epithets drawn from the operations of mind, and therefore giving to them an imaginative tinge-are, for the most part, a mere picture of the august brotherhood of trees, though their very sound is in more august accordance with their theme than most of the examples usually produced of "echoes to the sense." Having completely set before us the image of the scene, the poet begins that enchantment by which it is to be converted into a fitting temple for the noontide spectres of Death and Time, by the general intimation that it is "not uninformed by fantasy and looks that threaten the profane❞—then by the mere epithet pillared gives us the more particular feeling of a fane-then, by reference to the actual circumstances of the grassless floor of red-brown hue, preserves to us the peculiar features of the scene which thus he is hallowing-and at last gives to the roof and its berries a strange air of unrejoicing festivity-until we are prepared for the introduction of the phantasms, and feel that the scene could be fitted to no less tremendous a conclave. The place, without losing one of its individual features, is decked for the reception of these noon-tide shades, and we are prepared to muse on them with unshrinking eyes. How by a less adventurous but not less delightful process, does the poet impart to an evening scene on the Thames, at Richmond, the serenity of his own heart, and tinge it with softest and saddest hues of the fancy and the affections! The verses have all the richness of Collins, to whom they allude, and breathe a more profound and universal sentiment than is found in his sky-tinctured poetry.

"How richly glows the water's breast
Before us tinged with evening hues,
While, facing thus the crimson west,
The boat her silent course pursues!
And see how dark the backward stream!
A little moment past so smiling!
And still perchance, with faithless gleam,
Some other loiterer beguiling.

Such views the youthful bard allure;
But, heedless of the following gloom,
He deems their colours shall endure
Till peace go with him to the tomb.

And let him nurse his fond deceit,

And what if he must die in sorrow!

Who would not cherish dreams so sweet,
Though grief and pain may come to-morrow?

Glide gently thus for ever glide,

O Thames! that other bards may see

As lovely visions by thy side

As now, fair river! come to me.
O glide, fair stream! for ever so,
Thy quiet soul on all bestowing,
Till all our minds for over flow,

As thy deep waters now are flowing.

Vain thought!-Yet be as now thou art,
That in thy waters may be seen
The image of a poet's heart,

How bright, how solemn, how serene!

The following delicious sonnet, inspired by the same scene, is one of the latest effusions of its author. We do not here quote it on account of its allusion to one of the most delightful of poets-nor of the fine unbroken ligament by which the harmony listened to by the later bard is connected with that which the earlier drank in, by the lineage of the songsters who keep up the old ravishment-but of that imaginative power, by which a sacredness is imparted to the place and to the birds, as though they performed unresting worship in the most glorious of cathedrals.

"Fame tells of groves from England far away-*
Groves that inspire the nightingale to trill
And modulate, with subtle reach of skill
Elsewhere unmatch'd, her ever-varying lay;
Such bold report I venture to gainsay:
For I have heard the choir of Richmond-hill
Chaunting with indefatigable bill ;
While I bethought me of a distant day;
When, haply under shade of that same wood,
And scarcely conscious of the dashing oars
Plied steadily between those willowy shores
The sweet-soul'd Poet of the Seasons stood-

Listening, and listening long, in rapturous mood,
Ye heavenly birds! to your progenitors."

The following "Thought of a Briton on the subjugation of

* Wallachia is the country alluded to.

Switzerland," has an elemental grandeur imbued with the intensest sentiment, which places it among the highest efforts of the imaginative faculty.

"Two voices are there; one is one of the sea,
One of the mountains; each a mighty voice:
In both from age to age thou didst rejoice,
They were thy chosen music, Liberty!
There came a tyrant, and with holy glee

Thou fought'st against him; but hast vainly striven,
Thou from thine Alpine holds at length are driven,
Where not a torrent murmurs heard by thee.
Of one deep bliss thine ear hath been bereft;
Then cleave, O cleave, to that which still is left;
For, high-soul'd maid, what sorrow would it be,
That mountain-floods should thunder as before,
And ocean bellow from his rocky shore,

And neither awful voice be heard by thee !"

We have thus feebly attempted to give some glimpse into the essence of Wordsworth's powers—of his skill in delineating the forms of creation-of his insight into the spirit of man-and of his imaginative faculty. How he has applied these gifts to philosophical poetry, and what are the results of his contemplation, by their aid, on the external universehuman life-individual character-the vicissitudes of individual fortune-society at large—and the prospects of the species we shall next proceed more particularly to examine.

The spirit of contemplation influences and directs all Wordsworth's poetical faculties. He does not create a variety of individual forms to vivify them with the Promethean fire of dramatic genius, and exhibit the living struggle of their passions and their affections in opposition to each other, or to destiny. "The moving accident is not his trade." He looks on humanity as from a more exalted sphere, though he feels his kindred with it while he gazes, and yearns over it with deepest sympathy. No poet of ancient or modern times has dared so entirely to repose on the mere strength of his own powers. Others, indeed, have given hints of the divinest truths, even amidst their wildest and most passionate effusions. The tragedies of Sophocles, for example, abound in moralities expressed with a grace and precision which often ally the sentiment to an image and almost define it to the senses. In Shakspeare the wisdom is as much

deeper as the passion is intenser; the minds of the characters, under the strongest excitements of love, hope, or agony, grow bright as well as warm, and in their fervid career shed abroad sparkles of fire, which light up for an instant, the inmost sanctuaries of our nature. But few have ventured to send into the world essentially meditative poems, which none but the thoughtful can truly enjoy. Lucretius is the only writer of antiquity who has left a great work of this description; and he has unhappily lavished the boundless riches of genius on doctrines which are in direct opposition to the spirit of poetry. An apostle of a more genial faith, Wordsworth, stands pre-eminently-almost alone-a divine philosopher among the poets. It has been his singular lot, in this late age of the world, to draw little from those sources of interest which incident and situation supply—and to rest his claim to the gratitude and admiration of the people on his majestical contemplations of man and the universe.

The philosophical poetry of Wordsworth is not more distinct from the dramatic, or the epic, than from the merely didactic and moral. He has thrown into it as much of profound affection, as much of ravishing loveliness, as much of delicate fantasy, as adorn the most romantic tales, or the most passionate tragedies. If he sees all things "far as angel's ken," he regards them with human love. His imagination is never obscured amidst his reasonings, but is ever active to embody the beautiful and the pure, and to present to us the most august moralities in "clear dream and solemn vision." Instead of reaching sublime conclusions by a painful and elaborate process, he discloses them by a single touch, he fixes them on our hearts for ever. So intense are his perceptions of moral beauty, that he feels the spirit of good however deeply hidden, and opens to our view the secret springs of love and of joy, where all has appeared barren to the ungifted observer. He can trace, prolong, and renew within us, those mysterious risings of delight in the soul which "may make a chysome child to smile," and which, when half-experienced at long intervals in riper age, are to us the assurances of a better life. He follows with the nice touch of unerring sympathy all the most subtle workings of the spirit of good, as it makes its little sanctuaries in hearts unconscious of its presence, and blends its influences unheeded with ordinary thoughts, hopes, and sorrows. The

old prerogatives of humanity, which long usage has made appear common, put on their own air of grandeur while he teaches us to revere them. When we first read his poetry, we look on all the mysteries of our being with a new reverence, and feel like children who, having been brought up in some deserted palace, learn for the first time the regality of their home-understand a venerableness in the faded escutcheons with which they were accustomed to play—and feel the figures on the stained windows, or on the decaying tapestry, which were only grotesque before speaking to their hearts in ancestral voices.

The consecration which Wordsworth has shed over the external world is in a great measure peculiar to his genius. In the Hebrew poetry there was no trace of particular description-but general images, such as of tall cedars, of green pastures, or of still waters, were alone permitted to aid the affections of the devout worshipper. The feeling of the vast and indistinct prevailed; for all in religion was symbolical and mysterious, and pointed to "temples not made with hands, eternal in the heavens." In the exquisite master-pieces of Grecian inspiration, free nature's grace was almost excluded by the opposite tendency to admire only the definite and the palpable. Hence, the pictures of nymphs, satyrs, and deities, were perpetually substituted for views of the magnificence of earth and heaven. In the romantic poetry of modern times, the open face of nature has again been permitted to smile on us, and its freshness to glide into our souls. Nor has there been wanting "craft of delicate spirits" to shed lovelier tinges of the imagination on all its scenes-to scatter among them classical images like Ionic temples among the fair glades and deep woods of some rich domain-to call dainty groups of fairies to hold their revellings upon the velvet turf-or afford glimpses of angel wings floating at eventide in the golden perspective. But the imagination of Wordsworth has given to the external universe a charm which has never else, extensively at least, been shed over it. He has not personified the glorious objects of creation-nor peopled them with beautiful and majestic shapes-but, without depriving them of their own reality, has imparted to them a life which makes them objects of affection and reveHe enables us at once to enjoy the contemplation of their colours and forms, and to love them as human friends.

rence.