400 Were steeped in feeling; I was only then O'er all that, lost beyond the reach of thought And human knowledge, to the human eye Invisible, yet liveth to the heart; O'er all that leaps and runs, and shouts and sings, Or beats the gladsome air; o'er all that glides Beneath the wave, yea, in the wave itself, And mighty depth of waters. Wonder not If high the transport, great the joy I felt, Communing in this sort through earth and heaven 411 With every form of creature, as it looked 420 If this be error, and another faith Find easier access to the pious mind, Yet were I grossly destitute of all Those human sentiments that make this earth So dear, if I should fail with grateful voice To speak of you, ye mountains, and ye lakes And sounding cataracts, ye mists and winds That dwell among the hills where I was born. If in my youth I have been pure in heart, If, mingling with the world, I am content With my own modest pleasures, and have lived With God and Nature communing, removed 430 From little enmities and low desires- 440 120 Incumbencies more awful, visitings To every natural form, rock, fruits, or flower, Even the loose stones that cover the highway, I gave a moral life: I saw them feel, Or linked them to some feeling: the great Of amorous passion. And that gentle Bard, Chosen by the Muses for their Page of State Sweet Spenser, moving through his clouded heaven 280 With the moon's beauty and the moon's soft pace, I called him Brother, Englishman, and Friend! Yea, our blind Poet, who in his later day, 290 From the assembly; through a length of streets, Ran, ostrich-like, to reach our chapel door No longer haunting the dark winter night. Call back, O Friend!1 a moment to thy mind, The place itself and fashion of the rites. 310 With careless ostentation shouldering up My surplice, through the inferior throng I clove Of the plain Burghers, who in audience stood Hast placed me high above my best deserts, BOOK IV [Lines 256-338] 320 |