...excessive tale bespeaks a loss so complete that it requires transcendental interpretation: O Wedding Guest! this soul hath been Alone on a wide wide sea: So lonely...'twas , that God himself Scarce seemed there to be. (Poetical Works 1: 208, hereafter cited by line) Like "Kubla Khan," "The Rime of the Ancient Mariner"...

...speech; that moment that his face I see, I know the man that must hear me: to him my tale I teach. What loud uproar bursts from that door! The wedding-guests...'twas, that God himself scarce seemed there to be. O sweeter than the marriage-feast, 'tis sweeter far to me, to walk together to the kirk with a goodly...

...speech; That moment that his face I see, I know the man that must hear me: To him my tale I teach. What loud uproar bursts from that door! The Wedding-Guests...little vesper bell, Which biddeth me to prayer! O Wedding- Guest! this soul hath been Alone on a wide wide sea: So lonely 'twas, that God himself Scarce...

...was deeply moved. For the first time, because of my experiences, I understood its depth and meaning. O Wedding-Guest! this soul hath been Alone on a wide...'twas, that God himself Scarce seemed there to be. Farewell, farewell! but this I tell To thee, thou Wedding Guest! He prayeth well, who loveth well Both...

...unspeakable. Like Coleridge's Ancient Mariner who must wander in expiation for killing the Albatross: "... this soul hath been / Alone on a wide wide sea: /...'twas, that God himself/ Scarce seemed there to be" (597-600) and whose sin and punishment are marked by his eye fixing his audience in horror so that...

...ends with a man, if not mankind, bereft of hope. In a sense, we are back with the Ancient Mariner, "Alone on a wide wide sea: / So lonely 'twas, that God himself/ Scarce seemed there to be." 5 Only the faint ghost of religion survives in the OED's second definition, which hinges on the word...