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And future generations shall rise up and call you blessed. "My spirit's bark is driven Far from the shore, far from the trembling throng Whose sails were never to the tempest given." Shelley: "Adonais."
That Shelley, acute critic and profound student as he was, could conform himself to rule and show himself an artist in the stricter sense, is, however, abundantly proved by "The Cenci" and by "Adonais". The reason why he did not always observe this method will be understood by those who have studied his "Defence of Poetry", and learned to sympathize with his impassioned theory of art.
The first and second portions of the poem are, at the same time, thoroughly concordant, and the passage from the one to the other is natural. Two quotations from "Adonais" will suffice to show the power and sweetness of its verse.
It is an elegy on the death of a youthful poet of considerable promise, Mr. Keats, and was printed at Pisa. After the publication in London of the Pisan edition of Adonais, the poem remained unreprinted until 1829. Arthur Hallam, the latter having brought from Italy a copy of the original pamphlet. The Cambridge edition, an octavo in paper wrappers, is now still scarcer than the Pisan one.
The spirit of Adonais came as a flame from the 'burning fountain' of the Eternal, and has now reverted thither, he being one of the 'enduring dead. But the 'deaf and viperous murderer' must not hope for a like destiny.
He lives, he wakes 'tis Death is dead, not he; Mourn not for Adonais. Thou young Dawn, Turn all thy dew to splendour, for from thee The spirit thou lamentest is not gone; Ye caverns and ye forests, cease to moan!
John, back to 'plasters, pills and ointment boxes." And even when Shelley wrote his "Adonais" on the death of Keats, Blackwood's met it with a contemptible parody: "Weep for my Tom cat! all ye Tabbies weep!" Perhaps I have quoted enough. This is the parentage of our silken and flattering criticism. The pages of these old reviews rest yellow on the shelves.
Then all the throng Leapt swift upon me and tore me as I lay, And left me man again." In Shelley's poem Adonais is the following allusion to the story of Actaeon:
As an outcome of this grief we have one of Tennyson's finest poems, In Memoriam. It is an elegy which we place beside Lycidas and Adonais. But In Memoriam strikes yet a sadder note. For in Lycidas and Adonais Milton and Shelley mourned kindred souls rather than dear loved friends. To Tennyson, Arthur Hallam was "The brother of my love"
In a different mood, which finds expression Alastor, Adonais, and his wonderful lyrics, Shelley is like a wanderer following a vague, beautiful vision, forever sad and forever unsatisfied. In the latter mood he appeals profoundly to all men who have known what it is to follow after an unattainable ideal.
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