My Recollections of Lord Byron
acts of beneficence: to change the position of some among his
fellow-men, and make them exchange misery for unexpected good fortune,
was for him the dearest exercise of his faculties. No one ever
sympathized more deeply with the joys he could create."
The same biographer remarks that one great error of Lord Byron's youth
was to count upon gratitude and devotedness proportionate to his own,
and that most of his accusations against human nature originated with
this mistake. And then he adds:--
"But his sentiments, in accordance with his nature, far from obeying the
false direction his prejudices and erroneous opinions would have given,
always made him, on the contrary, love his fellow-men with a warmth that
quite excluded misanthropy. Still this natural ardor rendered him
extremely sensitive to neglect from those he loved, especially in early
youth, when he was led by the fault of an individual to generalize blame
against mankind. He relates somewhere, with merited contempt, that one
of his friends would accompany a female relative to her milliner,
instead of coming to take leave of him when he was about to leave
England for a long time. The truth is that _no one ever loved his
neighbor as much as Lord Byron_. Sympathy, respect, affection,
attention, were perpetual wants with him. He was really disgusted and
sad when they failed him. But then he did not reason much, he only felt
like a poet. It was his business to feed all these discontents, for the
public likes nothing so much in poetry as disdain, contempt, derision,
indignation, and particularly a kind of proud mockery, which forms the
line of transition from or distinguishes a disordered state of
imagination from madness. Consequently, seeing that this sort of tone
pleased the public, when he began to write again he encouraged that
style, his first care being to collect, like Jupiter, the darkest
clouds."
The same biographer also tries to insinuate that the romantic interest
excited by a handsome young man, full of melancholy and mystery, may
have influenced Lord Byron's choice of heroes in his early poems; for,
says he, it is not every one who can be weary of the most exquisite
enjoyments of society, and to be thus sated a man must have been greatly
prized by beauty and wealth. These reflections and explanations are
arbitrary, and not impartial. But even if Lord Byron, at twenty-one
years of age, did borrow ideas and sentiments not really his, by way of
producing poetic effect, we must nevertheless acknowledge that, even in
this order of sentiments, part still were genuine and real. Like all
young men, Lord Byron had entered the world armed with the notions
preceptors deem it necessary to inculcate on their disciples regarding
generosity, disinterestedness, liberty, honor, patriotism, etc. When he
saw that almost all he had thus been taught was mere illusion, a theme
for declamation, and that people in the world very rarely act on such
principles; then, no doubt, with his exquisite sensibility, and elevated
standard of ideal, he must have felt himself more disgusted than any one
else, and must have believed he had a right to despise the human race.
Especially would this have been the case after he had personally
suffered from cruel satire, from the conduct of his relative and
guardian, Lord Carlisle, from the lightness of a few women, and the
lukewarmness of some few friends. But, while owing to this fault in
education, many young men subjected to like trials become sensualists,
and others, convinced of the falsities that have been inculcated on
them, conclude there is no better system of morality than to seek after
place, power, and profit, and become voluntary instruments in the hands
of the world's oppressors, Lord Byron's soul revolted at it. Too noble
by nature to stoop, and confiding also in his genius, he became a poet
with a slight tinge of misanthropy in his mind, but that could never
reach unto his heart, that never modified his amiability in society, and
which at a later period, when experience of life made him reflect more
on the nature of his own sentiments and the weakness of humanity, became
transformed into a sweet philosophy, full of indulgence for every human
defect. This generous disposition is to be found at the base of all his
poems written in Italy.
Another reproach brought against Lord Byron is that he did not paint the
good side of human nature. People showed as much indignation at this as
if he had betrayed some secret, or calumniated some innocent person. A
wondrous susceptibility, assuredly, with regard to the imperfections of
our common nature, as tardy as strange. One would think, in reading the
reproaches addressed to Lord Byron, that those who made them had quite
forgotten how, from all time and in all languages, since man commented
on man, our poor human nature has not generally been treated with much
respect. Putting to one side moralists, and still more pessimists, have
not the Holy Scriptures and all the Fathers of the Church, used the most
mortifying language concerning the perversity and corruption of our
species? As regards complaints and avowals humiliating for our nature,
could there be any more eloquent than those of St. Augustine? Did not
Pascal almost wish man to understand that _he is an incomprehensible
monster_? Lord Byron would not have called man a _monster_; but shocked
at his pride he would willingly have said with Pascal, "If he raises
himself, I will lower him; if he abuses himself, I will raise him up."
In his drama of "Cain," where Lucifer is conducting Cain through space
and worlds, "Where is earth?" asks Cain. "'Tis now beyond thee, less in
the universe than thou in it," answers Lucifer. Byron always wished to
make man feel his littleness. It is true that, while saying the same
thing, a notable difference exists between Lord Byron's thought and that
of great Christian souls, who humble man in order to make him see that
his sole hope is in supernatural power. Lord Byron follows the same
road, but his starting-point and his goal are not the same. When Lord
Byron humbles man, it proceeds from a soul-felt want of truth and
justice. He sought truth by a natural law of his mind, expressed it
unflinchingly, and thus yielded a pleasure to his heart and
understanding. But if the impulse that sometimes provoked his severe or
contemptuous words was not the sublime one of Christian orthodoxy, that
sees no remedy for human depravity save in God alone, it was still
farther off from belonging to the school of the pessimists, of La
Rochefoucault in particular, who, content with asserting evil, neither
saw nor sought for a remedy anywhere. Lord Byron never despaired of
mankind. In early youth, especially, he thought,--not like a Utopist, or
even a poet, but like a sensible, humane, generous man, who deems that
many of the evils that afflict his species, morally and physically,
might be alleviated by better laws, under whose influence more goodness,
sincerity, and real virtue might be substituted for the hypocrisy and
other vices that now deprave our nature. Lord Byron saw in many vices
and littlenesses the work of man rather than of nature. It was man
corrupted by society, rather than by nature, that he condemned.
If religious hopes did not furnish him with an escape from the cruel
sentence, philosophical hopes saved him from being overwhelmed by it.
Was that an error?--an illusion? In any case, it was a noble one;
sufficient to raise up an insurmountable barrier between him and La
Rochefoucault. For a time, it is true, in his first youth, he also
seemed to be under the prestige La Rochefoucault exercised over so many
minds, through his "Maxims." The elegant manner in which they were
written, the clever tone of observation they displayed, boldly laying
down the result in the shape of axioms, was well calculated to lead a
youthful mind astray, and make a relative appear an absolute truth. For
a while, Lord Byron also seemed to confound the self-love that merges
into real hateful egotism, with that which constitutes the principle of
life, and which, under the influence of heart and intelligence, claims
the high name of virtue. He seemed to doubt of many things, and to be
uneasy at the best impulses of his heart. We may remember that he
accused himself of selfishness, because he took pleasure in the exercise
of amiable virtues. But then that was only the passing error of a
youthful mind, filled with an ideal of excellence too high for reality;
and therefore coming into rude contact with deceptions and sorrows. In
those days, recalling the fine pictures of life and mankind that had
been presented to him as realities, especially at his first onset, and
perceiving how different things actually were, seeing men pursue their
fellow-men, and ascribe vices to the good and virtues to the bad, not
even finding in his friends the qualities that distinguished his own
heart, indignant at seeing so many persons sought after for their
attractions, despite the vices that defaced them, his soul revolted at
the sight--saddened too--and he exclaimed, sorrowfully, in his
memoranda:--"_Yes, La Rochefoucault is right._"
An illusion might find place in Lord Byron's mind, but it could not
last; and if people will read with attention what he has written, they
will soon understand the great difference existing between him and the
author of the "Maxims." Without even speaking of that which separates
prose from poetry, an axiom from a hasty expression, grave from gay,
maxims from satire, the difference is still enormous. Lord Byron had not
received from nature, any more than the author of the "Maxims," the gift
of seeing things in a roseate hue. On the contrary, from his habit of
profound observation, he too often saw them enveloped in sombre colors.
But, on the other hand, he had received such a great gift of
perspicacity and exactness that things false and fictitious could no
more resist his glance than fog can resist the rays of the sun. La
Rochefoucault is certainly an admirable painter, but he never takes a
likeness otherwise than by profile. Just as our satellite turns round
our planet, only showing us its volcanoes and calcined summits, and
leaving us in ignorance of the other side; just so did La Rochefoucault
turn around human nature. It only showed him one side,--the most barren
and most unhealthy, and that alone did he describe. Still, his
description is made with such art and nicety, and has so much charm
about it, that it appears correct at first sight, and, indeed, so it is
relatively; but, nevertheless, by dint of omission and generalization,
it is false, since it would fain impose a part upon us for the whole. In
his voyage of exploration through the windings of the human heart the
author of the "Maxims" stops midway, and comes back over the same
ground. It would appear as if his mind lacked strength to go through
more than half the circle of truth. But Lord Byron, through the vigor
and elasticity of his faculties, after having penetrated into the dark
regions where only evil is perceived, and gone through the whole circle,
raised himself up into that pure, serene atmosphere where goodness and
virtue inhabit, and he also could say, with Dante, coming out of the
last infernal circle,--
"Alfin tornammo a riveder le stelle."
La Rochefoucault always rails against mankind, without ever finding out
any good. Lord Byron, on the contrary, sees both good and evil. He
points out the latter, often sadly, and sometimes with light jests; but
he is always happy to acknowledge seriously the existence of good, and
to proclaim that, despite all hinderances, beautiful souls do exist,
practicing all kinds of virtue; thus proving that, however rare, virtue
to him is still a reality, and no illusion. If, in his burlesque,