To men as they are men within themselves.

How oft high service is performed within,

When all the external man is rude in show:

Not like a temple rich with pomp and gold,

But a mere mountain chapel that protects

Its simple worshippers from sun and shower!

Of these, said I, shall be my song; of these,

If future years mature me for the task, Will I record the praises, making verse Deal boldly with substantial things, - in truth

And sanctity of passion speak of these, That justice may be done, obeisance paid

Where it is due. Thus haply shall I teach,

Inspire, through unadulterated ears Pour rapture, tenderness, and hope; my theme

No other than the very heart of man, As found among the best of those who live,

Not unexalted by religious faith, Nor uninformed by books, good books,

though few,

In Nature's presence: thence may I

select

too,

Others,

There are, among the walks of homely life,

Still higher, men for contemplation framed;

Shy, and unpractised in the strife of phrase.

Meek men, whose very souls perhaps would sink

Beneath them, summoned to such intercourse.

Theirs is the language of the heavens, the power,

The thought, the image, and the silent joy:

Words are but under-agents in their souls;

When they are grasping with their greatest strength

They do not breathe among them; this I speak

In gratitude to God, who feeds our hearts

For his own service, knoweth, loveth us,

When we are unregarded by the world."

WORDSWORTH.

UNDER THE PORTRAIT OF MILTON.

THREE Poets, in three distant ages born,

Greece, Italy, and England did adorn.

The first in loftiness of thought sur

passed;

The next in majesty; in both the last. The force of Nature could no fur

ther go:

To make a third she joined the former two.

DRYDEN.

To certain species of external things Attune the finer organs of the mind; So the glad impulse of congenial powers,

Or of sweet sound, or fair-proportioned form,

The grace of motion, or the bloom of light,

Thrills through imagination's tender frame,

From nerve to nerve; all naked and alive

They catch the spreading rays; till now the soul

At length discloses every tuneful spring,

To that harmonious movement from without,

Responsive. Then the inexpressive strain

Diffuses its enchantment; Fancy dreams

Of sacred fountains and Elysian

Say, why was man so eminently

raised

Amid the vast creation; why ordained

Through life and death to dart his piercing eye,

With thoughts beyond the limits of his frame,

But that the Omnipotent might send him forth

In sight of mortal and immortal powers,

As on a boundless theatre to run The great career of justice; to exalt His generous aim to all diviner deeds;

To chase each partial purpose from his breast;

And through the mists of passion and of sense,

And through the tossing tide of chance and pain,

To hold his course unfaltering, while the voice

Of Truth and Virtue, up the steep

To mark the windings of a scanty rill

That murmurs at his feet? The high-born soul

Disdains to rest her heaven-aspiring wing

Beneath its native quarry. Tired of earth

And this diurnal scene, she springs aloft,

Through fields of air pursues the flying storm;

Rides on the volleyed lightning through the heavens; Or, yoked with whirlwinds and the northern blast,

Sweeps the long track of day. Then high she soars

The blue profound, and hovering o'er the sun

Beholds him pouring the redundant stream

Of light: beholds the unrelenting

the morn.

Each passing Hour sheds tribute from her wings,

And still new beauties meet his lonely walk,

And loves unfelt attract him.

Look, then, abroad through Nature, to the range

Of planets, suns, and adamantine spheres,

Wheeling unshaken through the Void immense,

And speak, O man! does this capacious scene

With half that kindling majesty dilate

Thy strong conception, as when Brutus rose

Refulgent from the stroke of Cæsar's fate,

Amid the crowd of patriots; and his

ULYSSES.

Troy.

I am a part of all that I have met; Yet all experience is an arch wherethrough

Gleams that untravelled world, whose margin fades

Forever and forever when I move. How dull it is to pause, to make an end,

To rust unburnished, not to shine in use!

As though to breathe were life. Life piled on life

Were all too little, and of one to me Little remains: but every hour is saved

From that eternal silence, something more,

A bringer of new things; and vile it

were

For some three suns to store and hoard myself,

And this gray spirit yearning in desire

To follow knowledge like a sinking

star