EXPOSTULATION AND REPLY.
"Why William, on that old grey stone,
"Thus for the length of half a day,
"Why William, sit you thus alone,
"And dream your time away?
"Where are your books? that light bequeathd
"To beings else forlorn and blind!
"Up! Up! and drink the spirit breathd
"From dead men to their kind.
"You look round on your mother earth,
"As if she for no purpose bore you;
"As if you were her ?rst-born birth,
"And none had lived before you!"
One m thus, by Esthwaite lake,
When life was sweet I knew not why,
To me my good friend Matthew spake,
And thus I made reply.
"The eye it ot chuse but see,
"We ot bid the ear be still;
"Our bodies feel, whereer they be,
"Against, or with our will.
"Nor less I deem that there are powers,
"Which of themselves our minds impress,
"That we feed this mind of ours,
"In a wise passiveness.
"Think you, mid all this mighty sum
"Of things for ever speaking,
"That nothing of itself will e,
"But we must still be seeking?
"--Then ask not wherefore, here, alone,
"versing as I may,
"I sit upon this old grey stone,
"And dream my time away."