The Prelude. William Wordsworth

Nor for that place. But wherefore be cast down?

       For (not to speak of Reason and her pure

       ​Reflective acts to fix the moral law

       Deep in the conscience, nor of Christian Hope,

       Bowing her head before her sister Faith

       As one far mightier), hither I had come,

       Bear witness Truth, endowed with holy powers

       And faculties, whether to work or feel.

       Oft when the dazzling show no longer new

       Had ceased to dazzle, ofttimes did I quit

       My comrades, leave the crowd, buildings and groves,

       And as I paced alone the level fields

       Far from those lovely sights and sounds sublime

       With which I had been conversant, the mind

       Drooped not; but there into herself returning,

       With prompt rebound seemed fresh as heretofore.

       At least I more distinctly recognised

       Her native instincts: let me dare to speak

       A higher language, say that now I felt

       What independent solaces were mine,

       To mitigate the injurious sway of place

       Or circumstance, how far soever changed

       In youth, or to be changed in manhood's prime; Or for the few who shall be called to look On the long shadows in our evening years, Ordained precursors to the night of death. As if awakened, summoned, roused, constrained, ​I looked for universal things; perused The common countenance of earth and sky: Earth, nowhere unembellished by some trace Of that first Paradise whence man was driven; And sky, whose beauty and bounty are expressed By the proud name she bears—the name of Heaven. I called on both to teach me what they might; Or turning the mind in upon herself Pored, watched, expected, listened, spread my thoughts And spread them with a wider creeping; felt Incumbencies more awful, visitings Of the Upholder of the tranquil soul, That tolerates the indignities of Time, And, from the centre of Eternity All finite motions overruling, lives In glory immutable. But peace! enough Here to record that I was mounting now To such community with highest truth— A track pursuing, not untrod before, From strict analogies by thought supplied Or consciousnesses not to be subdued. To every natural form, rock, fruit or flower, Even the loose stones that cover the high-way, I gave a moral life: I saw them feel, Or linked them to some feeling: the great mass ​Lay bedded in a quickening soul, and all That I beheld respired with inward meaning. Add that whatever of Terror or of Love Or Beauty, Nature's daily face put on From transitory passion, unto this I was as sensitive as waters are To the sky's influence in a kindred mood Of passion; was obedient as a lute That waits upon the touches of the wind. Unknown, unthought of, yet I was most rich— I had a world about me—'twas my own; I made it, for it only lived to me, And to the God who sees into the heart. Such sympathies, though rarely, were betrayed By outward gestures and by visible looks: Some called it madness—so indeed it was, If child-like fruitfulness in passing joy, If steady moods of thoughtfulness matured To inspiration, sort with such a name; If prophecy be madness; if things viewed By poets in old time, and higher up By the first men, earth's first inhabitants, May in these tutored days no more be seen With undisordered sight. But leaving this, It was no madness, for the bodily eye ​Amid my strongest workings evermore Was searching out the lines of difference As they lie hid in all external forms, Near or remote, minute or vast, an eye Which from a tree, a stone, a withered leaf, To the broad ocean and the azure heavens Spangled with kindred multitudes of stars, Could find no surface where its power might sleep; Which spake perpetual logic to my soul, And by an unrelenting agency Did bind my feelings even as in a chain.

      And here, Friend! have I retraced my life

       Up to an eminence, and told a tale

       Of matters which not falsely may be called

       The glory of my youth. Of genius, power,

       Creation and divinity itself

       I have been speaking, for my theme has been

       What passed within me. Not of outward things

       Done visibly for other minds, words, signs,

       Symbols or actions, but of my own heart

       Have I been speaking, and my youthful mind.

       O Heavens! how awful is the might of souls,

       And what they do within themselves while yet

       The yoke of earth is new to them, the world

       ​Nothing but a wild field where they were sown.

       This is, in truth, heroic argument,

       This genuine prowess, which I wished to touch

       With hand however weak, but in the main

       It lies far hidden from the reach of words.

       Points have we all of us within our souls

       Where all stand single; this I feel, and make

       Breathings for incommunicable powers;

       But is not each a memory to himself,

       And, therefore, now that we must quit this theme,

       I am not heartless, for there's not a man

       That lives who hath not known his god-like hours,

       And feels not what an empire we inherit

       As natural beings in the strength of Nature.

      No more: for now into a populous plain

       We must descend. A Traveller I am,

       Whose tale is only of himself; even so,

       So be it, if the pure of heart be prompt

       To follow, and if thou, my honoured Friend!

       Who in these thoughts art ever at my side,

       Support, as heretofore, my fainting steps.

      It hath been told, that when the first delight

       That flashed upon me from this novel show

       ​Had failed, the mind returned into herself;

       Yet true it is, that I had made a change

       In climate, and my nature's outward coat

       Changed also slowly and insensibly.

       Full oft the quiet and exalted thoughts

       Of loneliness gave way to empty noise

       And superficial pastimes; now and then

       Forced labour, and more frequently forced hopes;

       And, worst of all, a treasonable growth

       Of indecisive judgments, that impaired

       And shook the mind's simplicity.—And yet

       This was a gladsome time. Could I behold—

       Who, less insensible than sodden clay

       In a sea-river's bed at ebb of tide,

       Could have beheld—with undelighted heart,

       So many happy youths, so wide and fair

       A congregation in its budding-time

       Of health, and hope, and beauty, all at once

       So many divers samples from the growth

       Of life's sweet season—could have seen unmoved

       That miscellaneous garland of wild flowers

       Decking the matron temples of a place

       So famous through the world? To me, at least,

       It was a goodly prospect: for, in sooth,

       Though I had learnt betimes to stand unpropped,

       ​And