CHAPTER V

WORDSWORTH AS A NATURE POET

It is a far cry from Tennyson to Wordsworth as exponents of scientific fact and minute observation. We have seen how lovingly Tennyson dwelt on microscopic details in flowers, and how closely he studied the habits and the notes of birds. Wordsworth loved Nature with an ecstatic fervour-an overmastering passion that Tennyson could not boast; his eye and his ear were open to be played upon by every natural appearance in hill, in cloud, in stream and in tree; but his outlook was broader and, in one sense, less intimate. In other words, he was less of a scientist in the modern acceptation of that term than Tennyson. He was always

accurate so far as his observation went, but he rather despised too inquisitive examination.

Sweet is the lore which Nature brings;

Our meddling intellect

Misshapes the beauteous forms of things;—
We murder to dissect.

Enough of Science and of Art ;

Close up those barren leaves;

Come forth and bring with you a heart
That watches and receives.

In Expostulation and Reply, while expressing the same thought, he insists that we can feed our minds "in a wise passiveness," that it is a mistake to be always seeking, that if we open our hearts in reverence, Nature will enter. Hence he has a certain aversion to the modern botanist who explores every corner of a hillside or a shady wood in his search for rare plants, and, when he has found them, pulls their blossoms to pieces to discern their floral structure. One, all eyes

Philosopher! a fingering slave,

One that would peep and botanise
Upon his mother's grave.

Yet in his preface to "This lawn a carpet all alive," Wordsworth takes a line more sympathetic towards science: "Some are of opinion that the habit of analysing, decomposing, and anatomising is inevitably unfavourable to the perception of beauty. People are led into this mistake by overlooking the fact that such processes are to a certain extent within the reach of a limited intellect the beauty in form of a plant or an animal is not made less, but more, apparent as a whole by more accurate

insight into its constituent properties and powers. This was his theoretical opinion, but we cannot conceal from ourselves that his dominant temper of mind was rather unscientific. Coleridge showed him through a magnifying glass "the mysteries that cups of flowers enfold"; but as a rule such minutia did not appeal to him.

We cannot help thinking that Wordsworth held a mistaken attitude towards science. With Tennyson's example before us, we are forced to the conclusion that Wordsworth was grievously wrong when he affirmed that Nature revealed her secrets unsought. The fact is that many of her most charming riddles are solved only after much seeking and close persistent labour. A merely meditative gaze, however sympathetic and however reverent, will not, from a distance, discover all that is to be Yet Wordsworth affirmed, and he was un

seen.

doubtedly sincere in his belief, that

One impulse from a vernal wood

May teach you more of man,

Of moral evil and of good

Than all the sages can.

He also said in The Excursion :

How bountiful is Nature, he shall find
Who seeks not; and to him who hath not asked,
Large measure shall be dealt.

It follows that we cannot expect to find in him the same kind of illustrative passages, showing the transfiguring of unfamiliar scientific facts into poetry. The truth is that Wordsworth came, for that purpose, a generation or so too soon; he was an old man before the scientific revival began to gain strength, and by that time his poetic fervour had burned itself out. Yet, although he is less scientific than Tennyson, no account of Nature in poetry, however superficial, can omit Wordsworth, because in his point of view he was unique; his originality and individuality changed the whole current of English verse. What gave distinction to Wordsworth was the new way in which he viewed Nature at her work and the new way in which she moved his inner being. Nature to him was an all-pervading spirit, and in her presence he felt himself overawed, as an ordinary man may when he enters a great cathedral, in which the artistic grandeur of the building is supported and harmonised with the splendour of the ritual, and he is prompted to uncover his head and bow his knees in an attitude of humble reverence and sincere devotion. That was how Wordsworth felt as he wandered on the lone hillside and looked up at the gleaming silent stars, or at the gorgeous glories of

be

the clouds that enwrap the sinking sun. At such moments he caught glimpses of "the light that never was on sea or land," and felt himself to be a great high priest of Nature-a human spirit dedicated to raise his voice in adoration of this august and beneficent power that rules the world. Hence in Nutting he asks his sister to

move along these shades

In gentleness of heart; with gentle hand
Touch, for there is a spirit in the woods.

And in Tintern Abbey he tells us :

I have felt

A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime
Of something far more deeply interfused,
Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,
And the round ocean and the living air,
And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;
A motion and a spirit, that impels

All thinking things, all objects of all thought,
And rolls through all things.

Peter Bell was untouched by Nature's terrors or

her charms.

To this soulless man the outside

world had no appeal.

A primrose by a river's brim

A yellow primrose was to him,
And it was nothing more.