ARGUMENT OF THE SIXTH BOOK. Bells at a distance.-Their effect.—A fine noon in winter.-A sheltered walk.—Meditation better than books.Our familiarity with the course of nature makes it appear less wonderful than it is.-The transformation that spring effects in a shrubbery described. A mistake concerning the course of nature corrected.-God maintains it by an unremitted act.—The amusements fashionable at this hour of the day reproved.Animals happy, a delightful sight.-Origin of cruelty to animals.-That it is a great crime proved from scripture. That proof illustrated by a tale.-A line drawn between the lawful and unlawful destruction of them.—Their good and useful properties insisted on.—Apology for the encomiums bestowed by the author on animals.-Instances of man's extravagant praise of man. The groans of the creation shall have an end-A view taken of the restoration of all things. An invocation and an invitation of him who shall bring it to pass.-The retired man vindicated from the charge of uselessness-Con clusion. BOOK VI. THE WINTER WALK AT NOON. T HERE is in souls a sympathy with sounds; 5 In cadence sweet, now dying all away, 10 With easy force it opens all the cells Where memory slept. Wherever I have heard A kindred melody, the scene recurs, And with it all its pleasures and its pains. Such comprehensive views the spirit takes, 15 That in a few short moments I retrace (As in a map the voyager his course) The windings of my way through many years. It seem'd not always short; the rugged path 20 Mov'd many a sigh at its disheartening length, 25 A father, whose authority, in show 30 When most severe, and mustering all its force, Was but the graver countenance of love; Whose favour, like the clouds of spring, might lower, And utter now and then an awful voice, 35 But had a blessing in its darkest frown, And, seeking grace to improve the prize they hold, 55 The night was winter in his roughest mood; The morning sharp and clear. But now at noon Upon the southern side of the slant hills, And where the woods fence off the northern blast, 60 And through the trees I view the embattled tower The walk, still verdant, under oaks and elms, The frequent flakes, has kept a path for me. 75 No noise is here, or none that hinders thought. The redbreast warbles still, but is content With slender notes, and more than half suppress'd : 80 Here the heart, From spray to spray, where'er he rests he shakes The mere materials with which wisdom buiids, Knowledge is proud that he has learn'd so much; Books are not seldom talismans and spells, By which the magic art of shrewder wits 100 Surrender judgment, hood-wink'd. Some the style Of error leads them by a tune entranc'd. While sloth seduces more, too weak to bear 105 The insupportable fatigue of thought, And swallowing, therefore, without pause or choice, The total grist unsifted, husks and all, But trees, and rivulets whose rapid course Defies the check of winter, haunts of deer, 110 And sheep-walks populous with bleating lambs, And lanes in which the primrose ere her time Peeps through the moss that clothes the hawthorn root, Deceive no student. Wisdom there, and truth, Not shy, as in the world, and to be won 115 The roving thought, and fix it on themselves. What prodigies can power divine perform More grand than it produces year by year, And all in sight of inattentive man? 120 And, in the constancy of nature's course, See nought to wonder at. Should God again, 125 As once in Gibeon, interrupt the race Of the undeviating and punctual sun, How would the world admire! but speaks it less An agency divine, to make him know His moment when to sink and when to rise, 130 Age after age, then to arrest his course? Where now the vital energy that mov'd, While summer was, the pure and subtile lymph 135 Through the imperceptible meandring veins Of leaf and flower? It sleeps; and the icy touch A cold stagnation on the intestine tide. But let the months go round, a few short months, 140 And all shall be restor'd. These naked shoots, Barren as lances, among which the wind Makes wintry music, sighing as it goes, Shall put their graceful foliage on again, And, more aspiring, and with ampler spread, 145 Shall boast new charms, and more than they have lost. And of an humbler growth, the * other tall, And throwing up into the darkest gloom 155 The lilac, various in array, now while, Now sanguine, and her beautecus head now set Studious of ornament, yet unresolv'd 160 Which hue she most approv'd, she chose them all; Copious of flow'rs the woodbine, pale and wan, With never-cloying odours, early and late; *The Guelder-rose. |