The following are the notes which Wordsworth added to _The Excursion_ in
the edition of 1814. In the case of the second, it will be observed that
a new note was substituted in 1827 for that of 1814 and 1820. In other
respects these "notes" remained unaltered throughout the editions, from
1814 to 1850. I have not thought it necessary to indicate the few, and
very slight, changes in the phraseology of separate sentences. The text
of the passages, on which the notes are based, is taken from the edition
of 1850.--ED.
Preface, page 25.
_Descend, prophetic Spirit! that inspir'st_
_The human Soul_, etc.
Not mine own fears, nor the prophetic Soul
Of the wide world dreaming on things to come.
_Shakspeare's Sonnets._--W.W. (1814).
Page 43.
----_much did he see of men._
In Heron's Tour in Scotland is given an intelligent account of the
qualities by which this class of men used to be, and still are in some
degree, distinguished, and of the benefits which society derives from
their labours. Among their characteristics, he does not omit to mention
that, from being obliged to pass so much of their time in solitary
wandering among rural objects, they frequently acquire meditative habits
of mind, and are strongly disposed to enthusiasm poetical and religious.
I regret that I have not the book at hand to quote the passage, as it is
interesting on many accounts. (1814.)
At the risk of giving a shock to the prejudices of artificial society, I
have ever been ready to pay homage to the aristocracy of nature; under a
conviction that vigorous human-heartedness is the constituent principle
of true taste. It may still, however, be satisfactory to have prose
testimony how far a Character, employed for purposes of imagination,
is founded upon general fact. I, therefore, subjoin an extract from an
author who had opportunities of being well acquainted with a class of
men, from whom my own personal knowledge emboldened me to draw this
portrait.
"We learn from Cæsar and other Roman Writers, that the travelling
merchants who frequented Gaul and other barbarous countries, either
newly conquered by the Roman arms, or bordering on the Roman conquests,
were ever the first to make the inhabitants of those countries
familiarly acquainted with the Roman modes of life, and to inspire them
with an inclination to follow the Roman fashions, and to enjoy Roman
conveniences. In North America, travelling merchants from the Settlements
have done and continue to do much more towards civilising the Indian
natives, than all the missionaries, papist or protestant, who have ever
been sent among them.
"It is farther to be observed, for the credit of this most useful class
of men, that they commonly contribute, by their personal manners, no less
than by the sale of their wares, to the refinement of the people among
whom they travel. Their dealings form them to great quickness of wit and
acuteness of judgment. Having constant occasion to recommend themselves
and their goods, they acquire habits of the most obliging attention,
and the most insinuating address. As in their peregrinations they have
opportunity of contemplating the manners of various men and various
cities, they become eminently skilled in the knowledge of the world.
_As they wander, each alone, through thinly-inhabited districts, they
form habits of reflection and of sublime contemplation._ With all these
qualifications, no wonder, that they should often be, in remote parts of
the country, the best mirrors of fashion, and censors of manners; and
should contribute much to polish the roughness, and soften the rusticity
of our peasantry. It is not more than twenty or thirty years since a
young man going from any part of Scotland to England, of purpose to
_carry the pack_, was considered as going to lead the life and acquire
the fortune of a gentleman. When, after twenty years' absence, in that
honourable line of employment, he returned with his acquisitions to
his native country, he was regarded as a gentleman to all intents and
purposes."--Heron's _Journey in Scotland_, vol. i. p. 89.--W.W. (1827).
Page 110.
_Lost in unsearchable eternity!_
Since this paragraph was composed, I have read with so much pleasure,
in Burnet's Theory of the Earth, a passage expressing corresponding
sentiments, excited by objects of a similar nature, that I cannot forbear
to transcribe it.
"Siquod verò Natura nobis dedit spectaculum, in hâc tellure, verè
gratum, et philosopho dignum, id semel mihi contigisse arbitror; cùm ex
celsissimâ rupe speculabundus ad oram maris Mediterranei, hinc æquor
cæruleum, illinc tractus Alpinos prospexi; nihil quidem magìs dispar
aut dissimile, nec in suo genere, magìs egregium et singulare. Hoc
theatrum ego facile prætulerim Romanis cunctis, Græcisve, atque id quod
natura hîc spectandum exhibet, scenicis ludis omnibus, aut amphitheatri
certaminibus. Nihil hîc elegans aut venustum, sed ingens et magnificum,
et quod placet magnitudine suâ et quâdam specie immensitatis. Hinc
intuebar maris æquabilem superficiem, usque et usque diffusam, quantum
maximùm oculorum acies ferri potuit; illinc disruptissimam terræ faciem,
et vastas moles variè elevatas aut depressas, erectas, propendentes,
reclinatas, coacervatas, omni situ inæquali et turbido: Placuit ex hâc
parte Naturæ unitas et simplicitas, et inexhausta quædam planities; ex
alterâ, multiformis confusio magnorum corporum, et insanæ rerum strages:
quas cùm intuebar, non urbis alicujus aut oppidi, sed confracti mundi
rudera, ante oculos habere mihi visus sum.
"In singulis ferè montibus erat aliquid insolens et mirabile, sed
præ cæteris mihi placebat ilia, quâ sedebam, rupes; erat maxima et
altissima, et quâ terram respiciebat, molliori ascensu altitudinem suam
dissimulabat: quà verò mare, horrendúm præceps, et quasi ad perpendiculum
facta instar parietis. Prætereà facies ilia marina adeò erat lævis ac
uniformis (quod in rupibus aliquando observare licet) ac si scissa
fuisset à summo ad imum, in illo plano, vel terræ motu aliquo, aut
fulmine divulsa.
"Ima pars rupis erat cava, recessusque habuit, et saxeos specus, euntes
in vacuum montem; sive naturâ pridem factos, sive exesos mari, et undarum
crebris ictibus: In hos enim cum impetu ruebant, et fragore æstuantis
maris fluctus, quos iterum spumantes reddidit antrum, et quasi ab imo
ventre evomuit.
"Dextrum latus mentis erat præruptum, aspero saxo et nudâ caute;
sinistrum non adeò neglexerat Natura, arboribus utpote ornatum: et
prope pedem montis rivus limpidæ aquæ prorupit, qui cùm vicinam vallem
irrigaverat, lento motu serpens, et per varios mæandros, quasi ad
protrahendam vitam, in magno mari absorptus subito periit. Denique
in summo vertice promontorii, commodè eminebat saxum, cui insidebam
contemplabundus. Vale augusta sedes, Rege digna: Augusta rupes,
semper mihi memoranda!" P. 89. _Telluris Theoria sacra, etc. Editio
secunda._--W. W. 1814).
Page 139.
_Of Mississippi, or that northern stream._
"A man is supposed to improve by going out into the _World_, by visiting
_London_. Artificial man does; he extends with his sphere; but, alas!
that sphere is microscopic; it is formed of minutiæ, and he surrenders
his genuine vision to the artist, in order to embrace it in his ken. His
bodily senses grow acute, even to barren and inhuman pruriency; while
his mental become proportionally obtuse. The reverse is the Man of Mind:
he who is placed in the sphere of Nature and of God, might be a mock at
Tattersall's and Brooks's, and a sneer at St. James's: he would certainly
be swallowed alive by the first _Pizarro_ that crossed him:--But when he
walks along the river of Amazons; when he rests his eye on the unrivalled
Andes; when he measures the long and watered savannah; or contemplates,
from a sudden promontory, the distant, vast Pacific--and feels himself a
freeman in this vast theatre, and commanding each ready produced fruit of
this wilderness, and each progeny of this stream--his exaltation is not
less than imperial. He is as gentle, too, as he is great: his emotions of
tenderness keep pace with his elevation of sentiment; for he says, 'These
were made by a good Being, who, unsought by me, placed me here to enjoy
them.' He becomes at once a child and a king. His mind is in himself;
from hence he argues, and from hence he acts, and he argues unerringly,
and acts magisterially; his mind in himself is also in his God; and
therefore he loves, and therefore he soars."--From the notes upon _The
Hurricane_, a Poem, _by William Gilbert_.[LJ]
The Reader, I am sure, will thank me for the above quotation, which,
though from a strange book, is one of the finest passages of modern
English prose.--W.W. (1814).
Page 149.
_'Tis, by comparison, an easy task_
_Earth to despise_, etc.
See, upon this subject, Baxter's most interesting review of his own
opinions and sentiments in the decline of life. It may be found (lately
reprinted) in Dr. Wordsworth's _Ecclesiastical Biography_.--W.W. (1814).
Page 152.
_Alas! the endowment of immortal Power,_
_Is matched unequally with custom, time_, etc.
This subject is treated at length in the _Ode, Intimations of
Immortality_.--W.W. (1814).
Page 156.
_Knowing the heart of man is set to be_, etc.
The passage quoted from Daniel is taken from a poem addressed to the
Lady Margaret, Countess of Cumberland, and the two last lines, printed
in Italics, are by him translated from Seneca. The whole Poem is very
beautiful. I will transcribe four stanzas from it, as they contain an
admirable picture of the state of a wise Man's mind in a time of public
commotion.
Nor is he moved with all the thunder-cracks
Of tyrant's threats, or with the surly brow
Of Power, that proudly sits on others' crimes;
Charged with more crying sins than those he checks.
The storms of sad confusion that may grow
Up in the present for the coming times,
Appal not him; that hath no side at all,
But of himself, and knows the worst can fall.
Although his heart (so near allied to earth)
Cannot but pity the perplexed state
Of troublous and distressed mortality,
That thus make way unto the ugly birth
Of their own sorrows, and do still beget
Affliction upon Imbecility;
Yet seeing thus the course of things must run,
He looks thereon not strange, but as fore-done.
And whilst distraught ambition compasses,
And is encompassed, while as craft deceives,
And is deceived: whilst man doth ransack man,
And builds on blood, and rises by distress;
And th' Inheritance of desolation leaves
To great-expecting hopes: He looks thereon,
As from the shore of peace, with unwet eye,
And bears no venture in Impiety.
Thus, Lady, fares that man that hath prepared
A rest for his desires; and sees all things
Beneath him; and hath learned this book of man,
Full of the notes of frailty; and compared
The best of glory with her sufferings:
By whom, I see, you labour all you can
To plant your heart! and set your thoughts as near
His glorious mansion as your powers can bear. (1814.)
Page 221.
_Or rather, as we stand on holy earth.
And have the dead around us._
_Leo._ You, Sir, could help me to the history
Of half these graves?
_Priest._ For eight-score winters past,
With what I've witnessed, and with what I've heard,
Perhaps I might; ...
By turning o'er these hillocks one by one,
We two could travel, Sir, through a strange round;
Yet all in the broad highway of the world.
See the Author's poem of _The Brothers_, published in the "Lyrical
Ballads," in the year 1800.--W.W. (1814).
Page 233.
_And suffering Nature grieved that one should die._
_Southey's Retrospect_.--W.W. (1814).
Page 233.
_And whence that tribute? wherefore these regards?_
The sentiments and opinions here uttered are in unison with those
expressed in the ... Essay upon Epitaphs, which was furnished by me for
Mr. Coleridge's periodical work, _The Friend_; and as they are dictated
by a spirit congenial to that which pervades this and the two succeeding
books, the sympathising reader will not be displeased to see the Essay
here annexed.[LK]--W.W. (1814).
Page 236.
_And spires whose 'silent finger points to heaven.'_
An instinctive taste teaches men to build their churches in flat
countries with spire-steeples, which as they cannot be referred to any
other object, point as with silent finger to the sky and stars, and
sometimes, when they reflect the brazen light of a rich though rainy
sunset, appear like a pyramid of flame burning heaven-ward. See _The
Friend_, by S. T. Coleridge, No. 14, p. 223.--W. W. (1814).
Page 308.
_That sycamore, which annually holds_
_Within its shade, as in a stately tent._
This Sycamore oft musical with Bees;
_Such Tents_ the Patriarchs loved.
_S. T. Coleridge_.--W.W. (1814).
(It is in his _Inscription for a fountain on a Heath_.--ED.)
Page 323.
_Perish the roses and the flowers of kings._
The "Transit gloria mundi" is finely expressed in the Introduction to
the Foundation-charters of some of the ancient Abbeys. Some expressions
here used are taken from that of the Abbey of St. Mary's, Furness, the
translation of which is as follows:--
"Considering every day the uncertainty of life, that the roses and
flowers of Kings, Emperors, and Dukes, and the crowns and palms of all
the great, wither and decay; and that all things, with an uninterrupted
course, tend to dissolution and death: I therefore," etc.--W.W. (1814).
Page 331.
----_Earth has lent_
_Her waters, Air her breezes._
In treating this subject, it was impossible not to recollect, with
gratitude, the pleasing picture, which, in his Poem of _The Fleece_, the
excellent and amiable Dyer has given of the influences of manufacturing
industry upon the face of this Island. He wrote at a time when machinery
was first beginning to be introduced, and his benevolent heart prompted
him to augur from it nothing but good. Truth has compelled me to dwell
upon the baneful effects arising out of an ill-regulated and excessive
application of powers so admirable in themselves.--W. W. (1814).
Page 363.
_Binding herself by statute._
The discovery of Dr. Bell affords marvellous facilities for carrying this
into effect; and it is impossible to over-rate the benefit which might
accrue to humanity from the universal application of this simple engine
under an enlightened and conscientious government.--W. W. (1814).