{"id":106039,"date":"2022-11-09T06:08:09","date_gmt":"2022-11-09T06:08:09","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/2022\/11\/09\/it-was-a-dreary-morning-when-the-wheels-rolled-over-a-wide\/"},"modified":"2022-11-09T06:08:09","modified_gmt":"2022-11-09T06:08:09","slug":"it-was-a-dreary-morning-when-the-wheels-rolled-over-a-wide","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/2022\/11\/09\/it-was-a-dreary-morning-when-the-wheels-rolled-over-a-wide\/","title":{"rendered":"It was a dreary morning when the wheels Rolled over a wide"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>It\u00a0was a dreary morning when the wheels<br \/> Rolled over a wide plain o&#8217;erhung with clouds,<br \/> And nothing cheered our way till first we saw<br \/> The long-roofed chapel of King&#8217;s College lift<br \/> Turrets and pinnacles in answering files,<br \/> Extended high above a dusky grove.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Advancing, we espied upon the road<br \/> A student clothed in gown and tasselled cap,<br \/> Striding along as if o&#8217;ertasked by Time,<br \/> Or covetous of exercise and air;<br \/> He passed\u2014nor was I master of my eyes<br \/> Till he was left an arrow&#8217;s flight behind.<br \/> As near and nearer to the spot we drew,<br \/> It seemed to suck us in with an eddy&#8217;s force.<br \/> Onward we drove beneath the Castle; caught,<br \/> While crossing Magdalene Bridge, a glimpse of Cam;<br \/> And at the\u00a0Hoop\u00a0alighted, famous Inn.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060My spirit was up, my thoughts were full of hope;<br \/> Some friends I had, acquaintances who there<br \/> Seemed friends, poor simple school-boys, now hung round<br \/> With honour and importance: in a world<br \/> Of welcome faces up and down I roved;<br \/> Questions, directions, warnings and advice,<br \/> Flowed in upon me, from all sides; fresh day<br \/> Of pride and pleasure! to myself I seemed<br \/> A man of business and expense, and went<br \/> From shop to shop about my own affairs,<br \/> To Tutor or to Tailor, as befel,<br \/> From street to street with loose and careless mind.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060I was the Dreamer, they the Dream; I roamed<br \/> Delighted through the motley spectacle;<br \/> Gowns grave, or gaudy, doctors, students, streets,<br \/> Courts, cloisters, flocks of churches, gateways, towers:<br \/> Migration strange for a stripling of the hills,<br \/> A northern villager.<br \/> \u2060As if the change<br \/> Had waited on some Fairy&#8217;s wand, at once<br \/> Behold me rich in monies, and attired<br \/> In splendid garb, with hose of silk, and hair<br \/> Powdered like rimy trees, when frost is keen.<br \/> My lordly dressing-gown, I pass it by,<br \/> With other signs of manhood that supplied<br \/> The lack of beard.\u2014The weeks went roundly on,<br \/> With invitations, suppers, wine and fruit,<br \/> Smooth housekeeping within, and all without<br \/> Liberal, and suiting gentleman&#8217;s array.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060The Evangelist St. John my patron was:<br \/> Three Gothic courts are his, and in the first<br \/> Was my abiding-place, a nook obscure;<br \/> Right underneath, the College kitchens made<br \/> A humming sound, less tuneable than bees,<br \/> But hardly less industrious; with shrill notes<br \/> Of sharp command and scolding intermixed.<br \/> Near me hung Trinity&#8217;s loquacious clock,<br \/> Who never let the quarters, night or day,<br \/> Slip by him unproclaimed, and told the hours<br \/> Twice over with a male and female voice.<br \/> Her pealing organ was my neighbour too;<br \/> And from my pillow, looking forth by light<br \/> Of moon or favouring stars, I could behold<br \/> The antechapel where the statue stood<br \/> Of Newton with his prism and silent face,<br \/> The marble index of a mind for ever<br \/> Voyaging through strange seas of Thought, alone.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Of College labours, of the Lecturer&#8217;s room<br \/> All studded round, as thick as chairs could stand,<br \/> With loyal students faithful to their books,<br \/> Half-and-half idlers, hardy recusants,<br \/> And honest dunces\u2014of important days,<br \/> Examinations, when the man was weighed<br \/> As in a balance! of excessive hopes,<br \/> Tremblings withal and commendable fears,<br \/> Small jealousies, and triumphs good or bad,<br \/> Let others that know more speak as they know.<br \/> Such glory was but little sought by me,<br \/> And little won. Yet from the first crude days<br \/> Of settling time in this untried abode,<br \/> I was disturbed at times by prudent thoughts,<br \/> Wishing to hope without a hope, some fears<br \/> About my future worldly maintenance,<br \/> And, more than all, a strangeness in the mind,<br \/> A feeling that I was not for that hour,<br \/> Nor for that place. But wherefore be cast down?<br \/> For (not to speak of Reason and her pure<br \/> Reflective acts to fix the moral law<br \/> Deep in the conscience, nor of Christian Hope,<br \/> Bowing her head before her sister Faith<br \/> As one far mightier), hither I had come,<br \/> Bear witness Truth, endowed with holy powers<br \/> And faculties, whether to work or feel.<br \/> Oft when the dazzling show no longer new<br \/> Had ceased to dazzle, ofttimes did I quit<br \/> My comrades, leave the crowd, buildings and groves,<br \/> And as I paced alone the level fields<br \/> Far from those lovely sights and sounds sublime<br \/> With which I had been conversant, the mind<br \/> Drooped not; but there into herself returning,<br \/> With prompt rebound seemed fresh as heretofore.<br \/> At least I more distinctly recognised<br \/> Her native instincts: let me dare to speak<br \/> A higher language, say that now I felt<br \/> What independent solaces were mine,<br \/> To mitigate the injurious sway of place<br \/> Or circumstance, how far soever changed<br \/> In youth, or\u00a0to\u00a0be changed in manhood&#8217;s prime;<br \/> Or for the few who shall be called to look<br \/> On the long shadows in our evening years,<br \/> Ordained precursors to the night of death.<br \/> As if awakened, summoned, roused, constrained,<br \/> I looked for universal things; perused<br \/> The common countenance of earth and sky:<br \/> Earth, nowhere unembellished by some trace<br \/> Of that first Paradise whence man was driven;<br \/> And sky, whose beauty and bounty are expressed<br \/> By the proud name she bears\u2014the name of Heaven.<br \/> I called on both to teach me what they might;<br \/> Or turning the mind in upon herself<br \/> Pored, watched, expected, listened, spread my thoughts<br \/> And spread them with a wider creeping; felt<br \/> Incumbencies more awful, visitings<br \/> Of the Upholder of the tranquil soul,<br \/> That tolerates the indignities of Time,<br \/> And, from the centre of Eternity<br \/> All finite motions overruling, lives<br \/> In glory immutable. But peace! enough<br \/> Here to record that I was mounting now<br \/> To such community with highest truth\u2014<br \/> A track pursuing, not untrod before,<br \/> From strict analogies by thought supplied<br \/> Or consciousnesses not to be subdued.<br \/> To every natural form, rock, fruit or flower,<br \/> Even the loose stones that cover the high-way,<br \/> I gave a moral life: I saw them feel,<br \/> Or linked them to some feeling: the great mass<br \/> Lay bedded in a quickening soul, and all<br \/> That I beheld respired with inward meaning.<br \/> Add that whatever of Terror or of Love<br \/> Or Beauty, Nature&#8217;s daily face put on<br \/> From transitory passion, unto this<br \/> I was as sensitive as waters are<br \/> To the sky&#8217;s influence in a kindred mood<br \/> Of passion; was obedient as a lute<br \/> That waits upon the touches of the wind.<br \/> Unknown, unthought of, yet I was most rich\u2014<br \/> I had a world about me\u2014&#8217;twas my own;<br \/> I made it, for it only lived to me,<br \/> And to the God who sees into the heart.<br \/> Such sympathies, though rarely, were betrayed<br \/> By outward gestures and by visible looks:<br \/> Some called it madness\u2014so indeed it was,<br \/> If child-like fruitfulness in passing joy,<br \/> If steady moods of thoughtfulness matured<br \/> To inspiration, sort with such a name;<br \/> If prophecy be madness; if things viewed<br \/> By poets in old time, and higher up<br \/> By the first men, earth&#8217;s first inhabitants,<br \/> May in these tutored days no more be seen<br \/> With undisordered sight. But leaving this,<br \/> It was no madness, for the bodily eye<br \/> Amid my strongest workings evermore<br \/> Was searching out the lines of difference<br \/> As they lie hid in all external forms,<br \/> Near or remote, minute or vast, an eye<br \/> Which from a tree, a stone, a withered leaf,<br \/> To the broad ocean and the azure heavens<br \/> Spangled with kindred multitudes of stars,<br \/> Could find no surface where its power might sleep;<br \/> Which spake perpetual logic to my soul,<br \/> And by an unrelenting agency<br \/> Did bind my feelings even as in a chain.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060And here, Friend! have I retraced my life<br \/> Up to an eminence, and told a tale<br \/> Of matters which not falsely may be called<br \/> The glory of my youth. Of genius, power,<br \/> Creation and divinity itself<br \/> I have been speaking, for my theme has been<br \/> What passed within me. Not of outward things<br \/> Done visibly for other minds, words, signs,<br \/> Symbols or actions, but of my own heart<br \/> Have I been speaking, and my youthful mind.<br \/> O Heavens! how awful is the might of souls,<br \/> And what they do within themselves while yet<br \/> The yoke of earth is new to them, the world<br \/> Nothing but a wild field where they were sown.<br \/> This is, in truth, heroic argument,<br \/> This genuine prowess, which I wished to touch<br \/> With hand however weak, but in the main<br \/> It lies far hidden from the reach of words.<br \/> Points have we all of us within our souls<br \/> Where all stand single; this I feel, and make<br \/> Breathings for incommunicable powers;<br \/> But is not each a memory to himself,<br \/> And, therefore, now that we must quit this theme,<br \/> I am not heartless, for there&#8217;s not a man<br \/> That lives who hath not known his god-like hours,<br \/> And feels not what an empire we inherit<br \/> As natural beings in the strength of Nature.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060No more: for now into a populous plain<br \/> We must descend. A Traveller I am,<br \/> Whose tale is only of himself; even so,<br \/> So be it, if the pure of heart be prompt<br \/> To follow, and if thou, my honoured Friend!<br \/> Who in these thoughts art ever at my side,<br \/> Support, as heretofore, my fainting steps.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060It hath been told, that when the first delight<br \/> That flashed upon me from this novel show<br \/> Had failed, the mind returned into herself;<br \/> Yet true it is, that I had made a change<br \/> In climate, and my nature&#8217;s outward coat<br \/> Changed also slowly and insensibly.<br \/> Full oft the quiet and exalted thoughts<br \/> Of loneliness gave way to empty noise<br \/> And superficial pastimes; now and then<br \/> Forced labour, and more frequently forced hopes;<br \/> And, worst of all, a treasonable growth<br \/> Of indecisive judgments, that impaired<br \/> And shook the mind&#8217;s simplicity.\u2014And yet<br \/> This was a gladsome time. Could I behold\u2014<br \/> Who, less insensible than sodden clay<br \/> In a sea-river&#8217;s bed at ebb of tide,<br \/> Could have beheld,\u2014with undelighted heart,<br \/> So many happy youths, so wide and fair<br \/> A congregation in its budding-time<br \/> Of health, and hope, and beauty, all at once<br \/> So many divers samples from the growth<br \/> Of life&#8217;s sweet season\u2014could have seen unmoved<br \/> That miscellaneous garland of wild flowers<br \/> Decking the matron temples of a place<br \/> So famous through the world? To me, at least,<br \/> It was a goodly prospect: for, in sooth,<br \/> Though I had learnt betimes to stand unpropped,<br \/> And independent musings pleased me so<br \/> That spells seemed on me when I was alone,<br \/> Yet could I only cleave to solitude<br \/> In lonely places; if a throng was near<br \/> That way I leaned by nature; for my heart<br \/> Was social, and loved idleness and joy.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Not seeking those who might participate<br \/> My deeper pleasures (nay, I had not once,<br \/> Though not unused to mutter lonesome songs,<br \/> Even with myself divided such delight,<br \/> Or looked that way for aught that might be clothed<br \/> In human language), easily I passed<br \/> From the remembrances of better things,<br \/> And slipped into the ordinary works<br \/> Of careless youth, unburthened, unalarmed.<br \/> Caverns\u00a0there were within my mind which sun<br \/> Could never penetrate, yet did there not<br \/> Want store of leafy\u00a0arbours\u00a0where the light<br \/> Might enter in at will. Companionships,<br \/> Friendships, acquaintances, were welcome all.<br \/> We sauntered, played, or rioted; we talked<br \/> Unprofitable talk at morning hours;<br \/> Drifted about along the streets and walks,<br \/> Read lazily in trivial books, went forth<br \/> To gallop through the country in blind zeal<br \/> Of senseless horsemanship, or on the breast<br \/> Of Cam sailed boisterously, and let the stars<br \/> Come forth, perhaps without one quiet thought.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Such was the tenor of the second act<br \/> In this new life. Imagination slept,<br \/> And yet not utterly. I could not print<br \/> Ground where the grass had yielded to the steps<br \/> Of generations of illustrious men,<br \/> Unmoved. I could not always lightly pass<br \/> Through the same gateways, sleep where they had slept,<br \/> Wake where they waked, range that inclosure old,<br \/> That garden of great intellects, undisturbed.<br \/> Place also by the side of this dark sense<br \/> Of noble feeling, that those spiritual men,<br \/> Even the great Newton&#8217;s own ethereal self,<br \/> Seemed humbled in these precincts thence to be<br \/> The more endeared. Their several memories here<br \/> (Even like their persons in their portraits clothed<br \/> With the accustomed garb of daily life)<br \/> Put on a lowly and a touching grace<br \/> Of more distinct humanity, that left<br \/> All genuine admiration unimpaired.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Beside the pleasant Mill of Trompington<br \/> I laughed with Chaucer in the hawthorn shade;<br \/> Heard him, while birds were warbling, tell his tales<br \/> Of amorous passion. And that gentle Bard,<br \/> Chosen by the Muses for their Page of State\u2014<br \/> Sweet Spenser, moving through his clouded heaven<br \/> With the moon&#8217;s beauty and the moon&#8217;s soft pace,<br \/> I called him Brother, Englishman, and Friend!<br \/> Yea, our blind Poet, who, in his later day,<br \/> Stood almost single; uttering odious truth\u2014<br \/> Darkness before, and danger&#8217;s voice behind,<br \/> Soul awful\u2014if the earth has ever lodged<br \/> An awful soul\u2014I seemed to see him here<br \/> Familiarly, and in his scholar&#8217;s dress<br \/> Bounding before me, yet a stripling youth\u2014<br \/> A boy, no better, with his rosy cheeks<br \/> Angelical, keen eye, courageous look,<br \/> And conscious step of purity and pride.<br \/> Among the band of my compeers was one<br \/> Whom chance had stationed in the very room<br \/> Honoured by Milton&#8217;s name. O temperate Bard!<br \/> Be it confest that, for the first time, seated<br \/> Within thy innocent lodge and oratory,<br \/> One of a festive circle, I poured out<br \/> Libations, to thy memory drank, till pride<br \/> And gratitude grew dizzy in a brain<br \/> Never excited by the fumes of wine<br \/> Before that hour, or since. Then, forth I ran<br \/> From the assembly; through a length of streets,<br \/> Ran, ostrich-like, to reach our chapel door<br \/> In not a desperate or opprobrious time,<br \/> Albeit long after the importunate bell<br \/> Had stopped, with wearisome Cassandra voice<br \/> No longer haunting the dark winter night.<br \/> Call back, O Friend! a moment to thy mind<br \/> The place itself and fashion of the rites.<br \/> With careless ostentation shouldering up<br \/> My surplice, through the inferior throng I clove<br \/> Of the plain Burghers, who in audience stood<br \/> On the last skirts of their permitted ground,<br \/> Under the pealing organ. Empty thoughts!<br \/> I am ashamed of them: and that great Bard,<br \/> And thou, O Friend! who in thy ample mind<br \/> Hast placed me high above my best deserts,<br \/> Ye will forgive the weakness of that hour,<br \/> In some of its unworthy vanities,<br \/> Brother to many more.<br \/> \u2060In this mixed sort<br \/> The months passed on, remissly, not given up<br \/> To wilful alienation from the right,<br \/> Or walks of open scandal, but in vague<br \/> And loose indifference, easy likings, aims<br \/> Of a low pitch\u2014duty and zeal dismissed,<br \/> Yet Nature, or a happy course of things<br \/> Not doing in their stead the needful work.<br \/> The memory languidly revolved, the heart<br \/> Reposed in noontide rest, the inner pulse<br \/> Of contemplation almost failed to beat.<br \/> Such life might not inaptly be compared<br \/> To a floating island, an amphibious spot<br \/> Unsound, of spongy texture, yet withal<br \/> Not wanting a fair face of water weeds<br \/> And pleasant flowers. The thirst of living praise,<br \/> Fit reverence for the glorious Dead, the sight<br \/> Of those long vistas, sacred catacombs,<br \/> Where mighty\u00a0minds\u00a0lie visibly entombed,<br \/> Have often stirred the heart of youth, and bred<br \/> A fervent love of rigorous discipline.\u2014<br \/> Alas! such high emotion touched not me.<br \/> Look was there none within these walls to shame<br \/> My easy spirits, and discountenance<br \/> Their light composure, far less to instil<br \/> A calm resolve of mind, firmly addressed<br \/> To puissant efforts. Nor was this the blame<br \/> Of others but my own; I should, in truth,<br \/> As far as doth concern my single self,<br \/> Misdeem most widely, lodging it elsewhere:<br \/> For I, bred up &#8216;mid Nature&#8217;s luxuries,<br \/> Was a spoiled child, and rambling like the wind,<br \/> As I had done in daily intercourse<br \/> With those crystalline rivers, solemn heights,<br \/> And mountains, ranging like a fowl of the air,<br \/> I was ill-tutored for captivity;<br \/> To quit my pleasure, and, from month to month,<br \/> Take up a station calmly on the perch<br \/> Of sedentary peace. Those lovely forms<br \/> Had also left less space within my mind,<br \/> Which, wrought upon instinctively, had found<br \/> A freshness in those objects of her love,<br \/> A winning power, beyond all other power.<br \/> Not that I slighted books,\u2014that were to lack<br \/> All sense,\u2014but other passions in me ruled,<br \/> Passions more fervent, making me less prompt<br \/> To in-door study than was wise or well,<br \/> Or suited to those years. Yet I, though used<br \/> In magisterial liberty to rove,<br \/> Culling such flowers of learning as might tempt<br \/> A random choice, could shadow forth a place<br \/> (If now I yield not to a flattering dream)<br \/> Whose studious aspect should have bent me down<br \/> To instantaneous service; should at once<br \/> Have made me pay to science and to arts<br \/> And written lore, acknowledged my liege lord,<br \/> A homage frankly offered up, like that<br \/> Which I had paid to Nature. Toil and pains<br \/> In this recess, by thoughtful Fancy built,<br \/> Should spread from heart to heart; and stately groves,<br \/> Majestic edifices, should not want<br \/> A corresponding dignity within.<br \/> The congregating temper that pervades<br \/> Our unripe years, not wasted, should be taught<br \/> To minister to works of high attempt\u2014<br \/> Works which the enthusiast would perform with love.<br \/> Youth should be awed, religiously possessed<br \/> With a conviction of the power that waits<br \/> On knowledge, when sincerely sought and prized<br \/> For its own sake, on glory and on praise<br \/> If but by labour won, and fit to endure<br \/> The passing day; should learn to put aside<br \/> Her trappings here, should strip them off abashed<br \/> Before antiquity and stedfast truth<br \/> And strong book-mindedness; and over all<br \/> A healthy sound simplicity should reign,<br \/> A seemly plainness, name it what you will,<br \/> Republican or pious.<br \/> \u2060If these thoughts<br \/> Are a gratuitous emblazonry<br \/> That mocks the recreant age\u00a0we\u00a0live in, then<br \/> Be Folly and False-seeming free to affect<br \/> Whatever formal gait of discipline<br \/> Shall raise them highest in their own esteem\u2014<br \/> Let them parade among the Schools at will,<br \/> But spare the House of God. Was ever known<br \/> The witless shepherd who persists to drive<br \/> A flock that thirsts not to a pool disliked?<br \/> A weight must surely hang on days begun<br \/> And ended with such mockery. Be wise,<br \/> Ye Presidents and Deans, and, till the spirit<br \/> Of ancient times revive, and youth be trained<br \/> At home in pious service, to your bells<br \/> Give seasonable rest, for &#8217;tis a sound<br \/> Hollow as ever vexed the tranquil air;<br \/> And your officious doings bring disgrace<br \/> On the plain steeples of our English Church,<br \/> Whose worship, &#8216;mid remotest village trees,<br \/> Suffers for this. Even Science, too, at hand<br \/> In daily sight of this irreverence,<br \/> Is smitten thence with an unnatural taint,<br \/> Loses her just authority, falls beneath<br \/> Collateral suspicion, else unknown.<br \/> This truth escaped me not, and I confess,<br \/> That having &#8216;mid my native hills given loose<br \/> To a schoolboy&#8217;s vision, I had raised a pile<br \/> Upon the basis of the coming time,<br \/> That fell in ruins round me. Oh, what joy<br \/> To see a sanctuary for our country&#8217;s youth<br \/> Informed with such a spirit as might be<br \/> Its own protection; a primeval grove,<br \/> Where, though the shades with cheerfulness were filled,<br \/> Nor indigent of songs warbled from crowds<br \/> In under-coverts, yet the countenance<br \/> Of the whole place should bear a stamp of awe;<br \/> A habitation sober and demure<br \/> For ruminating creatures; a domain<br \/> For quiet things to wander in; a haunt<br \/> In which the heron should delight to feed<br \/> By the shy rivers, and the pelican<br \/> Upon the cypress spire in lonely thought<br \/> Might sit and sun himself.\u2014Alas! Alas!<br \/> In vain for such solemnity I looked;<br \/> Mine eyes were crossed by butterflies, ears vexed<br \/> By chattering popinjays; the inner heart<br \/> Seemed trivial, and the impresses without<br \/> Of a too gaudy region.<br \/> \u2060Different sight<br \/> Those venerable Doctors saw of old,<br \/> When all who dwelt within these famous walls<br \/> Led in abstemiousness a studious life;<br \/> When, in forlorn and naked chambers cooped<br \/> And crowded, o&#8217;er the ponderous books they hung<br \/> Like caterpillars eating out their way<br \/> In silence, or with keen devouring noise<br \/> Not to be tracked or fathered. Princes then<br \/> At matins froze, and couched at curfew-time,<br \/> Trained up through piety and zeal to prize<br \/> Spare diet, patient labour, and plain weeds.<br \/> O seat of Arts! renowned throughout the world!<br \/> Far different service in those homely days<br \/> The Muses&#8217; modest nurslings underwent<br \/> From their first childhood: in that glorious time<br \/> When Learning, like a stranger come from far,<br \/> Sounding through Christian lands her trumpet, roused<br \/> Peasant and king; when boys and youths, the growth<br \/> Of ragged villages and crazy huts,<br \/> Forsook their homes, and, errant in the quest<br \/> Of Patron, famous school or friendly nook,<br \/> Where, pensioned, they in shelter might sit down,<br \/> From town to town and through wide scattered realms<br \/> Journeyed with ponderous folios in their hands;<br \/> And often, starting from some covert place,<br \/> Saluted the chance comer on the road,<br \/> Crying, &#8220;An obolus, a penny give<br \/> To a poor scholar!&#8221;\u2014when illustrious men,<br \/> Lovers of truth, by penury constrained,<br \/> Bucer, Erasmus, or Melancthon, read<br \/> Before the doors or windows of their cells<br \/> By moonshine through mere lack of taper light.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060But peace to vain regrets! We see but darkly<br \/> Even when we look behind us, and best things<br \/> Are not so pure by nature that they needs<br \/> Must keep to all, as fondly all believe,<br \/> Their highest promise. If the mariner,<br \/> When at reluctant distance he hath passed<br \/> Some tempting island, could but know the ills<br \/> That must have fallen upon him had he brought<br \/> His bark to land upon the wished-for shore,<br \/> Good cause would oft be his to thank the surf<br \/> Whose white belt scared him thence, or wind that blew<br \/> Inexorably adverse: for myself<br \/> I grieve not; happy is the gown\u00e8d youth,<br \/> Who only misses what I missed, who falls<br \/> No lower than I fell.<br \/> \u2060I did not love,<br \/> Judging not ill perhaps, the timid course<br \/> Of our scholastic studies; could have wished<br \/> To see the river flow with ampler range<br \/> And freer pace; but more, far more, I grieved<br \/> To see displayed among an eager few,<br \/> Who in the field of contest persevered,<br \/> Passions unworthy of youth&#8217;s generous heart<br \/> And mounting spirit, pitiably repaid,<br \/> When so disturbed, whatever palms are won.<br \/> From these I turned to travel with the shoal<br \/> Of more unthinking natures, easy minds<br \/> And pillowy; yet not wanting love that makes<br \/> The day pass lightly on, when foresight sleeps,<br \/> And wisdom and the pledges interchanged<br \/> With our own inner being are forgot.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Yet was this deep vacation not given up<br \/> To utter waste. Hitherto I had stood<br \/> In my own mind remote from social life,<br \/> (At least from what we commonly so name,)<br \/> Like a lone shepherd on a promontory<br \/> Who lacking occupation looks far forth<br \/> Into the boundless sea, and rather makes<br \/> Than finds what he beholds. And sure it is,<br \/> That this first transit from the smooth delights<br \/> And wild outlandish walks of simple youth<br \/> To something that resembles an approach<br \/> Towards human business, to a privileged world<br \/> Within a world, a midway residence<br \/> With all its intervenient imagery,<br \/> Did better suit my visionary mind,<br \/> Far better, than to have been bolted forth,<br \/> Thrust out abruptly into Fortune&#8217;s way<br \/> Among the conflicts of substantial life;<br \/> By a more just gradation did lead on<br \/> To higher things; more naturally matured,<br \/> For permanent possession, better fruits,<br \/> Whether of truth or virtue, to ensue.<br \/> In serious mood, but oftener, I confess,<br \/> With playful zest of fancy did we note<br \/> (How could we less?) the manners and the ways<br \/> Of those who lived distinguished by the badge<br \/> Of good or ill report; or those with whom<br \/> By frame of Academic discipline<br \/> We were perforce connected, men whose sway<br \/> And known authority of office served<br \/> To set our minds on edge, and did no more.<br \/> Nor wanted we rich pastime of this kind,<br \/> Found everywhere, but chiefly in the ring<br \/> Of the grave Elders, men unscoured, grotesque<br \/> In character, tricked out like aged trees<br \/> Which through the lapse of their infirmity<br \/> Give ready place to any random seed<br \/> That chooses to be reared upon their trunks.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Here on my view, confronting vividly<br \/> Those shepherd swains whom I had lately left,<br \/> Appeared a different aspect of old age;<br \/> How different! yet both distinctly marked,<br \/> Objects embossed to catch the general eye,<br \/> Or portraitures for special use designed,<br \/> As some might seem, so aptly do they serve<br \/> To illustrate Nature&#8217;s book of rudiments\u2014<br \/> That book upheld as with maternal care<br \/> When she would enter on her tender scheme<br \/> Of teaching comprehension with delight,<br \/> And mingling playful with pathetic thoughts.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060The surfaces of artificial life<br \/> And manners finely wrought, the delicate race<br \/> Of colours, lurking, gleaming up and down<br \/> Through that state arras woven with silk and gold;<br \/> This wily interchange of snaky hues,<br \/> Willingly or unwillingly revealed,<br \/> I neither knew nor cared for; and as such<br \/> Were wanting here, I took what might be found<br \/> Of less elaborate fabric. At this day<br \/> I smile, in many a mountain solitude<br \/> Conjuring up scenes as obsolete in freaks<br \/> Of character, in points of wit as broad,<br \/> As aught by wooden images performed<br \/> For entertainment of the gaping crowd<br \/> At wake or fair. And oftentimes do flit<br \/> Remembrances before me of old men\u2014<br \/> Old humourists, who have been long in their graves,<br \/> And having almost in my mind put off<br \/> Their human names, have into phantoms passed<br \/> Of texture midway between life and books.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060I play the loiterer: &#8217;tis enough to note<br \/> That here in dwarf proportions were expressed<br \/> The limbs of the great world; its eager strifes<br \/> Collaterally pourtrayed, as in mock fight,<br \/> A tournament of blows, some hardly dealt<br \/> Though short of mortal combat; and whate&#8217;er<br \/> Might in this pageant be supposed to hit<br \/> An artless rustic&#8217;s notice, this way less,<br \/> More that way, was not wasted upon me\u2014<br \/> And yet the spectacle may well demand<br \/> A more substantial name, no mimic show,<br \/> Itself a living part of a live whole,<br \/> A creek in the vast sea; for, all degrees<br \/> And shapes of spurious fame and short-lived praise<br \/> Here sate in state, and fed with daily alms<br \/> Retainers won away from solid good;<br \/> And here was Labour, his own bond-slave; Hope,<br \/> That never set the pains against the prize;<br \/> Idleness halting with his weary clog,<br \/> And poor misguided Shame, and witless Fear,<br \/> And simple Pleasure foraging for Death;<br \/> Honour misplaced, and Dignity astray;<br \/> Feuds, factions, flatteries, enmity, and guile<br \/> Murmuring submission, and bald government,<br \/> (The idol weak as the idolator,)<br \/> And Decency and Custom starving Truth,<br \/> And blind Authority beating with his staff<br \/> The child that might have led him; Emptiness<br \/> Followed as of good omen, and meek Worth<br \/> Left to herself unheard of and unknown.<\/p>\n<p> Of these and other kindred notices<br \/> I cannot say what portion is in truth<br \/> The naked recollection of that time,<br \/> And what may rather have been called to life<br \/> By after-meditation. But delight<br \/> That, in an easy temper lulled asleep,<br \/> Is still with Innocence its own reward,<br \/> This was not wanting. Carelessly I roamed<br \/> As through a wide museum from whose stores<br \/> A casual rarity is singled out<br \/> And has its brief perusal, then gives way<br \/> To others, all supplanted in their turn;<br \/> Till &#8216;mid this crowded neighbourhood of things<br \/> That are by nature most unneighbourly,<br \/> The head turns round and cannot right itself;<br \/> And though an aching and a barren sense<br \/> Of gay confusion still be uppermost,<br \/> With few wise longings and but little love,<br \/> Yet to the memory something cleaves at last,<br \/> Whence profit may be drawn in times to come.<\/p>\n<p> \u2060Thus in submissive idleness, my Friend!<br \/> The labouring time of autumn, winter, spring,<br \/> Eight months! rolled pleasingly away; the ninth<br \/> Came and returned me to my native hills.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>It\u00a0was a dreary morning when the wheels Rolled over a wide plain o&#8217;erhung with clouds, And nothing cheered our way till first we saw The long-roofed chapel of King&#8217;s College lift Turrets and pinnacles in answering files, Extended high above a dusky grove. \u2060Advancing, we espied upon the road A student clothed in gown and [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[10],"class_list":["post-106039","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-research-paper-writing","tag-writing"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106039","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=106039"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/106039\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=106039"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=106039"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/papersspot.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=106039"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}