Laurel · William Wordsworth · Lyrical Ballads

The Tables Turned; an Evening Scene, on the Same Subject

common measure · ABAB · 32 lines · from Lyrical Ballads

Up! up! my friend, and clear your looks,Why all this toil and trouble?Up! up! my friend, and quit your books,Or surely you’ll grow double.

The sun above the mountain’s head,A freshening lustre mellow,Through all the long green fields has spread,His first sweet evening yellow.

Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife,Come, hear the woodland linnet,How sweet his music; on my lifeThere’s more of wisdom in it.

And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!And he is no mean preacher;Come forth into the light of things,Let Nature be your teacher.

She has a world of ready wealth,Our minds and hearts to bless--Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,Truth breathed by chearfulness.

One impulse from a vernal woodMay teach you more of man;Of moral evil and of good,Than all the sages can.

Sweet is the lore which nature brings;Our meddling intellectMisshapes the beauteous forms of things;--We murder to dissect.

Enough of science and of art;Close up these barren leaves;Come forth, and bring with you a heartThat watches and receives.

Words in this poem

lustre n.: A period of five years; a lustrum. [L. lustrum: cf. F. lustre.]
strife n.: The act of striving; earnest endeavor. [OF. estrif. See Strive.]
blithe a.: Gay; merry; sprightly; joyous; glad; cheerful; as, a blithe spirit. [AS. bli blithe, kind; akin to Goth. blei kind, Icel. bli mild, gentle, Dan. & Sw. blid gentle, D. blijd blithe, OHG. blidi kind, blithe.]
throstle n.: The song thrush. See under Song. [OE. throsel, AS. , ; akin to MHG. trostel, G. drossel, Icel. , Sw. trast, Lith. strazdas, L. turdus. *238. Cf. Thrush the bird.]
wealth n.: Weal; welfare; prosperity; good. [OE. welthe, from wele; cf. D. weelde luxury. See Weal prosperity.]
beauteous a.: Full of beauty; beautiful; very handsome. [Mostly poetic] -- Beau"te*ous*ly, adv. --
dissect v. t.: To divide into separate parts; to cut in pieces; to separate and expose the parts of, as an animal or a plant, for examination and to show their structure and relations; to anatomize. [L. dissectus, p. p. of dissecare; dis- + secare to cut. See Section.]

Definitions and etymologies from Webster's Unabridged Dictionary, 1913.

About this text

The Tables Turned; an Evening Scene, on the Same Subject is in the public domain. This text is taken from Lyrical Ballads, With a Few Other Poems (1798), Project Gutenberg ebook #9622; the transcription's header, footer and licence were removed and nothing else was changed. You may copy, print and reuse it freely.

Cite as: William Wordsworth, The Tables Turned; an Evening Scene, on the Same Subject, in Lyrical Ballads (1798), text of Project Gutenberg ebook #9622, Laurel, https://laurelpoetry.com/poem/lyrical-ballads/the-tables-turned-an-evening-scene-on-the-same-subject.html, id L02863.

Form and metre

The Tables Turned; an Evening Scene, on the Same Subject is 32 lines in 8 stanzas of 4 lines each. Every stanza rhymes ABAB. The metre is common measure, measured from the stress the words themselves fix (confidence 91%). 97% of its stressed syllables fall where the metre puts the beat. The lines average 7.4 syllables. 7 lines end on an unstressed syllable, a feminine ending. 12% of the lines run on without a stop at the line end.

See other poems in common measure.

Measured by Laurel's pipeline, not copied from a handbook: how stress and metre are counted, how rhyme is lettered, how a drifted rhyme is found. Where the dictionary cannot confirm a rhyme the letter is withheld, not guessed.

Rhyme words, stanza by stanza

The word that ends each line, lettered by the rhyme it makes; a dash is a line whose rhyme the dictionary could not confirm.

1 ABAB looks^A · trouble^B · books^A · double^B
2 ABAB head^A · mellow^B · spread^A · yellow^B
3 ABAB strife^A · linnet^B · life^A · it^B
4 ABAB sings^A · preacher^B · things^A · teacher^B
5 ABAB wealth^A · bless^B · health^A · chearfulness^B
6 ABAB wood^A · man^B · good^A · can^B
7 ABAB brings^A · intellect^B · things^A · dissect^B
8 ABAB art^A · leaves^B · heart^A · receives^B

Scansion, line by line

Each line with its syllable count and the stresses the words themselves fix: / stressed, ˘ unstressed, · a syllable the word leaves free and the metre decides. Read against common measure. How this is done.

Line	Syl.	Stress
Up! up! my friend, and clear your looks,	8	········
Why all this toil and trouble?	7	·····/˘
Up! up! my friend, and quit your books,	8	········
Or surely you’ll grow double.	7	·/˘··/˘
The sun above the mountain’s head,	8	·····/˘·
A freshening lustre mellow,	8	·/˘˘/˘/˘
Through all the long green fields has spread,	8	········
His first sweet evening yellow.	7	···/˘/˘
Books! ’tis a dull and endless strife,	8	·····/˘·
Come, hear the woodland linnet,	7	···/·/˘
How sweet his music; on my life	8	···/˘···
There’s more of wisdom in it.	7	···/˘··
And hark! how blithe the throstle sings!	8	·····/˘·
And he is no mean preacher;	7	·····/˘
Come forth into the light of things,	8	········
Let Nature be your teacher.	7	·/˘··/˘
She has a world of ready wealth,	8	·····/˘·
Our minds and hearts to bless--	7	/˘·····
Spontaneous wisdom breathed by health,	8	˘/˘/˘···
Truth breathed by chearfulness.	7	··˘····
One impulse from a vernal wood	8	·/˘··/˘·
May teach you more of man;	6	······
Of moral evil and of good,	8	·/˘/˘···
Than all the sages can.	6	···/˘·
Sweet is the lore which nature brings;	8	·····/˘·
Our meddling intellect	8	/˘/˘˘/˘·
Misshapes the beauteous forms of things;	9	···/˘˘···
--We murder to dissect.	6	·/˘·˘/
Enough of science and of art;	8	˘/·/˘···
Close up these barren leaves;	6	···/˘·
Come forth, and bring with you a heart	8	········
That watches and receives.	6	·/˘·˘/

On this poem

Composed 1798. Cf. Lines Written at a Small Distance, etc., notes. Both are spousal strains celebrating the spirit and power of joy ‘which, wedding Nature to us, gives in dower a new Earth and new Heaven’; or they may be described as a glorification of sense, even as Expostulation, etc. is a glorification of reverie. [Hutchinson]

Notes from the edition 3

Notes credited “[Hutchinson]” are Thomas Hutchinson’s, from his edition Lyrical Ballads 1798 (Duckworth, 3rd ed. 1920; Internet Archive lyricalballads00worduoft), keyed to his own line numbers within each poem (the Ancyent Marinere numbered continuously 1-658 across all seven Parts). Notes credited “[W. Wordsworth, 1798]” are the poet’s own five footnotes printed in the site’s own source text (Project Gutenberg #9622).

Stanza 6, line 1 Cf. the apostrophe to Nature that opens Prelude xii., illustrating the educative power of her ‘motions of delight’: ‘Ye breezes and soft airs / Whose subtle intercourse with breathing flowers... might teach Man’s haughty race / How without injury to take, to give / Without offence.’ [Hutchinson]
Stanza 7, line 1 The poet contrasts that knowledge which is ‘the wedding of man’s feeling intellect to this goodly universe in love and holy passion,’ with ‘the repetitions wearisome of sense / Where soul is dead, and feeling hath no place... Lost in a gloom of uninspired research.’ [Hutchinson]
Stanza 8, line 3 Cf. ‘a watchful heart / Still couchant, an inevitable eye, / And an ear practised like a blind man’s touch’ (‘When to the attractions,’ 1800). [Hutchinson]

The reader shows the same poem with its rhymes coloured and a stress row above each line, the notes beside their stanzas, and any word's definition on a tap; the analysis page takes the whole book apart. How every part of this site was made.

More by William Wordsworth

Lyrical Ballads The Brothers, and Other Poems The Prelude, and Other Poems