Page:Studies of a Biographer 1.djvu/243

 Wordsworth was certainly not seduced by a 'bit of ribbon.' His change of attitude only suggested in a general way the theme of the poem. But a fair account of the way in which his change actually came about is interesting, both as explaining some of his literary tendencies and as illustrating a similar change in many of his contemporaries. Such an account may naturally be sought in Wordsworth's autobiographical poem, the Prelude, and there, indeed, it is implicitly given. Yet its significance is brought out by M. Legouis's careful study of the poem in connection with other documents and some of the earlier writings. M. Legouis has, I think, thrown new light upon the whole process; and in what I have to say I shall be mainly following his lead, though I may be making a slightly different estimate of certain elements of the question.

The Prelude, though it gives the clue, has one characteristic which obscures the self-revelation. Wordsworth describes facts till some of his readers are sick of them. Still, a fact is for him mainly a peg upon which to hang some poetical or philosophical conclusion. When, for example, he is crossing the Simplon, he supposes