University of Virginia Library

MUSINGS.

Wordsworth.

Have we looked upon the earth so long, only to
reckon how many men and beasts it can maintain,
and to see to what account its timber can be turned,
and to what uses its rocks and waters may be put?
Do we, with Baillie Jarvie, think it a pity that so
much good soil should lie waste under a useless lake,
and set against the cost of draining the in-comings of
the crops? Have we lived so many years in the world
and been familiar with its affairs, only to part off men
into professions and trades, and to tell the due proportions
required to stock each? Must we for ever
travel the straight-forward, turnpike road of business,

and not be left to take the way that winds round the
meadows, and leads us sociably by the doors of retired
farms? Must all the hills be levelled, and hollows
filled up, that we may go like draught-horses the dull
and even road of labour, the easier and with the more
speed? May we not sit awhile to cool and rest ourselves
in the shade of some shut-in valley, with its
talking rills, and fresh and silent water-plants, — or
pass over the free and lit hill-tops, catching views of
the broad, open country alive with the universal
growth of things, and guarded with its band of mountains
resting in the distance, like patriarchs of the
earth? Must all we do and all we think about have
reference to the useful, while that alone is considered
useful which is tangible, present gain? Is it for food,
and raiment, and shelter alone, that we came into the
world? Do we talk of our souls, and live as if we,
and all that surrounded us, were made up of nothing
else but dull matter? Are the relations of life for our
convenience merely, or has the fulfilling of their
duties none but promised and distant rewards?

Man has another and higher nature even here;
and the spirit within him finds an answering spirit in
every thing that grows, and affectionate relations not
only with his fellow-man, but with the commonest
things that lie scattered about the earth.

To the man of fine feeling, and deep and delicate
and creative thought, there is nothing in nature which
appears only as so much substance and form, nor any
connexions in life which do not reach beyond their
immediate and obvious purposes. Our attachments
to each other are not felt by him merely as habits of
the mind given to it by the customs of life; nor does
he hold them to be only as the goods of this world,

and the loss of them as merely turning him forth an
outcast from the social state; but they are a part of
his joyous being, and to have them torn from him, is
taking from his very nature.

Life, indeed, with him, in all its connexions and
concerns, has an ideal and spiritual character, which,
while it loses nothing of the definiteness of reality, is
for ever suggesting thoughts, taking new relations,
and peopling and giving action to the imagination.
All that the eye falls upon and all that touches the
heart, run off into airy distance, and the regions into
which the sight stretches, are alive and bright and
beautiful with countless shapings and fair hues of the
gladdened fancy. From kind acts and gentle words
and fond looks there spring hosts many and glorious
as Milton's angels; and heavenly deeds are done,
and unearthly voices heard, and forms and faces,
graceful and lovely as Uriel's, are seen in the noonday
sun. What would only have given pleasure for
the time to another, or at most, be now and then
called up in his memory, in the man of feeling and
imagination, lays by its particular and short-lived and
irregular nature, and puts on the garments of spiritual
beings, and takes the everlasting nature of the soul.
The ordinary acts which spring from the good will of
social life, take up their dwelling within him and
mingle with his sentiment, forming a little society in
his mind, going on in harmony with its generous enterprises,
its friendly labours, and tasteful pursuits.
They undergo a change, becoming a portion of him,
making a part of his secret joy and melancholy,
and wandering at large among his far-off thoughts.
All that his mind falls in with, it sweeps along in its
deep and swift and continuous flow, and bears onward

with the multitude, that fills its shoreless and living
sea.

So universal is this operation in such a man, and so
instantly does it act upon whatever he is concerned
about, that a double process is going on within him,
and he lives, as it were, a two-fold life. Is he, for
instance, talking with you about a North-west passage,
he is looking far off at the ice-islands, with their
turreted castles and fairy towns, or at the penguin,
at the southern pole, pecking the rotting seaweed on
which she has lighted, or he is listening to her distant
and lonely cry, within the cold and barren tracts of
ice — yet all the while he reasons as ingeniously
and wisely as you. His attachments do not grow
about a changeless and tiring object; but be it filial
reverence, Abraham is seen sitting at the door of his
tent, and the earth is one green pasture for flocks and
herds; or be it love, she who is dear to him is seen
in a thousand imaginary changes of situation, and
new incidents are happening, delighting his mind with
all the distinctness and sincerity of truth. So that
while he is in the midst of men, and doing his part in
the affairs of the world, his spirit has called up a fairy
vision, and he is walking in a lovely dream: — it is
round about him in his sorrows for a consolation; and
out of the gloom of his affliction he looks forth upon
an horizon touched with a gentle, morning twilight,
and growing brighter on his gaze. Through pain
and poverty and the world's neglect, when men look
cold upon him, and his friends are gone, he has where
to rest a tired spirit, that others know not of, and
healings for a wounded mind, which others can never
feel.

And who is of so hard a nature that he would deny

him these? If there are assuagings for his spirit,
which are never ministered to other men, it has tortures
and griefs and a fearful melancholy, which need
them more. He brought into the world passions deep
and strong, senses tremulous and thrilling at every
touch, feelings delicate and shy, yet affectionate and
warm, and an ardent and romantic mind. He has
dwelt upon the refinements and virtues of our nature,
till they have almost become beauties sensible to the
mortal eye, and to worship them he has thought could
hardly be idolatry.

And what does he find in the world? Perhaps, in
all the multitude, he meets a mind or two which answers
to his own; but through the crowd, where he
looks for the free play of noble passions, he finds men
eager after gain or vulgar distinctions, hardening the
heart with avarice, or making it proud and reckless
with ambition. Does he speak with an honest indignation
against oppression and trick? He is met by
loose doubts and shallow speculations, or teasing
questions as to right and wrong. Are the weak to be
defended, or strong opposed? One man has his place
yet to reach, and another his to maintain, and why
should they put all at stake? Are others at work in a
good cause? They are so little scrupulous about means,
so bustling and ostentatious and full of self, so wrapt
about in solemn vanity, that he is ready to turn from
them and their cause in disgust. There is so little
of nature and sincerity — of ardor and sentiment of
character — such a dulness of perception — such a
want of that enthusiasm for all that is great and lovely
and true, (which, while it makes us forgetful of ourselves,
brings with it our highest enjoyments) such
an offensive show and talk of factitious sensibility —

that the current of his feelings is checked — he turns
away depressed and disappointed, and becomes shut up
in himself; and he, whose mind is all emotion, and
who loves with a depth of feeling that few souls have
ever sounded, is pointed at, as he stands aloof from
men, as a creature cold and motionless, selfish and
reserved.

But if manner too often goes for character, hardlearned
rules for native taste, fastidiousness for refinement,
ostentation for dignity, cunning for wisdom,
timidity for prudence, and nervous affections for tenderness
of heart, — if the order of nature be so much
reversed, and semblance so often takes precedence of
truth, yet it is not so in all things, nor wholly so in
any. The cruel and ambitious have touches of pity
and remorse, and good affections are mingled with our
frailties. Amid the press of selfish aims, generous
ardor is seen lighting up, and in the tumultuous and
heedless bustle of the world, we here and there meet
with considerate thought and quiet and deep affections.
Patient endurance of sufferings, bold resistance of
power, forgiveness of injuries, hard-tried and faithful
friendship, and self-sacrificing love, are seen in beautiful
relief over the flat uniformity of life, or stand out
in steady and bright grandeur in the midst of the dark
deeds of men. And then, again, the vices of our
nature are sometimes revealed with a violence of
passion and a terrible intellectual energy, which fasten
on the imagination of a creative and high mind, while
they call out opposing virtues to pass before it in
visions of glory: — For “there is a soul of goodness
in things evil;” and the crimes of men have brought
forth deeds of heroism and sustaining faith, that have
made our rapt fancies but gatherings from the world
in which we live.

And there are beautiful souls, too, in the world, to
hold kindred with a man of a feeling and refined mind;
and there are delicate and warm and simple affections,
that now and then meet him on his way, and enter
silently into his heart like blessings. Here and there,
on the road, go with him for a time some who call to
mind the images of his soul, — a voice, or a look, is a
remembrancer of past visions, and breaks out upon
him like openings through the clouds; and the distant
beings of his imagination seem walking by his side,
and the changing and unsubstantial creatures of the
brain put on body and life. In such moments his
fancies are turned to realities, and over the real the
lights of his mind shift and play; his imagination shines
out warm upon it, and it changes, and takes the freshness
of fairy life.

When such an one turns away from men, and is
left alone in silent communion with nature and his
own thoughts, and there are no bonds on the movements
of the feelings, and nothing on which he would
shut his eyes, but God's own hand has made all
before him as it is, he feels his spirit opening upon a
new existence, becoming as broad as the sun and air,
as various as the earth, over which it spreads itself,
and touched with that love which God has imaged in
all he has formed. His senses take a quicker life,
and become one refined and exquisite emotion; and
the etherealized body is made, as it were, a spirit in
bliss. His soul grows stronger and more active within
him, as he sees life intense and working throughout
nature; and that which is passing away links itself
with the eternal, when he finds new life beginning
even with decay, and hastening to put forth in some
other form of beauty, and become a sharer in some

new delight. His spirit is ever awake with happy
sensations, and cheerful and innocent and easy
thoughts. Soul and body are blending into one; the
senses and thoughts mix in one delight; he sees a
universe of order and beauty, and joy and life, of
which he becomes a part, and finds himself carried
along in the eternal going-on of nature. Sudden and
short-lived passions of men take no hold upon him;
for he has sat in holy thought by the roar and hurry
of the stream, which has rushed on from the beginning
of things; and he is quiet in the tumult of the multitude,
for he has watched the tracery of leaves playing safely
over the foam.

The innocent face of nature gives him an open and
fair mind; pain and death seem passing away, for all
about him is cheerful and in its spring. His virtues
are not taught him as lessons, but are shed upon him
and enter into him like the light and warmth of the
sun; and amidst the variety of the earth, he sees a
fitness, which frees him from the formalities of rule,
and lets him abroad, to find a pleasure in all things;
and order becomes a simple feeling of the soul.

Religion, to such an one, has thoughts and visions
and sensations, tinged, as it were, with a holier and
brighter light than falls on other men. The love and
reverence of the Creator make their abode in his
imagination, and he gathers about them earth and
air and ideal worlds. His heart is made glad with
the perfectness in the works of God, when he considers
that even of the multitude of things that are
growing up and decaying, and of those which have
come and gone, on which the eye of man has never
rested, each was as fair and complete as if made to
live for ever for our instruction and delight.

Freedom and order, and beauty and grandeur, are
in accordance in his mind, and give largeness and
height to his thoughts; he moves among the bright
clouds; he wanders away into the measureless depths
of the stars, and is touched by the fire with which
God has lighted them — all that is made partakes of
the eternal, and religion becomes a perpetual pleasure.