Divine communion; both to live and move,
Whate'er to shallow Faith their ways unfold,
Inly illumined by Heaven's pitying love;
Love pitying innocence not long to last,
In them,

in her our sins and sorrows past.

XXXVII.

INTENT on gathering wool from hedge and brake,
Yon busy Little-ones rejoice that soon

A poor old Dame will bless them for the boon:
Great is their glee while flake they add to flake,
With rival earnestness; far other strife
Than will hereafter move them, if they make
Pastime their idol, give their day of life

To pleasure snatched for reckless pleasure's sake.
Can
pomp and show allay one heart-born grief?
Pains which the World inflicts can she requite?
Not for an interval however brief;

The silent thoughts that search for steadfast light,
Love from her depths, and Duty in her might,
And Faith, these only yield secure relief.

March 8th, 1842.

XXXVIII.

A PLEA FOR AUTHORS, MAY, 1838.

FAILING impartial measure to dispense
To every suitor, Equity is lame

And social Justice, stripped of reverence

For natural rights, a mockery and a shaine;
Law but a servile dupe of false pretence,
If, guarding grossest things from common claim
Now and for ever, she, to works that came
From mind and spirit, grudge a short-lived fence.
"What! lengthened privilege, a lineal tie,
For Books!" Yes, heartless Ones, or be it proved
That 't is a fault in Us to have lived and loved
Like others, with like temporal hopes to die;
No public harm that Genius from her course
Be turned; and streams of truth dried up, even at
their source

!

XXXIX.

VALEDICTORY SONNET.

Closing the Volume of Sonnets published in 1838.

SERVING no haughty Muse, my hands have here Disposed some cultured Flowerets (drawn from

spots

Where they bloomed singly, or in scattered knots), Each kind in several beds of one parterre ;

Both to allure the casual Loiterer,

And that, so placed, my Nurslings may requite
Studious regard with opportune delight,
Nor be unthanked, unless I fondly err.
But metaphor dismissed, and thanks apart,
Reader, farewell! My last words let them be, · --
If in this book Fancy and Truth agree;
If simple Nature trained by careful Art

Through It have won a passage to thy heart;
Grant me thy love, I crave no other fee!

XL.

TO THE REV. CHRISTOPHER WORDSWORTH, D.D., MASTER OF HARROW SCHOOL,

After the perusal of his Theophilus Anglicanus, recently published.

ENLIGHTENED Teacher, gladly from thy hand
Have I received this proof of pains bestowed
By thee to guide thy Pupils on the road
That, in our native isle, and every land,
The Church, when trusting in divine command
And in her Catholic attributės, hath trod:

may

these lessons be with profit scanned To thy heart's wish, thy labor blest by God!

So the bright faces of the young and

gay

Shall look more bright, the happy, happier still;

Catch, in the pauses of their keenest play,

Motions of thought which elevate the will,

And, like the Spire that from your classic Hill
Points heavenward, indicate the end and way.
Rydal Mount, Dec. 11, 1843.

XLI.

TO THE PLANET VENUS,

Upon its approximation (as an Evening Star) to the Earth, Jan. 1838.

WHAT strong allurement draws, what spirit guides, Thee, Vesper! brightening still, as if the nearer

Thou com'st to man's abode the spot grew dearer
Night after night? True is it Nature hides
Her treasures less and less. Man now presides
In power, where once he trembled in his weakness;
Science advances with gigantic strides ;

But are we aught enriched in love and meekness? Aught dost thou see, bright Star! of pure and wise More than in humbler times graced human story; That makes our hearts more apt to sympathize With heaven, our souls more fit for future glory, When earth shall vanish from our closing eyes, Ere we lie down in our last dormitory?

XLII.

WANSFELL!* this Household has a favored lot, Living with liberty on thee to gaze,

To watch while Morn first crowns thee with her

rays,

Or when along thy breast serenely float
Evening's angelic clouds. Yet ne'er a note
Hath sounded (shame upon the Bard!) thy praise
For all that thou, as if from heaven, hast brought
Of glory lavished on our quiet days.
Bountiful Son of Earth! when we are gone
From every object dear to mortal sight,
As soon we shall be, may these words attest
How oft, to elevate our spirits, shone

* The Hill that rises to the southeast, above Ambleside

Thy visionary majesties of light,

How in thy pensive glooms our hearts found rest.

Dec 24, 1842.

XLIII.

WHILE beams of orient light shoot wide and high, Deep in the vale a little rural Town*

Breathes forth a cloud-like creature of its own,
That mounts not toward the radiant morning sky,
But, with a less ambitious sympathy,

Hangs o'er its Parent waking to the cares,
Troubles, and toils that every day prepares.
So Fancy, to the musing Poet's eye,

Endears that Lingerer. And how blest her sway
(Like influence never may my soul reject)
If the calm Heaven, now to its zenith decked
With glorious forms in numberless array,
To the lone shepherd on the hills disclose
Gleams from a world in which the saints repose.
Jan. 1, 1843.

IN

XLIV.

my mind's eye a Temple, like a cloud Slowly surmounting some invidious hill

Rose out of darkness: the bright Work stood still; And might of its own beauty have been proud,

* Ambleside.