Page:The Prelude, Wordsworth, 1850.djvu/317

 BOOK ELEVENTH.

FRANCE.—(.)

that time forth, Authority in France

Put on a milder face; Terror had ceased,

Yet every thing was wanting that might give

Courage to them who looked for good by light

Of rational Experience, for the shoots

And hopeful blossoms of a second spring:

Yet, in me, confidence was unimpaired;

The Senate's language, and the public acts

And measures of the Government, though both

Weak, and of heartless omen, had not power

To daunt me; in the People was my trust:

And, in the virtues which mine eyes had seen,

I knew that wound external could not take

Life from the young Republic; that new foes

Would only follow, in the path of shame,