concerns natural and quiet objects. But it would be a great error to
imagine that he was not an attentive observer of public events. He was
an ardent lover of his country and of mankind. He watched the progress
of civil affairs in England with a vigilant eye, and he brought the
actions of public men to the test of the great and lasting principles of
equity and truth. He extended his range of view to events in foreign
parts, especially on the continent of Europe. Few persons, though
actually engaged in the great struggle of that period, felt more deeply
than WORDSWORTH did in his peaceful retreat for the calamities of
European nations, suffering at that time from the imbecility of their
governments, and from the withering oppression of a prosperous
despotism. His heart burned within him when he looked forth upon the
contest, and impassioned words proceeded from him, both in poetry and
prose. The contemplative calmness of his position, and the depth and
intensity of his feelings, combined together to give a dignity and
clearness, a vigour and splendour, and, consequently, a lasting value,
to his writings on measures of domestic and foreign policy, qualities
that rarely belong to contemporaneous political effusions produced by
those engaged in the heat and din of the battle. This remark is
specially applicable to his tract on the Convention of Cintra....
Whatever difference of opinion may prevail concerning the relevance of
the great principles enunciated in it to the questions at issue, but one
judgment can exist with respect to the importance of those principles,
and the vigorous and fervid eloquence with which they are enforced. If
WORDSWORTH had never written a single verse, this Essay alone would be
sufficient to place him in the highest rank of English poets.... Enough
has been quoted to show that the Essay on the Convention of Cintra was
not an ephemeral production, destined to vanish with the occasion which
gave it birth. If this were the case, the labour bestowed upon it was
almost abortive. The author composed the work in the discharge of what