[272]: Edinburgh Review, juin 1810.
[273]: Nos jansénistes, les puritains et les méthodistes sont les extrêmes de ce groupe.
To me the meanest flower that blows can give
Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.
[275]: Préface de la seconde édition des Lyrical Ballads.
[276]: Peter Bell,—the White doe,—the Kitten and the Falling leaves, etc.
«This dull product of a scoffer's pen,
Impure conceits discharging from a heart
Harden'd by impious pride!»
On man, on nature and on human life
Musing in solitude, I oft perceive
Fair trains of imagery before me rise,
Accompanied by feelings of delight
Pure, or with no unpleasing sadness mixed;
And I am conscious of affecting thoughts
And dear remembrances, whose presence soothes
Or elevates the mind, intent to weigh
The good or evil of our mortal stake.
—To these emotions, whencesoe'er they come,
Whether from breath of outward circumstance,
Or from the soul—an impulse to herself,—
I would give utterance in numerous verse.
Of Truth, of Grandeur, Beauty, Love and Hope,
And melancholy Fear subdued by Faith;
Of blessed consolations in distress,
Of moral strength and intellectual Power,
Of joy in widest commonalty spread,
Of the individual mind that keeps her own
Inviolate retirement, subject there
To conscience only, and the Law supreme
Of that Intelligence that governs all
I sing.