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UNS fret not at their convent's narrow room;
And hermits are contented with their cells;

And students with their pensive citadels :

Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
High as the highest peak of Furness-fells,
Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells :
In truth, the prison unto which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me,

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!
This sea that bares her bosom to the moon,

The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers ;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;
It moves us not.-Great God! I'd rather be

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 :
England hath need of thee: she is a fen

Of stagnant waters: altar, sword, and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower

Of inward happiness. We are selfish men ;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;

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;
And was the safeguard of the West: the worth
Of Venice did not fall below her birth,

Venice, the eldest child of Liberty.

She was a maiden city, bright and free;
No guile seduced, no force could violate;

And when she took unto herself a mate,

She must espouse the everlasting Sea.
And what if she had seen those glories fade,
Those titles vanish, and that strength decay,—

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,
Nor dares to move unpropped upon the staff
Which Art hath lodged within his hand-
must laugh

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;
And so the grandeur of the Forest-tree
Comes not by casting in a formal mould,

But from its own divine vitality.

WILLIAM WORDSWORTH.

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