To humbler functions, awful Power!
I call thee I myself commend
Unto thy guidance from this hour;

O, let my weakness have an end!
Give unto me, made lowly wise,
The spirit of self-sacrifice;

The confidence of reason give;

And in the light of truth thy Bondman let me live!

"THE WORLD IS TOO MUCH WITH US ; LATE AND SOON."

THE world is too much with us; late and soon,
Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers:
Little we see in Nature that is ours;

We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!
The sea that bares her bosom to the moon;
The winds that will be howling at all hours,
And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers;
For this, for everything, we are out of tune;1
It moves us not.-Great God! I'd rather be
A Pagan suckled in a creed outworn;
So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,
Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;
Have sight of Proteus2 rising from the sea;
Or hear old Triton3 blow his wreathèd horn.

4

THE LOVE OF BOOKS.

THIS Sonnet, "The Love of Books," and the next, "The Gain of Books," are part of a series on "Personal Talk," in which the poet describes the felicity and inspiration of happy domestic life. Wordsworth's own home life ranks among the brightest and most enviable in literary history. WINGS have we,-and as far as we can go, We may find pleasure: wilderness and wood, Blank ocean and mere sky, support that mood Which with the lofty sanctifies the low.

Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,

Are a substantial world, both pure and good:

Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood,

Our pastime and our happiness will grow.

There find I personal themes, a plenteous store,
Matter wherein right voluble I am,

To which I listen with a ready ear;

Two shall be named, pre-eminently dear,-
The gentle Lady married to the Moor;1
And heavenly Una with her milk-white Lamb.2

THE GAIN OF BOOKS.

NOR can I not believe but that hereby
Great gains are mine; for thus I live remote
From evil-speaking; rancor, never sought,
Comes to me not; malignant truth, or lie.
Hence have I genial seasons, hence have I

Smooth passions, smooth discourse, and joyous thought:

And thus from day to day my little boat
Rocks in its harbor, lodging peaceably.
Blessings be with them, and eternal praise,
Who gave us nobler loves, and nobler cares—
The Poets, who on earth have made us heirs
Of truth and pure delight by heavenly lays!
O! might my name be numbered among theirs,
Then gladly would I end my mortal days.1

AFTER-THOUGHT.

I thought of Thee, my partner and my guide,
As being past away.-Vain sympathies!
For, backward, Duddon,' as I cast my eyes,
I see what was, and is, and will abide ;
Still glides the Stream, and shall forever glide;
The Form remains, the Function never dies;
While we, the brave, the mighty, and the wise,
We Men, who in our morn of youth defied.
The elements, must vanish ;—be it so!

Enough, if something from our hands have power
To live, and act, and serve the future hour;
And if, as toward the silent tomb we go,

Through love, through hope, and faith's transcendent dower,

We feel that we are greater than we know.

THE PLEASURES OF LIFE.

THIS Sonnet bears the title, "Composed on a May Morning, 1838." "Wordworth's soul," says Mr. A. J. George, "wedded to this goodly universe in love and holy passion,' could find no sphere from which the divine life was excluded, no sphere where joy was not 'in widest commonalty spread.""

LIFE with yon Lambs, like day, is just begun,
Yet Nature seems to them a heavenly guide.
Does joy approach? they meet the coming tide;
And sullenness avoid, as now they shun
Pale twilight's lingering glooms,-and in the sun
Couch near their dams, with quiet satisfied;
Or gambol-each with his shadow at his side,
Varying its shape wherever he may run.
As they from turf yet hoar with sleepy dew
All turn, and court the shining and the green,
Where herbs look up, and opening flowers are seen;
Why to God's goodness can not We be true,
And so, His gifts and promises between,
Feed to the last on pleasures ever new?