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In talk and gambol join, their labour done;
rustic life, as the subject of his verse. He states several reasons for adopting the language of that condition, He contends, in his preface to Lyrical Ballads, that "such a language, arising out of repeated experience and regular feelings, is a more permanent and a far more philosophical language, than that which is frequently substituted for it by poets, who think that they are conferring honour upon themselves and their art, in proportion as they separate themselves from the sympathies of men, and indulge in arbitrary and capricious habits of expression, in order to furnish food for fickle tastes, and fickle appetites, of their own creation."
This is language, which might be employed with sincerity both by the advocates of the ancient and the modern school; but the meaning, which they would severally attach to it, would be far different. Mr Wordsworth's meaning is obvious, from his illustration of the doctrine in the Lyrical Ballads, which exhibit the character and language of Betty Foy, Johnny, &e. &c.
In pursuance of this plan of poesy, it would be easy, in a future edition of Milton's Poems, to expunge the Arca-
