visible to the bodily eye, express the mighty emotion that inwardly
agitated him, when he approached, for the first time, a volume which he
believed to be replete with the recondite and mystic philosophy of
antiquity: his cheeks glowed, his eyes became bright, his whole frame
trembled, and his entire attention was immediately swallowed up in the
depths of contemplation. The rapid and vigorous conversion of his soul
to intellect can only be compared with the instantaneous ignition and
combustion, which dazzle the sight, when a bundle of dry reeds, or other
light inflammable substance, is thrown upon a fire already rich with
accumulated heat."

As at Eton, so at Oxford, Shelley refused to keep the beaten track of
prescribed studies, or to run in ordinary grooves of thought. The mere
fact that Aristotle was a duty, seems to have disgusted him with the
author of the Organon, from whom, had his works been prohibited to
undergraduates, he would probably have been eager to learn much. For
mathematics and jurisprudence he evinced a marked distaste. The common
business of the English Parliament had no attraction for him, and he
read few newspapers. While his mind was keenly interested in great
political questions, he could not endure the trivial treatment of them
in the daily press, and cared far more for principles than for the
incidents of party warfare. Here again he showed that impatience of
detail, and that audacity of self-reliant genius, which were the source
of both his weakness and his strength. He used to speak with aversion of
a Parliamentary career, and told Hogg that though this had been
suggested to him, as befitting his position, by the Duke of Norfolk, he
could never bring himself to mix with the rabble of the House. It is
none the less true, however, that he entertained some vague notion of
eventually succeeding to his father's seat.