of Keats's writings, accompanied with a biographical notice, and I engaged to use them to the best of my ability for the purpose of vindicating the character and advancing the fame of his honoured friend.

As soon as my intention was made known, I received from the friends and acquaintances of the poet the kindest assistance. His earliest guide and companion in literature, Mr. Cowden Clarke, and his comrades in youthful study, Mr. Holmes and Mr. Felton Mathew, supplied me with all their recollections of his boyhood; Mr. Reynolds, whom Mr. Leigh Hunt, in the "Examiner" of 1816, associated with Shelley and Keats as the three poets of promise whom time was ripening, contributed the rich store of correspondence, which began with Keats's introduction into literary society, and never halted to the last; Mr. Haslam and Mr. Dilke aided me with letters and remembrances, and many persons who casually heard of my project forwarded me information that circumstances had placed in their way. To the enlightened publishers Messrs. Taylor and Hessey, and to Mr. Ollier, I am also indebted for willing cooperation.

Mr. Leigh Hunt had already laid his offering on

the shrine of his beloved brother in the trials and triumphs of genius, and could only encourage me by his interest and sympathy.

I have already mentioned Mr. Severn, without whom I should probably have never thought of undertaking the task, and who now offered me the additional inducement of an excellent portrait of his friend to prefix to the book: he has also in his possession a small full-length of Keats sitting reading, which is considered a striking and characteristic resemblance.

But perhaps the most valuable, as the most confidential communication I received, was from the gentleman who has married the widow of George Keats, and who placed at my disposal, with the consent of the family, the letters George received from his brother after he emigrated to America. I have taken the liberty of omitting some few unimportant passages which referred exclusively to individuals or transitory circumstances, regarding this part of the correspondence as of a more private character than any other that has fallen into my hands.

I am not indeed unprepared for the charge, that I have published in these volumes much that

might well have been omitted, both for its own irrelevancy, and from the decent reverence that should always veil, more or less, the intimate family concerns and the deep internal life of those that are Never has such remonstrance been more ably expressed than in the following passage from Mr. Wordsworth's "Letter to a friend of Robert Burns,"* and which, on account of the rarity of the pamphlet, I here transcribe:

no more.

Biography, though differing in some essentials from works of fiction, is nevertheless like them an art—an art, the laws of which are determined by the imperfections of our nature and the constitution of society. Truth is not here, as in the sciences and in natural philosophy, to be sought without scruple, and promulgated for its own sake upon the mere chance of its being serviceable, but only for obviously justifying purposes, moral or intellectual. Silence is a privilege of the grave, a right of the departed; let him therefore, who infringes that right by speaking publicly of, for, or against those who cannot speak for themselves, take heed that he open not his mouth without a sufficient sanction.

* Published 1816.

*

The general obligation upon which I have insisted is especially binding upon those who undertake the biography of authors. Assuredly there is no cause why the lives of that class of men should be pried into with diligent curiosity, and laid open with the same disregard of reserve which may sometimes be expedient in composing the history of men who have borne an active part in the world. Such thorough knowledge of the good and bad qualities of these latter, as can only be obtained by a scrutiny of their private bias, conduces to explain, not only their own public conduct, but that of those with whom they have acted. Nothing of this applies to authors, considered merely as authors. Our business is with V their books, to understand and to enjoy them. of poets more especially it is true, that if their works be good, they contain within themselves all that is necessary to their being comprehended and relished. It should seem that the ancients thought in this manner, for of the eminent Greek and Roman poets, few and scanty memorials were, I believe, ever prepared, and fewer still are preserved. It is delightful to read what, in the happy exercise of his own genius, Horace chooses to communicate of

And

himself and his friends; but I confess I am not so much a lover of knowledge independent of its quality, as to make it likely that it would much rejoice me were I to hear that records of the Sabine poet and his contemporaries, composed upon the Boswellian plan, had been unearthed among the ruins of Herculaneum."

With this earnest warning before me, I hesitated some time as to the application of my materials. It was easy for me to construct out of them a signal monument of the worth and genius of Keats: by selecting the circumstances and the passages that illustrated the extent of his abilities, the purity of his objects and the nobleness of his nature, I might have presented to the world a monography, apparently perfect, and at least as real as those which the affection or pride of the relatives or dependants of remarkable personages generally prefix to their works. But I could not be unconscious that, if I were able to present to public view the true personality of a man of genius, without either wounding the feelings of mourning friends or detracting from his existing reputation, I should be doing a much better thing in itself, and one much more becoming