Did I ever mention to you that owing to the sea having swallowed up his father-in-law’s coal-pits, ... income is much reduced; and he therefore feels it necessary to endeavour to procure a couple of pupils, who could afford to pay rather handsomely for the advantages they would have under his roof?  By this time he would have succeeded, but parents in the South have an unaccountable objection to sending their sons so far North.  As the same might not be felt in Ireland, I take the liberty of mentioning his wish to you, being persuaded that if you can you will assist him in his views.  If your address to your Society should be published, could you send it me, and acquaint me with what you have done?

Affectionately yours,
WM. WORDSWORTH.[161]

[161] Here first printed.  G.

106. Of his own Poems and posthumous Fame.

LETTER TO HENRY REED, ESQ., PHILADELPHIA.

Rydal Mount, Dec. 23. 1839.

MY DEAR SIR,

The year is upon the point of expiring; and a letter of yours, dated May 7th, though not received till late in June (for I was moving about all last spring and part of the summer), remains unacknowledged.  I have also to thank you for the acceptable present of the two volumes which reached me some time afterwards.

* * * * *

Your letters are naturally turned upon the impression which my poems have made, and the estimation they are held, or likely to be held in, through the vast country to which you belong.  I wish I could feel as lively as you do upon this subject, or even upon the general destiny of those works.  Pray do not be long surprised at this declaration.  There is a difference of more than the length of your life, I believe, between our ages.  I am standing on the brink of that vast ocean I must sail so soon; I must speedily lose sight of the shore; and I could not once have conceived how little I now am troubled by the thought of how long or short a time they who remain on that shore may have sight of me.  The other day I chanced to be looking over a MS. poem, belonging to the year 1803, though not actually composed till many years afterwards.  It was suggested by visiting the neighbourhood of Dumfries, in which Burns had resided, and where he died; it concluded thus: 

    ’Sweet Mercy to the gales of heaven
    This minstrel led, his sins forgiven;

    The rueful conflict, the heart riven
      With vain endeavour,
    And memory of earth’s bitter leaven
      Effaced for ever.’

Here the verses closed; but I instantly added, the other day,

    ’But why to him confine the prayer,
    When kindred thoughts and yearnings bear
    On the frail heart the purest share
        With all that live? 
    The best of what we do and are. 
        Just God, forgive!’

The more I reflect upon this last exclamation, the more I feel (and perhaps it may in some degree be the same with you) justified in attaching comparatively small importance to any literary monument that I may be enabled to leave behind.  It is well, however, I am convinced, that men think otherwise in the earlier part of their lives; and why it is so, is a point I need not touch upon in writing to you.