wer,
Behold the mighty Moon! this way
She looks as if at them--but they 20
Regard not her:--oh better wrong and strife
(By nature transient) than this torpid life;
Life which the very stars reprove[A]
As on their silent tasks they move![1][B]
Yet, witness all that stirs in heaven or[2] earth! 25
In scorn I speak not;--they are what their birth
And breeding suffer[3] them to be;
Wild outcasts of society![4]

See S. T. Coleridge's criticism of this poem in his _Biographia
Literaria_, vol. ii. p. 156 (edition 1847).--ED.

VARIANTS:

[1] 1836.

Regard not her:--oh better wrong and strife
Better vain deeds or evil than such life!
The silent Heavens have goings on;[C]
The stars have tasks--but these have none. 1807.

... wrong and strife,
(By nature transient) than such torpid life!
The silent Heavens have goings-on;
The stars have tasks--but these have none! 1820.

(By nature transient) than such torpid life;
Life which the very stars reprove
As on their silent tasks they move! 1827.

[2] 1827.

... and ... 1820.

[3] 1836.

... suffers ... 1820.

[4] The last four lines were added in 1820.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] Compare the _Ode to Duty_, l. 47 (vol. iii. p. 41).--ED.

[B] Compare, in the _Ode to Duty_, l. 48--

And the most ancient heavens, through Thee, are fresh and strong.--
ED.

[C] Compare, in the Fragment, vol. viii., beginning "No doubt if you in
terms direct had asked," the phrase--

... the goings on
Of earth and sky. ED.

"O NIGHTINGALE! THOU SURELY ART"

Composed 1807 (probably).--Published 1807

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere. (Mrs. W. says, in a note,--"At
Coleorton.")--I. F.]

One of the "Poems of the Imagination."--ED.

O Nightingale! thou surely art
A creature of a "fiery heart:"--[A][1]
These notes of thine--they pierce and pierce;
Tumultuous harmony and fierce!
Thou sing'st as if the God of wine 5
Had helped thee to a Valentine;[B]
A song in mockery and despite
Of shades, and