Here Pause: the Poet Claims at Least This Praise
Here Pause: the Poet Claims at Least This Praise - meaning Summary
A Defence of Liberty
Wordsworth asserts that the poet's chief praise is championing liberty. He insists his song kept hope alive during dark times and frames hope as a divine duty for suffering hearts. The poem condemns admiration for triumphant tyrants and warns readers not to forget humanity's weakness, which enables oppression. It presents moral vigilance and solidarity with the oppressed as the poet's ethical task.
Read Complete AnalysesHERE pause: the poet claims at least this praise, That virtuous Liberty hath been the scope Of his pure song, which did not shrink from hope In the worst moment of these evil days; From hope, the paramount 'duty' that Heaven lays, For its own honour, on man's suffering heart. Never may from our souls one truth depart-- That an accursed thing it is to gaze On prosperous tyrants with a dazzled eye; Nor--touched with due abhorrence of 'their' guilt For whose dire ends tears flow, and blood is spilt, And justice labours in extremity-- Forget thy weakness, upon which is built, O wretched man, the throne of tyranny!
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