rom his poetical works. But to these matters we can only give a passing allusion here. As we have seen bove, it is not, as with Byron, the sterner, or, as with Scott, the wilder aspects of Nature that Tennyson loves to depict; he wooes her rather in her calm and disciplined moods. And the same tendency may be observed in his treatment of the intellectual phenomena of the day-in his social and political faith and teaching. In both, his ideal is a majestic order, a gradual and regular development, without rest indeed but above all without haste. Enthusiasm may be well, but self-control is better. "Forward, forward, let us range, Let the great world spin for ever down the ringing grooves of change." But at the same time, "Let knowledge grow from more to more, Tennyson is always sincere; his poetry is throughout inspired by elevated thought and noble sentiment; and he too, like Wordsworth before him, will hand down to his successor the Laureate's wreath "Greener from the brows Of him who uttered nothing base." |