ABSTRACT
In glancing at my motto, I find that I have nearly forgot to mention, what most persons have been led to think are the chief parts in this poets character: his defects. As far as regards Mr. Wordsworth himself, I should not think it worth while to descant upon his faults, because he has redeemed them by inimitable beauties: but as there are some simple souls who have confounded his eccentricities with his excellences, have mistaken that for sublime which is in fact only odd, a few words may not be thrown away on an attempt to point out where this poet has erred. He seems to think that the commonest thoughts and feelings are as fit subjects for poetry as the most dignified, and that the most obvious diction is the most poetical. It is heedless to say that all his best pieces are in direct variance with this proposition, abounding as they do with sentiments and phraseology which are exalted utterly beyond the reach of common apprehension: yet he has condescended to write a few poems in conformity with those principles, and a less seductive illustration of their truth could not well be imagined. The failure would have been still greater if he had perfectly accorded in his own rule: but such is not the case: he details indeed some common incidents, but they by no means suggest to him common sentiments or common language. For instance, he takes a morning walk and sees a leech-gatherer, and on this
occasion pours out some of the noblest thoughts clothed in the finest and most elaborate diction. But does he mean to say, that, to ten thousand other persons who might have seen the same leech-gatherer, any thought would have occured except that he was a sturdy person with a stupid employment: and could such a thought embodied in such common language excite the slightest interest in any bosom. Mr. Wordsworth has ventured to go further: he has published what he calls the moods of his own mind, and has disclosed the silliest as well as the wisest of his feelings. This experiment is rather to be considered as a hazardous vanity than real magnanimity. It is true that nothing can be more interesting than to view a great mind under all circumstances, in its undress as well as in ‘all its bravery:’ it is true that simplicity and greatness are so akin, that the most exalted intellects have occasionally been delighted to relapse into the feelings of childhood. – The disclosure however of this tendency should never be made but to the most intimate hearts: the world at large will misunderstand it, and it is not for the interest of virtue that the dignity of the wise and good should be lowered even in the estimation of the most contemptible. Socrates would knuckle down at law with his own children, nor was he ashamed to be caught, for he knew how to abash and overwhelm impertinent folly: but had Socrates carried his bag of marbles to the market-place, and played with the ragged boys of Athens, the profoundest sentence that he could have uttered would not have saved him from scorn and contempt.
