Nature. (45) In 'the unapparent' he was welcomed by
Chatterton, Sidney, Lucan, and (46) many more immortals, and was hailed
as the master of a 'kingless sphere' in a 'heaven of song.' (48) Let any
rash mourner go to Rome, and (49) visit the cemetery. (53) And thou, my
heart, why linger and shrink? Adonais calls thee: be no longer divided
from him. (55) The soul of Adonais beacons to thee 'from the abode where
the Eternal are.'

This may he the most convenient place for raising a question of leading
importance to the Argument of _Adonais_--Who is the personage designated
under the name Urania?--a question which, so far as I know, has never
yet been mooted among the students of Shelley. Who is Urania? Why is she
represented as the mother of Adonais (Keats), and the chief mourner for
his untimely death?

In mythology the name Urania is assigned to two divinities wholly
distinct. The first is one of the nine Muses, the Muse of Astronomy: the
second is Aphrodite (Venus). We may without any hesitation assume that
Shelley meant one of these two: but a decision, as to which of the two
becomes on reflection by no means so obvious as one might at first
suppose. We will first examine the question as to the Muse Urania.

To say that the poet Keats, figured as Adonais, was son to one of the
Muses, appears so natural and straightforward a symbolic suggestion as
to command summary assent. But why, out of the nine sisters, should the
Muse of Astronomy be selected? Keats never wrote about astronomy, and
had no qualifications and no faintest inclination for writing about it:
this science, and every other exact or speculative science, were highly
alien from his disposition and turn of mind. And yet, on casting about
for a reason, we can find that after all and in a certain sense there is
one forthcoming, of some considerable amount of relevancy. In the eyes
of Shelley, Keats was principally and above all the poet of _Hyperion_;
and _Hyperion_ is, strictly speaking, a poem about the sun. In like
manner, _Endymion_ is a poem about the moon. Thus, from one point of
view--I cannot see any other--Keats might be regarded as inspired by, or
a son of, the Muse of Astronomy. A subordinate point of some difficulty
arises from stanza 6, where Adonais is spoken of as 'the nursling of thy
[Urania's] widowhood'--which seems to mean, son of Urania, born after
the father's death. Urania is credited in mythology with the motherhood
of two sons--Linus,