I sang--Let myriads of bright flowers, Like Thee, in field and grove Revive unenvied;--mightier far, Than tremblings that reprove Our vernal tendencies to hope, 35 Is[688] God's redeeming love; That love which changed--for wan disease, For sorrow that had bent O'er hopeless dust, for withered age-- Their moral element, 40 And turned the thistles of a curse To types beneficent. Sin-blighted though we are, we too, The reasoning Sons of Men, From one oblivious winter called 45 Shall rise, and breathe again; And in eternal summer lose Our threescore years and ten. To humbleness of heart descends This prescience from on high, 50 The faith that elevates the just, Before and when they die; And makes each soul a separate heaven, A court for Deity. FOOTNOTES: [686] 1835. ... lonely front 1836. The edition of 1841 returns to the text of 1835. [687] In Dorothy Wordsworth's Grasmere Journal the following occurs:--April 24, 1802.--"We walked in the evening to Rydal. Coleridge and I lingered behind. We all stood to look at Glow-worm Rock--a primrose that grew there, and just looked out on the road from its own sheltered bower." The Primrose had disappeared when the Fenwick note was dictated, and Glow-worms have now almost deserted the district; but the _Rock_ is unmistakable, and it is one of the most interesting spots connected with Wordsworth in the Lake District.--ED. [688] 1836. In ... 1835. TO B. R. HAYDON, ON SEEING HIS PICTURE OF NAPOLEON BONAPARTE ON THE ISLAND OF ST. HELENA Composed 1831.--Published 1832 [This Sonnet, though said to be written on seeing the Portrait of Napoleon, was, in fact, composed some time after, extempore, in the wood at Rydal Mount.--I.F.] Haydon! let worthier judges praise the skill Here by thy pencil shown in truth of lines And charm of colours; _I_ applaud those signs Of thought, that give the true poetic thrill; That unencumbered whole of blank and still, 5 Sky without cloud--ocean without a wave; And the one Man that laboured to enslave The World, sole-standing high on the bare hill-- Back turned, arms folded, the unapparent face Tinged, we may fancy, in this dreary place 10 With light reflected from the invisible sun Set, like his fortunes; but not set for aye Like them. The unguilty Power pursues his way, And before _him_ doth dawn perpetual run.[689] FOOTNOTES: [689] Haydon, as he tells us in his Autobiography, received a commission from Sir Robert Peel, in December 1830, "to paint Napoleon musing, the size of life." He finished it in June 1831, and thus described it himself:--