Hypericum, all bloom, so thick a swarm

Of flowers, like flies clothing her slender rods,
That scarce a leaf appears; mezerion, too,
Though leafless, well attired, and thick beset
With blushing wreaths, investing every spray;
Althea with the purple eye; the broom,
Yellow and bright, as bullion unalloy'd,
Her blossoms; and, luxuriant above all,
The jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets,
The deep dark green of whose unvarnish'd leaf
Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more
The bright profusion of her scatter'd stars.-
These have been, and these shall be in their day;
And all this uniform, uncolour'd scene,
Shall be dismantled of its fleecy load,
And flush into variety again.

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From dearth to plenty, and from death to life,
Is nature's progress, when she lectures man
In heavenly truth; evincing, as she makes
The grand transition, that there lives and works

A soul in all things, and that soul is God.
The beauties of the wilderness are his,

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That make so gay the solitary place

Where no eye sees them. And the fairer forms

That cultivation glories in, are his.

He sets the bright procession on its way,

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And marshalls all the order of the year;

He marks the bounds which winter may not pass,

And blunts his pointed fury; in its case,

Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ,
Uninjur'd, with inimitable art;

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And, ere one flowery season fades and dies,
Designs the blooming wonders of the next.

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That under force

Some say that, in the origin of things,
When all creation started into birth,
The infant elements receiv'd a law,
From which they swerve not since.
Of that controuling ordinance they move,
And need not his immediate hand, who first
Prescrib'd their course, to regulate it now.
Thus dream they, and contrive to save a God

The incumbrance of his own concerns, and spare
The great Artificer of all that moves
The stress of a continual act, the pain

Of unremitted vigilance and care,

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As too laborious and severe a task.
So man, the moth, is not afraid, it seems,
To span omnipotence, and measure might,
That knows no measure, by the scanty rule
And standard of its own, that is to-day,
And is not ere to-morrow's sun go down!
But how should matter occupy a charge
Dull as it is, and satisfy a law

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So vast in its demands, unless impell'd

To ceaseless service by a ceaseless force,

And under pressure of some conscious cause?

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The Lord of all, himself through all diffus'd,
Sustains, and is the life of all that lives.
Nature is but a name for an effect,

Whose cause is God. He feeds the secret fire
By which the mighty process is maintain'd,
Who sleeps not, is not weary; in whose sight
Slow-circling ages are as transient days;
Whose work is without labour; whose designs
No flaw deforms, no difficulty thwarts;
And whose beneficence no charge exhausts.
Him blind antiquity profan'd, not serv'd,

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With self-taught rites, and under various names,
Female and male, Pomona, Pales, Pan,
And Flora, and Vertumnus; peopling earth
With tutelary goddesses and gods

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That were not; and commending, as they would,

To each some province, garden, field, or grove.
But all are under one. One spirit-His

Who wore the platted thorns with bleeding brows-
Rules universal nature. Not a flower

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But shows some touch, in freckle, streak, or stain,

Of his unrivall'd pencil. He inspires

Their balmy odours, and imparts their hues,

And bathes their eyes with nectar, and includes,

In grains as countless as the sea-side sands,

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The forms with which he sprinkles all the earth.

Happy who walks with him; whom what he finds

Of flavour or of scent in fruits or flower,

Or what he views of beautiful or grand

In nature, from the broad majestic oak

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To the green blade that twinkles in the sun,
Prompts with remembrance of a present God!
His presence, who made all so fair, perceiv'd,
Makes all still fairer. As with him no scene
Is dreary, so with him all seasons please.

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Though winter had been none, had man been true,
And earth be punish'd for its tenant's sake.
Yet not in vengeance; as this smiling sky,
So soon succeeding such an angry night,

And these dissolving snows, and this clear stream
Recovering fast its liquid music, prove.

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Who then, that has a mind well strung and tun'd To contemplation, and within his reach

A scene so friendly to his favorite task,

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Would waste attention at the chequer'd board.
His host of wooden warriors to and fro
Marching and counter-marching, with an eye
As fixt as marble, with a forehead ridg'd
And furrow'd into storms, and with a hand
Trembling, as if eternity were hung
In balance on his conduct of a pin ?-
Nor envies he aught more their idle sport,
Who pant with application misapplied,
To trivial toys, and, pushing ivory balls
Across a velvet level, feel a joy
Akin to rapture when the bawble finds
Its destin'd goal, of difficult access.-

To miss, the mercer's plague, from shop to shop

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Nor deems he wiser him, who gives his noom

Wandering, and littering with unfolded silks

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The polish'd counter, and approving none,

Or promising with smiles to call again.-
Nor him, who by his vanity seduc'd,

And sooth'd into a dream that he discerns

The difference of a Guido from a daub,

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Frequents the crowded auction: station'd there

As duly as the Langford of the show,

With glass at eye, and catalogue in hand,
And tongue accomplish'd in the fulsome cant
And pedantry that coxcombs learn with ease;
Oft as the price deciding hammer falls
He notes it in his book, then raps his box,
Swears 'tis a bargain, rails at his hard fate
That he has let it pass-but never bids!

Here, unmolested, though whatever sign
The sun proceeds, I wander. Neither mist,
Nor freezing sky nor sultry, checking me,
Nor stranger intermeddling with my joy.
Even in the spring and play-time of the year,

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That calls the unwonted villager abroad
With all her little ones, a sportive train,
To gather king-cups in the yellow mead,
And prink their hear with daisies, or to pick
A cheap but wholesome sallad from the brook,
These shades are all my own. The timorous hare,
Grown so familar with her frequent guest,
Scarce shuns me; and the stock-dove, unaları'd,
Sits cooing in the pine-tree, nor suspends
His long love-ditty for my near approach.
Drawn from his refuge in some lonely elm
That age or injury has hollow'd deep,

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Where, on his bed of wool and matted leaves,

He has outslept the winter, ventures forth

To frisk awhile and bask in the warm sun,

The squirrel, flippant, pert, and full of play :

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He sees me, at once swift as a bird,

Ascends the neighboring beach; there whisks his brush,

And perks his ears, and stamps and scolds aloud,

With all the prettiness of feign'd alarm,

And anger insignificantly fierce.

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The heart is hard in nature, and unfit

For human fellowship, as being void

Of sympathy, and therefore dread alike

To love and friendship both, that is not pleas'd

With sight of animals enjoying life,

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Nor feel their happiness augment his own.

The bounding fawn, that darts across the glade

When none pursues, through mere delight of heart,

And spirits buoyant with excess of glee;

The horse as wanton, and almost as fleet.

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That skims the spacious meadow at full speed,

Then stops and snorts, and, throwing high his heels,
Starts to the voluntary race again;

The very kine that gambol at high noon,

The total herd receiving first from one

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That leads the dance a summons to be gay,

Though wild their strange vagaries, and uncouth

Their efforts, yet resolv'd with one consent

To give such act and utterance as they may
To ecstasy too big to be suppress'd--
These, and a thousand images of bliss,

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With which kind nature graces every scene
Where cruel man defeats not her design,
Impart to the benevolent, who wish

All that are capable of pleasure pleas'd,

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A far superior happiness to their's,

The comfort of a reasonable joy.

Man scarce had risen, obedient to his call

Who form'd him from the dust, his future grave,

When he was crown'd as never king was since.
God set the diadem upon his head,

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And angel choirs attended. Wondering stood

The new-made monarch, while before him pass'd,
All happy, and all perfect in their kind,

The creatures, summon'd from their various haunts

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To see their sovereign, and confess his sway.

Vast was his empire, absolute his power,

Or bounded only by a law, whose force

'Twas his sublimest privilege to feel

And own-the law of universal love.

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He rul'd with meekness, they obey'd with joy ;

And fear as yet was not, nor cause for fear.

But sin marr'd all; and the revolt of man,

That source of evils not exhausted yet,

Was punish'd with revolt of his from him.

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Garden of God, how terrible the change

Thy groves and lawns then witness'd! Every heart,

As taught him, too, to tremble in his turn.

Hence date the persecution and the pain
That man inflicts on all inferior kinds,

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Regardless of their plaints. To make him sport,

To gratify the frenzy of his wrath,

Or his base gluttony, are causes good

And just, in his account, why bird and beast