"Written in Germany; intended as a part of a poem on my own life, but
struck out as not being wanted there. Like most of my schoolfellows, I
was an impassioned Nutter. For this pleasure, the Vale of Esthwaite,
abounding in coppice wood, furnished a very wide range. These verses
arose out of the remembrance of feelings I had often had when a boy, and
particularly in the extensive woods that still stretch from the side of
Esthwaite Lake towards Graythwaite."
Wordsworth possessed in an unusual degree the power of reviving the
impressions of his youth. Few autobiographical records are so vivid in
this respect as his _Prelude_. In his famous ode on the _Intimations of
Immortality from Recollections of Early Childhood_, he dwells upon the
unreflective exultation which in the child responds to the joyousness of
nature, and with a profound intuition that may not be justified in the
facts, he sees in this heedless delight a mystical intimation of
immortality.
In the poem _Nutting_ the animal exhilaration of boyhood is finely
blended with this deeper feeling of mystery. The boy exultingly
penetrates into one of those woodland retreats where nature seems to be
holding communion with herself. For some moments he is subdued by the
beauty of the place, and lying among the flowers he hears with ecstasy
the murmur of the stream. Then the spirit of ravage peculiar to boyhood
comes over him, and he rudely mars the beauty of the spot:
"And the shady nook
Of hazels, and the green and mossy bower,
Deformed and sullied, patiently gave up
Their quiet being:"
Such wantonness seems to his maturer reflection a sacrilege, and even the
boy was not insensible to the silent reproach of the "intruding sky."
TOUCH,--FOR THERE IS A SPIRIT IN THE WOODS. Many lines might be quoted
from Wordsworth to illustrate his theory of the personal attributes of
nature. In some of his more elevated passages nature in all her
processes is regarded as the intimate revelation of the Godhead, the
radiant garment in which the Deity clothes Himself that our senses may
apprehend Him. Thus, when we touch a tree or a flower we may be said to
touch God himself. In this way the beauty and power of nature become
sacred for Wordsworth, and inspired his verse at times with a solemn
dignity to which other poets have rarely attained.
The immanence of God in nature, and yet His superiority to His own
revelation of Himself is beautifully expressed in some of the later
verses of _Hart Leap Well_:
"The Being, that is in the clouds and air,
That is in the green leaves among the groves,
Maintains a deep and reverential care
For the unoffending creatures whom he loves."
Yet the life in nature is capable of multiplying itself infinitely, and
each of her manifold divisions possesses a distinctive mood; one might
almost say a separate life of its own. It is, in his ability to capture
the true emotional mood which clings to some beautiful object or scene in
nature, and which that object or scene may truly be said to inspire, that
Wordsworth's power lies.
Wordsworth possessed every attribute necessary to the descriptive
poet,--subtle powers of observation, ears delicately tuned to seize the
very shadow of sound, and a diction of copious strength suggestive beyond
the limits of ordinary expression. Yet purely descriptive poetry he
scorned. "He expatiated much to me one day," writes Mr. Aubrey de Vere,
"as we walked among the hills above Grasmere, on the mode in which Nature
had been described by one of the most justly popular of England's modern
poets--one for whom he preserved a high and affectionate respect
[evidently Sir Walter Scott]. 'He took pains,' Wordsworth said; 'he went
out with his pencil and note-book, and jotted down whatever struck him
most--a river rippling over the sands, a ruined tower on a rock above it,
a promontory, and a mountain-ash waving its red berries. He went home
and wove the whole together into a poetical description.' After a pause,
Wordsworth resumed, with a flashing eye and impassioned voice; 'But
Nature does not permit an inventory to be made of her charms! He should
have left his pencil and note-book at home, fixed his eye as he walked
with a reverent attention on all that surrounded him, and taken all into
a heart that could understand and enjoy. Then, after several days had
passed by, he should have interrogated his memory as to the scene. He
would have discovered that while much of what he had admired was
preserved to him, much was also most wisely obliterated; that which
remained--the picture surviving in his mind--would have presented the
ideal and essential truth of the scene, and done so in a large part by
discarding much which, though in itself striking, was not characteristic.
In every scene many of the most brilliant details are but accidental; a
true eye for Nature does not note them, or at least does not dwell on
them.'"
The student should learn to compare the descriptive methods of Coleridge
and Wordsworth. See especially Lowell's note quoted on pp. 197-198; also
see pp. 47 f.