Among the pictures which Wordsworth has left us of the influence of Nature on human character, _Peter Bell_ may be taken as marking one end, and the poems on _Lucy_ the other end of the scale. Peter Bell lives in the face of Nature untouched alike by her terror and her charm; Lucy's whole being is moulded by Nature's self; she is responsive to sun and shadow, to silence and to sound, and melts almost into an impersonation of a Cumbrian valley's peace. Between these two extremes how many are the possible shades of feeling! In _Ruth_, for instance, the point impressed upon us is that Nature's influence is only salutary so long as she is herself, so to say, in keeping with man; that when her operations reach that degree of habitual energy and splendour at which our love for her passes into fascination and our admiration into bewilderment, then the fierce and irregular stimulus consorts no longer with the growth of a temperate virtue. The wind, the tempest roaring high, The tumult of a tropic sky, Might well be dangerous food For him, a youth to whom was given So much of earth, so much of heaven, And such impetuous blood. And a contrasting touch recalls the healing power of those gentle and familiar presences which came to Ruth in her stormy madness with visitations of momentary calm. Yet sometimes milder hours she knew, Nor wanted sun, nor rain, nor dew, Nor pastimes of the May; They all were with her in her cell; And a wild brook with cheerful knell Did o'er the pebbles play. I will give one other instance of this subtle method of dealing with the contrasts in Nature. It is from the poem entitled "_Lines left upon a Seat in a Yew-Tree which stands near the Lake of Esthwaite, on a desolate part of the Shore, commanding a beautiful Prospect_." This seat was once the haunt of a lonely, a disappointed, an embittered man. Stranger! These gloomy boughs Had charms for him: and here he loved to sit, His only visitants a straggling sheep, The stone-chat, or the glancing sand-piper; And on these barren rocks, with fern and heath And juniper and thistle sprinkled o'er, Fixing his downcast eye, he many an hour A morbid pleasure nourished, tracing here An emblem of his own unfruitful life: And, lifting up his head, he then would gaze On the more distant scene,--how lovely 'tis Thou seest,--and he would gaze till it became Far lovelier, and his heart could not sustain The beauty, still more beauteous! Nor, that time, When Nature had subdued him to herself, Would he forget those beings, to whose minds, Warm from the labours of benevolence, The world, and human life, appeared a scene Of kindred loveliness; then he would sigh With mournful joy, to think that others felt What he must never feel; and so, lost Man! On visionary views would fancy feed Till his eyes streamed with tears.