Alas! what boots the long laborious quest
Of moral prudence, sought through good and ill;
Or pains[1] abstruse—to elevate the will,
And[2] lead us on to that transcendent rest
Where every passion shall the sway attest 5
Of Reason, seated on her sovereign hill;
What is it but a vain and curious skill,
If sapient Germany must lie deprest,
Beneath the brutal sword?—Her haughty Schools
Shall blush; and may not we with sorrow say, 10
A few strong instincts and a few plain rules,
Among the herdsmen of the Alps, have wrought
More for mankind at this unhappy day
Than all the pride of intellect and thought?
See the paper by Alois Brandl appended to this series of sonnets, [p. 218]. Wordsworth had probably no means of knowing anything of Fichte's "Addresses to the German Nation," delivered weekly in Berlin, from December 1807 to March 1808. (See Fichte, by Professor Adamson, pp. 84-91.)—Ed.
VARIANTS:
[1] 1815.
... pain ... 1809.
[2] 1815.
Or ... 1809.
FOOTNOTES:
[A] In The Friend, November 16, under the title, Sonnet suggested by the efforts of the Tyrolese, contrasted with the present state of Germany.—Ed.