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Methinks thou piercest it

As with a wedge; but when I look again

It seems thy own calm home, thy crystal shrine,
Thy habitation from Eternity!

O dread and silent form! I gazed upon thee,
Till thou, still present to my bodily eye,

Didst vanish from my thought. Entranc'd in prayer
I worshipp'd the Invisible alone.

Yet thou mean time wert working on my soul,

E'en like some deep enchanting melody,

So sweet we know not we are list'ning to it.
But I awake, and with a busier mind
And active will self-conscious offer now,
Not as before involuntary prayer,
And passive adoration! Hand and voice
Awake, awake, and thou my heart awake!
Awake ye rocks, ye forest pines awake!
Green fields and icy cliffs all join my hymn!
And thou, O silent mountain, sole and bare,
O blacker than the darkness all the night,
And visited all night by troops of stars,
Or when they climb the sky, or when they sink,
Companion of the morning star at dawn,
Thyself earth's rosy star, and of the dawn
Co-herald! wake, O wake, and utter praise!
Who sank thy sunless pillars deep in earth?
Who fill'd thy countenance with rosy light?
Who made thee father of perpetual beams?
And you, ye five wild torrents, fiercely glad,
Who call'd you forth from night and utter death,
From darkness set you loose, and icy dens
Down those precipitous, black, jagged rocks
For ever shattered and the same for ever?
Who gave you your invulnerable life,

Your strength, your speed, your fury and your joy,
Unceasing thunder and eternal foam?

And who commanded and the silence came,

"Here shall the billows stiffen and have rest?"

Ye icy falls, ye that from dizzy heights

Adown enormous ravines steeply slope,

Torrents methinks that heard a mighty voice,

And stopped at once amidst their maddest plunge :
Motionless torrents, silent cataracts!

Who made you glorious as the gate of heaven

Beneath the keen full moon? Who bade the sun

Clothe you with rainbows? Who with lovely flowers
Of living blue spread garlands at your feet?
God! God! the torrents like a shout of nations
Utter. The ice-plain bursts and answers, God!
God! sing the meadow-streams with gladsome voice,
And pine-groves with their soft and soul-like sound.
The silent snow-mass loosening, thunders, God?
D2

Ye dreadless flowers, that fringe the eternal frost,
Ye wild goats, bounding by the eagle's nest,
Ye eagles, playmates of the mountain-blast,
Ye lightnings, the dread arrows of the clouds,
Ye signs and wonders of the elements,
Utter forth GOD, and fill the hills with praise!
And thou! O silent form, alone and bare,
Whom as I lift again my head bow'd low
In adoration, I again behold,

And to thy summit upward from thy base
Sweep slowly by dim eyes suffused by tears,
Awake thou mountain-form: rise like a cloud,
Rise like a cloud of incense from the earth;
Thou kingly spirit thron'd among the hills!
Thou dread ambassador from earth to heav'n,
Great hierarch, tell thou the silent sky,
And tell the stars, and tell the rising sun,
Earth with her thousand voices calls on God.

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THESE are tby glorious works, Parent of good!
Almighty! thine this universal frame,

Thus wondrous fair; thyself how wondrous then!
Unspeakable; who sit'st above these heavens,
To us invisible, or dimly seen

In these thy lowest works: yet these declare
Thy goodness beyond thought and power divine.
Speak ye, who best can tell, ye sons of light,
Angels, for ye behold him, and with songs
And choral symphonies, day without night,
Circle his throne, rejoicing; ye in heaven,
On earth, join, all ye creatures, to extol
Him first, him last, him midst, and without end.
Fairest of stars! last in the train of night,

If better thou belong not to the dawn,

Sure pledge of day, that crown'st the smiling morn
With thy bright circlet; praise him in the sphere
While day arises, that sweet hour of prime.
Thou, sun! of this great world both eye and soul,
Acknowledge him thy greater; sound his praise
In thy eternal course, both when thou climb'st
And when high noon hast gain'd, and when thou fall'st:
Moon! that now meet'st the orient sun, now fly'st;
And ye five other wandering fires! that move

In mystic dance, not without song, resound
His praise who out of darkness call'd up light,
Air! and ye elements! the eldest birth
Of nature-oh, let your deaseless change
Vary to our great Maker, still new praise,
Ye mists and exhalations! that now rise.
From hill or streaming lake, dusky or gray,

Till the sun paints your fleecy skirts with gold,
In honour to the world's great Author rise :
Whether to deck with clouds the uncolour'd sky,
Or wet the thirsty earth with falling showers,
Rising or falling, still advance his praise.

His praise, ye winds! that from four quarters blow,
Breathe soft or loud; and wave your tops, ye pines!
With every plant, in sign of worship wave.
Fountains, and ye, that warble as ye flow,
Melodions murmurs! warbling, tune his praise!
Join voices, all ye living souls! ye birds,
That, singing, up to heaven's gate ascend,
Bear on your wings and in your notes his praise.
Ye that in waters glide, and ye that walk
The earth, and stately tread or lowly creep!
Witness if I be silent morn or even,

To hill or valley, fountain or fresh shade,
Made vocal by my song, and taught his praise.
Hail, universal Lord! be bounteous still
To give us only good: and if our minds
Have gather'd aught of error or of vice,
Disperse it, as now light dispels the dark.

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