Letters of John Keats to His Family and Friends
Hastings and whom I met when we were going to the English Opera. It was in
a street which goes from Bedford Row to Lamb's Conduit Street.--I passed
her and turned back: she seemed glad of it--glad to see me, and not
offended at my passing her before. We walked on towards Islington, where
we called on a friend of hers who keeps a Boarding School. She has always
been an enigma to me--she has been in a Room with you and Reynolds, and
wishes we should be acquainted without any of our common acquaintance
knowing it. As we went along, sometimes through shabby, sometimes through
decent Streets, I had my guessing at work, not knowing what it would be,
and prepared to meet any surprise. First it ended at this House at
Islington: on parting from which I pressed to attend her home. She
consented, and then again my thoughts were at work what it might lead to,
though now they had received a sort of genteel hint from the Boarding
School. Our Walk ended in 34 Gloucester Street, Queen Square--not exactly
so, for we went upstairs into her sitting-room, a very tasty sort of place
with Books, Pictures, a bronze Statue of Buonaparte, Music, aeolian Harp, a
Parrot, a Linnet, a Case of choice Liqueurs, etc. etc. She behaved in the
kindest manner--made me take home a Grouse for Tom's dinner. Asked for my
address for the purpose of sending more game.... I expect to pass some
pleasant hours with her now and then: in which I feel I shall be of
service to her in matters of knowledge and taste: if I can I will.... She
and your George are the only women a peu pres de mon age whom I would be
content to know for their mind and friendship alone.--I shall in a short
time write you as far as I know how I intend to pass my Life--I cannot
think of those things now Tom is so unwell and weak. Notwithstanding your
Happiness and your recommendation I hope I shall never marry. Though the
most beautiful Creature were waiting for me at the end of a Journey or a
Walk; though the Carpet were of Silk, the Curtains of the morning Clouds;
the chairs and Sofa stuffed with Cygnet's down; the food Manna, the Wine
beyond Claret, the Window opening on Winander mere, I should not feel--or
rather my Happiness would not be so fine, as my Solitude is sublime. Then
instead of what I have described, there is a sublimity to welcome me
home--The roaring of the wind is my wife and the Stars through the window
pane are my Children. The mighty abstract Idea I have of Beauty in all
things stifles the more divided and minute domestic happiness--an amiable
wife and sweet Children I contemplate as a part of that Beauty, but I must
have a thousand of those beautiful particles to fill up my heart. I feel
more and more every day, as my imagination strengthens, that I do not live
in this world alone but in a thousand worlds--No sooner am I alone than
shapes of epic greatness are stationed around me, and serve my Spirit the
office which is equivalent to a King's bodyguard--then "Tragedy with
sceptred pall comes sweeping by." According to my state of mind I am with
Achilles shouting in the Trenches, or with Theocritus in the Vales of
Sicily. Or I throw my whole being into Troilus, and repeating those lines,
"I wander like a lost Soul upon the stygian Banks staying for waftage," I
melt into the air with a voluptuousness so delicate that I am content to
be alone. These things, combined with the opinion I have of the generality
of women--who appear to me as children to whom I would rather give a sugar
Plum than my time, form a barrier against Matrimony which I rejoice in.
I have written this that you might see I have my share of the highest
pleasures, and that though I may choose to pass my days alone I shall be
no Solitary. You see there is nothing spleenical in all this. The only
thing that can ever affect me personally for more than one short passing
day, is any doubt about my powers for poetry--I seldom have any, and I
look with hope to the nighing time when I shall have none. I am as happy
as a Man can be--that is, in myself I should be happy if Tom was well, and
I knew you were passing pleasant days. Then I should be most
enviable--with the yearning Passion I have for the beautiful, connected
and made one with the ambition of my intellect. Think of my Pleasure in
Solitude in comparison of my commerce with the world--there I am a
child--there they do not know me, not even my most intimate
acquaintance--I give into their feelings as though I were refraining from
irritating a little child. Some think me middling, others silly, others
foolish--every one thinks he sees my weak side against my will, when in
truth it is with my will--I am content to be thought all this because I
have in my own breast so great a resource. This is one great reason why
they like me so; because they can all show to advantage in a room and
eclipse from a certain tact one who is reckoned to be a good Poet. I hope
I am not here playing tricks 'to make the angels weep': I think not: for I
have not the least contempt for my species, and though it may sound
paradoxical, my greatest elevations of soul leave me every time more
humbled--Enough of this--though in your Love for me you will not think it
enough.
[Later, October 29 or 31.]
Haslam has been here this morning and has taken all the Letters except
this sheet, which I shall send him by the Twopenny, as he will put the
Parcel in the Boston post Bag by the advice of Capper and Hazlewood, who
assure him of the safety and expedition that way--the Parcel will be
forwarded to Warder and thence to you all the same. There will not be a
Philadelphia ship for these six weeks--by that time I shall have another
Letter to you. Mind you I mark this Letter A. By the time you will receive
this you will have I trust passed through the greatest of your fatigues.
As it was with your Sea Sickness I shall not hear of them till they are
past. Do not set to your occupation with too great an anxiety--take it
calmly--and let your health be the prime consideration. I hope you will
have a Son, and it is one of my first wishes to have him in my Arms--which
I will do please God before he cuts one double tooth. Tom is rather more
easy than he has been: but is still so nervous that I cannot speak to him
of these Matters--indeed it is the care I have had to keep his Mind aloof
from feelings too acute that has made this Letter so short a one--I did
not like to write before him a Letter he knew was to reach your hands--I
cannot even now ask him for any Message--his heart speaks to you. Be as
happy as you can. Think of me, and for my sake be cheerful.
Believe me, my dear Brother and sister, Your anxious and affectionate
Brother
JOHN.
This day is my Birth day.
All our friends have been anxious in their enquiries, and all send their
remembrances.
LXXIV.--TO FANNY KEATS.
Hampstead, Friday Morn [October 16, 1818].
My dear Fanny--You must not condemn me for not being punctual to Thursday,
for I really did not know whether it would not affect poor Tom too much to
see you. You know how it hurt him to part with you the last time. At all
events you shall hear from me; and if Tom keeps pretty well to-morrow, I
will see Mr. Abbey the next day, and endeavour to settle that you shall be
with us on Tuesday or Wednesday. I have good news from George--He has
landed safely with our Sister--they are both in good health--their
prospects are good--and they are by this time nighing to their journey's
end--you shall hear the particulars soon.
Your affectionate Brother
JOHN.
Tom's love to you.
LXXV.--TO FANNY KEATS.
[Hampstead, October 26, 1818.]
My dear Fanny--I called on Mr. Abbey in the beginning of last Week: when
he seemed averse to letting you come again from having heard that you had
been to other places besides Well Walk. I do not mean to say you did
wrongly in speaking of it, for there should rightly be no objection to
such things: but you know with what People we are obliged in the course of
Childhood to associate, whose conduct forces us into duplicity and
falsehood to them. To the worst of People we should be openhearted: but it
is as well as things are to be prudent in making any communication to any
one, that may throw an impediment in the way of any of the little
pleasures you may have. I do not recommend duplicity but prudence with
such people. Perhaps I am talking too deeply for you: if you do not now,
you will understand what I mean in the course of a few years. I think poor
Tom is a little Better: he sends his love to you. I shall call on Mr.
Abbey to-morrow: when I hope to settle when to see you again. Mrs. Dilke
has been for some time at Brighton--she is expected home in a day or two.
She will be pleased I am sure with your present. I will try for permission
for you to remain here all Night should Mrs. D. return in time.
Your affectionate Brother
JOHN ----.
LXXVI.--TO RICHARD WOODHOUSE.
[Hampstead, October 27, 1818.]
My dear Woodhouse--Your letter gave me great satisfaction, more on account
of its friendliness than any relish of that matter in it which is
accounted so acceptable to the "genus irritabile." The best answer I can
give you is in a clerklike manner to make some observations on two
principal points which seem to point like indices into the midst of the
whole pro and con about genius, and views, and achievements, and ambition,
et caetera.--1st. As to the poetical Character itself (I mean that sort, of
which, if I am anything, I am a member; that sort distinguished from the
Wordsworthian, or egotistical Sublime; which is a thing per se, and stands
alone,) it is not itself--it has no self--It is everything and nothing--It
has no character--it enjoys light and shade; it lives in gusto, be it foul
or fair, high or low, rich or poor, mean or elevated--It has as much
delight in conceiving an Iago as an Imogen. What shocks the virtuous
philosopher delights the chameleon poet. It does no harm from its relish
of the dark side of things, any more than from its taste for the bright
one, because they both end in speculation. A poet is the most unpoetical
of anything in existence, because he has no Identity--he is continually in
for and filling some other body. The Sun,--the Moon,--the Sea, and men and
women, who are creatures of impulse, are poetical, and have about them an
unchangeable attribute; the poet has none, no identity--he is certainly
the most unpoetical of all God's creatures.--If then he has no self, and
if I am a poet, where is the wonder that I should say I would write no
more? Might I not at that very instant have been cogitating on the
Characters of Saturn and Ops?[83] It is a wretched thing to confess; but
it is a very fact, that not one word I ever utter can be taken for granted
as an opinion growing out of my identical Nature--how can it, when I have
no Nature? When I am in a room with people, if I ever am free from
speculating on creations of my own brain, then, not myself goes home to
myself, but the identity of every one in the room begins to press upon me,
so that I am in a very little time annihilated--not only among men; it
would be the same in a nursery of Children. I know not whether I make
myself wholly understood: I hope enough so to let you see that no
dependence is to be placed on what I said that day.
In the 2d place, I will speak of my views, and of the life I purpose to
myself. I am ambitious of doing the world some good: if I should be
spared, that may be the work of maturer years--in the interval I will
assay to reach to as high a summit in poetry as the nerve bestowed upon me
will suffer. The faint conceptions I have of poems to come bring the blood
frequently into my forehead--All I hope is, that I may not lose all