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Ah, wherefore? - Did not Hercules by force
Wrest from the guardian Monster of the tomb
Alcestis, a reanimated corse,

Given back to dwell on earth in vernal bloom?
Medea's spells dispersed the weight of years,
And Æson stood a youth 'mid youthful peers.

"The Gods to us are merciful — and they
Yet further may relent: for mightier far
'Than strength of nerve and sinew, or the sway
Of magic potent over sun and star,

Is love, though oft to agony distrest,

And though his favourite seat be feeble woman's breast.

"But if thou goest, I follow "Peace!" he said,

She looked upon him and was calmed and cheered;
The ghastly colour from his lips had fled;

In his deportment, shape, and mien, appeared
Elysian beauty, melancholy grace,

Brought from a pensive though a happy place.

no strife to heal

He spake of love, such love as Spirits feel
In worlds whose course is equable and pure;
No fears to beat away
The past unsighed for, and the future sure;
Spake of heroic arts in graver mood
Revived, with finer harmony pursued;

Of all that is most beauteous

imaged there

In happier beauty; more pellucid streams,

An ampler ether, a diviner air,

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And fields invested with purpureal gleams;

Climes which the sun, who sheds the brightest day
Earth knows, is all unworthy to survey.

Yet there the Soul shall enter which hath earned

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That privilege by virtue. Ill," said he,

"The end of man's existence I discerned,

Who from ignoble games and revelry

Could draw, when we had parted, vain delight,

While tears were thy best pastime, day and night;

ΙΙΟ

“And while my youthful peers before my eyes
(Each hero following his peculiar bent)
Prepared themselves for glorious enterprise
By martial sports, - or, seated in the tent,
Chieftains and kings in council were detained;
What time the fleet at Aulis lay enchained.

"The wished-for wind was given: -I then revolved The oracle, upon the silent sea;

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And, if no worthier led the way, resolved
That, of a thousand vessels, mine should be
The foremost prow in pressing to the strand,
Mine the first blood that tinged the Trojan sand.

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"Yet bitter, oft-times bitter, was the pang When of thy loss I thought, beloved Wife!

On thee too fondly did my memory hang,
And on the joys we shared in mortal life,

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The paths which we had trod—these fountains, flowers,
My new-planned cities, and unfinished towers..

"But should suspense permit the Foe to cry,
Behold they tremble! — haughty their array,
Yet of their number no one dares to die?'
In soul I swept the indignity away:

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Old frailties then recurred: - but lofty thought,

In act embodied, my deliverance wrought.

“And Thou, though strong in love, art all too weak

In reason, in self-government too slow;

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I counsel thee by fortitude to seek

Our blest re-union in the shades below.

The invisible world with thee hath sympathised;

Be thy affections raised and solemnised.

"Learn, by a mortal yearning, to ascend
Seeking a higher object. Love was given,
Encouraged, sanctioned, chiefly for that end;
For this the passion to excess was driven
That self might be annulled: her bondage prove
The fetters of a dream, opposed to love.".

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Aloud she shrieked! for Hermes reappears!

Round the dear Shade she would have clung 'tis vain:

The hours are past—too brief had they been years;

And him no mortal effort can detain :

Swift, toward the realms that know not earthly day,
He through the portal takes his silent way,
And on the palace-floor a lifeless corse she lay.

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Thus, all in vain exhorted and reproved,
She perished; and, as for a wilful crime,
By the just Gods whom no weak pity moved,
Was doomed to wear out her appointed time,
Apart from happy Ghosts, that gather flowers
Of blissful quiet 'mid unfading bowers.

Yet tears to human suffering are due;
And mortal hopes defeated and o'erthrown
Are mourned by man, and not by man alone,
As fondly he believes. — Upon the side

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Of Hellespont (such faith was entertained)
A knot of spiry trees for ages grew

From out the tomb of him for whom she died;
And ever, when such stature they had gained
That Ilium's walls were subject to their view,
The trees' tall summits withered at the sight;
A constant interchange of growth and blight!

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ODE.

INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY FROM RECOLLECTIONS OF EARLY

CHILDHOOD.

I.

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.

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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.

II.

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.

III.

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;
No more shall grief of mine the season wrong;
I hear the Echoes through the mountains throng,
The winds come to me from the fields of sleep,
And all the earth is gay;

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!

ΙΟ

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IV.

Ye blesséd 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,

The fulness of your bliss, I feel - I feel it all.
Oh evil day! if I were sullen

While Earth herself is adorning,

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 looked upon,

Both of them speak of something that is gone:

The Pansy at my feet

Doth the same tale repeat:

Whither is fled the visionary gleam?

Where is it now, the glory and the dream?

V.

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Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting:

The Soul that rises with us, our life's Star,
Hath had elsewhere its setting,

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And cometh from afar:

Not in entire forgetfulness,
And not in utter nakedness,

But trailing clouds of glory do we come
From God, who is our home:

Heaven lies about us in our infancy!

Upon the growing Boy,

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Shades of the prison-house begin to close

But He beholds the light, and whence it flows,

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He sees it in his joy;