Selected Poetry and Prose. Percy Bysshe Shelley

was by six months or so;

      For, after her first shyness was worn out,

      We sate there, rolling billiard balls about,

      When the Count entered—salutations past—

      ‘The words you spoke last night might well have cast

      A darkness on my spirit—if man be

      The passive thing you say, I should not see

      Much harm in the religions and old saws,

      (Though I may never own such leaden laws)

      Which break a teachless nature to the yoke.

      Mine is another faith.’—Thus much I spoke,

      And noting he replied not, added: ‘See

      This lovely child, blithe, innocent and free;

      She spends a happy time with little care,

      While we to such sick thoughts subjected are

      As came on you last night—it is our will

      That thus enchains us to permitted ill—

      We might be otherwise—we might be all

      We dream of happy, high, majestical.

      Where is the love, beauty and truth we seek,

      But in our mind? and if we were not weak,

      Should we be less in deed than in desire?’

      ‘Ay, if we were not weak—and we aspire

      How vainly to be strong!’ said Maddalo;

      ‘You talk Utopia.’ ‘It remains to know,’

      I then rejoined, ‘and those who try may find

      How strong the chains are which our spirit bind;

      Brittle perchance as straw. We are assured

      Much may be conquered, much may be endured

      Of what degrades and crushes us. We know

      That we have power over ourselves to do

      And suffer—what, we know not till we try;

      But something nobler than to live and die—

      So taught those kings of old philosophy,

      Who reigned before religion made men blind;

      And those who suffer with their suffering kind

      Yet feel this faith religion.’ ‘My dear friend,’

      Said Maddalo, ‘my judgment will not bend

      To your opinion, though I think you might

      Make such a system refutation-tight

      As far as words go. I knew one like you,

      Who to this city came some months ago,

      With whom I argued in this sort, and he

      Is now gone mad,—and so he answered me,—

      Poor fellow! but if you would like to go,

      We’ll visit him, and his wild talk will show

      How vain are such aspiring theories.’

      ‘I hope to prove the induction otherwise,

      And that a want of that true theory still,

      Which seeks “a soul of goodness” in things ill,

      Or in himself or others, has thus bowed

      His being—there are some by nature proud,

      Who patient in all else demand but this:

      To love and be beloved with gentleness;

      And, being scorned, what wonder if they die

      Some living death? this is not destiny

      But man’s own wilful ill.’ As thus I spoke,

      Servants announced the gondola, and we

      Through the fast-falling rain and high-wrought sea

      Sailed to the island where the madhouse stands.

      We disembarked. The clap of tortured hands,

      Fierce yells and howlings and lamentings keen,

      And laughter where complaint had merrier been,

      Moans, shrieks, and curses, and blaspheming prayers,

      Accosted us. We climbed the oozy stairs

      Into an old courtyard. I heard on high,

      Then, fragments of most touching melody,

      But looking up saw not the singer there—

      Through the black bars in the tempestuous air

      I saw, like weeds on a wrecked palace growing,

      Long tangled locks flung wildly forth, and flowing,

      Of those who on a sudden were beguiled

      Into strange silence, and looked forth and smiled

      Hearing sweet sounds.—Then I: ‘Methinks there were

      A cure of these with patience and kind care,

      If music can thus move . . . But what is he,

      Whom we seek here?’ ‘Of his sad history

      I know but this,’ said Maddalo: ‘he came

      To Venice a dejected man, and fame

      Said he was wealthy, or he had been so.

      Some thought the loss of fortune wrought him woe;

      But he was ever talking in such sort

      As you do—far more sadly—he seemed hurt,

      Even as a man with his peculiar wrong,

      To hear but of the oppression of the strong,

      Or those absurd deceits (I think with you

      In some respects, you know) which carry through

      The excellent impostors of this earth

      When they outface detection—he had worth,

      Poor fellow! but a humorist in his way.’—

      ‘Alas, what drove him mad?’ ‘I cannot say;

      A lady came with him from France, and when

      She left him and returned, he wandered then

      About yon lonely isles of desert sand

      Till he grew wild—He had no cash or land

      Remaining,—the police had brought him here—

      Some fancy took him and he would not bear

      Removal; so I fitted up for him

      Those rooms beside the sea, to please his whim,

      And sent him busts and books and urns for flowers,

      Which had adorned his life in happier hours,

      And instruments of music—you may guess

      A stranger could do little more or less

      For one so gentle and unfortunate—

      And those are his sweet strains which charm the weight

      From madmen’s chains, and make this Hell appear

      A heaven of sacred silence, hushed to hear.’—

      ‘Nay, this was kind of you—he had no claim,

      As the world says.’—‘None—but the very same

      Which