ABSTRACT
Wordsworth makes clear, in his opening address to Coleridge (‘Thus far, O friend, have we …’), that the spirit of this Book is not one of lonely reminiscence. Coleridge is a companion on the journey back through memory. So later is the whole crowd of childhood friends. ‘And be ye happy! Yet, my friends, I know/That more than one of you will think with me’ (42–3). A mood of companionship and relationship, amounting to a ‘great social principle of life’ (408), goes right through the Book.
