Come forth, ye drooping old men, look abroad,
And see to what fair countries ye are bound!
* * * * *
"Dread Power! whom peace and calmness serve
No less than Nature's threatening voice,
From THEE, if I would swerve,
Oh, let Thy grace remind me of the light
Full early lost, and fruitlessly deplored;
Which, at this moment, on my waking sight
Appears to shine, by miracle restored;
My soul, though yet confined to earth,
Rejoices in a second birth!"
Picture the scene for yourselves; and observe how it moves in him the
sense of responsibility, and the prayer, that if he has in any matter
wandered from the right road, if he has forgotten the simplicity of
childhood in the toil of life, he may, from this time, remember the vow
that he now records--from this time to press on towards the things that
are unseen, but which are manifested through the things that are seen. I
refer you likewise to the poem "Resolution and Independence," commonly
called "The Leech Gatherer;" also to that grandest ode that has ever
been written, the "Ode on Immortality." You will find there, whatever
you may think of his theory, in the latter, sufficient proof that nature
was to him a divine teaching power.
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