After many vicissitudes, opinion seems to be agreeing to recognise Shelley as the supreme lyrist, all of whose poems, whatever their outward form, should be viewed from the lyrical standpoint. This is a just judgment, for even the apparently austere and methodical ‘Cenci’ is as truly born of a passionate lyrical impulse as any of his songs. Despite his limitations, no modern poet, unless it be Wordsworth, has so deeply influenced English poetry.
The splendour of his prose style, while exalting his character for imagination, has seemed incompatible with homely wisdom. In reality his essays and correspondence are not more distinguished by fine insight into high matters than by sound common-sense in ordinary things. No contemporary, perhaps, so habitually conveys the impression of a man in advance of his time. His capacity for calm discussion appears to advantage under the most provoking circumstances, as in his correspondence with Godwin, Booth, and Southey. As a critic, Shelley does not possess Coleridge's subtlety and penetration, but has a gift for the intuitive recognition of excellence which occasionally carries him too far in enthusiasm, but at all events insures him against the petty and self-interested jealousies from which none of his contemporaries, except Scott and Keats, can be considered exempt. This delight in the work of others, even more than his own poetical power, renders him matchless as a translator. Of his lyrics, those which have been most frequently set to music are: ‘I arise from dreams of thee,’ ‘The Cloud,’ ‘The fountains mingle with the river,’ ‘One word is too often profaned,’ and ‘Music when soft voices die.’
Only two genuine portraits of Shelley are extant, and neither is satisfactory. The earlier, a miniature, was taken when he was only thirteen or fourteen, and is authenticated by its strong and undesigned resemblance to miniatures of the Pilfold family. The later portrait, painted by Miss Curran at Rome in 1819, was left in a flat and unfinished state. ‘I was on the point of burning it before I left Italy,’ the artist told Mrs. Shelley; ‘I luckily saved it just as the fire was scorching.’ There is a general agreement among the descriptions of personal acquaintance; all agree as to the slight but tall and sinewy frame, the abundant brown hair, the fair but somewhat tanned and freckled complexion, the dark blue eyes, with their habitual expression of rapt wonder, and the general appearance of extreme youth. Resemblances, by no means merely fanciful, have been found with the portraits of Novalis, of Sir Robert Dudley, styled duke of Northumberland and earl of Warwick [q. v.], and of Antonio Leisman in the Florentine Ritratti de' Pittori. The preternatural keenness of his senses is well attested, and contributed to the illusions which play so large a part in his history. Of late years two splendid monuments have been erected to Shelley by the piety of his son and daughter-in-law; one is in Christchurch minster, Hampshire; the other, designed by Mr. Onslow Ford, R.A., is at University College, Oxford.
