Page:The Prelude, Wordsworth, 1850.djvu/359

BOOK XIII.] Were re-established now those watchful thoughts

Which, seeing little worthy or sublime

In what the Historian's pen so much delights

To blazon—power and energy detached

From moral purpose—early tutored me

To look with feelings of fraternal love

Upon the unassuming things that hold

A silent station in this beauteous world.

Thus moderated, thus composed, I found

Once more in Man an object of delight,

Of pure imagination, and of love;

And, as the horizon of my mind enlarged,

Again I took the intellectual eye

For my instructor, studious more to see

Great truths, than touch and handle little ones.

Knowledge was given accordingly; my trust

Became more firm in feelings that had stood

The test of such a trial; clearer far

My sense of excellence—of right and wrong:

The promise of the present time retired

Into its true proportion; sanguine schemes,

Ambitious projects, pleased me less; I sought

For present good in life's familiar face,

And built thereon my hopes of good to come.