Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1855-12-15
Mtisttilnntous.
From and English Paper.
R BYssHE SHELLEY.



Shelley is not yet pro- crly understood. Ills re-
hsi'us opinions excited \ prejudice against him,
aud his poetry is not of annture to acquire gonor-
vi or immediate popularity-and yet he was u true
poet. There can 10 no question that he is entitled
10 rank with Byron and Wndsworth. as the third
great poet OF an ago distinguished for its fertility
IN poetical genius. In many of the most essential
qualities of q poet he was not only the fist Of his
age, but interior 10 none Of any age or any coun.
try. No one was ever endowed with a more cx-
auisite susceptibility to everything grand and
beautiful in nature and in art no one ever rem
dered back these impression in verse with more
magic force and truth. The voice Of the mighty
ocean was familiar to him he understood the
language OF the eternal heavcnS,-the stern sub
Unity vt the mountain solitudes, the soft and
gentle influence of evening the gladncss of earth,
with all its varied sights and sounds Of beauty.
These aud the magic influences Of music and love,
the brightest creations of human genias, and tho
most beautiful aspirations Of the human heart,
were tue clements in which be lived and had his
being. lie has been called the poet of poets, and
with ustlce-tur whilst others rise rarely, and at
intervals, into the regions of poetical thought and
feeling, he seems 10 know no other, and to speak
the language of poetry rs if it were his native
tongue. Hence II is that we ind in his poetry such
n bOundless and czharstiess wealth Of beautiful
imagery. S
Nor is il in tho poetry Of nature alone, that
Shelley lives haOitually in the region Of the beau.
tifnl, be IS no less at home in the poetry Of the
human heart. lie knows little Of its common every
'ay workings, Of the secret springs of vanity,
ambition, avarice, s%elEloye, which prompt the ordi.
nary actions of ordinary men. Ii is only by n
painful effort by "compuision and labcrious flight
that he can occasionally, as in some scenes og the
Cenci, sink into the sphere Of the dramatic, and
paint men as they really are, with their vulgar
hopes and fears, and passions. Admirably as
ilose scenes are cAccuted, itis easy to see that he
IS not in his native element, ana that his genius
does net move with the same freedom and facility
rs in the raTer and ioftier region of the purely
poe:ical. His common thoughts are aspirations
alter tile Infinite, passionate ~lonsings for ideal
beauty, qucstionirgs Of the deep mysteries of ma
ture overnowing5 Of love and sympathy, and all
those deepest and most beautiful workings Of our
nature, which although not less real than the COM
mon prosaic realities Of life, slumbcr with most
men under o surface Of coldnes S and worldli-
mess and are but rarely and at intervals called
forth.
In ~ other requisite Of a great poet, Shelley is
also unrivalled. No one ever possessed q more
thorough mastery over language, or \ finer ear
for the music and meditation of verse. Nothing
can surpass the case aud elegance, the exquisite
harmonious flow Of his vcrsifcation. His Spence
rlan stanzas are like strains of sweetest music.
Spencer himself never surpassed the ETHEREAL light
ness, the charming mostudied ease and full rich
lnurmuring melody of many stan2as of the "Rc-
volt of Islam" Compare them with the rugged
stanzCs Of "Childe Harold" which show what an
effort 1T cost Byron to drag his deep thoughts up
into the Light, and clothe them in verse, and YOU
will see at once what | mean by Shelley's musical
car and command of language. Nor is he less
iu blank verse. The address to Nature,
with which his "Alastor" opens, approaches more
nearly TO the majestic march and sonorous harmo-
ny, as well as 70 TIE lofty and sustained strain of
OF poetic feeling Of tie divine Milton, than any,
thing With which am acquainted in modern poe
try. The greatest triumph of his heart however
still rnmafnS lIvGEag'c lA,v tho tnt-nn4nl1o 100
meter yields in his hands, loses its stiffness and
.formalty, and becomes light, musical, and fexi-
BILE. In the "Epipsyche5ion," .he conclusion of
which is the most beautiful passage of his poetry
the most beautiful single passage, perhaps, in the
whole range of poetry-the metre quite changes
its nature. 81 exquisitely are the pauscs and mo-
dulations Of the verse managed, thst all traces of
the monotonous singSOng, which makes all other
hexameters absolutely unreliable, are quito lost,
aud the ear is charmed by the smooth, easy, ma
tural flow Of the melody. This unrivaled conf
mand OF language furnishes him with a store Of
magic eplthets which condenso whole worlds of.
and feeling into 4 single word, and make
he scenes of nature flash before us with the force
and viyidness Of reality. No one images back the !
impressions of nature with such force and distinct
ness as Shelley. | constantly find in his poetry .
my own feelings and recollections expressed with
power and elearness with which ! should have :
sought IN vain to express them myself. =
With all these glorious faculties, Shelley is far {
from being a perfect poet, and,his poetry has faults
which will in all probability prevent it from ever {
bocoming generally popular. l do not here allude
to his religious opinions for l cannot but hope
and trust that the age Of religious prudery is pass
away. and that a time is coming when men will
have the eandor and manIinoss not to turn UP their
eyes with affected horror at the sight Of honest,
Conscientious %unbelief, while they fawn on writers
who, under the mask Of hollow hypocrittcal confor-
nifty, sap the very foundations of morality. Sure
Is we are getting too enlightened to allow Oxford
doctors Of divinity to expel n young man, and fix
a stigma on his name for life, because at his first
into the university be is so startled by The
.hoIlowness and insIncerity he sees around him
the oaths which everybody swears and no one un-
derstands-the crowd of idle d~issipated men rush
ing into tho church from worldly motives-the
compulsory chapel-goiug-and all other solemnized
hypocrlcies which are perpetrated in such places
under the name and sanction of religion-as to
doubt whether religion itself be not like all the
rest, an em9ty m~ockery. True Shelley was no
Christian, and he made no secret of his unbelief.
fearless in everything, authority and persecution
only made him speak out with a chiyalrous and
almost quioxotic boldness in the cause of what he
believed to be truth. But however rash and i'll.
judged we may deem his speculative opinions, no
one can read q page Of his writings with com
mon candor, without seeing that there never lived
II more ard0nt worshippcroF everything that is good
and beautiful. Nay more. | venture to say that,
nhdel as he is, those who can look below the out
ward form and surface, will find more real and
genuine spirit Of Christianity in his poems than
in the poetry Of half those who are admired as
moral and religious writer's. What was ever con-
ceiyed more truly in the spirit Of Christ's doctrine
than the passage in which he makes Prometheus,
IN order to render himself worthy Of the happiness
destined for him, rise superior to revenge, and
recall the curse which in the first moments Of his
agony he had uttered against his enemy, Jupiter,
because taught by suffering" he wishes "no liv.
ing thing tc suffer pain ?" What more thoroughly
than the lines in the exquisite dedica-
ton of the "Reyoit Of Islam" to Mrs. Shelley, in
which he says, in nllusion to himself, that
Suffering brought the knowledge and the power,
Which said, Let Scora be mol repaid eoiM scornf'
dmention these as a few out Of many instances
20 enable you to Judge of the candor and fairness
ct an age which wershipped Byron and prescribed
Shelley. But truth and genius will remain long