ETON AND OXFORD.
In 1804 Shelley went from Sion House to Eton. At this time Dr. Goodall was
headmaster, and Shelley’s tutor was a Mr. Bethel, “one of the dullest men
in the establishment.” At Eton Shelley was not popular either with his
teachers or his elder school-fellows, although the boys of his own age are
said to have adored him. “He was all passion,” writes Mrs. Shelley,
“passionate in his resistance to an injury, passionate in his love:” and
this vehemence of temperament he displayed by organizing a rebellion
against fagging, which no doubt won for him the applause of his juniors
and equals. It was not to be expected that a lad intolerant of rule and
disregardful of restriction, who neglected punctuality in the performance
of his exercises, while he spent his leisure in translating half of
Pliny’s history, should win the approbation of pedagogues. At the same
time the inspired opponent of the fagging system, the scorner of games and
muscular amusements, could not hope to find much favour with such
martinets of juvenile convention as a public school is wont to breed. At
Eton, as elsewhere, Shelley’s uncompromising spirit brought him into
inconvenient contact with a world of vulgar usage, while his lively fancy
invested the commonplaces of reality with dark hues borrowed from his own
imagination. Mrs. Shelley says of him, “Tamed by affection, but
unconquered by blows, what chance was there that Shelley should be happy
at a public school?” This sentence probably contains the pith of what he
afterwards remembered of his own school life, and there is no doubt that a
nature like his, at once loving and high-spirited, had much to suffer. It
was a mistake, however, to suppose that at Eton there were any serious
blows to bear, or to assume that laws of love which might have led a
spirit so gentle as Shelley’s, were adapted to the common stuff of which
the English boy is formed. The latter mistake Shelley made continually
throughout his youth; and only the advance of years tempered his
passionate enthusiasm into a sober zeal for the improvement of mankind by
rational methods. We may also trace at this early epoch of his life that
untamed intellectual ambition--that neglect of the immediate and detailed
for the transcendental and universal--which was a marked characteristic of
his genius, leading him to fly at the highest while he overleaped the
facts of ordinary human life. “From his earliest years,” says Mrs.
Shelley, “all his amusements and occupations were of a daring, and in one
sense of the term, lawless nature. He delighted to exert his powers, not
as a boy, but as a man; and so with manly powers and childish wit, he
dared and achieved attempts that none of his comrades could even have
conceived. His understanding and the early development of imagination
never permitted him to mingle in childish plays; and his natural aversion
to tyranny prevented him from paying due attention to his school duties.
But he was always actively employed; and although his endeavours were
prosecuted with puerile precipitancy, yet his aim and thoughts were
constantly directed to those great objects which have employed the
thoughts of the greatest among men; and though his studies were not
followed up according to school discipline, they were not the less
diligently applied to.” This high-soaring ambition was the source both of
his weakness and his strength in art, as well as in his commerce with the
world of men. The boy who despised discipline and sought to extort her
secrets from nature by magic, was destined to become the philanthropist
who dreamed of revolutionizing society by eloquence, and the poet who
invented in _Prometheus Unbound_ forms of grandeur too colossal to be
animated with dramatic life.
A strong interest in experimental science had been already excited in him
at Sion House by the exhibition of an orrery; and this interest grew into
a passion at Eton. Experiments in chemistry and electricity, of the
simpler and more striking kind, gave him intense pleasure--the more so
perhaps because they were forbidden. On one occasion he set the trunk of
an old tree on fire with a burning glass: on another, while he was amusing
himself with a blue flame, his tutor came into the room and received a
severe shock from a highly-charged Leyden jar. During the holidays Shelley
carried on the same pursuits at Field Place. “His own hands and clothes,”
says Miss Shelley, “were constantly stained and corroded with acids, and
it only seemed too probable that some day the house would be burned down,
or some serious mischief happen to himself or others from the explosion of
combustibles.” This taste for science Shelley long retained. If we may
trust Mr. Hogg’s memory, the first conversation which that friend had with
him at Oxford, consisted almost wholly of an impassioned monologue from
Shelley on the revolution to be wrought by science in all realms of
thought. His imagination was fascinated by the boundless vistas opened to
the student of chemistry. When he first discovered that the four elements
were not final, it gave him the acutest pleasure: and this is highly
characteristic of the genius which was always seeking to transcend and
reach the life of life withdrawn from ordinary gaze. On the other hand he
seems to have delighted in the toys of science, playing with a solar
microscope, and mixing strangest compounds in his crucibles, without
taking the trouble to study any of its branches systematically. In his
later years he abandoned these pursuits. But a charming reminiscence of
them occurs in that most delightful of his familiar poems, the _Letter to
Maria Gisborne_.
While translating Pliny and dabbling in chemistry, Shelley was not wholly
neglectful of Etonian studies. He acquired a fluent, if not a correct,
knowledge of both Greek and Latin, and astonished his contemporaries by
the facility with which he produced verses in the latter language. His
powers of memory were extraordinary, and the rapidity with which he read a
book, taking in seven or eight lines at a glance, and seizing the sense
upon the hint of leading words, was no less astonishing. Impatient speed
and indifference to minutiæ were indeed among the cardinal qualities of
his intellect. To them we may trace not only the swiftness of his
imaginative flight, but also his frequent satisfaction with the somewhat
less than perfect in artistic execution.
That Shelley was not wholly friendless or unhappy at Eton may be gathered
from numerous small circumstances. Hogg says that his Oxford rooms were
full of handsome leaving books, and that he was frequently visited by old
Etonian acquaintances. We are also told that he spent the 40_l._ gained
by his first novel, _Zastrozzi_, on a farewell supper to eight school-boy
friends. A few lines, too, might be quoted from his own poem, the _Boat on
the Serchio_, to prove that he did not entertain a merely disagreeable
memory of his school life.[1] Yet the general experience of Eton must have
been painful; and it is sad to read of this gentle and pure spirit being
goaded by his coarser comrades into fury, or coaxed to curse his father
and the king for their amusement. It may be worth mentioning that he was
called “the Atheist” at Eton; and though Hogg explains this by saying that
“the Atheist” was an official character among the boys, selected from time
to time for his defiance of authority, yet it is not improbable that
Shelley’s avowed opinions may even then have won for him a title which he
proudly claimed in after-life. To allude to his boyish incantations and
nocturnal commerce with fiends and phantoms would scarcely be needful,
were it not that they seem to have deeply tinged his imagination. While
describing the growth of his own genius in the _Hymn to Intellectual
Beauty_, he makes the following reference to circumstances which might
otherwise be trivial:--
While yet a boy, I sought for ghosts, and sped
Thro’ many a listening chamber, cave, and ruin,
And starlight wood, with fearful steps pursuing
Hopes of high talk with the departed dead.
I call’d on poisonous names with which our youth is fed,
I was not heard, I saw them not--
When, musing deeply on the lot
Of life, at that sweet time when winds are wooing
All vital things that wake to bring
News of birds and blossoming,--
Sudden, thy shadow fell on me;
I shrieked, and clasped my hands in ecstasy!
Among his friends at Windsor was one whose name will always be revered by
Shelley’s worshippers; for he alone discerned the rare gifts of the
strange and solitary boy, and Shelley loved him. Dr. Lind was an old man,
a physician, and a student of chemistry. Shelley spent long hours at his
house, conversing with him, and receiving such instruction in philosophy
and science as the grey-haired scholar could impart. The affection which
united them must have been of no common strength or quality; for when
Shelley lay ill of a fever at Field Place, and had conceived the probably
ill-founded notion that his father intended to place him in a mad-house,
he managed to convey a message to his friend at Eton, on the receipt of
which Dr. Lind travelled to Horsham, and by his sympathy and skill
restored the sick boy’s confidence. It may incidentally be pointed out
that this story, credited as true by Lady Shelley in her Memorials, shows
how early an estrangement had begun between the poet and his father. We
look, moreover, vainly for that mother’s influence which might have been
so beneficial to the boy in whom “love and life were twins, born at one
birth.” From Dr. Lind Shelley not only received encouragement to pursue
his chemical studies; but he also acquired the habit of corresponding with
persons unknown to him, whose opinions he might be anxious to discover or
dispute. This habit, as we shall see in the sequel, determined Shelley’s
fate on two important occasions of his life. In return for the help
extended to him at Eton, Shelley conferred undying fame on Dr. Lind; the
characters of Zonaras in _Prince Athanase_, and of the hermit in _Laon and
Cythna_, are portraits painted by the poet of his boyhood’s friend.
The months which elapsed between Eton and Oxford were an important period
in Shelley’s life. At this time a boyish liking for his cousin, Harriet
Grove, ripened into real attachment; and though there was perhaps no
formal engagement between them, the parents on both sides looked with
approval on their love. What it concerns us to know about this early
passion, is given in a letter from a brother of Miss Grove. “Bysshe was at
that time (just after leaving Eton) more attached to my sister Harriet
than I can express, and I recollect well the moonlight walks we four had
at Strode and also at St. Irving’s; that, I think was the name of the
place, then the Duke of Norfolk’s, at Horsham.” For some time after the
date mentioned in this letter, Shelley and Miss Grove kept up an active
correspondence; but the views he expressed on speculative subjects soon
began to alarm her. She consulted her mother and her father, and the
engagement was broken off. The final separation does not seem to have
taken place until the date of Shelley’s expulsion from Oxford; and not the
least cruel of the pangs he had to suffer at that period, was the loss of
one to whom he had given his whole heart unreservedly. The memory of Miss
Grove long continued to haunt his imagination, nor is there much doubt
that his first unhappy marriage was contracted while the wound remained
unhealed. [The name of Harriet Westbrook and something in her face
reminded him of Harriet Grove; it is even still uncertain to which Harriet
the dedication of Queen Mab is addressed.][2]
In his childhood Shelley scribbled verses with fluency, by no means
unusual in the case of forward boys; and we have seen that at Sion House
he greedily devoured the sentimental novels of the day. His favourite
poets at the time of which I am now writing, were Monk Lewis and Southey;
his favourite books in prose were romances by Mrs. Radcliffe and Godwin.
He now began to yearn for fame and publicity. Miss Shelley speaks of a
play written by her brother and her sister Elizabeth, which was sent to
Matthews the comedian, and courteously returned as unfit for acting. She
also mentions a little volume of her own verses, which the boy had printed
with the tell-tale name of “H--ll--n Sh--ll--y” on the title-page. Medwin
gives a long account of a poem on the story of the Wandering Jew, composed
by him in concert with Shelley during the winter of 1809-1810. They sent
the manuscript to Thomas Campbell, who returned it with the observation
that it contained but two good lines:--
It seemed as if an angel’s sigh
Had breathed the plaintive symphony.
Undeterred by this adverse criticism Shelley subsequently offered _The
Wandering Jew_ to the publishers, Messrs. Ballantyne and Co. of Edinburgh.
It was reviewed in the _Edinburgh Journal_ in 1829; but it remained in MS.
till 1831, when a portion was printed in _Fraser’s Magazine_.
Just before leaving Eton he finished his novel of _Zastrozzi_, which some
critics trace to its source in _Zofloya the Moor_, perused by him at Sion
House. The most astonishing fact about this incoherent medley of mad
sentiment is that it served to furnish forth the 40_l._ Eton supper
already spoken of, that it was duly ushered into the world of letters by
Messrs. Wilkie and Robinson on the 5th of June, 1810, and that it was
seriously reviewed. The dates of Shelley’s publications now come fast and
frequent. In the late summer of 1810 he introduced himself to Mr. J. J.
Stockdale, the then fashionable publisher of poems and romances, at his
house of business in Pall Mall. With characteristic impetuosity the young
author implored assistance in a difficulty. He had commissioned a printer
in Horsham to strike off the astounding number of 1480 copies of a volume
of poems; and he had no money to pay the printer’s bill. Would Stockdale
help him out of this dilemma, by taking up the quires and duly ushering
the book into the world? Throughout his life Shelley exercised a wonderful
fascination over the people with whom he came in contact, and almost
always won his way with them as much by personal charm as by determined
and impassioned will. Accordingly on this occasion Stockdale proved
accommodating. The Horsham printer was somehow satisfied; and on the 17th
of September, 1810, the little book came out with the title of _Original
Poetry, by Victor and Cazire_. This volume has disappeared; and much
fruitless conjecture has been expended upon the question of Shelley’s
collaborator in his juvenile attempt. Cazire stands for some one; probably
it is meant to represent a woman’s name, and that woman may have been
either Elizabeth Shelley or Harriet Grove. The _Original Poetry_ had only
been launched a week, when Stockdale discovered on a closer inspection of
the book that it contained some verses well known to the world as the
production of M. G. Lewis. He immediately communicated with Shelley, and
the whole edition was suppressed--not, however, before about one hundred
copies had passed into circulation. Shelley satisfied Stockdale that this
act of literary larceny was due to his collaborator, who may have been his
intimate friend Edward Graham; and the publisher saw no reason to break
with him. On the 14th of November in the same year he issued Shelley’s
second novel from his press, and entered into negotiations with him for
the publication of more poetry. The new romance was named _St. Irvyne, or
the Rosicrucian_. This tale, no less unreadable than _Zastrozzi_, and even
more chaotic in its plan, contained a good deal of poetry, which has been
incorporated in the most recent editions of Shelley’s works. A certain
interest attaches to it as the first known link between Shelley and
William Godwin, for it was composed under the influence of the latter’s
novel, _St. Leon_. The title, moreover, carries us back to those moonlight
walks with Harriet Grove alluded to above. Shelley’s earliest attempts in
literature have but little value for the student of poetry, except in so
far as they illustrate the psychology of genius and its wayward growth.
Their intrinsic merit is almost less than nothing, and no one could
predict from their perusal the course which the future poet of _The Cenci_
and _Epipsychidion_ was to take. It might indeed be argued that the
defects of his great qualities, the over-ideality, the haste, the
incoherence, and the want of grasp on narrative, are glaringly apparent in
these early works. But while this is true, the qualities themselves are
absent. A cautious critic will only find food in _Zastrozzi_ and _St.
Irvyne_ for wondering how such flowers and fruits of genius could have
lain concealed within a germ apparently so barren. There is even less of
the real Shelley discernible in these productions, than of the real Byron
in the _Hours of Idleness_.
In the Michaelmas Term of 1810 Shelley entered University College, Oxford,
as Leicester scholar; and very soon after his arrival he made the
acquaintance of a man who was destined to play a prominent part in his
subsequent history, and to bequeath to posterity the most brilliant, if
not in all respects the most trustworthy, record of his marvellous youth.
Thomas Jefferson Hogg was unlike Shelley in temperament and tastes. His
feet were always planted on the earth, while Shelley flew aloft to heaven
with singing robes around him, or the mantle of the prophet on his
shoulders.[3] Hogg had much of the cynic in his nature; he was a shrewd
man of the world, and a caustic humorist. Positive and practical, he chose
the beaten path of life, rose to eminence as a lawyer, and cherished the
Church and State opinions of a staunch Tory. Yet, though he differed so
essentially from the divine poet, he understood the greatness of Shelley
at a glance, and preserved for us a record of his friend’s early days,
which is incomparable for the vividness of its portraiture. The chapters
which narrate Shelley’s course of life at Oxford have all the charm of a
romance. No novel indeed is half so delightful as that picture, at once
affectionate and satirical, tender and humorous, extravagant and
delicately shaded, of the student life enjoyed together for a few short
months by the inseparable friends. To make extracts from a masterpiece of
such consummate workmanship is almost painful. Future biographers of
Shelley, writing on a scale adequate to the greatness of their subject,
will be content to lay their pens down for a season at this point, and let
Hogg tell the tale in his own wayward but inimitable fashion. I must
confine myself to a few quotations and a barren abstract, referring my
readers to the ever-memorable pages 48-286 of Hogg’s first volume, for the
life that cannot be transferred to these.
“At the commencement of Michaelmas term,” says this biographer, “that is,
at the end of October, in the year 1810, I happened one day to sit next to
a freshman at dinner; it was his first appearance in hall. His figure was
slight, and his aspect remarkably youthful, even at our table, where all
were very young. He seemed thoughtful and absent. He ate little, and had
no acquaintance with any one.” The two young men began a conversation,
which turned upon the respective merits of German and Italian poetry, a
subject they neither of them knew anything about. After dinner it was
continued in Hogg’s rooms, where Shelley soon led the talk to his
favourite topic of science. “As I felt, in truth, but a slight interest in
the subject of his conversation, I had leisure to examine, and I may add,
to admire, the appearance of my very extraordinary guest. It was a sum of
many contradictions. His figure was slight and fragile, and yet his bones
and joints were large and strong. He was tall, but he stooped so much,
that he seemed of a low stature. His clothes were expensive, and made
according to the most approved mode of the day; but they were tumbled,
rumpled, unbrushed. His gestures were abrupt, and sometimes violent,
occasionally even awkward, yet more frequently gentle and graceful. His
complexion was delicate, and almost feminine, of the purest red and white;
yet he was tanned and freckled by exposure to the sun, having passed the
autumn, as he said, in shooting. His features, his whole face, and
particularly his head, were, in fact, unusually small; yet the last
_appeared_ of a remarkable bulk, for his hair was long and bushy, and in
tits of absence, and in the agonies (if I may use the word) of anxious
thought, he often rubbed it fiercely with his hands, or passed his fingers
quickly through his locks unconsciously, so that it was singularly wild
and rough. In times when it was the mode to imitate stage-coachmen as
closely as possible in costume, and when the hair was invariably cropped,
like that of our soldiers, this eccentricity was very striking. His
features were not symmetrical (the mouth, perhaps, excepted), yet was the
effect of the whole extremely powerful. They breathed an animation, a
fire, an enthusiasm, a vivid and preternatural intelligence, that I never
met with in any other countenance. Nor was the moral expression less
beautiful than the intellectual; for there was a softness, a delicacy, a
gentleness, and especially (though this will surprise many) that air of
profound religious veneration, that characterizes the best works, and
chiefly the frescoes (and into these they infused their whole souls), of
the great masters of Florence and of Rome. I recognized the very peculiar
expression in these wonderful productions long afterwards, and with a
satisfaction mingled with much sorrow, for it was after the decease of him
in whose countenance I had first observed it.”
In another place Hogg gives some details which complete the impression of
Shelley’s personal appearance, and which are fully corroborated by
Trelawny’s recollections of a later date. “There were many striking
contrasts in the character and behaviour of Shelley, and one of the most
remarkable was a mixture, or alternation, of awkwardness with agility--of
the clumsy with the graceful. He would stumble in stepping across the
floor of a drawing-room; he would trip himself up on a smooth-shaven
grass-plot, and he would tumble in the most inconceivable manner in
ascending the commodious, facile, and well-carpeted staircase of an
elegant mansion, so as to bruise his nose or his lip on the upper steps,
or to tread upon his hands, and even occasionally to disturb the composure
of a well-bred footman; on the contrary, he would often glide without
collision through a crowded assembly, thread with unerring dexterity a
most intricate path, or securely and rapidly tread the most arduous and
uncertain ways.”
This word-portrait corresponds in its main details to the descriptions
furnished by other biographers, who had the privilege of Shelley’s
friendship. His eyes were blue, unfathomably dark and lustrous. His hair
was brown; but very early in life it became grey, while his unwrinkled
face retained to the last a look of wonderful youth. It is admitted on all
sides that no adequate picture was ever painted of him. Mulready is
reported to have said that he was too beautiful to paint. And yet,
although so singularly lovely, he owed less of his charm to regularity of
feature or to grace of movement, than to an indescribable personal
fascination. One further detail Hogg pointedly insists upon. Shelley’s
voice “was excruciating; it was intolerably shrill, harsh, and
discordant.” This is strongly stated; but, though the terms are certainly
exaggerated, I believe that we must trust this first impression made on
Shelley’s friend. There is a considerable mass of convergent testimony to
the fact that Shelley’s voice was high pitched, and that when he became
excited, he raised it to a scream. The epithets “shrill,” “piercing,”
“penetrating,” frequently recur in the descriptions given of it. At the
same time its quality seems to have been less dissonant than thrilling;
there is abundance of evidence to prove that he could modulate it
exquisitely in the reading of poetry, and its tone proved no obstacle to
the persuasive charms of his eloquence in conversation. Like all finely
tempered natures, he vibrated in harmony with the subjects of his thought.
Excitement made his utterance shrill and sharp. Deep feeling or the sense
of beauty lowered its tone to richness; but the _timbre_ was always acute,
in sympathy with his intense temperament. All was of one piece in
Shelley’s nature. This peculiar voice, varying from moment to moment and
affecting different sensibilities in divers ways, corresponds to the
high-strung passion of his life, his fine-drawn and ethereal fancies, and
the clear vibrations of his palpitating verse. Such a voice, far-reaching,
penetrating, and unearthly, befitted one who lived in rarest ether on the
topmost heights of human thought.
The acquaintance begun that October evening soon ripened into close
friendship. Shelley and Hogg from this time forward spent a large part of
their days and nights together in common studies, walks, and
conversations. It was their habit to pass the morning, each in his own
rooms, absorbed in private reading. At one o’clock they met and lunched,
and then started for long rambles in the country. Shelley frequently
carried pistols with him upon these occasions, and would stop to fix his
father’s franks upon convenient trees and shoot at them. The practice of
pistol-shooting, adopted so early in his life, was afterwards one of his
favourite amusements in the company of Byron. Hogg says that in his use of
fire-arms he was extraordinarily careless. “How often have I lamented that
Nature, which so rarely bestows upon the world a creature endowed with
such marvellous talents, ungraciously rendered the gift less precious by
implanting a fatal taste for perilous recreations, and a thoughtlessness
in the pursuit of them, that often caused his existence from one day to
another to seem in itself miraculous.” On their return from these
excursions the two friends, neither of whom cared for dining in the
College Hall, drank tea and supped together, Shelley’s rooms being
generally chosen as the scene of their symposia.
These rooms are described as a perfect palace of confusion--chaos on chaos
heaped of chemical apparatus, books, electrical machines, unfinished
manuscripts, and furniture worn into holes by acids. It was perilous to
use the poet’s drinking-vessels, lest perchance a seven-shilling piece
half dissolved in _aqua regia_ should lurk at the bottom of the bowl.
Handsome razors were used to cut the lids of wooden boxes, and valuable
books served to support lamps or crucibles; for in his vehement
precipitation Shelley always laid violent hands on what he found
convenient to the purpose of the moment. Here the friends talked and read
until late in the night. Their chief studies at this time were in Locke
and Hume and the French essayists. Shelley’s bias toward metaphysical
speculation was beginning to assert itself. He read the School Logic with
avidity, and practised himself without intermission in dialectical
discussion. Hogg observes, what is confirmed by other testimony, that in
reasoning Shelley never lost sight of the essential bearings of the topic
in dispute, never condescended to personal or captious arguments, and was
Socratically bent on following the dialogue wherever it might lead,
without regard for consequences. Plato was another of their favourite
authors; but Hogg expressly tells us that they only approached the divine
philosopher through the medium of translations. It was not until a later
period that Shelley studied his dialogues in the original: but the
substance of them, seen through Mdme. Dacier’s version, acted powerfully
on the poet’s sympathetic intellect. In fact, although at this time he had
adopted the conclusions of materialism, he was at heart all through his
life an idealist. Therefore the mixture of the poet and the sage in Plato
fascinated him. The doctrine of _anamnesis_, which offers so strange a
vista to speculative reverie, by its suggestion of an earlier existence in
which our knowledge was acquired, took a strong hold upon his imagination;
he would stop in the streets to gaze wistfully at babies, wondering
whether their newly imprisoned souls were not replete with the wisdom
stored up in a previous life.
In the acquisition of knowledge he was then as ever unrelaxing. “No
student ever read more assiduously. He was to be found, book in hand, at
all hours; reading in season and out of season; at table, in bed, and
especially during a walk; not only in the quiet country, and in retired
paths; not only at Oxford, in the public walks, and High Street, but in
the most crowded thoroughfares of London. Nor was he less absorbed by the
volume that was open before him, in Cheapside, in Cranbourne Alley, or in
Bond Street, than in a lonely lane, or a secluded library. Sometimes a
vulgar fellow would attempt to insult or annoy the eccentric student in
passing. Shelley always avoided the malignant interruption by stepping
aside with his vast and quiet agility.” And again:--“I never beheld eyes
that devoured the pages more voraciously than his; I am convinced that
two-thirds of the period of day and night were often employed in reading.
It is no exaggeration to affirm, that out of the twenty-four hours, he
frequently read sixteen. At Oxford, his diligence in this respect was
exemplary, but it greatly increased afterwards, and I sometimes thought
that he carried it to a pernicious excess: I am sure, at least, that I was
unable to keep pace with him.” With Shelley study was a passion, and the
acquisition of knowledge was the entrance into a thrice-hallowed
sanctuary. “The irreverent many cannot comprehend the awe--the careless
apathetic worldling cannot imagine the enthusiasm--nor can the tongue that
attempts only to speak of things visible to the bodily eye, express the
mighty emotion that inwardly agitated him, when he approached, for the
first time, a volume which he believed to be replete with the recondite
and mystic philosophy of antiquity: his cheeks glowed, his eyes became
bright, his whole frame trembled, and his entire attention was immediately
swallowed up in the depths of contemplation. The rapid and vigorous
conversion of his soul to intellect can only be compared with the
instantaneous ignition and combustion, which dazzle the sight, when a
bundle of dry reeds, or other light inflammable substance, is thrown upon
a fire already rich with accumulated heat.”
As at Eton, so at Oxford, Shelley refused to keep the beaten track of
prescribed studies, or to run in ordinary grooves of thought. The mere
fact that Aristotle was a duty, seems to have disgusted him with the
author of the Organon, from whom, had his works been prohibited to
undergraduates, he would probably have been eager to learn much. For
mathematics and jurisprudence he evinced a marked distaste. The common
business of the English Parliament had no attraction for him, and he read
few newspapers. While his mind was keenly interested in great political
questions, he could not endure the trivial treatment of them in the daily
press, and cared far more for principles than for the incidents of party
warfare. Here again he showed that impatience of detail, and that audacity
of self-reliant genius, which were the source of both his weakness and his
strength. He used to speak with aversion of a Parliamentary career, and
told Hogg that though this had been suggested to him, as befitting his
position, by the Duke of Norfolk, he could never bring himself to mix with
the rabble of the House. It is none the less true, however, that he
entertained some vague notion of eventually succeeding to his father’s
seat.
Combined with his eager intellectual activity, there was something
intermittent and fitful in the working of his mental faculties. Hogg, in
particular, mentions one of his habits in a famous passage, which, since
it brings the two friends vividly before us, may here be quoted. “I was
enabled to continue my studies afterwards in the evening, in consequence
of a very remarkable peculiarity. My young and energetic friend was then
overcome by extreme drowsiness, which speedily and completely vanquished
him; he would sleep from two to four hours, often so soundly that his
slumbers resembled a deep lethargy; he lay occasionally upon the sofa, but
more commonly stretched upon the rug before a large fire, like a cat; and
his little round head was exposed to such a fierce heat, that I used to
wonder how he was able to bear it. Sometimes I have interposed some
shelter, but rarely with any permanent effect; for the sleeper usually
contrived to turn himself, and to roll again into the spot where the fire
glowed the brightest. His torpor was generally profound, but he would
sometimes discourse incoherently for a long while in his sleep. At six he
would suddenly compose himself, even in the midst of a most animated
narrative, or of earnest discussion; and he would lie buried in entire
forgetfulness, in a sweet and mighty oblivion, until ten, when he would
suddenly start up, and, rubbing his eyes with great violence, and passing
his fingers swiftly through his long hair, would enter at once into a
vehement argument, or begin to recite verses, either of his own
composition or from the works of others, with a rapidity and an energy
that were often quite painful.”
Shelley’s moral qualities are described, with no less enthusiasm than his
intellectual and physical beauty by the friend from whom I have already
drawn so largely. Love was the root and basis of his nature: this love,
first developed as domestic affection, next as friendship, then as a
youth’s passion, now began to shine with steady lustre as an all-embracing
devotion to his fellow-men. There is something inevitably chilling in the
words “benevolence” and “philanthropy.” A disillusioned world is inclined
to look with languid approbation on the former, and to disbelieve in the
latter. Therefore I will not use them to describe that intense and glowing
passion of unselfishness, which throughout his life led Shelley to find
his strongest interests in the joys and sorrows of his fellow-creatures,
which inflamed his imagination with visions of humanity made perfect, and
which filled his days with sweet deeds of unnumbered charities. I will
rather collect from the pages of his friend’s biography a few passages
recording the first impression of his character, the memory of which may
be carried by the reader through the following brief record of his
singular career:--
“His speculations were as wild as the experience of twenty-one years has
shown them to be; but the zealous earnestness for the augmentation of
knowledge, and the glowing philanthropy and boundless benevolence that
marked them, and beamed forth in the whole deportment of that
extraordinary boy, are not less astonishing than they would have been if
the whole of his glorious anticipations had been prophetic; for these high
qualities, at least, I have never found a parallel.”
“In no individual perhaps was the moral sense ever more completely
developed than in Shelley; in no being was the perception of right and of
wrong more acute.”
“As his love of intellectual pursuits was vehement, and the vigour of his
genius almost celestial, so were the purity and sanctity of his life most
conspicuous.”
“I never knew any one so prone to admire as he was, in whom the principle
of veneration was so strong.”
“I have had the happiness to associate with some of the best specimens of
gentlemen; but with all due deference for those admirable persons (may my
candour and my preference be pardoned), I can affirm that Shelley was
almost the only example I have yet found that was never wanting, even in
the most minute particular, of the infinite and various observances of
pure, entire, and perfect gentility.”
“Shelley was actually offended, and indeed more indignant than would
appear to be consistent with the singular mildness of his nature, at a
coarse and awkward jest, especially if it were immodest, or uncleanly; in
the latter case his anger was unbounded, and his uneasiness pre-eminent;
he was, however, sometimes vehemently delighted by exquisite and delicate
sallies, particularly with a fanciful, and perhaps somewhat fantastical
facetiousness--possibly the more because he was himself utterly incapable
of pleasantry.”
“I never could discern in him any more than two fixed principles. The
first was a strong irrepressible love of liberty; of liberty in the
abstract, and somewhat after the pattern of the ancient republics, without
reference to the English constitution, respecting which he knew little and
cared nothing, heeding it not at all. The second was an equally ardent
love of toleration of all opinions, but more especially of religious
opinions; of toleration, complete, entire, universal, unlimited; and, as a
deduction and corollary from which latter principle, he felt an intense
abhorrence of persecution of every kind, public or private.”
The testimony in the foregoing extracts as to Shelley’s purity and
elevation of moral character is all the stronger, because it is given by a
man not over-inclined to praise, and of a temperament as unlike the poet’s
as possible. If we were to look only upon this side of his portrait, we
should indeed be almost forced to use the language of his most
enthusiastic worshippers, and call him an archangel. But it must be
admitted that, though so pure and gentle and exalted, Shelley’s virtues
were marred by eccentricity, by something at times approaching madness,
which paralysed his efficiency by placing him in a glaringly false
relation to some of the best men of the world around him. He possessed
certain good qualities in excess; for, though it sounds paradoxical, it is
none the less true that a man may be too tolerant, too fond of liberty:
and it was precisely the extravagance of these virtues in Shelley which
drove him into acts and utterances so antagonistic to society as to be
intolerable.
Of Shelley’s poetical studies we hear but little at this epoch. His genius
by a stretch of fancy might be compared to one of those double stars which
dart blue and red rays of light: for it was governed by two luminaries,
poetry and metaphysics; and at this time the latter seems to have been in
the ascendant. It is, however, interesting to learn that he read and
re-read Landor’s _Gebir_--stronger meat than either Southey’s epics or the
ghost-lyrics of Monk Lewis. Hogg found him one day busily engaged in
correcting proofs of some original poems. Shelley asked his friend what he
thought of them, and Hogg answered that it might be possible by a little
alteration to turn them into capital burlesques. This idea took the young
poet’s fancy; and the friends between them soon effected a metamorphosis
in Shelley’s serious verses, by which they became unmistakably ridiculous.
Having achieved their purpose, they now bethought them of the proper means
of publication. Upon whom should the poems, a medley of tyrannicide and
revolutionary raving, be fathered? Peg Nicholson, a mad washerwoman, had
recently attempted George the Third’s life with a carving-knife. No more
fitting author could be found. They would give their pamphlet to the world
as her work, edited by an admiring nephew. The printer appreciated the
joke no less than the authors of it. He provided splendid paper and
magnificent type; and before long the book of nonsense was in the hands of
Oxford readers. It sold for the high price of half-a-crown a copy; and,
what is hardly credible, the gownsmen received it as a genuine production.
“It was indeed a kind of fashion to be seen reading it in public, as a
mark of nice discernment, of a delicate and fastidious taste in poetry,
and the best criterion of a choice spirit.” Such was the genesis of
_Posthumous Fragments of Margaret Nicholson_, edited by John Fitz Victor.
The name of the supposititious nephew reminds us of _Original Poems_ by
Victor and Cazire, and raises the question whether the poems in that lost
volume may not have partly furnished forth this Oxford travesty.
Shelley’s next publication, or quasi-publication, was neither so innocent
in substance nor so pleasant in its consequences. After leaving Eton, he
continued the habit, learned from Dr. Lind, of corresponding with
distinguished persons whom he did not personally know. Thus we find him
about this time addressing Miss Felicia Browne (afterwards Mrs. Hemans)
and Leigh Hunt. He plied his correspondents with all kinds of questions;
and as the dialectical interest was uppermost at Oxford, he now
endeavoured to engage them in discussions on philosophical and religious
topics. We have seen that his favourite authors were Locke, Hume, and the
French materialists. With the impulsiveness peculiar to his nature, he
adopted the negative conclusions of a shallow nominalistic philosophy. It
was a fundamental point with him to regard all questions, however sifted
and settled by the wise of former ages, as still open; and in his
inordinate thirst for liberty, he rejoiced to be the Deicide of a
pernicious theological delusion. In other words, he passed at Oxford by
one leap from a state of indifferentism with regard to Christianity, into
an attitude of vehement antagonism. With a view to securing answers to his
missives, he printed a short abstract of Hume’s and other arguments
against the existence of a Deity, presented in a series of propositions,
and signed with a mathematically important “Q. E. D.” This document he
forwarded to his proposed antagonists, expressing his inability to answer
its arguments, and politely requesting them to help him. When it so
happened that any incautious correspondents acceded to this appeal,
Shelley fell with merciless severity upon their feeble and commonplace
reasoning. The little pamphlet of two pages was entitled _The Necessity of
Atheism_; and its proposed publication, beyond the limits of private
circulation already described, is proved by an advertisement (Feb. 9,
1811) in the _Oxford University and City Herald_. It was suppressed after
being for a few hours offered for sale.
A copy of this syllabus reached a Fellow of another college, who made the
Master of University acquainted with the fact. On the morning of March 25,
1811, Shelley was sent for to the Senior Common Room, and asked whether
he acknowledged himself to be the author of the obnoxious pamphlet. On his
refusal to answer this question, he was served with a formal sentence of
expulsion duly drawn up and sealed. The college authorities have been
blamed for unfair dealing in this matter. It is urged that they ought to
have proceeded by the legal method of calling witnesses; and that the
sentence was not only out of all proportion to the offence, but that it
ought not to have been executed till persuasion had been tried. With
regard to the former indictment, I do not think that a young man still _in
statu pupillari_, who refused to purge himself of what he must have known
to be a serious charge, had any reason to expect from his tutors the
formalities of an English court of law. There is no doubt that the Fellows
were satisfied of his being the real author; else they could not have
ventured on so summary a measure as expulsion. Their question was probably
intended to give the culprit an occasion for apology, of which they
foresaw he would not avail himself. With regard to the second, it is true
that Shelley was amenable to kindness, and that gentle and wise treatment
from men whom he respected, might possibly have brought him to retract his
syllabus. But it must be remembered that he despised the Oxford dons with
all his heart; and they were probably aware of this. He was a dexterous,
impassioned reasoner, whom they little cared to encounter in argument on
such a topic. During his short period of residence, moreover, he had not
shown himself so tractable as to secure the good wishes of superiors, who
prefer conformity to incommensurable genius. It is likely that they were
not averse to getting rid of him as a man dangerous to the peace of their
society; and now they had a good occasion. Nor was it to be expected that
the champion and apostle of Atheism--and Shelley was certainly both, in
spite of Hogg’s attempts to tone down the purpose of his document--should
be unmolested in his propaganda by the aspirants to fat livings and
ecclesiastical dignities. Real blame, however, attaches to these men:
first, for their dulness to discern Shelley’s amiable qualities; and,
secondly, for the prejudgment of the case implied in the immediate
delivery of their sentence. Both Hogg and Shelley accused them, besides,
of a gross brutality, which was, to say the least, unseemly on so serious
an occasion. At the beginning of this century the learning and the manners
of the Oxford dons were at a low ebb; and the Fellows of University
College acted harshly but not altogether unjustly, ignorantly but after
their own kind, in this matter of Shelley’s expulsion. _Non ragionam di
lor, ma guarda e passa._ Hogg, who stood by his friend manfully at this
crisis, and dared the authorities to deal with him as they had dealt with
Shelley, adding that they had just as much real proof to act upon in his
case, and intimating his intention of returning the same answer as to the
authorship of the pamphlet, was likewise expelled. The two friends left
Oxford together by the coach on the morning of the 26th of March.
Shelley felt his expulsion acutely. At Oxford he had enjoyed the
opportunities of private reading which the University afforded in those
days of sleepy studies and innocuous examinations. He delighted in the
security of his “oak,” and above all things he found pleasure in the
society of his one chosen friend. He was now obliged to exchange these
good things for the tumult and discomfort of London. His father, after
clumsily attempting compromises, had forbidden his return to Field Place.
The whole fabric of his former life was broken up. The last hope of
renewing his engagement with his cousin had to be abandoned. His pecuniary
position was precarious, and in a short time he was destined to lose the
one friend who had so generously shared his fate. Yet the notion of
recovering his position as a student in one of our great Universities, of
softening his father’s indignation, or of ameliorating his present
circumstances by the least concession, never seems to have occurred to
him. He had suffered in the cause of truth and liberty, and he willingly
accepted his martyrdom for conscience’ sake.