Delphi Complete Works of William Wordsworth

by William Wordsworth

  Five years have passed; five summers, with the length

  Of five long winters! and again I hear

  These waters, rolling from their mountain-springs

  With a sweet inland murmur. — Once again

  Do I behold these steep and lofty cliffs,

  Which on a wild secluded scene impress

  Thoughts of more deep seclusion; and connect

  The landscape with the quiet of the sky.

  The day is come when I again repose

  Here, under this dark sycamore, and view

  These plots of cottage-ground, these orchard-tufts,

  Which, at this season, with their unripe fruits,

  Among the woods and copses lose themselves,

  Nor, with their green and simple hue, disturb

  The wild green landscape. Once again I see

  These hedge-rows, hardly hedge-rows, little lines

  Of sportive wood run wild; these pastoral farms

  Green to the very door; and wreathes of smoke

  Sent up, in silence, from among the trees,

  With some uncertain notice, as might seem,

  Of vagrant dwellers in the houseless woods,

  Or of some hermit’s cave, where by his fire

  The hermit sits alone.

  Though absent long,

  These forms of beauty have not been to me,

  As is a landscape to a blind man’s eye:

  But oft, in lonely rooms, and mid the din

  Of towns and cities, I have owed to them,

  In hours of weariness, sensations sweet,

  Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart,

  And passing even into my purer mind

  With tranquil restoration: — feelings too

  Of unremembered pleasure; such, perhaps,

  As may have had no trivial influence

  On that best portion of a good man’s life;

  His little, nameless, unremembered acts

  Of kindness and of love. Nor less, I trust,

  To them I may have owed another gift,

  Of aspect more sublime; that blessed mood,

  In which the burthen of the mystery,

  In which the heavy and the weary weight

  Of all this unintelligible world

  Is lighten’d: — that serene and blessed mood,

  In which the affections gently lead us on,

  Until, the breath of this corporeal frame,

  And even the motion of our human blood

  Almost suspended, we are laid asleep

  In body, and become a living soul:

  While with an eye made quiet by the power

  Of harmony, and the deep power of joy,

  We see into the life of things.

  If this

  Be but a vain belief, yet, oh! how oft,

  In darkness, and amid the many shapes

  Of joyless day-light; when the fretful stir

  Unprofitable, and the fever of the world,

  Have hung upon the beatings of my heart,

  How oft, in spirit, have I turned to thee

  O sylvan Wye! Thou wanderer through the woods,

  How often has my spirit turned to thee!

  And now, with gleams of half-extinguish’d thought,

  With many recognitions dim and faint,

  And somewhat of a sad perplexity,

  The picture of the mind revives again:

  While here I stand, not only with the sense

  Of present pleasure, but with pleasing thoughts

  That in this moment there is life and food

  For future years. And so I dare to hope

  Though changed, no doubt, from what I was, when first

  I came among these hills; when like a roe

  I bounded o’er the mountains, by the sides

  Of the deep rivers, and the lonely streams,

  Wherever nature led; more like a man

  Flying from something that he dreads, than one

  Who sought the thing he loved. For nature then

  (The coarser pleasures of my boyish days,

  And their glad animal movements all gone by,)

  To me was all in all. — I cannot paint

  What then I was. The sounding cataract

  Haunted me like a passion: the tall rock,

  The mountain, and the deep and gloomy wood,

  Their colours and their forms, were then to me

  An appetite: a feeling and a love,

  That had no need of a remoter charm,

  By thought supplied, or any interest

  Unborrowed from the eye. — That time is past,

  And all its aching joys are now no more,

  And all its dizzy raptures. Not for this

  Faint I, nor mourn nor murmur: other gifts

  Have followed, for such loss, I would believe,

  Abundant recompence. For I have learned

  To look on nature, not as in the hour

  Of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes

  The still, sad music of humanity,

  Not harsh nor grating, though of ample power

  To chasten and subdue. And I have felt

  A presence that disturbs me with the joy

  Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime

  Of something far more deeply interfused,

  Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,

  And the round ocean, and the living air,

  And the blue sky, and in the mind of man,

  A motion and a spirit, that impels

  All thinking things, all objects of all thought,

  And rolls through all things. Therefore am I still

  A lover of the meadows and the woods,

  And mountains; and of all that we behold

  From this green earth; of all the mighty world

  Of eye and ear, both what they half-create,

  And what perceive; well pleased to recognize

  In nature and the language of the sense,

  The anchor of my purest thoughts, the nurse,

  The guide, the guardian of my heart, and soul

  Of all my moral being.

  Nor, perchance,

  If I were not thus taught, should I the more

  Suffer my genial spirits to decay:

  For thou art with me, here, upon the banks

  Of this fair river; thou, my dearest Friend,

  My dear, dear Friend, and in thy voice I catch

  The language of my former heart, and read

  My former pleasures in the shooting lights

  Of thy wild eyes. Oh! yet a little while

  May I behold in thee what I was once,

  My dear, dear Sister! And this prayer I make,

  Knowing that Nature never did betray

  The heart that loved her; ‘tis her privilege,

  Through all the years of this our life, to lead

  From joy to joy: for she can so inform

  The mind that is within us, so impress

  With quietness and beauty, and so feed

  With lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues,

  Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men,

  Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor all

  The dreary intercourse of daily life,

  Shall e’er prevail against us, or disturb

  Our chearful faith that all which we behold

  Is full of blessings. Therefore let the moon

  Shine on thee in thy solitary walk;

  And let the misty mountain winds be free

  To blow against thee: and in after years,

  When these wild ecstasies shall be matured

  Into a sober pleasure, when thy mind

  Shall be a mansion for all lovely forms,

  Thy memory be as a dwelling-place

  For all sweet sounds and harmonies; Oh! then,

  If solitude, or fear, or pain, or grief,

  Should be thy portion, with what healing thoughts

  Of tender joy w
ilt thou remember me,

  And these my exhortations! Nor, perchance,

  If I should be, where I no more can hear

  Thy voice, nor catch from thy wild eyes these gleams

  Of past existence, wilt thou then forget

  That on the banks of this delightful stream

  We stood together; and that I, so long

  A worshipper of Nature, hither came,

  Unwearied in that service: rather say

  With warmer love, oh! with far deeper zeal

  Of holier love. Nor wilt thou then forget,

  That after many wanderings, many years

  Of absence, these steep woods and lofty cliffs,

  And this green pastoral landscape, were to me

  More dear, both for themselves, and for thy sake.

  LYRICAL BALLADS, WITH OTHER POEMS

  Published two years later in 1800, the second edition of Lyrical Ballads features additional poems by Wordsworth and the poem Love by Coleridge. The collection also included a preface, detailing the two poets’ avowed poetical principles, which is now recognised as being one of the most monumental works in the history of English poetry, regarded as a manifesto for what would later be termed the Romantic movement.

  Samuel Taylor Coleridge, (1772-1834), Wordsworth’s close friend and collaborator

  CONTENTS

  VOLUME I

  EXPOSTULATION AND REPLY.

  THE TABLES TURNED;

  ANIMAL TRANQUILLITY & DECAY

  THE COMPLAINT OF A FORSAKEN INDIAN WOMAN.

  THE LAST OF THE FLOCK.

  LINES

  FOSTER-MOTHER. (COLERIDGE)

  GOODY BLAKE & HARRY GILL

  THE THORN.

  WE ARE SEVEN.

  ANECDOTE FOR FATHERS.

  LINES WRITTEN AT A SMALL DISTANCE FROM MY HOUSE, AND SENT BY MY LITTLE BOY TO THE PERSON TO WHOM THEY ARE ADDRESSED.

  THE FEMALE VAGRANT

  THE DUNGEON. (COLERIDGE)

  SIMON LEE, THE OLD HUNTSMAN.

  LINES WRITTEN IN EARLY SPRING.

  THE NIGHTINGALE. (COLERIDGE)

  LINES WRITTEN WHEN SAILING IN A BOAT AT EVENING.

  LINES WRITTEN NEAR RICHMOND UPON THE THAMES.

  THE IDIOT BOY.

  LOVE. (COLERIDGE)

  THE MAD MOTHER.

  THE ANCIENT MARINER. (COLERIDGE)

  LINES WRITTEN A FEW MILES ABOVE TINTERN ABBEY, ON REVISITING THE BANKS OF THE WYE DURING A TOUR.

  VOLUME II

  HART-LEAP WELL

  THE BROTHERS.

  ELLEN IRWIN.

  SONG: SHE DWELT AMONG TH’ UNTRODDEN WAYS

  THE WATERFALL AND THE EGLANTINE.

  THE OAK AND THE BROOM.

  LUCY GRAY.

  THE IDLE SHEPHERD-BOYS.

  POOR SUSAN.

  INSCRIPTION FOR THE SPOT WHERE THE HERMITAGE STOOD ON ST. HERBERT’S ISLAND, DERWENT-WATER.

  INSCRIPTION FOR THE HOUSE ON THE ISLAND AT GRASMERE.

  TO A SEXTON.

  ANDREW JONES.

  THE TWO THIEVES.

  SONG FOR THE WANDERING JEW.

  RUTH.

  LINES WRITTEN WITH A SLATE-PENCIL UPON A STONE, THE LARGEST OF A HEAP LYING NEAR A DESERTED QUARRY, UPON ONE OF THE ISLANDS AT RYDALE.

  THE FOUNTAIN.

  NUTTING.

  WRITTEN IN GERMANY, ON ONE OF THE COLDEST DAYS OF THE CENTURY.

  THE CHILDLESS FATHER.

  THE OLD CUMBERLAND BEGGAR.

  RURAL ARCHITECTURE.

  A POET’S EPITAPH.

  A CHARACTER IN THE ANTITHETICAL MANNER.

  A FRAGMENT

  POEMS ON THE NAMING OF PLACES.

  MICHAEL: A PASTORAL POEM.

  Wordsworth, aged 35. Interestingly, the poet complained the portrait made him appear ‘too handsome’.

  The first edition of both volumes of ‘Lyrical Ballads’

  PREFACE.

  The First Volume of these Poems has already been submitted to general perusal. It was published, as an experiment which, I hoped, might be of some use to ascertain, how far, by fitting to metrical arrangement a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation, that sort of pleasure and that quantity of pleasure may be imparted, which a Poet may rationally endeavour to impart.

  I had formed no very inaccurate estimate of the probable effect of those Poems: I flattered myself that they who should be pleased with them would read them with more than common pleasure: and on the other hand I was well aware that by those who should dislike them they would be read with more than common dislike. The result has differed from my expectation in this only, that I have pleased a greater number, than I ventured to hope I should please.

  For the sake of variety and from a consciousness of my own weakness I was induced to request the assistance of a Friend, who furnished me with the Poems of the ANCIENT MARINER, the FOSTER-MOTHER’S TALE, the NIGHTINGALE, the DUNGEON, and the Poem entitled LOVE. I should not, however, have requested this assistance, had I not believed that the poems of my Friend would in a great measure have the same tendency as my own, and that, though there would be found a difference, there would be found no discordance in the colours of our style; as our opinions on the subject of poetry do almost entirely coincide.

  Several of my Friends are anxious for the success of these Poems from a belief, that if the views, with which they were composed, were indeed realized, a class of Poetry would be produced, well adapted to interest mankind permanently, and not unimportant in the multiplicity and in the quality of its moral relations: and on this account they have advised me to prefix a systematic defence of the theory, upon which the poems were written. But I was unwilling to undertake the task, because I knew that on this occasion the Reader would look coldly upon my arguments, since I might be suspected of having been principally influenced by the selfish and foolish hope of reasoning him into an approbation of these particular Poems: and I was still more unwilling to undertake the task, because adequately to display my opinions and fully to enforce my arguments would require a space wholly disproportionate to the nature of a preface. For to treat the subject with the clearness and coherence, of which I believe it susceptible, it would be necessary to give a full account of the present state of the public taste in this country, and to determine how far this taste is healthy or depraved; which again could not be determined, without pointing out, in what manner language and the human mind act and react on each other, and without retracing the revolutions not of literature alone but likewise of society itself. I have therefore altogether declined to enter regularly upon this defence; yet I am sensible, that there would be some impropriety in abruptly obtruding upon the Public, without a few words of introduction, Poems so materially different from those, upon which general approbation is at present bestowed.

  It is supposed, that by the act of writing in verse an Author makes a formal engagement that he will gratify certain known habits of association, that he not only thus apprizes the Reader that certain classes of ideas and expressions will be found in his book, but that others will be carefully excluded. This exponent or symbol held forth by metrical language must in different aeras of literature have excited very different expectations: for example, in the age of Catullus Terence and Lucretius, and that of Statius or Claudian, and in our own country, in the age of Shakespeare and Beaumont and Fletcher, and that of Donne and Cowley, or Dryden, or Pope. I will not take upon me to determine the exact import of the promise which by the act of writing in verse an Author in the present day makes to his Reader; but I am certain it will appear to many persons that I have not fulfilled the terms of an engagement thus voluntarily contracted. I hope therefore the Reader will not censure me, if I attempt to state what I have proposed to myself to perform, and also, (as far as the limits of a preface will permit) to explain some of the chief reasons which have determined me in the choice of my purpose: that at least he may be spared any unpleasant feeling of disappointment, and that I myself may be protected from the most dishonorab
le accusation which can be brought against an Author, namely, that of an indolence which prevents him from endeavouring to ascertain what is his duty, or, when his duty is ascertained prevents him from performing it.

  The principal object then which I proposed to myself in these Poems was to make the incidents of common life interesting by tracing in them, truly though not ostentatiously, the primary laws of our nature: chiefly as far as regards the manner in which we associate ideas in a state of excitement. Low and rustic life was generally chosen because in that situation the essential passions of the heart find a better soil in which they can attain their maturity, are less under restraint, and speak a plainer and more emphatic language; because in that situation our elementary feelings exist in a state of greater simplicity and consequently may be more accurately contemplated and more forcibly communicated; because the manners of rural life germinate from those elementary feelings; and from the necessary character of rural occupations are more easily comprehended; and are more durable; and lastly, because in that situation the passions of men are incorporated with the beautiful and permanent forms of nature. The language too of these men is adopted (purified indeed from what appear to be its real defects, from all lasting and rational causes of dislike or disgust) because such men hourly communicate with the best objects from which the best part of language is originally derived; and because, from their rank in society and the sameness and narrow circle of their intercourse, being less under the action of social vanity they convey their feelings and notions in simple and unelaborated expressions. Accordingly such a language arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings is a more permanent and a far more philosophical language than that which is frequently substituted for it by Poets, who think that they are conferring honour upon themselves and their art in proportion as they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in arbitrary and capricious habits of expression in order to furnish food for fickle tastes and fickle appetites of their own creation.

  I cannot be insensible of the present outcry against the triviality and meanness both of thought and language, which some of my contemporaries have occasionally introduced into their metrical compositions; and I acknowledge that this defect where it exists, is more dishonorable to the Writer’s own character than false refinement or arbitrary innovation, though I should contend at the same time that it is far less pernicious in the sum of its consequences. From such verses the Poems in these volumes will be found distinguished at least by one mark of difference, that each of them has a worthy purpose. Not that I mean to say, that I always began to write with a distinct purpose formally conceived; but I believe that my habits of meditation have so formed my feelings, as that my descriptions of such objects as strongly excite those feelings, will be found to carry along with them a purpose. If in this opinion I am mistaken I can have little right to the name of a Poet. For all good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; but though this be true, Poems to which any value can be attached, were never produced on any variety of subjects but by a man who being possessed of more than usual organic sensibility had also thought long and deeply. For our continued influxes of feeling are modified and directed by our thoughts, which are indeed the representatives of all our past feelings; and as by contemplating the relation of these general representatives to each other, we discover what is really important to men, so by the repetition and continuance of this act feelings connected with important subjects will be nourished, till at length, if we be originally possessed of much organic sensibility, such habits of mind will be produced that by obeying blindly and mechanically the impulses of those habits we shall describe objects and utter sentiments of such a nature and in such connection with each other, that the understanding of the being to whom we address ourselves, if he be in a healthful state of association, must necessarily be in some degree enlightened, his taste exalted, and his affections ameliorated.