DUKE 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 Treasure %qom 
 

I 
 
 lU 
 
ALASTOR; 
 
 OB, 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE 
 
 AND OTHER POEMS. 
 
 BY 
 
 PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. 
 
 LONDON: 
 
 PRINTED FOR BALDWIN^ CRADOCK, AND JOY^ PATER- 
 NOSTER ROWj AND CARPENTER AND SONj 
 OLD BOND-STREET : 
 
 By S. Hamilton, Weybridge, Surrey. 
 
 1816. 
 
S5N-5A 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The poem entitled ' Alastor/ may be con^ 
 sidered as allegorical of one of the most inte-^ 
 resting situations of the human mind. It re- 
 presents a youth of uncorrupted feelings and 
 adventurous genius led forth by an imagina- 
 tion inflamed and purified through familiarity 
 with all that is excellent and majestic, to the 
 contemplation of the universe. He drinks^ 
 deep of the fountains of knowledge, and is still 
 insatiate* The magnificence and beauty of 
 the external world sinks profoundly into the 
 frame of his conceptions, and affords to their 
 modifications a variety not to be exhausted. 
 So long as it is possible for his desires to point 
 towards objects thus infinite and unmeasured, 
 he is joyous, and tranquil, and self-possessed. 
 But the period arrives when these objects 
 
 M7J9Sf 
 
IV PREFACE. 
 
 cease to suffice. His mind is at length sud- 
 denly awakened and thirsts for intercourse 
 with an intelligence similar to itself. He 
 images to himself the Being whom he loves. 
 Conversant with speculations of the suhlimest 
 and most perfect natures, the vision in which 
 he embodies his own imaginations unites all 
 of wonderful, or wise, or beautiful, which the 
 poet, the philosopher, or the lover cojild de- 
 picture. The intellectual faculties^ the irp:agi- 
 liation, the functions of sense, have their re- 
 spective requisitions on the sympathy of cor- 
 responding powers in other human beings. 
 The Poet is represented as uniting these re- 
 quisitions, and attaching them to a single 
 image. He seeks in vain for a prototype of 
 his conception. Blasted by his disappoint- 
 ment, he descends to an untimely grave. 
 
 The picture is not barren of instruction 
 to actual men. The Poet's self-centred se- 
 clusion was avenged by the furies of an irre- 
 sistible passion pursuing him to speedy ruin. 
 But that PoWer which strikes the luminaries of 
 the world with suddeti darkness and extinction, 
 
by awatkening them to too exquisite a percep- 
 tioti of it§ iiiflueiices, dooiXis to a slo^ and 
 poisoiiOus decay those meariei- spirits that dare 
 to abjure its dominion. Their destiny is more 
 abject and inglorious as their delinquency 
 is more contemptible and pernicious. They 
 who, deluded by no generous error, instigated 
 by no sacred thirst of doubtful knowledge, 
 duped by no illustrious superstition, loving 
 nothing on this earth, and cherishing no hopes 
 beyond, yet keep aloof from sympathies with 
 their kind, rejoicing neither in human joy nor 
 mourning with human grief; these, and such as 
 they, have their apportioned curse. They lan- 
 guish, because none feel with them their com- 
 mon nature. They are morally dead. They 
 are neither friends, nor lovers, nor fathers, nor 
 citizens of the world, nor benefactors of their 
 country. Among those who attempt to exist 
 without human sympathy, the pure and tender- 
 hearted perish through the intensity and passion 
 of their search after its communities, when the 
 vacancy of their spirit suddenly makes itself 
 felt. All else, selfish, blind, and torpid, are 
 
m PREFA.GE. 
 
 those unforeseeing multitudes who constitute, 
 together with their own, the lasting misery and 
 loneliness of the world. Those who love not 
 their fellow-beings, live unfruitful lives, and 
 prepare for their old age a miserable grave. 
 
 * The good die first, 
 And those whose hearts are dry as summer dust, 
 Bum to the socket !' 
 
 The Fragment, entitled 'The D^mon of 
 THE World,' is a detached part of a poem 
 which the author does not intend for publica- 
 tion. The metre in which it is composed is 
 that of Samson Agonistes and the Italian pas- 
 toral drama, and may be considered as the 
 natural measure into which poetical concep- 
 tions, expressed in harmonious language, ne-^ 
 cessarily fall. - 
 
 December ]4, 1815. 
 
ALASTOR; 
 
 OB, 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 
 
 Nondum annjJbam, et amare amabam, quaerebam quid amarem, 
 amans mare. 
 
 Confess. St* August, 
 
ALASTOR; 
 
 OR, 
 
 THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 
 
 Earth^ ocean, air, beloved brotherhood! ' 
 If our great Mother has imbued my soul 
 With aught of natural piety to feel 
 Your love, and recompense the boon with mine j 
 If dewy mom, and odorous noon, and even. 
 With sunset and its gorgeous ministers. 
 And solemn midnight's tingling silentness^ 
 
2 ALASTORj OR, 
 
 If autumn's hollow sighs in the sere wood. 
 And winter robing with pure snow and crowns 
 Of starry ice the gray grass and bare boughs j 
 If spring's voluptuous pantings when she breathes 
 Her first sweet kisses, have been dear to me ^ 
 If no bright bird, insect, or gentle beast 
 I consciously have injured, but still loved 
 And cherished these my kindred ; then forgive 
 This boast, beloved brethren, and withdraw 
 No portion of your wdrited favour now ! 
 Mother of this unfathomable world !. 
 Favour «iy solemn song, for I have loved 
 Thee ever, and the€ only j I have watched 
 Thy shadow, and the darkness of thy steps. 
 And my heart «ver gazes on the depth 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 
 
 Of thy deep mysteries. I have made my bed 
 In charnels and on coffins^ where black death 
 Keeps record of the trophies won from thee^ 
 Hoping to still these obstinate questionings 
 Of thee and thine^ by forcing 5ome lone ghost 
 Thy messenger^ to render up the tale 
 'Of what we are. In lone and silent hours. 
 When night makes a weird soundof its own stillness. 
 Like an inspired and desperate alchymist 
 Staking his very life on some dark hope. 
 Have I mixed awful talk and asking looks 
 With my most innocent love, until strange -tears 
 Uniting with those breathless kisses, made 
 Such magic as compels the charmed night 
 To render up thy charge : . . .and, though ne'er yet 
 
 b2 
 
4 alastor; or. 
 
 Thou hast unveil'd thy inmost sanctuary 3 
 
 Enough from incommunicable dream. 
 
 And twilight phantasms, and deep noonday thought. 
 
 Has shone within me, that serenely now 
 
 And moveless, as a long-forgotten lyre 
 
 Suspended in the solitary dome 
 
 Of some mysterious and deserted fane, 
 
 I wait thy breath. Great Parent, that my strain 
 May modulate with murmurs of the air. 
 And motions of the forests and the sea. 
 And voice of living beings, and woven hymns 
 Of night and day, and the deep heart of man. 
 
 There was a Poet whose untimely tomb 
 No human hands with pious reverence reared. 
 But the charmed eddies of autumnal winds 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 5 
 
 Built o'er his mouldering bones a pyramid 
 Of mouldering leaves in the waste wilderness : — 
 A lovely youthj — no mourning maiden decked 
 With weeping flowers^ or votive cypress wreath^ 
 The lone couch of his everlasting sleep : — 
 Gentle, and brave, and generous, — no lorn bard 
 ' Breathed o'er his dark fate one melodious sigh : 
 He lived, he died, he sung, in solitude. 
 Strangers have wept to hear his passionate notes.. 
 And virgins, as unknown he past, have pined 
 And wasted for fond love of his wild eyes. 
 The fire of those soft orbs has ceased to burn. 
 And Silence, too enamoured of that voice. 
 Locks its mute music in her rugged cell. 
 By solemn vision, and bright silver dream. 
 
6 ALASTOR^ OR^ 
 
 His infancy was nurtured. Every sight 
 
 And sound from the vast earth and ambient air^ 
 
 Sent to his heart its choicest impulses. 
 
 The fountains of divine philosophy 
 
 Fled not his thirsting lips^ and all of great. 
 
 Or good, or lovely, vrhich the sacred past 
 
 In truth or fable consecrates, he felt 
 
 And knew. When early youth had past, he left 
 
 His cold fireside and alienated home 
 
 To seek strange truths in undiscovered lands. 
 
 Many a wide waste and tangled wilder.ness 
 
 Has lured his fearless steps j and he has bought 
 
 With his sweet voice and eyes, from savage men. 
 
 His rest and food. Nature's most secret steps 
 
 He like her shadow has pursued, where'er 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 
 
 The red volcano overcanopies 
 
 Its fields of snow and pinnacles of ice 
 
 With burning smoke^ or where bitumen lakes^ 
 
 On black bare pointed islets ever beat 
 
 With sluggish surge^ or where the secret caves 
 
 Rugged and dark, winding among the springs 
 
 Of fire and poison^ inaccessible 
 
 To avarice or pride^, their starry domes 
 
 Of diamond and of gold expand above 
 
 Numberless and immeasurable halls. 
 
 Frequent with crystal column, and clear shrines 
 
 Of pearl, and thrones radiant with chrysolite. 
 
 Nor had that scene of ampler majesty 
 
 Than gems or gold, the varying roof of heaven 
 
 And the green earth lost in his heart its claims 
 
8 ALAST0R3 ORj 
 
 To love and wonder 3 he would linger long 
 In lonesome vales^ making the wild his home^ 
 Until the doves and squirrels would partake 
 From his innocuous hand his bloodless food. 
 Lured by the gentle meaning of his looks ; 
 And the wild antelope, that starts whene'er 
 The dry leaf rustles in the brake, suspend 
 Her timid steps to gaze upon a form 
 More graceful than her own. 
 
 His wandering step 
 Obedient to high thoughts, has visited 
 The awful ruins of the days of old ; 
 Athens, and Tyre, and Balbec, and the waste 
 Where stood Jerusalem, the fallen towers 
 Of Babylon, the eternal pyramids. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. y 
 
 Memphis and Thebes, and whatsoe'er of strange 
 
 Sculptured on alabaster obelisk. 
 
 Or jasper tomb, or mutilated sphynx. 
 
 Dark ./Ethiopia in her desert hills 
 
 Conceals. Among the ruined temples there. 
 
 Stupendous columns, and wild images 
 
 Of more than man, where marble daemons watch 
 
 The Zodiac's brazen mystery, and dead men 
 
 Hang their mute thoughts on the mute walls around. 
 
 He lingered, poring on memorials 
 
 Of the world's youth, through the long burning day 
 
 Gazed on those speechless shapes , nor, when the moon 
 
 Filled the mysterious halls with floating shades 
 
 Suspended he that task, but ever gazed 
 
 And gazed, till meaning on his vacant mind 
 
10 AJLASTOR; OR, 
 
 Flashed like strong inspiration^ and he saw 
 The thrilling secrets of the birth of time. 
 
 Meanwhile an Arab maiden brought his food^ 
 Her daily portion^, from her father's tent^ 
 And spread her matting for his couch, and stole 
 From duties and repose to tend his steps : — 
 Enamoured, yet not daring for deep awe 
 To speak her love : — and watched his nightly sleep. 
 Sleepless herself, to gaze upon his lips 
 Parted in slumber, whence the regular breath 
 Of innocent dreams arose : then, when red mora 
 Made paler the pale moon, to her cold home 
 Wildered, and wan, and panting, she returned. 
 
 The Poet wandering on, through Arabic 
 And Persia, and the wild Carmanian waste. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 1 1 
 
 And o'er the aerial mountains which pour do^vn 
 Indus and Oxus from their icy caves. 
 In joy and exultation held his way; 
 Till in the vale of Cashmire, far within n 
 
 Its loneliest dell, where odorous plants ent^vine 
 Beneath the hollow rocks a natural bower, 
 'Beside a sparkling rivulet he stretched 
 His languid limbs. A vision on his sleep 
 There came, a dream of hopes that never yet 
 Had flushed his cheek. He dreamed a veiled maid 
 Sate near him, talking in low solemn tones. 
 Her voice was like the voice of his own soul 
 Heard in the calm of thought 3 its music long. 
 Like woven sounds of streams and breezes^ held 
 His inmost sense suspended in its web 
 
12 ALASTOR^ ORy 
 
 Of many-coloured woof and shifting lines. 
 
 Knowledge and truth and virtue were her theme^ 
 
 And lofty hopes of divine liberty^ 
 
 Thoughts the most dear to him^ and poesy. 
 
 Herself a poet. Soon the solemn mood 
 
 Of her pure mind kindled through all her frame 
 
 A permeating fire : wild numbers then 
 
 She raised, with voice stifled in tremulous sobs 
 
 Subdued by its own pathos : her fair hands 
 
 Were bare alone, sweeping from some strange harp 
 
 Strange symphony, and in their branching veins 
 
 The eloquent blood told an ineffable tale. 
 
 The beating of her heart was heard to fill 
 
 The pauses of her music, and her breath 
 
 Tumultuously accorded with those fits 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 13 
 
 Of intermitted song. Sudden she rose. 
 
 As if her heart impatiently endured 
 
 Its bursting burthen : at the sound he turned. 
 
 And saw by the warm light of their own life 
 
 Her glowing limbs beneath the sinuous veil 
 
 Of woven wind, her outspread arms now bare, 
 
 'Her dark locks floating in the breath of night. 
 
 Her beamy bending eyes, her parted lips 
 
 Outstretched, and pale, and quivering eagerly. 
 
 His strong heart sunk and sickened with excess 
 
 Of love. He reared his shuddering limbs and quelled:; 
 
 His gasping breath, and spread his arms to meet 
 
 Her panting bosom : . . . she drew back a while. 
 
 Then, yielding to the irresistible joy. 
 
 With frantic gesture and short breathless cry 
 
14 ALASTOR3 ORj 
 
 Folded his frame in her dissolving arms. 
 Now blackness veiled his dizzy eyes^ and night 
 Involved and swallowed up the vision ; sleep. 
 Like a dark flood suspended in its course. 
 Rolled back its impulse on his vacant brain. 
 
 Roused by the shock he started from his trance-— 
 The cold white light of morning, the blue moon 
 Low in the west, the clear and garish hills. 
 The distinct valley and the vacant woods. 
 Spread round him where he stood. Whither have fled 
 The hues of heaven that canopied his bower 
 Of yesternight ? The sounds that soothed his sleep. 
 The mystery and the majesty of Earth, 
 The joy, the exultation? His wan eyes 
 Gaze on the empty scene as vacantly 
 
THE SPIRIT OP SOLITUDE. 1'5 
 
 As ocean's moon looks on the moon in heaven. 
 
 The spirit of sweet human love has sent 
 
 A vision to the sleep of him Avho spurned 
 
 Her choicest gifts. He eagerly pursues 
 
 Beyond the realms of dream that fleeting shade j 
 
 He overleaps the bounds. Alas ! alas ! 
 
 Were limbs^ and breath, and being intertvi'ined 
 
 Thus treacherously ? Lost, lost, for ever lost. 
 
 In the wide pathless desert of dim sleep. 
 
 That beautiful shape! Does the dark gate of death 
 
 Conduct to thy mysterious paradise, 
 
 O Sleep ? Does the bright arch of rainbow clouds. 
 
 And pendent mountains seen in the calm lake. 
 
 Lead only to a black and watery depth. 
 
 While death's blue vault, with loathliest vapours hung. 
 
16 alastor; or. 
 
 Where every shade which the foul grave exhales 
 Hides its dead eye from the detested day. 
 Conduct, O Sleep, to thy delightful realms ? 
 This doubt with sudden tide flowed on his heart. 
 The insatiate hope which it awakened, stung 
 His brain even like despair. 
 
 While day-light held 
 The sky, the Poet kept mute conference 
 With his still soul. At night the passion came. 
 Like the fierce fiend of a distempered dream. 
 And shook him from his rest, and led him forth 
 Into the darkness. — As an eagle grasped 
 In folds of the green serpent, feels her breast 
 Burn with the poison, and precipitates 
 Through night and day, tempest, and calm, and cloud. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 17 
 
 Frantic with dizzying anguish^ her blind flight 
 O'er the wide aery wilderness : thus driven 
 By the bright shadow of that lovely dream^ 
 Beneath the cold glare of the desolate night. 
 Through tangled swamps and deep precipitous dells, 
 Starthng with careless step the moon-light snake. 
 He fled. Red morning dawned upon his flight. 
 Shedding the mockery of its vital hues 
 Upon his cheek of death. He wandered on 
 Till vast Aornos seen from Petra's steep 
 Hung o'er the low horizon like a cloud ; 
 Through Balk, and where the desolated tombs 
 Of Parthian kings scatter to every wind 
 Their wasting dust, wildly he wandered on , 
 Day after day, a weary waste of hours. 
 
18 ALASTORj OB, 
 
 Bearing within his life the brooding care 
 
 That ever fed on its decaying flame. 
 
 And now his limbs were lean ; his scattered hair 
 
 Sered by the autumn of strange suflfering 
 
 Sung dirges in the wind^ his listless hand 
 
 Hung like dead bone within its withered skin 5 
 
 Life, and the lustre that consumed it, shone 
 
 As in a furnace burning secretly 
 
 From his dark eyes alone. The cottagers. 
 
 Who ministered with human charity 
 
 His human wants, beheld with wondering awe 
 
 Their fleeting visitant. The mountaineer. 
 
 Encountering on some dizzy precipice 
 
 That spectral form, deemed that the Spirit of wind 
 
 With lightning eyes, and eager breath, and feet 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. ]9 
 
 Disturbing not the drifted snow^ had paused 
 
 In its career : the infant would conceal 
 
 His troubled visage in his mother's robe 
 
 In terror at the glare of those wild eyes. 
 
 To remember their strange light in many a dream 
 
 Of after-times j but youthful maidens, taught 
 
 By nature, would interpret half the woe 
 
 That wasted him, would call him with false names 
 
 Brother, and friend, would press his pallid hand 
 
 At parting, and watch, dim through tears, the path 
 
 Of his departure from their father's door. 
 
 At length upon the lone Ghorasmian shore 
 He paused^ a wide and melancholy waste 
 Of putrid marshes. A strong impulse urged 
 His steps to the sea- shore. A swan was there, 
 
 c2 
 
20 ALASTOR^ OR, 
 
 Beside a sluggish stream among the reeds. 
 It rose as he approached, and with strong wings 
 Scaling the upward sky, bent its bright course 
 High over the immeasurable main. 
 His eyes pursued its flight. — '' Thou hast a home. 
 Beautiful bird ; thou voyagest to thine home. 
 Where thy sweet mate will twine her downy neck 
 With thine, and welcome thy return with eyes 
 Bright in the lustre of their own fond joy. 
 And what am I that I should linger here. 
 With voice far sweeter than thy dying notes. 
 Spirit more vast than thine, frame more attuned 
 To beauty, wasting these surpassing powers 
 In the deaf air, to the blind earth, and heaven 
 That echoes not my thoughts ?" A gloomy smile 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 21 
 
 Of desperate hope wi'inkled his quivering lips. 
 
 For sleep, he knew, kept most relentlessly 
 
 Its precious charge, and silent death exposed. 
 
 Faithless perhaps as sleep, a shadowy lure. 
 
 With doubtful smile mocking its own strange charms. 
 
 Startled by his own thoughts he looked around. 
 There was no fair fiend near him, not a sight 
 Or sound of awe but in his own deep mind. 
 A little shallop floating near the shore 
 Caught the impatient wandering of his gaze. 
 It had been long abandoned, for its sides 
 Gaped wide with many a rift, and its frail joints 
 Swayed with the undulations of the tide. 
 A restless impulse urged him to embark 
 And meet lone Death on the drear ocean's waste; 
 
22 ALASTOB; OR, 
 
 For well he knew that mighty Shadow loves 
 The slimy caverns of the populous deep. 
 
 The day was fair and sunny, sea and sky 
 Drank its inspiring radiance, and the wind 
 Swept strongly from the shore, blackening the waves. 
 Following his eager soul, the wanderer 
 Leaped in the boat, he spread his cloak aloft 
 On the bare mast, and took his lonely seat. 
 And felt the b6at speed o'er the tranquil sea 
 Like a torn cloud before the hurricane. 
 
 As one that in a silver vision floats • 
 Obedient to the sweep of odorous winds 
 Upon resplendent clouds, so rapidly 
 Along the dark and ruffled waters fled 
 The straining boat.---A whirlwind swept it on. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 23 
 
 With fierce gusts and precipitating force. 
 
 Through the white ridges of the chafed sea. 
 
 The waves arose. Higher and higher still 
 
 Their fierce necks writhed beneath the tempest's scourge 
 
 Like serpents struggling in a vulture's grasp. 
 
 Calm and rejoicing in the fearful war 
 
 Of wave ruining on wave, and blast on blast 
 
 Descending, and black flood on whirlpool driven 
 
 With dark obliterating course, he sate : 
 
 As if their genii were the ministers 
 
 Appointed to conduct him to the light 
 
 Of those beloved eyes, the Poet sate 
 
 Holding the steady helm. Evening came on. 
 
 The beams of sunset hung their rainbow hues 
 
 High 'mid the shifting domes of sheeted spray 
 
24 ALASTORJ ORj 
 
 That canopied his path o'er the waste deepj 
 Twilight, ascending sloAvly from the east, 
 Entwin'd in duskier wreaths her braided locks 
 O'er the fair front and radiant eyes of day 5 
 Night followed, clad with stars. On every side 
 More horribly the multitudinous streams 
 Of ocean's mountainous waste to mutual war 
 Rushed in dark tumult thundering, as to mock 
 The calm and. spangled sky. The little boat 
 Still fled before the storm ; still fled, like foam 
 Down the steep cataract of a wintry river 3 
 Now pausing on the edge of the riven wave j 
 Now leaving far behind the bursting mass 
 That fell, convulsing ocean. Safely fledr-*" 
 As if that frail and wasted human form^ 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 25 
 
 Had been an elemental god. 
 
 At midnight 
 The moon arose : and lo ! the etherial cliflfs 
 Of Caucasus, whose icy summits shone 
 Among the stars like sunlight, and around 
 Whose cavern' d base the whirlpools and the waves 
 Bursting and eddying irresistibly 
 Rage and resound for ever. — Who shall save ? — 
 The boat fled on, — the boiling torrent drove, — 
 The crags closed round with black and jagged arms, 
 Th* shattered mountain overhung the sea. 
 And faster still, beyond all human speed. 
 Suspended on the sweep of the smooth wave. 
 The little boat was driven. A cavern there 
 Yawned^ and amid its slant and winding depths 
 
2$ ALASTORj OR, 
 
 Ingulphed the rushing sea. The boat fled on 
 With unrelaxing speed.— *^ Vision and Love !' 
 The Poet cried aloud, ' I have beheld 
 The path of thy departure. Sleep and death 
 Shall not divide us long !' 
 
 The boat pursued 
 The windings of the cavern. Day-light shone 
 At length upon that gloomy river's flow 3 
 Now, where the fiercest war among the waves 
 Is calm, on the unfathomable stream 
 The boat moved slowly. Where the mountain, riven. 
 Exposed those black depths to the azure sky. 
 Ere yet the flood's enormous volume fell 
 Even to the base of Caucasus, with sound 
 That shook the everlasting rocks, the mass 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 27 
 
 Filled with one whirlpool all that ample chasm ; 
 
 Stair above stair the eddying waters rose. 
 
 Circling immeasurably fast, and laved 
 
 With alternating dash the knarled roots 
 
 Of mighty trees, that stretched their giant arms 
 
 In darkness over it. F the midst was left. 
 
 Reflecting, yet distorting every cloud, 
 
 A pool of treacherous and tremendous calm. 
 
 Seized by the sway of the ascending stream. 
 
 With dizzy swiftness, round, and round, and round. 
 
 Ridge after ridge the straining boat arose. 
 
 Till on the verge of the extremest curve. 
 
 Where, through an opening of the rocky bank. 
 
 The waters overflow, and a smooth spot 
 
 Of glassy quiet mid those battling tides 
 
28 ALASTOR, OR, 
 
 Is left, the boat paused shuddering. — Shall it sink 
 
 Down the abyss ? Shall the reverting stress 
 
 Of that resistless gulph embosom it ? 
 
 Now shall it fall ? — A wandering stream of wind. 
 
 Breathed from the west, has caught the expanded sail. 
 
 And, lo ! with gentle motion, between banks 
 
 Of mossy slope, and on a placid stream. 
 
 Beneath a woven grove it sails, and, hark ! 
 
 The ghastly torrent mingles its far roar. 
 
 With the breeze murmuring in the musical woods. 
 
 Where the embowering trees recede, and leave 
 
 A little space of green expanse, the cove 
 
 Is closed by meeting banks, whose yellow flowers 
 
 For ever gaze on their own drooping eyes. 
 
 Reflected in the crystal calm. The wave 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 29 
 
 Of the boat's motion marred their pensive task^ 
 
 Which nought but vagrant bird^ or wanton wind. 
 
 Or falling spear-grass, or their own decay 
 
 Had e'er disturbed before. The Poet longed 
 
 To deck with their bright hues his withered hair. 
 
 But on his heart its solitude returned. 
 
 And he forbore. Not the strong impulse hid 
 
 In those flushed cheeks, bent eyes, and shadowy frame. 
 
 Had yet performed its ministry : it hung 
 
 Upon his life, as lightning in a cloud 
 
 Gleams, hovering ere it vanish, ere the floods 
 
 Of night close over it. 
 
 The noonday sun 
 Now shone upon the forest, one vast mass 
 Of mingling shade, whose brown magnificence 
 
30 ALASTOR; OR, 
 
 A narrow vale embosoms. There, huge caves, 
 &' cooped in the dark base of their aery rocks 
 Mocking its moans, respond and roar for ever. 
 The meeting boughs and implicated leaves 
 Wove twilight o'er the Poet's path, as led 
 By love, or dream, or god, or mightier Death, 
 He sought in Nature's dearest haunt, some bank. 
 Her cradle, and his sepulchre. More dark 
 And dark the shades accumulate. The oak. 
 Expanding its immense and knotty arms. 
 Embraces the light beech. The pyramids 
 Of the tall cedar overarching^ frame 
 Most solemn domes within, and far below. 
 Like clouds suspended in an emerald sky. 
 The ash and the acacia floating hang 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 31 
 
 Tremulous and pale. Like restless serpents, clothed 
 
 In rainbow and in fire, the parasites. 
 
 Starred with ten thousand blossoms, flow around 
 
 The gray trunks, and, as gamesome infants' eyes. 
 
 With gentle meanings, and most innocent wiles. 
 
 Fold their beams round the hearts of those that love. 
 
 These twine their tendrils with the wedded boughs 
 
 Uniting their close union j the woven leaves 
 
 Make net-work of the dark blue light of day. 
 
 And the night's noontide clearness, mutable 
 
 As shapes in the weird clouds. Soft mossy lawns 
 
 Beneath these canopies extend their swells. 
 
 Fragrant with perfumed herbs, and eyed with blooms 
 
 Minute yet beautiful. One darkest glen 
 
 Sends from its woods of musk-rose, twined with j asmine. 
 
32 ALAST0R3 OR, 
 
 A soul-dissolving odour, to invite 
 To some more lovely mystery. Through the dell. 
 Silence and Twilight here, twin-sisters, keep 
 Their noonday watch, and sail among the shades. 
 Like vaporous shapes half seen 3 beyond, a well,^ 
 Dark, gleaming, and of most translucent wave. 
 Images all the woven boughs above. 
 And each depending leaf, and every speck 
 Of azure sky, darting between their chasms y 
 Nor aught else in the liquid mirror laves 
 Its portraiture, but some inconstant star 
 Between one foliaged lattice twinkling fair. 
 Or, painted bird, sleeping beneath the moon. 
 Or gorgeous insect floating motionless. 
 Unconscious of the day, ere yet his wings 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE, 33 
 
 Have spread their glories to the gaze of noon. 
 
 Hither the Poet came. His eyes beheld 
 Their own wan light through the reflected lines 
 Of his thin hair, distinct in the dark depth 
 Of that still fountain ; as the human heart. 
 Gazing in dreams over the gloomy grave. 
 Sees its own treacherous likeness there. He heard 
 The motion of the leaves, the grass that sprung 
 Startled and glanced and trembled even to feel 
 An unaccustomed presence, and the sound 
 Of the sweet brook that from the secret springs 
 Of that dark fountain rose. A Spirit seemed 
 Ta stand beside him — clothed in no bright robes 
 Of shadowy silver or enshrining light. 
 Borrowed from aught the visible world affords 
 
34 ALASTOR) OR, 
 
 Of grace, or majesty, or mystery ^ — 
 
 But, undulating woods, and silent well. 
 
 And leaping rivulet, and evening gloom. 
 
 Now deepening the dark shades, for speech assuming 
 
 Held commune with him, as if he and it 
 
 Were all that was,— only . . . when, his regard 
 
 Was raised by intense pensiveness, . . .two eyes. 
 
 Two starry eyes, hung in the gloom of thought. 
 
 And seemed .with their serene and azure smiles 
 
 To beckon him. - 
 
 Obedient to the light 
 That shone within his soul, he went, pursuing 
 The windings of the dell.— ^The rivulet 
 Wanton and wild, through many a green ravine 
 Beneath the forest flowed. Sometimes it fell 
 
THE SPIRIT OP SOLITUDE. 35 
 
 Among the moss with hollow harmony 
 Dark and profound. Now on the polished stones 
 It danced; like childhood laughing as it went: 
 Then^ through the plain in tranquil wanderings crept. 
 Reflecting every herb and drooping bud 
 That overhung its quietness. — ' O stream ! 
 Whose source is inaccessibly profound. 
 Whither do thy mysterious waters tend ? 
 Thou imagest my life. Thy darksome stillness. 
 Thy dazzling waves, thy loud and hollow gulphs. 
 Thy searchless fountain, and invisible course 
 Have each their type in me : and the wide sky. 
 And measureless ocean may declare as soon 
 What oozy cavern or what wandering cloud 
 Contains thy waters, as the universe 
 
 d2 
 
36 ALASTOR^ OR, 
 
 Tell where these living thoughts reside, when stretched 
 Upon thy flowers my bloodless limbs shall waste 
 r the passing wind ! ' 
 
 Beside the grassy shore 
 Of the small stream he went^ he did impress 
 On the green moss his tremulous step, that caught 
 Strong shuddering from his burning limbs. As one 
 Roused by some joyous madness from the couch 
 Of fever, he did move ; yet, not like him. 
 Forgetful of the grave, where, when the flame 
 Of his frail exultation shall be spent,. 
 He must descend. With rapid steps he went 
 Beneath the shade of trees, beside the flow 
 Of the wild babbling rivulet > and now 
 The forest's solemn canopies were changed 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 37 
 
 For the uniform and lightsome evening sky. 
 
 Gray rocks did peep from the spare moss, and stemmed 
 
 The struggling brook : tall spires of windlestrae 
 
 Threw their thin shadows down the rugged slope. 
 
 And nought but knarled roots bi ancient pines 
 
 Branchless and blasted, clenched with grasping roots 
 
 The unwilling soil. A gradual change was here. 
 
 Yet ghastly. For, as fast years flow away. 
 
 The smooth brow gathers, and the hair grows thin 
 
 And white, and where irradiate dewy eyes 
 
 Had shone, gleam stony orbs : — so from his steps 
 
 Bright flowers departed, and the beautiful shade 
 
 Of the green groves, with all their odorous winds 
 
 And musical motions. Calm, he still pursued 
 
 The stream, that with a larger volume now 
 
38 ALASTOR^ OR, 
 
 Rolled through the labyrinthine dell 3 and there 
 Fretted a path through its descending curves 
 With its wintry speed. On every side now rose 
 Rocksj which, in unimaginable forms. 
 Lifted their black and barren pinnacles 
 In the light of evening, and its precipice 
 Obscuring the ravine, disclosed above. 
 Mid toppling stones, black gulphs and yawning caves. 
 Whose windings gave ten thousand various tongues 
 To the loud stream. Lo ! where the pass expands 
 Its stony jaws, the abrupt mountain breaks. 
 And seems, with its accumulated crags. 
 To overhang the world : for wide expand 
 Beneath the wan stars and descending moon 
 Islanded seas, blue mountains, mighty streams. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 39 
 
 Dim tracts and vast, robed iii the lustrous gloom 
 Of leaden-coloured even, and fiery hills 
 Mingling their flames with twilight, on the verge 
 Of the remote horizon. The near scene. 
 In naked and severe simplicity. 
 Made contrast with the universe. A pine. 
 Rock-rooted, stretched athwart the vacancy 
 Its swinging boughs, to each inconstant blast 
 Yielding one only response, at each pause 
 In most familiar cadence, with the howl 
 The thunder and the hiss of homeless streams 
 Mingling its solemn song, whilst the broad riverj 
 Foaming and hurrying o'er its rugged path. 
 Fell into that immeasurable void 
 Scattering its waters to the passing winds. 
 
40 ALASTOR , OR^ 
 
 Yet the gray precipice and solemn pin€ 
 And torrent, were not all ; — one silent nook 
 Was there. Even on the edge of that vast mouiitain, 
 Upheld by knotty roots and fallen rocks. 
 It overlooked in its serenity 
 The dark earth, and the bending vault of stars. 
 It was a tranquil spot, that seemed to smile 
 Even in the lap of horror. Ivy clasped 
 The fissured stones with its entwining arms. 
 And did embower with leaves for ever green. 
 And berries dark, the smooth and even space 
 Of its inviolated floor, and here 
 The children of the autumnal whirhvind bore. 
 In wanton sport, those bright leaves, whose decay. 
 Red, yellow, or etherially pale. 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 41 
 
 Rivals the pride of summer. 'Tis the haunt 
 Of every gentle wind, whose breath can teach 
 The wilds to love tranquillity. One step. 
 One human step alone, has ever broken 
 The stillness of its solitude : — one voice 
 Alone in^ired its echoes , — even that voice 
 Which hither came, floating among the winds. 
 And led the loveliest among human forms 
 To make their wild haunts the depository 
 Of all the grace and beauty that endued 
 Its motions, render up its majesty. 
 Scatter its music on the unfeeling storm. 
 And to the damp leaves and blue cavern mould. 
 Nurses of rainbow flowers and branching moss. 
 Commit the colours of that varying cheek. 
 
42 ALAST0R3 OR, 
 
 That snowy breast, those dark and drooping eyes. 
 
 The dim and horned inoon hung low, and poured 
 A sea of histre on the horizon's verge 
 That overflowed its mountains. Yellow mist 
 Filled the unbounded atmosphere, and drank 
 Wan moonlight even to fullness : not a star 
 Shone, not a sound Was heard 5 the very winds. 
 Danger's grim playmates, on that precipice 
 Slept, clasped in his embrace. — O, storm of death ! 
 Whose sightless speed divides this sullen night : 
 And thou, colossal Skeleton, that, still 
 Guiding its irresistible career 
 In thy devastating omnipotence. 
 Art king of this frail world, from the red field 
 Of slaughter^ from the reekijig hospital> 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 43 
 
 The patriot's sacred couch^ the snowy bed 
 Of innocence^ the scaffold and the throne^ 
 A mighty voice invokes thee. Ruin calls 
 His brother Death. A rare and regal prey 
 He hath prepared^ prowling around the Avorld ; 
 Glutted with which thou mayst repose, and men 
 Go to their graves iike flowers or creeping worinSj 
 Nor ever more offer at thy dark shrine 
 The unheeded tribute of a broken heart. 
 
 When on the threshold of the green recess 
 The wanderer's footsteps fell, he knew that death 
 Was on him. Yet a little, ere it fled. 
 Did he resign his high and holy soul * 
 To images of the majestic past. 
 That paused within his passive being now. 
 
44 ALASTORj OR, 
 
 Like winds that bear sweet music, when they breathe 
 
 Through some dim latticed chamber. He did place 
 
 His pale lean hand upon the rugged trunk 
 
 Of the old pine. Upon an ivied stone 
 
 Reclined his languid head, his limbs did rest. 
 
 Diffused and motionless, on the smooth brink 
 
 Of that obscurest chasm ; — and thus he lay. 
 
 Surrendering to their final impulses 
 
 The hovering powers of life. Hope and despair. 
 
 The torturers, slept j no mortal pain or fear 
 
 Marred his repose , the influxes of sense. 
 
 And his own being unalloyed by pain, 
 
 Yet feebler arid more feeble, calmly fed 
 
 The stream of thought, till he lay breathing there 
 
 At peace, and faintly smiling :-^his last sight 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 45, 
 
 Was the great moon, which o'er the western line 
 
 Of the wide world her mighty horn suspended. 
 
 With whose dun beams inwoven darkness seemed 
 
 To mingle. Now upon the jagged hills 
 
 it rests, and still as the divided frame 
 
 Of the vast meteor sunk, the Poet's blood. 
 
 That ever beat in_mystic sympathy 
 
 With nature'^s ebb and flow, grew feebler still : 
 
 And when two lessening points of light alone 
 
 Gleamed through the darkness, the alternate gasp 
 
 Of his faint respiration scarce did stir 
 
 The stagnate night: — till the minutest ray 
 
 Was quenched, the pulse yet lingered in his heart. 
 
 It paused — it fluttered. But when heaven remained 
 
 Utterly black, the murky shades involved 
 
46 ALASTGR; OR, 
 
 An image, silent, cold, and motionless. 
 
 As their own voiceless earth and vacant air. 
 
 Even as a vapour fed with golden beams 
 
 That ministered on sunlight, ere the west 
 
 Eclipses it, was now that wonderous frame — 
 
 No sense, no motion, no divinity — 
 
 A fragile lute, on whose harmonious strings 
 
 The breath of heaven did wander — a bright stream 
 
 Once fed with many-voiced waves — a dream 
 
 Of youth, which pight and time have quenched for ever. 
 
 Still, dark, and dry, and unremembered now. 
 
 O, for Medea's wondrous alchemy. 
 Which wheresoe'er it fell made the earth gleam 
 With bright flowers, and the wintry boughs exhale 
 From vernal blooms fresh fragrance! O, that God, ' 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 47 
 
 Profuse of poisons^, would concede the chaKee 
 Which but one living man has drained, who now,. 
 Vessel of deathless wrath, a slave that feels 
 No proud exemption in the blighting curse 
 He bears, over the world wanders for ever. 
 Lone as incarnate death ! O, that the dream 
 Of dark magician in his visioned cave. 
 Raking the cinders of a crucible 
 For life and power, even when his feeble hand 
 Shakes in its last decay, were the true law 
 Of this so lovely world ! But thou art fled 
 Like some frail exhalation j which the dawn 
 Robes in its golden beams, — ah ! thou hast fled ! 
 The brave, the gentle, and the beautiful. 
 The child of grace and; genius. H eartless things 
 
4;S ALASTORJ OR, 
 
 Are done and said i'the world, and many worms 
 
 And beasts and men live on, and mighty Earth 
 
 From sea and mountain, city and wilderness. 
 
 In vesper low or joyous orison. 
 
 Lifts still its solemn voice: — but thou art fled— 
 
 Thou canst no longer know or love the shapes 
 
 Of this phantasmal scene, who have to thee 
 
 Been purest ministers, who; are, alas ! 
 
 Now thou art not. Upon those pallid lips 
 
 So sweet even in their silence, on those eyes 
 
 That image sleep in death, upon that form 
 
 Yet safe from the worm's outrage, let no tear 
 
 Be shed — not even in thought. Nor, when those hues 
 
 Are gone, and those divinest lineaments. 
 
 Worn by the senseless wind, shall live alone 
 
THE SPIRIT OF SOLITUDE. 49 
 
 In the frail pauses of this simple strain. 
 Let not high verse, mourning the memory 
 Of that which is no more, or painting's woe 
 Or sculpture, speak in feeble imagery 
 Their own cold powers. Art and eloquence,- 
 And all the shews o' the world are frail and vain 
 To weep a loss that turns their lights to shade. 
 It is a woe too ' deep for tears,' when all 
 Is reft at once, when some surpassing Spirit, 
 Whose light adorned the world around it, leaves 
 Those who remain behind, not sobs or groans. 
 The passionate tumult of a clinging hope 3 
 But pale despair and cold tranquillity. 
 Nature's vast frame, the web of human things. 
 Birth and the grave, that are not as they were. 
 
POEMS, 
 
 e2 
 
POEMS, 
 
 AAKPTEI AlOISfl nOTMON AHOTMON. 
 
 O ! there are spirits of the air^ 
 
 And genii of the evening breeze^ 
 And gentle ghosts, with eyes as fair 
 As star-beams among twilight trees :«— 
 Such lovely ministers to meet 
 Oft hast thou turned from men thy lonely feet. 
 
 With mountain winds, and babbling springs. 
 And moonlight seas, that are the voice 
 
 Of these inexplicable things 
 Thou didst hold commune, and rejoice 
 
54 POEMS. 
 
 When they did answer thee j but they 
 Cast^ like a worthless boon^ thy love away. 
 
 And thou hast sought in starry eyes 
 
 Beams that were never meant for thine 
 Another's wealth : — tame sacrifice 
 To a fond faith ! still dost thou pine ? 
 Still dost thou hope that greeting hands. 
 Voice, looks, or lips, may answer thy demands ? 
 
 Ah ! wherefore didst thou build thine hope 
 
 On the false earth's inconstancy ? 
 Did thine own mind afford no scope 
 Of love, or moving thoughts to thee ? 
 That natural scenes or human smiles 
 Could steal the power to wind thee in their wiles. 
 
FO£MS. 55 
 
 Yes^ all the faithless smiles are fled 
 
 Whose falsehood left thee broken-hearted; 
 The glory of the moon is dead; 
 Night's ghosts and dreams have nOw departed; 
 Thine own soul still is true to thee^ 
 But changed to a foul fiend through misery. 
 
 This fiendj whose ghastly presence ever 
 
 Beside thee like thy shadow hangs. 
 Dream not to chase; — the mad endeavour 
 Would scourge thee to severer pangs. 
 Be as thou art. Thy settled fate^ 
 Dark a& it is, all change would aggravate. 
 
*f§ POEMS. 
 
 STANZAS.— APRIL, 1814. 
 
 Away ! the moor is dark beneath the moon^ 
 
 Rapid clouds have drank the last pale beam of even : 
 Away ! the gathering winds will call the darkness soon^ 
 And profoundest midnight shroud the serene lights 
 of heaven. 
 Pause not! The time is past! Every voice cries. 
 Away! 
 Tempt not with one last tear thy friend's ungentle 
 mood: 
 Thy lover's eye, so glazed and cold^ dares not entreat 
 thy stay: 
 Duty and dereliction guide thee back to solitude. 
 
poems: 57 
 
 Away, away ! to thy sad and silent home -, 
 
 Pour bitter tears on its desolated hearth ; 
 Watch the dim shades as like ghosts they go and come. 
 And complicate strange webs of melancholy mirth. 
 The leaves of wasted autumn woods shall float around 
 thine head : 
 The blooms of dewy spring shall gleam beneath thy 
 feet : 
 But thy soul or this world must fade in the frost that 
 
 binds the dead^ 
 Ere midnight's frown and morning's smile^ ere thou 
 and peace may meet. 
 
 The cloud shadows of midnight possess their own 
 repose. 
 
5S POEMS. 
 
 For the weary winds are silent, or the moon is in 
 the deep: 
 Some respite to its turbulence unresting ocean knows j 
 Whatever moves, or toils, or grieves, hath its ap- 
 pointed sleep. 
 Thou in the grave shalt rest — ^yet till the phantoms flee 
 Which that house and heath and garden made dear 
 to thee erewhile. 
 Thy remembrance, and repentance, and deep musings 
 are not free 
 From the music of two voices and the light of one 
 sweet smile. 
 
POEMS. 59 
 
 MUTABILITY. 
 
 We are as clouds that veil the midnight moon ; 
 
 How restlessly they speed, and gleam,, and quiver. 
 Streaking the darkness radiantly ! — yet soon 
 
 Night closes round, and they are lost for ever : 
 
 Or like forgotten lyres, whose dissonant strings 
 Give various response to each varying blast. 
 
 To whose frail frame no second motion brings 
 One mood or modulation like the last- 
 
 We rest. — A dream has power to poison sleeps 
 We rise. — One wandering thought pollutes the day 5 
 
60 POEMS. 
 
 We feelj conceive or reason^ laugh or weep 3 
 Embrace fond woe^ or cast our cares away : 
 
 It is the same !— For, be it joy or sorrow. 
 The path of its departure still is free : 
 
 Man^s yesterday may ne'er be like his morrow 5 
 Nought may endure but Mutability. 
 
Poems; 61 
 
 THERE IS NO WORK, NOR DEVICE, NOR KNOWLEDGE, NOR WIS- 
 DOM, IN THE GRAVE, WHITHER THOU GOEST. 
 
 Ecclesiastes. 
 
 The pale, the cold, and the moony smile 
 Which the meteor beam of a starless night 
 
 Sheds on a lonely and sea-girt isle^ 
 
 Ere the dawning of morn's undoubted lights 
 
 Is the flame of life so fickle and wan 
 
 That flits round our steps till their strength is gone. 
 
 O man ! hold thee on in courage of soul 
 
 Through the stormy shades of thy worldly way. 
 
 And the billows of cloud that around thee roll 
 Shall sleep in the light of a wondrous day. 
 
 Where hell and heaven shall leave thee free 
 
 To the universe of destiny. 
 
62 POEMS. 
 
 This world is the nurse of all we know. 
 This world is the mother of all we feel. 
 
 And the coming of death is a fearful blow 
 
 To a brain unencompassed with nerves of steel j 
 
 When all that we know, or feel, or see. 
 
 Shall pass like an unreal mystery. 
 
 The secret things of the grave are there. 
 Where all but this frame must surely be. 
 
 Though the fine-wrought eye and the wondrous ear 
 No longer will live to hear or to see 
 
 All that is great and all that is strange 
 
 In the boundless realm of unending change. 
 
 Who telleth a tale of unspeaking death ? 
 Who lifteth the veil of what is to come ? 
 
POEMS. 63 
 
 Who painteth the shadows that are beneath 
 
 The wide-winding caves of the peopled tomb ? 
 Or uniteth the hopes of what shall be 
 With the fears ^nd the love for that which we see ? 
 
64 POEMS. 
 
 SUMMER-EVENING CHURCH-YARD, 
 
 LECHLADE, GLOUCESTERSHIRE. 
 
 The wind has swept from the wide atmosphere 
 Each vapour that obscured the sunset's rayj 
 And pallid evening twines its beaming hair 
 In duskier braids around the languid eyes of day : 
 Silence and twilight^ unbeloved of men^ 
 Creep hand in hand from yon obscurest glen. 
 
 They breathe their spells towards the departing day. 
 Encompassing the earth, air, stars, and sea^ 
 
POEMS. 65 
 
 Light, sound, and motion own the potent sway. 
 Responding to the charm with its own mystery. 
 The winds are still, or the dry church-tower grass 
 Knows not their gentle motions as they pass. 
 
 Thou too, aerial Pile! whose pinnacles 
 Point from one shrine like pyramids of fire, 
 Obeyest in silence their sweet solemn spells. 
 Clothing in hues of heaven thy dim and distant spire. 
 Around whose lessening and invisible height 
 Gather among the stars the clouds of night. 
 
 The dead are sleeping in their sepulchres : 
 And, mouldering as they sleep, a thrilling sound 
 Half sense, half thought, among the darkness stirs. 
 
66 POEMS. 
 
 Breathed from their wormy beds all living things around^ 
 And mingling with the still night and mute sky 
 Its awful hush is felt inaudibly. 
 
 Thus solemnized and softened^ death is mild 
 And terrorless as this serenest night : 
 Here could I hope^ like some enquiring child 
 Sporting on graves, that death did hide from human sight 
 Sweet secretS;, or beside its breathless sleep 
 That loveliest dreams perpetual watch did keep. 
 
POEMS. 67 
 
 TO 
 
 WORDSWORTH. 
 
 Poet of Nature^ thou hast wept to know 
 That things deparf which never may return : 
 Childhood and youths frieUdship and love's first glow^ 
 Have fled like sweet dreams^ leaving thee to mourn. 
 These common woes I feel. One loss is mine 
 Which thou too feel'st^ yet I alone deplore. 
 Thou wert as a lone star^ whose light did shine 
 On some frail bark in winter's midnight roar : 
 Thou hast like to a rock-built refuge stood 
 Above the blind and battling multitfude : 
 
 f2 
 
68 POEMS, 
 
 In honoured poverty thy voice did weave 
 Songs consecrate to truth and liberty, — 
 Deserting these, thou leavest me to grieve. 
 Thus having been, that thou shouldst cease to be. 
 
POEMS. 69- 
 
 FEELINGS OF A REPUBLICAN 
 
 ON THE FALL OF BONAPARTE. 
 
 I HATED theCj fallen tyrant ! I did groan 
 
 To think that a most unambitious slave. 
 
 Like thoUj shouldst dance and revel on the grave 
 
 Of Liberty. Thou mightst have built thy throne 
 
 Where it had stood even now : thou didst prefer 
 
 A frail and bloody pomp which time has swept 
 
 In fragments towards oblivion. Massacre, 
 
 For this I prayed, would on thy sleep have crept. 
 
 Treason and Slavery, Rapine, Fear, and Lust, 
 
 And stifled thee, their minister. I know 
 
70 POEMg. 
 
 Too late^ since thou and France are in the dust. 
 That virtue owns a more eternal foe 
 Than force or fraud: old Custom, legal Crime, 
 And bloody Faith the foulest birth of time. 
 
POEMS. 7) 
 
 SUPERSTITION. 
 
 Thou taintest all thou lookest upon ! The stars. 
 Which on thy cractie beamed so brightly sweet. 
 Were gods to the distempered playfulness 
 Of thy untutored infancy 5 the trees. 
 The grasSj the clouds^ the mountains, and the sea. 
 All living things that walk, swim, creep, or fly. 
 Were gods : the sun had homage, and the moon 
 Her worshipper. Then thou becamest, a boy. 
 More daring in thy frenzies : every shape. 
 Monstrous or vast, or beautifully wild. 
 
72 POEMS. 
 
 Whichj from sensation's relics^ fancy culls 5 
 The spirits of the air, the shuddering ghost. 
 The genii of the elements, the powers 
 That give a shape to nature's varied works. 
 Had life and place in the corrupt belief 
 Of thy blind heart : yet still thy youthful hands 
 Were pure of human blood. Then manhood gave 
 Its strength and ardour to thy frenzied brain 3 
 Thine eager gaze scanned the stupendous scene. 
 Whose wonders mocked the knowledge of thy pride 
 Their everlasting and unchanging laws 
 Reproached thine ignorance. Awhile thou stoodest 
 Baffled and gloomy 5 then thou didst sum up 
 The elements of all that thou didst knowj 
 The changing seasons, winter's leafless reign. 
 
POEMS. 73 
 
 The budding of the heaven-breathing trees. 
 The eternal orbs that beautify the night. 
 The sun-rise, and the setting of the moon. 
 Earthquakes and wars, and poisons and disease. 
 And all their causes, to an abstract point 
 Converging, thou didst give it name, and form. 
 Intelligence, and unity, and power. 
 
74 
 
 SONNET. 
 
 FROM THE ITALIAN OF DANTE. 
 
 Dante Alighieri to Guido Cavalcantt. 
 
 GuiDO^ I would that Lappo^ thouj and l. 
 Led by some strong enchantment, might ascend 
 A magic ship, whose charmed sails should fly 
 With winds at will where'er our thoughts might wend. 
 And that no change, nor any evil chance. 
 Should mar our joyous voyage 3 but it might be. 
 That even satiety should still enhance 
 Between our hearts their strict community : 
 
SONNET. 75 
 
 And that the bounteous wizard then would place 
 Vanna and Bice and my gentle love. 
 Companions of our wandering, and would grace 
 With passionate talk wherever we might rove 
 Our time, and each were as content and free 
 As I believe that thou and I should be. 
 
7^ 
 
 TRANSLATED FROM THE GREEK OF MOSCHUS. 
 
 loLV uKa. TOLV yXauxav ot«v wvifiog arpefxa ^/xKkri, x. t. K. 
 
 When winds that move not its calm surface sweep 
 The azure sea^ I love the land no more 3 
 The smiles of the serene and tranquil deep 
 Tempt my unquiet mind. — But when the roar 
 Of ocean's gray abyss resounds, and foam 
 Gathers upon the sea, and vast waves burst, 
 I turn from the drear aspect to the home 
 Of earth and its deep woods, where interspersed. 
 When winds blow loud, pines make sweet melody. 
 Whose house is some lone bark, whose toil the sea. 
 
TRANSLATION FROM THE GREEK. ^^ 
 
 WTiose prey the wandering fish, an evil lot 
 Has chosen. — But I my languid limbs will fling 
 Beneath the plane, where the brook's murmuring 
 Moves the calm spirit, but disturbs it not. 
 
THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 Nee tantum prodere vatr, 
 Quantum scire licet. Venit setas omnis in unam 
 Congeriem, miserumque premunt tot saecula pectus. 
 
 Ltican Phars, L, v. 1. 17G„ 
 
THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 A FRAGMENT. 
 
 How wonderful is Deaths 
 
 Death and his brother Sleep ! 
 One pale as yonder wan and homed moon. 
 
 With lips of lurid blue , 
 The other glowing like the vital mom. 
 
 When throned on ocean's wave 
 
 It breathes over the world : 
 Yet both so passing strange and wonderful \ 
 
82 THE D^MON OF THE WORLD, 
 
 Hath then the iron-sceptered Skeleton^ 
 Whose reign is in the tainted sepulchres^ 
 To the hell dogs that couch beneath his throne 
 Cast that fair prey ? Must that divinest form. 
 Which love and admiration cannot view 
 Without a beating hearty whose azure veins 
 Steal like dark streams along a field of snow^ 
 Whose outline is as fair as marble clothed 
 In light of some sublimest mind, decay ? 
 
 Nor putrefaction's breath 
 Leave aught of this pure spectacle 
 
 But loathsomeness and ruin ? — 
 
 Spare aught but a dark theme^ 
 On which the lightest heart might moralize ? 
 Or is it but that downy-winged slumbers 
 
THE DJEMON OF THE WORLD. 83 
 
 Have charmed their nurse coy Silence near her lids 
 
 To watch their own repose i 
 
 Will they, when morning's beam 
 
 Flows through those wells of lights 
 Seek far from noise and day some western cave, 
 l^Tiere woods and streams with soft and pausing 
 winds 
 
 A lulling murmur weave ? — 
 
 lanthe doth not sleep 
 
 The dreamless sleep of death . 
 Nor in her moonlight chamber silently 
 Doth Henry hear her regular pulses throbs 
 
 Or mark her delicate cheek 
 With interchange of hues mock the broad moon^ 
 
 G 2 
 
84 THE DJEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 Ou'twatching weary nighty 
 
 Without assured reward. 
 
 Her dewy eyes are closed 3 
 On their translucent lids, whose texture fine 
 Scarce hides the dark blue orbs that burn below 
 
 With unapparent fire. 
 
 The baby Sleep is pillowed : 
 
 Her golden tresses shade 
 
 The bosom's stainless pride. 
 Twining like tendrils of the parasite 
 
 Around a marble column. 
 
 Hark! whence that rushing sound? 
 'Tis like a wondrous strain that sweeps 
 Around a lonely ruin 
 
THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD. 85 
 
 When west winds sigh and evening waves respond 
 
 In whispers from the shore : 
 'Tis wilder than the unmeasured notes 
 Which from the unseen lyres of dells and groves 
 
 The genii of the breezes sweep. 
 
 Floating on waves of music and of light 
 The chariot of the Daemon of the World 
 
 Descends in silent power : 
 Its shape reposed within : slight as some cloud 
 That catches but the palest tinge of day 
 
 When evening yields to nighty 
 Bright as that fibrous woof when stars indue 
 
 Its transitory robe. 
 Four shapeless shadows bright and beautiful 
 Draw that strange car of glory, reins of light 
 
86 THE DiBMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 Check their imearthly speed 3 they stop and fold 
 
 Their wings of braided air : 
 The Daemon leaning from the etherial cai" 
 
 Gazed on the slumbering maid. 
 Human eye hath ne'er beheld 
 A shape so wild, so bright, so beautiful. 
 As that which o'er the maiden's charmed sleep 
 
 Waving a starry wand. 
 
 Hung like a mist of light. 
 Such sounds as breathed around like odorous winds 
 
 Of wakening spring arose^ 
 Filling the chamber and the moonlight sky. 
 
 Mai^n> the world's supremest spirit 
 Beneath the shadow of her wings 
 
THE D^MON OF THE WORLD. 87 
 
 Folds all thy memory doth inherit 
 From ruin of divinest things. 
 Feelings that lure thee to betray. 
 And light of thoughts that pass away. 
 
 For thou hast earned a mighty boon. 
 The truths which wisest poets see 
 Dimly, thy mind may make its own. 
 Rewarding its own majesty. 
 
 Entranced in some diviner mood 
 Of self-oblivious solitude. 
 
 Custom, and Faith, and Power thou spumest ; 
 
 From hate and awe thy heart is free 3 
 Ardent and pure as day thou bumest. 
 
 For dark and cold mortality 
 
88 THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD; 
 
 A living lights to cheer it long. 
 The watch-fires of the world among. 
 
 Therefore from nature's inner shrine. 
 
 Where gods and fiends in worship bend. 
 Majestic spirit, be it thine - 
 
 The flame to seize, the veil to rend. 
 Where the vast snake Eternity 
 In charmed sleep doth ever lie. 
 
 All that inspires thy voice of love. 
 Or speaks in thy unclosing eyes. 
 Or through thy frame doth burn or move. 
 Or think or feel, awake, arise ! 
 Spirit, leave for mine and me 
 Earth's unsubstantial mimickry ! 
 
THE DAEMON OP THE WORLD. 89 
 
 It ceased, and from the mute and moveless frame 
 
 A radiant spirit arose. 
 All beautiful in naked purity. 
 Robed in its human hues it did ascend. 
 Disparting as it went the silver clouds 
 It moved towards the car, and took its seat 
 
 Beside the Daemon shape. 
 
 Obedient to the sweep of aery song. 
 
 The mighty ministers 
 Unfurled their prismy wings. 
 
 The magic car moved on j 
 The night was fair, innumerable stars 
 
 Studded heaven's dark blue vault 5 
 
 The eastern wave grew pale 
 
 With the first smile of morn. 
 
9^ THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD, 
 
 The magic car moved on. 
 
 From the swift sweep of wings 
 The atmosphere in flaming sparkles flew j 
 
 And where the burning wheels 
 Eddied above the mountain's loftiest peak 
 
 Was traced a line of lightning. 
 Now far above a rock the utmost verge 
 
 Of the wide earth it flew. 
 The rival df the Andes, whose dark brow 
 
 Frowned o'er the silver sea. 
 
 Far, far below the chariot's stormy path. 
 
 Calm as a slumbering babe. 
 
 Tremendous ocean lay. 
 Its broad and silent mirror gave to view 
 
 The pale and waning starsj 
 
THE D^MON OF THE WORLD. 91 
 
 The chariot's fiery track. 
 
 And the grey light of morn 
 
 Tinging those fleecy clouds 
 That cradled in their folds the infant dawn. 
 
 The chariot seemed to fly 
 Through the abyss of an immense concave, . 
 Radiant with million constellations, tinged 
 
 With shades of infinite colour. 
 
 And semicircled with a belt 
 
 Flashing incessant meteors. 
 
 As they approached their goal. 
 The winged shadows seemed to gather speed. 
 The sea no longer was distinguished j earth 
 Appeared a vast and shadowy sphere^ suspended 
 
92 THE D^MON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 In the black concave of heaven 
 
 With the sun's cloudless orb. 
 
 Whose rays of rapid light 
 Parted around the chariot's swifter course. 
 And fell like ocean's feathery spray 
 
 Dashed from the boiling surge 
 
 Before a vessel' sj)row. 
 
 The magic car moved on. 
 
 Earth's distant orb appeared 
 The smallest light that twinkles in the heavens. 
 
 Whilst round the chariot's way 
 Innumerable systems widely rolled. 
 
 And countless spheres diffused 
 An ever varying glory. 
 
THB D^MON OF THE WORLD. 93 
 
 It was a sight of wonder ! Some were horned^ 
 And;, like the moon's argentine crescent hung 
 In the dark dome of heaven^ some did shed 
 A clear mild beam like Hesperus^ while the sea 
 Yet glows with fading sun-light; others dashed 
 Athwart the night with trains of bickering fire. 
 Like sphered worlds to death and ruin driven 5 
 Some shone like stars, and as the chariot passed 
 Bedimmed all other light. 
 
 Spirit of Nature ! here 
 In this interminable wilderness 
 Of worlds, at whose involved immensity 
 
 Even soaring fancy staggers. 
 
 Here is thy fitting temple. 
 
94 THE DiEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 Yet not tlie lightest leaf 
 That quivers to the passing breeze 
 
 Is less instinct with thee^ — 
 
 Yet not the meanest worm. 
 That lurks in graves and fattens on the dead 
 
 Less shares thy eternal breath. 
 
 Spirit of Nature ! thou 
 Imperishable as this glorious scencj 
 
 Here is. thy fitting temple. 
 
 If solitude hath ever led thy steps . 
 To the shore of the immeasurable sea. 
 
 And thou hast lingered there 
 
 Until the sun's broad orb 
 deemed resting on the fiery line of ocean. 
 
THE DJEMON OF THE WORLD. 95 
 
 Thou must have marked the braided webs of gold 
 
 That without motion hang 
 
 Over the sinking sphere : 
 Thou must have marked the billowy mountain clouds. 
 Edged with intolerable radiancy. 
 
 Towering like rocks of jet 
 
 Above the burning deep : 
 
 And yet there is a moment 
 
 ''i^Tien the sun's highest point 
 Peers like a star o'er ocean's western edge^ 
 When those far clouds of feathery purple gleam 
 Like fairy lands girt by some heavenly sea: 
 Then ha^ thy rapt imagination soared 
 Where in the midst of all existing things 
 The temple of the mightiest Daemon stands. 
 
96 THE DAEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 Yet not the golden islands 
 That gleam amid yon flood of purple lights 
 
 Nor the feathery curtains ' 
 
 That canopy the sun's resplendent couch. 
 
 Nor the burnished ocean waves 
 
 Paving that gorgeous dome. 
 
 So fair, so wonderful a sight 
 As the eternal temple could afford. 
 The elements of all that human thought 
 Can frame of lovely or sublime, did join 
 To rear the fabric of the fane, nor aught 
 Of earth may image forth its majesty. 
 Yet likest evening's vault that faery hall. 
 As heaven low resting on the wave it spread 
 
 Its floors of flashing light. 
 
THE D^MON OP THE WORLO, 97 
 
 Its vast and azure dome j 
 And on the verge of that obscure abyss 
 Where crystal battlements o'erhang the gulph 
 Of the dark world, ten thousand spheres difiuse 
 Their lustre through its adamantine gates. 
 
 The magic car no longer moved > 
 The Daemon and the Spirit 
 Entered the eternal gates. 
 Those clouds of aery gold 
 That slept in glittering billows 
 Beneath the azure canopy. 
 With the etherial footsteps trembled not^ 
 Wiile slight and odorous mists 
 
V THE D.mHON OP THE WORLD. 
 
 Floated to strains of thrilling melody 
 
 Through the vast columns and the pearly shrines ^ 
 
 The Daemon and the Spirit 
 Approached the overhanging battlement. 
 Below lay stretched the boundless universe! 
 
 There^ far as the remotest line 
 That limits swift imagination's flighty 
 Unending orbs mingled In mazy motion. 
 
 Immutably fulfilling 
 
 Eternal Nature's law. 
 
 Above, below, around. 
 
 The circling Systems formed. 
 
 A wilderness of harmony. 
 
THE D^MON OF THE WORLD. 99 
 
 Each with undeviating aim 
 In eloquent silence through the depths of space 
 Pursued its wondrous way.*^ 
 
 Awhile the Spirit paused in ecstasy. 
 Yet soon she saw, as the vast spheres swept by. 
 Strange things within their belted orbs appear. 
 Like animated frenzies, dimly moved 
 Shadows, and skeletons, and fiendly shapes. 
 Thronging round human graves, and o'er the dead 
 Sculpturing records for each memory 
 In verse, such as malignant gods pronounce. 
 Blasting the hopes of men, when heaven and hell 
 Confounded burst in ruin o'er the world : 
 And they did build vast trophies, instruments 
 
 h2 
 
iOO .THE DAEMON OF THE WORLD. 
 
 Of murder^ human bones^ barbaric gold. 
 Skins torn from living men, and towers of skulls 
 With sightless hole^ gazing on blinder heaven. 
 Mitres, and crowns, and brazen chariots stained 
 With blood, and scrolls of mystic wickedness. 
 The sanguine codes of venerable crime. 
 The likeness of a throned king came by. 
 When these had past, bearing upon his brow 
 A threefold. crown i his countenance was calm. 
 His eye severe and cold -, but his right hand 
 Was charged with bloody coin, and he did gnaw 
 By fits, with secret smiles, a human heart 
 Concealed beneath his robe 5 and motley shapes, 
 A multitudinous throng, around him knelt. 
 With bosoms bare, and bowed heads, and false looks 
 
THE D^MON OF THE WORLD. 101 
 
 Of true submission^ as the sphere rolled by. 
 Brooking no eye to witness their foul shame. 
 Which human hearts must feel, while human tongues 
 Tremble to speak, they did rage horribly. 
 Breathing in self contempt fierce blasphemies 
 Against the Dasmon of the World, and high 
 Hurling their armed hands where the pure Spirit, 
 Serene and inaccessibly secure. 
 Stood on an isolated pinnacle. 
 The flood of ages combating below 
 The depth of the unbounded universe 
 
 Above, and all around 
 Necessity's unchanging harmony. 
 
 THE END. 
 
 Printed by S. Hamilton, Weybridge, Surrey. 
 
iHELLEY 
 
 POEMS. 
 
 •^ — - 
 
'nx'i 
 
 V ^i^^ t-dAjj^^