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| NATURE, so far as in her lies, | |
| Imitates God, and turns her face | |
| To every land beneath the skies, | |
| Counts nothing that she meets with base, | |
| But lives and loves in every place; | 5 |
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| Fills out the homely quickset-screens, | |
| And makes the purple lilac ripe, | |
| Steps from her airy hill, and greens | |
| The swamp, where humm’d the dropping snipe, | |
| With moss and braided marish-pipe; | 10 |
| |
| And on thy heart a finger lays, | |
| Saying, “Beat quicker, for the time | |
| Is pleasant, and the woods and ways | |
| Are pleasant, and the beech and lime | |
| Put forth and feel a gladder clime.” | 15 |
| |
| And murmurs of a deeper voice, | |
| Going before to some far shrine, | |
| Teach that sick heart the stronger choice, | |
| Till all thy life one way incline, | |
| With one wide will that closes thine. | 20 |
| |
| And when the zoning eve has died | |
| Where yon dark valleys wind forlorn, | |
| Come Hope and Memory, spouse and bride, | |
| From out the borders of the morn, | |
| With that fair child betwixt them born. | 25 |
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| And when no mortal motion jars | |
| The blackness round the tombing sod, | |
| Thro’ silence and the trembling stars | |
| Comes Faith from tracts no feet have trod, | |
| And Virtue, like a household god | 30 |
| |
| Promising empire; such as those | |
| Once heard at dead of night to greet | |
| Troy’s wandering prince, so that he rose | |
| With sacrifice, while all the fleet | |
| Had rest by stony hills of Crete. | 35 |
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