Does he not speak an universal language? Has he not shed a benign light on the truth which is never to perish-on questions interesting to man in all states and stages of his being? We look on the poet as the benefactor of our race. In perusing his works, we feel a new interest, not alone in our English descent; a new bond of affection, not alone for our mother speech. The poet has enlarged the sphere of human knowledge; he has quickened the sympathies of our common humanity.

We may be permitted to mention that the unsettled state of the public mind in this country on many questions in mental and moral philosophy is unfavorable to a due appreciation of Wordsworth. The poet is a philosopher. He has studied hard and thought clearly. His poems are constructed on fixed principles. He has not judged it worth while to write at random, in fits of inspiration, without any well considered plan, or any determinate object. He has higher ideas of his vocation than to trust to some lucky moment, or to ring changes on a few set phrases. No intelligent man can read his Prefaces and Notes without being convinced that the poet has accurately studied the mental and moral faculties. Whether his doctrines are right or wrong, he has well considered them, and has made them the foundation of his claims as a poet. We do not say that the reader must think in all respects like his author in order to derive pleasure and instruction from his writings. Wordsworth has many detached passages of singular power and beauty-open to the comprehension and love of all. The deep pathos and perfect nature of nearly the whole of the first two books of the Excursion will find a response in every heart which is not utterly dead. But a deeper meaning frequently pervades a poem. Fine views of thought intertwine themselves in the texture of a piece, which is outwardly unassuming and simple. This is eminently the case in the poems where imagination and reflection are predominant. It is not required of an author that he should at all times, remain on a level with an indolent reader's comprehension. are passages in the Hebrew Scriptures and in Milton, which, wholly apart from their costume, require from him who opens the page, the closest study. The ground work of the poem, the nature of the conception will not be obvious to an unreflecting mind. Now, among the mass of educated people in this country, there is no distinct apprehension of the peculiar merits of Wordsworth, because they have not themselves any clear con

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ception of the powers of mind requisite in the production of poetry. They have never studied their own powers. To habits of calm meditation upon the laws of their own inward being, they are strangers. This may not be altogether their own fault. So far as we understand the case, there is no predominant system of ethics, or of mental philosophy in the country. Paley is taught in some of our colleges rather because his errors furnish a good starting point for the teacher's lecture or questions, than from any belief in his doctrines. Locke and Dr. Brown retain a doubtful supremacy in some institutions, while in others, Dugald Stewart is recovering his lost honors. Consequently, the minds of pupils are afloat on these great subjects. When a poet appears, who claims to be a philosopher, who asserts that genuine poetry is as permanent as pure science, who maintains that a poet "binds together by knowledge and passion the vast empire of human society, as it is spread over the whole earth, and over all time," he cannot in such society, receive a general and cordial welcome. Milton was little heard of in England till more than 150 years after the publication of his poems. In eleven years, only 3,000 copies of Paradise Lost were sold. Only two editions of the works of Shakspeare were sold in more than forty years,- from 1623 to 1664. Spenser, if known, is scarcely read in the United States. His Faery Queen has not been republished in this country, so far as our knowledge extends. Who is found reading the Canterbury Tales of Chaucer, or the Reliques of Ancient English poetry?

This leads us to remark that the powers of the English language are not understood, as they should be, for the proper mastery of a poet like Wordsworth. The history of some English words, it has been remarked, is worth more than the history of a campaign. Many words in Paradise Lost are absolutely insusceptible of exchange. Removal destroys the stanza. So in some of Wordsworth's Sonnets. There is a perfect adaptation between the word and the sentiment. It lies in its place like apples of gold in pictures of silver. In other cases, a knowledge of the history or of the etymology of a word, or a phrase, is needed, in order to the full appreciation of the stanza, or the poem in which it is found. This is not, however, the age of logical precision in the use of language. The scholar is not often directed to study the models of severe classical beauty. Immediate, practical effect is the object. Any approxi

mation towards a perfect style is regarded as unattainable, or, perhaps, undesirable. Some of the leading periodical publications are, in our opinion, fast corrupting the language. Every thing is thrown off in a smart, dashing, impetuous style. Keen, lively, pointed sallies of wit, or nonsense, as the case may be, are substituted for such English as Addison and Playfair have given us. Truth is made to bow at the shrine of vigorous writing. Originality is considered as synonymous with odd terms in a sentence, or with singular combinations of phraseology. Some of the British Magazines are filled with humorous articles, greedily republished in this country, which are a motley mixture of profaneness, staring exclamation-points, personal scandal, inuendoes, and all other things, which can show the emptiness of the writer's brain, or degrade the language in which he professes to write. We must go back to former days, when Bates, and Jeremy Taylor, and Leighton, and Milton gave us specimens of the mature strength and finished beauty of the English tongue, when both the Saxon and the Greek roots were duly honored, when massive richness of thought was equalled by the sweet music, or the consummate finish of the diction. Wordsworth belongs to the old school in this respect. He cannot be entirely appreciated by such persons as are indifferent to language. His words are not simply the costume of his thoughts, but in many instances at least, are an integral part of those thoughts. We will give a specimen or two.

Composed upon Westminster Bridge, Sept. 3, 1803.
Earth has not any thing to show more fair;
Dull would he be of soul who could pass by
A sight so touching in its majesty;
This city now doth like a garment wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare,
Ships, towers, domes, theatres and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky;
All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep
In his first splendor, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep!
The river glideth at his own sweet will!
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep;
And all that mighty heart is lying still.

Who could attempt to displace any word in that sonnet? How thoroughly Saxon in etymology. How select the epithets. VOL. VII. No. 21.

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How distinct is every picture, and yet how compact the whole great effect. Listen to the following noble apostrophe.

1802.

MILTON! thou shouldst be living at this hour;
England hath need of thee; she is a fen
Of stagnant waters; altar, sword and pen,
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hall and bower,
Have forfeited their ancient English dower
Of inward happiness. We are selfish men;
Oh! raise us up, return to us again;

And give us manners, virtue, freedom, power.
Thy soul was like a Star and dwelt apart;

Thou hadst a voice whose sound was like the sea;

Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,

So didst thou travel on life's common way,
In cheerful godliness; and yet thy heart
The lowliest duties on herself did lay.

Who that has read "meek Walton" will not answer to the perfect truth of the following?

Walton's Book of “Lives."

There are no colors in the fairest sky

So fair as these. The feather, whence the pen
Was shaped that traced the lives of these good men,
Dropped from an angel's wing. With moistened eye
We read of faith and purest charity

In statesman, priest, and humble citizen.
O could we copy their mild virtues, then
What joy to live, what blessedness to die!

Methinks their very names shine still and bright,
Apart-like glow-worms in the woods of spring,
Or lonely tapers shooting far a light

That guides and cheers-or-seem, like stars on high,
Satellites burning in a lucid ring

Around meek Walton's heavenly memory.

In the last volume of Wordsworth, are some exquisite stanzas on "The Power of Sound." Here are the last three. The first alludes to the Pythagorean theory of numbers and music, with their supposed power over the motions of the uni

verse.

By one pervading spirit

Of tones and numbers all things are controlled,
As sages taught, where faith was found to merit

Initiation in that mystery old.

The heavens, whose aspects make our minds as still As they themselves appear to be,

Innumerable voices fill

With everlasting harmony;

The towering headlands, covered with mist,

Their feet among the billows, know

That ocean is a mighty harmonist;

Thy pinions, universal air,

Ever waving to and fro,

Are delegates of harmony, and bear

Strains that support the seasons in their round;
Stern winter loves a dirge-like sound.

Break forth into thanksgiving,

Ye banded instruments of wind and chords;
Unite, to magnify the Everliving,

Your inarticulate notes with the voice of words!

Nor hushed be service from the lowing mead,

Nor mute the forest hum of noon;

Thou too be heard, lone eagle! freed
From snowy peak and cloud, attune
Thy hungry barkings to the hymn
Of joy, that from her utmost walls
The six days' work, by flaming seraphim,
Transmits to heaven! As deep to deep
Shouting through one valley calls,

All worlds, all natures, mood and measure keep
For praise and ceaseless gratulation, poured
Into the ear of God, their Lord!

A voice to light gave being;

To time, and man, his earth-born chronicler;
A voice shall finish doubt and dim forseeing

And sweep away life's visionary stir;
The trumpet (we, intoxicate with pride,
Arm at its blast for deadly wars)

To archangelic lips applied,

The grave shall open, quench the stars.

O silence! are inan's noisy years

No more than moments of thy life?

Is harmony, blest queen of smiles and tears,
With her smooth tones and discords just,

Tempered into rapturous strife,

Thy destined bond-slave? No! though earth be dust And vanish, though the heavens dissolve, her stay

Is in the WORD, that shall not pass away.