“The eye--it cannot choose but see;We cannot bid the ear be still;Our bodies feel, where'er they be,Against or with our will.”

“One Lesson, Shepherd, let us two divide,Taught both by what she shews, and what conceals,Never to blend our pleasure or our prideWith sorrow of the meanest thing that feels.”

“With an eye made quiet by the power of harmony, and the deep power of joy, we see into the life of things.”

“The world is too much with us; late and soon,Getting and spending, we lay waste our powers;Little we see in Nature that is ours;We have given our hearts away, a sordid boon!This Sea that bares her bosom to the moon,The winds that will be howling at all hours,And are up-gathered now like sleeping flowers,For this, for everything, we are out of tune;It moves us not.—Great God! I'd rather beA Pagan suckled in a creed outworn; So might I, standing on this pleasant lea,Have glimpses that would make me less forlorn;Have sight of Proteus rising from the sea;Or hear old Triton blow his wreathed horn.”

“Dreams, books, are each a world; and books, we know,Are a substantial world, both pure and good:Round these, with tendrils strong as flesh and blood,Our pastime and our happiness will grow.”

“getting and spending, we lay waste our powers ~ but like lemmings running headlong to the sea, we are oblivious.”

“But trailing clouds of glory do we come from God, who is our home.”