ΤΟ WILLIAM WORDSWORTH, Esq. IN TOKEN OF DEEP RESPECT FOR HIS CHARACTER, AND FERVENT GRATITUDE FOR MORAL AND INTELLECTUAL BENEFIT DERIVED FROM REVERENTIAL COMMUNION WITH THE SPIRIT OF HIS POETRY, THIS VOLUME IS AFFECTIONATELY INSCRIBED, BY FELICIA HEMANS. (130) PREFACE. I TRUST I shall not be accused of presumption for the endeavour which I have here made to enlarge, in some degree, the sphere of Religious Poetry, by associating with its themes more of the emotions, the affections, and even the purer imaginative enjoyments of daily life, than may have been hitherto admitted within the hallowed circle. It has been my wish to portray the religious spirit, not alone in its meditative joys and solitary aspirations, (the poetic embodying of which seems to require from the reader a state of mind already separated and exalted,) but likewise in those active influences upon human life, so often called into victorious energy by trial and conflict, though too often also, like the upward-striving flame of a mountain watch-fire, borne down by tempest showers, or swayed by the current of opposing winds. I have sought to represent that spirit as penetrating the gloom of the prison and the deathbed, bearing "healing on its wings" to the agony of parting love-strengthening the heart of the wayfarer for "perils in the wilderness"-gladdening the domestic walk through field and woodland-and spring ing to life in the soul of childhood, along with its earliest rejoicing perceptions of natural beauty. Circumstances not altogether under my own control, have, for the present, interfered to prevent the fuller development of a plan which I yet hope more worthily to mature; and I lay this little volume before the public with that deep sense of deficiency which cannot be more impressively taught to human powers, than by their reverential application to things divine. 1834. F. H. Edith. Morn once again! Morn in the lone dim cell, The cavern of the prisoner's fever dream, And morn on all the green rejoicing hills, And the bright waters round the prisoner's home, From voices buried in a thousand trees, Through the dim starry hours. Now doth the lake VOL. VII. 12 (133) Darken and flash in rapid interchange Gomez. [GOMEZ, a Spanish priest, enters. Daughter, hail! I bring thee tidings. Edith. Heaven will aid my soul Calmly to meet whate'er thy lips announce. Gomez. Nay, lift a song of thanksgiving to Heaven, And bow thy knee down for deliverance won! Hast thou not pray'd for life? and wouldst thou not Once more be free? Edith. Have I not pray'd for life! With such a heart of tendrils? Heaven! thou know'st And a glad wanderer with the happy streams, |