no
sort of dealings except through the policeman. "Social anarchists,"
likewise, gathered "around the husband of Godwin's daughter"--a pregnant
denunciation, though it leaves us in doubt whether Shelley, Godwin, or
Mary was the anarch, or all three of them together; while the "husband"
seems to imply that getting married was one of the gravest of Shelley's
offences.

But the worst of all is to come: "Those to whom the restraints of
religion were hateful marshalled themselves under the banner of the
youth who had rashly styled himself as an Atheist, forgetful of the
fact that All his best writings attest that, whatever name he might
call himself, he, more than any other poet of the age, saw God in
everything."

We beg to tell Mr. Gosse that he is libellous and impertinent. He knows
little or nothing of Atheists if he thinks they are only repelled by the
"restraints of religion." They have restraints of their own, quite as
numerous and imperative as those of any religionist who fears his God.
What is more, they have incentives which religion weakens. Mr. Gosse is
perhaps in a state of ignorance on this matter. He probably speaks of
the moral condition of Atheists as a famous American humorist proposed
to lecture on science, with an imagination untrammeled by the least
acquaintance with the subject.

So much (it is quite enough) for the libel; and now for the
impertinence. Mr. Gosse pretends to know Shelley's mind better than
he knew it himself. Shelley called himself an Atheist; that is
indisputable; but he did so "rashly." He was mistaken about his own
opinions; he knew a great many things, but he was ignorant of himself.
But the omniscient Mr. Gosse was born (or _was_ he born?) to rectify
the poet's blunder, and assure the world that he was a Theist without
knowing it--in fact, a really God-intoxicated person.

What wonder is it that Mr. Gosse became intoxicated in turn, and soared
in a rapture of panegyric over a Shelley of his own construction? "The
period of prejudice is over," he exclaimed, "and we are gathered here
to-day under the auspices of the greatest poet our language has produced
since Shelley died, encouraged by universal public opinion and by
dignitaries of all the professions--yea, even by prelates of our
national Church." Here the preacher's intoxication became maudlin, and
there should have been an interval for soda-water.

Curiously enough, the very last page of Trelawny's _Records of Shelley
an