Mr. Swinburne quotes the following passage from a description given by
one of the daily papers of a certain murderer who at the time was
attracting great attention in London:--
"He has great taste for poetry, can recite long passages from
popular poets,--Byron's denunciations of the pleasures of the world
having for him great attraction as a _description of his own
experiences_. Wordsworth is his favorite poet. He confesses himself
a villain."
At this day the two latter facts will not necessarily be supposed to
have any logical connection; but there was a time when the violence of
the opponents of Wordsworth's claim to be a poet might have suggested
the most intimate relation between these two statements. For many years
he was looked upon as an "inspired idiot" by a large part of the reading
world; and his place in literature has not been definitely settled to
this day. Such extravagant claims have always been made for him by his
friends that they have called forth just as extravagant denunciations
from those who do not admire his works; and violent controversies arise
concerning his merits among first-class scholars and critics. It is
always noticeable, however, in these discussions that his panegyrists
always quote his best efforts, those sublime passages to which no one
denies transcendent merit, and that his opponents never get much beyond
"Peter Bell," and other trivialities and absurdities, which his best
friends must admit that he wrote in great numbers. That his best work
ranks next to Shakespeare, Milton, and Shelley, can scarcely be doubted
by any true lover of poetry; and he certainly has the right to be judged
by his best, rather than by his inferior work.
Wordsworth was born in 1770, in Cumberland, and received his early
education there, being noted for his excellence in classical studies and
for his thoughtful disposition. He graduated from St. John's College,
Cambridge, and immediately after began his literary labors, which were
continued through a long and most industrious life.
In 1803 he married Miss Mary Hutchinson of Penrith, and settled at
Grasmere, in Westmoreland, where he passed the remainder of his life,
and where he lies buried in the little churchyard where so many of his
family had preceded him. He helped to make the Lake district famous the
world over, and himself never wearied of its charms. He was
pre-eminently the poet of Nature, and it was from the unrivalled scenery
of this part of England that he caught much of his inspiration. Mrs.
Wordsworth, who was as fond of it as her husband, used to say in extreme
old age, that the worst of living in the Lake region was that it made
one unwilling to die when the time came. The poet's marriage was an
eminently happy one, although Miss Martineau hints that it was not first
love on his part, but that the lines, "She was a phantom of delight," so
often quoted as relating to Mrs. Wordsworth, were really meant to
indicate another person who had occupied his thoughts at an early day.
At any rate, he did address the following lines to his wife after
thirty-six years of married life, which is certainly a far higher
compliment to her:--
"Morn into noon did pass, noon into eve,
And the old day was welcome as the young,
As welcome, and as beautiful,--in sooth, more beautiful,
As being a thing more holy."
The other poems, "Let other bards of angels sing," and "Oh, dearer far
than life and light are dear," were also addressed to her.
It was through her early friendship for Wordsworth's sister that she
first came to know the poet, and she was not at that time a person whom
a poet would be supposed to fancy. She was the incarnation of good-sense
as applied to the concerns of the every-day world, and in no sense a
dreamer, or a seeker after the ideal. Her intellect, however, developed
by contact with higher minds, and her tastes after a time became more in
accordance with those of her husband. She learned to passionately admire
the outward world, in which he took such great delight, and to admire
his poetry and that of his friends. She was of a kindly, cheery,
generous nature, very unselfish in her dealings with her family, and
highly beloved by her friends. She was the finest example of thrift and
frugality to be found in her neighborhood, and is said to have exerted a
decidedly beneficial influence upon all her poorer neighbors. She did
not give them as much in charity as many others did, but she taught them
how to take care of what they had, and to save something for their days
of need. Miss Martineau, who was a neighbor, says: "The oldest residents
have long borne witness that the homes of the neighbors have assumed a
new character of order and comfort and wholesome economy, since the
poet's family lived at Rydal Mount." She took the kindest and tenderest
care of Wordsworth's sister Dorothy, who was for many years a helpless
charge upon her hands. This sister had ruined her health, and finally
dethroned her reason, by trying to accompany her brother on his long and
tiresome rambles among the lakes and up the mountains. She has been
known to walk with him forty miles in a single day. Many English women
are famous walkers, but her record is beyond them all. Such excessive
exercise is bad for a man, as was proved in the case of Dickens, who
doubtless injured himself much by such long pedestrian trips after brain
labor; but no woman can endure such a strain as this, and the adoring
sister not only failed to be a companion to her idolized brother, but
became a care and burden for many years. She lies now by her brother's
side in the crowded little churchyard, and doubtless the "sweet bells
jangled" are in tune again. A lovely group of children filled the
Wordsworth home, some of whom died in childhood; but one daughter and
two sons lived, as loving companions for their parents, until near the
end of the poet's life, when the daughter Dora preceded him a little
into the silent land. Wordsworth was utterly inconsolable for her loss;
and used to spend the long winter evenings in tears, week after week,
and month after month. Mrs. Wordsworth was much braver than he, and bore
her own burdens calmly, while trying to cheer his exaggerated gloom. He
was old and broken at this time, and never recovered from the shock of
his daughter's death. Mrs. Wordsworth survived him for several years,
being over ninety at the time of her death, and having long been deaf
and blind. But she was very cheerful and active to the last, and not
unwilling to live on, even with her darkened vision. The devotion of the
old poet to his wife was very touching, and she who had idolized him in
life was never weary of recounting his virtues when he was gone.
The character of Wordsworth is getting to be understood as we recede
from the prejudices of the time in which he lived, and begins to assume
something like a consistent whole, compared to the contradictions which
at one time seemed to be inherent in it. He says of his own childhood:--
"I was of a stiff, moody, and violent temper; so much so that I
remember going once into the attic of my grandfather's house at
Penrith, upon some indignity having been put upon me, with an
intention of destroying myself with one of the foils which I knew
were kept there. I took the foil in my hand, but my heart failed."