The relationship between Emerson and Wordsworth, or rather the influence of Wordsworth upon Emerson, needs to be defined. There is a nebulous impression of close kinship between the two, particularly in their views concerning nature. Since Wordsworth's more original and potent verse had been written before 1820, while Emerson's earliest significant address was delivered in 1837 and his earliest significant essay was printed in 1836, we are apt to assume that Wordsworth exerted an important influence upon the young Emerson in the 1830's. The assumption does not appear to be well founded as I shall attempt to demonstrate. During the years that followed his first efforts, Emerson's attitude grew successively friendly, enthusiastic, confident toward the Wordsworth he had formerly found interesting but blundering, admirable in intention but ludicrously incapable. It is not difficult to mark the very year in which the transition from very considerable disapproval to almost unbroken approval was completed.