Invocation To The Earth

William Wordsworth

Six thousand veterans practised in war's game,

Tried men, at Killicranky were arrayed

Against an equal host that wore the plaid,

Shepherds and herdsmen.--Like a whirlwind came

The Highlanders, the slaughter spread like flame;

And Garry, thundering down his mountain-road,

Was stopped, and could not breathe beneath the load

Of the dead bodies.--'Twas a day of shame

For them whom precept and the pedantry

Of cold mechanic battle do enslave. 

O for a single hour of that Dundee,

Who on that day the word of onset gave!

Like conquest would the Men of England see;

And her Foes find a like inglorious grave. 

* * *

WE can endure that He should waste our lands,

Despoil our temples, and by sword and flame

Return us to the dust from which we came;

Such food a Tyrant's appetite demands:

And we can brook the thought that by his hands

Spain may be overpowered, and he possess,

For his delight, a solemn wilderness

Where all the brave lie dead. But, when of bands

Which he will break for us he dares to speak,

Of benefits, and of a future day 

When our enlightened minds shall bless his sway;

'Then', the strained heart of fortitude proves weak;

Our groans, our blushes, our pale cheeks declare

That he has power to inflict what we lack strength to bear. 

* * *

'REST, rest, perturbed Earth!

O rest, thou doleful Mother of Mankind!'

A Spirit sang in tones more plaintive than the wind:

'From regions where no evil thing has birth

I come--thy stains to wash away,

Thy cherished fetters to unbind,

And open thy sad eyes upon a milder day.

The Heavens are thronged with martyrs that have risen

From out thy noisome prison;

The penal caverns groan

With tens of thousands rent from off the tree

Of hopeful life,--by battle's whirlwind blown

Into the deserts of Eternity.

Unpitied havoc! Victims unlamented!

But not on high, where madness is resented,

And murder causes some sad tears to flow,

Though, from the widely-sweeping blow,

The choirs of Angels spread, triumphantly augmented.

II

'False Parent of Mankind!

Obdurate, proud, and blind,

I sprinkle thee with soft celestial dews,

Thy lost, maternal heart to re-infuse!

Scattering this far-fetched moisture from my wings,

Upon the act a blessing I implore,

Of which the rivers in their secret springs,

The rivers stained so oft with human gore,

Are conscious;--may the like return no more!

May Discord--for a Seraph's care

Shall be attended with a bolder prayer--

May she, who once disturbed the seats of bliss

These mortal spheres above,

Be chained for ever to the black abyss.

And thou, O rescued Earth, by peace and love,

And merciful desires, thy sanctity approve!'

The Spirit ended his mysterious rite,

And the pure vision closed in darkness infinite. 

* * *

Wisdom and Spirit of the universe! 

Thou Soul, that art the Eternity of thought! 

And giv'st to forms and images a breath 

And everlasting motion! not in vain, 

By day or star-light, thus from my first dawn 

Of childhood didst thou intertwine for me 

The passions that build up our human soul; 

Not with the mean and vulgar works of Man; 

But with high objects, with enduring things, 

With life and nature; purifying thus 

The elements of feeling and of thought, 

And sanctifying by such discipline 

Both pain and fear,--until we recognise 

A grandeur in the beatings of the heart. 

Nor was this fellowship vouchsafed to me 

With stinted kindness. In November days, 

When vapours rolling down the valleys made 

A lonely scene more lonesome; among woods 

At noon; and 'mid the calm of summer nights, 

When, by the margin of the trembling lake, 

Beneath the gloomy hills, homeward I went 

In solitude, such intercourse was mine: 

Mine was it in the fields both day and night, 

And by the waters, all the summer long. 

And in the frosty season, when the sun 

Was set, and, visible for many a mile, 

The cottage-windows through the twilight blazed, 

I heeded not the summons: happy time 

It was indeed for all of us; for me 

It was a time of rapture! Clear and loud 

The village-clock tolled six--I wheeled about, 

Proud and exulting like an untired horse 

That cares not for his home.--All shod with steel 

We hissed along the polished ice, in games 

Confederate, imitative of the chase 

And woodland pleasures,--the resounding horn, 

The pack loud-chiming, and the hunted hare. 

So through the darkness and the cold we flew, 

And not a voice was idle: with the din 

Smitten, the precipices rang aloud; 

The leafless trees and every icy crag 

Tinkled like iron; while far-distant hills 

Into the tumult sent an alien sound 

Of melancholy, not unnoticed while the stars, 

Eastward, were sparkling clear, and in the west 

The orange sky of evening died away. 

Not seldom from the uproar I retired 

Into a silent bay, or sportively 

Glanced sideway, leaving the tumultuous throng, 

To cut across the reflex of a star; 

Image, that, flying still before me, gleamed 

Upon the glassy plain: and oftentimes, 

When we had given our bodies to the wind, 

And all the shadowy banks on either side 

Came sweeping through the darkness, spinning still 

The rapid line of motion, then at once 

Have I, reclining back upon my heels, 

Stopped short; yet still the solitary cliffs 

Wheeled by me--even as if the earth had rolled 

With visible motion her diurnal round! 

Behind me did they stretch in solemn train, 

Feebler and feebler, and I stood and watched 

Till all was tranquil as a summer sea.