As if they did rejoice o’er a young earthquake’s birth.”
Heavens! what a terrible fascination in the fellow! Here is shown not only the weird psychology of the north, but another great illustration of Lord Byron’s humor; for what but a spirit racy of the lower regions, could invoke that loud and awful warring of the elements, that darting to and fro from crag to crag, of deadly thunderbolt, as a fair, congenial delight; and long to claim kindred with, and become a part of the destroying emissary?
How, then, shall we characterize Lord Byron’s poetry, and make plain the mystery of its singularity? How shall we assert that its charm is simple, and prove its simplicity, evolving it from the intricacies of Romance? Be it remembered that I said Lord Byron was totally, utterly earthly: yet I say his poetry is Satanic. This is no paradox. There are minds which are utterly earthly and are not Satanic; but this is owing solely to their supineness and incapacity. A mind essentially active, grasping, comprehensive; its vast faculties born of Heaven, yet thwarted and diverted to passion and sensuality; succumbing, not only without resistance, but with infinite relish to the passing whim; courting voluptuousness, and reveling in it; conceiving stupendous and holy thoughts, yet wantonly blasting them, to joy in their sad and terrible destruction; understanding the most hidden depths of human weakness, and human tenderness, and human feeling, yet exploring but to profane; gifted with the finest appreciation of beauty and pleasure, yet gorging to satiety, intoxication, disgust—then turning in selfishness, hatred and malice from all that is good; such a mind, I say, is earthly, nay more, in its unbridled license it is devilish. Had Satan freed from fire, and sent on earth a fiend, a fiend damned for hatred, selfishness and wanton malice, to be the chief among English poets, this poet would have written in Byronic style, and with Byronic humor; with more ability, perhaps, but not with greater fidelity to his court; nor would the infernal glare of his fierce and voluptuous sentiment be more apparent. Byron touched no beauty that he did not wither; no virtue, no holy feeling that he did not mock. Why was it? It was by reason of the deep-seated malice of his thought. Womanly beauty in his hands was a plaything, womanly weakness a delight, woman’s fall a glory, and woman’s virtue a scorn. He could gaze on the stars, and the mountains, and the ocean, but he could not see and feel the poetry of their creation and government, as the stupendous works of God’s hand, and as types and illustrations of scientific, and universal, and eternal law. He drew down the very stars from Heaven to minister to mere sentiment of man’s or woman’s humor. He could draw the most pleasing picture for gratified sensibilities to pour upon, rejoicing; and with fell joy he would dash it o’er, gloating in the destruction of all moral beauty. Among the darker, deadlier passions of revenge and hatred he was perfectly at ease: any passion, whatsoever, was to his mind savory food; and there exists no passion of lightest or heaviest grade, that Byron has not felt. His mental existence was in a sphere of passion; in it did he live; by it was he ruled; and—by the odor of passion is his poetry characterized. Let me then term it a poetry of passion, wild sentiment, and moral riot; earthly, diabolical, as you will—it is all the same. Let me call it original, bold, audacious. Let me call it a mingling of northern superstitious etherealism, and southern brilliancy and materialism. Let me call it wandering, astray, without principle or guide; without aim, or any motive but the fitful blasts of his own caprice and passion. Let me call it self-esteem and praise, scorn of the moral judgment of the world, scorn of true humanity, and glory in one’s own contempt and wickedness; and I have characterised Lord Byron’s poetry, and unraveled the mystery of its charm.
Concerning Byron’s character as a man, little need be said to prove its double littleness. From every man, no matter how low his capacity, something good, something useful is expected; and he who meets not this natural, this rational expectation, merits the stigma of littleness of character. To some men are given high conceptions, deep penetration, exalted feelings and impulses, and energy of mind: yet, if they meet not the rational expectation of greater good, greater utility than is the average offspring of lowlier men, they merit the stigma of littleness of character; and if they produce no good at all, they are doubly little. If not only this, but they positively pervert those gifts to the detriment of others, they are trebly little. Nay, more—a man’s littleness, if he pervert his gifts, does not increase in direct ratio with his relative capacities; but I feel that I am justified in applying here the mathematical law of gravitation, and in saying that his littleness—measured on God’s measure of mankind—increases as the square of his distance above the average capacity of his race. How much, then, must the greatest admirers of Lord Byron; those who seem struck with awe before the mountain of his stupendous power, despise, in their inmost heart, his utter, utter littleness! Truly may we comprise him in the Latin poet’s pithy words—“Parturiunt montes, nascetur ridiculus mus.”
No man is great who has not the strength of mind to work utility from vast resources, and is able, besides, to appreciate the necessity of working that utility, in spite of whim, humor, flattery, success or misfortune: yet not one sentiment, of benefit to mankind or individual, amongst those now ministering upon this earth of trial, of suffering, and of temptation, can claim paternity in Lord Byron. As his poetry is a poetry of passion unregulated by principle, so was the life of his feelings and his intellect, a life of unbridled license. Let no one put forth, in extenuation, that he often meant well; and that his venom, when he spat it, was the secretion of unhappiness and misfortune; for we have no proof, no reason to believe that he ever meant well, but his own assertion—which is singular when contrasted with his life and his writings; and as to his sufferings, he courted, nursed suffering as the theme of all his writings. How strangely does the assertion of his moral intent, in his farewell to the “Childe,” contrast with the confession of the truth which a moment of intoxication beguiled from him in the II. Canto of Don Juan! In the one we read—
“Farewell! with him alone may rest the pain,
If such there were—with you, the moral of this strain.”
In the other, where his true character speaks—
“As for the ladies I have nought to say,
A wanderer from the British world of fashion,