o describe in this poem the state of his own mind. They made
capital out of a few historical and local circumstances, to give to
their falsehood some appearance of truth. But only those who did not
know him personally could be ignorant how improbable it was that any
resemblance between the poet and his hero could be maintained.

Let us confine ourselves to the remark that Lord Byron, instead of
personifying his hero, personifies no one but simply the poet. Let us
add, besides, that in no case could Lord Byron be made responsible for
the consequences of the doctrines of the materialists, as held by his
hero. Not only because of his nature, which was totally opposed to them,
but also and especially because of his tendencies, which were eminently
and persistently those of a spiritualist, and which clung to him
throughout his life even at the time when he was accused of skepticism.
This was at the time when he wrote the second canto of "Childe Harold."
Thoughts, little in unison with, if not entirely opposed to his intimate
convictions, sprang from his sick heart to his head: his soul became
dejected, and his copious tears so obscured his eyes as to veil from
them for a time the existence of the Almighty, which he seemed to
question; and he appeared to think that if the Cambridge philosophy was
right in doubting the soul's spirituality, its immortality might be
equally questioned. These doubts having been expressed in his own, and
not in his hero's name, at the outset of the second canto of "Childe
Harold," led to his being also accused of skepticism.

But if pain actually paralyzed for a time the elasticity of his mind,
the latter very soon recovered its natural vigor and showed itself in
all its glowing energy in the eighth and ninth stanzas, which are most
delicate emanations from a beautiful soul. The first stanzas alone,
however, continued to occupy the attention of some orthodox and
over-scrupulous minds: poetry not necessarily being a mode of teaching
philosophy. We must besides remark that the meaning of the lines is
purely hypothetical. In _saying_ that the soul might _not be immortal_,
is it not saying much the same as was said by Locke in the words _the
soul is perhaps spiritual_? Is not that perishable which is capable of
dissolution according to the laws of the world? Lord Byron, though a
stanch spiritualist at heart, derived his doubts from other much less
exalted authorities. Believing implicitly in the omnip