Poet’s Corner: Wordsworth–Resolution 4

26 February 2026

(4 July 2014) We pause before returning to the conclusion of Wordsworth’s “Resolution and Independence” to remember all those who put their lives, their reputations, and their goods on the line for American Independence: may we always remember their actions and hold dear the freedom they gave us! And now, Wordsworth:

XVI

The old Man still stood talking by my side;
But now his voice to me was like a stream
Scarce heard; nor word from word could I divide;
And the whole body of the Man did seem
Like one whom I had met with in a dream;
Or like a man from some far region sent,
To give me human strength, by apt admonishment.

XVII

My former thoughts returned: the fear that kills;
And hope that is unwilling to be fed;
Cold, pain, and labour, and all fleshly ills;
And mighty Poets in their misery dead.
–Perplexed, and longing to be comforted,
My question eagerly did I renew,
“How is it that you live, and what is it you do?”

XVIII

He with a smile did then his words repeat;
And said, that, gathering leeches, far and wide
He travelled; stirring thus about his feet
The waters of the pools where they abide.
“Once I could meet with them on every side;
But they have dwindled long by slow decay;
Yet still I persevere, and find them where I may.”

XIX

While he was talking thus, the lonely place,
The old Man’s shape, and speech–all troubled me:
In my mind’s eye I seemed to see him pace
About the weary moors continually,
Wandering about alone and silently.
While I these thoughts within myself pursued,
He, having made a pause, the same discourse renewed.

XX

And soon with this he other matter blended,
Cheerfully uttered, with demeanour kind,
But stately in the main; and when he ended,
I could have laughed myself to scorn to find
In that decrepit Man so firm a mind.
“God,” said I, “be my help and stay secure;
I’ll think of the Leech-gatherer on the lonely moor!”

The poet now sees himself in a dream and the old man a messenger sent from above to admonish him; with this thought, the depression returns with ‘fear that kills’ and dead hope, so he asks the question, which the old man has already answered, to shake himself from his melancholy. The old man, the soul of patience, repeats his answer and adds more details–that the leeches are dying out, and that he must travel farther and farther to find them, which bothers him not at all. The poet fixes on this wandering, his lonely, unending vigil; this steadfastness, or ‘resolution’ teaches the poet that he, who has much more than the old man, can be steadfast also, the old man’s example the answer to the poet’s depression, and in typical Romantic fashion, the poet concludes with an aphorism–a wise saying–that will arm him against future depression–resolved to resist and independent from the melancholy that too often rules his life. Come back on Saturday for another edition of the Poet’s Corner. Good reading!