And his Lordship refers you to "Wordsworth's Thanksgiving Ode."
I have no early edition of Wordsworth. In Moxon's, 1844, no such lines appear in the Thanksgiving Ode, but in the ode dated 1815, and printed immediately before it, the following lines occur.
"But man is thy most awful instrument
In working out a pure intent."
It is hardly possible to avoid the conclusion that Wordsworth altered the lines after "Don Juan" was written. I am, with great respect, your obedient servant,
Ralph Thicknesse.
FOOTNOTES:
[88] November, 1880.—Ed.
[89] "Childe Harold," iv. 79; compare "Adonais," and Sismondi, vol. i. p. 148.
[90] Adrian the Fourth. Eugenius died in the previous year.