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17.4: The World Is Too Much With Us by William Wordsworth

  • Page ID
    87435
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    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 be

    A 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 wreathèd horn.

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