In every brain Spreads the dominion of the sprightly juice, Through the wide world to madding Fancy dear, 1822. [165] See Wordsworth's note to the next Sonnet.--ED. XXI DISSOLUTION OF THE MONASTERIES Threats come which no submission may assuage, No sacrifice avert, no power dispute; The tapers shall be quenched, the belfries mute, And,'mid their choirs unroofed by selfish rage, The warbling wren shall find a leafy cage; 5 The gadding bramble hang her purple fruit; And the green lizard and the gilded newt Lead unmolested lives, and die of age.[166] The owl of evening and the woodland fox For their abode the shrines of Waltham choose:[167] 10 Proud Glastonbury can no more refuse To stoop her head before these desperate shocks-- She whose high pomp displaced, as story tells, Arimathean Joseph's wattled cells.[168] FOOTNOTES: [166] These two lines are adopted from a MS., written about the year 1770, which accidentally fell into my possession. The close of the preceding Sonnet on monastic voluptuousness is taken from the same source, as is the verse, "Where Venus sits," etc. [W. W. 1822], and the line, "Once ye were holy, ye are holy still," in a subsequent Sonnet.--W. W. 1837. [167] Waltham Abbey is in Essex, on the Lea.--ED. [168] Alluding to the Roman legend that Joseph of Arimathea brought Christianity into Britain, and built Glastonbury Church. See Part I. Sonnet II. (p. 5) and note [14].--ED. XXII THE SAME SUBJECT The lovely Nun (submissive, but more meek Through saintly habit than from effort due To unrelenting mandates that pursue With equal wrath the steps of strong and weak) Goes forth--unveiling timidly a cheek[169] 5 Suffused with blushes of celestial hue, While through the Convent's[170] gate to open view Softly she glides, another home to seek. Not Iris, issuing from her cloudy shrine, An Apparition more divinely bright! 10 Not more attractive to the dazzled sight Those watery glories, on the stormy brine Poured forth, while summer suns at distance shine, And the green vales lie hushed in sober light! FOOTNOTES: [169] 1837. ... her cheek 1822. [170] 1837. ... Convent ... 1822. XXIII CONTINUED