LOVE thou thy land, with love far-brought From out the storied Past, and used Within the Present, but transfused Thro' future time by power of thought. True love turn'd round on fixed poles, Love, that endures not sordid ends, For English natures, freemen, friends, Thy brothers and immortal souls. But pamper not a hasty time, Nor feed with crude imaginings The herd, wild hearts and feeble wings, That every sophister can lime. Deliver not the tasks of might To weakness, neither hide the ray From those, not blind, who wait for day, Tho' sitting girt with doubtful light. Make knowledge circle with the winds; Watch what main currents draw the years: Cut Prejudice against the grain : But gentle words are always gain : Regard the weakness of thy peers : Nor toil for title, place, or touch Of pension, neither count on praise : It grows to guerdon after-days: Nor deal in watch-words overmuch : Not clinging to some ancient saw ; Not master'd by some modern term; Not swift nor slow to change, but firm: And in its season bring the law; That from Discussion's lip may fall With Life, that, working strongly, binds- Set in all lights by many minds, To close the interests of all. For Nature also, cold and warm, And moist and dry, devising long, Thro' many agents making strong, Matures the individual form. Meet is it changes should control Our being, lest we rust in ease. We all are changed by still degrees, All but the basis of the soul. So let the change which comes be free To ingroove itself with that, which flies, And work, a joint of state, that plies Its office, moved with sympathy. A saying, hard to shape in act; For all the past of Time reveals Ev'n now we hear with inward strife A slow-develop'd strength awaits Completion in a painful school; Phantoms of other forms of rule, New Majesties of mighty States— The warders of the growing hour, But vague in vapor, hard to mark ; And round them sea and air are dark With great contrivances of Power. Of many changes, aptly join'd, Is bodied forth the second whole. Regard gradation, lest the soul Of Discord race the rising wind ; A wind to puff your idol-fires, And heap their ashes on the head; To shame the boast so often made, That we are wiser than our sires. O yet, if Nature's evil star Drive men in manhood, as in youth, To follow flying steps of Truth Across the brazen bridge of war If New and Old, disastrous feud, Must ever shock, like armed foes, And this be true, till Time shall close, That Principles are rain'd in blood; Not yet the wise of heart would cease To hold his hope thro' shame and guilt, But with his hand against the hilt, Would pace the troubled land, like Peace; Not less, tho' dogs of Faction bay, Would serve his kind in deed and word, Certain, if knowledge bring the sword, That knowledge takes the sword away It clack'd and cackled louder. Would love the gleams of good that broke | But ah! the more the white goose laid It clutter'd here, it chuckled there; The game of forfeits done the girls all kiss'd Beneath the sacred bush and pastawayThe parson Holmes, the poet Everard Hall, The host, and I sat round the wassailbowl, Then half-way ebb'd: and there we held a talk, How all the old honor had from Christmas gone, Or gone, or dwindled down to some odd games In some odd nooks like this; till I, tired out With cutting eights that day upon the pond, Where, three times slipping from the outer edge, I bump'd the ice into three several stars, Fell in a doze; and half-awake I heard The parson taking wide and wider sweeps, Now harping on the church-commission He thought that nothing new was said, or else Something so said 't was nothing that a truth So all day long the noise of battle roll'd The bold Sir Bedivere uplifted him, Lay a great water, and the moon was full. vere: "The sequel of to-day unsolders all a sleep They sleep the men I loved. I think Shall nevermore, at any future time, deeds, Walking about the gardens and the halls By zig-zag paths, and juts of pointed rock, bur, Ando'er him, drawing it, the winter moon, Brightening the skirts of a long cloud, ran forth And sparkled keen with frost against the hilt: For all the haft twinkled with diamond Myriads of topaz-lights, and jacinth-work This way and that dividing the swift mind, To rule once more but let what will Better to leave Excalibur conceal'd |