William Wordsworth
Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey, on Revisiting the Banks of the Wye during a Tour, July 13, 1798
from Lyrical Ballads
Five years have past; five summers, with the length | ||
Of five long winters! and again I hear | ||
These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs | ||
With a sweet inland murmur. Once again | ||
5 | Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs, | |
Which on a wild secluded scene impress | ||
Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect | ||
The landscape with the quiet of the sky. | ||
The day is come when I again repose | ||
10 | Here, under this dark sycamore, and view | |
These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts, | ||
Which, at this season, with their unripe fruits, | ||
Among the woods and copses lose themselves, | ||
Nor, with their green and simple hue, disturb | ||
15 | The wild green landscape. Once again I see | |
These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines | ||
Of sportive wood run wild; these pastoral farms | ||
Green to the very door; and wreaths of smoke | ||
Sent up, in silence, from among the trees, | ||
20 | With some uncertain notice, as might seem, | |
Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods, | ||
Or of some hermits cave, where by his fire | ||
The hermit sits alone. | ||
Though absent long, | ||
These form of beauty have not been to me, | ||
25 | As is a landscape to a blind mans eye: | |
But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din | ||
Of towns and cities, I have owed to them | ||
In hours of weariness, sensations sweet, | ||
Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart, | ||
30 | And passing even into my purer mind | |
With tranquil restoration: feelings too | ||
Of unremembered pleasure; such, perhaps, | ||
As may have had no trivial influence | ||
On that best portion of a good mans life; | ||
35 | His little, nameless, unremembered acts | |
Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust, | ||
To them I may have owed another gift, | ||
Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood, | ||
In which the burthen of the mystery, | ||
40 | In which the heavy and the weary weight | |
Of all this unintelligible world, | ||
Is lightend: that serene and blessed mood, | ||
In which the affections gently lead us on, | ||
Until, the breath of this corporeal frame | ||
45 | And even the motion of our human blood | |
Almost suspended, we are laid asleep | ||
In body, and become a living soul: | ||
While with an eye made quiet by the power | ||
Of harmony, and the deep power of joy, | ||
We see into the life of things. | ||
50 | If this | |
Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! How oft, | ||
In darkness, and amid the many shapes | ||
Of joyless daylight; when the fretful stir | ||
Unprofitable, and the fever of the world, | ||
55 | Have hung upon the beatings of my heart, | |
How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee | ||
O sylvan Wye! Thou wanderer through the woods, | ||
How often has my spirit turned to thee! | ||
And now, with gleams of half-extinguish'd thought, | ||
60 | With many recognitions dim and faint, | |
And somewhat of a sad perplexity, | ||
The picture of the mind revives again: | ||
While here I stand, not only with the sense | ||
Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts | ||
65 | That in this moment there is life and food | |
For future years. And so I dare to hope | ||
Though changed, no doubt, from what I was, when first | ||
I came among these hills; when like a roe | ||
I bounded oer the mountains, by the sides | ||
70 | Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams, | |
Wherever nature led; more like a man | ||
Flying from something that he dreads, than one | ||
Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then | ||
(The coarser pleasures of my boyish days, | ||
75 | And their glad animal movements all gone by) | |
To me was all in all. I cannot paint | ||
What then I was. The sounding cataract | ||
Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock, | ||
The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood, | ||
80 | Their colours and their forms, were then to me | |
An appetite: a feeling and a love, | ||
That had no need of a remoter charm, | ||
By thought supplied, or any interest | ||
Unborrowed from the eye. That time is past, | ||
85 | And all its aching joys are now no more, | |
And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this | ||
Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur: other gifts | ||
Have followed, for such loss, I would believe, | ||
Abundant recompense. For I have learned | ||
90 | To look on nature, not as in the hour | |
Of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes | ||
The still, sad music of humanity, | ||
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power | ||
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt | ||
95 | A presence that disturbs me with the joy | |
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime | ||
Of something far more deeply interfused, | ||
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns, | ||
And the round ocean, and the living air, | ||
100 | And the blue sky, and in the mind of man, | |
A motion and a spirit, that impels | ||
All thinking things, all objects of all thought, | ||
And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still | ||
A lover of the meadows and the woods, | ||
105 | And mountains; and of all that we behold | |
From this green earth; of all the mighty world | ||
Of eye and ear, both what they half create, | ||
And what perceive; well pleased to recognise | ||
In nature and the language of the sense, | ||
110 | The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse, | |
The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul | ||
Of all my moral being. | ||
Nor, perchance, | ||
If I were not thus taught, should I the more | ||
Suffer my genial spirits to decay: | ||
115 | For thou art with me, here, upon the banks | |
Of this fair river; thou, my dearest Friend, | ||
My dear, dear Friend, and in thy voice I catch | ||
The language of my former heart, and read | ||
My former pleasures in the shooting lights | ||
120 | Of thy wild eyes. Oh! Yet a little while | |
May I behold in thee what I was once, | ||
My dear, dear Sister! And this prayer I make, | ||
Knowing that Nature never did betray | ||
The heart that loved her; tis her privilege, | ||
125 | Through all the years of this our life, to lead | |
From joy to joy: for she can so inform | ||
The mind that is within us, so impress | ||
With quietness and beauty, and so feed | ||
With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues, | ||
130 | Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men, | |
Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all | ||
The dreary intercourse of daily life, | ||
Shall eer prevail against us, or disturb | ||
Our cheerful faith that all which we behold | ||
135 | Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon | |
Shine on thee in thy solitary walk; | ||
And let the misty mountain winds be free | ||
To blow against thee: and in after years, | ||
When these wild ecstasies shall be matured | ||
140 | Into a sober pleasure, when thy mind | |
Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms, | ||
Thy memory be as a dwelling-place | ||
For all sweet sounds and harmonies; Oh! then, | ||
If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief, | ||
145 | Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts | |
Of tender joy wilt thou remember me, | ||
And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance, | ||
If I should be, where I no more can hear | ||
Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams | ||
150 | Of past existence, wilt thou then forget | |
That on the banks of this delightful stream | ||
We stood together; and that I, so long | ||
A worshipper of Nature, hither came, | ||
Unwearied in that service: rather say | ||
155 | With warmer love, oh! with far deeper zeal | |
Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget, | ||
That after many wanderings, many years | ||
Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs, | ||
And this green pastoral landscape, were to me | ||
160 | More dear, both for themselves, and for thy sake! | |
First published 1798
Robert Clark