Hither, the gray and shapely church beside, At sandy Hingham, by the sounding sea, From the disturbing town escaped thus wide, I’m come, from all encumbering care set free, To raise the choral song, with friends discourse, Roam the wide fields for flowers, or seaward sail, Or to Cohasset’s strand repair, where hoarse Tumultuous surges chant their ceaseless tale; Or poesy entertain, grave Wordsworth’s lays, Melodious musing childhood’s glorious prime, Shakespeare’s warm sonnets or Venetian plays, Or that sad wizard Mariner’s marvellous Rime. Here in these haunts, this lovers’ company, Sweet Love’s symposium hold we happily. “_Books have always a secret influence on the understanding: we cannot at pleasure obliterate ideas; he that reads books of science, though without any desire for improvement, will grow more knowing; he that entertains himself with moral or religious treatises will imperceptibly advance to goodness; the ideas which are often offered to the mind will at last find a lucky moment when it is disposed to receive them_”. DR. JOHNSON. XIII. My Lady reads, with judgment and good taste, Books not too many, but the wisest, best, Pregnant with sentiment sincere and chaste, Rightly conceived were they and aptly dressed: These wells of learning tastes she at the source,-- Johnson’s poised periods, Fénelon’s deep sense, Taylor’s mellifluous and sage discourse, Majestic Milton’s epic eloquence,-- Nor these alone her thoughts do all engage, But classic authors of the modern time, And the great masters of the ancient age, In prose alike and of the lofty rhyme: Montaigne and Cowper, Plutarch’s gallery, Blind Homer’s Iliad and his Odyssey. “_Ye blessed creatures, I have heard the call Ye to each other make: I see The heavens laugh with you in your jubilee; My heart is at your festival, My head hath its coronal, The fulness of your bliss I feel--I feel it all._” WORDSWORTH. XIV. Not Wordsworth’s genius, Pestalozzi’s love, The stream have sounded of clear infancy. Baptismal waters from the Head above These babes I foster daily are to me; I dip my pitcher in these living springs And draw, from depths below, sincerity; Unsealed, mine eyes behold all outward things Arrayed in splendors of divinity. What mount of vision can with mine compare? Not Roman Jove nor yet Olympian Zeus Darted from loftier ether through bright air One spark of holier fire for human use. Glad tidings thence these angels downward bring, As at their birth the heavenly choirs do sing.