sensualist, there must have been many such stories,
authentic and authenticated. But there are none
such,—absolutely none. His name has
been coupled with the names of three, four, or more
women of some rank: but what kind of women?
Every one of them, in the first place, about as old
as himself in years, and therefore a great deal older
in character; every one of them utterly battered in
reputation long before he came into contact with them,—licentious,
unprincipled, characterless women. What father
has ever reproached him with the ruin of his daughter?
What husband has denounced him as the destroyer of
his peace?
’Let us not be mistaken. We are not defending
the offences of which Lord Byron unquestionably was
guilty; neither are we finding fault with those, who,
after looking honestly within and around themselves,
condemn those offences, no matter how severely:
but we are speaking of society in general as it now
exists; and we say that there is vile hypocrisy in
the tone in which Lord Byron is talked of there.
We say, that, although all offences against purity
of life are miserable things, and condemnable things,
the degrees of guilt attached to different offences
of this class are as widely different as are the degrees
of guilt between an assault and a murder; and we confess
our belief, that no man of Byron’s station or
age could have run much risk in gaining a very bad
name in society, had a course of life similar (in
so far as we know any thing of that) to Lord Byron’s
been the only thing chargeable against him.
’The last poem he wrote was produced upon his
birthday, not many weeks before he died. We
consider it as one of the finest and most touching
effusions of his noble genius. We think he who
reads it, and can ever after bring himself to regard
even the worst transgressions that have been charged
against Lord Byron with any feelings but those of humble
sorrow and manly pity, is not deserving of the name
of man. The deep and passionate struggles with
the inferior elements of his nature (and ours) which
it records; the lofty thirsting after purity; the heroic
devotion of a soul half weary of life, because unable
to believe in its own powers to live up to what it
so intensely felt to be, and so reverentially honoured
as, the right; the whole picture of this mighty spirit,
often darkened, but never sunk,—often erring,
but never ceasing to see and to worship the beauty
of virtue; the repentance of it; the anguish; the
aspiration, almost stifled in despair,—the
whole of this is such a whole, that we are sure no
man can read these solemn verses too often; and we
recommend them for repetition, as the best and most
conclusive of all possible answers whenever the name
of Byron is insulted by those who permit themselves
to forget nothing, either in his life or in his writings,
but the good.’—[1825.]
LETTERS OF LADY BYRON TO H.
C. ROBINSON
Copyrights
Lady Byron Vindicated from Project Gutenberg. Public domain.
