One summer evening (led by her) I found
  A little boat tied to a willow tree
  Within a rocky cave, [e] its usual home. 
  Straight I unloosed her chain, and stepping in 360
  Pushed from the shore.  It was an act of stealth
  And troubled pleasure, nor without the voice
  Of mountain-echoes did my boat move on;
  Leaving behind her still, on either side,
  Small circles glittering idly in the moon, 365
  Until they melted all into one track
  Of sparkling light.  But now, like one who rows,
  Proud of his skill, to reach a chosen point
  With an unswerving line, I fixed my view
  Upon the summit of a craggy ridge, 370
  The horizon’s utmost boundary; far above
  Was nothing but the stars and the grey sky. 
  She was an elfin pinnace; lustily
  I dipped my oars into the silent lake,
  And, as I rose upon the stroke, my boat 375
  Went heaving through the water like a swan;
  When, from behind that craggy steep till then
  The horizon’s bound, a huge peak, black and huge,
  As if with voluntary power instinct
  Upreared its head. [f] I struck and struck again, 380
  And growing still in stature the grim shape
  Towered up between me and the stars, and still,
  For so it seemed, with purpose of its own
  And measured motion like a living thing,
  Strode after me.  With trembling oars I turned, 385
  And through the silent water stole my way
  Back to the covert of the willow tree;
  There in her mooring-place I left my bark,—­
  And through the meadows homeward went, in grave
  And serious mood; but after I had seen 390
  That spectacle, for many days, my brain
  Worked with a dim and undetermined sense
  Of unknown modes of being; o’er my thoughts
  There hung a darkness, call it solitude
  Or blank desertion.  No familiar shapes 395
  Remained, no pleasant images of trees,
  Of sea or sky, no colours of green fields;
  But huge and mighty forms, that do not live
  Like living men, moved slowly through the mind
  By day, and were a trouble to my dreams. 400

    Wisdom and Spirit of the universe! 
  Thou Soul that art the eternity of thought,
  That givest to forms and images a breath
  And everlasting motion, not in vain
  By day or star-light thus from my first dawn 405
  Of childhood didst thou intertwine for me
  The passions that build up our human soul;
  Not with the mean and vulgar works of man,
  But with high objects, with enduring things—­
  With life and nature, purifying thus 410
  The elements of feeling and of thought,
  And sanctifying, by such discipline,