A Mind For Ever Voyaging: Wordsworth at Work Portraying Newton and Science

Wordsworth depicted Newton, as Roubiliac may well have done in his statue of him, as voyaging, in ecstasy, through God's sensorium. In the Prelude passage from which the title A Mind For Ever Voyaging is derived, and in various others portraying Newton and science, Wordsworth seems to have written for two audiences, the general public and a much smaller, private audience, while seeking to elevate the minds of both to God. Like Pope before him, Wordsworth achieved "What oft was wrought, but ne'er so well exprest."