That into music touch the passing wind.
Here then my young imagination found
No uncongenial element; could here
Among new objects serve or give command,
Even as the heart's occasions might require,
To forward reason's else too-scrupulous march.
The effect was, still more elevated views
Of human nature. Neither vice nor guilt,
Debasement undergone by body or mind,
Nor all the misery forced upon my sight,
Misery not lightly passed, but sometimes scanned
Most feelingly, could overthrow my trust

In what we may become; induce belief
That I was ignorant, had been falsely taught,
A solitary, who with vain conceits

Had been inspired, and walked about in dreams.
From those sad scenes when meditation turned,
Lo! everything that was indeed divine

Retained its purity inviolate,

Nay brighter shone, by this portentous gloom
Set off; such opposition as aroused

The mind of Adam, yet in Paradise

Though fallen from bliss, when in the East he saw *Darkness ere day's mid course, and morning light More orient in the western cloud, that drew

O'er the blue firmament a radiant white, Descending slow with something heavenly fraught.

Add also, that among the multitudes Of that huge city, oftentimes was seen Affectingly set forth, more than elsewhere Is possible, the unity of man,

* From Milton, Par. Lost, xi. 204. W. W.

One spirit over ignorance and vice
Predominant, in good and evil hearts;

One sense for moral judgments, as one eye

For the sun's light. The soul when smitten thus By a sublime idea whencesoe'er

Vouchsafed for union or communion, feeds

On the pure bliss, and takes her rest with God.

Thus from a very early age, O Friend!
My thoughts by slow gradations had been drawn
To human kind, and to the good and ill
Of human life: Nature had led me on;
And oft amid the "busy hum" I seemed
To travel independent of her help,
As if I had forgotten her; but no,

The world of human-kind outweighed not hers
In my habitual thoughts; the scale of love,
Though filling daily, still was light, compared
With that in which her mighty objects lay.

Book Ninth.

RESIDENCE IN FRANCE.

EVEN as a river,—partly (it might seem)
Yielding to old remembrances, and swayed
In part by fear to shape a way direct,

That would engulph him soon in the ravenous sea-
Turns, and will measure back his course, far back,
Seeking the very regions which he crossed
In his first outset; so have we, my Friend!
Turned and returned with intricate delay.
Or as a traveller, who has gained the brow
Of some aerial Down, while there he halts
For breathing-time, is tempted to review
The region left behind him; and, if aught
Deserving notice have escaped regard,
Or been regarded with too careless eye,
Strives, from that height, with one and yet one more
Last look, to make the best amends he may :
So have we lingered. Now we start afresh.
With courage, and new hope risen on our toil.
Fair greetings to this shapeless eagerness,
Whene'er it comes! needful in work so long,
Thrice needful to the argument which now
Awaits us! Oh, how much unlike the past!

Free as a colt at pasture on the hill,

I ranged at large, through London's wide domain,
Month after month.* Obscurely did I live,
Not seeking frequent intercourse with men
By literature, or elegance, or rank,

* See next note, p. 308.-ED.

Distinguished.

Scarcely was a year thus spent

Ere I forsook the crowded solitude,

With less regret for its luxurious pomp,

And all the nicely-guarded shows of art,
Than for the humble book-stalls in the streets,
Exposed to eye and hand where'er I turned.

*

France lured me forth; the realm that I had crossed So lately,† journeying toward the snow-clad Alps. But now, relinquishing the scrip and staff, And all enjoyment which the summer sun Sheds round the steps of those who meet the day With motion constant as his own, I went Prepared to sojourn in a pleasant town,‡ Washed by the current of the stately Loire.

Through Paris lay my readiest course, and there
Sojourning a few days, I visited

In haste each spot of old or recent fame,
The latter chiefly; from the field of Mars
Down to the suburbs of St Antony,

And from Mont Martre southward to the Dome
Of Geneviève.§ In both her clamorous Halls,
The National Synod and the Jacobins,

I saw the Revolutionary Power

* This must either mean a year from the time at which he took his degree at Cambridge, or it is inaccurate as to date. He graduated in January 1791, and left Brighton for Paris in November 1791. In London he only spent four months, the February, March, April, and May of 1791. Then followed the Welsh tour with Jones, and his return to Cambridge in September 1791.-Ed.

+ With Jones in the previous year, 1790.—ED.

Orleans.-ED.

§ The Champ de Mars is in the west, the Rue St Antoine (the old suburb of St Antony) in the east, Montmartre in the north, and the Dome of St Geneviève, commonly called the Pantheon, in the south of Paris.-ED.

Toss like a ship at anchor, rocked by storms;
The Arcades I traversed in the Palace huge
Of Orleans; † coasted round and round the line
Of Tavern, Brothel, Gaming-house, and Shop
Great rendezvous of worst and best, the walk
Of all who had a purpose, or had not;

I stared and listened, with a stranger's ears,
To Hawkers and Haranguers, hubbub wild!
And hissing Factionists with ardent eyes,
In knots, or pairs, or single. Not a look
Hope takes, or Doubt or Fear is forced to wear,
But seemed there present; and I scanned them all,
Watched every gesture uncontrollable,

Of anger, and vexation, and despite,

All side by side, and struggling face to face,
With gaiety and dissolute idleness.

Where silent zephyrs sported with the dust
Of the Bastile, I sate in the open sun,
And from the rubbish gathered up a stone,
And pocketed the relic,‡ in the guise
Of an enthusiast; yet, in honest truth,

I looked for something that I could not find,
Affecting more emotion than I felt;

The States-General consisting of the clergy, noblesse, and the tiers etat met first at Notre Dame on the 4th May 1789. On the following day, the tiers etat assumed the title of the National Assembly-constituting themselves the sovereign power-and invited the others to join them. The club of the Jacobins was instituted the same year. It leased for itself the hall of the Jacobins' convent: hence the name.-ED.

The Palais Royal, built by Cardinal Richelieu in 1636, presented by Louis XIV. to his brother, the Duke of Orleans, and thereafter the property of the house of Orleans (hence the name). The "arcades" referred to were removed in 1830, and the brilliant Galerie d'Orleans built in their place.-ED.

On the 14th July, 1789, the Bastile was taken, and destroyed by the Revolutionists. The stones were used, for the most part, in the construction of the Pont de la Concorde.-ED.