“Lines Composed a Few Miles above Tintern Abbey” 1179“ ’mid the din / of towns and cities” (25). Nature’s
power to provide “tranquil restoration” (30) has
been with him throughout the five years and has
helped him “see into the life of things” (49). Here,
Wordsworth begins to connect nature and the soul
of man. Not only does contemplation of nature
lighten “the weight / of this unintelligible world”
(39–40), but the act is also an avenue of moral
improvement. Nature also provides a link uniting
past, present, and future. Wordsworth views the
valley “not only with a sense / of present pleasure”
(62–63) but with the knowledge that he will carry
these images into the future.
A contrast between the person Wordsworth was
and the person he has become is developed in terms
of his relationship to nature. When he first encoun-
tered the Wye Valley, he experienced an adolescent
joy full of “dizzy raptures” (85). This exuberance
has been replaced with thoughtful contemplation
as he now hears “the still, sad music of humanity”
(91) and feels a transcendent “presence” with him.
The mature Wordsworth sees beyond the joys of
the senses into the connection that “rolls through all
things” (102). He does not mourn the loss of his pas-
sion for nature, because “other gifts / have followed”
(86–87) in his greater understanding and his “sense
sublime” (95) of a spirit “that impels all thinking
things” (101). The loss he has suffered has also given
him the ability to sympathize with other individuals
and with nature. For Wordsworth, all that is good—
happiness, love, peacefulness, spontaneity—can be
achieved if humankind will only ask for guidance in
nature. Nature is the “anchor” of the poet’s “purest
thoughts” (110). Beginning with his sensory aware-
ness of the familiar in nature, Wordsworth moves
forward in his discernment of the mysteries of the
universe.
Although Wordsworth’s later poetry acknowl-
edges the full range of nature’s power, in “Tintern
Abbey” there is faith only in its benevolence. In the
final verse paragraph, addressed to his sister, Word-
sworth prays Dorothy will be a worshiper of nature,
for “nature never did betray the heart that loved her”
(122). In a type of spiritual benediction, he expresses
his hope that the natural scene before them will be
for her, as it has been for him, a solace and comfort
against “the dreary intercourse with daily life.”
As much as any other poem in Lyrical Bal-
lads, “Tintern Abbey” announces the revolution in
English poetry and expresses the romantic attitude
toward nature: Love of nature leads to an under-
standing and love of humankind and enables the
worshiper to become a sensitive and creative soul.
Jean HammStaGeS oF LIFe in “Lines Composed a Few
Miles above Tintern Abbey”
William Wordsworth wrote this poem to indicate
his view of the natural world and to demonstrate
how his understanding has changed and matured
over time. The time shift in the development of the
poet’s ideas is reflected from the outset: Although
the poem is dated July 13, 1798, the first words
indicate that “Five years have past; five summers,
with the length / Of five long winters!” (ll. 1–2)
since he first visited this particular area. As the
poem progresses, Wordsworth shows, through his
reflections on nature, how his understanding of life
has deepened during that period. He highlights
how nature invariably involves change, whether it
is the obvious change of seasons from summer to
winter, the stages of life that move us through life
to death to afterlife, or the stages that occur in our
understanding of ourselves and the world around
us as we age.
In the first section of the poem, Wordsworth
recalls how the Welsh countryside appeared to
him five years ago. He states that the time that
has passed was long, ruminates on the changes the
seasons would have brought about, and concludes
with the image of farms entering the late bloom of
spring with their fruits ripening. The peaceful and
natural seasons are juxtaposed with the seemingly
unnatural change of the great cities of the Indus-
trial Revolution. Keeping in mind Wordsworth’s
aim to glorify nature over the urban setting, a
keen reader will recognize that he implies indus-
trialization’s rapid and destructive changes are far
too unnatural for human beings. In the din of the
cities and towns and away from the natural cycles
of nature, humans are easily dehumanized and cut
adrift from what Wordsworth calls “The anchor
of my purest thoughts, the nurse, / The guide, the
guardian of my heart, and soul, / Of all my moral