Freedom! the deep breath!

The old Earth breathes deep and rhythmically, night and day, summer and winter; the cuckoo calls across the woodland, and the willow-wren warbles among the great chestnut buds; the laborer eases himself under a hedge, and the frog flops into the pond as the cows approach;

In the theatre Juliet from her balcony still bends in the moonlight, and Romeo leans up from the bushes below; in the pale dawn, still, faint with love he tears himself away; the great outlines of the fields and hills where you were born and grew up remain apparently unchanged.

If I am not level with the lowest I am nothing; and if I did not know for a certainty that the craziest sot in the village is my equal, and were not proud to have him walk with me as my friend, I would not write another word—for in this is my strength.

My thoughts are nothing, but I myself will reach my arms through time, constraining you.

* * * * *

These are the days which nourished and fed me so kindly and well; this is the place where I was born, the walls and roofs which are familiar to me, the windows out of which I have looked. This is the overshadowing love and care of parents; these are the faces and deeds, indelible, of brothers and sisters—closing round me like a wall—the early world in which I lay so long.

This is to-day: the little ship lies ready, the fresh air blowing, the sunlight pouring over the world. These are the gates of all cities and habitations standing open; this is the love of men and women accompanying me wherever I go; these are the sacred memories of that early world, time may never change.

And this is the word which swells the bosom of the hills and feeds the sacred laughter of the streams, for man: the purpose which endures for you in those old fields and hills and the sphinx-glance of the stars.