THE impress of Shelley's character is stamped everywhere upon his work. In his case, to an even greater degree than usual, some knowledge of the man is necessary for the understanding of his writings. To furnish this knowledge, in as far as our narrow limits will permit, is the aim of the following sketch. It seems superfluous, therefore, to occupy space in giving the present writer's opinion on those many points in Shelley's conduct which have been the subject of controversy, and upon which such divergent judgments have been pronounced. There were passages in Shelley's life from boyhood onward which, had he not been a man of genius, would incur the unhesitating censure of the world in general. He set parental and scholastic authority at defiance; he was guilty of indoctrinating the immature minds of youth with religious opinions which their natural guardians held in abhorrence; he tried to convince a younger sister, just entering womanhood, that legal marriage was a needless form; he deserted his wife without, as far as is known, any grounds which would ordinarily be regarded as adequate, and eloped with a girl not yet seventeen years old, — the daughter of an intimate friend. Yet Shelley has inspired many of his admirers with an enthusiasm which leads them to write in terms of unbroken eulogy, not merely of the poet, but of the man; to treat with injustice persons who came into collision with him during his lifetime; and sometimes to play fast and loose with the dictates of good sense and sound morals. On the other hand, unqualified condemna

tion, such as one readily pronounces on a man guilty of actions like those specified above, is shown by a thorough examination of Shelley's life and character to be as unjustifiable as indiscriminate approval.

Shelley was, in truth, a man of quite abnormal type. With certain qualities he was endowed to an extraordinary degree; others, which belong to the average man, were almost totally lacking in him. Owing to his extreme sensitiveness to certain aspects of life and his comparative blindness to others, he was not actuated by the same motives as other men or, rather, motives did not have the same relative weight with him as with others. He was, further, to an unusual degree the creature of impulse; yet he was not, like most creatures of impulse, dominated by ignoble and transitory aims. His actions, though the outcome of an unchecked. will, were not sensual or consciously selfish, but directed, as far as his insight went, towards the benefiting of his fellows. Though justice, kindness, and forbearance were the objects. of his passionate admiration and pursuit, yet, owing to his incapacity for understanding other people and his subjection to the impulse of the moment, he continually, both by his judgments and his actions, wronged those with whom he came in contact. It is difficult to characterize him without overstating or overlooking essential qualities; hence the complex impression of his personality is best rendered directly from a record of his life. Such a record should be written rather from the point of view of Shelley himself than from that of a moralizing critic. A sketch as brief as the following can give only a small selection from the biographical material available. The 'selection is determined, not by the absolute importance of the facts chosen, but by their effectiveness in producing an impression of Shelley's character, and especially of those sides of it which most influenced his poetic work.

PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY was born August 4, 1792, at Field Place, near Horsham, in Sussex.

He came of gentle

lineage; the Shelley family had belonged to the squirearchy of Sussex for centuries. His father, Timothy Shelley, was a county magnate and Whig member of parliament, a puzzle-headed, irritable, not unkindly, man of a commonplace and narrow type. Shelley's mother was a woman of beauty, possessed of greater sense and ability than her husband, but commonplace, also, without breadth of knowledge or sympathy. Sir Bysshe Shelley, the poet's grandfather, had revived the fortunes of this branch of the family. In early years he had been possessed of great personal attractions and of much adroitness and push. He had begun life as an adventurer, and laid the foundations of his wealth by his two marriages-on each occasion eloping with an heiress. As Percy knew him, he was an eccentric, avaricious old man living in a cottage in the village of Horsham. The desire to accumulate wealth, to found a family, to win social standing—such were the ruling motives of Sir Bysshe and his son Timothy.

In Field Place, among the surroundings which belong to an English country gentleman, Percy Shelley, the eldest child and heir, grew from infancy to boyhood. At the age of ten he was sent to a private boarding-school near Brentford. He was not an ordinary boy, was of a gentle and dreamy temperament, and, doubtless, seemed girlish to his companions. "He passed among his school fellows," writes his cousin and fellow pupil, Thomas Medwin, "as a strange and unsocial being; for when a holiday relieved us from our tasks, and the other boys were engaged in such sports as the narrow limits of our prison court allowed, Shelley, who entered into none of them, would pace backwards and for

wards- I think I see him now along the southern wall, indulging in various vague and undefined ideas, the chaotic elements, if I may say so, of what afterwards produced so beautiful a world." His life among other boys could scarcely have been very happy, but at school he found at least one kindred spirit. Shelley's description of this friend, though written in later life, reveals something of the boyish Percy himself.

There was a delicacy and a simplicity in his manners inexpressibly attractive. The tones of his voice were so soft and winning that every word pierced into my heart, and their pathos was so deep that in listening to him the tears have involuntarily gushed from my eyes. I remember in my simplicity writing to my mother a long account of his admirable qualities and my own devoted attachment. I suppose she thought me out of my wits, for she returned no answer to my letter. I remember we used to walk the whole play hours up and down by some moss-covered palings, pouring out our hearts in youthful talk. We used to speak of the ladies with whom we were in love, and I remember our usual practice was to confirm each other in the everlasting fidelity in which we had bound ourselves towards them and towards each other. I recollect thinking my friend exquisitely beautiful. Every night when we parted to go to bed we kissed each other like children, as we still were.

In 1804 Shelley went to Eton, where he was even less in harmony with his environment than at Brentford. His gentleness and oddity exposed him to teasing and bullying. "I have seen him," writes a school fellow, "surrounded, hooted, baited like a maddened bull, and at this distance of time I seem to hear ringing in my ears the cry which Shelley was wont to utter in the paroxysms of revengeful anger." "His name," says Dowden, "would suddenly be sounded through the cloisters, in an instant to be taken up by another and another voice, until hundreds joined in the clamor, and the