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Another year!-another deadly blow! Another empty Empire overthrown!1 And we are left, or shall be left, alone; The last that dare to struggle with the foe. 5 'Tis well! from this day forward we shall know

That in ourselves our safety must be sought;

That by our own right hands it must be wrought;

That we must stand unpropped, or be laid low.

O dastard whom such foretaste doth not cheer!

10 We shall exult, if they who rule the land Be men who hold its many blessings dear, Wise, upright, valiant; not a servile band, Who are to judge of danger which they fear,

And honor which they do not understand.

1 A reference to the French victories over the Germans, October and November, 1806.

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O joy! that in our embers
Is something that doth live,
That nature yet remembers
What was so fugitive!

The thought of our past years in me doth
breed

Perpetual benediction: not indeed
For that which is most worthy to be
blest;

135 Delight and liberty, the simple creed
Of childhood, whether busy or at rest,
With new-fledged hope still fluttering in
his breast:-

To dialogues of business, love, or strife; 140
But it will not be long

Ere this be thrown aside,

And with new joy and pride
The little Actor cons another part;
Filling from time to time his "humorous 145

stage'"

With all the Persons, down to palsied Age,
105 That Life brings with her in her equipage;
As if his whole vocation
Were endless imitation.

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Not for these I raise

The song of thanks and praise;
But for those obstinate questionings
Of sense and outward things,
Fallings from us, vanishings;

Blank misgivings of a Creature
Moving about in worlds not realized,
High instincts before which our mortal
nature

Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised:
But for those first affections,
Those shadowy recollections,
Which, be they what they may,
Are yet the fountain-light of all our
day,

Are yet a master-light of all our seeing;
Uphold us, cherish, and have power
to make

Our noisy years seem moments in the being
Of the Eternal Silence: truths that wake,
To perish never:

Which neither listlessness, nor mad en-
deavor,

Nor man nor boy,

Nor all that is at enmity with joy,
Can utterly abolish or destroy!

Hence in a season of calm weather
Though inland far we be,

Our souls have sight of that immortal sea
Which brought us hither,

And

Can in a moment travel thither, see the children sport upon the shore,

And hear the mighty waters rolling ever

more.

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Loving she is, and tractable, though wild;
And Innocence hath privilege in her
To dignify arch looks and laughing eyes;
And feats of cunning; and the pretty
round

5 Of trespasses, affected to provoke
Mock-chastisement and partnership in
play.

And, as a faggot sparkles on the hearth,
Not less if unattended and alone

Than when both young and old sit gathered
round

10 And take delight in its activity;

Even so this happy creature of herself
Is all-sufficient; solitude to her

Is blithe society, who fills the air
With gladness and involuntary songs.
15 Light are her sallies as the tripping fawn's
Forth-startled from the fern where she

lay couched;

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