They call upon the hills and streams

"They call upon the hills and streams, to mourn
And senseless rocks; nor idly; for with a voice
Obedient to the strong creative power
Of human passion. . .
That steal upon the meditative mind."

The Old Man in relating his narrative of The Ruined Cottage almost invokes the self-same muse that Wordsworth turns to in Tintern Abbey."And passing even into my purer mind/With tranquil restoration:-feelings too…Of aspect more sublime". Yet the greatest difference between the two is the narrator's use of this aspect in The Ruined Cottage. Prefacing Margaret's sad story as she descends further and further into "poverty and grief", the old man says that "a bond of brotherhood is broken" and that "the touch of human hand/ Dislodged the natural sleep that binds them up".Interestingly utilizing the same measures that were later to erupt in his hymn to nature (Tintern Abbey), Wordsworth here almost speaks to our tragic shortcomings and inabilities to re-connect.

Through Margaret's desparation and suffering it seems that even the natural world surrounding the event of narration transforms into that of "tranquil ruin". In alluding to the Fall of Eden, Wordsworth constructs a picture of mankind locked into the assuring advent of human failure and suffering. In pain and grief,we are brothers of the same broken bond:

"In sickness she remained;and here she died;Last human tenant of these ruined walls!"