Included by Wordsworth among his “Poems founded on the Affections.”—­Ed.

  The peace which others seek they find;
  The heaviest storms not longest last;
  Heaven grants even to the guiltiest mind
  An amnesty for what is past;
  When will my sentence be reversed? 5
  I only pray to know the worst;
  And wish as if my heart would burst.

  O weary struggle! silent years
  Tell seemingly no doubtful tale;
  And yet they leave it short, and fears 10
  And hopes are strong and will prevail. 
  My calmest faith escapes not pain;
  And, feeling that the hope is vain,
  I think that he will come again.

* * * * *

REPENTANCE

A PASTORAL BALLAD

Composed 1804.—­Published 1820

[Written at Town-end, Grasmere.  Suggested by the conversation of our next neighbour, Margaret Ashburner.—­I.  F.]

This “next neighbour” is constantly referred to in Dorothy Wordsworth’s Grasmere Journal.

Included in 1820 among the “Poems of Sentiment and Reflection”; in 1827, and afterwards, it was classed with those “founded on the Affections.”—­Ed.

  The fields which with covetous spirit we sold,
  Those beautiful fields, the delight of the day,
  Would have brought us more good than a burthen of gold, [1]
  Could we but have been as contented as they.

  When the troublesome Tempter beset us, said I, 5
  “Let him come, with his purse proudly grasped in his hand;
  But, Allan, be true to me, Allan,—­we’ll die [2]
  Before he shall go with an inch of the land!”

  There dwelt we, as happy as birds in their bowers;
  Unfettered as bees that in gardens abide; 10
  We could do what we liked [3] with the land, it was ours;
  And for us the brook murmured that ran by its side.

  But now we are strangers, go early or late;
  And often, like one overburthened with sin,
  With my hand on the latch of the half-opened gate, [4] 15
  I look at the fields, but [5] I cannot go in!

  When I walk by the hedge on a bright summer’s day,
  Or sit in the shade of my grandfather’s tree,
  A stern face it puts on, as if ready to say,
  “What ails you, that you must come creeping to me!” 20

  With our pastures about us, we could not be sad;
  Our comfort was near if we ever were crost;
  But the comfort, the blessings, and wealth that we had,
  We slighted them all,—­and our birth-right was lost. [6]

  Oh, ill-judging sire of an innocent son 25
  Who must now be a wanderer! but peace to that strain! 
  Think of evening’s repose when our labour was done,
  The sabbath’s return; and its leisure’s soft chain!