tempted to add my feeble tribute of applause to the more solid recompense which the virtuous man finds in the recollection of his own motives. Mr. Severn can dispense with a reward from 'such stuff as dreams are made of. His conduct is a golden augury of the success of his future career-may the unextinguished Spirit of his illustrious friend animate the creations of his pencil, and plead against Oblivion for his name!"

Adonais is based upon two Greek pastoral elegies of the 3rd cent. B. C.-Bion's Lament for Adonis and Moschus's Epitaph on Bion. Milton's Lycidas also was probably in Shelley's mind, and a number of ideas expressed in the poem go back to Plato. Cf. Adonais with the following fragments of Shelley's translation of the two Greek poems referred

Utter thy legend now-yet more, dumb flower,
Than "Ah! alas!"- -thine is no common
grief-
Blon the sweetest singer is no more.

731. 10-11. Cf. Bion's Lament for Adonis (Lang's trans.): "He reclines, the delicate Adonis, in his raiment of purple, and around him the Loves are weeping, and groaning aloud, clipping their locks for Adonis. And one upon his shafts, another on his bow is treading, and one hath loosed the sandal of Adonis, and another hath broken his own feathered quiver, and one in a golden vessel bears water, and another laves the wound, and another from behind him with his wings is fanning Adonis."

14-17. Cf. Moschus's Elegy on Bion (Lang's trans.): "Ye flowers, now in sad clusters breathe yourselves away. Now redden, ye roses, in your sorrow, and now wax red, ye wind-flowers; now, thou hyacinth, whisper the letters on thee graven, and add a deeper ai ai to thy petals; he is dead, the beautiful singer.... Ye nightingales that lament among the thick leaves of the trees, tell ye to the Sicilian waters of Arethusa the tidings that Bion the herdsman is dead. . . . And Echo in the rocks laments that thou art silent, and no more she mimics thy voice. And in sorrow for thy fall the trees cast down their fruit, and all the flowers have faded."

735. 39. Cf. the closing stanzas of The Sensitive Plant (p. 703). See also Plato's Phædo, 67-68.

736. 46, 9. Cf. Plato's epigram on Aster, thus translated by Shelley under the title of To Stella and applied to Keats:

35

737.

The flowers are withered up with grief. *

Who will weep not thy dreadful woe, 0

Soon as she saw and knew the mortal wound
Of her Adonis-saw the life-blood flow
From his fair thigh, now wasting,-wailing

Thou wert the morning star among the living, Ere thy fair light had fled;

Now, having died, thou art as Hesperus, giving

New splendor to the dead.

HELLAS

Hellas is a lyrical drama inspired by the Greek war for independence from the Turks, fought in 1821. Shelley looked upon this manifestation of a free spirit as a prophecy of the dawning Golden Age of love and freedom. Life May Change, But It May Fly

Not occupies lines 34-45 of the drama; Worlds on Worlds are Rolling Ever, lines 197-238; Darkness has Dawned ir the East, lines 102359; The World's Grea. Age Begins Anew is the closing chorus, lines 1060-1101. 738b. S. The Evening land.-A reference to America.

739.

740.

742.

THE WORLD'S GREAT AGE BEGINS ANEW At the end of the "great age" of the ancients, the sun, moon, and planets were to return to their original positions, and the history of the world would repeat itself; the Golden Age would return and be followed by ages of degradation and evil. Cf. this chorus with Byron's The Isles of Greece (p. 596).

THE EVENING

The Ponte al Mare is the seaward bridge of Pisa.

REMEMBRANCE

This song was sent by Shelley with the following letter 'to his friend, Mrs. Williams: "Dear Jane,-If this melancholy old song suits any of your tunes, or any that humor of the moment may dictate, you are welcome to it. Do not say it is mine to any one, even if you think so; indeed, it is from the torn leaf of a book out of date. today, and how is Williams?

I dreamed of nothing but sailing and fishing up coral. Your ever affectionate P. B. S."

TO EDWARD WILLIAMS

This poem was inspired by Mary Shelley's jealousy of Jane Williams, the wife of Edward Williams, both intimate friends of the Shelleys. The following letter from Shelley to Williams (Jan. 26, 1822) refers to the poem: "My dear Williams: Looking over the portfolio in which my friend used to keep his verses, and in which those I sent you the other day were found, I have lit upon these; which, as they are too dismal for me to keep, I send you. If any of the stanzas should please you, you may read them to Jane, but to no one else. And yet, on second thoughts, I had rather you would not. Yours ever affectionately, P. B. S."

WITH A GUITAR: TO JANE Woodberry gives the following note on the poem (Cambridge ed. of Shelley's Poetical Works): "The suggestion for the poem is found by Dr. Garnett in the fact that 'the front portion of the guitar is made of Swiss pine.' He continues: 'It is now clear how the The poem took shape in Shelley's mind. actual thought of the imprisonment of the Spirit of Music in the material of the instrument suggested Ariel's penance in the cloven pine; the identification of himself with Ariel and of Jane Williams with Miranda was the

easiest of feats to his brilliant imagination; and hence an allegory of unequalled grace and charm, which could never have existed if the instrument had not been partly made of pine wood. The back, it should be added, is of mahogany, the finger board of ebony, and minor portions, chiefly ornamental, of some wood not identified. It was made by Ferdinando Bottari of Pisa in 1816. Having been religiously preserved since Shelley's death, it is in as perfect condition as when made. The strings, it is said, are better than those that are produced now.

""This guitar is also in a measure the subject of another of Shelley's most beautiful lyrics, The Keen Stars Were Twinkling. In a letter dated June 18, 1822, speaking of his cruises in the evening wind under the summer moon,' he adds, 'Jane brings her guitar.' There is probably no other relic of a great poet so intimately associated with the arts of poetry and music, or ever will be, unless Milton's organ should turn up at a broker's or some excavating explorer should bring to light the lyre of Sappho.'”

TO JANE

This poem was sent in a letter to Mrs. Jane Williams. See note on preceding poem.

CHARLES THE FIRST

This is an unfinished tragedy on the subject of Charles I, King of England, who was beheaded in 1649. The song given here is found in scene 5, 11. 6-17. It is sung by the court fool.

A DEFENSE OF POETRY

In a letter to Peacock, dated March 21, 1821, Shelley states that this essay was written "as an antidote" to Peacock's Four Ages of Poetry. "You will see," he says, "that I have taken a more general view of poetry than you have. 745b. 22-27. Cf. this sentence with Plato's The

Symposium, 205 (Shelley's trans.): "Poetry, which is a general name signifying every cause whereby anything proceeds from that which is not into that which is; so that the exercise of every inventive art is poetry, and all such artists poets. Yet they are not called poets, but distinguished by other names; and one portion or species of poetry, that which has relation to music and rhythm, is divided from all others, and known by the name belonging to all."

746b. 31ff. Cf. this passage with Wordsworth's Preface (p. 322a, 28ff.) and with Aristotle's Poetics (Butcher's translation), 9, 1-3: "It is, moreover, evident from what has been said that it is not the function of the poet to relate what has happened, but what may happen,— what is possible according to the law of probability or necessity. The poet and the historian differ not by writing in verse or in

prose. The work of Herodotus might be put into verse, and it would be still a species of history, with metre no less than without it. The true difference is that one relates what has happened, the other what may happen. Poetry, therefore, is a more philosophical and a higher thing than history; for poetry tends to express the universal, history the particuiar."

men.

ing except the famous poem which is in everybody's mouth,-perhaps the most beautiful of all lyrical compositions, and which he himself calls a gift of the Muses. I think you will agree with me that examples of this sort are exhibited by the God himself to prove that those beautiful poems are not human nor from man, but divine and from the Gods, and that poets are only the inspired interpreters of the Gods, each excellent in proportion to the degree of his inspiration. This example of the most beautiful of lyrics having been produced by a poet in other respects the worst seems to have been afforded as a divine evidence of the truth of this opinion."

P. 40 EDITIONS

748a. 46. The passage omitted contains a historical review of European poetry and a discussion of the superiority of poetry to science and political philosophy. 749a, 32-33. Cf. with Plato's Ion 533-34 (Shelley's trans.) : "For the authors of those great poems which we admire do not attain to excellence through the rules of any art, but they utter their beautiful melodies of verse in a state of inspiration, and, as it were, possessed by a spirit not their own. Thus the composers of lyrical poetry create those admired songs of theirs in a state of divine insanity, like the Corybantes, who lose all control over their reason in the enthusiasm of the sacred dance, and during this supernatural possession are excited to the rhythm and harmony which they communicate to For a poet is indeed a thing ethereally light, winged, and sacred, nor can he compose anything worth calling poetry until he becomes inspired and, as it were, mad, or whilst any reason remains in him. For whilst a man retains any portion of the thing called reason, he is utterly incompetent to produce poetry, or to vaticinate. Thus, those who declaim various and beautiful poetry upon any subject, as for instance upon Homer, are not enabled to do so by art or study; but every rhapsodist or poet, whether dithyrambic, encomiastic, choral, epic, or lambic, is excellent in proportion to the ex- 40. tent of his participation in the divine influence and the degree in which the Muse itself has descended on him. In other respects, poets may be sufficiently ignorant and incapable. For they do not compose according to any art which they have acquired, but from the impulse of the divinity within them; for did they know any rules of criticism, according to which they could compose beautiful verses upon one subject, they would be able to exert the same faculty with respect to all or any other. The God seems pur posely to have deprived all poets, prophets, and soothsayers of every particle of reason and understanding, the better to adapt them to their employment as his ministers and interpreters; and that we, their auditors, may acknowledge that those who write so beautifully are possessed, and address us inspired by the God. A presumption in favor of this opinion may be drawn from the circumstance of Tynnichus the Chalcidian1 having composed no other poem worth mention

1 Tynnichus is unknown except for this reference in Plato.

CRITICAL NOTES

THE SCHOOL MISTRESS

One of the unmistakable signs of Romanticism was the reawakened interest in English literature of the past, especially in ballads, Spenser, and Milton. Although Spenser and Milton were never completely forgotten, it was not until late in the eighteenth century that their influence became a real quickening force in English poetry; by the time of Keats, English poets had caught the spirit of these masters, and had reproduced it successfully.

The early eighteenth century poets did not take Spenser very seriously. They copied his language, his meter, and his stanza, all of which they used in comic verses, parodies, and mild satires. Of the numerous Spenserian imitations which appeared between 1735 and 1775, Shenstone's The Schoolmistress and Thomson's The Castle of Indolence are the best. Neither poem was written in any serious vein, although both were admired for their own sake.

"The inimitable Schoolmistress of Shenstone is one of the felicities of genius; but the purpose of this poem has been entirely

Own

to

misconceived. The Schoolmistress of Shenstone has been admired for its simplicity and tenderness, not for its exquisitely ludicrous turn! This discovery I owe to the good fortune of possessing the original edition of The Schoolmistress, which the author printed under his directions, and his own fancy. To this piece of LUDICROUS POETRY, as he calls it, 'lest it should be mistaken,' he added a LUDICROUS INDEX, 'purely to show fools that I am in jest.' But 'the fool,' his subsequent editor, who I regret to say, was Robert Dodsley, thought proper to suppress this amusing ludicrous index,' and the consequence is, as the poet foresaw, that his aim has been 'mistaken.'"-Disraeli, in Curiosities of Literature (1791-1823).

ROBERT SOUTHEY (1774-1843), p. 400

EDITIONS

Poetical Works, collected by himself, 10 vols. (London, Longmans, 1837-38).

Poetical Works, with a Memoir by H. T. Tucker

man, 10 vols. (Boston, Little, 1860); 10 vols.
in 5 (British Poets ed.: Boston, Houghton,
1880).

Poems, ed. by M. H. Fitzgerald (Oxford Univ.
Press, 1909).
Selections from the Poems, ed. by S. R. Thompson

(Canterbury Poets ed.: London, Scott, 1888). Poems, selections, ed. by E. Dowden (Golden Treasury ed.: London, Macmillan, 1895). Ballads and Other Poems, ed. by C. J. Battersby (London, Blackie, 1899).

Correspondence With Caroline Bowles, ed. by E. Dowden (London and New York, Longmans, 1881).

CRITICISM

Blackwood's Magazine, "Life and Correspondence," March and April, 1851 (69:349, 385). Dawson, W. J.: The Makers of English Poetry (New York and London, Revell, 1906). Dennis, J.: Studies in English Literature (London, Stanford, 1876). Dowden, E.: "Early Revolutionary Group and

Antagonists," The French Revolution and English Literature (New York, Scribner, 1897, 1908). Edinburgh Review, The: "A Vision of Judgment," July, 1821 (35:422); "Madoc," Oct., 1805 (7:1); "Roderick," June, 1815 (25:1); "Thalaba," Oct., 1802 (1:63); "The Curse of Kehama," Feb., 1811 (17:429); "Wat Tyler," March, 1817 (28:151).

Hazlitt, W.: The Spirit of the Age (London, 1825); Collected Works, ed. Waller and Glover (London, Dent, 1902-06; New York, McClure), 4, 262. Lockhart, J. G.: Memoirs of the Life of Sir Walter Scott, Baronet, 10 vols. (Edinburgh, 1839); 3 vols. (Boston, Houghton, 1881); abridged ed., 1 vol. (New York, Crowell, 1871; London, Black, 1880; Boston, Houghton, 1901).

Macaulay, T. B.: "Southey's Colloquies on Society," The Edinburgh Review, Jan., 1830; Critical and Historical Essays (London and New York, Longmans, 1898).

Quarterly Review, The, "Roderick," April, 1815 (13:83); "The Curse of Kehama," Feb., 1811 (5:40).

Rawnsley, H. D.: Literary Associations of the English Lakes, 2 vols. (Glasgow, MacLehose, 1894, 1906).

Robinson, H. C.: Diary, Reminiscences, and Correspondence, 3 vols., ed. by T. Sadler (London, Macmillan, 1869); 2 vols. (1872; Boston, Fields, 1869, 1874).

Letters, selected and edited, with an Introduction,

by M. H. Fitzgerald (World's Classics ed.:
Oxford Univ. Press, 1912).

Select Prose, ed., with an Introduction, by J.
Zeitlin (New York, Macmillan, 1916).
The Life of Nelson, ed., with an Introduction,
by H. B. Butler (London, Frowde, 1911).

BIOGRAPHY

Cottle, J. S.: Reminiscences of 8. T. Coleridge and Robert Southey (London, Houlston, 1847).

De Quincey, T.: "The Lake Poets," Tait's Magazine, July and August, 1839; Collected Writings, ed. Masson (London, Black, 1889-90, 1896-97), 2, 303, 335. Dowden, E.: Southey (English Men of Letters Series London, Macmillan, 1876; New York, Harper).

Southey, C. C.: Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, ed. in 6 vols. (London, Long mans, 1849-50).

1860, Second Series (London, Dent, 1895; New York, Scribner).

Stephen, L.: "Southey's Letters," Studies of a Biographer, 4 vols. (London, Duckworth,

1898-1902; New York, Putnam). Symons, A.: The Romantic Movement in English Poetry (London, Constable, 1909; New York, Dutton).

CRITICAL NOTES

"Poetical criticism, whether of his own writings or of those of others, was one of Southey's weakest points. But while egregiously deceived as to the absolute worth of his epics, he obeyed a happy instinct in selecting epic as his principal field in poetry. The gifts which he possessedornate description, stately diction, invention on a large scale-required an ample canvas for their display. Although the concise humor and simplicity of his lines on The Battle of Blenheim ensure it a place among the best known short poems in the language, there are not half a dozen of his lyrical pieces, some of his racy ballads excepted, that have any claim to poetic distinc

GOD'S JUDGMENT ON A WICKED BISHOP

"Here followeth the History of Hatto, Archbishop of Mentz.

"It hapned in the year 914, that there was an exceeding great famine in Germany, at what time Otho, surnamed the Great, was Emperor, and one Hatto, once Abbot of Fulda, was Archbishop of Mentz, of the Bishops after Crescens and Crescentius the two and thirtieth, of the Archbishops after St. Bonifacius the thirteenth. This Hatto, in the time of this great famine afore-mentioned, when he saw the poor people of the country exceedingly oppressed with famine, assembled a great company of them together into a barne, and, like a most accursed and mercilesse caitiffe, burnt up those poor innocent souls, that were so far from doubting any such matter, that they rather hoped to receive some comfort and relief at his hands. The reason that moved the prelat to commit that execrable impiety was, because he thought the famine would the sooner cease, if those unprofitable beggars that consumed more bread than they were worthy to eat, were dispatched out of the world. For he said that those poor folks were like to mice, that were good for nothing but to devour corne. But God Almighty, the just avenger of the poor folks' quarrel, did not long suffer this heinous tyranny, this most detestable fact, unpunished. For he mustered up an army of mice against the Archbishop, and sent them to persecute him as his furious Alastors, so that they afflicted him both day and night, and would not suffer him to take his rest in any place. Whereupon the Prelate, thinking that he should be secure from the injury of mice if he were in a certain tower, that standeth in the Rhine near to the towne, betook himself unto the said tower as to a safe refuge and sanctuary from his enemies, and locked himself in. But the innumerable troupes of mice chased him continually very eagerly, and swumme unto him upon the top of the water to execute the just judgment of God, and so at last he was most miserably devoured by those sillie creatures; who pursued him with such bitter hostility, that it is recorded they scraped and knawed out his very name from the walls and tapistry wherein it was written, after they had so cruelly devoured his body. Wherefore the tower wherein he was eaten up by the mice is shewn to this day, for a perpetual monument to all succeeding ages of the barbarous and inhuman tyranny of this impious Prelate, being situate in a little green island in the midst of the Rhine near to the towne of Bingen, and is commonly called in the German tongue the MOWSE-TURN.'-Coryat's Crudities, pp. 571,

572.

"Other authors who record this tale say was rats."eaten by that the Bishop Southey's introductory note.

Do you think I can listen all day to such stuff?

Be off, or I'll kick you downstairs!'"

1 avenging spirits