To nurse that immaterial fire,
From whose most healthful warmth proceed
Each real joy and generous deed;
Which, once extinct, no toil or pain
Can kindle into life again,
To light the then unvarying eye,
To melt, in question or reply,
Those tones, so subtil and so sweet,
That none can look for, none repeat;
Which, self-impell'd, defy controul,--
They bear the signet of the soul;
And, as attendants of their flight,
Enforce persuasion and delight.

Words that an instant have reclin'd
Upon the pillow of the mind,
Or caught, upon their rapid way,
The beams of intellectual day,
Pour fresh upon the thirsty ear,
O'erjoy'd, and all awake to hear,
Proof that in other hearts is known
The secret language of our own.
They to the way-worn pilgrim bring
A draught from Rapture's sparkling spring;
And, ever welcome, are, when given,
Like some few scatter'd flowers from heaven;
Could such in earthly garlands twine,
To bloom by others less divine.

Where does this idle Minstrel stay?