No More Learning

O Friend! O Teacher! God's great Gift to me!
Into my Heart have I received that Lay
More than historic, that prophetic Lay
Wherein (high theme by thee first sung aright)
Of the foundations and the building up 5
Of thine own spirit thou hast loved to tell
What _may_ be told, by words revealable:
With heavenly breathings, like the secret soul
Of vernal growth, oft quickening in the heart
Thoughts, that obey no mastery of words, 10
Pure Self-beholdings! Theme as hard as high,
Of Smiles spontaneous and mysterious Fear!
The first born they of Reason and twin birth!
Of tides obedient to external force,
And currents self-determin'd, as might seem, 15
Or by some inner power! Of moments awful,
Now in thy hidden life, and now abroad,
When power stream'd from thee, and thy soul receiv'd
The light reflected, as a light bestow'd!
Of fancies fair, and milder hours of youth, 20
Hybloean murmurs of poetic thought
Industrious in its joy, in vales and glens
Native or outland, Lakes and famous Hills;
Or on the lonely high-road, when the stars
Were rising; or by secret mountain streams, 25
The guides and the companions of thy way!
Of more than Fancy--of the SOCIAL SENSE
Distending, and of Man belov'd as Man,
Where France in all her Towns lay vibrating,
Even as a Bark becalm'd on sultry seas 30
Quivers beneath the voice from Heaven, the burst
Of Heaven's immediate thunder, when no cloud
Is visible, or shadow on the main!
For thou wert there, thy own brows garlanded,
Amid the tremor of a Realm aglow! 35
Amid a mighty nation jubilant!
When from the general Heart of Human Kind
Hope sprang forth, like an armed Deity!
Of that dear Hope afflicted and struck down,
So summon'd homeward; thenceforth calm and sure, 40
As from the Watch-tower of Man's absolute Self,
With light unwaning on her eyes, to look
Far on--herself a Glory to behold,
The Angel of the Vision! Then (last strain)
Of Duty, chosen Laws controlling choice, 45
Action and Joy!
--an Orphic Tale indeed,
A Tale divine of high and passionate Thoughts,
To their own Music chaunted! --

A great Bard!
Ere yet the last strain dying awed the air,
With steadfast eyes I saw thee in the choir 50
Of ever-enduring men. The truly Great
Have all one age, and from one visible space
Shed influence: for they, both power and act,
Are permanent, and Time is not with them,
Save as it worketh for them, they in it. 55
Nor less a sacred Roll, than those of old,
And to be plac'd, as they, with gradual fame
Among the Archives of Mankind, thy Work
Makes audible a linked Song of Truth,
Of Truth profound a sweet continuous Song 60
Not learnt, but native, her own natural notes!
Dear shall it be to every human heart,
To me how more than dearest! Me, on whom
Comfort from thee, and utterance of thy Love,
Come with such Heights and Depths of Harmony 65
Such sense of Wings uplifting, that its might
Scatter'd and quell'd me, till my Thoughts became
A bodily Tumult; and thy faithful Hopes,
Thy Hopes of me, dear Friend! by me unfelt!
Were troublous to me, almost as a Voice 70
Familiar once and more than musical;
As a dear Woman's Voice to one cast forth, [A]
A Wanderer with a worn-out heart forlorn,
Mid Strangers pining with untended wounds.

O Friend! too well thou know'st, of what sad years 75
The long suppression had benumbed my soul,
That, even as Life returns upon the Drown'd,
The unusual Joy awoke a throng of Pains--
Keen Pangs of LOVE, awakening, as a Babe,
Turbulent, with an outcry in the Heart! 80
And Fears self-will'd, that shunn'd the eye of Hope,
And Hope, that scarce would know itself from Fear;
Sense of past youth, and manhood come in vain,
And Genius given and Knowledge won in vain;
And all, which I had cull'd in wood-walks wild, 85
And all, which patient Toil had rear'd, and all,
Commune with THEE had open'd out--but Flowers
Strew'd on my Corse, and borne upon my Bier,
In the same Coffin, for the self-same Grave!

That way no more! and ill beseems it me, 90
Who came a Welcomer, in Herald's Guise,
Singing of Glory and Futurity,
To wander back on such unhealthful road
Plucking the Poisons of Self-harm! And ill
Such intertwine beseems triumphal wreaths 95
Strew'd before thy advancing! Thou too, Friend!