Page:The Excursion, Wordsworth, 1814.djvu/265

239 While thankless thousands are oppressed and clogged

By ease and leisure—by the very wealth

And pride of opportunity made poor;

While tens of thousands falter in their path,

And sink, through utter want of cheering light,

For you the hours of labour do not flag;

For you each Evening hath its shining Star,

And every Sabbath-day its golden Sun."

"Yes!" said the Solitary, with a smile

That seemed to break from an expanding heart,

"The untutored Bird may found, and so construct,

And with such soft materials line her nest,

Fixed in the centre of a prickly brake,

That the thorns wound her not; they only guard.

Powers, not unjustly likened to those gifts

Of happy instinct which the woodland Bird

Shares with her species, Nature's grace sometimes

Upon the Individual doth confer,

Among the higher creatures born and trained

To use of reason. And, I own, that tired

Of the ostentatious world—a swelling stage

With empty actions and vain passions stuffed,