THE POETICAL WORKS OF WILLIAM WORDSWORTH - VOL. 2 (Completed)

KING OF SWEDEN

Composed August, 1802.--Published 1807

The Voice of song from distant lands shall call

To that great [1] King; shall hail the crownèd Youth

Who, taking counsel of unbending Truth,

By one example hath set forth to all

How they with dignity may stand; or fall,

If fall they must. Now, whither doth it tend?

And what to him and his shall be the end?

That thought is one which neither can appal

Nor cheer him; for the illustrious Swede hath done

The thing which ought to be; is raised above [2]

All consequences: work he hath begun

Of fortitude, and piety, and love,

Which all his glorious ancestors approve:

The heroes bless him, him their rightful son.

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VARIANTS ON THE TEXT

[Variant 1:1807.

... bold ... In 1838 only.]

[Variant 2:1845.

... He stands _above_ 1807.]

The following is Wordsworth's note to this sonnet, added in 1837:

"In this and a succeeding Sonnet on the same subject, let me be understood as a Poet availing himself of the situation which the King of Sweden occupied, and of the principles AVOWED IN HIS MANIFESTOS; as laying hold of these advantages for the purpose of embodying moral truths. This remark might, perhaps, as well have been suppressed; for to those who may be in sympathy with the course of these Poems, it will be superfluous; and will, I fear, be thrown away upon that other class, whose besotted admiration of the intoxicated despot hereafter placed [A] in contrast with him, is the most melancholy evidence of degradation in British feeling and intellect which the times have furnished."

The king referred to is Gustavus IV., who was born in 1778, proclaimed king in 1792, and died in 1837. His first public act after his accession was to join in the coalition against Napoleon, and dislike of Napoleon was the main-spring of his policy. It is to this that Wordsworth refers in the sonnet:

'... the illustrious Swede hath done

The thing which ought to be ...'

It made him unpopular, however, and gave rise to a conspiracy against him, and to his consequent abdication in 1809. He "died forgotten and in poverty."--Ed.

[Footnote A: See the sonnet beginning "Call not the royal Swede unfortunate," vol. iv. p. 224.--Ed.]

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