THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, VOL. 8 (Completed)

"THE UNREMITTING VOICE OF NIGHTLY STREAMS"

Composed 1846.--Published 1850

One of the "Poems of Sentiment and Reflection."--ED.

The unremitting voice of nightly streams

That wastes so oft, we think, its tuneful powers,

If neither soothing to the worm that gleams

Through dewy grass, nor small birds hushed in bowers,

Nor unto silent leaves and drowsy flowers,--

That voice of unpretending harmony

(For who what is shall measure by what seems

To be, or not to be,[309]

Or tax high Heaven with prodigality?)

Wants not a healing influence that can creep

Into the human breast, and mix with sleep

To regulate the motion of our dreams

For kindly issues--as through every clime

Was felt near murmuring brooks in earliest time;

As at this day, the rudest swains who dwell

Where torrents roar, or hear the tinkling knell

Of water-breaks, with grateful heart could tell.

[309] Hamlet, act III. scene i. l. 56.--ED.