Read "Inscription" by William Wordsworth online for free on Textopian. Full text with search, annotations, highlights, and AI-powered reading aids.
If Thou in the dear love of some one Friend / Hast been so happy, that thou know'st what thoughts / Will, sometimes, in the happiness of love / Make the heart sick, then wilt thou reverence / This quiet spot.
-- St. Herbert hither came, / And here, for many seasons, from the world / Removed, and the affections of the world, / He dwelt in solitude.
-- But he had left / A Fellow-labourer, whom the good Man loved / As his own soul. And, when within his cave / Alone he knelt before the crucifix / While o'er the Lake the cataract of Lodore / Pealed to his orisons, and when he paced / Along the beach of this small isle and thought / Of his Companion, he would pray that both / Might die in the same moment. Nor in vain / So prayed he: -- as our Chronicles report, / Though here the Hermit numbered his last days, / Far from St. Cuthbert his beloved Friend, / Those holy Men both died in the same hour.