one of whom, General Beaupuis, he has celebrated under the name of Dion, in "The Prelude." It was from him that Wordsworth learned the love story of " Vaudracour and Julia," with which our readers are doubtless acquainted. The General afterwards fell in battle, and Wordsworth has raised a monument to his memory in "The Prelude." He visited Paris in the autumn, on his way home, and arrived there soon after the massacres of September, 1792.
So much was his mind affected by the scenes of horror which he witnessed, that years afterwards they haunted his dreams. Though very anxious to stay and mix himself up with political parties in the French capital, he was, fortunately for himself, compelled by circumstances to leave for England, and he arrived in London in the winter. Soon after his return, he wrote, but did not publish, a pamphlet, entitled, "A letter to the Bishop of Llandaff on the Political Principles contained in an Appendix to one of his Lordship's recent Sermons."[1]
"The sentiments avowed in it," says Dr. Wordsworth, "are republican. He declares himself an enemy to an hereditary monarchy, and an hereditary peerage, and to all social privileges and distinctions, except such as are conferred by the elective voice of the people." In writing to a friend at the same time, he says: "Hereditary distinctions, and privileged orders of every species, I think, must necessarily counteract the progress of human improvement. Hence it follows that I am not among the admirers of the British constitution." He adds, however, that the destruction of the institutions which he dislikes
- ↑ We make these brief extracts merely to show what were the Poet's opinions at this period. Those who wish to see this matter very fully discussed, must consult Dr. Wordsworth's Memoirs, a book of which we would fain speak respectfully, because we owe so much to it, but which is unfortunately far too much devoted to proving that Wordsworth was at last ashamed of his juvenile politics, and that if he was ever a Pantheist, he lived to be an orthodox High Churchman.
