Book Thirteenth: Imagination and Taste, How Impaired and Restored—Concluded

From Nature doth emotion come, and moodsOf calmness equally are Nature's gift:This is her glory; these two attributesAre sister horns that constitute her strength.Hence Genius, born to thrive by interchangeOf peace and excitation, finds in herHis best and purest friend; from her receivesThat energy by which he seeks the truth,From her that happy stillness of the mindWhich fits him to receive it when unsought.

Such benefit the humblest intellectsPartake of, each in their degree; 'tis mineTo speak, what I myself have known and felt;Smooth task! for words find easy way, inspiredBy gratitude, and confidence in truth.Long time in search of knowledge did I rangeThe field of human life, in heart and mindBenighted; but, the dawn beginning nowTo re-appear, 'twas proved that not in vainI had been taught to reverence a PowerThat is the visible quality and shapeAnd image of right reason; that maturesHer processes by steadfast laws; gives birthTo no impatient or fallacious hopes,No heat of passion or excessive zeal,No vain conceits; provokes to no quick turnsOf self-applauding intellect; but trainsTo meekness, and exalts by humble faith;Holds up before the mind intoxicateWith present objects, and the busy danceOf things that pass away, a temperate showOf objects that endure; and by this courseDisposes her, when over-fondly setOn throwing off incumbrances, to seekIn man, and in the frame of social life,Whate'er there is desirable and goodOf kindred permanence, unchanged in formAnd function, or, through strict vicissitudeOf life and death, revolving. Above allWere re-established now those watchful thoughtsWhich, seeing little worthy or sublimeIn what the Historian's pen so much delightsTo blazon--power and energy detachedFrom moral purpose--early tutored meTo look with feelings of fraternal loveUpon the unassuming things that holdA silent station in this beauteous world.

Thus moderated, thus composed, I foundOnce more in Man an object of delight,Of pure imagination, and of love;And, as the horizon of my mind enlarged,Again I took the intellectual eyeFor my instructor, studious more to seeGreat truths, than touch and handle little ones.Knowledge was given accordingly; my trustBecame more firm in feelings that had stoodThe test of such a trial; clearer farMy sense of excellence--of right and wrong:The promise of the present time retiredInto its true proportion; sanguine schemes,Ambitious projects, pleased me less; I soughtFor present good in life's familiar face,And built thereon my hopes of good to come.

With settling judgments now of what would lastAnd what would disappear; prepared to findPresumption, folly, madness, in the menWho thrust themselves upon the passive worldAs Rulers of the world; to see in these,Even when the public welfare is their aim,Plans without thought, or built on theoriesVague and unsound; and having brought the booksOf modern statists to their proper test,Life, human life, with all its sacred claimsOf sex and age, and heaven-descended rights,Mortal, or those beyond the reach of death;And having thus discerned how dire a thingIs worshipped in that idol proudly named"The Wealth of Nations," where alone that wealthIs lodged, and how increased; and having gainedA more judicious knowledge of the worthAnd dignity of individual man,No composition of the brain, but manOf whom we read, the man whom we beholdWith our own eyes--I could not but inquire--Not with less interest than heretofore,But greater, though in spirit more subdued--Why is this glorious creature to be foundOne only in ten thousand? What one is,Why may not millions be? What bars are thrownBy Nature in the way of such a hope?Our animal appetites and daily wants,Are these obstructions insurmountable?If not, then others vanish into air."Inspect the basis of the social pile:Inquire," said I, "how much of mental powerAnd genuine virtue they possess who liveBy bodily toil, labour exceeding farTheir due proportion, under all the weightOf that injustice which upon ourselvesOurselves entail." Such estimate to frameI chiefly looked (what need to look beyond?)Among the natural abodes of men,Fields with their rural works; recalled to mindMy earliest notices; with these comparedThe observations made in later youth,And to that day continued.--For, the timeHad never been when throes of mighty NationsAnd the world's tumult unto me could yield,How far soe'er transported and possessed,Full measure of content; but still I cravedAn intermingling of distinct regardsAnd truths of individual sympathyNearer ourselves. Such often might be gleanedFrom the great City, else it must have provedTo me a heart-depressing wilderness;But much was wanting: therefore did I turnTo you, ye pathways, and ye lonely roads;Sought you enriched with everything I prized,With human kindnesses and simple joys.

Oh! next to one dear state of bliss, vouchsafedAlas! to few in this untoward world,The bliss of walking daily in life's primeThrough field or forest with the maid we love,While yet our hearts are young, while yet we breatheNothing but happiness, in some lone nook,Deep vale, or any where, the home of both,From which it would be misery to stir:Oh! next to such enjoyment of our youth,In my esteem, next to such dear delight,Was that of wandering on from day to dayWhere I could meditate in peace, and cullKnowledge that step by step might lead me onTo wisdom; or, as lightsome as a birdWafted upon the wind from distant lands,Sing notes of greeting to strange fields or groves,Which lacked not voice to welcome me in turn:And, when that pleasant toil had ceased to please,Converse with men, where if we meet a faceWe almost meet a friend, on naked heathsWith long long ways before, by cottage bench,Or well-spring where the weary traveller rests.

Who doth not love to follow with his eyeThe windings of a public way? the sight,Familiar object as it is, hath wroughtOn my imagination since the mornOf childhood, when a disappearing line,One daily present to my eyes, that crossedThe naked summit of a far-off hillBeyond the limits that my feet had trod,Was like an invitation into spaceBoundless, or guide into eternity.Yes, something of the grandeur which investsThe mariner who sails the roaring seaThrough storm and darkness, early in my mindSurrounded, too, the wanderers of the earth;Grandeur as much, and loveliness far more.Awed have I been by strolling Bedlamites;From many other uncouth vagrants (passedIn fear) have walked with quicker step; but whyTake note of this? When I began to enquire,To watch and question those I met, and speakWithout reserve to them, the lonely roadsWere open schools in which I daily readWith most delight the passions of mankind,Whether by words, looks, sighs, or tears, revealed;There saw into the depth of human souls,Souls that appear to have no depth at allTo careless eyes. And-now convinced at heartHow little those formalities, to whichWith overweening trust alone we giveThe name of Education, have to doWith real feeling and just sense; how vainA correspondence with the talking worldProves to the most; and called to make good searchIf man's estate, by doom of Nature yokedWith toil, be therefore yoked with ignorance;If virtue be indeed so hard to rear,And intellectual strength so rare a boon--I prized such walks still more, for there I foundHope to my hope, and to my pleasure peaceAnd steadiness, and healing and reposeTo every angry passion. There I heard,From mouths of men obscure and lowly, truthsReplete with honour; sounds in unisonWith loftiest promises of good and fair.

There are who think that strong affection, loveKnown by whatever name, is falsely deemedA gift, to use a term which they would use,Of vulgar nature; that its growth requiresRetirement, leisure, language purifiedBy manners studied and elaborate;That whoso feels such passion in its strengthMust live within the very light and airOf courteous usages refined by art.True is it, where oppression worse than deathSalutes the being at his birth, where graceOf culture hath been utterly unknown,And poverty and labour in excessFrom day to day pre-occupy the groundOf the affections, and to Nature's selfOppose a deeper nature; there, indeed,Love cannot be; nor does it thrive with easeAmong the close and overcrowded hauntsOf cities, where the human heart is sick,And the eye feeds it not, and cannot feed.--Yes, in those wanderings deeply did I feelHow we mislead each other; above all,How books mislead us, seeking their rewardFrom judgments of the wealthy Few, who seeBy artificial lights; how they debaseThe Many for the pleasure of those Few;Effeminately level down the truthTo certain general notions, for the sakeOf being understood at once, or elseThrough want of better knowledge in the headsThat framed them; nattering self-conceit with words,That, while they most ambitiously set forthExtrinsic differences, the outward marksWhereby society has parted manFrom man, neglect the universal heart.

Here, calling up to mind what then I saw,A youthful traveller, and see daily nowIn the familiar circuit of my home,Here might I pause, and bend in reverenceTo Nature, and the power of human minds,To men as they are men within themselves.How oft high service is performed within,When all the external man is rude in show,--Not like a temple rich with pomp and gold,But a mere mountain chapel, that protectsIts simple worshippers from sun and shower.Of these, said I, shall be my song; of these,If future years mature me for the task,Will I record the praises, making verseDeal boldly with substantial things; in truthAnd sanctity of passion, speak of these,That justice may be done, obeisance paidWhere it is due: thus haply shall I teach,Inspire, through unadulterated earsPour rapture, tenderness, and hope,--my themeNo other than the very heart of man,As found among the best of those who live,Not unexalted by religious faith,Nor uninformed by books, good books, though few,In Nature's presence: thence may I selectSorrow, that is not sorrow, but delight;And miserable love, that is not painTo hear of, for the glory that redoundsTherefrom to human kind, and what we are.Be mine to follow with no timid stepWhere knowledge leads me: it shall be my prideThat I have dared to tread this holy ground,Speaking no dream, but things oracular;Matter not lightly to be heard by thoseWho to the letter of the outward promiseDo read the invisible soul; by men adroitIn speech, and for communion with the worldAccomplished; minds whose faculties are thenMost active when they are most eloquent,And elevated most when most admired.Men may be found of other mould than these,Who are their own upholders, to themselvesEncouragement, and energy, and will,Expressing liveliest thoughts in lively wordsAs native passion dictates. Others, too,There are among the walks of homely lifeStill higher, men for contemplation framed,Shy, and unpractised in the strife of phrase;Meek men, whose very souls perhaps would sinkBeneath them, summoned to such intercourse:Theirs is the language of the heavens, the power,The thought, the image, and the silent joy:Words are but under-agents in their souls;When they are grasping with their greatest strength,They do not breathe among them: this I speakIn gratitude to God, Who feeds our heartsFor His own service; knoweth, loveth us,When we are unregarded by the world.

Also, about this time did I receiveConvictions still more strong than heretofore,Not only that the inner frame is good,And graciously composed, but that, no less,Nature for all conditions wants not powerTo consecrate, if we have eyes to see,The outside of her creatures, and to breatheGrandeur upon the very humblest faceOf human life. I felt that the arrayOf act and circumstance, and visible form,Is mainly to the pleasure of the mindWhat passion makes them; that meanwhile the formsOf Nature have a passion in themselves,That intermingles with those works of manTo which she summons him; although the worksBe mean, have nothing lofty of their own;And that the Genius of the Poet henceMay boldly take his way among mankindWherever Nature leads; that he hath stoodBy Nature's side among the men of old,And so shall stand for ever. Dearest Friend!If thou partake the animating faithThat Poets, even as Prophets, each with eachConnected in a mighty scheme of truth,Have each his own peculiar faculty,Heaven's gift, a sense that fits him to perceiveObjects unseen before, thou wilt not blameThe humblest of this band who dares to hopeThat unto him hath also been vouchsafedAn insight that in some sort he possesses,A privilege whereby a work of his,Proceeding from a source of untaught things,Creative and enduring, may becomeA power like one of Nature's. To a hopeNot less ambitious once among the wildsOf Sarum's Plain, my youthful spirit was raised;There, as I ranged at will the pastoral downsTrackless and smooth, or paced the bare white roadsLengthening in solitude their dreary line,Time with his retinue of ages fledBackwards, nor checked his flight until I sawOur dim ancestral Past in vision clear;Saw multitudes of men, and, here and there,A single Briton clothed in wolf-skin vest,With shield and stone-axe, stride across the wold;The voice of spears was heard, the rattling spearShaken by arms of mighty bone, in strength,Long mouldered, of barbaric majesty.I called on Darkness--but before the wordWas uttered, midnight darkness seemed to takeAll objects from my sight; and lo! againThe Desert visible by dismal flames;It is the sacrificial altar, fedWith living men--how deep the groans! the voiceOf those that crowd the giant wicker thrillsThe monumental hillocks, and the pompIs for both worlds, the living and the dead.At other moments (for through that wide wasteThree summer days I roamed) where'er the PlainWas figured o'er with circles, lines, or mounds,That yet survive, a work, as some divine,Shaped by the Druids, so to representTheir knowledge of the heavens, and image forthThe constellations; gently was I charmedInto a waking dream, a reverieThat, with believing eyes, where'er I turned,Beheld long-bearded teachers, with white wandsUplifted, pointing to the starry sky,Alternately, and plain below, while breathOf music swayed their motions, and the wasteRejoiced with them and me in those sweet sounds.

This for the past, and things that may be viewedOr fancied in the obscurity of yearsFrom monumental hints: and thou, O Friend!Pleased with some unpremeditated strainsThat served those wanderings to beguile, hast saidThat then and there my mind had exercisedUpon the vulgar forms of present things,The actual world of our familiar days,Yet higher power; had caught from them a tone,An image, and a character, by booksNot hitherto reflected. Call we thisA partial judgment--and yet why? for thenWe were as strangers; and I may not speakThus wrongfully of verse, however rude,Which on thy young imagination, trainedIn the great City, broke like light from far.Moreover, each man's Mind is to herselfWitness and judge; and I remember wellThat in life's every-day appearancesI seemed about this time to gain clear sightOf a new world--a world, too, that was fitTo be transmitted, and to other eyesMade visible; as ruled by those fixed lawsWhence spiritual dignity originates,Which do both give it being and maintainA balance, an ennobling interchangeOf action from without and from within;The excellence, pure function, and best powerBoth of the object seen, and eye that sees.