"Think you, 'mid all this mighty sum Of things for ever speaking,

That nothing of itself will come,

But we must still be seeking?

"Then ask not wherefore, here, alone,
Conversing as I may,

I sit upon this old grey stone,
And dream my time away."

THE TABLES TURNED

[AN EVENING SCENE ON THE SAME SUBJECT]

Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;
Or surely you'll grow double:

Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;
Why all this toil and trouble?

The sun, above the mountain's head,

A freshening lustre mellow

Through all the long green fields has spread,

His first sweet evening yellow.

Books! 't is a dull and endless strife:

Come, hear the woodland linnet,

How sweet his music! on my life,

There's more of wisdom in it.

And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!

He, too, is no mean preacher :

Come forth into the light of things,

Let Nature be your teacher.

She has a world of ready wealth,

Our minds and hearts to bless

Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,

Truth breathed by cheerfulness.

Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;
Our meddling intellect

Mis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:

We murder to dissect.

Enough of Science and of Art;

Close up those barren leaves;

Come forth and bring with you à heart

That watches and receives.

FROM "PETER BELL"

HE roved among the vales and streams, In the green wood and hollow dell;

They were his dwellings night and day,But nature ne'er could find the way

Into the heart of Peter Bell.

In vain, through every changeful year, Did Nature lead him as before;

A primrose by a river's brim

A yellow primrose was to him,
And it was nothing more.

Small change it made on Peter's heart
To see his gentle panniered train
With more than vernal pleasure feeding,
Where 'er the tender grass was leading
Its earliest green along the lane.

In vain, through water, earth, and air, The soul of happy sound was spread, When Peter on some April morn, Beneath the broom or budding thorn, Made the warm earth his lazy bed.

At noon, when, by the forest's edge
He lay beneath the branches high,
The soft blue sky did never melt
Into his heart; he never felt
The witchery of the soft blue sky!

On a fair prospect some have looked
And felt, as I have heard them say,
As if the moving time had been
A thing as steadfast as the scene
On which they gazed themselves away.