CHARACTERISTICS OF THE MAN.

"He wasn't a man as said a deal to common folk," said a Grasmere peasant in answer to an enquirer, "but he talked a deal to hissen." "He was not a man that folks could crack wi'," said another, "nor not a man as could crack wi' folks."

"I have known him nearly twenty years, and for about that time intimately. The strength and character of his mind you see in The Excursion, and his life does not belie his writings; for in every relation in life and point of view he is a truly exemplary and admirable man." Southey.

"During the last seven or ten years of his life, Wordsworth felt himself to be a recognized lion in certain considerable London circles, and was in the habit of coming up to town with his wife for a month or two every season to enjoy his quiet triumph and collect his bits of tribute tales quales. Wordsworth took his bit of lionism very quietly, with a smile sardonic rather than triumphant, and certainly got no harm by it, if he got or expected little good. For the rest, he talked well in his way; with veracity, easy brevity, and force, as a wise tradesman would of his tools and workshop, and as no unwise one could. His voice was good, frank and sonorous, though practically clear, distinct, and forcible rather than melodious; the tone of him business-like, sedately confident: no discourtesy, yet no anxiety about being courteous. A fine, wholesome rusticity, fresh as his mountain breezes, sat well on the stalwart veteran, and on all he said and did. You would have said he was usually a taciturn man; glad to unlock himself to audience sympathetic and intelligent, when such offered itself. His face bore marks of much, not always peaceful, meditation; the look of it not bland or benevolent so much as close, impregnable and hard, a man multa tacere loquive paratus, in a world where he had experienced no lack of contradictions as he strode along. The eyes were not very brilliant, but they had a quiet clearness; there was enough of brow, and well-shaped; rather too much of cheek ("horse-face," I have heard satirists say); face of squarish shape, and decidedly longish, as I think the head itself was (its "length" going horizontal); he was large-boned, lean, but still firmknit, tall, and strong-looking when he stood, a right good old steel-grey figure, with rustic simplicity and dignity about him, and a vivacious strength looking through him which might have suited one of those old steel-grey markgrafs whom Henry the Fowler set up to ward the 'marches' and do battle with the intrusive heathen in a stalwart and judicious manner." Carlyle's Reminiscences.

CHARACTERISTICS OF HIS POETRY.

Wordsworth's represents more strongly than any other poetry, the reaction against the eighteenth century forms and ideals. The general life and thought of the eighteenth century had not been characterized by any depth of feeling or genuineness of emotion, and the work of the poets of the so-called classical school fairly reflected the character of the age. Their poetry is largely didactic, intended to instruct or to please the intellect, rather than to appeal to the imagination and the emotions of men. Hence, the poets of the time wrote consciously for the entertainment rather of the literati, than of the common people. In so doing, they were naturally led to deal with the life of the city as opposed to rural life, and to the life of man in society as opposed to the humbler walks of life. As a result, furthermore, of this effort to please a critical public, form came to be considered as of more importance than matter. The poet was content with a superficial treatment of his subject, and gave no thought to the spiritual aspect of his theme. His chief care was to maintain the dignity of his verse. As a consequence, he had recourse to conventional stereotyped expressions, to classical imagery, and to figurative language, and avoided the natural language of common life; and, furthermore, as the rhyming heroic couplet gave a certain point and smartness to the expression it came to be used more largely than any other form of verse.

Wordsworth, in the preface to the Lyrical Ballads, set forth his theory of poetry, as opposed to that of the Classical School, under three main heads. He therein declared, (1) that each of his poems had a purpose, to trace in incidents and situations "the primary laws of our nature;" hence, he went to humble and rustic life, and to nature herself for his art; (2) that the action and situation should be only secondary to feeling; hence, the profoundly emotional nature of his work; (3) that the language of poetry differs from that of prose only by the use of metre; hence, in some of even his best work we find the actual language of daily life, not, however, the language of men in the pursuance of their ordinary duties; but rather the language of their impassioned moods. This preface, with some slight modifications, constituted Wordsworth's life-long poetic creed, and it will at once be seen, that in following out these three fundamental principles therein stated, he deliberately broke with the old traditions and became the recognized leader of the new movement in literature.