UNS fret not at their convent's narrow room; And students with their pensive citadels : Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom, In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground; Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be) Who have felt the weight of too much liberty, Should find brief solace there, as I have found. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. HE world is too much with us; late and soon, Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers: Little we see in Nature that is ours; We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon! The winds that will be howling at all hours, A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea, Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn ; Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea; Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn. LONDON, 1802. ILTON! thou shouldst be living at this hour : Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen, Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ; And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power. Thy soul was like a star, and dwelt apart; Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea, Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free; So didst thou travel on life's common way, In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart The lowliest duties on herself did lay. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. ON THE EXTINCTION OF THE VENETIAN REPUBLIC. NCE did She hold the gorgeous East in fee; Venice, the eldest child of Liberty. She was a maiden city, bright and free; And when she took unto herself a mate, She must espouse the everlasting Sea. Yet shall some tribute of regret be paid When her long life hath reached its final day : Men are we, and must grieve when even the Shade Of that which once was great is passed away. POET! He hath put his heart to school, By precept only, and shed tears by rule. Thy Art be Nature; the live current quaff And let the groveller sip his stagnant pool, In fear that else, when Critics grave and cool Have killed him, Scorn should write his epitaph. How does the Meadow-flower its bloom unfold? Because the lovely little flower is free Down to its root, and, in that freedom, bold; But from its own divine vitality. WILLIAM WORDSWORTH. G |