BOOK VI.-THE WINTER WALK AT NOON.
Bells at a distance-Their effect-A fine noon in winter-A sheltered walk-Meditation better than books-Our familiarity with the course of nature makes it appear less wonderful than it is-The transformation that spring effects in a shrubbery described -A mistake concerning the course of nature corrected-God maintains it by an unremitted act-The amusements fashionable at this hour of the day reproved-Animals happy, a delightful sight—Origin of cruelty to animals-That it is a great crime proved from Scripture-That proof illustrated by a tale-A line drawn between the lawful and unlawful destruction of them-Their good and useful properties insisted on-Apology for the encomiums bestowed by the author upon animals-Instances of man's extravagant praise of man-The groans of the creation shall have an end-A view taken of the restoration of all things-An invocation and an invitation of Him who shall bring it to pass-The retired man vindicated from the charge of uselessness -Conclusion.
THERE is in souls a sympathy with sounds, And as the mind is pitch'd the ear is pleased With melting airs or martial, brisk or grave. Some chord in unison with what we hear Is touch'd within us, and the heart replies. How soft the music of those village bells Falling at intervals upon the ear In cadence sweet! now dying all away, Now pealing loud again and louder still, Clear and sonorous as the gale comes on. With easy force it opens all the cells Where memory slept. Wherever I have heard A kindred melody, the scene recurs, And with it all its pleasures and its pains. Such comprehensive views the spirit takes, That in a few short moments I retrace (As in a map the voyager his course) The windings of my way through many years. Short as in retrospect the journey seems, It seem'd not always short; the rugged path, And prospect oft so dreary and forlorn, Moved many a sigh at its disheartening length. Yet feeling present evils, while the past Faintly impress the mind, or not at all, How readily we wish time spent revoked, That we might try the ground again, where once (Through inexperience as we now perceive) We miss'd that happiness we might have found! Some friend is gone, perhaps his son's best friend, A father, whose authority, in show
When most severe, and mustering all its force, Was but the graver countenance of love;
Whose favour, like the clouds of spring, might lower, And utter now and then an awful voice, But had a blessing in its darkest frown, Threatening at once and nourishing the plant. We loved, but not enough, the gentle hand That rear'd us. At a thoughtless age allured By every gilded folly, we renounced His sheltering side, and wilfully forewent That converse which we now in vain regret. How gladly would the man recall to life The boy's neglected sire! a mother too, That softer friend, perhaps more gladly still, Might he demand them at the gates of death. Sorrow has, since they went, subdued and tamed The playful humour; be could now endure (Himself grown sober in the vale of tears) And feel a parent's presence no restraint. But not to understand a treasure's worth Till time has stolen away the slighted good, Is cause of half the poverty we feel, And makes the world the wilderness it is. The few that pray at all pray oft amiss,
And, seeking grace to improve the prize they hold, Would urge a wiser suit than asking more.
The night was winter in its roughest mood, The morning sharp and clear. But now at noon Upon the southern side of the slant hills,
And where the woods fence off the northern blast, The season smiles, resigning all its rage,
And has the warmth of May. The vault is blue Without a cloud, and white without a speck The dazzling splendour of the scene below. Again the harmony comes o'er the vale,
And through the trees I view the embattled tower Whence all the music. I again perceive The soothing influence of the wafted strains, And settle in soft musings as I tread
The walk still verdant, under oaks and elms, Whose outspread branches overarch the glade. The roof though moveable through all its length As the wind sways it, has yet well sufficed, And intercepting in their silent fall The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me. No noise is here, or none that hinders thought. The redbreast warbles still, but is content With slender notes and more than half suppress'd
Pleased with his solitude, and flitting light From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes From many a twig the pendent drops of ice, That tinkle in the wither'd leaves below. Stillness, accompanied with sounds so soft, Charms more than silence. Meditation here May think down hours to moments. Here the heart May give a useful lesson to the head,
And learning wiser grow without his books. Knowledge and wisdom, far from being one, Have ofttimes no connexion. Knowledge dwells In heads replete with thoughts of other men, Wisdom in minds attentive to their own. Knowledge, a rude unprofitable mass,
The mere materials with which wisdom builds, Till smoothed and squared and fitted to its place, Does but encumber whom it seems to enrich. Knowledge is proud that he has learn'd so much; Wisdom is humble that he knows no more. Books are not seldom talismans and spells, By which the magic art of shrewder wits Holds an unthinking multitude enthrall'd. Some, to the fascination of a name
Surrender judgment hoodwink'd. Some the style Infatuates, and through labyrinths and wilds Of error leads them, by a tune entranced. While sloth seduces more, too weak to bear The insupportable fatigue of thought,
And swallowing therefore, without pause or choice, The total grist unsifted, husks and all.
But trees, and rivulets whose rapid course
Defies the check of winter, haunts of deer,
And sheepwalks populous with bleating lambs,
And lanes in which the primrose ere her time
Peeps through the moss that clothes the hawthorn root, Deceive no student. Wisdom there, and truth, Not shy as in the world, and to be won By slow solicitation, seize at once
The roving thought, and fix it on themselves. What prodigies can power divine perform More grand than it produces year by year, And all in sight of inattentive man? Familiar with the effect we slight the cause, And in the constancy of nature's course, The regular return of genial months, And renovation of a faded world,
See nought to wonder at. Should God again, As once in Gibeon, interrupt the race
Of the undeviating and punctual sun,
How would the world admire! but speaks it less
An agency divine, to make him know
His moment when to sink and when to rise,
Age after age, than to arrest his course? All we behold is miracle, but seen So duly, all is miracle in vain.
Where now the vital energy that moved, While summer was, the pure and subtle lymph Through the imperceptible meandering veins Of leaf and flower? It sleeps; and the icy touch Of unprolific winter has impress'd
A cold stagnation on the intestine tide.
But let the months go round, a few short months, And all shall be restored. These naked shoots, Barren as lances, among which the wind Makes wintry music, sighing as it goes, Shall put their graceful foliage on again,
And more aspiring, and with ampler spread,
Shall boast new charms, and more than they have lost. Then, each in its peculiar honours clad, Shall publish, even to the distant eye, Its family and tribe. Laburnum rich In streaming gold; syringa ivory pure; The scentless and the scented rose, this red And of an humbler growth, the other tall,* And throwing up into the darkest gloom Of neighbouring cypress, or more sable yew, Her silver globes, light as the foamy surf That the wind severs from the broken wave; The lilac various in array, now white, Now sanguine, and her beauteous head now set With purple spikes pyramidal, as if
Studious of ornament, yet unresolved
Which hue she most approved, she chose them all; Copious of flowers the woodbine, pale and wan, But well compensating her sickly looks With never-cloying odours, early and late; Hypericumt all bloom, so thick a swarm Of flowers like flies clothing her slender rods That scarce a leaf appears; mezereon, too, Though leafless, well attired, and thick beset With blushing wreaths investing every spray; Altheat with the purple eye; the broom, Yellow and bright as bullion unalloy'd
The common St. John's wort.
Her blossoms; and luxuriant above all
The jasmine, throwing wide her elegant sweets, The deep dark green of whose unvarnish'd leaf Makes more conspicuous, and illumines more The bright profusion of her scatter'd stars. These have been, and these shall be in their day; And all this uniform, uncolour'd scene Shall be dismantled of its fleecy load,
And flush into variety again.
From dearth to plenty, and from death to life, Is Nature's progress when she lectures man In heavenly truth; evincing as she makes The grand transition, that there lives and works A soul in all things, and that soul is God. The beauties of the wilderness are His, That make so gay the solitary place
Where no eye sees them. And the fairer forms That cultivation glories in are His,
He sets the bright procession on its way, And marshals all the order of the year;
He marks the bounds which Winter may not pass, And blunts his pointed fury; in its case, Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ Uninjured, with inimitable art;
And, ere one flowery season fades and dies, Designs the blooming wonders of the next. Some say that in the origin of things, When all creation started into birth, The infant elements received a law
From which they swerve not since. That under force Of that controlling ordinance they move,
And need not His immediate hand who first Prescribed their course, to regulate it now. Thus dream they, and contrive to save a God
The incumbrance of His own concerns, and spare The great Artificer of all that moves
The stress of a continual act, the pain Of unremitted vigilance and care, As too laborious and severe a task.
So man, the moth, is not afraid, it seems, To span Omnipotence, and measure might That knows no measure, by the scanty rule And standard of his own, that is to-day, And is not ere to-morrow's sun go down. But how should matter occupy a charge, Dull as it is, and satisfy a law
So vast in its demands, unless impell'd To ceaseless service by a ceaseless force,
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