FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144  
145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   >>   >|  
on the same subject a little later, and received the following reply:--"As for poor Shelley, who also frightens you and the world, he is, to my knowledge, the least egotistical and kindest of men. I know no one who has so sacrificed both fortune and sentiments for the good of others; as for his speculative opinions, we have none in common, nor do I wish to have any." All the poems which he wrote at this time, and which admitted of his introducing the religious element either purposely or accidentally into them, prove one and all that his mind, as regards religion, was as we have shown it to be. This is particularly noticeable in his mystery called "Heaven and Earth;" but the same remark is applicable to others, such as the "Island," and even to some passages in "Don Juan." "Heaven and Earth"--a poem which appeared about this time, and which he styled "A Mystery"--is a biblical poem in which all the thoughts agree with the Book of Genesis, and "which was inspired," says Galt, "by a mind both serious and patriarchal, and is an echo of the oracles of Adam and of Melchisedec." In this work he exhibits as much veneration for scriptural theology as Milton himself. In the "Island," which he wrote at Genoa, there are passages which penetrate the soul with so religious a feeling, that Benjamin Constant, in reading it, and indignant at hearing Byron called an unbeliever, exclaimed in his work on religion, "I am assured that there are men who accuse Lord Byron of atheism and impiety. There is more religion in the twelve lines which I have quoted than in the past, present, and future writings of all his detractors put together." Even in "Don Juan," in that admirable satire which, not being rightly understood, has given rise to so many calumnies, he says, after having spoken in the fifteenth canto of the moral greatness of various men, and among others of Socrates:-- "And thou, Diviner still, Whose lot it is by man to be mistaken, And thy pure creed made sanction of all ill? Redeeming worlds to be by bigots shaken, How was thy toil rewarded?" At the end of this stanza he wrote the following note:---- "As it is necessary in these times to avoid ambiguity, I say that I mean by 'Diviner still,' Christ. If ever God was man--or man God--he was both. I never arraigned his creed, but the use or abuse made of it. Mr. Canning one day quoted Christianity to sanction negro slavery, and Mr. Wilberf
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   120   121   122   123   124   125   126   127   128   129   130   131   132   133   134   135   136   137   138   139   140   141   142   143   144  
145   146   147   148   149   150   151   152   153   154   155   156   157   158   159   160   161   162   163   164   165   166   167   168   169   >>   >|  



Top keywords:
religion
 

Diviner

 

called

 
Heaven
 

religious

 

sanction

 

quoted

 

Island

 

passages

 

admirable


Canning

 
satire
 

calumnies

 
understood
 
rightly
 

detractors

 

atheism

 

impiety

 

accuse

 

Wilberf


assured

 

twelve

 

slavery

 

present

 

future

 
writings
 

Christianity

 

fifteenth

 

mistaken

 

exclaimed


stanza

 

bigots

 
shaken
 

worlds

 

Redeeming

 

rewarded

 

greatness

 

arraigned

 

spoken

 

ambiguity


Christ
 
Socrates
 

exhibits

 

received

 

admitted

 
introducing
 

element

 
subject
 
purposely
 

accidentally