Thoughtless Youth

A long time ago I was a second year literature student at the University of St Andrews and I was supposed to study Wordsworth. I forget how much effort I put into reading Tintern Abbey but it won't have been much. It amused me today because I went to Tintern Abbey with my own, rather more thoughtful, youth and realised the truth of that poem.

The day started out in Cardiff and we visited Castell Coch. This castle is a Victorian rebuild of a medieval castle that was destroyed in the fourteenth century. It was a project of the Marquis of Bute, reputed to be the richest man in the word, and work started in 1875. It was hardly ever used as it had no guest accommodation and Bute was interested in the project, not the outcome. Inside the Arts and Crafts inspired furnishings are incredible.













Afterwards we drove to the former Cistercian monastery of Tintern Abbey on the banks of the Wye. It was impossible to capture the beauty of the surroundings with my iPhone: the colours of the autumn leaves were glorious. I sat for a while and read Wordsworth's poem and was very struck by these lines:

... For I have learned
To look on nature, not as in the hour
Of thoughtless youth, but hearing oftentimes
The still, sad music of humanity,
Nor harsh nor grating, though of ample power
To chasten and subdue. And I have felt
A presence that disturbs me with the joy
Of elevated thoughts; a sense sublime

That is how I felt in the light rain at Tintern Abbey looking at the hills, the trees and a perfect rainbow 'a sense sublime'. It was a real gift.



















The rainbow

Afterwards, my son and I did the huge trek up the hillside opposite to see Offa's Dyke and the Devil's Pulpit from where we surveyed the beauty that is Tintern and the Wye Valley.







To quote Wordsworth again:

And this prayer I make,
Knowing that Nature never did betray
The heart that loved her; 'tis her privilege,
Through all the years of this our life, to lead
From joy to joy

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