rate fail to see what the secret could have been according to the system in question."* Which is the more probable that the system in question has not been completely grasped, or that Shelley in this work, which he approached so deliberately and at which he confesses much arduous labor, should have utterly failed to make an artistic whole? Why this crude, indigested, foreign matter in the body of the poem? Why the chief dramatic scenes thus alien to the purpose? What makes a work of art a noble success is the complete subserviency of all parts to the organizing idea; to have left in the reconstructed myth any important elements that are meaningless now, would, one must admit, have been to reconstruct it very imperfectly. A theory of interpretation which leaves the secret Jupiter wants Prometheus to reveal a silly memory from Æschylus, and the marriage with Thetis of Jupiter a mere opportunity for illustrating the old adage, "pride goes before a fall," must be somewhat defective; or, granting it to be strictly correct, we must capitulate to Shelley's detractors, who claimed that he "could not construct a whole," simply allowing ourselves henceforth to rejoice in the beauty of disjointed parts as independent fragments. An effort will, however, be made in this paper to suggest such slight changes in the usual interpretations of some of the dramatic personages as shall allow of the poem's consistent unity; that is to say, we will strive to adapt our notion of Shelley's ideal system as held at the time he composed his Prometheus Unbound to what seem the requirements of the poem's own structure, laying every part of the same under contribution (in something like fair proportions to its poetic importance) for the philosophic and religious expositions of the whole. The problems whose solution concerns us are perplexing enough.* That Prometheus represents the prophetic soul of humanity (cf. Act III, sc. i, l. 5), or, as Mr. Rossetti puts it, “the mind of man seems clear beyond a doubt. It is only with this understanding of his signification that there is nothing hyperbolical in the assertion that he gave all that Jupiter has † (Act I, 1. 273, and 1. 382); that he gave man civilization (Act I, 1. 54, and Act II, sc. iv, l. 98); that for this he suffered, and that, in the nature of the case, his repentance of evil should amount to a liberation of himself, and the perfection of the race. Only with this meaning is it explicable that Prometheus, liberated, would spend his life creating and contemplating intellectual and moral ideals (Act III, sc. iii, ll. 22–62). The meaning of Asia is also quite definite.‡ A * The secret is, of course, without possible meaning, if the marriage of Jupiter and Thetis is a mere survival. The main object of this paper is, by a particular interpretation of Demogorgon, to give the marriage a real importance, esoteric as well as dramatic, and the secret would then be, as in the Greek work, the direfulness of this marriage which Jupiter looks upon as fortunate. † Cf. Act II, sc. iv, l. 44. Asia is the "glory unbeheld” (Act II, sc. v, 1. 60); the “golden chalice" to the “bright wine” of Prometheus' love,“ which else had sunk into the thirsty dust." (Act 1, 1. 820.) Her “presence " makes her prison beautiful, but, though separated from him, if she would cease, "fade" into nothing were it not" for Prometheus, the soul of man. (Act I, 1. 841.) Her " desire" is" harmonizing 66 pupil of Godwin could not possibly have viewed the emotive nature as other than the intellect. But were such an a priori ground insufficient, we have Shelley's own analysis of "thought," as he conceived the term, into subordinate terms: "Thought Thought.. and its quick elements, will, passion, reason, imagination," "*which would show the emotive nature of man to be comprised already in Prometheus. the else convenient hyphothesis, therefore, that Asia stands for Love, and her sisters for Hope and Faith, can not be accepted. She is not Love so much as the Loveable, that which kindles Love. Mrs. Shelley says she is Nature; Nature, that is to say, in her potential beauty; the dream of the physical world's glory that arose from the calm deep seas as they mirrored the calmer deeper heavens. Panthea declares that "love, like the atmosphere Of the sun's fire filling the living world, Burst from her and illumined earth and heaven And the deep ocean, and the sunless caves 1. 26.) this earth with what we feel above" (Act III, sc. v, l. 95), namely, with herself. "It is true that the sensitive organization of Shelley, shrinking from the rough contact with reality, never quite looked Nature in the face; and in the west wind and sunset cloud, in running stream and fragrant flower, he recognized a more benignant manifestation of power than that which he saw in the social state of man, because what he saw reflected by these passive phenomena was in reality the shade of his own soul, and his own soul, being one of the loveliest as well as loftiest that ever passed across the stage of the world, transmuted the visible universe to something after its own likeness."-"Shelley's View of Nature," etc., by Mathilde Blind, printed among the Shelley Society Papers. Speech of Ahasuerus in "Hellas." Asia is not love,* though by her beauty the direct source of it; and, since she is seen in all, causes love to irradiate all. The mind of man, married to nature, separated, reunited, is then the theme of the whole poem. But our problem lies in the significance of Jupiter and particularly of Demogorgon. 5. PROMETHEUS BOUND. Before we address ourselves seriously to the solution of the principal enigmas (1) just what Demogorgon must signify in order to play in reality the part which he does in the plot of the poem, and (2) why that part is played, whether at the solicitation of Asia, or by some eternal fate, or by some spiritual necessitation immanent in Prometheus himself (else how shall he realize his ideal of being not the "saved," but the "savior")? Before we launch into these seas of difficult speculation, though guided all the while by the words of the poem itself, it will be, no doubt, advisable to take a glance at Prometheus and Jupiter as they are sketched by Aeschylus of old, against whose solution Shelley protests so strongly in his preface, and from whose understanding of what constitutes the sublimest virtue, he differs toto cœlo. In a paragraph or two, it will be easy to summarize their chief characteristics. There is in the poem of Aeschylus a reverence for Zeus (doubtless sincere enough, but not at all akin to esteem), which clashes sorely with the sympathy accorded to his foe and victim. Sin is viewed politically. It is simply * See note, p. 161. resistance to "whoso rules." Hence Prometheus says, without sign of shame or contrition: "I have known All in prevision. By my choice, my choice I freely sinned-I will confess my sin And helping mortals, found mine own despair.' (1. 313.) * He defies penalty-a dreader visitation of woe than death: : "Why let him do it! I am here prepared For all things and their pangs." (1. 1111.) The wrong he complains of is a too severe punishment for his offense; indeed, the base ingratitude of Zeus in failing to balance the offense against former service rendered, and so to remit all otherwise deserved penalty. He hates Zeus; does not fear him, nor reverence him. Against the unwilling servants of Zeus he harbors no malice, but scorns them : "I would not barter My suffering for thy service. I maintain It is a nobler thing to serve these rocks Than live a faithful slave to father Zeus." (1. 1247.) He has sympathy for his fellow Titans, and to Oceanus, who is still left his old free deity and sway, -not surely without some latent contempt, he says: "I gratulate thee, who hast shared and dared All things with me, except their penalty." (1. 388.) He is willing to receive sympathy: "Think not I am silent thus Through pride or scorn," (1.505.) though he has done with wail" for his "own griefs" (1. 719), and if he grieves, he does "not therefore wish to multiply the griefs of others." (1. 404.) * References are to Mrs. Browning's Prometheus Bound. |