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Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The soul that rises with us, our life's star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And cometh from afar. Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory, do we come From God, who is our home: Heaven lies about us in our infancy.

Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting: The soul that rises with us, our life's star, Hath had elsewhere its setting, And cometh from afar. Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory, do we come From God, who is our home: Heaven lies about us in our infancy.

Approximate author period: c. 1810 AD · industrial

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Attribution & collection notes
Author or tradition
William Wordsworth
Attribution: attributed
Country attributed
Not established
A country attribution does not establish the earliest origin.
Historical period
Approximate author period: c. 1810 AD · industrial
author lifetime midpoint
An author lifetime, approximate period or collection date is not necessarily the date when these words were first written or spoken.
Recorded source
Familiar Quotations, ninth edition (1905 printing) (1905 AD)

Ode. Intimations of Immortality. Stanza 5.

A collection's publication date can be later than the words it records.