cult to fix the
fairy fabric of his character, is itself the clue to whatever was most
dazzling in his might, or startling in his levity, or most attractive or
most repellent in his life and genius. A variety of powers almost
boundless, and a pride no less vast in displaying them; an unusual
susceptibility and an uncontrolled impetuosity--such were the two great
sources of all that varied spectacle of his life--unchecked feeling and
dominant self-will.

Great versatility of power will hardly be found without a tendency to
versatility of principle. Byron was fully aware, not only of this
characteristic quality of his nature, but also of its danger to
singleness of character; and this consciousness had the effect of
keeping him in a general line of consistency, throughout life, on
certain great subjects, and helped him to preserve unbroken the greater
number of his personal attachments. But, except in some few respects, he
gave way to his versatile humour without scruple or check; and it was
impossible but that such a range of will and power should be abused. Is
it to be wondered at that in the works of one thus gifted and carried
away we should find, without any design of corrupting on his side, evil
too often invested with a grandeur which belongs intrinsically but to
good?

Nay, it will be found that even the strength and impressiveness of
Byron's poetry is sometimes injured by a capricious and desultory
quality due to this very pliancy of mind. It may be questioned whether a
concentration of his powers would not have afforded a grander result. It
may be that, if Lord Byron had not been so actively versatile, he would
have been, not less wonderful, but more great.

Again, this love of variety was one of the most pervading weaknesses,
not only to his poetry, but of his life. The pride of personating every
kind of character, evil as well as good, influenced his ambition and his
conduct; and to such a perverse length did he carry this fancy for
self-defamation that, if there was any tendency to mental derangement,
it was in this point that it manifested itself. I have known him more
than once, as we have sat together, to throw out dark hints of his past
life with an air of gloom and mystery designed to awaken interest; and I
have little doubt that, to produce effect at the moment, there is hardly
any crime so dark or so desperate of which, in the excitement of acting
upon the imaginations of others, he would not have h