Hence have I genial seasons; hence have I
Smooth passions, smooth discourse, and joyous thought.
Left to herself, the mind can expatiate in those kingdoms of the
spirit bequeathed to us by past generations and distant men, which
to the idle are but a garden of idleness, but to those who choose it
become a true possession and an ever widening home. Among those
"nobler loves and nobler cares" there is excitement without reaction,
there is an unwearied and impersonal joy--a joy which can only be
held cheap because it is so abundant, and can only disappoint us
through our own incapacity to contain it. These delights of study
and of solitude Wordsworth enjoyed to the full. In no other poet,
perhaps, have the poet's heightened sensibilities been productive of
a pleasure so unmixed with pain. The wind of his emotions blew right
abaft; he "swam smoothly in the stream of his nature, and lived but
one man."
The blessing of meditative and lonely hours must of course be
purchased by corresponding limitations. Wordsworth's conception of
human character retained to the end an extreme simplicity. Many of
life's most impressive phenomena were hid from his eyes. He never
encountered any of those rare figures whose aspect seems to justify
all traditions of pomp and pre-eminence when they appear amid
stately scenes as with a natural sovereignty.
Pages:
63
64
65
66
67
68
69
70
71
72
73
74
75
76
77
78
79
80
81
82
83
84
85
86
87