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I see not one poor flower along This mossy * side , While , on the other , violets throng In sparkling pride . Perhaps , awhile , with heat oppress ed , Thou deem'st the shady side the best : If so , I think with thee the zest Of life is made
Most open to the alternate guest Of sun and shade . The secret is—if our proud clay Would moralize an insect's Jay—Through both alike to sing away , Whether across Joy ' s violet-tufts with sunbeams gay , Or Grief ' s damp moss .
But hark—the ploughman ' s cheery call , To me a sound of festival ! Even at the season of the Fall , Sweet , though scarce gay , When Nature's voices , each and all , Prelude decay .
How musical , then , in the Spring , When happy thoughts , like larks , take wing , And every glad and lovely thing Glows into birth , As Space were but the golden ring , The diamond—Earth !
" The sacred plough , " * thou well wert hail'd , By him whose loving hand unveil'd Beautiful Nature's face , nor fail ' d To fix a part Of what has evermore exhal'd—Not from my heart /
A sacred thing thou art in sooth , Memorial of the world ' s brief youth , Ere yet from the sown dragon ' s tooth The sword had sprung , When life was health , and song was truth , And love was young .
And still , wherever thou hast been , Thou hast brought with thee , fresh and keen , All we have left of Eden ' s green , Or Eden ' s air : Where limbs are strong , and brows serene , The plough is there .
% " In ancient times the sacred plough employ ed The kings and awful fathers of mankind . "—Thomson .
Monthly Repository (1806-1838) and Unitarian Chronicle (1832-1833), June 2, 1831, page 374, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/mruc/issues/vm2-ncseproduct2598/page/14/