Follow thou the flowing river
On whose breast are thither borne
All deceived, and each deceiver,
Through the gates of night and morn ;
Through the year's successive portals;
Through the bounds which many a star
Marks, not mindless of frail mortals,
When his light returns from far.
Thus when thou with Time hast travelled
Toward the mighty gulf of things,
And the mazy stream unravelled
With thy best imaginings;
Think, if thou on beauty leanest,
Think how pitiful that stay,
Did not virtue give the meanest
Charms superior to decay.
Duty, like a strict preceptor,
Sometimes frowns, or seems to frown;
Choose her thistle for thy sceptre,
While youth's roses are thy crown.
Grasp it,-if thou shrink and tremble,
Fairest damsel of the green,
Thou wilt lack the only symbol
That proclaims a genuine queen ;
And ensures those palms of honour
Which selected spirits wear,
Bending low before the Donor,
Lord of heaven's unchanging year!
THE PASS Of kirkstone. (51)
WITHIN the mind strong fancies work,
A deep delight the bosom thrills,
Oft as I pass along the fork
Of these fraternal hills :
Where, save the rugged road, we find
No appanage of human kind,
Nor hint of man; if stone or rock
Seem not his handy-work to mock
By something cognizably shaped;
Mockery-or model roughly hewn,
And left as if by earthquake strewn,
Or from the Flood escaped :
Altars for Druid service fit;
(But where no fire was ever lit,
Unless the glow-worm to the skies
Thence offer nightly sacrifice)
Wrinkled Egyptian monument;
Green moss-grown tower; or hoary tent;
Tents of a camp that never shall be razed—
On which four thousand years have gazed!
Ye plough-shares sparkling on the slopes!
Ye snow-white lambs that trip
Imprisoned 'mid the formal props
Of restless ownership!
Ye trees, that may to-morrow fall
To feed the careless Prodigal !
Lawns, houses, chattels, groves, and fields,
All that the beauteous valley shields;
Wages of folly-baits of crime,
Of life's uneasy game the stake,
Playthings that keep the eyes awake
Of drowsy, dotard Time ;—
O care! O guilt !—O vales and plains,
Here, in his own unvexed domains,
A Genius dwells, that can subdue
At once all memory of You,—
Most potent when mists veil the sky,
Mists that distort and magnify;
While the coarse rushes, to the sweeping breeze,
Sigh forth their ancient melodies!
List to those shriller notes !-that march
Perchance was on the blast,
When, through this Height's inverted arch,
Rome's earliest legion passed! (62)
-They saw, adventurously impelled,
And older eyes than theirs beheld,
This block-and yon, whose church-like frame
Gives to this savage Pass its name. (53)
Aspiring Road! that lov'st to hide
Thy daring in a vapoury bourn,
Not seldom may the hour return
When thou shalt be my guide:
And I (as all men may find cause,
When life is at a weary pause,
And they have panted up the hill
Of duty with reluctant will)
Be thankful, even though tired and faint,
For the rich bounties of constraint ;
Whence oft invigorating transports flow
That choice lacked courage to bestow !
My Soul was grateful for delight
That wore a threatening brow;
A veil is lifted-can she slight
The scene that opens now?
Though habitation none appear,
The greenness tells, man must be there;
The shelter-that the pérspective
Is of the clime in which we live ;
Where Toil pursues his daily round;
Where Pity sheds sweet tears-and Love,
In woodbine bower or birchen grove,
Inflicts his tender wound.
-Who comes not hither ne'er shall know
How beautiful the world below;
Nor can he guess how lightly leaps
The brook adown the rocky steeps.
Farewell, thou desolate Domain !
Hope, pointing to the cultured plain,
Carols like a shepherd-boy;
And who is she?-Can that be Joy!
Who, with a sunbeam for her guide,
Smoothly skims the meadows wide;
While Faith, from yonder opening cloud,
To hill and vale proclaims aloud,
"Whate'er the weak may dread, the wicked dare,
Thy lot, O Man, is good, thy portion fair!"
INSCRIPTIONS SUPPOSED TO BE FOUND IN AND NEAR A HERMIT'S CELL.
HOPES, what are they?-Beads of morning
Strung on slender blades of grass;
Or a spider's web adorning
In a strait and treacherous pass.
What are Fears but voices airy?
Whispering harm where harm is not;
And deluding the unwary
Till the fatal bolt is shot!
What is Glory?—in the socket
See how dying tapers fare!
What is Pride?—a whizzing rocket
That would emulate a star.
What is Friendship?—do not trust her, Nor the vows which she has made; Diamonds dart their brightest lustre From a palsy-shaken head.
What is Truth?-a staff rejected;
Duty?—an unwelcome clog ;
Joy?-a moon by fits reflected
In a swamp or watery bog;
Bright, as if through ether steering,
To the Traveller's eye it shone :
He hath hailed it re-appearing-
And as quickly it is gone;
What is Youth ?—a dancing billow,
(Winds behind, and rocks before !)
Age?-a drooping, tottering willow
On a flat and lazy shore.
What is Peace?—when pain is over,
And love ceases to rebel,
Let the last faint sigh discover
That precedes the passing-knell !
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