48 Famous Quotes by Percy Bysshe Shelley
8/4/1792 - 7/8/1822
Also Known As:
Percy Shelley
Shelley, Percy Bysshe
Percy B Shelley
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About Percy Bysshe Shelley
Percy Bysshe Shelley was one of the major English Romantic poets and is critically regarded as among the finest lyric poets in the English language. A radical in his poetry and his political and social views, fame eluded him during his lifetime, but recognition grew steadily following his death. Shelley was a key member of a close circle of visionary poets and writers that included Lord Byron; Leigh Hunt; Thomas Love Peacock; and his own second wife, Mary Shelley, the author of Frankenstein.
Shelley is perhaps best known for such classic poems as Ozymandias, Ode to the West Wind, To a Skylark, Music, When Soft Voices Die, The Cloud and The Masque of Anarchy. His other major works include long, visionary poems such as Queen Mab, Alastor, The Revolt of Islam, Adonaïs, the unfinished work The Triumph of Life; and the visionary verse dramas The Cenci and Prometheus Unbound.
Shelley's early profession of atheism led to his expulsion from Oxford and branded him a radical agitator and thinker, setting an early pattern of marginalisation and ostracism from the intellectual and political circles of his time. His close circle of admirers, however, included some progressive thinkers of the day, including his future father-in-law, the philosopher William Godwin. Though Shelley's poetry and prose output remained steady throughout his life, most publishers and journals declined to publish his work for fear of being arrested themselves for blasphemy or sedition. Shelley did not live to see success and influence, although these reach down to the present day not only in literature, but in major movements in social and political thought.
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O, white innocence,
That thou shouldst wear the mask of guilt to hide
Thine awful and serenest countenance
From those who know thee not!
Innocence
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: The Cenci (act V, sc. 3, l. 24)
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Sing again, with your dear voice revealing
A tone
Of some world far from ours,
Where music and moonlight and feeling
Are one.
Singing
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: To Jane--The Keen Stars were Twinkling
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You must come home with me and be my guest;
You will give joy to me, and I will do
All that is in my power to honour you.
Guests
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Hymn to Mercury (st. 5)
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Those who inflict must suffer, for they see
The work of their own hearts, and that must be
Our chastisement or recompense.
Suffering
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Julian and Maddalo (l. 494)
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. . . then black despair
The shadow of a starless night, was thrown
Over the world in which I moved alone.
Despair
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Revolt of Islam--Dedication (st. 6)
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How many a rustic Milton has passed by,
Stifling the speechless longings of his heart,
In unremitting drudgery and care!
How many a vulgar Cato has compelled
His energies, no longer tameless then,
To mould a pin, or fabricate a nail!
Work
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Queen Mad (pt. V, st. 9)
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Like a glowworm golden, in a dell of dew,
Scattering unbeholden its aerial blue
Among the flowers and grass which screen it from the view.
Glowworms
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: To a Skylark
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The seed ye sow, another reaps;
The wealth ye find, another keeps;
The robes ye weave, another wears;
The arms ye forge, another bears.
Plagiarism
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Song--To Men of England
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Commerce has set the mark of selfishness,
The signet of its all-enslaving power
Upon a shining ore, and called it gold;
Before whose image bow the vulgar great,
The vainly rich, the miserable proud,
The mob of peasants, nobles, priests, and kings,
And with blind feelings reverence the power
That grinds them to the dust of misery.
But in the temple of their hireling hearts
Gold is a living god, and rules in scorn
All earthly things but virtue.
Gold
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Queen Mab (pt. V, st. 4)
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The desire of the moth for the star,
Of the night for the morrow,
The devotion to something afar
From the sphere of our sorrow.
Desire
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: To---- One Word is too Often Profaned.
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Kings are like stars--they rise and set, they have
The worship of the world, but no repose.
Royalty
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Hellas--Mahmud to Hassan (l. 195)
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Peter was dull; he was at first
Dull;--Oh, so dull--so very dull!
Whether he talked, wrote, or rehearsed--
Still with his dulness was he cursed--
Dull--beyond all conception--dull.
Stupidity
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Peter Bell the Third (pt. VII, XI)
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Around, around in ceaseless circles wheeling
With clangs of wings and scream, the Eagle sailed
Incessantly.
Eagles
Quotes, by Percy Bysshe Shelley , Source: Revolt of Islam (canto I, st. 10)
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