5

10

'And Matthew, for thy children dead
I'll be a son to thee!'

At this he grasp'd my hand and said,
'Alas! that cannot be.'

-We rose up from the fountain-side;
And down the smooth descent

Of the green sheep-track did we glide;
And through the wood we went;

And ere we came to Leonard's rock
He sang those witty rhymes

About the crazy old church-clock,
And the bewilder'd chimes.

W. Wordsworth

CCCXXXII

THE RIVER OF LIFE

The more we live, more brief appear
Our life's succeeding stages:
A day to childhood seems a year,
And years like passing ages.

The gladsome current of our youth,
Ere passion yet disorders,

Steals lingering like a river smooth
Along its grassy borders.

But as the care-worn cheek grows wan,
And sorrow's shafts fly thicker,

Ye Stars, that measure life to man,

Why seem your courses quicker?

When joys have lost their bloom and breath
And life itself is vapid,

Why, as we reach the Falls of Death

Feel we its tide more rapid?

It may be strange-yet who would change
Time's course to slower speeding,

When one by one our friends have gone
And left our bosoms bleeding?

Heaven gives our years of fading strength
Indemnifying fleetness;

And those of youth, a seeming length,
Proportion'd to their sweetness.

T. Campbell

CCCXXXIII

THE HUMAN SEASONS

Four Seasons fill the measure of the year;
There are four seasons in the mind of man:
He has his lusty Spring, when fancy clear
Takes in all beauty with an easy span:
5 He has his Summer, when luxuriously

Spring's honey'd cud of youthful thought he loves
To ruminate, and by such dreaming high

Is nearest unto heaven: quiet coves

His soul has in its Autumn, when his wings 10 He furleth close; contented so to look On mists in idleness-to let fair things Pass by unheeded as a threshold brook. He has his Winter too of pale misfeature, Or else he would forego his mortal nature. J. Keats

5

CCCXXXIV

A DIRGE

Rough wind, that moanest loud
Grief too sad for song;
Wild wind, when sullen cloud
Knells all the night long;

Sad storm whose tears are vain,
Bare woods whose branches stain,
Deep caves and dreary main,—
Wail for the world's wrong!

P. B. Shelley

5

10

CCCXXXV

THRENOS

O World! O Life! O Time!

On whose last steps I climb,

Trembling at that where I had stood before;
When will return the glory of your prime?
No more Oh, never more!

Out of the day and night

A joy has taken flight:

Fresh spring, and summer, and winter hoar Move my faint heart with grief, but with delight No more Oh, never more!

P. B. Shelley

CCCXXXVI

THE TROSACHS

There's not a nook within this solemn Pass,
But were an apt confessional for One

Taught by his summer spent, his autumn gone,
That Life is but a tale of morning grass

5 Wither'd at eve. From scenes of art which chase That thought away, turn, and with watchful eyes Feed it 'mid Nature's old felicities,

Rocks, rivers, and smooth lakes more clear than glass Untouch'd, unbreathed upon:-Thrice happy quest, 10 If from a golden perch of aspen spray

(October's workmanship to rival May),
The pensive warbler of the ruddy breast
That moral sweeten by a heaven-taught lay,
Lulling the year, with all its cares, to rest!

W. Wordsworth

5

CCCXXXVII

My heart leaps up when I behold
A rainbow in the sky :

So was it when my life began,
So is it now I am a man,

So be it when I shall grow old
Or let me die!

The Child is father of the Man:

And I could wish my days to be

Bound each to each by natural piety.

W. Wordsworth

CCCXXXVIII

ODE ON INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD

There was a time when meadow, grove, and stream,
The earth, and every common sight

To me did seem
Apparell'd in celestial light,

5 The glory and the freshness of a dream.
It is not now as it hath been of yore;-
Turn wheresoe'er I may,

By night or day,

The things which I have seen I now can see no more.

The rainbow comes and goes,

And lovely is the rose;

The moon doth with delight

Look round her when the heavens are bare;

Waters on a starry night

Are beautiful and fair;

The sunshine is a glorious birth;

But yet I know, where'er I go,

That there hath past away a glory from the earth.

Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song.
And while the young lambs bound

As to the tabor's sound,

To me alone there came a thought of grief:
A timely utterance gave that thought relief.
And I again am strong.

The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep:-
5 No more shall grief of mine the season wrong:
I near the echoes through the mountains throng,
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,
And all the earth is gay:

10

Land and sea

Give themselves up to jollity.
And with the heart of May
Doth every beast keep holiday—

Thou child of joy

Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy!

15 Ye blessed Creatures. I have heard the call
Ye to each other make; I see

The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee;
My heart is at your festival,

My head hath its coronal,

20 The fulness of your bliss, I feel-I feel it all.
Oh evil day! if I were sullen
While Earth herself is adorning

25

30

This sweet May-morning;

And the children are culling

On every side

In a thousand valleys far and wide,
Fresh flowers; while the sun shines warm
And the babe leaps up on his mother's arm:—
I hear, I hear, with joy I hear!
-But there's a tree, of many, one,
A single field which I have look'd upon,
Both of them speak of something that is gone:
The pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:
35 Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where it is now, the glory and the dream?
Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting;
The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting

And cometh from afar;