Wordsworth by William Wordsworth

Infancy itself
    A visible scene, on which the sun is shining?
        One end hereby at least hath been attain’d,
    665   My mind hath been revived, and if this mood
    Desert me not, I will forthwith bring down,
    Through later years, the story of my life.
    The road lies plain before me; ’tis a theme
    Single and of determined bounds; and hence
    670   I chuse it rather at this time, than work
    Of ampler or more varied argument.
    BOOK SECOND
SCHOOL-TIME (CONTINUED)
    Thus far, O Friend! have we, though leaving much
    Unvisited, endeavour’d to retrace
    My life through its first years, and measured back
    The way I travell’d when I first began
    5      To love the woods and fields; the passion yet
    Was in its birth, sustain’d, as might befal,
    By nourishment that came unsought; for still,
    From week to week, from month to month, we liv’d
    A round of tumult: duly were our games
    10     Prolong’d in summer till the day-light fail’d;
    No chair remain’d before the doors, the bench
    And threshold steps were empty; fast asleep
    The Labourer, and the Old Man who had sate,
    A later lingerer, yet the revelry
    15     Continued, and the loud uproar: at last,
    When all the ground was dark, and the huge clouds
    Were edged with twinkling stars, to bed we went,
    With weary joints, and with a beating mind.
    Ah! is there one who ever has been young,
    20     And needs a monitory voice to tame
    The pride of virtue, and of intellect?
    And is there one, the wisest and the best
    Of all mankind, who does not sometimes wish
    For things which cannot be, who would not give,
    25     If so he might, to duty and to truth
    The eagerness of infantine desire?
    A tranquillizing spirit presses now
    On my corporeal frame: so wide appears
    The vacancy between me and those days,
    30     Which yet have such self-presence in my mind
    That, sometimes, when I think of it, I seem
    Two consciousnesses, conscious of myself
    And of some other Being. A grey Stone
    Of native rock, left midway in the Square
    35     Of our small market Village, was the home
    And centre of these joys, and when, return’d
    After long absence, thither I repair’d,
    I found that it was split, and gone to build
    A smart Assembly-room that perk’d and flar’d
    40     With wash and rough-cast elbowing the ground
    Which had been ours. But let the fiddle scream,
    And be ye happy! yet, my Friends! I know
    That more than one of you will think with me
    Of those soft starry nights, and that old Dame
    45     From whom the stone was nam’d who there had sate
    And watch’d her Table with its huxter’s wares
    Assiduous, thro’ the length of sixty years.
        We ran a boisterous race; the year span round
    With giddy motion. But the time approach’d
    50     That brought with it a regular desire
    For calmer pleasures, when the beauteous forms
    Of Nature were collaterally attach’d
    To every scheme of holiday delight,
    And every boyish sport, less grateful else,
    55     And languidly pursued.
                                            When summer came
    It was the pastime of our afternoons
    To beat along the plain of Windermere
    With rival oars, and the selected bourne
    Was now an Island musical with birds
    60     That sang for ever; now a Sister Isle
    Beneath the oaks’ umbrageous covert, sown
    With lillies of the valley, like a field;
    And now a third small Island where remain’d
    An old stone Table, and a moulder’d Cave,
    65     A Hermit’s history. In such a race,
    So ended, disappointment could be none,
    Uneasiness, or pain, or jealousy:
    We rested in the shade, all pleas’d alike,
    Conquer’d and Conqueror. Thus the pride of strength,
    70     And the vain-glory of superior skill
    Were interfus’d with objects which subdu’d
    And temper’d them, and gradually produc’d
    A quiet independence of the heart.
    And to my Friend, who knows me, I may add,
    75     Unapprehensive of