Page:The Excursion, Wordsworth, 1814.djvu/211

185 And offered, far as frailty would allow,

My heart a daily sacrifice to Truth,

I now affirm of Nature and of Truth,

Whom I have served, that their

Revolts, offended at the ways of Men

Swayed by such motives, to such end employed;

Philosophers, who, when the human Soul

Is of a thousand faculties composed,

And twice ten thousand interests, do yet prize

This Soul, and the transcendent Universe,

No more than as a Mirror that reflects

To proud Self-love her own intelligence;

That one, poor, finite Object, in the Abyss

Of infinite Being, twinkling restlessly!

Nor higher place can be assigned to Him

And his Compeers—the laughing Sage of France.—

Crowned was He, if my Memory doth not err,

With laurel planted upon hoary hairs,

In sign of conquest by his Wit atchieved,

And benefits his Wisdom had conferred.

His tottering Body was oppressed with flowers;

Far less becoming ornaments than those