"Thy father cares not for my breast, Last, and pre-eminently I challenge for this poet the gift of IMAGINATION in the highest and strictest sense of the word. In the play of Fancy, Wordsworth, to my feelings, is not always graceful, and sometimes recondite. The likeness is occasionally too strange, or demands too peculiar a point of view, or is such as appears the creature of predetermined research, rather than spontaneous presentation. Indeed his fancy seldom displays itself, as mere and unmodified fancy. But in imaginative power, he stands nearest of all modern writers to Shakespear and Milton; and yet perfectly unborrowed and his own. his own words, which are at once an instance and an illustration, he does indeed to all thoughts and to all objects in a kind To employ The light that never was on sea or land, The consecration, and the poet's dream." I shall select a few examples as most obviously manifesting this faculty; but if I should ever be fortunate enough to render my analysis. of imagination, its origin and characters thoroughly intelligible to the reader, he will scarcely open on a page of this poet's works without recognizing, more or less, the presence and the influences of this faculty. From the poem on the Yew Trees, vol. I. page 303, 304. "But worthier still of note Are those fraternal four of Borrowdale, Huge trunks!-and each particular trunk a growth Up-coiling, and inveterately convolved, Not uninformed with phantasy, and looks May meet at noontide-FEAR and trembling HOPE, As in a natural temple scattered o'er The effect of the old man's figure in the poem of Resignation and Independence, vol. II. page 33. "While he was talking thus, the lonely place Wandering about alone and silently." Or the 8th, 9th, 19th, 26th, 31st, and 33d, in the collection of miscellaneous sonnets - the sonnet on the subjugation of Switzerland, page 210, or the last ode from which I especially select the two following stanzas or paragraphs, page 349 to 350. "Our birth is but a sleep and a forgetting; And cometh from afar. Not in entire forgetfulness, And not in utter nakedness, But trailing clouds of glory do we come From God who is our home: Heaven lies about us in our infancy! Shades of the prison-house begin to close Upon the growing boy; But he beholds the light, and whence it flows, He sees it in his joy! The youth who daily further from the east Must travel, still is nature's priest, And by the vision splendid Is on his way attended; At length the man perceives it die away, And page 352 to 354 of the same ode. "O joy that in our embers The thought of our past years in me doth breed For that which is most worthy to be blest Delight and liberty the simple creed Of childhood, whether busy or at rest, With new-fledged hope still fluttering in his breast:- The song of thanks and praise; But for those obstinate questionings Fallings from us, vanishings; Blank misgivings of a creature Moving about in worlds not realized, High instincts, before which our mortal nature Did tremble like a guilty thing surprised! But for those first affections, Those shadowy recollections, Which, be they what they may, Are yet the fountain light of all our day, To perish never: Which neither listlessness, nor mad endeavour Nor man nor boy Nor all that is at enmity with joy Can utterly abolish or destroy! Hence, in a season of calm weather, Though inland far we be, Our souls have sight of that immortal sea Can in a moment travel thither And see the children sport upon the shore, And hear the mighty waters rolling evermore." And since it would be unfair to conclude with an extract, which though highly characteristic must yet from the nature of the thoughts and the subject be interesting, or perbaps intelligible, to but a limited number of readers ; I will add from the poet's last published work a passage equally Wordsworthian; of the beauty of which, and of the imaginative power displayed therein, there can be but one opinion, and one feeling. See White Doe, page 5. "Fast the church-yard fills;-anon The cluster round the porch, and the folk |