ABSTRACT
Wordsworth is all contemplation, and Byron all passion; or in the one, passion seems to be perpetually hushed to sleep in the arms of contemplation, and in the other, contemplation forever strangled in its birth by the throes of passion. Byron’s poetical character exhibits the very essence, the concentration of all the powers and attributes of man – a personification of our human nature, in all the shadows of its gloom, and in all the light of its glory. – Wordsworth would almost seem to be an incarnation of some loftier and less earthly nature, permitted for a time to sojourn in this lower world, in order to teach man the possible purity and grandeur of his destinies, and beckon him onward to deserve and enjoy them.
