ions against human nature originated with
this mistake. And then he adds:--

"But his sentiments, in accordance with his nature, far from obeying the
false direction his prejudices and erroneous opinions would have given,
always made him, on the contrary, love his fellow-men with a warmth that
quite excluded misanthropy. Still this natural ardor rendered him
extremely sensitive to neglect from those he loved, especially in early
youth, when he was led by the fault of an individual to generalize blame
against mankind. He relates somewhere, with merited contempt, that one
of his friends would accompany a female relative to her milliner,
instead of coming to take leave of him when he was about to leave
England for a long time. The truth is that _no one ever loved his
neighbor as much as Lord Byron_. Sympathy, respect, affection,
attention, were perpetual wants with him. He was really disgusted and
sad when they failed him. But then he did not reason much, he only felt
like a poet. It was his business to feed all these discontents, for the
public likes nothing so much in poetry as disdain, contempt, derision,
indignation, and particularly a kind of proud mockery, which forms the
line of transition from or distinguishes a disordered state of
imagination from madness. Consequently, seeing that this sort of tone
pleased the public, when he began to write again he encouraged that
style, his first care being to collect, like Jupiter, the darkest
clouds."

The same biographer also tries to insinuate that the romantic interest
excited by a handsome young man, full of melancholy and mystery, may
have influenced Lord Byron's choice of heroes in his early poems; for,
says he, it is not every one who can be weary of the most exquisite
enjoyments of society, and to be thus sated a man must have been greatly
prized by beauty and wealth. These reflections and explanations are
arbitrary, and not impartial. But even if Lord Byron, at twenty-one
years of age, did borrow ideas and sentiments not really his, by way of
producing poetic effect, we must nevertheless acknowledge that, even in
this order of sentiments, part still were genuine and real. Like all
young men, Lord Byron had entered the world armed with the notions
preceptors deem it necessary to inculcate on their disciples regarding
generosity, disinterestedness, liberty, honor, patriotism, etc. When he
saw that almost all he had thus been taught was mere illusion, a theme
for decl