Introduction and Summary of William Wordsworth's 'Tintern Abbey'.

Tintern Abbey' is the first poem in which Wordsworth feels in full control of his imagination for the first time. In July 1798, this poem was written. Wordsworth contributed to Lyrical Ballads(1798) as one of the 19 poems. This poem can be considered a "tale of the growth of the poet or his spiritual development." The gradual growth of Wordsworth's attitude towards nature is described in clear words. It reveals how the poet appreciated nature through the senses and how finally, he discovered the Divine spirit in Nature and begin to worship for its inner meaning or significance.

           
The poetry goes back to the Wye after a 5-year break. Once again, he hears the murmur of the Wye, and sees the steep and high hills, the gloomy Sykamores, the plots of the cottage estate, the orchard with its unripe apples, the hedges, the lush fields, and the clouds of smoke rising from among the trees with a brief glimpse of the gypsy tents in the forests or of some hermit's cave.

      A long absence does not seem to have blotted out these exquisite forms from his mind. Such magnificent aspects of nature were a source of comfort to him and sustained him in the middle of the chaos and bustle of cities and towns during his exile. We acted on him as a catalyst to acts of empathy and compassion.  They have a deep spiritual influence on him as well. He owes them the exalted mood in which the truth above and beyond earthly things can be interpreted. He has an insight into the life of nature in these times of peace, when everything is wrapped in a state of happiness and harmony. But if this were a vain belief, the poet knows at least that whenever he is oppressed by the unprofitable and meaningless business of the world he has turned to the ever sustaining memory of the wooded landscape of the Wye for comfort.

    Now once again the poet stands on the banks of the Wye, and the old picture revives in his mind. He looks forward to many pleasant thoughts to be called up by the memory of the landscape. Then he contrasts his present feelings with the past ones. In his childhood days the poet's love of nature was simply a healthy boy's delight in outdoor life. In his boyhood days he enjoyed nature only through the senses. At that time the sounding contract haunted film like a passion, and his hungry soul feds itself on the beautiful colours and lovely forms of the mountains in the Woods. As yet his love for nature was untouched by intellectual interests or associations. But as he advanced in age gradually,  he began to look up on nature in a new light after is familiarity with the sufferings of mankind. At last he has discovered that in nature the existence of living spirit, a pervasive spirit that dual in the light of the setting sun and the round ocean, in the living air and the blue sky, and in the mind of man. He still loves the objects of nature which appeal to his senses. He is happy to find that his purest thoughts are stimulated by nature and her impressions received through the avenues of his sense organs. Nature has thus become the nurse, the guide , the guardian of his heart and the soul of all his moral being.

     It is quite possible that even if he had not learned this lesson from nature he would not have allowed his warm feelings to lose their liveliness because he has the company of his dear sister on the banks of the beautiful river Wye. In her eye he can still see gleames of pleasure which he had enjoyed 5 years ago. The lesson that he has learnt is that nature never betrays the heart that loves her. Nature leads us from joy to joy and feels our minds with quietness and beauty so that evil tongues,unsympathetic  judgements, the sneers of selfish man and the dreary intercourse of daily life cannot disturb our cheerful faith. He asks his sister to go on enjoying the beauties of nature. If in future years she is afflicted with loneliness, fear or pain, she can look back to these hours of delight in the company of her brother and find comfort in the impressions of nature stored up in her mind. If in time to come,  it should so happen that he is separated from her even then she would remember that he had stood with her on the banks of the river Wye, that  he had revisited the place as a devoted worshipper of nature, and that her company had enhanced the beauty of nature in his eyes.