Suggestions Concerning the Source of the Poet's Doctrines and the Nature of His Mystical Experience
“. . . . his eyes
Have read the book of wisdom in the sun,
And after dark deciphered it on earth“—E. A. Robinson
To Call Wordsworth a great philosopher would, I suppose, if we put the word to its customary use, be extravagant. For he left the world no synthesis of doctrine that could be called his own. And yet his philosophy is a fascinating study, for although many may have understood with greater acuteness the numerous doctrines that appear in his poems, none could feel with an intensity greater than his, their human significance and value. Wordsworth's interests led him to demand more of philosophy than do most reflective men ; besides seeking a criterion of the good and probing into the problem of human freedom, he looked for an explanation of his own strange communion with Nature. Thus his philosophical life, proving as it did the source of some of the finest metaphysical and religious poetry in literature, was a deep and a rich one. It led him to absorb the teachings of many thinkers and to incorporate their doctrines in his poems.