EXCURSION, The.
conversation of The Wanderer and the sub sequent discourses of a good Pastor, visited by the party in his parish, are directed toward a correction of The Solitary's despondency. Standing amid the graves of a country church yard, The Pastor tells the simple but affecting stories of the lives of those who lie buried there. In Books VIII and IX The Wanderer dis courses of society and government, deploring the industrial exploitation of the poor, advocat ing a system of universal education and ex alting morality as the true basis of national greatness and the highest fruit of freedom. Despite some tediousness inseparable from the didactic character of the theme, the poem is a moving record of a mature and sobered ideal ism, firmly held in the face of all the influences which work against it — an impressive memorial of the strength and comfort which Wordsworth found In the primal sympathy Which having been must ever be; In the soothing thoughts which spring Out of human suffering; In the faith that looks through death, In years that bring the philosophic mind.
For reference, see article on (THE PRELUDE.