As now by thee, by all the good be known,
  When this weak frame lies moulder’d in the grave,
  Which self-surviving I might call my own,
  Which folly cannot mar, nor hate deprave—­
  The incense of those powers, which, risen in flame,
  Might make me dear to Him from whom they came.

Of this work, to which all my other writings (unless I except my Poems, and these I can exclude in part only) are introductory and preparative; and the result of which (if the premises be, as I, with the most tranquil assurance, am convinced they are—­insubvertible, the deductions legitimate, and the conclusions commensurate, and only commensurate, with both) must finally be a revolution of all that has been called philosophy or metaphysics in England and France, since the era of the commencing predominance of the mechanical system at the restoration of our second Charles, and with this the present fashionable views, not only of religion, morals, and politics but even of the modern physics and physiology.  You will not blame the earnestness of my expressions, nor the high importance which I attach to this work:  for how, with less noble objects, and less faith in their attainment, could I stand acquitted of folly, and abuse of time, talents, and learning in a labour of three-fourths of my intellectual life?  Of this work, something more than a volume has been dictated by me, so as to exist fit for the press, to my friend and enlightened pupil, Mr. Green; and more than as much again would have been evolved and delivered to paper, but that, for the last six or eight months, I have been compelled to break off our weekly meeting, from the necessity of writing (alas! alas! of attempting to write) for purposes, and on the subjects, of the passing day.  Of my poetic works I would fain finish the Christabel!  Alas! for the proud time when I planned, when I had present to my mind, the materials, as well as the scheme, of the Hymns entitled Spirit, Sun, Earth, Air, Water, Fire and Man; and the Epic Poem on what still appears to me the one only fit subject remaining for an epic poem—­Jerusalem besieged and destroyed by Titus.

TO THE SAME

Reminiscences

4 March, 1822.

My Dearest Friend,

I have been much more than ordinarily unwell for more than a week past—­my sleeps worse than my vigils, my nights than my days;

  —­The night’s dismay
  Sadden’d and stunned the intervening day;

but last night I had not only a calmer night, without roaming in my dreams through any of Swedenborg’s Hells moderes; but arose this morning lighter and with a sense of relief....