e cherished plan of a drama suggested by the Book
of Job, were due to the depressing effects of ill-health and external
discouragement. Poetry with Shelley was no light matter. He composed
under the pressure of intense excitement, and he elaborated his first
draughts with minute care and severe self-criticism.

These words must not be taken as implying that he followed the Virgilian
precedent of polishing and reducing the volume of his verses by an
anxious exercise of calm reflection, or that he observed the Horatian
maxim of deferring their publication till the ninth year. The contrary
was notoriously the case with him. Yet it is none the less proved by the
state of his manuscripts that his compositions, even as we now possess
them, were no mere improvisations. The passage already quoted from his
"Defence of Poetry" shows the high ideal he had conceived of the poet's
duty toward his art; and it may be confidently asserted that his whole
literary career was one long struggle to emerge from the incoherence of
his earlier efforts, into the clearness of expression and precision of
form that are the index of mastery over style. At the same time it was
inconsistent with his most firmly rooted aesthetic principles to attempt
composition except under an impulse approaching to inspiration. To
imperil his life by the fiery taxing of all his faculties, moral,
intellectual, and physical, and to undergo the discipline exacted by his
own fastidious taste, with no other object in view than the frigid
compliments of a few friends, was more than even Shelley's enthusiasm
could endure. He, therefore, at this period required the powerful
stimulus of some highly exciting cause from without to determine his
activity.

Such external stimulus came to Shelley from three quarters early in the
year 1821. Among his Italian acquaintances at Pisa was a clever but
disreputable Professor, of whom Medwin draws a very piquant portrait.
This man one day related the sad story of a beautiful and noble lady,
the Contessina Emilia Viviani, who had been confined by her father in a
dismal convent of the suburbs, to await her marriage with a distasteful
husband. Shelley, fired as ever by a tale of tyranny, was eager to visit
the fair captive. The Professor accompanied him and Medwin to the
convent-parlour, where they found her more lovely than even the most
glowing descriptions had led them to expect. Nor was she only beautiful.
Shelley soon discovered that