The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe Shelley Part 180

Whilst monarchs laughed upon their thrones To hear a famished nation's groans, And hugged the wealth wrung from the woe That makes its eyes and veins o'erflow,-- Those thrones, high built upon the heaps Of bones where frenzied Famine sleeps, Where Slavery wields her scourge of iron, Red with mankind's unheeded gore, And War's mad fiends the scene environ, Mingling with shrieks a drunken roar, There Vice and Falsehood took their stand, High raised above the unhappy land.

FALSEHOOD: Brother! arise from the dainty fare, Which thousands have toiled and bled to bestow; A finer feast for thy hungry ear Is the news that I bring of human woe.

VICE: And, secret one, what hast thou done, To compare, in thy tumid pride, with me?

I, whose career, through the blasted year, Has been tracked by despair and agony.

FALSEHOOD: What have I done!--I have torn the robe From baby Truth's unsheltered form, And round the desolated globe Borne safely the bewildering charm: My tyrant-slaves to a dungeon-floor Have bound the fearless innocent, And streams of fertilizing gore Flow from her bosom's hideous rent, Which this unfailing dagger gave...

I dread that blood!--no more--this day Is ours, though her eternal ray Must shine upon our grave.

Yet know, proud Vice, had I not given To thee the robe I stole from Heaven, Thy shape of ugliness and fear Had never gained admission here.

VICE: And know, that had I disdained to toil, But sate in my loathsome cave the while, And ne'er to these hateful sons of Heaven, GOLD, MONARCHY, and MURDER, given; Hadst thou with all thine art essayed One of thy games then to have played, With all thine overweening boast, Falsehood! I tell thee thou hadst lost!-- Yet wherefore this dispute?--we tend, Fraternal, to one common end; In this cold grave beneath my feet, Will our hopes, our fears, and our labours, meet.

FALSEHOOD: I brought my daughter, RELIGION, on earth: She smothered Reason's babes in their birth; But dreaded their mother's eye severe,-- So the crocodile slunk off slily in fear, And loosed her bloodhounds from the den....

They started from dreams of slaughtered men, And, by the light of her poison eye, Did her work o'er the wide earth frightfully: The dreadful stench of her torches' flare, Fed with human fat, polluted the air: The curses, the shrieks, the ceaseless cries Of the many-mingling miseries, As on she trod, ascended high And trumpeted my victory!-- Brother, tell what thou hast done.

VICE: I have extinguished the noonday sun, In the carnage-smoke of battles won: Famine, Murder, h.e.l.l and Power Were glutted in that glorious hour Which searchless fate had stamped for me With the seal of her security...

For the bloated wretch on yonder throne Commanded the b.l.o.o.d.y fray to rise.

Like me he joyed at the stifled moan Wrung from a nation's miseries; While the snakes, whose slime even him DEFILED, In ecstasies of malice smiled: They thought 'twas theirs,--but mine the deed!

Theirs is the toil, but mine the meed-- Ten thousand victims madly bleed.

They dream that tyrants goad them there With poisonous war to taint the air: These tyrants, on their beds of thorn, Swell with the thoughts of murderous fame, And with their gains to lift my name Restless they plan from night to morn: I--I do all; without my aid Thy daughter, that relentless maid, Could never o'er a death-bed urge The fury of her venomed scourge.

FALSEHOOD: Brother, well:--the world is ours; And whether thou or I have won, The pestilence expectant lowers On all beneath yon blasted sun.

Our joys, our toils, our honours meet In the milk-white and wormy winding-sheet: A short-lived hope, unceasing care, Some heartless sc.r.a.ps of G.o.dly prayer, A moody curse, and a frenzied sleep Ere gapes the grave's unclosing deep, A tyrant's dream, a coward's start, The ice that clings to a priestly heart, A judge's frown, a courtier's smile, Make the great whole for which we toil; And, brother, whether thou or I Have done the work of misery, It little boots: thy toil and pain, Without my aid, were more than vain; And but for thee I ne'er had sate The guardian of Heaven's palace gate.

5. 1, 2:--

Thus do the generations of the earth Go to the grave, and issue from the womb.

'One generation pa.s.seth away, and another generation cometh; but the earth abideth for ever. The sun also ariseth, and the sun goeth down, and hasteth to his place where he arose. The wind goeth toward the south, and turneth about unto the north; it whirleth about continually, and the wind returneth again according to his circuits. All the rivers run into the sea; yet the sea is not full; unto the place from whence the rivers come, thither they return again.'--Ecclesiastes, chapter 1 verses 4-7.

5. 4-6.

Even as the leaves Which the keen frost-wind of the waning year Has scattered on the forest soil.

Oin per phullon genee, toiede kai andron.

Phulla ta men t' anemos chamadis cheei, alla de th' ule Telethoosa phuei, earos d' epigignetai ore.

Os andron genee, e men phuei, e d' apolegei.

Iliad Z, line 146.

5. 58:-- The mob of peasants, n.o.bles, priests, and kings.

Suave mari magno turbantibus aequora ventis E terra magnum alterius spectare laborem; Non quia vexari quemquam est iucunda voluptas, Sed quibus ipse malis careas quia cernere suave est.

Suave etiam belli certamina magna tueri Per campos instructa, tua sine parte pericli; Sed nil dulcius est bene quam munita tenere Edita doctrina sapientum templa serena, Despicere undo queas alios, pa.s.simque videre Errare atque viam palantis quaerere vitae; Certare ingenio; contendere n.o.bilitate; Noctes atque dies niti praestante labore Ad summas emergere opes, rerumque potiri.

O miseras hominum mentes! O pectora caeca!

Lucret. lib. 2.

5. 93, 94.

And statesmen boast Of wealth!

There is no real wealth but the labour of man. Were the mountains of gold and the valleys of silver, the world would not be one grain of corn the richer; no one comfort would be added to the human race. In consequence of our consideration for the precious metals, one man is enabled to heap to himself luxuries at the expense of the necessaries of his neighbour; a system admirably fitted to produce all the varieties of disease and crime, which never fail to characterize the two extremes of opulence and penury. A speculator takes pride to himself as the promoter of his country's prosperity, who employs a number of hands in the manufacture of articles avowedly dest.i.tute of use, or subservient only to the unhallowed cravings of luxury and ostentation. The n.o.bleman, who employs the peasants of his neighbourhood in building his palaces, until 'jam pauca aratro jugera regiae moles relinquunt,' flatters himself that he has gained the t.i.tle of a patriot by yielding to the impulses of vanity. The show and pomp of courts adduce the same apology for its continuance; and many a fete has been given, many a woman has eclipsed her beauty by her dress, to benefit the labouring poor and to encourage trade. Who does not see that this is a remedy which aggravates whilst it palliates the countless diseases of society? The poor are set to labour,--for what? Not the food for which they famish: not the blankets for want of which their babes are frozen by the cold of their miserable hovels: not those comforts of civilization without which civilized man is far more miserable than the meanest savage; oppressed as he is by all its insidious evils, within the daily and taunting prospect of its innumerable benefits a.s.siduously exhibited before him:--no; for the pride of power, for the miserable isolation of pride, for the false pleasures of the hundredth part of society. No greater evidence is afforded of the wide extended and radical mistakes of civilized man than this fact: those arts which are essential to his very being are held in the greatest contempt; employments are lucrative in an inverse ratio to their usefulness (See Rousseau, "De l'Inegalite parmi les Hommes", note 7.): the jeweller, the toyman, the actor gains fame and wealth by the exercise of his useless and ridiculous art; whilst the cultivator of the earth, he without whom society must cease to subsist, struggles through contempt and penury, and perishes by that famine which but for his unceasing exertions would annihilate the rest of mankind.

I will not insult common sense by insisting on the doctrine of the natural equality of man. The question is not concerning its desirableness, but its practicability: so far as it is practicable, it is desirable. That state of human society which approaches nearer to an equal part.i.tion of its benefits and evils should, caeteris paribus, be preferred: but so long as we conceive that a wanton expenditure of human labour, not for the necessities, not even for the luxuries of the ma.s.s of society, but for the egotism and ostentation of a few of its members, is defensible on the ground of public justice, so long we neglect to approximate to the redemption of the human race.

Labour is required for physical, and leisure for moral improvement: from the former of these advantages the rich, and from the latter the poor, by the inevitable conditions of their respective situations, are precluded. A state which should combine the advantages of both would be subjected to the evils of neither. He that is deficient in firm health, or vigorous intellect, is but half a man: hence it follows that to subject the labouring cla.s.ses to unnecessary labour is wantonly depriving them of any opportunities of intellectual improvement; and that the rich are heaping up for their own mischief the disease, la.s.situde, and ennui by which their existence is rendered an intolerable burthen.

English reformers exclaim against sinecures,--but the true pension list is the rent-roll of the landed proprietors: wealth is a power usurped by the few, to compel the many to labour for their benefit. The laws which support this system derive their force from the ignorance and credulity of its victims: they are the result of a conspiracy of the few against the many, who are themselves obliged to purchase this pre-eminence by the loss of all real comfort.

'The commodities that substantially contribute to the subsistence of the human species form a very short catalogue: they demand from us but a slender portion of industry. If these only were produced, and sufficiently produced, the species of man would be continued. If the labour necessarily required to produce them were equitably divided among the poor, and, still more, if it were equitably divided among all, each man's share of labour would be light, and his portion of leisure would be ample. There was a time when this leisure would have been of small comparative value: it is to be hoped that the time will come when it will be applied to the most important purposes. Those hours which are not required for the production of the necessaries of life may be devoted to the cultivation of the understanding, the enlarging our stock of knowledge, the refining our taste, and thus opening to us new and more exquisite sources of enjoyment.

'It was perhaps necessary that a period of monopoly and oppression should subsist, before a period of cultivated equality could subsist.

Savages perhaps would never have been excited to the discovery of truth and the invention of art but by the narrow motives which such a period affords. But surely, after the savage state has ceased, and men have set out in the glorious career of discovery and invention, monopoly and oppression cannot be necessary to prevent them from returning to a state of barbarism.'--G.o.dwin's "Enquirer", Essay 2. See also "Pol. Jus.", book 8, chapter 2.

It is a calculation of this admirable author, that all the conveniences of civilized life might be produced, if society would divide the labour equally among its members, by each individual being employed in labour two hours during the day.

5. 112, 113:--

or religion Drives his wife raving mad.

I am acquainted with a lady of considerable accomplishments, and the mother of a numerous family, whom the Christian religion has goaded to incurable insanity. A parallel case is, I believe, within the experience of every physician.

Nam iam saepe homines patriam, carosquo parentes Prodiderunt, vitare Acherusia templa petentes.--Lucretius.

5. 189:--

Even love is sold.

Not even the intercourse of the s.e.xes is exempt from the despotism of positive inst.i.tution. Law pretends even to govern the indisciplinable wanderings of pa.s.sion, to put fetters on the clearest deductions of reason, and, by appeals to the will, to subdue the involuntary affections of our nature. Love is inevitably consequent upon the perception of loveliness. Love withers under constraint: its very essence is liberty: it is compatible neither with obedience, jealousy, nor fear: it is there most pure, perfect, and unlimited, where its votaries live in confidence, equality, and unreserve.

How long then ought the s.e.xual connection to last? what law ought to specify the extent of the grievances which should limit its duration? A husband and wife ought to continue so long united as they love each other: any law which should bind them to cohabitation for one moment after the decay of their affection would be a most intolerable tyranny, and the most unworthy of toleration. How odious an usurpation of the right of private judgement should that law be considered which should make the ties of friendship indissoluble, in spite of the caprices, the inconstancy, the fallibility, and capacity for improvement of the human mind. And by so much would the fetters of love be heavier and more unendurable than those of friendship, as love is more vehement and capricious, more dependent on those delicate peculiarities of imagination, and less capable of reduction to the ostensible merits of the object.

The state of society in which we exist is a mixture of feudal savageness and imperfect civilization. The narrow and unenlightened morality of the Christian religion is an aggravation of these evils. It is not even until lately that mankind have admitted that happiness is the sole end of the science of ethics, as of all other sciences; and that the fanatical idea of mortifying the flesh for the love of G.o.d has been discarded. I have heard, indeed, an ignorant collegian adduce, in favour of Christianity, its hostility to every worldly feeling! (The first Christian emperor made a law by which seduction was punished with death; if the female pleaded her own consent, she also was punished with death; if the parents endeavoured to screen the criminals, they were banished and their estates were confiscated; the slaves who might be accessory were burned alive, or forced to swallow melted lead. The very offspring of an illegal love were involved in the consequences of the sentence.--Gibbon's "Decline and Fall", etc., volume 2, page 210. See also, for the hatred of the primitive Christians to love and even marriage, page 269.)

But if happiness be the object of morality, of all human unions and disunions; if the worthiness of every action is to be estimated by the quant.i.ty of pleasurable sensation it is calculated to produce, then the connection of the s.e.xes is so long sacred as it contributes to the comfort of the parties, and is naturally dissolved when its evils are greater than its benefits. There is nothing immoral in this separation.

Constancy has nothing virtuous in itself, independently of the pleasure it confers, and partakes of the temporizing spirit of vice in proportion as it endures tamely moral defects of magnitude in the object of its indiscreet choice. Love is free: to promise for ever to love the same woman is not less absurd than to promise to believe the same creed: such a vow, in both cases, excludes us from all inquiry. The language of the votarist is this: The woman I now love may be infinitely inferior to many others; the creed I now profess may be a ma.s.s of errors and absurdities; but I exclude myself from all future information as to the amiability of the one and the truth of the other, resolving blindly, and in spite of conviction, to adhere to them. Is this the language of delicacy and reason? Is the love of such a frigid heart of more worth than its belief?

The present system of constraint does no more, in the majority of instances, than make hypocrites or open enemies. Persons of delicacy and virtue, unhappily united to one whom they find it impossible to love, spend the loveliest season of their life in unproductive efforts to appear otherwise than they are, for the sake of the feelings of their partner or the welfare of their mutual offspring: those of less generosity and refinement openly avow their disappointment, and linger out the remnant of that union, which only death can dissolve, in a state of incurable bickering and hostility. The early education of their children takes its colour from the squabbles of the parents; they are nursed in a systematic school of ill-humour, violence, and falsehood.

Had they been suffered to part at the moment when indifference rendered their union irksome, they would have been spared many years of misery: they would have connected themselves more suitably, and would have found that happiness in the society of more congenial partners which is for ever denied them by the despotism of marriage. They would have been separately useful and happy members of society, who, whilst united, were miserable and rendered misanthropical by misery. The conviction that wedlock is indissoluble holds out the strongest of all temptations to the perverse: they indulge without restraint in acrimony, and all the little tyrannies of domestic life, when they know that their victim is without appeal. If this connection were put on a rational basis, each would be a.s.sured that habitual ill-temper would terminate in separation, and would check this vicious and dangerous propensity.

Prost.i.tution is the legitimate offspring of marriage and its accompanying errors. Women, for no other crime than having followed the dictates of a natural appet.i.te, are driven with fury from the comforts and sympathies of society. It is less venial than murder; and the punishment which is inflicted on her who destroys her child to escape reproach is lighter than the life of agony and disease to which the prost.i.tute is irrecoverably doomed. Has a woman obeyed the impulse of unerring nature;--society declares war against her, pitiless and eternal war: she must be the tame slave, she must make no reprisals; theirs is the right of persecution, hers the duty of endurance. She lives a life of infamy: the loud and bitter laugh of scorn scares her from all return. She dies of long and lingering disease: yet SHE is in fault, SHE is the criminal, SHE the froward and untamable child,--and society, forsooth, the pure and virtuous matron, who casts her as an abortion from her undefiled bosom! Society avenges herself on the criminals of her own creation; she is employed in anathematizing the vice to-day, which yesterday she was the most zealous to teach. Thus is formed one-tenth of the population of London: meanwhile the evil is twofold.

Young men, excluded by the fanatical idea of chast.i.ty from the society of modest and accomplished women, a.s.sociate with these vicious and miserable beings, destroying thereby all those exquisite and delicate sensibilities whose existence cold-hearted worldlings have denied; annihilating all genuine pa.s.sion, and debasing that to a selfish feeling which is the excess of generosity and devotedness. Their body and mind alike crumble into a hideous wreck of humanity; idiocy and disease become perpetuated in their miserable offspring, and distant generations suffer for the bigoted morality of their forefathers. Chast.i.ty is a monkish and evangelical superst.i.tion, a greater foe to natural temperance even than unintellectual sensuality; it strikes at the root of all domestic happiness, and consigns more than half of the human race to misery, that some few may monopolize according to law. A system could not well have been devised more studiously hostile to human happiness than marriage.

I conceive that from the abolition of marriage, the fit and natural arrangement of s.e.xual connection would result. I by no means a.s.sert that the intercourse would be promiscuous: on the contrary, it appears, from the relation of parent to child, that this union is generally of long duration, and marked above all others with generosity and self-devotion.

But this is a subject which it is perhaps premature to discuss. That which will result from the abolition of marriage will be natural and right; because choice and change will be exempted from restraint.