26.--ED.

III

FEELINGS OF THE TYROLESE

Composed 1809.--Published 1809[A]

The Land we from our fathers had in trust,
And to our children will transmit, or die:
This is our maxim, this our piety;
And God and Nature say that it is just.
That which we _would_ perform in arms--we must! 5
We read the dictate in the infant's eye;
In the wife's smile; and in the placid sky;
And, at our feet, amid the silent dust
Of them that were before us.--Sing aloud
Old songs, the precious music of the heart! 10
Give, herds and flocks, your voices to the wind!
While we go forth, a self-devoted crowd,
With weapons grasped in fearless hands,[1] to assert
Our virtue, and to vindicate mankind.

VARIANTS:

[1] 1837.

With weapons in the fearless hand, 1809.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] In _The Friend_, December 21.--ED.

IV

"ALAS! WHAT BOOTS THE LONG LABORIOUS QUEST"

Composed 1809.--Published 1809[A]

Alas! what boots the long laborious quest
Of moral prudence, sought through good and ill;
Or pains[1] abstruse--to elevate the will,
And[2] lead us on to that transcendent rest
Where every passion shall the sway attest 5
Of Reason, seated on her sovereign hill;
What is it but a vain and curious skill,
If sapient Germany must lie deprest,
Beneath the brutal sword?--Her haughty Schools
Shall blush; and may not we with sorrow say, 10
A few strong instincts and a few plain rules,
Among the herdsmen of the Alps, have wrought
More for mankind at this unhappy day
Than all the pride of intellect and thought?

See the paper by Alois Brandl appended to this series of sonnets, p.
218. Wordsworth had probably no means of knowing anything of Fichte's
"Addresses to the German Nation," delivered weekly in Berlin, from
December 1807 to March 1808. (See _Fichte_, by Professor Adamson, pp.
84-91.)--ED.

VARIANTS:

[1] 1815.

... pain ... 1809.

[2] 1815.

Or ... 1809.

FOOTNOTES:

[A] In _The Friend_, November 16, under the title, _Sonnet suggested by
the efforts of the Tyrolese, contrasted with the present state of
Germany_.--ED.

V

ON THE FINAL SUBMISSION OF THE TYROLESE

Composed 1809.--Published 1809[A]