Classic Poem

In tranquil thought, last eventide, I went my wonted way,
Along the foldings of a vale where quiet beauty lay,
To breathe the living air, and watch with fancies half divine,
The clouds that gathered near the sun, to grace his grand decline.

The new-mown meadows, smooth and broad, gay in their second green,
The sinuous river gliding on in shadow and in sheen;
The orchard and its little cot, with low and mossy eaves,
And tiny lattice twinkling through its chequered veil of leaves.

The costly mansion, here and there, 'mid solemn groves and still;
The mass of deep and wave-like woods uprolling on the hill;
The grey and Gothic church that looked down on its graveyard lone,
And on the hamlet roofs and walls, coeval with its own;

Old farms remote and far apart, with intervening space
Of black'ning rock, and barren down, and pasture's pleasant face;
The white and winding road, that crept through village, vale, and glen,
And o'er the dreary moorlands, far beyond the homes of men.

The changeful glory of the sky, the loveliness below;
The tree-tops tinged with rosy fire, the bright pool's borrowed glow;
The blaze of windows, and the smile of fields so soon to fade,
And when the lingering sun went down, the tenderness of shade;

The throstle's still untiring song, loud as at early morn;
The grasshopper's shrill serenade amid the ripening corn;
The careless schoolboy's gleesome shout; the low of homeward herds;
The voice of mother and of child, let loose in loving words;

The rose that sighed its fragrant soul upon the summer air;
The breath of honeysuckle wild, that met me unaware;
The smell of cribs where oxen lay, of dairies dim and small;
Of herb, and moss, and fruit, that grew within the garden wall;

All pleasant things that wooed the sense in odour, sound, or hue,
Came with as sweet an influence as if they had been new, —
And so disposed my mind to love, to gentleness, and trust,
I blessed all seemly forms that God life-kindled from the dust

The mingled magic of the scene, the season, and the hour,
Fell on my world-sick spirit then with most consoling power;
Old friendships seemed revived again — old enmities forgiven,
Suspended as my feelings were midway 'tween earth and heaven.

I could have sported with a child, myself a child again;
I could have hailed the veriest wretch of penury and pain;
Religion, love, humanity, awoke within my breast,
And filled me with a solemn joy my tears alone expressed.

Thus nature wins her peaceful way, with silent strength and grace,
To souls that love her lineaments, and meet her face to face.
Blest privilege! to leave behind the paths of toil we trod,
And live an hour of purity with Nature and with God!