The Tables Turned

Up! up! my Friend, and quit your books;Or surely you’ll grow double:Up! up! my Friend, and clear your looks;Why all this toil and trouble? The sun above the mountain’s head,A freshening lustre mellowThrough all the long green fields has spread,His first sweet evening yellow. Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife:Come, hear the woodland linnet,How sweet his music! on my life,There’s more of wisdom in it. And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!He, too, is no mean preacher:Come forth into the light of things,Let Nature be your teacher. She has a world of ready wealth,Our minds and hearts to bless–Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,Truth breathed by cheerfulness. One impulse from a vernal woodMay teach you more of man,Of moral evil and of good,Than all the sages can. Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;Our meddling intellectMis-shapes the beauteous forms of things:–We murder to dissect. Enough of Science and of Art;Close up those barren leaves;Come forth, and bring with you a heartThat watches and receives.