Hearing, I be not downcast or forlorn!-- Descend, prophetic Spirit![2] that inspir'st The human Soul of universal earth, Dreaming on things to come;[R] and dost possess 85 A metropolitan temple in the hearts Of mighty Poets: upon me bestow A gift of genuine insight; that my Song With star-like virtue in its place may shine, Shedding benignant influence, and secure, 90 Itself, from all malevolent effect Of those mutations that extend their sway Throughout the nether sphere!--And if with this I mix more lowly matter; with the thing Contemplated, describe the Mind and Man 95 Contemplating; and who, and what he was-- The transitory Being that beheld This Vision; when and where, and how he lived;-- Be not this labour useless. If such theme May sort with highest objects, then--dread Power! Whose gracious favour is the primal source 101 Of all illumination--may my Life Express the image of a better time, More wise desires, and simpler manners;--nurse My Heart in genuine freedom:--all pure thoughts 105 Be with me;--so shall thy unfailing love Guide, and support, and cheer me to the end!" VARIANTS: [Footnote 1: 1845. Holiest of Men.-- ... 1814. ] [Footnote 2: 1827. --Come thou prophetic Spirit, ... 1814. ] FOOTNOTES: [Footnote K: The grounds of Lowther Castle. Compare the sonnet in "Poems, composed or suggested during a Tour, in the Summer of 1833," beginning-- Lowther! in thy majestic Pile are seen. ED. ] [Footnote L: The Lowther stream, rising among the Shap Fells, joins the Emont at Brougham Castle.--ED.] [Footnote M: _The Prelude_.--ED.] [Footnote N: As they were--according to their Author's somewhat arbitrary classification--in the editions of 1815 and subsequent years.--ED.] [Footnote O: See _Paradise Lost_, book vii. l. 31.--ED.] [Footnote P: "Daughter of Zeus and Mnemosyne. She was regarded as the Muse of Astronomy, and was represented with a celestial globe, to which she points with a little staff" (Hirt. _Mythol. Bilderb._ p. 210).--ED.] [Footnote Q: Compare _The Prelude_, book i. l. 191 (see vol. iii. p. 138, notes * and ☨); Strabo, 1; Pliny, 6, c. 31 and 32; Horace, _Odes_ IV., 8, v. 27; Plutarch, _The Life of Sertorius_.--ED.] [Footnote R: See Wordsworth's note (p. 383).--ED.] Book First THE WANDERER[S] ARGUMENT _A summer forenoon--The Author reaches a ruined Cottage upon a Common, and there meets with a revered Friend, the Wanderer, of whose education and course of life he gives an account[3]--The Wanderer, while resting under the shade of the Trees that surround the Cottage, relates the History of its last Inhabitant._