I have avoided, as I have said before, the imitation of any contemporary style. But there must be a resemblance which does not depend upon their own will, between all the writers of any particular age. They cannot escape from subjection to a common influence which arises out of an infinite combination of circumstances belonging to the times in which they live, though each is in a degree the author of the very influence by which his being is thus pervaded. Thus, the tragic Poets of the age of Pericles; the Italian revivers of ancient learning; those mighty intellects of our own country that succeeded the Reformation, the translators of the Bible, Shakspeare, Spenser, the Dramatists of the reign of Elizabeth, and Lord Bacon1; the colder spirits of the interval that succeeded;―all, resemble each other, and differ from every other in their several classes. In this view of things, Ford can no more be called the imitator of Shakspeare, than Shakspeare the imitator of Ford. There were perhaps few other points of resemblance between these two men, than that which the universal and inevitable influence of their age produced. And this is an influence which neither the meanest scribbler, nor the sublimest genius of any æra can escape; and which I have not attempted to escape.

I have adopted the stanza of Spenser, (a measure inexpressibly beautiful) not because I consider it a finer model of poetical harmony than the blank verse of Shakspeare and Milton, but because in the latter there is no shelter for mediocrity: you must either succeed or fail. This perhaps an aspiring spirit should desire. But I was enticed

1 Milton stands alone in the age which he illumined. [SHELLEY'S NOTE.]

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also, by the brilliancy and magnificence of sound which a mind that has been nourished upon musical thoughts, can produce by a just and harmonious arrangement of the pauses of this measure. Yet there will be found some

instances where I have completely failed in this attempt, and one, which I here request the reader to consider as an erratum, where there is left most inadvertently an alexandrine in the middle of a stanza.1

1 There are two instances of alexandrines left in the middle of stanzas. One is the central line of stanza 27, Canto IV,

Of whirlwind, whose fierce blasts the waves and clouds confound,

the other the central line of stanza 36, Canto IX,—

"Fair star of life and love," I cried, "my

soul's delight,"

and it is impossible to say which Shelley meant. He could hardly mean the third line of stanza 44, Canto V,

By winds which feed on sunrise woven, to

inchant

as stated by Mr. Garnett, or the third
line of stanza 27, Canto VIII,—
Are children of one mother, even Love-
behold!

But

unwarrantably altered by Mr. Rossetti
by the omission of the word even.
Both of these are to be scanned as five-
foot iambic lines without more elision
than is frequent all through Shelley's
works; and neither of these two is
"in the middle" of a stanza.
even if we were or could be certain
which of the two positive alexandrines
Shelley meant, and asked to have con-
sidered " as an erratum," there would
be no pretext for altering it without
explicit direction how. He had ample
opportunity to alter it if he wished;
but it was not treated as an erratum in
his own list of errata; and it is fair to
assume that, had he meant to change

it, he would have taken the opportunity
of the delay between the issue of Laon
and Cythna and The Revolt of Islam,
the one book being made up from the
sheets of the other with cancel-leaves.
But the metric irregularities do not
end here. I find in my copy three
instances of seven-foot ballad lines
instead of alexandrines, noted when
Mr. Garnett published Relics of Shelley,
and I had a search for the "peccant
alexandrine," which I thought then
remained to be discovered. These long
lines are

I turned in sickness, for a veil shrouded her
countenance bright. (St. 44, Canto V.)-
On the gate's turret, and in rage and grief
and scorn I wept! (St. 3, Canto VI.) —
A confident phalanx, which the foes on every
side invest. (St. 13, Canto VI.):
In addition to these I find that stanza
18, Canto IV, has no alexandrine at
all, the ninth line being

I prithee spare me ;-did with ruth so take.
In stanza 54 of Canto V, light and name
hold the position of a rhyme in the
second quatrain, and not I should
think by a printer's error. In stanza 3,
Canto VI, arms and arms, and in stanza
14, Canto VI, ever and forever stand
as rhymes. In stanza 22, Canto VIII,
self and self, in stanza 8, Canto X,
way and way, stand as rhymes. Then,
stanza 15 of Canto IX is prolonged to
ten lines in Laon and Cythna, the
alexandrine thus coming out with a

But in this, as in every other respect, I have written fearlessly. It is the misfortune of this age, that its Writers, too thoughtless of immortality, are exquisitely sensible to temporary praise or blame. They write with the fear of Reviews before their eyes. This system of criticism sprang up in that torpid interval when Poetry was not. Poetry, and the art which professes to regulate and limit its powers, cannot subsist together. Longinus could not have been the contemporary of Homer, nor Boileau of Horace. Yet this species of criticism never presumed to assert an understanding of its own: it has always, unlike true science, followed, not preceded the opinion of mankind, and would even now bribe with worthless adulation some of our greatest Poets to impose gratuitous fetters on their own imaginations, and become unconscious accomplices in the daily murder of all genius either not so aspiring or not so fortunate as their own. I have sought therefore to write, as I believe that Homer, Shakspeare, and Milton wrote, with an utter disregard of anonymous censure. I am certain that calumny and misrepresentation, though it may move me to compassion, cannot disturb my peace. I shall understand the expressive silence of those sagacious enemies who dare not trust themselves to speak. I shall endeavour to extract from the midst of insult, and contempt, and maledictions, those admonitions which may tend to correct whatever imperfections such censurers may discover in this my first

wrong rhyme; but Shelley altered this in converting the poem into The Revolt of Islam. In stanza 34 of the same Canto thee and thee have to serve as a rhyme; and a similar thing happens again in stanza 5, Canto X, where

came and came stand for a rhyme. In stanza 14, Canto XI, him and tone stand instead of a rhyme. I do not suppose I have nearly exhausted the instances of metric irregularity in this poem.

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serious appeal to the Public. If certain Critics were ast clear-sighted as they are malignant, how great would be the benefit to be derived from their virulent writings! As it is, I fear I shall be malicious enough to be amused with their paltry tricks and lame invectives. Should the Public judge that my composition is worthless, I shall indeed bow before the tribunal from which Milton received his crown of immortality, and shall seek to gather, if I live, strength from that defeat, which may nerve me to some new enterprise of thought which may not be worthless. I cannot conceive that Lucretius, when he meditated that poem whose doctrines are yet the basis of our metaphysical knowledge, and whose eloquence has been the wonder of mankind, wrote in awe of such censure as the hired sophists of the impure and superstitious noblemen of Rome might affix to what he should produce. It1 was at the period when Greece was led captive, and Asia made tributary to the Republic, fast verging itself to slavery and ruin, that a multitude of Syrian captives, bigotted to the worship of their obscene Ashtaroth, and the unworthy successors of Socrates and Zeno, found there a precarious subsistence by administering, under the name of freedmen, to the vices and vanities of the great. These wretched men were skilled to plead, with a superficial but plausible set of sophisms, in favour of that contempt for virtue which is the portion of slaves, and that faith in portents, the most

In a proof-leaf inserted in my "cancelled copy" (see appendix) this passage reads thus:

"Asia was first made tributary, Greece was enslaved to the Republic, fast verging itself to slavery and ruin,

and a multitude of Syrian captives bigoted to the worship of their obscene Ashtaroth, and the unworthy successors of Socrates and Zeno, found a precarious subsistence by adminis tering," &c.

fatal substitute for benevolence in the imaginations of men, which arising from the enslaved communities of the East, then first began to overwhelm the western nations in its stream. Were these the kind of men whose disapprobation the wise and lofty-minded Lucretius should have regarded with a salutary awe? The latest and perhaps the meanest of those who follow in his footsteps, would disdain to hold life on such conditions.

The Poem now presented to the Public occupied little more than six months in the composition. That period has been devoted to the task with unremitting ardour and enthusiasm. I have1 exercised a watchful and earnest criticism on my work as it grew under my hands. I would willingly have sent it forth to the world with that perfection which long labour and revision is said to bestow. But I found that if I should gain something in exactness by this method, I might lose much of the newness and energy of imagery and language as it flowed fresh from my mind. And although the mere composition occupied no more than six months, the thoughts thus arranged were slowly gathered in as many years.

I trust that the reader will carefully distinguish between those opinions which have a dramatic propriety in reference to the characters which they are designed to elucidate, and such as are properly my own. The erroneous and degrading idea which men have2 conceived of a Supreme Being, for instance, is spoken against, but not the Supreme Being itself. The belief which some superstitious persons whom

1 The word have is not in the proofleaf inserted in my copy.

2 In that leaf we read is for men have.

3 In the inserted leaf already referred to this passage reads thus :

"The belief which some supersti