Selected Poetry and Prose. Percy Bysshe Shelley

the soul’s wildest feelings stray

      Can speak so well as they.

      How eloquent are eyes!

      Not music-s most impassioned note

      On which Love-s warmest fervours float

      Like them bids rapture rise.

      Love, look thus again,—

      That your look may light a waste of years,

      Darting the beam that conquers cares

      Through the cold shower of tears.

      Love, look thus again!

      FEELINGS OF A REPUBLICAN ON THE FALL OF BONAPARTE

      I hated thee, fallen tyrant! I did groan

      To think that a most unambitious slave,

      Like thou, 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

      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.

      FRAGMENT: (‘WHAT MEN GAIN FAIRLY’)

      What men gain fairly—that they should possess,

      And children may inherit idleness,

      From him who earns it—This is understood;

      Private injustice may be general good.

      But he who gains by base and armed wrong,

      Or guilty fraud, or base compliances,

      May be despoiled; even as a stolen dress

      Is stripped from a convicted thief; and he

      Left in the nakedness of infamy.

      FROM ST IRVYNE; OR, THE ROSICRUCIAN

      “’Twas dead of the night, when I sat in my dwelling;

      One glimmering lamp was expiring and low;

      Around, the dark tide of the tempest was swelling.

      Along the wild mountains night-ravens were yelling,--

      They bodingly presag’d destruction and woe.

      ’Twas then that I started!—the wild storm was howling.

      Nought was seen, save the lightning, which danc’d in the sky;

      Above me, the crash of the thunder was rolling.

      And low, chilling murmurs, the blast wafted by.

      My heart sank within me--unheeded the war

      Of the battling clouds, on the mountain-tops, broke;—

      Unheeded the thunder-peal crash’d in mine ear—

      This heart, hard as iron, is stranger to fear;

      But conscience in low, noiseless whispering spoke.

      ’Twas then that her form on the whirlwind upholding.

      The ghost of the murder’d Victoria strode;

      In her right hand, a shadowy shroud she was holding.

      She swiftly advanc’d to my lonesome abode.

      I wildly then call’d on the tempest to bear me—”

      GOOD-NIGHT

      Good-night? ah! no; the hour is ill

      Which severs those it should unite;

      Let us remain together still,

      Then it will be good night.

      How can I call the lone night good,

      Though thy sweet wishes wing its flight?

      Be it not said, thought, understood—

      Then it will be good night.

      To hearts which near each other move

      From evening close to morning light,

      The night is good; because, my love,

      They never say good-night.

      HELLAS

      A LYRICAL DRAMA.

      ΜΑΝΤΙΣ ’ΕΙΜ’ ’ΕΣΘΛΩΝ ’ΑΓΩΝΩΝ.—OEDIP. COLON.

      TO HIS EXCELLENCY

      PRINCE ALEXANDER MAVROCORDATO

      LATE SECRETARY FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS TO THE HOSPODAR OF WALLACHIA

      THE DRAMA OF HELLAS

      IS INSCRIBED,

      AS AN IMPERFECT TOKEN OF THE ADMIRATION, SYMPATHY, AND FRIENDSHIP OF THE AUTHOR.

      Pisa, November 1, 1821.

      PREFACE

      The poem of Hellas, written at the suggestion of the events of the moment, is a mere improvise, and derives its interest (should it be found to possess any) solely from the intense sympathy which the Author feels with the cause he would celebrate.

      The subject, in its present state, is insusceptible of being treated otherwise than lyrically, and if I have called this poem a drama from the circumstance of its being composed in dialogue, the licence is not greater than that which has been assumed by other poets who have called their productions epics, only because they have been divided into twelve or twenty-four books.

      The Persæ of Æschylus afforded me the first model of my conception, although the decision of the glorious contest now waging in Greece being yet suspended forbids a catastrophe parallel to the return of Xerxes and the desolation of the Persians. I have, therefore, contented myself with exhibiting a series of lyric pictures, and with having wrought upon the curtain of futurity, which falls upon the unfinished scene, such figures of indistinct and visionary delineation as suggest the final triumph of the Greek cause as a portion of the cause of civilisation and social improvement.

      The drama (if drama it must be called) is, however, so inartificial that I doubt whether, if recited on the Thespian waggon to an Athenian village at the Dionysiaca, it would have obtained the prize of the goat. I shall bear with equanimity any punishment, greater than the loss of such a reward, which the Aristarchi of the hour may think fit to inflict.

      The only goat-song which I have yet attempted has, I confess, in spite of the unfavourable nature of the subject, received a greater and a more valuable portion of applause than I expected or than it deserved.

      Common fame is the only authority which I can allege for the details which form the basis of the poem, and I must trespass upon the forgiveness of my readers for the display of newspaper erudition to which I have been reduced. Undoubtedly, until the conclusion of the war, it will be impossible to obtain