Page:Poems and extracts - Wordsworth.djvu/111

Yet seeing thus the course of things must run
He looks thereon not strange, but as foredone.
And whilst distraught ambition compasses,
And is encompassed; whilst as craft deceives,50
And is deceived: Whilst man doth ransack man,
And builds on blood, and rises by distress;
And th' inheritance of Desolation leaves
To great-expecting hopes : He looks thereon,
As from the shore of peace, with unwet eye,
And bears no venture in impiety.
Thus, Madam, fares that man, who hath prepared
A rest for his desires; and sees all things
Beneath him; and hath learned this book of man,
Full of the notes of frailty; and compared60
The best of glory with her sufferings:
By whom, I see, you labour all you can
To plant your heart; and set your thoughts as near
His glorious mansion as your powers can bear.