Shelley, Volume 1

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Page 175 - To fetters, and the damp vault's dayless gloom, Their country conquers with their martyrdom, And Freedom's fame finds wings on every wind. Chillon! thy prison is a holy place, And thy sad floor an altar - for 'twas trod, Until his very steps have left a trace Worn, as if thy cold pavement were a sod, By Bonnivard! - May none those marks efface! For they appeal from tyranny to God.
Page 9 - Thoughts of great deeds were mine, dear Friend, when first The clouds which wrap this world from youth did pass. I do remember well the hour which burst My spirit's sleep : a fresh May-dawn it was, When I walked forth upon the glittering grass, And wept, I knew not why: until there rose From the near schoolroom voices that, alas ! Were but one echo from a world of woes — The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes.
Page 9 - And from that hour did I with earnest thought Heap knowledge from forbidden mines of lore, Yet nothing that my tyrants knew or taught I cared to learn, but from that secret store Wrought linked armour for my soul, before It might walk forth to war among mankind ; Thus power and hope were strengthened more and more Within me, till there came upon my mind A sense of loneliness, a thirst with which I pined.
Page 24 - ... through his locks unconsciously, so that it was singularly wild and rough. — His features were not symmetrical (the mouth, perhaps, excepted), yet was the effect of the whole extremely powerful. They breathed an animation, a fire, an enthusiasm, a vivid and preternatural intelligence, that I have never met with in any other countenance.
Page 80 - Nothing that I ever read in tale or history could present a more striking image of a sudden, violent, irresistible, uncontrollable passion, than that under which I found him labouring when, at his request, I went up from the country to call on him in London. Between his old feelings towards Harriet, from whom he was not then separated, and his new passion for Mary, he showed in his looks, in his gestures, in his speech, the state of a mind "suffering, like a little kingdom, the nature of an insurrection".
Page 64 - With respect to Universal Suffrage, I confess I consider its adoption, in the present unprepared state of public knowledge and feeling, a measure fraught with peril. I think that none but those who register their names as paying a certain small sum in direct taxes ought at present to send Members to Parliament.
Page 9 - I knew not why: until there rose From the near school-room, voices, that, alas! Were but one echo from a world of woes — The harsh and grating strife of tyrants and of foes. And then I clasped my hands and looked around, But none was near to mock my streaming eyes, Which poured their warm drops on the sunny ground — So without shame, I spake : — " I will be wise, And just, and free, and mild, if in me lies Such power, for I grow weary to behold The selfish and the strong still tyrannise Without...
Page 149 - I think one is always in love with something or other; the error, and I confess it is not easy for spirits cased in flesh and blood to avoid it, consists in seeking in a mortal image the likeness of what is, perhaps, eternal.

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