pourtrayed with which they echoed back the feelings in the capital; men of all parties had been there up to this time--aristocrats as well as democrats, and one, in particular, of the former class, is put forward as a representative of this class. This man, duly as the hour arrived that brought the Parisian newspapers, read, restlessly, of the tumults and insults amongst which the Royal Family now passed their days; of the decrees by which his own order were threatened or assailed; of the self-expatriation, now continually swelling in amount, as a measure of despair on the part of myriads, as well priests as gentry,--all this, and worse, he read in public; and still as he read-- ‘his hand Haunted his sword, like an uneasy spot In his own body.’ “In short, as there never has been so strong a national convulsion diffused so widely, with equal truth, it may be asserted that no describer, so powerful, or idealizing, so magnificent in what he deals with, has ever been a living spectator of parallel scenes.” The reaction of the atrocities and enormous crimes of the Revolution, upon Wordsworth’s mind, was terrible. But a short time before the Revolution commenced, we find him the espouser, the advocate of democracy; the enemy of monarchial forms of government, and consequently of _hereditary_ monarchy; the foe, likewise, of all class distinctions and privileges; for he regarded these as enemies to human progress and happiness.--After his return to England, he says, in one of his unpublished letters to the Bishop of Llandaff, “In my ardour to attain the goal, I do not forget the nature of the ground where the race is to be run. The destruction of those institutions which I condemn, appears to me _to be hastening on too rapidly. I abhor the very idea of a revolution._ I am a determined enemy to every species of violence. I see no connection, but what the obstinacy of pride and ignorance renders necessary, between reason and bonds. I deplore the miserable condition of the French, and think that we can only be guarded from the same scourge by the undaunted efforts of good men. I severely condemn all inflammatory addresses to the passions of men. I know that the multitude walk in darkness. I would put into each man’s hand a lanthern to guide him; not have him to set out on his journey depending for illumination on abortive flashes of lightning, the corruscations of transitory meteors.” These were the opinions of Wordsworth before, and at the commencement of the Revolution. As I said, however, the crimes into which the leaders of it subsequently plunged, and the mad passions which influenced them, completely revolutionised the mind of Wordsworth, and filled him with the darkest forebodings. He lost for a time, his generous faith in men, his hope of human liberty, and his belief in the perfection of human nature. He has given a fearful picture of his state of mind at this period, in the _Solitary_ of the “Excursion,” which the