omething that is gone:
The pansy at my feet
Doth the same tale repeat:
Whither is fled the visionary gleam?
Where is it now, the glory and the dream?' II. 150.

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O joy! that in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!
The thought of our past years in me doth breed
Perpetual benedictions: not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be blest:
Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of childhood, whether fluttering or at rest,
With new-born hope forever in his breast:--
Not for these I raise
The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;
Blank misgivings of a creature
Moving about in worlds not realiz'd,
High instincts, before which our mortal nature
Did tremble like a guilty thing surpriz'd:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain light of all our day,
Are yet a master light of all our feeling
Uphold us, cherish us, and make
Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the eternal silence: truths that wake,
To perish never;
Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour,
Nor man nor boy,
Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!
Hence, in a season of calm weather,
Though inland far we be,
Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,
Can in a moment travel thither,
And see the children sport upon the shore,
And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore.' II. 154-6.

We have thus gone through this publication, with a view to enable our
readers to determine, whether the author of the verses which have now
been exhibited, is entitled to claim the honours of an improver or
restorer of our poetry, and to found a new school to supersede or
new-model all our maxims on this subject. If we were to stop here, we do
not think that Mr Wordsworth, or his admirers, would have any reason to
complain; for what we have now quoted is undeniably the most peculiar
and characteristic part of his publication, and must be defended and
applauded if the merit or originality of his system is to be se