Intimations of immortality from recollections of early childhood

150 copies only, and all on vellum. This is copy number 138.

| SEE = ee eee SO TO ere eR m=O et Ge ns lie SSA ~ aaaneiaee 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.” I. HERE was a time when meadow, grove, and stream, The earth, and every common sight, fi To me did seem Apparelled in celestial light, AO The glory and the freshness of a dream. 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. ~~| HE Rainbow comes and goes, | And lovely is the Rose, The Moon doth with delight Look round her when the heavens are bare, 3 Doth every Beast keep holiday; Waters on a starry night Thou Child of Joy, Are beautiful and fair; The sunshine is a glorious birth; But yet I know, where’er I go, Shout round me, let me hear thy shouts, thou happy Shepherd-boy! That there hath past away aglory from theearth. IV. E blessed Creatures, I have heard the III. ? fom 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 4 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, Andthe Babeleaps 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 thatis gone: 5 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. C Oi) ye ex birth is but a sleep & a forgetting: The Soul that rises with us,our life’s Star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, 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 usin our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close Upon the growing Boy, But he beholds the light, & whence it flows He sees it in his joy: The Youth, who daily farther from the east Must travel, still is Nature’s Priest, And by the vision splendid Is on his way attended; At length the Man perceives it die away, And fade into the li ght of common day. 6 ARTAH fills her lap with pleasures of her own; Yearnings she hath in her own nz- tural kind, And even with something ofa 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. VII. ~~ EHOLD the Child among his new- »==~ born blisses, . F A six years’ Darling ofa pigmy size! See, where’mid work of hisown hand he lies, Fretted by sallies of his mother’s kisses, With light upon him from his father’s eyes ! See, at his feet, some little plan or chart, Some fragment from his dream of human life, Shaped by himself with newly-learnéd art ; A wedding ora festival, A mourning or a funeral ; And this hath now his heart, C pies. And unto this he frames his song : Then will he fit his tongue To dialogues of business, love, or strife : But it will not be long 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” With all the Persons, down to palsied Age, That Life brings with her in her equipage ; As if his whole vocation Were endless imitation. 4350W UE sihinastieidi. ee ink el eae Thou, over whom thy immortality Broods like the Day, a Master o’er a Slave, A Presence which is not to be put by; Thou little Child, yet glorious in the might Of heaven-born freedom on thy being’s height, Why withsuch earnest pains dost thou provoke The years to bring the inevitable yoke, Thus blindly with thy blessedness at strife! Full soon thy Soul shall have her earthly freight, And custom lie upon thee with a weight, Heavy as frost, and deep almost as life ! VIII. HOU, whose exterior semblance ‘doth belie Thy Soul’s immensity; Thou best Philosopher, who yet dost keep Thy heritage, thou Eye among the blind, That, deaf & silent, read’st the eternal deep, Haunted for ever by the eternal mind— Mighty Prophet ! Seer blest ! On whom those truths do rest, Which we are toiling all our lives to find, In darkness lost, the darkness of the grave 8 IX. JOY ! that in our embers Is something that doth live, That nature yet remembers What was so fugitive ! The thought of our past years in me doth breed Perpetual benediction: not indeed For that which is most worthy to be blest; Delight and liberty, the simple creed Of Childhood, whether busy or at rest, 9 With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast : Not for these I raise The song of thanks and praise ; Though inland far we be, Our Souls have sight of that immortal sea Which brought us hither, Can in a moment travel thither, But for those obstinate questionings And see the Children sport upon the shore, Of sense and outward things, Falling from us, vanishings ; Blank misgivings of a Creature Moving about in worlds not realised, yh High instincts before which our mortal Nature Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised: But for those first affections, Those Shadowy Recollections, Which, be they what they may, 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 And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore. X. 4 BEN sing, ye Birds, sing, sing a | joyous song ! And let the young Lambs bound As to the tabor’s sound ! We in thought will join your throng, Ye that pipe and ye that play, To perish never ; Ye that through your hearts to-day Feel the gladness of the May ! What though the radiance which was once so bright Be now for ever taken from my sight, Though nothing can bring back the hour Which neither listlessness, nor mad Of splendour in the grass, of glory in the endeavour, flower ; Nor Man nor Boy, We will grieve not, rather find Strength in what remains behind ; In the primal sympathy Which-having been must ever be ; Our noisy years seem moments in the being Of the eternal Silence: truths that wake, Nor all that is at enmity with joy, Can utterly abolish or destroy! Hence in a season of calm weather, 10 II In the soothing thoughts that spring Out of human suffering ; In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind. XI. _ ND O, ye Fountains, Meadows, Hills, and Groves, -Forbode not any severing of our loves ! Yet in my heart of hearts I feel your might ; I only have relinquished one delight To live beneath your more habitual sway. Ijove the Brooks which down their channels fret, melt)im LO) Even morethan when I tripped lightly asthey: The innocent brightness of a new-born Day Is lovely yet ; The Clouds that gather round the setting sun Do take a sober colouring from an eye That hath kept watch o’er man’s mortality; Another race hath been, and other palms are won. Thanks to the human heart by which welive, Thanks to its tenderness, its joys, and fears, Tomethe meanest flower that blows can give Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears. 12 HERE ENDS WILLIAM WORDSWORTH’S ODE ON THE INTIMATIONS OF IMMORTALITY, PRINTED, AMONG THE GREAT POEMS OF THE LANGUAGE, AT THE ESSEX HOUSE PRESS, CAMPDEN,GLOUCESTERSHIRE, WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY WALTER CRANE, AND UNDER THE CARE OF C. R. ASHBEE, ANNO DOMINI MDCCCCIII. Published in England by Epwarp ArNOLD, 37 Bedford Street, Strand, and in America by Samuet Buck.ey & Co., 100 William Street, New York. 150 copies only, and all on vellum. This copy is No. /3# oot) OE