the matron's countenance may be read plain indication that the words which told
• 3:23:58
  how that neglected pensioner was sent before his time into a quiet grave, had
• 3:24:03
  done to her humanity no wrong. But we are kindly welcomed, promptly served
• 3:24:07
  with ostentatious zeal. Along the floor of the small cottage in the lonely dell,
• 3:24:13
  a grateful couch was spread for our repose. Here, in the guise
• 3:24:18
  of mountaineers, we lay stretched upon fragrant heath, and lulled by sound of
• 3:24:24
  far torrents charming the still night. And to tired limbs and over busy thoughts,
• 3:24:31
  inviting sleep and soft forgetfulness. End of book four, Book fifth the
• 3:24:37
  pastor Farewell, Deep Valley, with thy one rude house and its small lot
• 3:24:45
  of life, supporting fields and guardian rocks. Farewell, attractive seat to the
• 3:24:50
  still influx of the morning light, open and day's pure cheerfulness, but veiled
• 3:24:56
  from human observation, as if yet primeval forests wrapped thee round with dark,
• 3:25:01
  impenetrable shade. Once more, Farewell, majestic circuit, beautiful abyss by nature
• 3:25:07
  destined from the birth of things, for quietness profound upon the side of that
• 3:25:15
  brown ridge, sole outlet of the veil, which foot of boldest stranger would
• 3:25:18
  attempt, lingering behind my comrades. Thus I breathed a parting tribute to a
• 3:25:24
  spot that seemed like the fixed center of a troubled world. Again I halted
• 3:25:30
  with reverted eyes. The chain that would not slacken was at length snapped and
• 3:25:35
  pursuing leisurely my way, how vain thought I is it by chance of place
• 3:25:41
  to seek that comfort which the mind denies. Yet trial and temptation oft are
• 3:25:46
  shunned wisely and by such tenure do we hold frail life's possessions, that even
• 3:25:52
  they whose fate yields no peculiar reason of complaint, might, by the promise
• 3:25:58
  that is here be one to steal from active duties and embrace obscurity and undisturbed
• 3:26:03
  repose knowledge. Methinks, in these disordered times should be allowed a privilege to
• 3:26:11
  have her anchorites like piety of old men who from faction, sacred and unstained
• 3:26:18
  by war, might, if so minded, turn aside, uncensured and subsist
• 3:26:24
  a scattered few living to God and Nature, and content with that communion consecrated
• 3:26:30
  be the spots where such abide. But happier still the man whom, furthermore
• 3:26:35
  a hope attends that meditation and research may guide his privacy to principles and powers
• 3:26:39
  discovered or invented, or set forth through his acquaintance with the ways of truth
• 3:26:46
  in lucid order, so that when his courses run some faithful eulogist may say,
• 3:26:52
  he sought not praise and praised it overlook his unobtrusive merit, but his
• 3:26:56
  life, sweet to himself, was exercised in good that shall survive his name
• 3:27:01
  and memory. Acknowledgments of gratitude sincere accompanied these musings fervent thanks for my own
• 3:27:09
  peaceful lot and happy choice, a choice that from the passions of the world
• 3:27:15
  withdrew and fixed me in a still retreat, sheltered but not to social duties
• 3:27:20
  lost, secluded but not buried, And with song cheering my days, and
• 3:27:26
  with industrious thought, with the ever welcome company of books, with virtuous friendship's
• 3:27:31
  sole sustaining aid, and with the blessings of domestic love thus occupied in mind,
• 3:27:39
  I paced along, following the rugged road by sledge or wheel worn in
• 3:27:43
  the moorland, till I overtook my two associates in the morning sunshine, halting
• 3:27:48
  together on a rocky knoll, from which the road descended rapidly to the green
• 3:27:52
  meadows of another vale. Here did our pensive host put forth his hand in
• 3:27:58
  sign of farewell. Nay, the old man said, the fragrant air,
• 3:28:03
  its coolness still retains. The herds and flocks are yet abroad to crop the
• 3:28:07
  dewy grass. You cannot leave us now. We must not part at this
• 3:28:11
  inviting hour. He yielded, though reluctant, for his mind instinctively disposed him
• 3:28:18
  to retire to his own covert as a billow heaved upon the beach rolls back
• 3:28:22
  into the sea. So we descend, and, winding around a rock,
• 3:28:28
  attain a point that showed the valley stretched in length before us, and not
• 3:28:33
  distant far upon a rising ground, a gray church tower, whose battlements were
• 3:28:37
  screened by tufted trees, and towards a crystal mirror that lay beyond. Among
• 3:28:43
  steep hills and woods embosomed flowed a copious stream with boldly winding course here traceable
• 3:28:52
  there hidden there again to sight, restored and glittering in the sun on the
• 3:28:58
  stream's bank, and everywhere appeared fair dwellings, single or in social knots,
• 3:29:03
  some scattered or the level, others perched on the hillsides. A cheerful,
• 3:29:07
  quiet scene now in its morning purity arrayed as midsum happy valley of the Alps,
• 3:29:15
  said I once happy ere tyrannic power, wantonly breaking in upon the Swiss
• 3:29:18
  destroyed their unoffending commonwealth. A popular equality reigns here save for Yon's stately house,
• 3:29:26
  beneath whose roof a rural lord might dwell. No feudal pomp or power,
• 3:29:33
  replied the wanderer, to that house belongs but there in his allotted home
• 3:29:37
  abides from year to year a genuine priest, the shepherd of his flock,
• 3:29:41
  or as a king is styled. When most affectionately praised the father of his
• 3:29:46
  people, such is he, and rich and poor, and young and old,
• 3:29:48
  rejoice under his spiritual sway. He hath vouchsafed to me some portion of
• 3:29:54
  a kind regard, and something also of his inner mind. Hath he imparted.
• 3:30:00
  I speak of him as he is known to all. The calm delights
• 3:30:03
  of unambitious piety he chose, and learning's solid dignity. Though born of knightly
• 3:30:09
  race, nor wanting powerful friends, hither in prime of manhood he withdrew from
• 3:30:15
  academic bowers. He loved the spot, who does not love his native soil.
• 3:30:20
  He prized the ancient rural character, composed of simple manners, feelings unsuppressed
• 3:30:26
  and undisguised, and strong and serious thought, A character reflected in himself with
• 3:30:31
  such embellishments as well beseems his rank and sacred function. This deep veil winds
• 3:30:39
  far and reaches hidden from our sight, and one a turreted manorial hall adorns
• 3:30:45
  in which the good man's ancestors have dwelt through ages patrons of this cure to
• 3:30:50
  them and to his own judicious pains. The vicar's dwelling and the whole domain
• 3:30:54
  owes that presiding aspect which might well attract your notice, statelier than could else
• 3:31:01
  have been bestowed through course of common chance on an unwealthy mountain. Benefice this
• 3:31:09
  said oft pausing, we pursued our way, nor reached the village churchyard till
• 3:31:15
  the sun, traveling at steadier pace than ours, had risen above the summits
• 3:31:20
  of the highest hills, and round our path darted oppressive beams as chanced.
• 3:31:26
  The portals of the sacred pile stood open, and we entered on my frame.
• 3:31:31
  At such transition from the fervid air, a grateful coolness fell that seemed
• 3:31:35
  to strike the heart, in concert with that temperate awe and natural reverence which
• 3:31:41
  the place inspired. Not raised in nice proportions, was the pile, but
• 3:31:46
  large and massy for duration, built with pillars crowded, and the roof upheld
• 3:31:50
  by naked rafters intricately crossed like leafless under boughs in some thick wood, all
• 3:31:58
  withered by the depth of shade of at monitory texts inscribed the walls, each
• 3:32:05
  in its ornamental scroll enclosed, each also crowned with winged heads a pair of
• 3:32:11
  rudely painted cheriobim. The floor of naven isle, in unpretending guise, was
• 3:32:16
  occupied by oaken benches ranged in seemly rows. The chancel only showed some vain
• 3:32:24
  distinctions marks of earthly state by immemorial privilege allowed, though with the in cinctures
• 3:32:30
  special sanctity, but ill according an heraldic shield, varying its tincture with the
• 3:32:37
  changeful light imbued the altar window fixed aloft, a faded hatchment hung, and
• 3:32:43
  one by time yet undiscolored. A capacious pew of sculptured oaks stood here,
• 3:32:48
  with drapery lined and marble. Monuments were here displayed thronging the walls, and
• 3:32:54
  on the floor beneath sepulchral stones appeared with emblems, graven and foot worn epitaphs,
• 3:33:01
  and some with small and shining effigies of brass. Inlaid the tribute by
• 3:33:07
  these various records claimed duly. We paid each after each, and read the
• 3:33:11
  ordinary chronicle of birth, office, alliance and promotion, all ending in dust
• 3:33:18
  of upright magistrates grave doctors strenuous for the mother Church, and uncorrupted senators alike
• 3:33:24
  to king and people true. A brazen plate, not easily deciphered, told
• 3:33:30
  of one whose course of earthly honor was begun in quality of page among the
• 3:33:35
  train of the eighth Henry, when he crossed the seas his royal state,
• 3:33:39
  to show and prove his strength in tournament upon the fields of France. Another
• 3:33:43
  tablet registered the death and praised the gallant bearing of a knight tried in the
• 3:33:50
  sea fights of the Second Charles. Near this brave knight, his father lay
• 3:33:54
  entombed, and to the silent language giving voice, I read how, in
• 3:34:00
  his manhood's earlier day he mid the afflictions of Intestine, war and rightful government
• 3:34:05
  subverted, found one only solace that he had espoused a virtuous lady, tenderly
• 3:34:11
  beloved for her benign perfections, and yet more endeared to him for this that,
• 3:34:18
  in her state of wedlock, richly crowned with Heaven's regard, she with
• 3:34:22
  a numerous issue, filled his house, who throve like plants uninjured by the
• 3:34:28
  storm that laid their country waste. No need to speak of less particular notices
• 3:34:33
  assigned to youth or maiden gone before their time, and matrons and unwedded sisters
• 3:34:37
  old, whose charity and goodness were rehearsed in modest panegyric, these dim lines,
• 3:34:45
  what would they tell, said I, But from the task of puzzling
• 3:34:48
  out that faded narrative. With whispers soft, my venerable friend called me,
• 3:34:54
  and looking down the darksome aisle, I saw the tenant of the lovely veil
• 3:34:58
  standing apart, with hervid arm reclined on the baptismal font, his pallid face
• 3:35:03
  upturned, as if his mind were wrapped or lost in some abstraction. Gracefully
• 3:35:09
  he stood the semblance bearing of a sculptured form that leans upon a monumental urn,
• 3:35:16
  in peace, from morn to night, from year to year. Him
• 3:35:20
  From that posture did the sexton rouse, who entered, humming carelessly, attune
• 3:35:24
  continuation, happily of the notes that had beguiled the work from which he came.
• 3:35:30
  With spade and mattic ore, his shoulder hung to be deposited for future
• 3:35:35
  need in their appointed place. The pale recluse withdrew and straight We followed to
• 3:35:41
  a spot where sun and shade were intermixed. For there a broad oak stretching
• 3:35:46
  forth its leafy arms from an adjoining pasture overhung small space of that green churchyard,
• 3:35:52
  with a light and pleasant awning on the moss grown wall. My ancient
• 3:35:56
  friend and I together took our seats, and thus the solitary spake standing before
• 3:36:03
  us. Did you note the mien of that self solaced, easy hearted churl
• 3:36:11
  Death's hireling, who scoops out his neighbor's grave, or wraps an old acquaintance
• 3:36:16
  up in clay, all unconcerned as he would bind a sheaf or plant a
• 3:36:20
  tree. And did you hear his voice? I was abruptly summoned by the
• 3:36:26
  sound from some affecting images and thoughts which then were silent. But crave utterance
• 3:36:31
  now much, he continued, with dejected looks. Much yesterday was said in
• 3:36:37
  glowing phrase, of our sublime dependencies and hopes for future states of being,
• 3:36:43
  and the wings of speculation, joyfully outspread, hovered above our destiny on earth.
• 3:36:50
  But stoop and place the prospect of the soul in sober contrast with reality
• 3:36:54
  and man's substantial life. If this mute earth, of what it folds,
• 3:37:00
  could speak, and every grave whereas a volume shut, yet capable of yielding
• 3:37:05
  its contents to eye and ear. We should recoil, stricken with sorrow and
• 3:37:09
  shame to see disclosed by such dread proof. How ill that which is done
• 3:37:15
  accords with what is known to reason and by conscience is enjoined. How idly,
• 3:37:20
  how perversely life's whole course to this conclusion deviates from the line or of
• 3:37:26
  the end stops short proposed to all at her aspiring outset mark the babe,
• 3:37:33
  not long accustomed to this breathing world, one that hath barely learned to shape
• 3:37:39
  a smile, though yet irrational of soul, to grasp with tiny finger to
• 3:37:43
  let fall a tear, and as the heavy cloud of sleep dissolves, to
• 3:37:48
  stretch his limbs, bemocking as might seem, the outward functions of intelligent man,
• 3:37:52
  a grave proficient in amusive feats of puppetry, that from the lap declare
• 3:37:58
  his expectation and announce his claims to that inheritance which millions rue that they were
• 3:38:03
  ever born to. In due time, a day of solemn ceremonial comes when
• 3:38:09
  they who for this minor hold in trust rights that transcend the loftiest heritage of
• 3:38:16
  mere humanity, present their charge for this occasion, daintily adorned at the baptismal
• 3:38:22
  font. And when the pure and consecrating element hath cleansed the original stain,
• 3:38:28
  the child is there received into the second arc Christ's Church, with trust that
• 3:38:33
  he from wrath redeemed therein shall float over the billows of this troublesome world to
• 3:38:39
  the fair land of everlasting life. Corrupt affections, covetous desires are all renounced
• 3:38:46
  high as the thought of man can carry virtue. Virtue is professed a dedication
• 3:38:52
  made, a promise given for due provision, to control and guide, and
• 3:38:56
  unremitting progress to ensure inn holiness. In truth, you cannot blame here interposing
• 3:39:05
  fervently, I said, rights which attest that man, by nature lies bedded
• 3:39:09
  for good and evil in a gulf fearfully low. Nor will your judgment scorn
• 3:39:15
  those services whereby attempt is made to lift the creature toward that eminence on which
• 3:39:20
  now fallen erewhile in majesty he stood, or if not so, whose top
• 3:39:26
  serene, at least he feels tis given to him to descry, nor without
• 3:39:31
  aspirations evermore returning and injunctions from within doubt to cast off and weariness, in
• 3:39:37
  trust that what the soul perceives, if glory lost may be through pains and
• 3:39:43
  persevering, hope recovered, or if hitherto unknown lies within reach, and one
• 3:39:50
  day shall be gained, I blame them not, he calmly answered, No.
• 3:39:56
  The outward ritual and established forms with which communities of men invest these inward
• 3:40:00
  feelings, and the aspiring vows to which the lips give public utterance are both
• 3:40:05
  a natural process, and by me shall pass uncensured. Though the issue prove
• 3:40:11
  bringing from age to age its own reproach incongruous, impotent, and blank.
• 3:40:16
  But oh, if to be weak is to be wretched, miserable, as
• 3:40:20
  the lost angel by a human voice hath mournfully pronounced, then in my mind,
• 3:40:26
  far better not to move at all than move by impulse sent from such
• 3:40:30
  elusive power that finds and cannot fasten down, that grasps and is rejoiced,
• 3:40:37
  and loses while it grasps, that tempts, emboldens for a time, sustains,
• 3:40:41
  and then betrays, accuses, and inflicts remorseless punishment, and so retreads
• 3:40:48
  the inevitable circle. Better far than this to graze the herb in thoughtless peace,
• 3:40:54
  by foresight or remembrance, undisturbed poop, and thou vaunted name religion with
• 3:41:03
  thy statelier retinue of faith, hope, and charity from the visible world.
• 3:41:05
  Choose for your emblems whatsoe'er ye find of safest guidance or firmest trust the torch,
• 3:41:13
  the star, the anchor, Nor accept the cross itself, at whose
• 3:41:16
  unconscious feet the generations of mankind have knelt, ruefully seized and shedding bitter tears,
• 3:41:24
  And through that conflict seeking rest of you high titled powers. Am I
• 3:41:28
  constrained to ask? Here? Standing with the unvoyageable sky and faint reflection of
• 3:41:35
  infinitude stretched overhead, and at my pensive feet a subterraneous magazine of bones,
• 3:41:41
  in whose dark vaults my own shall soon be laid. Where are your triumphs,
• 3:41:48
  your dominion? Where and in what age? Admitted and confirmed? Not
• 3:41:52
  for a happy land do I inquire ireland or grove that hides a blessed few,
• 3:41:58
  who, with obedience, willing and sincere to your serene authorities, can
• 3:42:03
  form, But whom I ask of individual souls? Have ye withdrawn from passions,
• 3:42:07
  crooked ways, inspired and thoroughly fortified? If the heart could be inspected
• 3:42:13
  to its inmost folds by sight undazzled with the glare of praise. Who shall
• 3:42:18
  be named in the resplendent line of Sage's martyrs confessors, the man whom the
• 3:42:24
  best might of faith, wherever fixed for one day's little compass, has preserved
• 3:42:31
  from painful and discreditable shocks of contradiction, from some vague desire, culpably cherished,
• 3:42:37
  or corrupt relapse to some unsanctioned fear. If this be so, and
• 3:42:43
  man said, I be in his noblest shape thus pitiably infirm, then he
• 3:42:50
  who made and who shall judge the creature will forgive. Yet in its general
• 3:42:54
  tenor, your complaint is all too true and surely not misplaced. For from
• 3:43:01
  this pregnant spot of ground such thoughts rise to the notice of a serious mind
• 3:43:05
  by natural exhalation, with the dead in their repose, the living in their
• 3:43:11
  mirth, who can reflect unmoved upon the round of smooth and solemnized complacencies by
• 3:43:18
  which on Christian lands, from age to age, profession mocks performance. Earth
• 3:43:22
  is sick, and Heaven is weary of the hollow words which states and kingdoms
• 3:43:28
  utter when they talk of truth and justice, turn to private life and social
• 3:43:33
  neighborhood. Look we to ourselves, a light of duty shines on every day
• 3:43:39
  for all. And yet how few are warmed or cheered, how few who
• 3:43:45
  mingle with their fellow men, and still remain self governed and apart. Like
• 3:43:48
  this our honored friend, and thence acquire right to expect his vigorous decline that
• 3:43:54
  promises to the end of blessed old age. Yet with a smile of triumph,
• 3:44:01
  thus exclaimed the solitary in the life of man. If to the poetry
• 3:44:05
  of common speech, faith may be given, we see, as in a
• 3:44:09
  glass a true reflection of the circling year, with all its seasons. Grant
• 3:44:15
  that spring is there, in spite of many a rough, untoward blast,
• 3:44:20
  hopeful and promising with buds and flowers. Yet where is glowing Summer's long,
• 3:44:24
  rich day that ought to follow faithfully expressed and mellow Autumn charged with bounteous fruit.
• 3:44:33
  Where is she imaged in what favored clime, her lavish pomp and ripe
• 3:44:37
  magnificence. Yet while the better part is missed, the worse in man's autumnal
• 3:44:43
  season is set forth with a resemblance not to be denied. And that contents
• 3:44:48
  him, bowers that hear no more the voice of gladness, less and less
• 3:44:52
  supply of outward sunshine and internal warmth. And with this change sharp air and
• 3:45:00
  falling leaves, foretelling aged winter's desolate sway. How gay the habitations that bedeck
• 3:45:07
  this fertile valley not a house, but seems to give assurance of content within,
• 3:45:13
  embosomed happiness and placid love, as if the sunshine of the day were
• 3:45:18
  met with answering brightness in the hearts of all who walk this favored ground.
• 3:45:24
  But chance regards and notice forced upon incurious ears. These, if these,
• 3:45:31
  only acting in despite of the encomiums by my friend pronounced on humble life,
• 3:45:35
  forbid the judging mind to trust the smiling aspect of this fair and noiseless commonwealth.
• 3:45:41
  The simple race of mountaineers, by Nature's self, removed from foul temptations,
• 3:45:46
  and by constant care of a good shepherd, tended as themselves do tend
• 3:45:50
  their flocks, partake man's general lot with little mitigation. They escape, perchance
• 3:45:58
  the heavy woes of guilt, feel not the tedium of fantastic idleness. Yet
• 3:46:03
  life, as with the multitude, with them is fashioned like an ill constructed
• 3:46:09
  tale, that on the outset wastes its gay desires, its fair adventures,
• 3:46:13
  its enlivening hopes, and pleasant interests. For the sequel, leaving old things
• 3:46:20
  repeated with diminished grace, and all the labored novelties at best imperfect substitutes,
• 3:46:26
  whose use and power evince the want and weakness whence they spring. While in
• 3:46:33
  this serious mood we held discourse, the reverend pastor, toward the churchyard gate
• 3:46:37
  approached, and with a mild, respectful air of native cordiality, our friend
• 3:46:43
  advanced to greet him with a gracious mien. Was he perceived, and mutual
• 3:46:48
  joy prevailed a while they stood in conference, And I guess that he who,
• 3:46:54
  now upon the mossy wall sat by my side, had vanished, if
• 3:46:58
  a whis bish could have transferred him to the flying clouds or the least penetrable
• 3:47:03
  hiding place in his own valley's rocky guardianship. For me, I looked upon
• 3:47:11
  the pair well pleased. Nature had framed them both, and both were marked
• 3:47:15
  by circumstance with intermixture, fine of contrast and resemblance to an oak hardy and
• 3:47:22
  grand, a weather beaten oak fresh in the strength and majesty of age.
• 3:47:26
  One might be likened flourishing appeared, though somewhat past the fullness of his prime,
• 3:47:31
  the other like a stately sycamore that spreads in gentle pomp its honeyed shade.
• 3:47:39
  A general greeting was exchanged, and soon the pastor learned that his approach
• 3:47:43
  had given a welcome interruption to discourse grave and in truth. Too often sad
• 3:47:50
  is man a child of hope? Do generations press on generations without progress made?
• 3:47:58
  Halts the individual? Ere his hair be gray? Perforce? Are we
• 3:48:01
  a creature in whom good preponderates? Or evil? Doth the will acknowledge Reason's
• 3:48:07
  law? A living power is virtue or no better than a name, fleeting
• 3:48:11
  as health or beauty, and unsound, so that the only substance which remains
• 3:48:18
  for thus the tenor of complainteth run. Among so many shadows are the pains
• 3:48:22
  and penalties of miserable life, doomed to decay and then expire in dust.
• 3:48:28
  Our cogitations this way have been drawn. These are the points, the wanderer
• 3:48:33
  said, on which our inquest turns accord. Good sir, the light of
• 3:48:37
  your experience to dispel this gloom by your persuasive wisdom, shall the heart that
• 3:48:43
  frets or languishes be stilled and cheered our nature, said the priest in mild
• 3:48:50
  reply. Angels may weigh in fathom. They perceive with undistempered and unclouded spirit
• 3:48:56
  the object as it is. But for ourselves that speculative height we may not
• 3:49:01
  reach. The good and evil are our own, and we are that which
• 3:49:07
  we would contemplate from far. Knowledge for us is difficult to gain, is
• 3:49:13
  difficult to gain, and hard to keep, as virtue's self like virtue is
• 3:49:16
  beset with snares, tried, tempted, subject to decay, love, admiration,
• 3:49:22
  fear, desire, and hate. Blind were we without these? Though
• 3:49:28
  these alone are capable to notice or discern, or to record. We judge,
• 3:49:33
  but cannot be in different judges. Spite of proudest boast. Reason best
• 3:49:39
  reason is to imperfect man and effort only, and a noble aim, a
• 3:49:45
  crown, an attribute of sovereign power, still to be courted, never to
• 3:49:48
  be one look forth, or each man dive into himself. What sees he
• 3:49:54
  but a creature too perturbed that is transported to excess that yearns regard threats or
• 3:50:00
  trembles wrongly, or too much, hopes rashly in disgust, as rash recoils,
• 3:50:05
  battens on spleen, or molders in despair. Thus comprehension fails, and
• 3:50:11
  truth is missed. Thus darkness and delusion round our path, spread from disease
• 3:50:16
  whose subtle injury lurks within the very faculty of sight. Yet, for the
• 3:50:22
  general purposes of faith in providence for solace and support, we may not doubt
• 3:50:28
  that who can best subject the will to reason's law, can strictliest live and
• 3:50:33
  act in that obedience, he shall gain the clearest apprehension of those truths which,
• 3:50:39
  unassisted reason's utmost power, is too infirm to reach. But waiving this
• 3:50:45
  in our regards, confining within bounds of less exalted consciousness, through which the
• 3:50:50
  very multitude are free to range, we safely may affirm that human life is
• 3:50:56
  either fair and tempting, a soft scene grateful to sight, refreshing to the
• 3:51:01
  soul, or a forbidding tract of cheerless view, even as the same as
• 3:51:07
  looked at or approached. Thus, when in changeful april fields are white with
• 3:51:11
  new fallen snow, if from the sullen north your walk conduct you hither Ere
• 3:51:16
  the sun hath gained his noontide height. This churchyard, filled with mounds,
• 3:51:22
  transversely lying side by side from east to west. Before you will appear an
• 3:51:28
  unillumined, blank and dreary plain, with more than wintry cheerlessness and gloom saddening
• 3:51:35
  the heart. Go forward and look back, look from the quarter. Whence
• 3:51:41
  the Lord of light, of life, of love and gladness doth dispense his
• 3:51:45
  beams, which unexcluded in their fall upon the southern side of every grave,
• 3:51:52
  have gently exercised a melting power. Then will a vernal prospect greet your eye,
• 3:51:58
  all fresh and beautiful, and green and bright, hopeful and cheerful.
• 3:52:03
  Vanished is the pall that overspread and chilled, the sacred turf, vanished or
• 3:52:07
  hidden, and the whole domain, to some too lightly minded, might appear
• 3:52:11
  a meadow carpet for the dancing hours. This contrast, not unsuitable to life,
• 3:52:18
  is to that other state more apposite death than its twofold aspect, wintry
• 3:52:24
  one, cold, sullen, blank from hope and joy, shut out the
• 3:52:28
  other, which the ray divine hath touched, replete with vivid promise, bright
• 3:52:33
  as spring. We see then as we feel the wanderer. Thus, with
• 3:52:37
  a complacent animation, spake, and in your judgment, sir, the mind's
• 3:52:43
  repose on evidence is not to be insured by act of naked reason. Moral
• 3:52:48
  truth is no mechanic structure built by rule, and which once built, retains
• 3:52:54
  a steadfast shape and undisturbed proportions, but a thing subject you've deemed vital accidents,
• 3:53:01
  And like the water lily lives and thrives, whose root is fixed in
• 3:53:05
  stable earth, whose head floats on the tossing waves with joy. Sincere I
• 3:53:11
  resolute these sentiments confirmed by your authority. But how acquire the inward principle that
• 3:53:18
  gives effect to outward argument? The passive will meek to admit the active energy,
• 3:53:22
  strong and unbounded, to embrace and firm, to keep and cherish.
• 3:53:28
  How shall man unite with self forgetting tenderness of heart and earth, despising dignity
• 3:53:33
  of soul, wise in that union and without it blind the way said I
• 3:53:41
  to court. If not obtained, the ingenuous mind apt to be set aright.
• 3:53:46
  This in the lonely dell discoursing you declared it large. And by what
• 3:53:52
  exercise from visible nature or the inner self power may be trained, and renovation
• 3:53:56
  brought to those who need the gift. But after all is aught, So
• 3:54:01
  certain as that man is doomed to breathe beneath a vault of ignorance, the
• 3:54:07
  natural roof of that dark house in which his soul is pent, how little
• 3:54:13
  can be known. This is the wise man's sigh. How far we err,
• 3:54:18
  this is the good man's not unfrequent pang, And they perhaps err least
• 3:54:24
  the lowly class, whom a benign necessity compels to follow reason's least ambitious course.
• 3:54:31
  Such do I mean, who unperplexed by doubt and unincited by a wish
• 3:54:37
  to look into high objects farther than they may paste to and fro from morn
• 3:54:41
  till eventide, the narrow avenue of daily toil for daily bread. Yes,
• 3:54:50
  buoyantly exclaimed the pale recluse. Praise to the sturdy plow and patient spade,
• 3:54:56
  Praise to the simple crook and ponderous loom resounded, while it holds body and
• 3:55:01
  mind in one captivity. And let the light mechanic tool be hailed with honor,
• 3:55:07
  which, encasing by the power of long companionship. The artist's hand cuts
• 3:55:11
  off that hand, with all its world of nerves, from a too busy
• 3:55:15
  commerce, with the heart inglorious implements of craft and toil, Both ye that
• 3:55:20
  shape and build, and YE that force by slow solicitation Earth to yield her
• 3:55:24
  annual bounties sparingly dealt forth with wise reluctance, You would I extol not for
• 3:55:31
  gross good alone, which he produce, but for the impertinent and ceaseless strife
• 3:55:37
  of proofs and reasons ye preclude in those who, to your dull society are
• 3:55:43
  born, and with their humble birthright rest content would I had ne'er renounced it.
• 3:55:52
  A slight flush of moral anger previously had tinged the old man's cheek.
• 3:55:56
  But at disclosing turn of self reproach, which it passed away, said he
• 3:56:03
  that which we feel we utter as we think. So have we argued reaping
• 3:56:09
  for our pains no visible recompense for our relief? You, to the pastor,
• 3:56:13
  turning thus he spake, have kindly interposed. May I entreat your further
• 3:56:20
  help. The mine of real life dig for us and present us in the
• 3:56:24
  shape of virgin ore, that gold which we by pains fruitless as those of
• 3:56:28
  airy alchemists seek from the torture in crucible. There lies around us a domain
• 3:56:35
  where you have long watched both the outward course and inner heart. Give us
• 3:56:43
  for our abstractions, solid facts for our disputes. Plain pictures, say what
• 3:56:48
  man he is who cultivates Yon Hanging Field, What qualities of mind she bears?
• 3:56:54
  Who comes for morn and evening service with her pale to that green pasture
• 3:57:00
  place before our sight? The family who dwell within Yon House fenced round with
• 3:57:05
  glittering laurel, or in that below from which the curling smoke ascends. Or
• 3:57:11
  rather, as we stand on holy earth and have the dead around us,
• 3:57:16
  take from them your instances, for they are both best known and by frail
• 3:57:22
  man most equitably judged. Epitomize the life. Pronounce you can authentic epitaphs on
• 3:57:28
  some of these, who, from their lowly mansions hither brought beneath this turf,
• 3:57:33
  lie moldering at our feet. So by your records may our doubts be
• 3:57:39
  solved, and so not searching higher, we may learn to prize the breath
• 3:57:45
  we share with human kind and look upon the dust of man with awe.
• 3:57:52
  The priest replied, an office you impose for which peculiar requisites our mine.
• 3:57:58
  Yet much I feel is one else the task would be most grateful. True.
• 3:58:03
  Indeed, it is that they whom death is hidden from our sight are
• 3:58:07
  worthiest of the mind's regard. With these the future cannot contradict the past.
• 3:58:13
  Mortality's last exercise and proof is undergone. The transit may that shows the very
• 3:58:18
  soul revealed as she departs. Yet on your first suggestion, will I give
• 3:58:24
  ere we descend into these silent vaults one picture from the living. You behold
• 3:58:30
  high on the breast of yon dark mountain, dark with stony barrenness, a
• 3:58:35
  shining speck bright as a sunbeam, sleeping till a shower brush it away,
• 3:58:39
  or cloud pass over it. And such it might be deemed a sleeping sunbeam,
• 3:58:46
  But tis a plot of cultivated ground, cut off an island in the
• 3:58:50
  dusky waste, and that attractive brightness is its own, the lofty sight by
• 3:58:56
  nature, framed to tempt amid a wilderness of rocks and stones the tiller's hand.
• 3:59:01
  A hermit might have chosen, for opportunity presented thence far forth to send
• 3:59:05
  his wandering eye or land in ocean, and look down upon the works the
• 3:59:09
  habitations and the ways of men himself unseen. But no tradition tells that ever
• 3:59:16
  hermit dipped his maple dish in the sweet spring that lurks mid yon green fields.
• 3:59:22
  And no such visionary views belong to those who occupy and till the ground
• 3:59:28
  high on that mountain where they long have dwelt. A wetted pear in childless
• 3:59:33
  solitude, A house of stones collected on the spot by rude hands, built
• 3:59:37
  with rocky knolls in front, backed also by a ledge of rock whose crest
• 3:59:43
  of birch trees waves over the chimney top. A rough abode in color,
• 3:59:46
  shape, and size, such as in unsafe times of border war, might
• 3:59:52
  have been wished for and contrived to elude the eye of roving plunderer. For
• 3:59:58
  their need suffices and unshaken bears the assault of their most dreaded foe, the
• 4:00:03
  strong southwest in anger, blowing from the distant sea. Alone within her solitary
• 4:00:11
  hut there or within the compass of her fields. At any moment, may
• 4:00:15
  the Dame be found true as the stalk dove to her shallow nest and to
• 4:00:18
  the grove that holds it. She beguiles by intermingled work of house and field,
• 4:00:24
  the summer's day and winters, with success not equal, but sufficient to
• 4:00:28
  maintain, even at the worst, a smooth stream of content, until the
• 4:00:33
  expected hour at which her mate, from the far distant Quarri's vault returns,
• 4:00:39
  and by his converse crowns a silent day with evening cheerfulness. In powers of
• 4:00:43
  mind and scale of culture, few among my flock hold lower rank than this
• 4:00:48
  sequestered pair. But true humility descends from heaven, and that best gift of
• 4:00:54
  Heaven hath fallen on them, abundant recompense for every want. Stoop from your
• 4:01:01
  height, ye, proud and copy, these who, in their noiseless dwelling
• 4:01:05
  place can hear the voice of wisdom whispering scripture texts for the mind's government or
• 4:01:09
  temper's peace, and recommending for their mutual need forgiveness, patience, hope,
• 4:01:16
  and charity. Much was I pleased, the gray eyed wanderer said, when
• 4:01:22
  to those shining fields our notice, first you turned, and yet more pleased,
• 4:01:26
  have from your lips gathered this fair report of them who dwell in that
• 4:01:30
  retirement. Whither by such course of evil hap and good as oft awaits a
• 4:01:35
  tired wayfaring man. Once I was brought while traversing alone Yon Mountain pass dark
• 4:01:41
  on my road, the autumnal evening fell, and nights succeeded with unusual gloom,
• 4:01:46
  so hazardous that feet and hands became guides better than mine eyes, until
• 4:01:52
  a light high in the gloom appeared too high methought for human habitation. But
• 4:01:56
  I longed to reach it, destitute of other hope. I looked with steadiness
• 4:02:01
  as sailors look on the north star or watch tower's distant lamp, and saw
• 4:02:05
  the light now fixed and shifting, now not like a dancing meteor, but
• 4:02:11
  in line of never varying motion to and fro. It is no night fire
• 4:02:16
  of the naked hills, thought I, some friendly covert must be near.
• 4:02:20
  With this persuasion, thitherward my steps, I turn and reach at last the
• 4:02:24
  guiding light, joy to myself, but to the heart of her, who
• 4:02:28
  there was standing on the open hill, the same kind matron, whom your
• 4:02:33
  tongue hath praised alarm and disappointment. The alarm ceased when she learned through what
• 4:02:39
  mishap I came, and by what help had gained those distant fields drawn from
• 4:02:46
  her cottage on that airy height. Bearing a lantern in her hand, she
• 4:02:50
  stood or paced the ground to guide her husband home by that unwearied signal kennd
• 4:02:56
  afar, an anxious duty which the lofty sight traversed, but by a few
• 4:03:01
  irregular paths imposes whence owe're untoward chance detains him after his accustomed hour, till
• 4:03:07
  night lies black upon the ground. But come, come, said the matron,
• 4:03:13
  to our poor abode, those dark rocks hide it. Entering, I
• 4:03:16
  beheld a blazing fire beside a cleanly hearth, sat down and to her office
• 4:03:22
  with leave asked. The dame returned over ere that glowing pile of mountain turf
• 4:03:30
  required the builder's hand its wasted splendor to repair. The door opened, and
• 4:03:35
  she re entered with glad looks Her helpmate following hospitable, fair, frank conversation
• 4:03:41
  made the evening's treat need. A bewildered traveler wish for more, but more
• 4:03:46
  was given. I studied, as we sat by the bright fire, the
• 4:03:50
  good man's form and face not less than beautiful, an open brow of undisturbed
• 4:03:56
  humanity, a cheek suffused with something of a femine, and hugh eyes beaming
• 4:04:01
  courtesy and mild regard. But in the quicker turns of the discourse, expressions
• 4:04:07
  slowly varying, that evinced a tardy apprehension from a found loss, thought I
• 4:04:13
  in the obscurities of time, but honored once those features and that mien may
• 4:04:18
  have descended, though I see them here in such a man, so gentle
• 4:04:22
  and subdued, withal so graceful in his gentleness. A race illustrious for heroic
• 4:04:28
  deeds, humbled but not degraded, may expire this pleasing fancy, cherished and
• 4:04:35
  upheld by sundry Recollections of such fall from high to low, assent from low
• 4:04:39
  to high, as books record, and even the careless mind cannot but notice.
• 4:04:45
  Among men and things went with me to the place of my repose,
• 4:04:52
  roused by the crowing cock at dawn of day, I yet had risen too
• 4:04:56
  late to interchange a morning salutation with my host, gone forth already to the
• 4:05:01
  far off seat of his day's work. Three dark midwinter months pass, said
• 4:05:07
  the matron, And I never see, save when the sabbath brings its kind
• 4:05:09
  release my helpmate's face by light of day. He quits his door in darkness,
• 4:05:16
  nor till dusk returns, and through Heaven's blessing, thus we gain the
• 4:05:22
  bread for which we pray, and for the wants provide of sickness, accident,
• 4:05:26
  and helpless age. Companions have I many, many friends, dependents,
• 4:05:31
  comforters, my wheel, my fire, all day at the house clock ticking
• 4:05:33
  in mine ear the cackling hen, the tender chicken brood, and the wild
• 4:05:37
  birds that gather round my porch. This honest sheep dog's countenance, I read
• 4:05:43
  with him, can talk nor blush to waste a word on creatures less intelligent
• 4:05:48
  and shrewd. And if the blustering wind that drives the clouds care not for
• 4:05:54
  me, he lingers round my door and makes me past time when our tempers
• 4:05:58
  suit. But above all my thoughts are my support, my comfort. Would
• 4:06:03
  that they were oftener fixed on what for guidance in the way that leads to
• 4:06:07
  Heaven I know by my redeemer taught the matron ended. Nor could I forbear
• 4:06:15
  to exclaim, oh happy yielding to the law of these privations richer in the
• 4:06:20
  main, while thankless thousands are oppressed and clogged by ease and leisure, by
• 4:06:26
  the very wealth and pride of opportunity made poor, while tens of thousands falter
• 4:06:31
  in their path and sink through utter want of cheering light. For you,
• 4:06:35
  the hours of labor do not flag. For you, Each evening hath its
• 4:06:39
  shining star, and every Sabbath day its golden sun. Yes, said the
• 4:06:46
  solitary, with a smile that seemed to break from an expanding heart. The
• 4:06:52
  untutored bird may found and construct, and with such soft materials line her nest
• 4:06:56
  fixed in the center of a prickly break that the thorns wound her. Not,
• 4:07:01
  they only guard powers not unjustly likened to those gifts of happy instinct which
• 4:07:07
  the woodland bird shares with her species. Nature's grace sometimes upon the individual doth
• 4:07:13
  confer among her higher creatures, born and trained to use of reason. And
• 4:07:18
  I own that tired of the ostentatious world, a swelling stage with empty actions
• 4:07:24
  and vain passions, stuffed and from the private struggles of mankind, hoping far
• 4:07:30
  less than I could wish to hope, far less than once I trusted and
• 4:07:33
  believed, I loved to hear of those who not contending, nor summoned to
• 4:07:37
  contend for virtue's prize, miss not the humbler good at which they aim blessed
• 4:07:45
  with a kindly faculty to blunt the edge of adverse circumstance, and turn into
• 4:07:50
  their contraries the petty plagues and hindrances with which they stand beset. In early
• 4:07:58
  youth among my native hills, I knew as Scottish peasant who possessed a few
• 4:08:01
  small crofts of stone encumbered ground masses of every shape and size that lay scattered
• 4:08:07
  about under the moldering walls of a rough precipice, and some apart in quarters,
• 4:08:13
  unobnoxious to such chance, as if the moon had showered them down in
• 4:08:18
  spite. But he repined not though the plow was scared by these obstructions.
• 4:08:24
  Round the shady stones of fertilizing moisture, said the swaying gathers and is preserved
• 4:08:30
  and feeding dews and damps through all the droughty summer day from out their substance,
• 4:08:35
  issuing maintain herbage that never fails. No grass springs up so green,
• 4:08:41
  so fresh, so plentiful as mine, but thinly sown. These natures rare
• 4:08:48
  at least the mutual aptitude of seed and soil that yields such kindly product.
• 4:08:54
  He whose bed perhaps yon loose sods cover the poor pensioner brought yesterday from our
• 4:08:58
  sequestered dell here to lie down in lasting quiet. He, if living now,
• 4:09:03
  could otherwise report of rustic loneliness that gray haired orphan, so call him
• 4:09:09
  for humanity to him, no parent was feelingly could have told in life in
• 4:09:16
  death what solitude can breed of selfishness and cruelty and vice? Or if it
• 4:09:22
  breed not, hath not power to cure? But your compliance, sir,
• 4:09:26
  without request, My words too long have hindered, undeterred, perhaps incited rather
• 4:09:33
  by these shocks. In no ungracious opposition given to the confiding spirit of his
• 4:09:37
  own experienced faith, the reverend pastor said around him, looking, where shall
• 4:09:43
  I begin? Who shall be first? Selected? From my flock gathered together
• 4:09:48
  in their peaceful fold? He paused, and, having lifted up his eyes
• 4:09:52
  to the pure heaven, he cast them down again upon the earth beneath his
• 4:09:56
  feet, and spake to a mysteriously united pair. This place is consecrate to
• 4:10:03
  death and life, and to the best affections that proceed from their conjunction.
• 4:10:07
  Consecrate to faith in Him who bled for man upon the cross, hallowed to
• 4:10:13
  revelation, and no less to reasons, mandates, and the Hope's divine of
• 4:10:18
  pure imagination, above all, to charity and love that have provided within these
• 4:10:24
  precincts a capacious bed and receptacle, open to the good and evil, to
• 4:10:30
  the just and the unjust, in which they find an equal resting place.
• 4:10:35
  Even as the multitude of kindred brooks and streams whose murmur fills this hollow vale,
• 4:10:41
  whether their course be turbulent or smooth, their waters clear or sullied,
• 4:10:45
  all are lost within the bosom of yon crystal lake, and end their journey
• 4:10:50
  in the same repose. And blessed are they who sleep, and we that
• 4:10:56
  know, while in a spot like this we breathe and walk, that all
• 4:10:58
  beneath us by the wings are covered of motherly humanity, outspread and gathering all
• 4:11:05
  within their tender shade, though loath and slow to come. A battlefield and
• 4:11:11
  stillness left when slaughter is no more. With this compared, makes a strange
• 4:11:15
  spectacle, A dismal prospect yields the wild shore, strewn with wrecks and trod
• 4:11:20
  by feet of young and old, wandering about in miserable search of friends or
• 4:11:24
  kindred, whom the angry sea restores not to their prayer. Ah, who
• 4:11:30
  would think that all the scattered subjects which compose Earth's melancholy vision through the space
• 4:11:35
  of all her climes, These wretched, these depraved to virtue, lost,
• 4:11:41
  insensible of peace from the delights of charity, cut off to pity, dead,
• 4:11:46
  the oppressor and the oppressed, tyrants who utter the destroying word, and
• 4:11:50
  slaves who will consent to be destroyed, were of one species, with the
• 4:11:54
  sheltered few, who, with a dutiful and tender hand lodged in a year
• 4:12:00
  appropriated spot. This file of infants, some that never breathed the vital air,
• 4:12:05
  others which, though allowed that privilege, did yet expire too soon or
• 4:12:11
  with too brief a warning to admit administration of the holy rite that lovingly consigns
• 4:12:16
  the babe to the arms of Jesus and his everlasting care. These that,
• 4:12:22
  in trembling hope, are laid apart, and the besprinkled nursling unrequired till he
• 4:12:28
  begins to smile upon the breast that feeds him, and the tottering little one
• 4:12:33
  taken from air and sunshine. When the rose of infancy first blooms upon his
• 4:12:37
  cheek, the thinking thoughtless schoolboy, the bold youth of soul impetuous, and
• 4:12:43
  the bashful maids smitten, while all the promises of life are opening round her.
• 4:12:50
  Those of middle age cast down, while confident in strength, they stand
• 4:12:54
  like pillars, fixed more firmly as might seem, and more secure by very
• 4:12:58
  weight of all that for support rests on them. The decayed and burthensome.
• 4:13:03
  And lastly that poor few whose light of reason is with age extinct. The
• 4:13:09
  hopeful and the hopeless, first and last, the earliest summoned and the longest
• 4:13:13
  spared, are here deposited, with tribute paid various, but unto each,
• 4:13:18
  some tribute paid, as if amid these peaceful hills and groves, society were
• 4:13:24
  touched with kind concern, and gentle nature grieved that one should die, or
• 4:13:31
  if the change demanded, no regret observed the liberating stroke and blessed. And
• 4:13:37
  whence that tribute. Wherefore these regards not from the naked heart alone of man,
• 4:13:45
  though claiming high distinction upon Earth as the soul, spring and fountain head
• 4:13:48
  of tears, his own peculiar utterance for distress or gladness. No, the
• 4:13:54
  philosophic priest continued, tis not in the vital seat of feeling to produce them
• 4:14:00
  without aid from the pure soul, the soul sublime and pure, with her
• 4:14:03
  two faculties of eye and ear, the one by which a creature whom his
• 4:14:09
  sins have rendered prone, can upward look to Heaven, the other that empowers
• 4:14:13
  him to perceive the voice of Deity on height and plain, whispering those truths
• 4:14:18
  in stillness which the Word to the four quarters of the winds proclaims. Not
• 4:14:26
  without such assistance could the use of these benign observances prevail. Thus they are
• 4:14:31
  born, thus fostered, thus maintained, and by the care perspective of our
• 4:14:37
  wise forefathers, who, to guard against the shocks the fluctuation and decay of
• 4:14:43
  things, embodied and established these high truths in solemn institutions. Men convinced that
• 4:14:50
  life is love and immortality, the being one and one, the element there
• 4:14:56
  lies, the channel and original bed from the beginning, hollowed out and scooped
• 4:15:01
  for man's affections, else betrayed and lost and swallowed up mid desert's infinite.
• 4:15:09
  This is the genuine course, the aim and end of prescient reason. All
• 4:15:13
  conclusions else are abject, vain, presumptuous and perverse, the faith partaking of
• 4:15:20
  those holy times. Life, I repeat, is energy of love divine or
• 4:15:24
  human, exercised in pain, in strife and tribulation, and ordained, if
• 4:15:31
  so approved and sanctified, to pass through shades in silent rest, to endless
• 4:15:37
  joy. End of Book five of The Excursion, Book sixth. The churchyard
• 4:15:46
  among the mountains, Hailed to the crown by freedom, shaped to gird an
• 4:15:54
  English sovereign's brow, and to the throne whereon he sits, whose deep foundations
• 4:16:00
  lie in veneration, and the people's love, whose steps our equity, whose
• 4:16:04
  seat is law. Hail to the State of England, and can join with
• 4:16:08
  this a salutation as devout made to the spiritual fabric of her church, founded
• 4:16:15
  in truth by blood of martyrdom, cemented by the hands of wisdom, reared
• 4:16:21
  in beauty of holiness, with ordered pomp, decent and unreproved. The voice
• 4:16:26
  that greets the majesty of both, shall pray for both, that mutually protected
• 4:16:30
  and sustained, they may endure long as the sea surrounds this favored land,
• 4:16:37
  or sunshine warms her soil and o ye swelling hills and spacious plains besprent from
• 4:16:45
  shore to shore, with steeple towers and spires whose silent finger points to Heaven,
• 4:16:51
  nor wanting at wide intervals the bulk of ancient minister lifted above the cloud
• 4:16:56
  of the dense air, which town or city breeds to intercept them. Sun's
• 4:17:00
  glad beams may ne'er that true succession fail of English hearts, who with ancestral
• 4:17:07
  feeling can perceive what in those holy structures ye possess of ornamental interest, and
• 4:17:14
  the charm of pious sentiment diffused afar, and human charity and social love.
• 4:17:21
  Thus never shall the indignities of time approach their reverend graces unopposed, nor shall
• 4:17:26
  the elements be free to hurt their fair proportions, nor the blinder rage of
• 4:17:32
  bigot zeal madly to overturn. And if the desolating hand of war spare them,
• 4:17:37
  they shall continue to bestow upon the thronged abodes of busy men, depraved
• 4:17:42
  and ever prone to fill the mind exclusively with transitory things and air, and
• 4:17:48
  mien of dignified pursuit of sweet civility on rustic wilds. The poet fostering for
• 4:17:56
  his native land such hope entreats that servants may abound of those pure altars,
• 4:18:02
  worthy ministers detached from pleasure to the love of gained superior insusceptible of pride,
• 4:18:08
  and by ambitious longings, undisturbed men whose delight is where their duty leads or
• 4:18:15
  fixes them, whose least distinguished day shines with some portion of that heavenly luster
• 4:18:21
  which makes the Sabbath lovely in the sight of blessed angels pitying human cares.
• 4:18:27
  And as on earth, it is the doom of truth to be perpetually attacked
• 4:18:30
  by foes, open or covert. Be that priesthood still for her defense replenished
• 4:18:37
  with a band of strenuous champions in scholastic arts thoroughly disciplined. Nor if in
• 4:18:45
  course of the revolving world's disturbances, cause should recur, which righteous heaven avert
• 4:18:49
  to meet such trial from their spiritual sires degenerate who constrained to wield the sword
• 4:18:56
  of disputation shrunk not those sailed with hostile din and combating in sight of angry
• 4:19:03
  umpires, partial and unjust, and did thereafter bathe their hands in fire,
• 4:19:11
  so to declare the conscience satisfied. Nor for their bodies would accept release,
• 4:19:17
  but blessing God and praising Him, bequeathed with their last breath from out the
• 4:19:22
  smoldering flame, the faith which they by diligence had earned, or through illuminating
• 4:19:27
  grace received, for their dear countrymen and all mankind. O high example constancy
• 4:19:36
  divine even such a man, inheriting the zeal and from the sanctity of elder
• 4:19:41
  times, not deviating a priest, the like of whom, if multiplied and
• 4:19:45
  in their stations set, would o'er the bosom of a joyful land, spread
• 4:19:48
  true religion and her genuine fruits before me stood that day on holy ground fraught
• 4:19:56
  with the relics of mortality exis, resulting tender themes by just degrees to lofty
• 4:20:03
  raised and to the highest last, the head and mighty paramount of truths,
• 4:20:08
  immortal life in never fading worlds for mortal creatures, conquered and secured that basis
• 4:20:15
  laid those principles of faith announced as a preparatory act of reverence done to the
• 4:20:21
  spirit of the place, the pastor cast his eyes upon the ground, not
• 4:20:26
  as before, like one oppressed with awe, but with a mild and social
• 4:20:30
  cheerfulness then to the solitary, turned and spake at morn or eve in your
• 4:20:37
  retired domain, perchance you not unfrequently have marked a visitor in quest of herbs
• 4:20:44
  and flowers. Two delicate employers would appear, for one who, though of
• 4:20:48
  drooping mien, had yet from nature's kindliness, received a frame robust as ever
• 4:20:55
  rural labor bred. The solitary answered, such a form full way, well,
• 4:21:00
  I recollect. We often crossed each other's path. But as the intruder
• 4:21:03
  seemed fondly to prize the silence which he kept, and as I willingly did
• 4:21:10
  cherish mine, we met and passed like shadows. I have heard from my
• 4:21:15
  good host that, being crazed in brain by unrequited love, he scaled the
• 4:21:18
  rocks, dived into caves, and pierced the matted woods, in hope to
• 4:21:23
  find some virtuous herb of power to cure his malady. The vicar smiled,
• 4:21:30
  alas before tomorrow's sun goes down, his habitation will be here for him.
• 4:21:36
  That open grave is destined. Died he then, of pain and grief.
• 4:21:41
  The solitary asked, do not believe it? Never? Could that be?
• 4:21:45
  He loved? The vicar answered deeply loved, loved fondly, truly, fervently,
• 4:21:52
  and dared at length to tell his love, but sued in vain rejected.
• 4:21:56
  Yea repelled, And if with scorn upon the haughty maiden's brow, tis
• 4:22:03
  but a high prized plume which female beauty wears in wantonness of conquest, or
• 4:22:08
  puts on to cheat the world, or from herself to hide humiliation. When
• 4:22:12
  no longer free, that he could brook and glory in. But when the
• 4:22:18
  tidings came that she whom he had wooed, was wedded to another, and
• 4:22:22
  his heart was forced to rend away its only hope, then pity could have
• 4:22:26
  scarcely found on earth an object worthier of regard than he. In the transition
• 4:22:33
  of that bitter hour lost was she lost? Nor could the sufferer say that,
• 4:22:38
  in the act of preference he had been unjustly dealt with. But the
• 4:22:41
  maid was gone, had vanished from his prospects and desires. Not by translation
• 4:22:48
  to the heavenly choir who have put off their mortal spoils, ah, No,
• 4:22:53
  she lives another's wishes to complete joy be their lot and happiness. He
• 4:22:57
  cried his lot in hers, as misery must be mine. Such was that
• 4:23:04
  strong concussion. But the man who trembled trunk and limbs like some huge oak
• 4:23:11
  by a fierce tempest, shaken, soon resumed the steadfast quiet natural to a
• 4:23:15
  mind of composition, gentle and sedate, and in its movements circumspect and slow.
• 4:23:22
  To books, and to the long forsaken desk, or which, enchained
• 4:23:26
  by science he had loved to bend. He stoutly readdressed himself, resolved to
• 4:23:32
  quell his pain and search for truth with keener appetite, if that might be,
• 4:23:36
  and closer industry of what ensued within the heart. No outward sign appeared
• 4:23:41
  till a betraying sickliness was seen to tinge his cheek, and through his frame
• 4:23:47
  it crept with slow mutation, unconcealable. Such universal change as autumn makes in
• 4:23:53
  the fair body of a leafy grove, discolored then divestedtis affirmed by poets skilled
• 4:24:00
  in nature's secret ways, that love will not submit to be controlled by mastery.
• 4:24:06
  And the good man lacked not friends who strove to instill this truth into
• 4:24:10
  his mind, a mind in all heart mysteries unversed. Go to the hills,
• 4:24:17
  said one remit a. While this baneful diligence at early morn court the
• 4:24:21
  fresh air, explore the heaths and woods, and leaving it to others to
• 4:24:25
  foretell by calculations, sage the ebb and flow of tides, and when the
• 4:24:29
  moon will be eclipsed. Do you, for your own benefit construct a calendar
• 4:24:33
  of flowers plucked as they blow, where health abides in cheerfulness and peace.
• 4:24:40
  The attempt was made. Tis needless to report how hopelessly, but innocence is
• 4:24:45
  strong, and an entire simplicity of mind, a thing most sacred in the
• 4:24:48
  eye of Heaven that opens for such sufferers relief within the soul fountains of grace
• 4:24:55
  divine and doth commend their weakness and disease to Nature's care, assisted in her
• 4:25:00
  office by all the elements that round her way to generate, to preserve,
• 4:25:04
  and to restore, and by her beautiful array of forms, shedding sweet influence
• 4:25:11
  from above, or pure delight exhaling from the ground. They tread. Impute
• 4:25:18
  it not to impatience. If exclaimed the wanderer, I infer that he was
• 4:25:22
  healed by perseverance in the course prescribed, you do not err. The powers
• 4:25:27
  that had been lost by slow degrees were gradually regained, the fluttering nerves composed,
• 4:25:33
  the beating heart in rest established, and the jarring thoughts to harmony restored.
• 4:25:38
  But yon dark mold will cover him in the fullness of his strength.
• 4:25:44
  Hastily smitten by a fever's force, yet not with stroke so sudden as refused
• 4:25:49
  time to look back with tenderness on her, whom he had loved in passion,
• 4:25:55
  and to send some farewell words with one but one quest that from his
• 4:26:02
  dying hand she would accept of his possessions that which most he prized, A
• 4:26:07
  book upon whose leaves some chosen plants by his own hand, disposed with nicest
• 4:26:12
  care, in undecaying beauty, were preserved, mute register to him of time
• 4:26:18
  and place, and various fluctuations in the breast to her, a monument of
• 4:26:22
  faithful love conquered and in tranquility retained. Close to his destined habitation, lies
• 4:26:30
  one who achieved a humbler victory, though marvelous in its kind. A place
• 4:26:36
  there is high in these mountains that allured a band of keen adventurers to unite
• 4:26:41
  their pains in search of precious ore. They tried, were foiled, and
• 4:26:45
  all desisted, all save him, alone, he, taking counsel of his
• 4:26:51
  own clear thoughts, and trusting only to his own weak hands, urged unremittingly,
• 4:26:56
  the stubborn work, unseconded, uncountenanced. Then, as time passed on,
• 4:27:02
  while still his lonely efforts found no recompense, derided and at length by
• 4:27:07
  many, pitied as insane of mind by others, dreaded as the luckless thrall
• 4:27:12
  of subterranean spirits, feeding hope by various mockery of sight and sound, hope
• 4:27:18
  after hope, encouraged and destroyed. But when the Lord of Seasons had matured
• 4:27:26
  the fruits of Earth through space of twice ten years, the mountain's entrails offered
• 4:27:32
  to his view, and, trembling grasp the long deferred reward. Not with
• 4:27:37
  more transport did Columbus greet a world his rich discovery. But our swain,
• 4:27:44
  a very hero till his point was gained, proved all unable to support the
• 4:27:48
  weight of prosperous fortune on the fields, he looked with an unsettled liberty of
• 4:27:53
  thought, wishes, and endless schemes. By daylight, walked giddy and restless,
• 4:27:59
  ever, and anon quaffed in his gratitude immoderate cups, and truly might
• 4:28:04
  be said to die of joy. He vanished, but conspicuous to this day.
• 4:28:11
  The path remains that linked his cottage door to the mine's mouth, a
• 4:28:15
  long and slanting track upon the rugged mountain's stony side, worn by his daily
• 4:28:21
  visits to and from the darksome center of a constant hope. This vestige neither
• 4:28:26
  force of beating rain nor the vicissitudes of frost and thaw shall cause to fade
• 4:28:32
  till ages pass away, and it is named in memory of the event.
• 4:28:37
  The path of perseverance, Thou, from whom man has his strength, exclaimed
• 4:28:44
  the wanderer, Oh, do thou direct it to the virtuous grant the penetrative
• 4:28:49
  eye which can perceive in this blind world, the guiding vein of hope,
• 4:28:55
  that, like this laborer, such may dig their way unshaken, unseduced,
• 4:29:00
  unterrified. Grant to the wise his firmness of resolve, that prayer were not
• 4:29:07
  superfluous, said the priest, amid the noblest relics proudest dust that Westminster,
• 4:29:12
  for Britain's glory, holds within the bosom of her awful pile, ambitiously collected.
• 4:29:18
  Yet the sigh which wafts that prayer to Heaven is due to all wherever
• 4:29:23
  laid, who living fell below their virtue's humbler mark a sigh of pain.
• 4:29:30
  If to the opposite extreme they sank, How would you pity her who yonder
• 4:29:36
  rests him farther off the pair who here are laid, but above all that
• 4:29:41
  mixture of Earth's mold, whom sight of this green hillock, to my mind
• 4:29:45
  recalls, he lived not till his locks were nipped by seasonable frost of age,
• 4:29:52
  nor died before his temples prematurely forced to mix the manly ground with silver
• 4:29:56
  gray, gave obvious instance of the sad effect for duce Us, when thoughtless
• 4:30:00
  folly hath usurped the natural crown that sage experience wears, gay, volatile and
• 4:30:07
  genius, quick to learn, and prompt to exhibit all that he possessed or
• 4:30:11
  could perform. A zealous actor hired into the troop of mirth, a soldier
• 4:30:18
  sworn into the lists of giddy enterprise. Such was he, Yet as if
• 4:30:22
  within his frame two several souls alternately had lodged two sets of manners. Could
• 4:30:29
  the youth put on and fraught with antics as the Indian bird that writhes and
• 4:30:33
  chatters in her wiry cage, was graceful when it pleased him. Smooth and
• 4:30:37
  still as the mute swan that floats adown the stream or on the waters of
• 4:30:41
  the unruffled lake, anchors her placid beauty. Not a leaf that flutters on
• 4:30:47
  the bough lighter than he, and not a flower that droops in the green
• 4:30:51
  shade more winningly reserved. If he inquire how such consummate elegance was bred amid
• 4:30:56
  these wilds, this answer may suffice twas Nature's will, who sometimes undertakes for
• 4:31:03
  the reproof of human vanity, art to outstrip in her peculiar walk. Hence,
• 4:31:11
  for this favorite, lavishly endowed with personal gifts and bright instinctive wit,
• 4:31:15
  while both embellishing each other, stood yet farther, recommended by the charm of
• 4:31:21
  fine demeanor, and by dance and song and skill in letters, every fancy
• 4:31:26
  shaped fair expectations. Nor when to the world's capacious field forth went the adventurer.
• 4:31:33
  There were he and his attainments overlooked or scantily rewarded, But all hopes
• 4:31:40
  cherished for him, he suffered to depart, like blighted buds or clouds that
• 4:31:45
  mimicked land before the sailor's eye, or diamond drops that sparkling decked the morning
• 4:31:51
  grass, or aught that was attractive and hath ceased to be. Yet when
• 4:31:56
  this prodigal returned, the rights of joyful greeting were on him bestowed, who,
• 4:32:02
  by humiliation, undeterred, sought for his weariness a place of rest within
• 4:32:07
  his father's gates. Whence came he clothed in tattered garb, from hovels where
• 4:32:12
  abides necessity, the stationary host of vagrant poverty, from rifted barns, where
• 4:32:18
  no one dwells but the wide, staring owl and the owl's prey. For
• 4:32:22
  these bare haunts to which he had descended from the proud saloon, he came
• 4:32:27
  the ghost of beauty and of health, the wreck of gaiety, but soon
• 4:32:33
  revived in strength and power. Refitted, he renewed his suit to fortune,
• 4:32:37
  and she smiled again upon a fickle ingrate. Thrice he rose thrice sank as
• 4:32:44
  willingly, for he whose nerves were used to thrill with pleasure, while his
• 4:32:48
  voice, softly accompanied the tuneful harp by the nice finger of fair ladies touched
• 4:32:55
  in glittering halls, was able to derive no less enjoyment from an hour object
• 4:33:00
  choice. Who happier for the moment? Who more blithe than this fallen spirit
• 4:33:07
  in those dreary holds, his talents lending to exalt the freaks of merry making
• 4:33:11
  beggars, nor provoked to laughter multiplied in louder peals by his malicious wit.
• 4:33:17
  Then all enchained with mute astonishment themselves to see in their own arts outdone,
• 4:33:23
  their fame, eclipsed as by the very presence of the fiend, who dictates
• 4:33:29
  and inspires elusive feats for knavish purposes. The city too with shame, I
• 4:33:34
  speak it to her guilty bowers allured him, sunk so low in self respect
• 4:33:41
  as there to linger there to eat his bread hired minstrel of voluptuous blandishment,
• 4:33:47
  charming the air with skill of hand or voice. Listen, who would be
• 4:33:52
  wrought upon? Who might sincerely wretched hearts or falsely gay such the too frequent
• 4:33:59
  tenor of his boast in ears that relished the report. But all was from
• 4:34:03
  his parents, happily concealed, who saw enough for blame in pitying love.
• 4:34:10
  They also were permitted to receive his last repentant breath and closed his eyes no
• 4:34:15
  more to open on that irksome world where he had long existed, in the
• 4:34:19
  state of a young fowl beneath one mother, hatched though from another sprung different
• 4:34:26
  and kind, where he had lived and could not cease to live, distracted
• 4:34:30
  in propensity, contend with neither element of good or ill, and yet in
• 4:34:36
  both rejoicing man unblest of contradictions, infinite, the slave till his deliverance,
• 4:34:44
  when mercy made him one with himself and one with them. That sleep tis
• 4:34:51
  strange, observed the solitary strange. It seems, and scarcely less than pitiful,
• 4:34:56
  that, in a land where charity provides for all all that can no
• 4:35:00
  longer feed themselves, a man like this should choose to bring his shame to
• 4:35:04
  the parental door, and with his sighs infect the air which he had freely
• 4:35:11
  breathed in happy infancy. He could not pine through lack of converse. No,
• 4:35:17
  he must have found abundant exercise for thought and speech in his individual beings,
• 4:35:22
  self reviewed, self catechised, self punished. Some there are, who,
• 4:35:26
  drawing near their final home, in much and daily longing that the same
• 4:35:30
  were reached, would rather shun than seek the fellowship of kindred mold. Such
• 4:35:37
  haply here are laid, Yes, said the priest, the genius of our
• 4:35:41
  hills, whose seems by these stupendous barriers cast round his domain, desirous not
• 4:35:48
  alone to keep his own, but also to exclude all other progeny, doth
• 4:35:52
  sometimes lure, even by his studied depth of privacy. The unhappy alien,
• 4:35:56
  hoping to obtain concealment, or seduced by wish to find in place from outward
• 4:36:03
  molestation free helps to internal ease of many such could I discourse, But as
• 4:36:10
  their stay was brief, so their departure only left behind fancies and loose conjectures.
• 4:36:15
  Other trace survives for worthy mention of a pair who, from the pressure
• 4:36:19
  of their several fates, meeting as strangers in a petty town whose blue roofs
• 4:36:25
  ornament a distant reach of this far winding vale, remained as friends, true
• 4:36:30
  to their choice, and gave their bones in trust to this loved cemetery,
• 4:36:36
  here to lodge with unescutcheoned privacy, interred far from the family vault, a
• 4:36:42
  chieftain one by right of birth, within whose spotless breast. The fire of
• 4:36:47
  ancient Caledonia burned. He with the foremost, whose impatience hailed the steward landing
• 4:36:55
  to resume by force of arms, the crown which bigotry had lost, aroused
• 4:37:00
  his clan, and, fighting at their head with his brave sword, endeavored
• 4:37:04
  to prevent Callawdon's fatal overthrow. Escaped from that disastrous route to foreign shores,
• 4:37:11
  he fled, And when the lenient hand of time those troubles had appeased,
• 4:37:15
  he sought and gained from his obscured condition an obscure retreat within this nook of
• 4:37:22
  English ground. The other born in Britain's southern tract had fixed his milder loyalty
• 4:37:29
  and placed his gentler sentiments of love and hate there where they placed them,
• 4:37:34
  who in conscience prized the new succession as a line of kings, whose oath
• 4:37:38
  had virtue to protect the land against the dire assaults of papacy and arbitrary rule,
• 4:37:45
  but launched thy bark on the distempered flood of public life, and cause
• 4:37:51
  for a most rare triumph will be thine, if, spite of keenest eye
• 4:37:56
  and steadiest hand, the stream that bears thee forward proved not soon or laid
• 4:38:00
  a perilous master. He who oft beneath the battlements and stately trees that round
• 4:38:07
  his mansion cast a sober gloom, had moralized on this and other truths of
• 4:38:11
  kindred import pleased and satisfied, was forced to vent his wisdom with a sigh
• 4:38:18
  heaved from the heart in fortune's bitterness, when he had crushed a plentiful estate
• 4:38:22
  by ruinous contest to obtain a seat in Britain's Senate. Fruitless was the attempt,
• 4:38:30
  And while the uproar of that desperate strife continued yet to vibrate on his
• 4:38:36
  ear, the vanquished Whig, under a borrowed name for the mere sound and
• 4:38:41
  echo of his own haunted him with sensations of disgust that he was glad to
• 4:38:45
  lose. Slunk from the world to the deep shade of those untraveled wilds in
• 4:38:51
  which the Scottish laird had long possessed an undisturbed abode. Here then they met
• 4:38:57
  two doughty champions, flaming Jacobite and sullen Hanoverian. You might think that losses
• 4:39:06
  and vexations less severe than those which they had severally sustained, would have inclined
• 4:39:11
  each to abate his zeal for his ungrateful cause. No I have heard my
• 4:39:17
  reverend father tell that mid the calm of that small town, encountering thus they
• 4:39:22
  filled daily its bowling green with harmless strife, plagued with uncharitable thoughts, the
• 4:39:29
  church and vexed the market place. But in the breasts of these opponents,
• 4:39:33
  gradually was wrought with little change of general sentiment, such leaning towards each other,
• 4:39:40
  that their days, by choice, were spent in constant fellowship. And
• 4:39:44
  if at times they fretted with the yoke, those very bickerings made them love
• 4:39:48
  it more. A favorite boundary to their lengthened walks, this churchyard was.
• 4:39:56
  And whether they had come treading their path in sympathy and linked in social converse,
• 4:40:00
  or by some short space discreetly parted to preserve the peace, one spirit
• 4:40:06
  seldom failed to extend its sway over both mines when they awhile had marked the
• 4:40:11
  visible quiet of this holy ground that breathed its soothing air, the spirit of
• 4:40:17
  hope and saintly magnanimity, that spurning the field of selfish difference in dispute,
• 4:40:22
  and every care which transitory things earth and the kingdoms of the Earth create doth
• 4:40:27
  by a rapture of forgetfulness, preclude forgiveness from the praise debarred, which else
• 4:40:33
  the Christian virtue might have claimed. There live who yet remember here to have
• 4:40:40
  seen their courtly figures seated on the stump of an old yew, their favorite
• 4:40:44
  resting place. But as the remnant of the long lived tree was disappearing by
• 4:40:48
  a swift decay, they with joint care, determined to erect upon its sight
• 4:40:55
  a dial that might stand for public use, preserved, and thus survive as
• 4:41:00
  their own private monument. For this was the particular spot in which they wished,
• 4:41:06
  and Heaven was pleased to accomplish the desire that undivided their remains should lie.
• 4:41:14
  So, where the molder tree had stood was raised yon structure, framing
• 4:41:18
  with the ascent of steps that to the decorated pillar lead a work of art
• 4:41:22
  more sumptuous than might seem to suit this place. Yet built in no proud
• 4:41:27
  scorn of rustic homeliness, they only aimed to insure for it respectful guardianship around
• 4:41:34
  the margin of the plate, where on the shadow falls to note the stealthy
• 4:41:38
  hours, wines and inscriptive legend. At these words, thither we turned and
• 4:41:45
  gathered as we read the appropriate sense in Latin numbers couched time flies. It
• 4:41:52
  is his melancholy task to bring and bear away delusive hopes and reproduce the troubles
• 4:41:59
  he did destroys. But while his blindness thus is occupied discerning mortal do thou
• 4:42:06
  serve the will of Time's eternal master, and that peace which the world wants
• 4:42:11
  shall be for thee confirmed smooth verse, inspired by no unlettered muse, exclaimed
• 4:42:21
  the skeptic, and the strain of thought accords with nature's language. The soft
• 4:42:26
  voice of Yon White Torrent falling down the rocks, speaks less distinctly to the
• 4:42:30
  same effect. If then their blended influence be not lost upon our hearts,
• 4:42:37
  not wholly lost, I grant even upon mine. The more are we required
• 4:42:41
  to feel for those among our fellow men, who, offering no obeisance to
• 4:42:47
  the world, are yet made desperate by too quick a sense of constant infelicity,
• 4:42:52
  cut off from peace, like exiles on some barren rock, their life's
• 4:42:56
  appointed prison, not more free than sentinels. Between two armies, set with
• 4:43:03
  nothing better in the chill night air than their own thoughts to comfort them,
• 4:43:07
  say why that ancient story of Prometheus chained to the bare rock on frozen Caucasus,
• 4:43:15
  the vulture, the inexhaustible repast, drawn from his vitals. Say what
• 4:43:19
  meant the woes by Tantalus entailed upon his race, and the dark sorrows of
• 4:43:25
  the line of Thebes fictions in form, but in their substance truths, tremendous
• 4:43:32
  truths familiar to the men of long past times, nor obsolete in ours.
• 4:43:37
  Exchange the shepherd's frock of native gray for robes with regal purple tinged. Convert
• 4:43:44
  the crook into a scepter, Give the pomp of circumstance, and hear the
• 4:43:48
  tragic muse shall find apt subjects for her highest art. Amid the groves,
• 4:43:53
  under the shadowy hills, the generations are prepared, the pangs the internals already
• 4:44:00
  the dread strife of poor humanity's afflicted will, struggling in vain with ruthless destiny.
• 4:44:08
  Though said the priest in answer, these be terms which a divine philosophy
• 4:44:15
  rejects. We whose established an unfailing trust is in controlling providence. Admit that
• 4:44:22
  through all station human life abounds with mysteries. For if faith were left untried.
• 4:44:27
  How could the might that lurks within her then be shown her glorious excellence
• 4:44:33
  that ranks among the first of powers and virtues proved our system is not fashioned
• 4:44:40
  to preclude that sympathy which you for others ask, and I could tell not
• 4:44:45
  traveling for my theme beyond these humble graves of grievous crimes and strange disasters.
• 4:44:52
  But I pass them by, loath to disturb what Heaven hath hushed in peace.
• 4:44:57
  Still less, far less am I inclined to treat of man degraded in
• 4:45:02
  his maker's sight by the deformities of brutish vice. For in such portraits,
• 4:45:07
  though a vulgar face and a course outside of repulsive life and unaffecting manners might
• 4:45:14
  at once be recognized by all Ah, Do not think the wanderer, somewhat
• 4:45:18
  eagerly exclaimed wish could be ours that you for such poor gain gain? Shall
• 4:45:25
  I call it? Gain? Of? What? For whom should be the
• 4:45:27
  word tending to violate your own pure spirit? Not a step we look for
• 4:45:33
  in slight of that forbearance and reserve which common human heartedness inspires, and mortal
• 4:45:37
  ignorance and frailty claim upon this sacred ground, if nowhere else end of Book
• 4:45:45
  six Part one of the Excursion. Book sixth, Part two of The Excursion
• 4:45:51
  by William Wordsworth, True said the solitary. Be it far from us to
• 4:45:56
  infringe the laws of charity. Let judgement here and mercy be pronounced. This
• 4:46:02
  self respecting nature prompts, and this wisdom enjoins. But if the thing we
• 4:46:07
  seek be genuine knowledge, bear we then in mind how from his lofty throne
• 4:46:11
  the sun can fling colors as bright on exultations bred by weedy pool, or
• 4:46:17
  pestilential swamp, as by the rivulet sparkling where it runs, or the pellucid
• 4:46:22
  lake. Small risk, said I of such illusion do we hear incur temptation?
• 4:46:30
  Here is none to exceed the truth. No evidence appears that they who
• 4:46:33
  rest within this ground were covetous of praise or of remembrance, even deserved or
• 4:46:40
  not. Green is the churchyard beautiful and green ridge rising gently by the side
• 4:46:45
  of ridge, a heaving surface almost wholly free from interruption of sepulchral stones and
• 4:46:52
  mantled ore with aboriginal turf and everlasting flowers. These dalesmen trust the lingering gleam
• 4:46:59
  of their hearted lives to oral record and the silent heart depository's faithful and more
• 4:47:06
  kind than fondest epitaph. For if those fail, what boots the sepulchered tomb,
• 4:47:11
  and who can blame? Who? Rather would not envy men that feel
• 4:47:15
  this mutual confidence if from such source the practice flow, if thence or from
• 4:47:22
  a deep and general humility and death, nor should I much condemn it if
• 4:47:29
  it spring from disregard of time's destructive power, as only capable to prey on
• 4:47:33
  things of earth and human nature's mortal part. Yet in less simple districts where
• 4:47:41
  we see stone lift its forehead, emulous of stone in courting notice, and
• 4:47:45
  the ground all paved with commendations of departed worth reading, where'er return of innocent
• 4:47:52
  lives of each domestic charity fulfilled and sufferings meekly borne. I, for my
• 4:47:57
  part, though with the silence, pleased that here prevails among those fair recitals
• 4:48:03
  also range soothed by the natural spirit which they breathe. And in the center
• 4:48:08
  of a world whose soil is rank with all unkindness, compassed round with such
• 4:48:14
  memorials, I have sometimes felt it was no momentary happiness to have one enclosure
• 4:48:19
  where the voice that speaks in envy or detraction is not heard, which malice
• 4:48:26
  may not enter, where the traces of evil inclinations are unknown, where love
• 4:48:30
  and pity tenderly unite with resignation, and no jarring tone intrudes the peaceful concert
• 4:48:37
  to disturb of amenity and gratitude. Thus sanctioned, the pastor said, I
• 4:48:42
  willingly confine my narratives to subjects that excite feelings, with these accordant love,
• 4:48:48
  esteem, and admiration, lifting up a veil a sunbeam, introducing among hearts
• 4:48:56
  retired and covert, so that ye shall have clear images before your gladdened eyes
• 4:49:00
  of nature's unambitious underwood and flowers that prosper in the shade. And when I
• 4:49:07
  speak of such among my flock as swerved or fell, those only shall be
• 4:49:11
  singled out, upon whose lapse or error something more than brotherly forgiveness may attend.
• 4:49:18
  Tis such will we restrict our notice else better by my tongue were mute.
• 4:49:23
  And yet there are I feel good reasons why we should not leave wholly
• 4:49:27
  untraced, a more forbidding way, for strength to persevere and to support,
• 4:49:33
  and energy to conquer and repel. These elements of virtue that declare the native
• 4:49:38
  grandeur of the human soul are ofttimes not unprofitably shown in the perverseness of a
• 4:49:45
  selfish course truth every day exemplified no less in the gray cottage by the murmuring
• 4:49:51
  stream than in fantastic conqueror's roving camp, or mid the factious senate, unappalled,
• 4:49:56
  whoe'er may sink or rise to so think again, as merciless proscription ebbs
• 4:50:02
  and flows. There said the vicar, pointing as he spake. A woman
• 4:50:07
  rests in peace, surpassed by few, in power of mind and eloquent discourse.
• 4:50:14
  Tall was her stature, her complexion dark and saturnine, Her head not
• 4:50:18
  raised to hold converse with Heaven, nor yet depressed towards Earth, but in
• 4:50:22
  projection, carried as she walked forever musing sunken. Were her eyes wrinkled and
• 4:50:29
  furrowed with habitual thought. Was her broad forehead, like the brow of one
• 4:50:33
  whose visual nerve shrinks from a painful glare of overpowering light. While yet a
• 4:50:40
  child, she mid the humble flowerets of the veil, towered like the imperial
• 4:50:45
  thistle, not unfurnished with its appropriate grace. Yet, rather seeking to be
• 4:50:49
  admired than coveted and loved, even at that age, she ruled a sovereign
• 4:50:56
  queen over her comrades else their simple sports, wanting all relish, for her
• 4:51:00
  strenuous mind had crossed her, only to be shunned with scorn. Oh pang
• 4:51:07
  of sorrowful regret for those whom, in their youth sweet study has enthralled that
• 4:51:11
  they have lived for harsher servitude, whether in soul, in body, or
• 4:51:17
  estate. Such doom was hers. Yet nothing could subdue her keen desire of
• 4:51:22
  knowledge, nor efface. Those brighter images by books impressed upon her memory faithfully
• 4:51:27
  as stars that occupy their places, and though oft hidden by clouds and oft
• 4:51:33
  be dimmed by haze, are not to be extinguished nor impaired. Two passions,
• 4:51:40
  both degenerate, for they both began an honor, gradually obtained rule over
• 4:51:45
  her, and vexed her daily life, an unremitting, avaricious thrift, and
• 4:51:49
  a strange thraldom of maternal love that held her spirit in its own, despite
• 4:51:55
  bound by vexation and regret and scorn, constrain forgiveness, and relenting vows and
• 4:52:02
  tears in pride suppressed in shame, concealed to a poor, dissolute son,
• 4:52:07
  her only child. Her wedded days had opened with mishap, whence dire dependence.
• 4:52:15
  What could she perform to shake the burthen off ah? There was felt
• 4:52:19
  indignantly the weakness of her sex. She mused, resolved, adhere to her
• 4:52:25
  resolve. The hand grew slack in alms giving, the heart closed by degrees
• 4:52:30
  to charity Heaven's blessing. Not seeking from that source, she placed her trust
• 4:52:34
  in ceaseless pains and strictest parsimony, which sternly hoarded all that could be spared
• 4:52:41
  from each day's need, out of each day's least gain. Thus all was
• 4:52:45
  re established, and a pile constructed that sufficed for every end, saved the
• 4:52:51
  contentment of the builder's mind, a mind by nature indisposed to aught, so
• 4:52:56
  placid, so inactive as content, a mind intolerant of lasting peace and cherishing
• 4:53:03
  the pang. Her heart deplored dread life of conflict, which I oft compared
• 4:53:08
  to the agitation of a brook that runs down a rocky mountain, buried now
• 4:53:14
  and lost in silent pools now in strong eddies, chained but never to be
• 4:53:18
  charmed to gentleness, its best attainment fits of such repose, as timid eyes
• 4:53:23
  might shrink from fathoming. A sudden illness seized her in the strength of life's
• 4:53:30
  autumnal season. Shall I tell how, on her bed of death the matron
• 4:53:33
  lay to providence, submissive, so she thought, but fretted, vexed,
• 4:53:38
  and wrought upon almost to anger by the malady that griped her prostrate frame with
• 4:53:45
  unrelaxing power. As the fierce eagle fastens on the lamb. She prayed,
• 4:53:51
  she moaned. Her husband's sister watched her dreary pillow waited on her knees,
• 4:53:56
  And yet the very sound of that kind foot was anguished to her. And
• 4:54:00
  must she rule? This was the death doomed woman heard to say in bitterness,
• 4:54:06
  And must she rule and reign sole mistress of this house? When I
• 4:54:10
  am gone tend what I tended, calling it her own enough, I fear
• 4:54:15
  too much. One vernal evening, while she was in prime of health and
• 4:54:19
  strength, I well remember, while I passed her door alone, with loitering
• 4:54:23
  step and upward eye turned towards the planet Jupiter that hung above the center of
• 4:54:29
  the veil, A voice roused me her voice, it said that glorious star,
• 4:54:34
  in its untroubled element, will shine as now it shines, when we
• 4:54:37
  are laid in earth and safe from all our sorrows. With a sigh,
• 4:54:42
  she spake, Yet I believe, not unsustained by faith and glory, that
• 4:54:48
  shall far transcend aught by these perishable heavens disclosed to sight or mind, nor
• 4:54:53
  less than care. Divine is divine mercy. She who had rebelled, was
• 4:54:59
  into meekness, softened and subdued, did, after trials not in vain,
• 4:55:03
  prolonged with resignations, sink into the grave, and her uncharitable acts, I
• 4:55:08
  trust and harsh unkindnesses are all forgiven. Though in this veil remembered with deep
• 4:55:15
  awe, the vicar paused, and toward a seat advanced, a long stone
• 4:55:22
  seat fixed in the churchyard wall, part shaded by cool sycamore, and part
• 4:55:26
  offering a sunny resting place to them who seek the house of worship. While
• 4:55:30
  the bells yet ring with all their voices, or before the last hath ceased
• 4:55:34
  its solitary knoll, beneath the shade, we all sate down, and there
• 4:55:40
  his office uninvited, he resumed as on a sunny bank, A tender lamb
• 4:55:47
  lurks in safe shelter from the winds of march, screened by its parent,
• 4:55:52
  so that little mound lies guarded by its neighbor. The small heap speaks for
• 4:55:56
  itself, and infant there doth rest. The sheltering hillock is the mother's grave.
• 4:56:03
  If mild discourse and manners that conferred a natural dignity and humblest rank,
• 4:56:07
  If gladsome spirits and benignant looks, that for a face not beautiful did more
• 4:56:12
  than beauty for the fairest face can do. And if religious tenderness of heart,
• 4:56:18
  grieving for sin, and penitential tears shed when the clouds had gathered and
• 4:56:22
  disdained the spotless ether of a maiden life, if these may make a hallow
• 4:56:27
  spot of earth more wholly to the sight of God or man, then o'er
• 4:56:32
  that mold a sanctity shall brood till the stars sicken at the day of doom.
• 4:56:38
  Ah, What a warning for a thoughtless man, could field or grove,
• 4:56:42
  could any spot of earth show to his eye an image of the pangs
• 4:56:47
  which it hath witnessed, render back an echo of the sad steps by which
• 4:56:52
  it hath been trod there by her innocent baby's precious grave, and on the
• 4:56:56
  very turf that roofs her own the mother off was seen to stand or kneel
• 4:57:02
  on the broad day a weeping Magdalene. Now she is not the swelling turf
• 4:57:07
  reports of the fresh shower, but of poor Ellen's tears is silent, Nor
• 4:57:12
  is any vestige left of the path worn by mournful tread of her, who,
• 4:57:17
  at her heart's light bidding, once had moved in virgin fearlessness, with
• 4:57:22
  step that seemed caught from the pressure of elastic turf, upon the mountains gemmed
• 4:57:26
  with morning dew, in the prime hour of sweetest scents and airs. Serious
• 4:57:32
  and thoughtful was her mind, And yet by reconcilement exquisite and rare the form
• 4:57:37
  port motions of this cottage girl, where such as might have quickened and inspired
• 4:57:42
  a titian's hand addressed to picture forth oreed or dryad glancing through the shade.
• 4:57:49
  What time the hunter's earliest horn is heard startling the golden hills. A widespread
• 4:57:56
  elm stands in our valley, named joyful tree from dateless usage, which our
• 4:58:03
  peasants hold of giving welcome to the first of may by dances round its trunk,
• 4:58:08
  and if the sky permit, like honors, dance and song are paid
• 4:58:14
  to the twelfth night beneath the frosty stars or the clear moon, The queen
• 4:58:18
  of these gay sports, if not in beauty yet in sprightly air, was
• 4:58:22
  hapless Ellen. No one touched the ground so deftly, and the nicest maiden's
• 4:58:27
  locks less gracefully were braided. But this praise, methinks, would better suit
• 4:58:33
  another place. She loved and fondly deemed herself beloved. The road is dim,
• 4:58:41
  the current unperceived, the weakness painful and most pitiful by which a virtuous
• 4:58:47
  woman in pure youth may be delivered to distress and shame. Such fate was
• 4:58:52
  hers. The last time Ellen danced among her equals round the joyful tree,
• 4:58:56
  she bore a secret burthen and full soon was left to tremble for a breaking
• 4:59:02
  vow, then to bewail a sternly broken vow alone within her widowed mother's house.
• 4:59:10
  It was the season of unfolding leaves, of days advancing toward their utmost
• 4:59:14
  length, and small birds singing happily to mates, happy as they with spirit
• 4:59:21
  saddening power, winds pipe through fading woods. But those blithe notes strike the
• 4:59:26
  deserted to the heart. I speak of what I know and what we feel
• 4:59:30
  within. Beside the cottage in which Ellen Dwelt stands, a tall ash tree,
• 4:59:36
  to whose topmost twig, a thrush resorts and annually chance at morn and
• 4:59:41
  evening from that naked perch, while all the undergrove is thick with leaves,
• 4:59:45
  a time beguiling ditty for delight of his fond partner, silent in the nest
• 4:59:52
  ah. Why said Ellen, sighing to herself, Why do not words and
• 4:59:56
  kiss, and solemn pledge, and nature that is kind in woman's breast,
• 5:00:02
  and reason that in man is wise and good, and fear of him who
• 5:00:06
  is a righteous judge. Why do not these prevail for human life? To
• 5:00:10
  keep two hearts together that began their spring time with one love, and that
• 5:00:15
  have need of mutual pity and forgiveness sweet to grant or be received. While
• 5:00:21
  that poor bird O come and hear him, Thou who hast to me been
• 5:00:25
  faithless. Hear him, though a lowly creature, one of God's simple children,
• 5:00:30
  that yet know not the universal parent. How he sings as if he
• 5:00:33
  wished the firmament of heaven should listen and give back to him the voice of
• 5:00:37
  his triumphant constancy and love, the proclamation that he makes how far his darkness
• 5:00:44
  doth transcend our fickle light. Such was the tender passage not by me,
• 5:00:49
  repeated without loss of simple phrase which I perused, even as the words have
• 5:00:55
  been committed by forsaken Ellen's hand to the blank margin of a Valentine be dropped
• 5:01:00
  with tears, twill please you to be told that studiously, withdrawing from the
• 5:01:04
  eye of all companionship, the sufferer, yet in lonely reading found a meek
• 5:01:10
  resource. How thankful for the warmth of summer days, when she could slip
• 5:01:15
  into the cottage barn and find a secret oratory there, or in the garden
• 5:01:19
  under friendly veil of their long twilight pour upon her book by the last lingering
• 5:01:25
  help of the open sky, until dark night dismissed her to bed. Thus
• 5:01:30
  did a waking fancy sometimes lose the unconquerable pang of despised love. A kindlier
• 5:01:36
  passion opened on her soul when that poor child was born. Upon its face,
• 5:01:41
  she gazed as on a pure and spotless gift of unexpected promise where a
• 5:01:45
  grief or dread was all that had been thought of. Joy far livelier than
• 5:01:49
  bewildered traveler feels amid a perilous waste, that all night long Hath harassed him,
• 5:01:56
  toiling through fearful storm, when he beholds the first pale speck serene of
• 5:02:00
  day spring in the gloomy east, revealed and greets it with thanksgiving till this
• 5:02:07
  hour. Thus, in her mother's hearing, Ellen spake, there was a
• 5:02:11
  stony region in my heart. But he at whose command the parched rock was
• 5:02:15
  smitten and poured forth a quenching stream, Hath softened that obduracy and made unlooked
• 5:02:22
  for gladness in the desert place to save the perishing. And henceforth I breathe
• 5:02:29
  the air with cheerful spirit, for thy sake, my infant, and for
• 5:02:33
  that good mother dear who bore me and hath prayed for me in vain.
• 5:02:37
  Yet not in vain. It shall not be in vain, she spake.
• 5:02:41
  Nor was the assurance unfulfilled. And if heart renting thoughts would oft return,
• 5:02:47
  they stayed not long. The blameless infant grew, the child whom Ellen and
• 5:02:51
  her mother loved. They soon were proud of tended it and nursed a soothing
• 5:02:56
  comforter, although forlorn, like a poor singing bird from distant lands, or
• 5:03:02
  a choice shrub, which he who passes by with vacant mind not seldom may
• 5:03:07
  observe fair flowering in a thinly peopled house, whose window, somewhat sadly it
• 5:03:12
  adorns through four months space, the infant drew its food from the maternal breast.
• 5:03:19
  Then scruples rose thoughts which the rich are free from, came and crossed
• 5:03:25
  the fond affection. She no more could bear by her offense to lay a
• 5:03:29
  twofold weight on a kind parent, willing to forget their slender means. So
• 5:03:33
  to that parent's care, Trusting her child, she left their common home and
• 5:03:38
  undertook with dutiful content a foster mother's office. Tis, perchance unknown to you,
• 5:03:47
  that in these simple veils the natural feeling of equality is by domestic service
• 5:03:52
  unimpaired. Yet, though such service be with us removed from sense of degradation,
• 5:03:57
  not the less the ungentle mind mind can easily find means to impose severe
• 5:04:02
  restraints and laws unjust, which hapless Ellen now was doomed to feel for blinded
• 5:04:10
  by an over anxious dread of such excitement and divided thought, as with her
• 5:04:15
  office, would but ill accord. The pair whose infant she was bound to
• 5:04:19
  nurse forbade her all communion with her own week after week. The mandate they
• 5:04:26
  enforced so near yet not allowed upon that site to fix her eyes alas twas
• 5:04:33
  hard to bear, but worse affliction must be borne, far worse. For
• 5:04:37
  tis Heaven's will that, after a disease begun and ended within three days space,
• 5:04:44
  her child should die, as Ellen now exclaimed her own deserted child once
• 5:04:49
  only once she saw it in that mortal malady, and on the burial day
• 5:04:56
  could scarcely gain permission to attend its obsequies. She reached the house last of
• 5:05:03
  the funeral train, and some one as she entered, having chanced to urge
• 5:05:07
  unthinkingly their prompt departure. Nay, she said, with commanding look, a
• 5:05:12
  spirit of anger never seen in her before. Nay ye must wait my time.
• 5:05:18
  And down she sate, and by the unclosed coffin kept her seat,
• 5:05:22
  weeping and looking, looking on and weeping upon the last sweet slumber of her
• 5:05:27
  child, until at length her soul was satisfied. You see the infant's grave,
• 5:05:33
  and to this spot the mother oft as she was sent abroad, on
• 5:05:37
  whatsoever errand urged her steps. Hither she came here, stood and sometimes knelt
• 5:05:44
  in the broad day A rueful magdalen. So call her, for not only
• 5:05:49
  she bewailed a mother's loss, but mourned in bitterness her own transgression. Penitent
• 5:05:55
  sincere as ever raised to heaven a streaming eye. At length, the parents
• 5:06:00
  of the foster child, noting that in despite of their commands, she still
• 5:06:06
  renewed, and could not but renew those visitations, ceased to send her forth
• 5:06:11
  or to the garden's narrow bounds. Confined. I failed not to remind them
• 5:06:15
  that they erred, for holy nature might not thus be crossed, thus wronged
• 5:06:21
  in woman's breast in vain, I pleaded, But the green stalk of Ellen's
• 5:06:26
  life was snapped, and the flower drooped, as every eye could see it
• 5:06:30
  hung its head in mortal languishment. Aided by this appearance, I at length
• 5:06:34
  prevailed, and from those bonds released, she went home to her mother's house.
• 5:06:41
  The youth was fled. The rash betrayer could not face the shame or
• 5:06:45
  sorrow which his senseless guilt had caused, and little would his presence or proof
• 5:06:51
  given of a relenting soul have now availed, For like a shadow, he
• 5:06:56
  was passed away from Ellen's thoughts had perished to her her mind, for all
• 5:07:00
  concerns of fear, or hope or love, save only those which, to
• 5:07:04
  their common shame and to his moral being appertained hope from that quarter would I
• 5:07:11
  know have brought a heavenly comfort. There She recognized an unrelaxing bond, a
• 5:07:15
  mutual need there, And as it seemed there only she had built her fond
• 5:07:22
  maternal heart had built a nest in blindness, all too near the river's edge.
• 5:07:27
  That work, a summer flood with hasty swell had swept away, and
• 5:07:32
  now her spirit longed for its last flight to Heaven's security. The bodily frame
• 5:07:37
  wasted from day to day. Meanwhile, relinquishing all other cares her mind,
• 5:07:44
  she strictly tutored to find peace and pleasure in endurance. Much she thought,
• 5:07:48
  and much she read and brooded. Feelingly upon her own unworthiness to me as
• 5:07:55
  to a spiritual comforter and friend, her heart she opened, and no pains
• 5:08:00
  were spared to mitigate as gently as I could the sting of self reproach with
• 5:08:04
  healing words. Meek saint, few patients glorified on earth, in whom as
• 5:08:11
  by her lonely heart, she sate the ghastly face of cold decay, put
• 5:08:17
  on a sun like beauty, and appeared divine. May I not mention that
• 5:08:22
  within those walls, in due observance of her pious wish, the congregation joined
• 5:08:26
  with me in prayer for her soul's good. Nor was that office vain.
• 5:08:32
  Much did she suffer. But if any friend beholding her condition at the sight,
• 5:08:37
  gave way to words of pity or complaint, she stilled them with a
• 5:08:41
  prompt reproof, and said, he who afflicts me knows what I can bear,
• 5:08:45
  and when I fail and can endure no more, will mercifully take me
• 5:08:49
  to himself. So through the cloud of death her spirit passed into that pure
• 5:08:55
  and unknown world of love, where injury cannot come. And here is lay
• 5:09:00
  the mortal body by her infant's side. The vicar, ceased and downcast's looks
• 5:09:06
  made known that each had listened with his inmost heart. For me, the
• 5:09:10
  emotion scarcely was less strong or less benign than that which I had felt when
• 5:09:15
  seated near my venerable friend, under those shady elms. From him, I
• 5:09:18
  heard the story that retraced the slow decline of Margaret, sinking on the lonely
• 5:09:23
  heath, with the neglected house to which she clung. I noted that the
• 5:09:29
  solitary's cheek confessed the power of nature. Pleased, though sad, more pleased
• 5:09:33
  than sad, the gray haired wanderer sate thanks to his pure, imaginative soul,
• 5:09:40
  capacious and serene, his blameless life, his knowledge, wisdom, love
• 5:09:44
  of truth, and love of human kind. He was it who first broke
• 5:09:48
  the pensive silence, saying, blessed are they whose sorrow rather is to suffer
• 5:09:55
  wrong than to do wrong. Albeit themselves have erred, This tale gives proof
• 5:10:00
  that Heaven most gently deals with such in their affliction. Ellen's fate, her
• 5:10:06
  tender spirit, and her contrite heart called to my mind dark hints which I
• 5:10:11
  have heard of one who died within this veil by doom, heavier as his
• 5:10:15
  offense was heavier. Far where, sir, I pray you, where are
• 5:10:19
  laid the bones of Wilfrid Armathwaite. The vicar answered, in that green nook
• 5:10:26
  close by the churchyard wall, beneath Yon Hawthorne, planted by myself in memory
• 5:10:33
  and forewarning, and in sign of sweetness, where dire anguish had been known,
• 5:10:37
  of reconcilement after deep offense. There doth he rest no theme his fate
• 5:10:42
  supplies for the smooth glosings of the indulgent world. Nor need the windings of
• 5:10:48
  his devious course be here retraced enough that by mishap and venial error, robbed
• 5:10:53
  of competence and her obsequious shadow peace of mind, he craved a substitute and
• 5:11:00
  troubled joy against his conscience, rose in arms, and, braving divine displeasure,
• 5:11:06
  broke the marriage bow. That which he had been weak enough to do
• 5:11:10
  was misery and remembrance. He was stung, stung by his inward thoughts and
• 5:11:15
  by the smiles of wife and children, Stung to agony, Wretched at home,
• 5:11:19
  he gained no peace abroad, ranged through the mountains, slept upon the
• 5:11:25
  earth, asked comfort of the open air, and found no quiet in the
• 5:11:30
  darkness of the night, no pleasure in the beauty of the day. His
• 5:11:33
  flock he slighted, his paternal fields, became a clog to him whose spirit
• 5:11:38
  wished to fly, but whither and this gracious church that wears a look so
• 5:11:44
  full of peace and hope and love, benignant mother of the veil, how
• 5:11:48
  fair amid her brood of cottages, she was to him a sickness and reproach.
• 5:11:53
  Much to the last remained unknown, But this is sure, that through
• 5:11:57
  remorse and grief he died. Though pitied among men, absolved by God,
• 5:12:03
  he could not find forgiveness in himself, nor could endure the weight of his
• 5:12:07
  own shame. Here rests a mother. But from her I turn, and
• 5:12:12
  from her grave behold upon that ridge that, stretching boldly from the mountain side,
• 5:12:18
  carries into the center of the vale, its rocks and woods, the
• 5:12:22
  cottage where she dwelt, and where yet was her faithful partner, left full
• 5:12:29
  eight years past the solitary prop of many helpless children. I begin with words
• 5:12:33
  that might be prelude to a tale of sorrow and dejection. But I feel
• 5:12:38
  no sadness when I think of what mine eyes see daily in that happy family,
• 5:12:44
  bright garland formed they for the pensive brow of their undrooping father's widowhood,
• 5:12:48
  those six fair daughters budding, Yet not one, not one of all,
• 5:12:52
  the band a full blown flower, depressed and desolate of soul, as once
• 5:12:59
  that father was, and filled with anxious fear. Now by experience taught,
• 5:13:03
  he stands assured that God who takes away yet takes not half of what he
• 5:13:07
  seems to take, or gives it back, not to our prayer, but
• 5:13:12
  far beyond our prayer. He gives it the boon produce of a soil which
• 5:13:18
  our endeavors have refused to till, and hope hath never watered the abode whose
• 5:13:26
  grateful owner can attest these truths. Even were the object nearer to our sight,
• 5:13:30
  would seem in no distinction to surpass the rudest habitations, ye might think
• 5:13:36
  that it had sprung self, raised from earth, or grown out of the
• 5:13:38
  living rock, to be adorned by nature only. But if thither led,
• 5:13:44
  ye would discover then a studious work of many fancies, prompting many hands,
• 5:13:51
  brought from the woods. The honeysuckle twines round the porch, and seems in
• 5:13:55
  that trim place a plant no longer wild. The cultured rows their blocks,
• 5:14:00
  strong in health, and will be soon roof high. The wild pink crowns
• 5:14:04
  the garden wall, and with the flowers are intermingled stones sparry and bright,
• 5:14:08
  rough scatterings of the hills, these ornaments that fade not with the year.
• 5:14:14
  A hearty girl continues to provide, who, mounting fearlessly the rocky heights her
• 5:14:18
  father's prompt attendant, does for him all that a boy could do, but
• 5:14:22
  with delight, more keen, and prouder daring. Yet hath she within the
• 5:14:27
  garden like the rest, a bed for her own flowers and favorite herbs,
• 5:14:32
  a space, by sacred charter holden for her use these and whatever else the
• 5:14:37
  garden bears a fruit or flower permission ask or not. I freely gather,
• 5:14:42
  and my leisure draws a not unfrequent pastime from the hum of bees round their
• 5:14:48
  sacred sheltered hives, busy in that enclosure, while the real that sparkling thrids
• 5:14:53
  the rocks, attunes his voice to the pure course of human life, which
• 5:14:57
  there flows on in solid But when the gloom of night is falling round my
• 5:15:03
  steps, then most this dwelling charms me. I often stopped short, who
• 5:15:07
  could refrain and feed by stealth, My sight, with prospect of the company
• 5:15:11
  within, laid open through the blazing window. There I see the eldest daughter
• 5:15:18
  at her wheel, spinning a mane as if to overtake thee, never halting
• 5:15:22
  time, or in her turn, teaching some novice of the sisterhood that skill
• 5:15:26
  in this or other household work, which, from her father's honored hand herself,
• 5:15:32
  while she was yet a little one, had learned, mild man,
• 5:15:37
  he is not gay, but they are gay, and the whole house seems
• 5:15:40
  filled with gayety thrice happy. Then the mother may be deemed the wife from
• 5:15:45
  whose consolatory grave I turned, that in ye mind might witness where and how
• 5:15:51
  her spirit yet survives on earth. End of Book sixth Part two, Book
• 5:16:00
  seventh, Part one. While thus from theme to theme the historian past the
• 5:16:07
  words he uttered in the scene that lay before our eyes awakened in my mind
• 5:16:11
  vivid remembrance of those long past hours when in the hollow of some shadowy veil,
• 5:16:18
  what time the splendor of the setting sun lay beautiful on Snowden's sovereign brow.
• 5:16:23
  On cater Idris or Hugh pen Menmoir, a wandering youth, I listened
• 5:16:30
  with delight to pastoral melody or warlike air drawn from the chords of the ancient
• 5:16:36
  British harp by some accomplished master, while he sate amid the quiet of the
• 5:16:41
  green recess, And there did inexhaustibly dispense an interchange of soft or solemn tunes,
• 5:16:47
  tender or blithe, now as the varying mood of his own spirit urged,
• 5:16:52
  Now as a voice from youth or maiden, or some honored chief of
• 5:16:56
  his compatriot villagers that hung around him, drinking in the impassioned notes of the
• 5:17:02
  time hallowed minstrelsry required for their heart's ease or pleasure. Strains of power were
• 5:17:08
  they to seize and occupy the sense. But to a higher mark than song
• 5:17:12
  can reach, rose this pure eloquence. And when the stream which overflowed the
• 5:17:18
  soul was passed away, a consciousness remained that it had left, deposited upon
• 5:17:22
  the silent shore of memory, images and precious thoughts that shall not die and
• 5:17:29
  cannot be destroyed. These grassy heaps lie amicably close, said I, like
• 5:17:36
  surges heaving in the wind along the surface of a mountain pool. Whence comes
• 5:17:41
  it then that yonder we behold five graves, and only five that rise together,
• 5:17:47
  unsociably, sequestered and encroaching on the smooth playground of the village school.
• 5:17:52
  The vicar answered, no disdainful pride in them who rest beneath, nor any
• 5:17:59
  course of strange or tragic accident hath helped to place those hillocks in that lonely
• 5:18:03
  guise. Once more, look forth, and follow with your sight the length
• 5:18:07
  of road that from Yon Mountain's base, through bare enclosures, stretches till its
• 5:18:14
  line is lost within a little tuft of trees, then, reappearing in a
• 5:18:18
  moment, quits the cultivated fields and up the heathy waste mounts, as you
• 5:18:22
  see in Maze's serpentine led towards an easy outlet of the vale. That little
• 5:18:29
  shady spot, that sylvan tuft by which the road is hidden, also hides
• 5:18:33
  a cottage from our view, though I discern ye scarcely can amid its sheltering
• 5:18:38
  trees, the smokeless chimney top, all unembowered and naked, stood that lowly
• 5:18:45
  parsonage. For such in truth it is and appertains to a small chapel in
• 5:18:49
  the vale beyond, when hither came its last inhabitant. Rough and forbidding were
• 5:18:55
  the choicest roads by which our northern wilds could then be And into most of
• 5:19:00
  these secluded Vales was no access for wane, heavy or light, so at
• 5:19:07
  his dwelling place the priest arrived with store of household goods in paniers, slung
• 5:19:11
  on sturdy horses graced with jingling bells, and on the back of more ignoble
• 5:19:17
  beast that, with like burthen of effects most prized or easiest, carried closed
• 5:19:22
  the motley train. Young was I then a schoolboy of eight years, but
• 5:19:26
  still methinks I see them as they passed in order, drawing toward their wished
• 5:19:32
  for home, Rocked by the motion of a trusty ass. Two ruddy children
• 5:19:37
  hung a well poised freight, each in his basket, nodding drowsily. Their
• 5:19:42
  bonnets I remember, wreathed with flowers which told it was the pleasant month of
• 5:19:47
  June. And close behind the comely matron road, a woman of soft speech
• 5:19:52
  and gracious smile, and with a ladies mien. From far they came,
• 5:19:56
  even from Northumbrian hills. Yet theirs had in a merry journey, rich in
• 5:20:00
  pastime, cheered by music, prank and laughter, stirring jest and freak put
• 5:20:06
  on and archword dropped to swell the cloud of fancy and uncouth surmise that gathered
• 5:20:12
  round the slowly moving train. Whence do they come? And with what errand
• 5:20:18
  charged belong they to the fortune telling tribe who pitched their tents under the greenwood
• 5:20:22
  tree? Or strollers? Are they furnished to enact fair Rosamund and the children
• 5:20:29
  of the wood, And by that whiskered tabby's aid set forth the lucky venture
• 5:20:33
  of Sage Whittington when the next village hears the show announced by blast of trumpet.
• 5:20:40
  Plenteous was the growth of such conjectures overheard or seen on many a staring
• 5:20:45
  countenance portrayed of Boer or Burgher as they marched along, And more than once
• 5:20:51
  their steadiness of face was put to proof and exercise supplied to their inventive humor
• 5:20:56
  by stern looks and questions in authoritative tone from some staid guardian of the public
• 5:21:02
  peace, checking the sober steed on which he rode in his suspicious wisdom.
• 5:21:07
  Oftener still, by notice indirect or blunt demand from traveler halting in his own
• 5:21:12
  despite a simple curiosity to ease of which adventures that beguiled and cheered their grave
• 5:21:19
  migration, the good pair would tell with undiminished glee in hoary age. A
• 5:21:25
  priest he was by function, But his course from his youth up and high
• 5:21:30
  as manhoods noon, the hour of life to which he was then brought had
• 5:21:33
  been irregular, I might say, wild by books, unstudied, by his
• 5:21:38
  pastoral care, too little checked. An active, ardent mind, a fancy
• 5:21:44
  pregnant with resource and scheme to cheat the sadness of a rainy day, hands
• 5:21:48
  apt for all ingenious arts and games, a generous spirit, and a body
• 5:21:52
  strong to cope with stoutest champions of the bowl had earned for him sure welcome
• 5:21:57
  and the rights of a pride visitant in the jolly hall of country squire or
• 5:22:03
  at the statelier board of duke or earl, from scenes of courtly pomp,
• 5:22:07
  withdrawn to while away the summer hours in condescension among rural guests. With these
• 5:22:14
  high comrades he had rebeled, long, frolicked industriously, a simple clerk by
• 5:22:18
  hopes of coming patronage, beguiled till the heart sickened. So each loftier aim,
• 5:22:25
  abandoning and all his showy friends, for a life's stay slender. It
• 5:22:30
  was, but sure he turned to this secluded chapelry that had been offered to
• 5:22:34
  his doubtful choice by an unthought of patron. Bleak and bare, they found
• 5:22:40
  the cottage there allotted home, naked without and rude, within a spot with
• 5:22:45
  which the cure not long had been endowed, and far remote. The chapel
• 5:22:49
  stood remote and from his dwelling, unapproachable save through a gap high in the
• 5:22:55
  hills and opening, shadeless and shelterless by driving showers, freequed and beset with
• 5:23:00
  howling winds. Yet cause was none whate'er regret might hang on his own mind
• 5:23:07
  to quarrel with the choice or the necessity that fixed him here, apart from
• 5:23:11
  old temptations, and constrained to punctual labor in his sacred charge, see him
• 5:23:18
  a constant preacher to the poor, and visiting, though not with saintly zeal.
• 5:23:22
  Yet when need was with no reluctant will, the sick in body or
• 5:23:26
  distressed in mind, and by a salutary change, compelled to rise from timely
• 5:23:32
  sleep and meet the day with no engagement in his thoughts, more proud or
• 5:23:37
  splendid than his garden could afford his fields or mountains. By the heathcock ranged
• 5:23:42
  o'er the wild brooks from which he now returned, contented to partake the quiet
• 5:23:48
  meal of his own board, where sat his gentle mate and three fair children,
• 5:23:53
  plentifully fed, though simply from their little household farm, nor wanted timely
• 5:23:59
  treat of fish or fowl. By nature yielded to his practiced hand to help.
• 5:24:03
  The small but certain comings in of that spare benefice. Yet not the
• 5:24:08
  less theirs. Was a hospitable board, and there's a charitable door. So
• 5:24:15
  days and years passed on the inside of that rugged house was trimmed and brightened
• 5:24:19
  by the matron's care, and gradually enriched with things of price which might be
• 5:24:25
  lacked for use or ornament. What though no soft and costly sofa there insidiously
• 5:24:30
  stretched out its lazy length, and no vain mirror glittered upon the walls,
• 5:24:34
  Yet were the windows of the low abode by shutters weather fended, which at
• 5:24:38
  once repelled the storm and deadened its loud roar. There snow white curtains hung
• 5:24:45
  in decent folds. Tough moss and long enduring mountain plants that creep along the
• 5:24:51
  ground with sinuous trail were nicely braided and composed, a work like Indian mats
• 5:24:56
  that with appropriate grace lay at the threshold the inner doors, and a fair
• 5:25:02
  carpet woven of home spun wool, but tinctured daintily with florid hues for seamliness
• 5:25:07
  and warmth on festal days, covered the smooth blue slabs of mountain stone with
• 5:25:12
  which the parlor floor, in simplest guise of pastoral homesteads, had been long
• 5:25:18
  inlaid those pleasing works the housewife's skill produced. Meanwhile, the unsedentary master's hand
• 5:25:26
  was busier with his task to rid, to plant, to rear for food
• 5:25:32
  for shelter and delight a thriving covert. And when wishes formed in youth and
• 5:25:37
  sanctioned by the riper mind, restored me to my native valley here to end
• 5:25:41
  my days well pleased was I to see the once bare cottage on the mountain
• 5:25:45
  side, screened from assault of every bitter blast, while the dark shadows of
• 5:25:51
  the summer leaves danced in the breeze, checkering its mossy roof. Time,
• 5:25:56
  which had thus afforded willing help to beautify with nature's fairest growths, This rustic
• 5:26:00
  tenement had gently shed upon its master's frame a wintry grace. The comeliness of
• 5:26:07
  unenfeebled age. But how could I say gently? For he still retained a
• 5:26:14
  flashing eye, a burning palm, a stirring foot, a head which beat
• 5:26:18
  at nights upon its pillow, with a thousand schemes. Few likings had he
• 5:26:22
  dropped, few pleasures, lost, generous and charitable prompt to serve. And
• 5:26:27
  still his harsher passions kept their hold anger and indignation. Still he loved the
• 5:26:33
  sound of titled names, and talked in glee of long past banquetings with high
• 5:26:38
  born friends. Then from those lulling fits of vain delight, uproused by recollected
• 5:26:45
  injury, railed at their false ways, disdainfully and oft in bitterness, and
• 5:26:49
  with a threatening eye of fire incensed beneath its hoary brow, those transports,
• 5:26:56
  with staid looks of pure good will, and with soft smile, his consort
• 5:27:02
  would reprove she far behind him in the race of years, Yet keeping her
• 5:27:07
  first mildness, was advanced, far nearer in the habit of her soul,
• 5:27:11
  to that still region whither all are bound him. Might we liken to the
• 5:27:15
  setting sun, as seen not seldom on some gusty day, struggling and bold
• 5:27:21
  and shining from the west with an inconstant and unmellowed light. She was a
• 5:27:25
  soft attendant cloud that hung, as if with wish to veil the restless orb
• 5:27:30
  from which it did itself imvibe a ray of pleasing luster. But no more
• 5:27:34
  of this. I bet her love to sprinkle on the sod that now divides
• 5:27:38
  the pair, or rather say that still unites them, praises like Heaven's dew
• 5:27:44
  without reserve, descending upon both our very first in eminence of years, this
• 5:27:52
  old man stood the patriarch of the veil, and to his unmolested mansion,
• 5:27:56
  death had never come through space of forty years, sparing both old and young
• 5:28:02
  in that abode. Suddenly, then they disappeared. Not twice had summer scorched
• 5:28:07
  the fields. Not twice had fallen on those high peaks, the first autumnal
• 5:28:11
  snow before the greedy visiting was closed, and the long privileged house left empty,
• 5:28:17
  swept as by a plague. Yet no rapacious plague had been among them.
• 5:28:22
  All was gentle death, one after one, with intervals of peace,
• 5:28:26
  a happy consummation, an accord sweet perfect to be wished for, save that
• 5:28:33
  here was something which to mortal sense might sound like harshness that the old gray
• 5:28:37
  headed sire, the oldest he was taken, last survived when the meek partner
• 5:28:41
  of his age, his son, his daughter, and that late and high
• 5:28:47
  prized gift, his little smiling grandchild were no more, all gone, all
• 5:28:52
  vanished, he deprived and bare. How will he face the remnant of his
• 5:28:56
  life? What will become of him? We said and mused in sad conjectures.
• 5:29:00
  Shall we meet him now haunting with rod and line the craggy brooks,
• 5:29:04
  Or shall we overhear him as we pass, striving to entertain the lonely hours
• 5:29:08
  with music? For he had not ceased to touch the harp or vial,
• 5:29:12
  which himself had framed for their sweet purposes with perfect skill. What titles will
• 5:29:18
  he keep? Will he remain? Musician, gardener, builder, mechanist,
• 5:29:23
  a planter and a rearer from the seed, a man of hope and forward
• 5:29:29
  looking mind even to the last, Such was he unsubdued. But Heaven was
• 5:29:34
  gracious yet a little while, and this survivor, with his cheerful throng of
• 5:29:38
  open projects and his inward horde of unsunned griefs, too many and too keen,
• 5:29:45
  was overcome by unexpected sleep. In one blest moment, like a shadow
• 5:29:49
  thrown softly and lightly from a passing cloud, death fell upon him. While
• 5:29:55
  reclined he lay for Noontide salas on the summer grass, the warm laugh of
• 5:29:59
  his mother Earth. And so their lenient term of separation passed. That family,
• 5:30:04
  whose graves you there behold by yet a higher privilege once more were gathered
• 5:30:10
  to each other. Calm of mind and silence waited on these closing words until
• 5:30:15
  the wanderer, whether moved by fear lest in those passages of life, were
• 5:30:19
  some that might have touched the sick heart of his friend too nearly, or
• 5:30:23
  intent to reinforce his own firm spirit and degree depressed by tender sorrow for our
• 5:30:29
  mortal state. Thus silence broke. Behold a thoughtless man from vice and premature
• 5:30:36
  decay, preserved by useful habits to a fitter soil transplanted air too late.
• 5:30:41
  The hermit, lodged amid the untrodden desert, tells his beads, with each
• 5:30:47
  repeating its allotted prayer, and thus divides and thus relieves the time smooth task.
• 5:30:53
  With his compared whose mind could string not scantily bright minutes on the threat
• 5:31:00
  of keen, domestic anguish and beguile, a solitude unchosen, unprofessed, till
• 5:31:06
  gentlest death released him far from us. Be the desire too curiously to ask
• 5:31:12
  how much of this is but the blind result of cordial spirits and vital temperament,
• 5:31:18
  and what to higher powers is justly due. But you, sir,
• 5:31:22
  know that in a neighboring veil, a priest abides before whose life such doubts
• 5:31:27
  fall to the ground, whose gifts of nature lie retired from notice, lost
• 5:31:32
  in attributes of reason, honorably effaced by debts which her poor treasure houses content
• 5:31:37
  to owe, and conquest over her dominion gained to which her forwardness must needs
• 5:31:44
  submit. In this one man is shown a temperance proof against all trials,
• 5:31:48
  industry, severe and constant, as the motion of the day, stern self
• 5:31:53
  denial round him, spread with shade that might be deemed forbidding. Did not
• 5:31:59
  there all all generous feelings flourish and rejoice forbearance, charity in deed and thought,
• 5:32:04
  and resolution, competent to take out of the bosom of simplicity all that
• 5:32:10
  her holy customs recommend, and the best ages of the world would prescribe,
• 5:32:15
  preaching, administering in every work of his sublime vocation, in the walks of
• 5:32:21
  worldly intercourse between man and man, and in his humble dwelling, he appears
• 5:32:26
  a laborer with moral virtue, girt with spiritual graces, like a glory crowned.
• 5:32:33
  Doubt can be none. The pastor said for whom this portraiture is sketched,
• 5:32:37
  the great, the good, the well beloved, the fortunate, the
• 5:32:41
  wise, these titles emperors and chiefs have borne honor, assumed or given,
• 5:32:47
  And him the wonderful, our simple shepherds, speaking from the heart deservedly have
• 5:32:52
  styled from his abode in a dependent chapelry that lies behind Yon Hill, a
• 5:32:57
  poor and rugged wail, which in his soul he lovingly embraced, and having
• 5:33:03
  once espoused, would never quit. Into its graveyard, will ere long be
• 5:33:07
  borne that lowly, great good man. A simple stone may cover him,
• 5:33:12
  and by its help, perchance a century shall hear his name pronounced with images
• 5:33:18
  attendant on the sound. Then shall the slowly gathering twilight close in utter night,
• 5:33:23
  and of his course remain no cognizible vestiges, no more than of this
• 5:33:29
  breath which shapes itself in words to speak of him, and instantly dissolves the
• 5:33:36
  pastor, pressed by thoughts which round his theme, still lingered after a brief
• 5:33:41
  pause, resumed noise. Is there not enough in doleful war, but that
• 5:33:45
  the heaven born poet must stand forth and lend the echoes of his sacred shell
• 5:33:51
  to multiply and aggravate the din pangs. Are there not enough in hopeless love
• 5:33:56
  and in requited passion, all much of turbulence, anxiety, and fear,
• 5:34:03
  But that the minstrel of the rural shade must tune his pipe insidiously to nurse
• 5:34:07
  the perturbation in the suffering breast and propagate its kind far as he may.
• 5:34:14
  Ah who and with such rapture as befits the hallowed theme, will rise and
• 5:34:18
  celebrate the good man's purposes and deeds, retrace his struggles, his discomfitures,
• 5:34:25
  deplore his triumphs, hail and glorify his end. That virtue, like the
• 5:34:30
  fumes and vapoury clouds through fancies, heat rebounding in the brain, and like
• 5:34:34
  the soft infections of the heart, by charm of measured words, may spread
• 5:34:40
  o'er the field, hamlet, and town, and piety survive upon the lips
• 5:34:44
  of men in hall or bower, not for reproof, but high and warm
• 5:34:48
  delight and grave encouragement by song inspired vain thought. But wherefore murmur or repine.
• 5:34:56
  The memory of the just survives in heaven, and without sorrow will the
• 5:35:00
  ground receive that venerable clay. Meanwhile, the best of what lies here confines
• 5:35:07
  us to degrees in excellence, less difficult to reach and milder worth. Nor
• 5:35:11
  need we travel far from those to whom our last regards were paid. For
• 5:35:17
  such example, almost at the root of that tall pine, the shadow of
• 5:35:21
  whose bare and slender stem, while here I sit at eve oft, stretches
• 5:35:25
  towards me like a long straight path traced faintly in the greensward. There beneath
• 5:35:30
  the plain blue stone, a gentle dalesman lies from whom, in early childhood
• 5:35:36
  was withdrawn the precious gift of hearing. He grew up from year to year
• 5:35:40
  in loneliness of soul, and this deep mountain valley was to him soundless,
• 5:35:45
  with all its streams. The bird of dawn did never rouse this cottager from
• 5:35:49
  sleep with startling summons, not for his delight with the vernal cuckoos shouted,
• 5:35:55
  not for him, murmured the laboring bee. When stormy winds were working the
• 5:36:00
  broad bosom of the lake into a thousand thousand sparkling waves, rocking the trees,
• 5:36:04
  or driving cloud on cloud along the sharp edge of yon lofty crags,
• 5:36:10
  The agitated scene before his eye was silent as a picture. Evermore were all
• 5:36:15
  things silent wheresoe'er he moved. Yet, by the solace of his own pure
• 5:36:19
  thoughts upheld, he duteously pursued the round of rural labors. The steep mountain
• 5:36:26
  side ascended with his staff and faithful dog, the plow he guided, and
• 5:36:30
  the scythe he swayed, and the ripe corn before his sickle fell among the
• 5:36:34
  jocund reapers. For himself, all watchful and industrious as he was, he
• 5:36:40
  wrought on neither field nor flock. He owned. No wish for wealth had
• 5:36:45
  place within his mind, nor husband's love, nor father's hope or care.
• 5:36:49
  Though born a younger brother, need was none that from the floor of his
• 5:36:53
  paternal home he should depart to plant himself anew. And when mature in manhood
• 5:36:59
  he beheld his parents laid in earth, no loss ensued of rights to him
• 5:37:03
  but he remained well pleased by the pure bond of independent love, an inmate
• 5:37:08
  of a second family, the fellow laborer and friend of him to whom the
• 5:37:14
  small inheritance had fallen. Nor deemed that his mild presence was a weight that
• 5:37:18
  pressed upon his brother's house. For books were ready comrades whom he could not
• 5:37:23
  tire of, whose society the blameless man was never satiate. Their familiar voice,
• 5:37:30
  even to old age, with unabated charm, beguiled. His leisure hours,
• 5:37:33
  refreshed his thoughts beyond its natural elevation, raised his introverted spirit, and
• 5:37:40
  bestowed upon his life an outward dignity which all acknowledged. The dark winter night,
• 5:37:47
  the stormy day. Each had its own resource, song of the muses,
• 5:37:51
  sage, historic tale, science, severe, or word of holy writ,
• 5:37:55
  announcing immortality and joy to the assembled spirits of just men, made perfect
• 5:38:00
  and from injuries secure, thus soothed at home, thus busy in the field,
• 5:38:07
  to no perverse suspicion. He gave way no languor peevishness, nor vain
• 5:38:11
  complaint. And they who were about him did not fail in reverence or in
• 5:38:17
  courtesy. They prized his gentle manners, and his peaceful smiles, the gleams
• 5:38:22
  of his slow bearing countenance were met with answering sympathy and love at length,
• 5:38:27
  when sixty years and five were told a slow disease insensibly consumed the powers of
• 5:38:33
  nature, and a few short steps of friends and kindred bore him from his
• 5:38:37
  home Yon Cottage, shaded by the woody crags, to the profounder stillness of
• 5:38:42
  the grave. Nor was his funeral denied the grace of many tears, virtuous
• 5:38:48
  and thoughtful grief, heart's sorrow rendered sweet by gratitude. And now that monumental
• 5:38:53
  stone preserves his name and unambitiously relates how long, and by what kindly outward
• 5:38:59
  aim, and in what pure contentedness of mind, the sad privation was by
• 5:39:04
  him endured. And Yon tall pine tree, whose composing sound was wasted on
• 5:39:10
  the good man's living ear, hath now its own peculiar sanctity, And at
• 5:39:14
  the touch of every wandering breeze murmurs not idly, or his peaceful grave soul,
• 5:39:21
  cheering light, most bountiful of things, guide of our way, mysterious
• 5:39:26
  comforter, whose sacred influence spread through earth and heaven. We all to thanklessly
• 5:39:30
  participate. Thy gifts were utterly withheld from him whose place of rest is near
• 5:39:36
  yon ivied porch. Yet of the wild brooks, ask if he complained,
• 5:39:41
  Ask of the channeled rivers, if they held a safer, easier, more
• 5:39:45
  determined course. What terror doth it strike into the mind to think of one
• 5:39:49
  blind and alone, advancing straight towards some precipice's airy brink, but timely warned,
• 5:39:56
  he would have stayed his steps, protected, say, enlightened by his
• 5:40:00
  ear, and on the very edge of vacancy, not more endangered than a
• 5:40:04
  man whose eye beholds the gulf beneath. No flower at blooms throughout the lofty
• 5:40:10
  range of these rough hills, nor in the woods that could from him conceal
• 5:40:14
  its birthplace, None whose figure did not live upon his touch the bowels of
• 5:40:19
  the earth, enriched with knowledge his industrious mind, The ocean paid him tribute
• 5:40:23
  from the stores lodged in her bosom, and by science led his genius mounted
• 5:40:30
  to the plains of heaven. Methinks I see him how his eyeballs rolled beneath
• 5:40:34
  his ample brow in darkness, paired but each instinct with spirit, and the
• 5:40:41
  frame of the whole countenance alive with thought, fancy, and understanding, while
• 5:40:45
  the voice discoursed of natural or moral truth with eloquence and such authentic power that
• 5:40:52
  in his presence humbler knowledge stood abashed, and tender pity overawed a noble and
• 5:41:00
  to unreflecting minds a marvelous spectacle. The wanderer said, beings like these present.
• 5:41:06
  But proof abounds upon the earth that faculties which seem extinguished do not therefore
• 5:41:11
  cease to be. And to the mind, among her powers of sense,
• 5:41:15
  this transfer is permitted, not alone that the bereft their recompense may win,
• 5:41:21
  but for remoter purposes of love and charity, nor last, nor least for
• 5:41:25
  this, that to the imagination may be given a type and shadow of an
• 5:41:29
  awful truth. How likewise, under sufferance, divine darkness is vanished from the
• 5:41:33
  realms of death by man's imperishable spirit, quelled unto the men who see not
• 5:41:40
  as we see. Futurity was thought in ancient times to be laid open,
• 5:41:45
  and they prophesied and know we not that from the blind have flowed the highest,
• 5:41:49
  holiest raptures of the lyre and wisdom married to immortal verse. End of
• 5:41:56
  Book seven, Part one, Book seven, Part two, among the humbler
• 5:42:03
  worthies at our feet, lying insensible to human praise, love or regret,
• 5:42:07
  Whose linements would next have been portrayed? I guess not. But it chanced
• 5:42:12
  that near the quiet churchyard where we sate, a team of horses with a
• 5:42:18
  ponderous freight pressing behind adown a rugged slope whose sharp descent confounded their array,
• 5:42:25
  came at that moment, ringing noisily. Here said the pastor, do we
• 5:42:30
  muse and mourn the waste of death? And lo the giant oak stretched on
• 5:42:36
  his bier, that massy timber. Wain nor fail to note the man who
• 5:42:40
  guides the team. He was a peasant of the lowest class. Gray locks
• 5:42:45
  profusely round his temples, hung in clustering curls like ivy, which the bite
• 5:42:51
  of winter cannot thin. The fresh air lodged within his cheek as light within
• 5:42:56
  a cloud. And he returned our greeting with a smile. When he had
• 5:43:00
  passed the solitary spake a man he seems of cheerful yesterdays and confident tomorrows,
• 5:43:08
  with a face not worldly minded, for it bears too much of nature's impress
• 5:43:14
  gayety and health, freedom and hope. But keen withal and shrewd his gestures,
• 5:43:21
  note and hark. His tones of voice are all vivacious as his mien
• 5:43:26
  and looks. The pastor answered, you have read him well. Year after
• 5:43:32
  years added to his store with silent increase, summers, winter's past past Or,
• 5:43:40
  to come, YEA boldly might I say, ten summers and ten winters
• 5:43:45
  of a space that lies beyond life's ordinary bounds. Upon his sprightly vigor cannot
• 5:43:51
  fix the obligation of an anxious mind, a pride in having, or a
• 5:43:56
  fear to lose possessed like outskirts of some large domain by any one more thought
• 5:44:03
  of than by him who holds the land in fee its careless lord. Yet
• 5:44:07
  is the creature rational, endowed with foresight? Here's too every Sabbath day the
• 5:44:14
  Christian promise with attentive ear. Nor will I trust the majesty of Heaven,
• 5:44:18
  reject the incense offered up by him, though of the kind which beasts and
• 5:44:23
  birds present in grove or pasture, cheerfulness of soul from trepidation and repining free.
• 5:44:30
  How many scrupulous worshipers fall down upon their knees and daily homage, pay
• 5:44:36
  less worthy, less religious even than his. This qualified respect, the old
• 5:44:42
  man's due is paid without reluctance, but in truth, said the good Vicar,
• 5:44:48
  with a fond half smile, I feel at times a motion of despite
• 5:44:52
  towards one whose bold contrivances and skill, as you have seen, bear such
• 5:44:57
  conspicuous part in works of havoc, taking from these vales one after one,
• 5:45:03
  their proudest ornaments full oft. His doings leave me to deplore. Tall ash
• 5:45:08
  tree sown by winds, by vapors, nursed in the dry crannies of the
• 5:45:14
  pendant rocks, light birch aloft upon the horizon's edge, a veil of glory
• 5:45:19
  for the ascending moon, and oak whose roots, by noontide dew were damped,
• 5:45:25
  and on whose forehead inaccessible the raven lodged in safety. Many a ship
• 5:45:32
  launched into Morcambe Bay to him. Hath owed her strong knee timbers and the
• 5:45:37
  mast that bears the loftiest of her pendants. He from park or forest fetched
• 5:45:42
  the enormous axle tree that whirls, how slow itself ten thousand spindles, and
• 5:45:49
  the vast engine laboring in the mine, content with meaner prowess must have lacked
• 5:45:55
  the trunk and body of its marvelous strength if his undaunted enterprise had failed.
• 5:46:00
  Among the mountain coves, yon household fur a guardian planted to fence off the
• 5:46:07
  blast, but towering high the roof above, as if its humble destination were
• 5:46:11
  forgot. That sycamore which annually holds within its shade, as in the stately
• 5:46:18
  tent, on all sides open to the fanning breeze, a grave assemblage seated
• 5:46:23
  while they shear the fleece encumbered flock. The joyful elm, around whose trunk
• 5:46:29
  the maidens dance in may, and the lord's oak, would plead their several
• 5:46:33
  rites in vain. If he were master of their fate, his sentence to
• 5:46:37
  the axe would doom them all but green in age and lusty as he is,
• 5:46:44
  and promising to keep his hold on earth less as might seem in rivalship
• 5:46:48
  with men than with the forests more enduring growth, his own appointed hour will
• 5:46:52
  come at last, And like the haughty spoilers of the world, this keen
• 5:46:59
  destroyer, in his turn, must fall now from the living pass we once
• 5:47:04
  again from age, the priest continued, turn your thoughts from age that often
• 5:47:11
  unlamented drops and mark that daisied hillock three spans long. Seven lusty sons sate
• 5:47:18
  daily round the board of gold Ryll's side, And when the hope had ceased
• 5:47:22
  of other progeny, a daughter then was given the crowning bounty of the whole,
• 5:47:27
  and so acknowledged with a tremulous joy felt to the center of that heavenly
• 5:47:32
  calm with which by nature every mother's soul is stricken. In the moment when
• 5:47:36
  her throes are ended and her ears have heard the cry which tells her that
• 5:47:41
  a living child is born, and she lies conscious in a blissful rest,
• 5:47:45
  that the dread storm is weathered by them both. The father him at this
• 5:47:52
  unlooked for gift, a bolder transport seizes from the side of his bright hearth,
• 5:47:57
  and from his open door. Day after day, the gladness is diffused
• 5:48:02
  to all that come, almost to all that pass invited, summoned to partake
• 5:48:08
  the cheers spread on the never empty board, and drink health and good wishes
• 5:48:12
  to his new born girl from cups replenished by his joyous hand. Those seven
• 5:48:19
  fair brothers variously were moved each by the thoughts best suited to his years.
• 5:48:25
  But most of all, and with most thankful mind, the hoary grandsire felt
• 5:48:29
  himself enriched a happiness that ebbed not but remained to fill the total measure of
• 5:48:36
  his soul. From the low tenement his own abode, whither as to a
• 5:48:41
  little private cell he had, withdrawn from bustle, care and noise, to
• 5:48:45
  spend the sabbath of old age in peace. Once every day he duteously repaired
• 5:48:51
  to rock the cradle of the slumbering babe. For in that female infant's name
• 5:48:56
  he heard the silent name of his departed wife. Heart stirred music hourly heard
• 5:49:00
  that name, full blest he was another Margaret green Oft, did he say,
• 5:49:07
  was come to gold Rill's side? Oh pang unthought of as the precious
• 5:49:12
  boon itself had been unlooked for, Oh dire stroke of desolating anguish for them
• 5:49:18
  all. Just as the child could totter on the floor, and by some
• 5:49:23
  friendly finger's help upstayed range round the garden walk, while she perchance was catching
• 5:49:30
  at some novelty of spring ground flower or glossy insect from its cell, drawn
• 5:49:36
  by the sunshine. At that hopeful season, the winds of march, smiting
• 5:49:41
  insidiously raised in the tender passage of the throat, viewless obstruction. Whence,
• 5:49:47
  all unforewarned, the household lost their pride and soul's delight. But time hath
• 5:49:52
  power to soften all regrets, and prayer and thought can bring to worst distress
• 5:49:59
  do resignation. Therefore, though some tears fail not to spring from either parent's
• 5:50:06
  eye, oft as they hear of sorrow like their own, Yet this departed
• 5:50:10
  little one too long. The innocent troubler of their quiet sleeps in what may
• 5:50:14
  now be called a peaceful bed on a bright day, so calm and bright
• 5:50:19
  it seemed to us, with our sad spirits, heavenly fair, these mountains
• 5:50:25
  echoed to an unknown sound. A volley thrice repeated, o'er the course let
• 5:50:30
  down into the hollow of that grave, While shelving sides are red with naked
• 5:50:36
  mold. Ye reigns of April duly wet this earth spare burning sun of midsummer.
• 5:50:42
  These sods that they may knit together, and therewith our thoughts, unite
• 5:50:48
  in kindred quietness. Nor so the valley shall forget her loss. Dear youth,
• 5:50:53
  by young and old alike beloved as to me, as precious as my
• 5:50:59
  own. Green herbs may creep. I wish that they would softly creep over
• 5:51:03
  thy last abode, and we may pass, reminded less imperiously of thee.
• 5:51:10
  The ridge itself may sink into the breast of earth, the great abyss,
• 5:51:14
  and be no more. Yet, shall not thy remembrance leave our hearts,
• 5:51:18
  Thy image disappear the mountain ash no eye can overlook. When mid a grove
• 5:51:26
  of yet unfaded trees, she lifts her head, decked with autumnal berries that
• 5:51:30
  outshine springs, richest blossoms, and ye may have marked by a brook side
• 5:51:37
  or solitary tarn, how she her station doth adorn. The pool glows at
• 5:51:41
  her feet, and all the gloomy rocks are brightened round her in his native
• 5:51:48
  veil, Such and so glorious did this youth appear, a sight that kindled
• 5:51:52
  pleasure in all hearts, by his ingenuous beauty, by the gleam of his
• 5:51:57
  fair eyes, by his capaevicious brow, by all the graces with which Nature's
• 5:52:03
  hand had lavishly arrayed him, as old Bard's tallon their idle songs of wandering
• 5:52:08
  gods pan or Apollo, veiled in human form, yet like the sweet breathed
• 5:52:15
  violet of the shade, discovered in their own despite to sense of mortals.
• 5:52:18
  If such fables without blame may find chance mentioned on this sacred ground. So
• 5:52:25
  through a simple rustic garb's disguise, and through the impediment of rural cares,
• 5:52:30
  in him revealed a scholar's genius shown, and so not wholly hidden from men's
• 5:52:37
  sight. In him, the spirit of a hero walked our unpretending valley.
• 5:52:41
  How the quoit whizzed from the stripling's arm if touched by him, The inglorious
• 5:52:48
  football mounted to the pitch of the lark's flight, or shaped a rainbow curve
• 5:52:53
  aloft in prospect of the shouting field. The indefatigable fox had learned to dread
• 5:53:00
  his perseverance in the chase with admiration. Would he lift his eyes to the
• 5:53:04
  wide ruling eagle, and his head was loth to assault the majesty he loved.
• 5:53:11
  Else, had the strongest fastnesses proved weak to guard the royal brood,
• 5:53:15
  The sailing gleed, the wheeling swallow, and the darting snipe. The sport
• 5:53:22
  of seagull dancing with the waves in cautious Waterfowl from distant climes, fixed at
• 5:53:29
  their seat the center of the mere, were subject to Young Oswald's steady aim
• 5:53:34
  and lived by his forbearance. From the coast of France, a boastful tyrant
• 5:53:41
  hurled his threats our country marked the preparation vast of hostile forces. And she
• 5:53:48
  called with voice that filled her plaines that reached her utmost shores, and in
• 5:53:52
  remotest vales, was heard to arms. Then for the first time here you
• 5:54:00
  might have seen the shepherd's gray to martial scarlet, changed that flashed uncouthly through
• 5:54:06
  the woods and fields. Ten hardy striplings, all in bright attire and graced
• 5:54:11
  with shining weapons, weakly marched from this lone valley to a central spot,
• 5:54:17
  where, in assemblage with the flower and choice of the surrounding district, they
• 5:54:22
  might learn the rudiments of war. Ten hardy, strong and valiant. But
• 5:54:27
  Young Oswald, like a chief and yet a modest comrade, led them forth
• 5:54:33
  from their shy solitude to face the world with a gay confidence and seemly pride,
• 5:54:40
  measuring the soil beneath their happy feet, like youths released from labor,
• 5:54:44
  and yet bound to most laborious service, though to them a festival of unencumbered
• 5:54:51
  ease, the inner spirit, keeping holiday like vernal ground to sabbath sunshine oft,
• 5:54:57
  have I marked him at some let leisure hour, stretched on the grass,
• 5:55:02
  or seated in the shade among his fellows, while an ample map before
• 5:55:06
  their eyes lay carefully outspread from the gallant teacher would discourse, now, pointing
• 5:55:11
  this way, and now that here flows. Thus would he say, the
• 5:55:17
  Rhine, that famous stream eastward the Danube, toward this inland sea. A
• 5:55:22
  mightier river winds from realm to realm, and like a serpent shows his glittering
• 5:55:27
  back be spotted with innumerable aisles. Here reigns the Russian. There the Turk
• 5:55:34
  observe his capital city. Thence along a tract of livelier interest to his hopes
• 5:55:41
  and fears. His finger moved distinguishing the spots where widespread conflict then most fiercely
• 5:55:48
  raged, nor left unstigmatized, those fatal fields on which the suns of Mighty
• 5:55:52
  Germany were taught a base submission. Here behold a nobler race, the Switzers,
• 5:56:00
  and their land vales deeper far than these of ours, Huge woods and
• 5:56:04
  mountains, white with everlasting snow. And surely he that spake with kindling brow
• 5:56:11
  was a true patriot, hopeful as the best of that young peasantry who in
• 5:56:17
  our days have fought and perished for Halvestia's rites. Ah not in vain,
• 5:56:23
  or those who, in old time, for work of happier issue to the
• 5:56:27
  side of Tell came trooping from a thousand huts when he had risen alone.
• 5:56:33
  No braver youth descended from Judean heights to march with righteous Joshua, nor appeared
• 5:56:38
  in arms when grove was felled and Altar was cast down, and Gideon blew
• 5:56:44
  the trumpet. Soul inflamed and strong in hatred of idolatry, the pastor,
• 5:56:51
  even as if by these last words, raised from his seat within the chosen
• 5:56:55
  shade, moved toward the grave. Instinctively his steps were followed, and my
• 5:57:00
  voice, with joy exclaimed. Power to the oppressors of the world is given
• 5:57:06
  a might of which they dream not owe. The cursed to be the awakener
• 5:57:10
  of divinest thoughts, father and founder of exalted deeds, and to whole nations
• 5:57:15
  bound in servile straits. The liberal donor of capacities more than heroic this to
• 5:57:22
  be, nor yet have sense of one conatural wish, nor yet deserve the
• 5:57:27
  least return of human thanks, winning no recompense, but deadly hate with pity,
• 5:57:33
  mixed astonishment with scorn. When this involuntary strain had ceased, the pastor
• 5:57:41
  said, so providence is served. The forked weapon of the skies can send
• 5:57:45
  illumination into deep dark holds which the mild sunbeam hath not power to pierce.
• 5:57:52
  Ye thrones that have defied remorse and cast pity away, Soon shall ye quake
• 5:57:57
  with fear or not, unconscious of the mighty debt which to outrageous wrong the
• 5:58:03
  sufferer owes Europe through all her habitable bounds, is thirsting for their overthrow.
• 5:58:11
  Who yet survive, as pagan temples stood of yore by horror of their impious
• 5:58:17
  rights preserved, are still permitted to extend their pride like cedars on the top
• 5:58:22
  of Lebanon, darkening the sun, but less impatient thoughts and love, all
• 5:58:29
  hoping and expecting all this hallowed grave demands. Where rests in peace, A
• 5:58:34
  humble champion of the better cause, a peasant youth, So call him,
• 5:58:40
  for he asked no higher name in whom our country showed as in a favorite
• 5:58:45
  sun, most beautiful in spite of vice and misery and disease spread with the
• 5:58:52
  spreading of her wealthy arts. England, the ancient and the free appeared in
• 5:58:56
  him to stand before my swimming eye, unconquerably, virtuous and secure. No
• 5:59:03
  more of this, lest I offend his dust. Short was his life,
• 5:59:07
  and a brief tale remains. One day, a summer's day of annual pomp
• 5:59:15
  and solemn chase, from morn to sultry noon, his steps had followed fleetest
• 5:59:19
  of the fleet, the red deer, driven along its native heights with cry
• 5:59:23
  of hound and horn, and from that toil returned with sinews Weakened and relaxed,
• 5:59:30
  this generous youth, too negligent of self, plunged mid a gay and
• 5:59:34
  busy throng convened to wash the fleeces of his father's flock into the chilling flood.
• 5:59:41
  Convulsion's dire seized him that self same night, and through the space of
• 5:59:47
  twelve ensuing days, his frame was wrenched till nature wrested from her work in
• 5:59:52
  death to him. Thus snatched away, his comrades paid a soldier's honors at
• 5:59:57
  his funeral hour bright was the sun, the sky a cloudless blue, A
• 6:00:03
  golden luster slept upon the hills. And if by chance a stranger wandering there
• 6:00:10
  from some commanding eminence had looked down on this spot well pleased, would he
• 6:00:14
  have seen a glittering spectacle. But every face was pallid. Seldom hath that
• 6:00:19
  eye been moist with tears that wept not then, Nor were the few who
• 6:00:25
  from their dwellings came not forth to join in this sad service less disturbed than
• 6:00:30
  we. They started at the tributary peal of instantaneous thunder, which announced through
• 6:00:37
  the still air the closing of the grave, and distant mountains echoed with a
• 6:00:41
  sound of lamentation never heard before the pastor ceased. My venerable friend victoriously upraised
• 6:00:52
  his clear, bright eye, and when that eulogy was ended, stood and
• 6:00:56
  rapped, as if his inward sense perceived the prolo jungition of some still response
• 6:01:02
  sent by the ancient soul of this wide land, the spirit of its mountains
• 6:01:07
  and its seas, its cities, temples, fields, its awful power,
• 6:01:11
  its rights and virtues, by that deity descending and supporting his pure heart with
• 6:01:17
  patriotic confidence and joy, and that the last of those memorial words, the
• 6:01:22
  pining solitary turned aside, whether through manly instinct to conceal tender emotions spreading from
• 6:01:30
  the heart to his worn cheek, or with uneasy shame for those cold humors
• 6:01:34
  of habitual spleen, that fondly seeking in dispraise of man, solace and self
• 6:01:40
  excuse, had sometimes urged to self abuse a not ineloquent tongue right toward the
• 6:01:47
  sacred edifice, his steps had been directed, and we saw him now intent
• 6:01:52
  upon a monumental stone whose uncouth form was grafted on the wall, or rather
• 6:01:56
  seemed to have grown into the side of the roof pile. As oft times,
• 6:02:02
  trunks of trees, where nature works in wild and craggy spots, are
• 6:02:06
  seen in corporate with the living rock to endure for eye. The vicar,
• 6:02:11
  taking note of his employment with a courteous smile, exclaimed the sageist antiquarian's eye
• 6:02:19
  that task would foil, then letting fall his voice while he advanced, thus
• 6:02:26
  spake. Tradition tells that in Eliza's golden days, a night came on a
• 6:02:32
  war horse, sumptuously attired, and fixed his home on this sequestered vale tis
• 6:02:37
  left untold. If here he first drew breath, or as a stranger,
• 6:02:41
  reached this deep recess, unknowing and unknown, a pleasing thought I sometimes entertain
• 6:02:48
  that haply bound to Scotland's court in service of his queen, or sent on
• 6:02:52
  mission to some northern chief of England's realm, This veil he might have seen
• 6:02:57
  with transient obsur and thence caught an image fare which, brightening in his soul,
• 6:03:04
  when joy of war and pride of chivalry languished beneath accumulated years, had
• 6:03:11
  power to draw him from the world, resolved to make that paradise his chosen
• 6:03:15
  home, to which his peaceful fancy oft had turned. Vague thoughts are these,
• 6:03:22
  but if belief may rest upon unwritten story fondly traced from sire to son
• 6:03:27
  in this obscure retreat, the night arrived with spear and shield, and borne
• 6:03:32
  upon a charger gorgeously bedecked with broidered housings, and the lofty steed his sole
• 6:03:38
  companion and his faithful friend, whom he, in gratitude let loose to range
• 6:03:44
  in fertile pastures, was beheld with eyes of admiration and delightful awe by those
• 6:03:49
  untraveled dalesmen with less pride, yet free from touch of envious discontent, They
• 6:03:56
  saw a mansion at his bidding rise like a bright star amid the lowly band
• 6:04:02
  of their rude homesteads. Here the warrior dwelt, and in that mansion children
• 6:04:08
  of his own or kindred gathered round him. As a tree that falls and
• 6:04:12
  disappears, the house is gone, and through improvidence or want of love for
• 6:04:18
  ancient, worth and honorable things, the spear and shield are vanished, which
• 6:04:22
  the knight hung in his rustic hall. One ivied arch myself have seen a
• 6:04:27
  gateway last remains of that foundation in domestic care, raised by his hands.
• 6:04:33
  And now no trace is left of the mild hearted champion, save this stone,
• 6:04:37
  faithless memorial, and his family name borne by yon clustering cottages that sprang
• 6:04:44
  from out the ruins of his stately lodge. These and the name and title
• 6:04:48
  at full length, Sir Alfred Rthing, with appropriate words accompanied still extant in
• 6:04:56
  a wreath or poesy girding round the several fronts of three clear sounding and harmonious
• 6:05:03
  bells that in the steeple hang. His pious gift so fails so languishes,
• 6:05:11
  grows dim, and dies. The gray haired wanderer pensively exclaimed all that this
• 6:05:17
  world is proud of. From their spheres. The stars of human glory are
• 6:05:21
  cast down, perish, the roses and the flowers of kings, princes and
• 6:05:26
  emperors, and the crowns and palms of all the mighty withered and consumed.
• 6:05:32
  Nor is power given to lowliest innocence, long to protect her own. The
• 6:05:37
  man himself departs and soon is spent. The line of those who, in
• 6:05:41
  the bodily image, in the mind, in heart, or soul, in
• 6:05:45
  station or pursuit, did most resemble him. Degrees and ranks, fraternities and
• 6:05:52
  orders, heaping high new wealth upon the burthen of the old, and placing
• 6:05:56
  trust in privilege. Confirmed and reconfirmed, are scoffed at with a smile of
• 6:06:02
  greedy foretaste. From the secret's stand of desolation. Aimed to slow decline,
• 6:06:07
  these yield, and these to sudden overthrow their virtue, service, happiness,
• 6:06:12
  and state expire, and nature's pleasant robe of green humanities appointed shroud and raps
• 6:06:19
  their monuments and their memory. The vast frame of social nature changes evermore.
• 6:06:25
  Her organs and her members would decay, restless and restless generation, powers and
• 6:06:32
  functions dying and produced at need. And by this law the mighty whole subsists
• 6:06:38
  with an assent and progress in the main. Yet, oh, how disproportioned
• 6:06:45
  to the hopes and expectations of self flattering minds. The courteous Knight, whose
• 6:06:52
  bones are here interred, lived in an age conspicuous as our own, for
• 6:06:56
  strife and ferment in the minds of men, whence alteration in the forms of
• 6:07:02
  things various and vast, a memorable age which did to him a sign a
• 6:07:07
  pensive lot to linger Mid, the last of those bright clouds that on the
• 6:07:12
  steady breeze of honor sailed in long procession, calm and beautiful. He who
• 6:07:18
  had seen his own bright order fade and its devotion gradually decline, while war
• 6:07:23
  relinquishing the lance and shield, her temper changed and bowed to other laws,
• 6:07:30
  had also witnessed in his mourn of life, that violent commotion which o'er through
• 6:07:37
  in town and city, and sequestered glen altar and cross, and church of
• 6:07:41
  solemn roof and old religious house, pile after pile, and shook their tenants
• 6:07:48
  out into the fields like wild beasts without home their hour was come. But
• 6:07:55
  why no softening thought of gratitude, no just remembrance scruple, or why doubt
• 6:08:00
  benevolence is mild, nor borrow's help save at worst need from bold, impetuous
• 6:08:06
  force, fitliest allied to anger and revenge. But human kind rejoices in the
• 6:08:12
  might of mutability and airy hopes dancing around her hinder and disturb. Those meditations
• 6:08:19
  of the soul that feed the retrospective virtues, festive songs break from the maddened
• 6:08:26
  nations at the sight of sudden overthrow, and cold neglect is the sure consequence
• 6:08:32
  of slow decay. Even said the Wanderer, as that courteous knight, bound
• 6:08:40
  by his vow to labor for redress of all who suffer wrong, and to
• 6:08:44
  enact by sword and lance the law of gentleness. If I may venture of
• 6:08:48
  myself to speak, trusting that not incongruously I blend low things with lofty,
• 6:08:55
  I too shall be doomed to outlive the kindly use and fair esteem of the
• 6:08:59
  poor calling, which my youth embraced with no unworthy prospect. But enough thoughts
• 6:09:06
  crowd upon me and tware seemlier now to stop and yield, our gracious teacher,
• 6:09:11
  Thanks for the pathetic records which his voice hath here delivered. Words of
• 6:09:17
  heartfelt truth, tending to patience when affliction strikes, to hope and love,
• 6:09:22
  to confident repose in God, and reverence for the dust of man. End
• 6:09:27
  of Book seventh, Part two, Book eighth of The Excursion by William Wordsworth.
• 6:09:33
  The Parsonage, the pensive skeptic of the lonely veil to those acknowledgments,
• 6:09:40
  subscribed his own with a sedate compliance which the priest failed not to notice.
• 6:09:45
  Inly pleased and said, if ye by whom invited I began these narratives of
• 6:09:52
  calm and humble life be satisfied, tis well the end is gained. And
• 6:09:59
  in return for sel empathy bestowed and patient listening, thanks except from me,
• 6:10:04
  life, death, eternity. Momentous themes are they and might demand a seraph's
• 6:10:11
  tongue were they not equal to their own support, and therefore no incompetence of
• 6:10:18
  mine could do them wrong. The universal forms of human nature in a spot
• 6:10:23
  like this, present themselves at once to all men's view. He wished for
• 6:10:29
  act and circumstance that make the individual known and understood and such as my best
• 6:10:36
  judgment could select from what the place afforded have been given. Though apprehensions crossed
• 6:10:41
  me that my zeal to his might be well likened. Who unlocks a cabinet
• 6:10:47
  stored with gems and pictures, draws his treasures forth, soliciting regard to this,
• 6:10:52
  and this as worthier than the last, till the spectator, who a
• 6:10:56
  while was pleased more than the exhibitor himself, becomes weary and faint, and
• 6:11:03
  longs to be released. But let us. Hence my dwelling is in sight.
• 6:11:08
  And there at this the solitary shrunk with backward will. But wanting not
• 6:11:15
  address that inward motion to disguise, he said to his compatriot, smiling as
• 6:11:19
  he spake, the peaceable remains of this good knight would be disturbed, I
• 6:11:25
  fear with wrathful scorn, if consciousness could reach him where he lies. That
• 6:11:30
  one, albeit of these degenerate times, deploring changes past or dreading change foreseen,
• 6:11:37
  had dared to couple even in thought, the fine vocation of the sword
• 6:11:41
  and lance with the gross aims and body bending toil of a poor brotherhood who
• 6:11:45
  walked the earth pitied, and where they are not known, despised. Yet
• 6:11:52
  by the good Knight's leave, the two estates are graced with some resemblance.
• 6:11:57
  Errant those exiled and wanderers, and the like are these who, with their
• 6:12:03
  burthen traverse, hill and dale, carrying relief for Nature's simple wants. What
• 6:12:08
  though no higher recompense be sought than honest maintenance by irksome toil, full oft
• 6:12:14
  procured, yet may they claim respect among the intelligent for what this course enables
• 6:12:19
  them to be and to perform. Their tardy steps give leisure to observe,
• 6:12:25
  while solitude permits the mind to feel, instructs and prompts her to supply defects
• 6:12:32
  by the division of her inward self. For grateful converse and to these poor
• 6:12:37
  men nature, I but repeat your favorite boast is bountiful. Go wheresoe'er they
• 6:12:44
  may kind. Nature's various wealth is all their own. Versed in the characters
• 6:12:49
  of men, and bound by ties of daily interest to maintain conciliatory manners and
• 6:12:56
  smooth speech, Such have been, and still are in their degree examples efficacious
• 6:13:02
  to refine, rude intercourse, apt agents to expel by importation of unlooked for
• 6:13:07
  arts, Barbarian torpor and blind prejudice, raising through just gradation savage life to
• 6:13:15
  rustic and the rustic to her bane. Within their moving magazines is lodged power
• 6:13:22
  that comes forth to quicken and exalt affections seated in the mother's breast and in
• 6:13:26
  the lover's fancy, and to feed the sober sympathies of long tried friends.
• 6:13:33
  By these itinerants, as experienced men, counsel is given contention. They appease
• 6:13:40
  with gentle language in remotest wilds, tears wipe away, and pleasant tidings bring.
• 6:13:47
  Could the proud quest of chivalry do more? Happy? Rejoined the wanderer
• 6:13:52
  they who gain a panegyric from your generous tongue. But if to these wayfarers
• 6:13:59
  once pertained aught of romantic interest, it is gone their purer service in this
• 6:14:04
  realm, at least is past Forever an inventive age has wrought, if not
• 6:14:10
  with speed of magic, yet to most strange issues. I have lived to
• 6:14:15
  mark a new and unforeseen creation rise from out the labors of a peaceful land,
• 6:14:21
  wielding her potent enginery to frame and to produce with appetite as keen as
• 6:14:26
  that of war, which rests not night or day industrious to destroy with fruitless
• 6:14:33
  pains. Might one like me now visit many a tract which in his youth
• 6:14:37
  he trod and trod again, a lone pedestrian with a scanty freight wished for
• 6:14:44
  or welcome wheresoe'er he came among the tenantry of thorpe and Ville, or straggling
• 6:14:51
  burgh of ancient charter, proud and dignified by battlements and towers of some stern
• 6:14:56
  castle, moldering on the brow of a green hill or bank of rugged stream,
• 6:15:02
  the footpath faintly marked, the horse track, wild and formidable length of
• 6:15:07
  plashy lane, prized avenues ere others had been shaped, or easier links connecting
• 6:15:11
  place with place have vanished, swallowed up by stately roads, easy and bold,
• 6:15:18
  that penetrate the gloom of Britain's farthest glens. The earth has lent.
• 6:15:23
  Her waters are her breezes, and the sale of traffic glides with ceaseless intercourse,
• 6:15:30
  glistening along the low and woody dale, or in its progress on the
• 6:15:34
  lofty side of some bare hill, with wonder kenned from far meanwhile at social
• 6:15:42
  Industri's command, How quick, how vast an increase from the germ of some
• 6:15:48
  poor hamlet rapidly produced. Here a huge town, continuous and compact, hiding
• 6:15:53
  the face of earth for leagues, and there where not a habitation stood before.
• 6:15:59
  Above, loads of men irregularly massed like trees and forests, spread through
• 6:16:04
  spacious tracts, or which the smoke of unremitting fires hangs, permanent and plentiful
• 6:16:11
  as wreaths of vapor, glittering in the morning sun. And wheesore the traveler
• 6:16:17
  turns his steps, he sees the barren wilderness, erased or disappearing triumph that
• 6:16:25
  proclaims how much the mild directress of the plow owes to alliance with these new
• 6:16:30
  born arts. Hence is the wide sea peopled. Hence the shores of Britain
• 6:16:34
  are resorted to by ships freighted from every climate of the world with the world's
• 6:16:40
  choicest produce. Hence that sum of keels that rest within her crowded ports,
• 6:16:45
  or ride at anchor in her sounds and bays, That animating spectacle of sails
• 6:16:51
  that through her inland regions to and fro pass with the respirations of the tide,
• 6:16:56
  perpetual, multitudinous. Finally, hence a dread arm of floating power,
• 6:17:03
  a voice of thunder, daunting those who would approach with hostile purposes. The
• 6:17:07
  blessed isle truths consecrated residence, the seat impregnable of liberty and peace, And
• 6:17:15
  yet o happy pasture of a flock faithfully watched, and by that loving care
• 6:17:21
  and Heaven's good providence preserved from taint with you. I grieve when on the
• 6:17:26
  darker side of this great change I look, and there beholds such outrage done
• 6:17:30
  to nature as compels the indignant power to justify herself yea to avenge her violated
• 6:17:37
  rights for England's bane. When soothing darkness spreads o'er hill and veil. The
• 6:17:42
  wanderer thus expressed his recollections and the punctual stars, while all things else are
• 6:17:48
  gathering to their homes advance, and in the firmament of Heaven glitter but undisturbing,
• 6:17:55
  undisturbed, as if their silent company were charged with peace admonitions for the
• 6:18:00
  heart of all beholding man Earth's thoughtful lord. Then in full many a region
• 6:18:07
  once like this, the assured domain of calm, simplicity, and pensive quiet,
• 6:18:12
  an unnatural light prepared for never resting labour's eyes breaks from a many windowed
• 6:18:18
  fabric huge, and at the appointed hour a bell is heard of harsher import
• 6:18:23
  than the curfew knoll that spake the Norman conqueror's stern behest a local summons to
• 6:18:30
  unceasing toil. Disgorged are now the ministers of day, And as they issue
• 6:18:36
  from the illumined pile, a fresh band meets them at the crowded door and
• 6:18:41
  in the courts, and where the rumbling stream that turns the multitude of dizzy
• 6:18:45
  wheels glares like a troubled spirit in its bed among the rocks below. Men,
• 6:18:52
  maidens, youths, mother and little children, boys and girls enter,
• 6:18:56
  and each the wonted task resumes within this temple, where is offered up to
• 6:19:00
  gain the master idol of the realm, perpetual sacrifice. Even thus of old
• 6:19:07
  our ancestors, within the still domain of vast cathedral or conventual church, their
• 6:19:11
  vigils kept where tapers day and night on the dim altar burned continually in token
• 6:19:18
  that the house was ever more watching to God. Religious men were they,
• 6:19:23
  Nor would there reason tutored to aspire above this transitory world, allow that there
• 6:19:29
  should pass a moment of the year, when in their land the almighties service
• 6:19:33
  ceased triumph. Who will in these profaner rites, which we a generation self
• 6:19:40
  extolled as zealously perform. I cannot share his proud complacency. Yet do I
• 6:19:47
  exult, casting reserve away, exult to see an intellectual mastery exercised o'er the
• 6:19:52
  blind elements, a purpose, given a perseverance, fed almost a soul imparted
• 6:19:59
  to brute matter. I rejoice measuring the force of those gigantic powers that,
• 6:20:04
  by the thinking mind have been compelled to serve the will of feeble bodied man.
• 6:20:11
  For with the sense of admiration blends the animating hope that time may come,
• 6:20:15
  when strengthened, yet not dazzled by the might of this dominion over nature
• 6:20:19
  gained, men of all lands shall exercise the same in due proportion to their
• 6:20:26
  country's need. Learning, though late that all true glory rests all praise,
• 6:20:32
  all safety, and all happiness upon the moral law. Egyptian, thebes tire
• 6:20:37
  by the margin of the sounding waves, Palmyra central in the desert, fell,
• 6:20:42
  and the arts died by which they had been raised. Call Archimedes from
• 6:20:47
  his buried tomb upon the grave of vanished syracuse, and feelingly the sage shall
• 6:20:52
  make report, How insecure, how baseless in itself is the philosophy whose sway
• 6:20:59
  depends on mere material instruments, How weak those arts and high inventions, if
• 6:21:04
  unpropped by virtue, He, sighing with pensive grief amid his calm abstractions,
• 6:21:11
  would admit that not the slender privilege is theirs to save themselves from blank forgetfulness.
• 6:21:18
  When from the wanderer's lips these words had fallen, I said, and
• 6:21:23
  did in truth those vaunted arts possess such privilege? How could we escape sadness
• 6:21:29
  and keen regret? We who revere, and who would preserve as things above
• 6:21:33
  all price, the old domestic morals of the land, her simple manners,
• 6:21:37
  and the stable worth that dignified and cheered a low estate. Oh, where
• 6:21:42
  is now the character of peace, sobriety and order, and chaste love,
• 6:21:47
  and honest dealing and untainted speech, and pure good will and hospitable cheer that
• 6:21:53
  made the very thought of country life a thought of refuge for a mind detained
• 6:21:57
  reluctantly amid the bustling cry. Where now the beauty of the sabbath kept with
• 6:22:03
  conscientious reverence, as a day by the almighty lawgiver, pronounced wholly and blessed,
• 6:22:08
  And where the winning grace of all the lighter ornaments attached to time and
• 6:22:12
  season, as the year rolled round fled, was the wanderer's passionate response fled
• 6:22:22
  utterly, or only to be traced in a few fortunate retreats like this,
• 6:22:26
  which I behold with trembling when I think what lamentable change a year a month
• 6:22:32
  may bring, that brook, converting as it runs, into an instrument of
• 6:22:36
  deadly bane for those who, yet untempted to forsake the simple occupations of their
• 6:22:41
  sires, drink the pure water of its innocent stream with lip almost as pure
• 6:22:48
  domestic bliss, Or call it comfort by a humbler name, how art thou
• 6:22:52
  blighted? For the poor man's heart lo in such neighborhood, from morn to
• 6:22:56
  eve, the habitations empty, or perchance the mother left alone, no helping
• 6:23:03
  hand to rock the cradle of her peevish babe, No daughters round her,
• 6:23:07
  busy at the wheel or in despatch of each day's little growth of household occupation,
• 6:23:14
  No nice arts of needlework, no bustle at the fire, where once
• 6:23:18
  the dinner was prepared with pride. Nothing to speed the day or cheer the
• 6:23:22
  mind, nothing to praise, to teach, or to command. The father,
• 6:23:27
  if perchance he still retain his old employments, goes to field or wood,
• 6:23:32
  no longer led or followed by the suns Idlers perchance they were but in
• 6:23:37
  his sight, breathing fresh air and treading the green earth, till their short
• 6:23:42
  holiday of childhood ceased. Ne'er to return that birthright now is lost. Economists
• 6:23:49
  will tell you that the state thrives by the forfeiture, unfeeling thought and false
• 6:23:55
  as monstrous? Can the mother thrive by the destruction of her innocence? Suns
• 6:24:00
  in whom a premature necessity blocks out the forms of nature, preconsumes, the
• 6:24:04
  reason famishes, the heart, shuts up the infant being in itself, and
• 6:24:10
  makes its very spring a season of decay. The lot is wretched, the
• 6:24:15
  condition sad. Whether a pining discontent survive and thirst for change or habit hath
• 6:24:22
  subdued, the soul depressed, dejected even to love of her close tasks and
• 6:24:26
  long captivity, Oh, banish far such wisdom as condemns a native Britain to
• 6:24:33
  these inward chains fixed in his soul, so early and so deep, without
• 6:24:40
  his own consent or knowledge. Fixed he is a slave to whom release comes
• 6:24:44
  not and cannot come. The boy, where'er he turns, is still a
• 6:24:48
  prisoner. When the wind is up among the clouds and roars through the ancient
• 6:24:52
  woods, or when the sun is shining in the east, quiet and calm,
• 6:24:56
  behold him in the school of his attainments. No, but with the
• 6:25:02
  air fanning his temples under Heaven's blue arch, his raiment whitened ore with cotton
• 6:25:07
  flakes or locks of wool, announces whence he comes, creeping his gait and
• 6:25:12
  cowering, his lip pale, his respiration quick and audible and scarcely. Could
• 6:25:18
  you fancy that a gleam could break from out those languid eyes, or a
• 6:25:22
  blush mantle upon his cheek? Is this the form is that the countenance,
• 6:25:27
  and such the port of no mean being one who should be clothed with dignity,
• 6:25:33
  befitting his proud hope, who in his very childhood should appear sublime from
• 6:25:37
  present purity and joy. The limbs increase, but liberty of mind is gone
• 6:25:44
  forever, And this organic frame so joyful in its motions, is become dull
• 6:25:48
  to the joy of her own motions dead, And even the touch so exquisitely
• 6:25:53
  poured through the whole body where a languid will performs its functions, rarely compet
• 6:26:00
  and to impress a vivid feeling on the mind of what there is delightful in
• 6:26:03
  the breeze, the gentle visitations of the sun, or lapse of liquid element
• 6:26:10
  by hand or foot or lip in summer's warmth perceived, can hope look forward
• 6:26:17
  to a manhood raised on such foundations? Hope is none for him, the
• 6:26:22
  pale recluse indignantly exclaimed, and tens of thousands suffer wrong as deep. Yet
• 6:26:29
  be it asked in justice to our age. If there were not before those
• 6:26:33
  arts appeared, these structures rose, commingling old and young, and unripe,
• 6:26:37
  sex with sex for mutual taint. If there were not then in our far
• 6:26:42
  famed isle multitudes who from infancy had breathed air, unimprisoned, and had lived
• 6:26:48
  at large, yet walked beneath the sun in human shape as abject as degraded
• 6:26:56
  at this day. Who shall enumerate the crazy huts and tottering hovels whence to
• 6:27:00
  issue forth a ragged offspring, with their upright hair crowned like the image of
• 6:27:06
  fantastic fear or wearing, shall we say in that white growth and ill adjusted
• 6:27:11
  turban for defense or fierceness, wreathed around their sun burnt brows by savage nature
• 6:27:19
  shriveled. Are their lips naked and colored like the soil the feet on which
• 6:27:25
  they stand, as if thereby they drew some nourishment, as trees do by
• 6:27:30
  their roots from Earth, the common mother of us. All figure and mean,
• 6:27:36
  complexion and attire are leagued to strike dismay, But outstretched hand and whining
• 6:27:41
  voice denote them supplicants for the least boon that pity can bestow. Such on
• 6:27:47
  the breast of darksome heaths are found, and with their parents occupy the skirts
• 6:27:52
  of furs clad commons. Such are born and reared at the mine's mouth under
• 6:27:56
  impending rocks, or dwell in chains of some natural cave, or where their
• 6:28:02
  ancestors erected huts for the convenience of unlawful gain. In forest, pearlws and
• 6:28:07
  the like are bread all England, through where nooks and slips of ground purloined
• 6:28:14
  in times less jealous than our own. From the green margin of the public
• 6:28:18
  way a residence afford them mid the bloom and gaiety of cultivated fields, such
• 6:28:25
  we will hope the lowest in the scale. Do I remember, oft times
• 6:28:29
  to have seen mid Buxton's dreary heights in earnest watch till the swift vehicle approach.
• 6:28:34
  They stand, then, following closely with the cloud of dust and uncouth
• 6:28:38
  feet exhibit, and are gone heels overhead like tumblers on a stage. Up
• 6:28:45
  from the ground, they snatch the copper coin, and on the freight of
• 6:28:48
  merry passengers, fixing a steady eye, maintain their speed, and spin and
• 6:28:53
  pant, and overhead again, wild persevence until their breath is lost or bound.
• 6:29:00
  He tires, and every face that smiled encouragement hath ceased to look that
• 6:29:04
  way. But like the vagrance of the gipsy tribe, these bread to little
• 6:29:10
  pleasure in themselves, are profitless to others. Turn we then to Britons,
• 6:29:15
  born and bred within the pale of civil polity, and early trained to earn
• 6:29:19
  by wholesome labor in the field. The bread they eat a sample should I
• 6:29:23
  give of what this stock hath long produced to enrich the tender age of life,
• 6:29:29
  ye would exclaim, Is this the whistling plowboy, whose shrill notes impart
• 6:29:33
  now gladness to the morning air. Forgive me if I venture to suspect that
• 6:29:38
  many sweet to hear of in soft verse are of no finer frame. Stiff
• 6:29:44
  are his joints beneath a cumbrous frock that to the knees invests the thriving churl.
• 6:29:49
  His legs appear fellows to those that lustily upheld the wooden stools for everlasting
• 6:29:56
  use. Whereon our father's sate, and mark his brow, under whose shaggy
• 6:30:00
  canopy are set, two eyes, not dim but of a healthy stare wide,
• 6:30:07
  sluggish, blank and ignorant and strange, proclaiming boldly that they never drew
• 6:30:12
  a look or motion of intelligence from infant conning of the christ cross row,
• 6:30:18
  or puzzling through a primmer line by line till perfect mastery crown the panes at
• 6:30:25
  last? What kindly warmth from touch of fostering hand, What penetrating power of
• 6:30:30
  sun or breeze shall air dissolve the crust wherein his soul sleeps like a caterpillar
• 6:30:37
  sheathed in ice. This torpor is no pitiable work of modern ingenuity. No
• 6:30:41
  town nor crowded city can be taxed with aught of Scottish vice or desperate breach
• 6:30:47
  of law, to which and who can tell where or how soon he may
• 6:30:51
  be roused. This boy the fields produce his spade and hoe, mattic and
• 6:30:56
  glittering scythe the carter's whip that on his shoulder rests in air, high towering
• 6:31:02
  with a boorish pomp, the scepter of his sway, his country's name,
• 6:31:07
  her equal rights, her churches, and her schools. What have they done
• 6:31:10
  for him? And let me ask, for tens of thousands, uninformed as
• 6:31:15
  he in brief, what liberty of mind is here? This ardent sally pleased
• 6:31:21
  the mild good man, to whom the appeal couched in its closing words,
• 6:31:26
  was pointedly addressed, and to the thoughts that in assent or opposition rose within
• 6:31:30
  his mind. He seemed prepared to give prompt utterance, But the vicar interposed
• 6:31:37
  with invitation urgently renewed. We followed, taking as he led a path along
• 6:31:42
  a hedge of holly's, dark and tall, whose flexile bows low bending with
• 6:31:48
  the weight of leafy spray, concealed the stems and roots that gave them nourishment.
• 6:31:53
  When frosty wins howl from the north, What kindly warmth methought is here?
• 6:31:57
  How grateful this pervious screen, not shaped by simple wearing of the foot
• 6:32:03
  on rural business passing to and fro was the commodious walk. A careful hand
• 6:32:08
  had marked the line and strewn its surface ore with pure cerulean gravel from the
• 6:32:14
  heights fetched by a neighboring brook across the vale. The stately fence accompanied our
• 6:32:18
  steps, and thus the pathway, by perennial green, guarded and graced,
• 6:32:23
  seemed fashioned to unite as by a beautiful yet solemn chain. The pastor's mansion,
• 6:32:30
  with the house of prayer like image of solemnity conjoined with feminine allurements,
• 6:32:37
  soft and fair. The mansion's self displayed a reverend pile with bold projections and
• 6:32:41
  recesses, deep, shadowy yet gay and lightsome. As it stood fronting the
• 6:32:47
  noontide sun, we paused to admire the pillared porch, elaborately embossed, the
• 6:32:53
  low, wide windows with their millions old the cornice richly fretted of gray stone,
• 6:33:00
  and that smooth slope from which the dwelling rose by beds and banks,
• 6:33:03
  arcadian of gay flowers and flowering shrubs, protected and adorned profusion, bright,
• 6:33:11
  and every flower assuming a more than natural vividness of hue. From unaffected contrast
• 6:33:18
  with the gloom of sober cypress and the darker foil of yewe in which survived
• 6:33:22
  some traces here not unbecoming of grotesque device and uncouth fancy. From behind the
• 6:33:30
  roof rose the slim ash and massy sycamore, blending their diverse foliage with the
• 6:33:37
  green of ivy, flourishing and thick that clasped the huge round chimneys, harbor
• 6:33:42
  of delight for wren and red breast, where they sit and sing their slender
• 6:33:47
  ditties when the trees are bare. Nor must I leave untouched the picture elsewhere
• 6:33:52
  incomplete, a relic of old times, happily spared, a little Gothic niche
• 6:33:57
  of nicest workmanship, that once had held the sculptured image of some patron saint,
• 6:34:03
  or of the blessed Virgin, looking down on all who entered those religious
• 6:34:07
  doors. But lo where from the rocky garden mount, crowned by its antique
• 6:34:14
  summer house, descends light as the silver fawn, a radiant girl, for
• 6:34:18
  she hath recognized her honored friend, the wanderer, ever welcome. A prompt
• 6:34:23
  kiss the gladsome child bestows at his request, and up the flowery lawn as
• 6:34:29
  we advance, hangs on the old man with a happy look, and with
• 6:34:33
  a pretty restless hand of love. We enter by the lady of the place.
• 6:34:38
  Cordially greeted. Graceful was her port, A lofty stature, undepressed by
• 6:34:44
  time, whose visitation had not wholly spared the finer lineaments of form and face
• 6:34:49
  to that complexion brought which prudence trusts in and wisdom loves. But when a
• 6:34:55
  stately ship sails in smooth weather by the placid coast on homeward voyage, what
• 6:35:00
  if wind and wave and hardship undergone in various climes have caused her to abate
• 6:35:06
  the virgin pride and that full trim of inexperienced hope with which she left her
• 6:35:11
  haven. Not for this, should the sun strike her and the impartial breeze
• 6:35:17
  play on her streamers fails, she to assume brightness and touching beauty of her
• 6:35:22
  own. That charm, all eyes, so bright, so fair appeared this
• 6:35:27
  goodly matron, shining in the beams of unexpected pleasure. Soon the board was
• 6:35:33
  spread, and we partook a plane repast. Here resting in cool shelter,
• 6:35:38
  we beguiled the midday hours with desultory talk, from trivial themes to general argument,
• 6:35:45
  passing as accident or fancy led, or courtesy prescribed. While question rose
• 6:35:51
  and answer flowed, the fetters of reserve dropping from every mind. The solitary
• 6:35:56
  resumed the manners of his happier days, and in the various common conversation bore
• 6:36:00
  a willing nay, at times a forward part, yet with the grace of
• 6:36:04
  one who in the world had learned the art of pleasing, and had now
• 6:36:08
  occasion given him to display his skill upon the steadfast vantage ground of truth.
• 6:36:15
  He gazed with admiration, unsuppressed upon the landscape of the sun bright veil seen
• 6:36:21
  from the shady room in which we sate in softened perspective, and more than
• 6:36:26
  once praised the consummate harmony, serene of gravity and elegance diffused around the mansion
• 6:36:33
  and its whole domain, not doubtless without help of female taste and female care.
• 6:36:40
  A blessed lot is yours. The words escaped his lip with a tender
• 6:36:44
  sigh breathed over them. But suddenly the door flew open, and a pair
• 6:36:48
  of lusty boys appeared, confusion checking their delight. Not brothers they in feature
• 6:36:53
  or attire, but fond companions. So I guessed in field and by the
• 6:36:59
  river's margin. Whence they come, keen anglers with unusual spoil elated one bears
• 6:37:04
  a willow pannier on his back, the boy of plainer garb, whose blush
• 6:37:08
  survives more deeply tinged twin. Might the other be to that fair girl who
• 6:37:14
  from the garden mount bounded triumphant entry. This for him. Between his hands
• 6:37:19
  he holds a smooth blue stone, on whose capacious surface sea outspread large store
• 6:37:26
  of gleaming crimson spotted trouts, ranged side by side and lessening by degrees up
• 6:37:32
  to the dwarf that tops the pinnacle. Upon the board, he lays the
• 6:37:36
  sky blue stone, with its rich freight. Their number, he proclaims,
• 6:37:41
  tells from what pool the noblest had been dragged, and where the very monarch
• 6:37:45
  of the brook, after long struggle, had escaped at last, stealing alternately
• 6:37:49
  at them and us, as doth his comrades too, a look of pride,
• 6:37:53
  and verily the silent creatures made a splendid sight together, thus exposed,
• 6:38:00
  dead but not sullied or deformed by death. That seemed to pity what he
• 6:38:04
  could not spare. But oh, the animation in the mean of those two
• 6:38:11
  boys, yea, in the very words with which the young narrator was inspired.
• 6:38:15
  When as our questions led, he told at large of that day's prowess
• 6:38:19
  him, Might I compare his looks tones, gestures, eager eloquence to a
• 6:38:25
  bold brook that splits for better speed, and at the self same moment works
• 6:38:30
  its way through many channels. Ever, and Anon parted and reunited his compare
• 6:38:34
  to the still lake, whose stillness is to site as beautiful as grateful to
• 6:38:40
  the mind. But to what objects shall the lovely girl be likened? She
• 6:38:45
  whose countenance and air unite the graceful qualities of both, even as she shares
• 6:38:51
  the pride and joy of both. My gray haired friend was moved, his
• 6:38:57
  vivid eye glistened with tenderness. His mind I knew was full, and had
• 6:39:02
  I doubted not returned upon this impulse to the theme erewhile abruptly broken off,
• 6:39:08
  the ruddy boys withdrew on summons to their well earned meal, and he to
• 6:39:14
  whom all tongues resigned their rights with willingness, to whom the general ear listened
• 6:39:18
  with readier patience than to strain of music, lute or harp, A long
• 6:39:22
  delight that ceased not when his voice had ceased. As one who from truth's
• 6:39:27
  central points serenely views the compass of his argument began mildly and with a clear
• 6:39:36
  and steady tone. End of Book eighth, Book ninth, Discourse of the
• 6:39:44
  Wanderer, and an evening visit to the lake. To every form of being
• 6:39:49
  is assigned. Thus calmly spake the venerable sage. An active principle, however,
• 6:39:56
  removed from sense and observation. It subsists in all things, in all
• 6:40:00
  natures, in the stars of azure, heaven, the unenduring clouds, in
• 6:40:06
  flower and tree, in every pebbly stone that paves, the brooks, the
• 6:40:10
  stationary rocks, the moving waters, and the invisible air. Whate'er exists,
• 6:40:15
  hath properties that spread beyond itself, communicating good, a simple blessing, or
• 6:40:21
  with evil mixt spirit that knows no insulated spot, no chasm, no solitude.
• 6:40:27
  From link to link, it circulates the soul of all the worlds.
• 6:40:32
  This is the freedom of the universe unfolded. Still, the more more visible,
• 6:40:37
  the more we know, and yet is reverenced, least and least respected
• 6:40:42
  in the human mind, its most apparent home. The food of hope is
• 6:40:48
  meditated action. Robbed of this her soul support, she languishes and dies.
• 6:40:52
  We perish also, for we live by hope and by desire. We see
• 6:40:57
  by the glad light and read the sweet air of futurity, and so we
• 6:41:03
  live, or else we have no life tomorrow, nay, perchance, this
• 6:41:07
  very hour, for every moment hath its own. Tomorrow. Those blooming boys
• 6:41:12
  whose hearts are almost sick with present triumph, will be sure to find a
• 6:41:18
  field before them, freshened with the dew of other expectations, in which course
• 6:41:22
  their happy year spins round. The youth obeys alike glad impulse, and so
• 6:41:30
  moves the man amid all his apprehensions, cares and fears, or so he
• 6:41:33
  ought to move. Ah. Why in age do we revert so fondly to
• 6:41:38
  the walks of childhood, but that there the soul discerns the dear memorial footsteps,
• 6:41:45
  unimpaired of her own native vigor fence, can hear reverberations and a choral
• 6:41:49
  song commingling with the incense that ascends undaunted toward the imperishable heavens from her own
• 6:41:56
  lonely altar. Do not think that good and wise ever will be allowed,
• 6:42:02
  though strength decay, to breathe in such a state as shall divide them wholly
• 6:42:07
  from the stir of hopeful nature. Rightly it is said that man descends into
• 6:42:12
  the veil of years. Yet have I thought that we might also speak,
• 6:42:17
  and not presumptuously. I trust of age as of a final eminence, though
• 6:42:22
  bare in aspect and forbidding, yet a point on which tis not impossible to
• 6:42:26
  sit in awful sovereignty, a place of power, a throne that may be
• 6:42:32
  likened unto his who, in some placid day of summer, looks down from
• 6:42:36
  a mountain top, say one of those high peaks that bound the veil,
• 6:42:40
  where now we are faint and diminished. To the gazing eye, forest and
• 6:42:45
  field, and hill and dale appear, with all the shapes over their surface
• 6:42:49
  spread. But while the gross and visible frame of things relinquishes its hold upon
• 6:42:55
  the sense, yea almost on the mind herself and seems all unso substantialized,
• 6:43:00
  how loud the voice of waters, with invigorated peel from the full river in
• 6:43:04
  the vale below, ascending for on that superior height, who sits is disencumbered
• 6:43:11
  from the press of near obstructions, and is privileged to breathe in solitude above
• 6:43:18
  the host of ever humming insects mid thin air that suits not them. The
• 6:43:23
  murmur of the leaves, many and idle visits not his ear. This he
• 6:43:27
  is freed from, and from thousand notes, not less unceasing, not less
• 6:43:33
  vain than these, by which the finer passages of sense are occupied, and
• 6:43:37
  the soul that would incline to listen is prevented or deterred. And may it
• 6:43:42
  not be hoped that placed by age and like removal, tranquil though severe,
• 6:43:48
  we are not so removed for utter loss, but for some favor suited to
• 6:43:52
  our need. What more than that the severing should confer fresh power to commune
• 6:43:57
  with the invisible world. And here the mighty stream of tendency uttering for elevation
• 6:44:03
  of our thought, a clear, sonorous voice, inaudible to the vast multitude,
• 6:44:10
  whose doom it is to run the giddy round of vain delight or fret,
• 6:44:14
  and labor on the plain below. But if to such sublime ascent the
• 6:44:18
  hopes of man may rise as to a welcome close and termination of his mortal
• 6:44:22
  course, them only can such hope inspire whose minds have not been starved by
• 6:44:27
  absolute neglect, nor bodies crushed by unremitting toil, to whom kind Nature therefore
• 6:44:34
  may afford proof of the sacred love she bears for all whose birthright reason therefore
• 6:44:41
  may insure for me, consulting what I feel within, in times when most
• 6:44:45
  existence with herself is satisfied, I cannot but believe that far as kindly Nature
• 6:44:52
  hath free scope and reasons, sway predominates, even so far country, society,
• 6:44:57
  and time itself that SAPs the individual's bodily frame and lays the generation's low
• 6:45:03
  in dust. Due by the almighty Ruler's grace, partake of one maternal spirit,
• 6:45:10
  bringing forth and cherishing with ever constant love that tires not nor betrays our
• 6:45:18
  life is turned out of her course. Wherever man is made an offering or
• 6:45:22
  a sacrifice, a tool or implement, a passive thing employed as a brute
• 6:45:26
  mean, without acknowledgment of common right or interest in the end used or abused
• 6:45:33
  as selfishness may prompt say what can follow for a rational soul perverted thus but
• 6:45:38
  weakness in all good and strengthen evil. Hence an after call for chastisement and
• 6:45:45
  custody and bonds, and ofttimes death, avenger of the past and the sole
• 6:45:51
  guardian in whose hands we dare and trust the future. Not for these sad
• 6:45:55
  issues was man created but to obey the law of life and hope and action.
• 6:46:00
  And tis known that when we stand upon our native soil, unelbowed by
• 6:46:06
  such objects as oppress our active powers, those powers themselves become strong to subvert
• 6:46:11
  our noxious qualities. They sweep distemper from the busy day, and make the
• 6:46:17
  chalice of the big round year run o'er with gladness. Whence the being moves
• 6:46:21
  in beauty through the world, and all who see bless him, rejoicing in
• 6:46:26
  his neighborhood. Then said the solitary by what force of language shall a feeling
• 6:46:32
  heart express her sorrow for that multitude in whom we look for health from seeds
• 6:46:37
  that have been sown in sickness, and for increase in a power that works,
• 6:46:40
  but by extinction on themselves. They cannot lean nor turn to their own
• 6:46:45
  hearts to know what they must do. Their wisdom is to look into the
• 6:46:48
  eyes of others, thence to be instructed what they must avoid. Or rather,
• 6:46:53
  let us say, how least observed, how with most quiet and most
• 6:46:59
  silent death would the least taint and injury to the air the oppressor breathe,
• 6:47:03
  their human form divine, and their immortal soul may waste away. The sage
• 6:47:08
  rejoined, I thank you you have spared my voice the utterance of a keen
• 6:47:14
  regret, a wide compassion which with you I share when Heretofore, I placed
• 6:47:18
  before your sight a little one subjected to the arts of modern ingenuity, and
• 6:47:23
  made the senseless member of a vast machine, serving as doth a spindle or
• 6:47:29
  a wheel. Think not that pitying him, I could forget the rustic boy
• 6:47:33
  who walks the fields untaught, the slave of ignorance and oft a want and
• 6:47:38
  miserable hunger. Much too much of this unhappy lot in early youth. We
• 6:47:44
  both have witnessed lot which I myself shared, though in mild and merciful degree.
• 6:47:49
  Yet was the mind to hindrances exposed through which I struggled, not without
• 6:47:55
  distress and sometimes injury, like a lamb enthralled mid thorns and bram, or
• 6:48:00
  a bird that breaks through a strong net and mounts upon the wind, though
• 6:48:04
  with their plumes impaired. If they whose souls should open while they range the
• 6:48:10
  richer fields of merry England are obstructed less by indigence. Their ignorance is not
• 6:48:15
  less nor less to be deplored. For who can doubt that tens of thousands
• 6:48:21
  at this day exists, such as the boy you painted lineal heirs of those
• 6:48:25
  who once wore vassals of her soil, following its fortunes, like the beasts
• 6:48:30
  or trees which it sustained. But no one takes delight in this oppression.
• 6:48:33
  None are proud of it. It bears no sounding name, nor ever bore
• 6:48:38
  a standing grievance, an indigenous vice of every country under heaven. My thoughts
• 6:48:45
  were turned to evils that are new and chosen, a bondage lurking under shape
• 6:48:48
  of good arts, in themselves beneficent and kind, but all too fondly followed,
• 6:48:55
  and too far to victims which the merciful can see nor think that they
• 6:48:59
  are victims turned to wrongs by women who have children of their own beheld without
• 6:49:03
  compassion. Yea, with praise. I spake of mischief by the wise diffused
• 6:49:08
  with gladness, thinking that the more it spreads, the healthier the securer we
• 6:49:12
  become, delusion which a moment may destroy. Lastly, I mourn for those
• 6:49:18
  whom I had seen corrupted and cast down on favored ground, where circumstance and
• 6:49:23
  nature had combined to shelter innocence and cherished love, who but for this intrusion,
• 6:49:30
  would have lived, possessed of health and strength and peace of mind,
• 6:49:33
  thus would have lived or never have been born. Alas, what differs more
• 6:49:40
  than man from man? And whence that difference? Whence but from himself?
• 6:49:45
  Foresee the universal race endowed with the same upright form. The sun is fixed,
• 6:49:49
  and the infinite magnificence of Heaven fixed within reach of every human eye.
• 6:49:55
  The sleepless ocean murmurs for all ears. The vernal field uses fresh delight into
• 6:50:00
  all hearts. Throughout the world of sense. Even as an object is sublime
• 6:50:06
  or fair, that object is laid open to the view without reserve or veil,
• 6:50:11
  And as a power is salutary or an influence. Suite are each and
• 6:50:15
  all enabled to perceive that power that influence by impartial law. Gifts nobler are
• 6:50:22
  vouchsafed alike to all reason, and with that reason smiles and tears, imagination,
• 6:50:30
  freedom in the will, conscience to guide and check, and death to
• 6:50:33
  be foretasted, immortality conceived by all, a blissful immortality to them whose holiness
• 6:50:40
  on earth shall make the spirit capable of heaven assured. Strange, then nor
• 6:50:47
  less than monstrous might be deemed the failure. If the Almighty, to this
• 6:50:51
  point, liberal and undistinguishing should hide the excellence of moral qualities from common understanding,
• 6:50:57
  leaving truth and virtue difficult, abstruse, and dark, hard to be
• 6:51:03
  won, and only by a few strange should he deal herein with nice respects
• 6:51:08
  and frustrate all the rest. Believe it not. The primal duties shine aloft
• 6:51:15
  like stars. The charities that soothe and heal and bless are scattered at the
• 6:51:19
  feet of man like flowers, the generous inclination, the just rule, kind
• 6:51:26
  wishes and good actions and pure thoughts. No mystery is here. Here is
• 6:51:30
  no boon for high, yet not for low, for proudly graced, yet
• 6:51:36
  not for meek of heart. The smoke ascends to Heaven as lightly from the
• 6:51:41
  cottage hearth as from the haughtiest palace. He whose soul ponders this true equality
• 6:51:47
  may walk the fields of earth with gratitude and hope. Yet in that meditation
• 6:51:52
  will he find motive to sadder grief, as we have found, lamenting ancient
• 6:51:56
  virtues overthrown, and for the injustice, grieving that hath made so wide a
• 6:52:02
  difference between man and man. Then let us rather fix our gladdened thoughts upon
• 6:52:07
  the brighter scene. How blest that pair of blooming boys, whom we beheld
• 6:52:11
  even now blessed in their several and their common lot, a few short hours
• 6:52:17
  of each returning day, the thriving prisoners of their village school, and thence
• 6:52:22
  let loose to seek their pleasant homes, arrange the grassy lawn and vacancy,
• 6:52:26
  to breathe and to be happy, run and shout, idle, but no
• 6:52:30
  delay, no harm, no loss. For every genial power of heaven and
• 6:52:36
  earth, through all the seasons of the changeful year, obsequiously doth take upon
• 6:52:41
  herself to labor for them, bringing each in turn the tribute of enjoyment,
• 6:52:45
  knowledge, health, beauty, or strength, such privilege as there is granted
• 6:52:49
  alike in the outset of their course to both. And if that partnership must
• 6:52:55
  cease, I grieve not to the pastor here he turned, much as I
• 6:53:00
  glory in that child of yours, repine not for his cottage, comrade,
• 6:53:06
  whom belike no higher destiny awaits than the old hereditary wish fulfilled, the wish
• 6:53:11
  for liberty, to live, content with what Heaven grants, and die in
• 6:53:15
  peace of mind within the bosom of his native veil, at least, whatever
• 6:53:21
  fate the noon of life reserves for either. Sure it is that both have
• 6:53:23
  been permitted to enjoy the dawn, whether regarded as a jocund time that in
• 6:53:30
  itself may terminate or lead in course of nature to a sober eve, both
• 6:53:34
  have been fairly dealt with. Looking back, they will allow that justice has
• 6:53:38
  in them been shown, alike to body and to mind. He paused,
• 6:53:44
  as if revolving in his soul some weighty matter. Then, with fervent voice
• 6:53:48
  and an impassioned majesty exclaimed, Oh, for the coming of that glorious time.
• 6:53:55
  When prizing knowledge as her noblest wealth and best protection, this imperial realm,
• 6:54:00
  while she exacts allegiance, shall admit an obligation on her part to teach
• 6:54:03
  them who are born to serve her, and obey binding herself by statute to
• 6:54:11
  secure for all the children whom her soil maintains the rudiments of letters, and
• 6:54:15
  inform the mind with moral and religious truth, both understood and practiced, so
• 6:54:21
  that none, however destitute, be left to droop by timely culture unsustained,
• 6:54:26
  or run into a wild disorder, or be forced to drudge through a weary
• 6:54:30
  life without the help of intellectual implements and tools, a savage horde among the
• 6:54:36
  civilized, a servile band among the lordly free. This sacred rite, the
• 6:54:41
  listping babe proclaims to be inherent in him by Heaven's will for the protection of
• 6:54:45
  his innocence. And the rude boy, who, having overpassed the sinless age
• 6:54:51
  by conscience, is enrolled yet mutinously knits his angry brow and lifts his wilful
• 6:54:56
  hand on mischief, bent turns the godlike faculty of speech to impious use.
• 6:55:03
  By process indirect declares his due while he makes known his need. This sacred
• 6:55:07
  right is fruitlessly announced. This universal plea in vain addressed to the eyes and
• 6:55:12
  ears of parents, who themselves did in the time of their necessity, urge
• 6:55:18
  it in vain, and therefore, like a prayer that from the humblest floor
• 6:55:22
  ascends to heaven, it mounts to reach the state's parental ear, who,
• 6:55:26
  if indeed she own a mother's heart and be not most unfeelingly devoid of gratitude
• 6:55:32
  to providence, will grant the unquestionable good which England, safe from interference of
• 6:55:38
  external force, may grant at leisure without risk, incurred that what in wisdom
• 6:55:44
  for herself she doth others shall e'er be able to undo. Look and behold
• 6:55:51
  from Chlp's sunburnt cliffs to the flat margin of the Baltic Sea, long reverenced,
• 6:55:56
  titles, cast away as weeds, laws overturned, and territory split like
• 6:56:00
  fields of ice, rent by the polar wind, and forced to join in
• 6:56:04
  less obnoxious shapes, which ere they gain consistence by a gust of the same
• 6:56:10
  breath, are shattered and destroyed. Meantime, the sovereignty of these fair isles
• 6:56:15
  remains entire and indivisible, And if that ignorance were removed, which breeds within
• 6:56:22
  the compass of their several shores, dark discontent or loud commotion, each might
• 6:56:27
  still preserve the beautiful repose of heavenly bodies shining in their spheres. The discipline
• 6:56:33
  of slavery is unknown among us. Hence the more do we require the discipline
• 6:56:38
  of virtue. Order else cannot subsist, nor confidence nor peace. Thus duties
• 6:56:45
  rising out of good possessed and prudent caution needful to avert impending evil equally require
• 6:56:52
  that the whole people should be taught and trained. So shall licentiousness and black
• 6:56:57
  resolve be rooted out, and virtuous habits take their place, and genuine piety
• 6:57:03
  descend like an inheritance from age to age. With such foundations lay devant the
• 6:57:10
  fear of numbers crowded on their native soil, to the prevention of all healthful
• 6:57:15
  growth through mutual injury. Rather, in the law of increase and the mandate
• 6:57:19
  from above, Rejoice and ye have special cause for joy. For as the
• 6:57:25
  element of air affords an easy passage to the industrious bees fraught with their burthens,
• 6:57:32
  and away as smooth for those ordained to take their sounding flight from the
• 6:57:34
  thronged hive and settle where they list in fresh abodes, their labor to renew,
• 6:57:41
  So the wide waters open to the power, the will, the instincts,
• 6:57:45
  and appointed needs of Britain to invite her to cast off her swarms,
• 6:57:48
  and in succession send them forth bound to establish new communities on every shore whose
• 6:57:56
  aspect favors hope or bold adventure, promising to skill and perseverance their deserved reward.
• 6:58:03
  Yes, he continued kindling, as he spake change wide and deep,
• 6:58:08
  and silently performed. This land shall witness, and as days roll on Earth's
• 6:58:14
  universal frame shall feel the effect, even till the smallest habitable rock, beaten
• 6:58:18
  by lonely billows hear the songs of humanized society and bloom with civil arts that
• 6:58:25
  shall breathe forth their fragrance, a grateful tribute to all ruling Heaven from culture
• 6:58:30
  unexclusively bestowed on Albion's noble race in freedom born, expect these mighty issues from
• 6:58:37
  the pains and faithful care of unambitious schools instructing simple childhood's ready ear. Thence
• 6:58:45
  look for these magnificent results. Vast the circumference of hope and ye are at
• 6:58:51
  its center. British lawgivers, ah sleep not there in shame, shall Wisdom's
• 6:58:57
  voice from out the bosom of these trouble times, repeat the dictates of her
• 6:59:02
  calmer mind, And shall the venerable halls ye feil refuse to echo the sublime
• 6:59:07
  decree. Trust, not to partial care, a general good, transfer not
• 6:59:11
  to futurity, a work of urgent need. Your country must complete her glorious
• 6:59:17
  destiny. Begin even now now when oppression, like the Egyptian plague of darkness,
• 6:59:22
  stretch o'er guilty Europe makes the brightness more conspicuous that invests the happy island.
• 6:59:29
  Where ye think and act now, when destruction is a prime pursuit,
• 6:59:33
  Show to the wretched nations for what end? The powers of civil polity were
• 6:59:37
  given abruptly here, but with a graceful air, the sage broke off.
• 6:59:44
  No sooner had he ceased than looking forth, the gentle lady said, behold,
• 6:59:49
  the shades of afternoon have fallen upon this flowery slope. And see beyond
• 6:59:56
  the silvery lake is streaked with placid blue, as if prepared caring for the
• 7:00:00
  peace of evening. How temptingly the landscape shines, The air breathes invitation,
• 7:00:07
  easy as the walk to the lake's margin, where a boat lies moored under
• 7:00:11
  a sheltering tree. Upon this hint we rose together. All were pleased,
• 7:00:15
  but most the beauteous girl, whose cheek was flushed with joy light as a
• 7:00:19
  sunbeam glides along the hills. She vanished, eager to impart the scheme to
• 7:00:25
  her loved brother and his shy compere. Now was there bustle in the vicar's
• 7:00:30
  house, and earnest preparation. Forth we went and down the vale along the
• 7:00:33
  streamlet's edge pursued our way a broken company, mute or conversing, single or
• 7:00:41
  in pairs. Thus, having reached a bridge that overarched the hasty rivulet,
• 7:00:45
  where it lay be calmed in a deep pool, by happy chance we saw
• 7:00:49
  a twofold image on a grassy bank, a snow white ram, and in
• 7:00:53
  the crystal flood another and the same, most beautiful, on the green turf,
• 7:00:59
  with his imperial front, shaggy and bold, and wreathed horns superb.
• 7:01:03
  The breathing creature stood as beautiful beneath him, shewed his shadowy counterpart. Each
• 7:01:11
  had his glowing mountains, each his sky, and each seemed center of his
• 7:01:15
  own fair world, antipodies unconscious of each other, yet in partition, with
• 7:01:22
  their several spheres blended in perfect stillness to our sight. Ah, what a
• 7:01:27
  pity were it to disperse or to disturb so fair a spectacle, And yet
• 7:01:33
  a breath can do it these few words, the lady whispered, while we
• 7:01:38
  stood and gazed, gathered together, all in still delight, not without awe
• 7:01:44
  thence passing on, she said, in like low voice, to my particular
• 7:01:48
  ear, I love to hear that eloquent old man pour forth his meditations and
• 7:01:53
  descant on human life from infancy to age. How pure his spirit, in
• 7:01:59
  what vivid hues his mind gives back the various forms of things caught in their
• 7:02:03
  fairest, happiest attitude. While he is speaking, I have power to see
• 7:02:07
  even as he sees. But when his voice hath ceased, then with a
• 7:02:12
  sigh, sometimes I feel as now that combinations so serene and bright cannot be
• 7:02:18
  lasting in a world like ours. Whose highest beauty, beautiful as it is,
• 7:02:23
  like that reflected in yon quiet pool, seems but a fleeting sunbeams gift
• 7:02:29
  whose peace the sufferance only of a breath of air. More had she said,
• 7:02:34
  but sportive shouts were heard sent from the jockuned hearts of those two boys,
• 7:02:38
  who, bearing each a basket on his arm, down the green field,
• 7:02:42
  came tripping after us. With caution we embarked, and now the pair
• 7:02:48
  for prouder service was addressed. But each wishful to leave an opening for my
• 7:02:52
  choice, dropped the light o'er his eager hand had seized. Thanksgiven for that
• 7:02:57
  becoming courtesy the place I took, and for a grateful office, pregnant with
• 7:03:03
  recollections of the time when on thy Bosom's spacious windermere a youth I practiced this
• 7:03:08
  delightful art, tossed on the waves alone or amid a crew of joyous comrades.
• 7:03:15
  Soon as the reedy marge was cleared, I dipped with arms accordant oars
• 7:03:18
  free from obstruction, and the boat advanced through crystal water smoothly as a hawk
• 7:03:23
  that disentangled from the shady boughs of some thick wood. Her place of covert
• 7:03:29
  cleaves with correspondent wings. The abyss of air observe, the vicar, said
• 7:03:36
  yon rocky isle, with birch trees fringed. My hand shall guide the helm
• 7:03:41
  while thitherward we shape our course, or while we seek that other on the
• 7:03:45
  western shore, where the bare columns of those lofty firs supporting gracefully a massy
• 7:03:51
  dome of somber foliage seemed to imitate a Grecian temple rising from the deep turn
• 7:03:56
  where we may said, I, we cannot err in this still delicious region.
• 7:04:00
  Cultured slopes, wild tracts of forest ground, and scattered groves and mountains
• 7:04:06
  bare or clothed with ancient woods, surrounded us. And as we held our
• 7:04:11
  way along the level of the glassy flood, they ceased not to surround us.
• 7:04:15
  Change of place from kindred features diversely combined, producing change of beauty.
• 7:04:22
  Ever knew ah that such beauty, varying in the light of living nature,
• 7:04:27
  cannot be portrayed by words, nor by the pencil's silent skill, but is
• 7:04:33
  the property of him alone, who hath beheld it, noted it with care,
• 7:04:37
  and in his mind recorded it with love, suffice it. Therefore,
• 7:04:41
  if the rural muse vouchsafed sweet influence, while her poet speaks of trivial occupations,
• 7:04:47
  well devised and unsought pleasures springing up by chance, as if some friendly
• 7:04:52
  genius had ordained that, as the day thus far had been enriched by acquisition
• 7:04:57
  of sincere delight. The so should be continued to its close, one spirit,
• 7:05:03
  animating old and young. A gipsy fire we kindled on the shore of
• 7:05:07
  the fair Isle, with birch trees fringed, and there merrily seated in a
• 7:05:11
  ring, partook a choice repast, served by our young companions with rival earnestness
• 7:05:18
  and kindred glee. Launched from our hands, the smooth stone skimmed the lake
• 7:05:25
  with shouts. We raised the echoes stiller sounds. The lovely girls supplied a
• 7:05:30
  simple song whose low tones reached not to the distant rocks to be repeated,
• 7:05:34
  thence but gently sank into our hearts, and charmed the peaceful flood. Rapaciously.
• 7:05:41
  We gathered flowery spoils from land and water, lilies of each hue,
• 7:05:47
  golden and white, that float upon the waves and court the wind. And
• 7:05:51
  leaves of that shy plant. Her flowers were shed, the lily of the
• 7:05:55
  vale that loves the ground, and from the sun withholds her pensive beauty from
• 7:06:00
  the breeze, her sweets. Such product and such pastime did the place in
• 7:06:07
  season yield. But as we re embarked, leaving in quest of other scenes
• 7:06:11
  the shore of that wild spot, the solitary said, in a low voice,
• 7:06:18
  yet careless, Who might hear the fire that burns so brightly to our
• 7:06:22
  wish? Where is it now deserted on the beach, dying or dead?
• 7:06:27
  Nor shall the fanning breeze revive its ashes? What care we for this,
• 7:06:32
  whose ends are gained? Behold an emblem here of one day's pleasure and all
• 7:06:37
  mortal joys, And in this unpremeditated slight of that which is no longer needed,
• 7:06:42
  see the common course of human gratitude. This plaintive note disturbed, not
• 7:06:48
  the repose of the still evening Right across the lake, our pinnace moves.
• 7:06:53
  Then, coasting creek and bay glades. We behold and into thickets peep where
• 7:06:59
  couch the spot deer or raised our eyes to shaggy steeps on which the careless
• 7:07:03
  goat browsed by the side of dashing waterfalls. And thus the bark, meandering
• 7:07:08
  with the shore, pursued her voyage till a natural pier of jutting rocks invited
• 7:07:15
  us to land, alert to follow. As the pasture led we clomb a
• 7:07:18
  green hill's side, and as we clomb the valley opening out her bosom gave
• 7:07:23
  fair prospect, intercepted less and less or the flat meadows and indented coast of
• 7:07:30
  the smooth lake encompass. Seen far off and yet conspicuous, stood the old
• 7:07:34
  church tower in majesty, presiding over fields and habitations, seemingly preserved from all
• 7:07:41
  intrusion of the restless world by rocks impassable and mountains huge soft heath. This
• 7:07:48
  elevated spots supplied, and choice of moss clad stones whereon we couched or sate
• 7:07:53
  reclined, admiring quietly the general aspect of the scene. But each knots seldom
• 7:08:00
  over anxious to make known his own discoveries or to favorite points, directing notice
• 7:08:06
  merely from a wish to impart a joy imperfect, while unshared, that rapturous
• 7:08:11
  moment. Never shall I forget when these particular interests were effaced from every mind.
• 7:08:17
  Already had the sun sinking with less than ordinary state, attained his western
• 7:08:22
  bound. But rays of light, now suddenly diverging from the orb, retired
• 7:08:26
  behind the mountain tops or veiled by the dense air, shot upwards to the
• 7:08:32
  crown of the blue firmament, aloft and wide, and multitudes of little floating
• 7:08:37
  clouds through their ethereal texture pierced ere, we who saw of change were conscious
• 7:08:44
  had become vivid as fire clouds, separately poised innumerable multitude of forms, scattered
• 7:08:51
  through half the circle of the sky, and giving back and shedding each on
• 7:08:55
  each with prodigal communion, the bright hues which from the unapparent and fount of
• 7:09:00
  glory they had imbibed, and ceased not to receive that which the heavens displayed.
• 7:09:06
  The liquid deep repeated but with unity sublime, while from the grassy mountains
• 7:09:11
  open side we gazed in silence, hushed, with eyes intent on the refulgent
• 7:09:17
  spectacle diffused through earth, sky, water, and all visible space. The
• 7:09:22
  priest in holy transport thus exclaimed eternal spirit, universal God power, inaccessible to
• 7:09:30
  human thought save by degrees and steps, which thou hast deigned to furnish.
• 7:09:36
  For this affluence of thyself to the infirmity of mortal sense, vouchsafed this local
• 7:09:41
  transitory type of thy paternal splendors and the pomp of those who filled thy courts
• 7:09:45
  in highest Heaven. The radiant Cherubim accept the thanks which we thy humble creatures
• 7:09:52
  here convened, presumed to offer. We, who from the breast of the
• 7:09:57
  frail earth, permitted to behold the faint reflections only of Thy face, are
• 7:10:03
  yet exalted and in soul adore such as they are, who in Thy presence
• 7:10:07
  stand unsullied, incorruptible, and drink imperishable majesty streamed forth from Thy imperial throne.
• 7:10:15
  The elect of Earth shall be divested at the appointed hour of all dishonour
• 7:10:21
  cleansed from mortal stain. Accomplish then their number, and conclude time's weary course.
• 7:10:27
  Or if by Thy decree the consummation that will come by stealth be yet
• 7:10:33
  far distant, let thy word prevail, Oh, let thy word prevail to
• 7:10:37
  take away the sting of human nature. Spread the law as it is written
• 7:10:41
  in thy Holy book throughout all lands. Let every nation hear the high behest,
• 7:10:47
  and every heart obey, both for the love of purity and hope,
• 7:10:52
  which it affords to such as do thy will and persevere in good, that
• 7:10:56
  they shall rise to have a nearer view of thee in heath, Father of
• 7:11:00
  Good. This prayer in bounty grant, in mercy granted to thy wretched sons.
• 7:11:07
  Then, nor till then shall persecution cease, and cruel wars expire,
• 7:11:12
  the way is marked, the guide appointed, and the ransom paid. Alas
• 7:11:18
  the nations who of yore received these tidings, and in Christian temples meet the
• 7:11:22
  sacred truth to knowledge linger still preferring bonds and darkness to a state of holy
• 7:11:30
  freedom by redeeming love proffer to all, while yet on earth detained. So
• 7:11:37
  fare the many and the thoughtful few, who, in the anguish of their
• 7:11:41
  souls bewail this dire perverseness, cannot choose but ask shall it endure? Shall
• 7:11:48
  enmity and strife, falsehood and guile be left to sow their seed, and
• 7:11:52
  the kind never perish? Is the hope fallacious? Or shall righteousness obtain a
• 7:11:59
  peaceable deary wide as earth and ne'er to fail. Shall that blessed day arrive
• 7:12:04
  when they whose choice or lot it is to dwell in crowded cities without fear,
• 7:12:11
  shall live studious of mutual benefit. And he whom morn awakens among dews
• 7:12:17
  and flowers of every clime, to till the lonely field be happy in himself.
• 7:12:22
  The law of faith working through love such conquest, shall it gain,
• 7:12:26
  such triumph over sin and guilt, achieve, Almighty Lord, thy further grace
• 7:12:33
  impart, and with that help the wonder shall be seen fulfilled, the hope
• 7:12:37
  accomplished, and Thy praise be sung with transport and unceasing joy. Once and
• 7:12:45
  with mild demeanor, as he spake on us, the venerable Pastor turned his
• 7:12:48
  beaming eye that had been raised to heaven. Once, while the name Jehovah
• 7:12:55
  was a sound within the circuit of this sea girt isle unheard, the savage
• 7:13:00
  nations bowed the head to God's delighting in remorseless deeds, Gods which themselves had
• 7:13:06
  fashioned to promote ill purposes and flatter foul desires. Then in the bosom of
• 7:13:11
  Yon Mountain cove to those inventions of corrupted man, mysterious rites were solemnized,
• 7:13:18
  and there amid impending rocks and gloomy woods of those terrific idols, some received
• 7:13:23
  such dismal service that the loudest voice of the swollen cataracts, which now our
• 7:13:29
  heard soft murmuring, was too weak to overcome, though aided by wild winds.
• 7:13:33
  The groans and shrieks of human victims offered up to appease or to propitiate,
• 7:13:40
  and if living eyes had visionary faculties to see the thing that hath been
• 7:13:45
  as the thing that is aghast, we might behold this crystal mirror be dimmed
• 7:13:49
  with smoke in wreaths voluminous flung from the body of devouring fires to Tyrannus,
• 7:13:56
  erected on the heights by priestly hands for sacrifice, performed exultingly in view of
• 7:14:03
  open day and full assemblage of a barbarous host or to andatees female power who
• 7:14:10
  gave for so they fancied glorious victory. A few rude monuments of mountain stones
• 7:14:15
  survive, All else is swept away. How bright the appearances of things from
• 7:14:22
  such, how changed the existing worship, and with those compared the worshippers,
• 7:14:26
  how innocent and blessed, So wide the difference a willing mind might almost think
• 7:14:32
  at this affecting hour, that Paradise, the lost abode of man, was
• 7:14:36
  raised again and to a happy few in its original beauty here restored. Whence
• 7:14:44
  but from THEE, the true and only God, and from the faith derived
• 7:14:47
  through Him who bled upon the cross, this marvelous advance of good from evil,
• 7:14:52
  As if one extreme were left, the other gained. O ye,
• 7:14:56
  who come to kneel devoutly in yon. Reverend pow Isle, called to such
• 7:15:00
  office by the peaceful sound of Sabbath bells, And ye whose sleep in Earth
• 7:15:06
  all cares forgotten round its hallowed walls for you. In presence of this little
• 7:15:11
  band gathered together on the green hill side, your pastor is emboldened to prefer
• 7:15:17
  vocal thanksgivings to the eternal King, whose love, whose counsel, whose commands
• 7:15:23
  have made your very poorest rich and peace of thought and in good works.
• 7:15:27
  And him who is endowed with scantiest knowledge, master of all truth which the
• 7:15:33
  salvation of his soul requires. Conscious of that abundant favor showered on you,
• 7:15:38
  the children of my humble care, and this dear land, our country,
• 7:15:42
  while on earth we sojourn, have I lifted up my soul, joy giving
• 7:15:48
  voice to fervent gratitude. These barren rocks, your stern inheritance, These fertile
• 7:15:53
  fields that recompense your pains, the shadowy veil, the sunny mountain, top
• 7:15:59
  woods waving in the wind, their lofty heads or hushed, the roaring waters,
• 7:16:03
  and the still They see the offering of my lifted hands. They hear
• 7:16:07
  my lips present their sacrifice. They know if I be silent mourn or even
• 7:16:14
  for though in whispers speaking, the full heart will find event and thought.
• 7:16:18
  Is praise to him, audible praise to thee omniscient mind, from whom all
• 7:16:23
  gifts descend, all blessings flow. This vesper service closed without delay. From
• 7:16:30
  that exalted station to the plain descending we pursued our homeward course in mute composure,
• 7:16:37
  or the shadowy lake under a faded sky. No trace remained of those
• 7:16:41
  celestial splendors gray the vault pure cloudless ether, and the star of Eve was
• 7:16:48
  wanting. But inferior lights appeared faintly, too faint almost for sight, and
• 7:16:53
  some above the darkened hills stood boldly forth in twinkling luster. Ere the boat
• 7:16:57
  attained her mooring place. Where to the sheltering tree, our youthful voyagers bound
• 7:17:03
  fast her prow with prompt yet careful hands. This done, we paced the
• 7:17:11
  dewy fields. But ere the Vicar's door was reached. The solitary checked his
• 7:17:15
  steps, then, intermingling thanks on each bestowed a farewell salutation, and the
• 7:17:22
  like receiving took the slender path that leads to the one cottage in the lonely
• 7:17:26
  dell, but turned not without welcome promise made that he would share the pleasures
• 7:17:32
  and pursuits of yet another summer's day. Not loath to wander with us through
• 7:17:37
  the fertile vales and o'er the mountain wastes another sun, said he shall shine
• 7:17:42
  upon us. Ere we part another sun, and peradventure more. If time,
• 7:17:48
  with free consent be yours to give, and season favors to enfeebled power.
• 7:17:55
  From this communion with uninjured minds, what renovation had been brought? What
• 7:18:00
  degree of healing to a wounded spirit, dejected and habitually disposed to seek in
• 7:18:06
  degradation of the kind excuse and solace for her own defects? How far those
• 7:18:11
  erring notions were reformed? And whether aught of tendency as good and pure.
• 7:18:17
  From further intercourse ensued this, if delightful hopes as heretofore inspired, the serious
• 7:18:23
  song and gentle hearts, cherish and lofty minds approve the past, My future
• 7:18:29
  labors may not leave untold. End of Book ninth recording by Bill Burst and
• 7:18:37
  end of the Excursion by William Wordsworth