INVOCATION TO THE EARTH. FEBRUARY, 1816. REST, rest, perturbed earth! Oh, rest, thou doleful mother of mankind!" A spirit sang in tones more plaintive than the wind: I come-thy stains to wash away, Thy cherished fetters to unbind, To open thy sad eyes upon a milder day. The heavens are thronged with martyrs that have risen The penal caverns groan With tens of thousands rent from off the tree "Unpitied havoc ! Victims unlamented! Obdura, proud, and blind. I sprinkle thee with soft celestial dews, Scattering this far-fetched moisture from my wings, Upon the act a blessing I implore, Of which the rivers in their secret springs, The rivers stained so oft with human gore, Are conscious;-may the like return no more! May Discord-for a seraph's care Shall be attended with a bolder prayer- Be chained for ever to the black abyss ! The spirit ended his mysterious rite, And the pure vision closed in darkness infinite. ODE. INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF EARLY CHILDHOOD. "The child is father of the man; And I could wish my days to be Bound each to each by natural piety." See page 20. THERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, The earth, and every common sight, To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light, The glory and the freshness of a dream. 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; Look round her when the heavens are bare; Are beautiful and fair; The sunshine is a glorious birth; But yet I know, where'er I go, That there hath passed away a glory from the earth, Now, while the birds thus sing a joyous song, To me alone there came a thought of grief: The cataracts blow their trumpets from the steep, 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! Ye blessed creatures, I have heard the call The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee ; My head hath its coronal, The fulness of your bliss, I feel-I feel it all. While the earth itself is adorning, This sweet May-morning, And the children are pulling, 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 :- A single field which I have looked upon, Doth the same tale repeat: Whither is fled the visionary gleam? Where is it now, the glory and the dream? Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: And cometh from afar: But trailing clouds of glory do we come But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, The youth, who daily farther from the east Is on his way attended; At length the man perceives it die away, Earth fills her lap with pleasures of her own; Yearnings she hath in her own natural kind, And, even with something of a mother's mind, And no unworthy aim, The homely nurse doth all she can To make her foster-child, her inmate man, Forget the glories he hath known, And that imperial palace whence he came. Behold the child among his new-born blisses, A mourning or a funeral ; And this hath now his heart, And unto this he frames his song: o dialogues of business, love, or strife; Ere this be thrown aside, And with new joy and pride The little actor cons another part; Filling from time to time his "humorous stage" Were endless imitation. Thou, whose exterior semblance doth belie Thou best philosopher, who yet dost keep That, deaf and silent, read'st the eternal deep, Mighty prophet! seer blest! On whom those truths do rest, Broods like the day, a master o'er a slave, O joy! that in our embers The thought of our past years in me doth breed For that which is most worthy to be blest; Delight and liberty, the simple creed Of childhood, whether busy or at rest, With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast :--Not for these I raise The song of thanks and praise; But for those obstinate questionings Moving about in worlds not realised, High instincts before which our mortal nature Those shadowy recollections, Are yet the fountain light of all our day, Are yet a master light of all our seeing; Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make Our noisy years seem moments in the being Of the eternal silence: truths that wake To perish never; Which neither listlessness, nor nad endeavour, Nor all that is at enmity with joy, Can utterly abolish or destroy! Hence, in a season of calm weather, Our souls have sight of that immorta sea Can in a moment travel thither, And see the children sport upon the shore, Then sing, ye birds, sing, sing a joyous song! As to the tabor's sound! We in thought will join your throng, Ye that pipe and ye that play, Ye that through your hearts to-day What though the radiance which was once so bright Though nothing can bring back the hour In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be, In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind. |