[1] The Letters (except those to Miss Brawne, and a few others) have
been edited by Colvin, and (without exception) by Forman (pub. Gowans
& Gray). I refer to them by their numbers, followed by the initial of
the editor's name. Both editions reproduce peculiarities of
punctuation, etc.; but for my present purpose these are usually
without interest, and I have consulted the convenience of the reader
in making changes.
[2] Keats himself, it is strange to think, was born in the same year
as Carlyle.
[3] These passions were in his last two years overclouded at times,
but they remained to the end. When, in the bitterness of his soul, he
begged Severn to put on his tombstone no name, but only 'Here lies
one whose name was writ in water,' he was thinking not merely of the
reviewers who had robbed him of fame in his short life, but also of
those unwritten poems, of which 'the faint conceptions' in happier
days used to 'bring the blood into his forehead.'
[4] LII, C., LV, F. The quotations above are from XIV, XVI, C., XV,
XVII, XVIII, F. The verses are a parody of Wordsworth's lines, 'The
cock is crowing.'
[5] LXI, C., LXVI, F.
[6] LVI, C., LXI, F.
[7] LXXIII, C., LXXXI, F. Mr. Hooker, I may remark, would not have
thanked Keats for his bishopric.
[8] From the letter last quoted. See also CXVI, CXVIII, CXIX, C.,
CXXXVII, CXXXIV, CXXXV, F.
[9] 'Pain had no sting and pleasure's wreath no flower.'
[10] XCII, C., CVI, F.
[11] XIX, C., XXI, F.
[12] LIV, C., LIX, F.
[13] CXXXI, C., CLII, F.
[14] CXVI, C., CXXXVII, F. The word 'turn' in the last sentence but
two seems to be doubtful. Mr. Colvin reads 'have.'
[15] Keats's use of the word is suggested, probably, by Milton's
'pure intelligence of heaven.'
[16] XCII, C., CVI, F.
[17] CLXVI, F., LXXIII, C., LXXXI, F. In XLI, C., XLIV, F., occurs a
passage ending with the words, 'they are able to "_consecrate
whate'er they look upon_."' Is not this a quotation from the _Hymn_:
Spirit of BEAUTY that dost consecrate
With thine own hues all thou dost shine upon?
If so, and if my memory serves me, this is the only quotation from
Shelley's poetry in the letters of Keats. The _Hymn_ had been
published in Hunt's _Examiner_, Jan., 1817.
[18] The first critic, I believe, who seriously attempted to
investigate Keats's mind, and the ideas that were trying to take
shape in some of his poems, was F. M. Owen, whose _John Keats, a
Study_ (1880) never attracted in her too brief life-time the
attention it deserved. Mr. Bridges's treatment of these ideas is
masterly. To what is said above may be added that, although Keats was
dissatisfied with _Endymion_ even before he had finished it, he did
not at any time criticise it on the ground that it tried to put too
much meaning into the myth. On _Alastor_ and _Endymion_ see further
the Note appended to this lecture.
[19] A notable (but not isolated) remark, seeing that the poetic
genius of Keats showed itself soonest and perhaps most completely in
the rendering of Nature.
[20] XXIV, C., XXVI, F.
[21] CXVI, C., CXXXVII, F.
[22] XIX, C., XXI, F.
[23] XXXII, C., XXXIV, F.
[24] He contemplates even the study of metaphysics, LI, C., LIV, F.
[25] L, C., LIII, F.
[26] XXIV, C., XXVI, F.
[27] Cf. in addition to the letters already referred to, the obscure
letter to Bailey, XXII, C., XXIV, F., which, however, is early, and
not quite in agreement with later thoughts. I should observe perhaps
that if Keats's position, as formulated above, is accepted, the
question still remains whether a truth which is also beauty, or a
beauty which is also truth, can be found by man; and, if so, whether
it can, in strictness, be called by either of those names.
[28] CLV, C., CCVI, F. See on these sentences the Note at the end of
the lecture.
[29] An expression used in reference to Wordsworth, XXXIV, C., XXXVI,
F.
[30] I have not space to dwell on this distinction, but I must warn
the reader that he will probably misunderstand the important passage
in the revised _Hyperion_, 161 ff., unless he consults Mr. de
Selincourt's edition.
[31] XXII, C., XXV, F.
[32] That is, in 'half-knowledge,' 'doubts,' 'mysteries' (see p.
235), while the philosopher is sometimes supposed by Keats to have a
reasoned certainty about everything. It is curious to reflect that
great metaphysicians, like Spinoza and Hegel, are often accused of
the un-moral impartiality which Keats attributes to the poet.
[33] LXXVI, C., LXXX, F.
[34] The ultimate origin of the dream-passage in both poems may well
be Adam's dream in _Paradise Lost_, Book viii.:
She disappear'd, and left me dark: I waked
To find her, or for ever to deplore
Her loss, and other pleasures all abjure.
Keats alludes to this in XXII, C., XXIV, F.
[35] It is tempting to conjecture with Mr. Forman that the full-stop
before the last sentence is a misprint, and that we should read 'the
world,--those who,' etc., so that the last two clauses would be
relative clauses co-ordinate with 'who love not their fellow-beings.'
Not to speak of the run of the sentences, this conjecture is tempting
because of the comma after 'fellow-beings,' and because the paragraph
is followed by the quotation ('those' should be 'they'),
The good die first,
And those whose hearts are dry as summer's dust
Burn to the socket.
The good who die first correspond with the 'pure and tender-hearted'
who perish and, as we naturally suppose, perish young, like the poet
in _Alastor_. But, as the last sentence stands, these, as well as the
torpid, live to old age. It is hard to believe that Shelley meant
this; but as he was in England when _Alastor_ was printed, he
probably revised the proofs, and it is perhaps easier to suppose that
he wrote what is printed than that he passed unobserved the serious
misprint supposed by Mr. Forman.
[36] XVIII, C., XX, F.