Page:Poems and extracts - Wordsworth.djvu/111

 Yet seeing thus the course of things must run He looks thereon not strange, but as foredone. And whilst distraught ambition compasses, And is encompassed; whilst as craft deceives, And is deceived: Whilst man doth ransack man, And builds on blood, and rises by distress; And th' inheritance of Desolation leaves To great-expecting hopes : He looks thereon, As from the shore of peace, with unwet eye, And bears no venture in impiety. Thus, Madam, fares that man, who hath prepared A rest for his desires; and sees all things Beneath him; and hath learned this book of man, Full of the notes of frailty; and compared The best of glory with her sufferings: By whom, I see, you labour all you can To plant your heart; and set your thoughts as near His glorious mansion as your powers can bear. Rh