In Percy Shelley’s poem Liberty liberty is compared to a force of nature sweeping the globe, where “tyrants and slaves are like shadows of night” which will disappear in “the van of the morning light” (1824)
About this Quotation:
In Aeschylus’ play Prometheus Unbound there is the imagery of fire as enlightenment and industrial progress which the titan steals from the gods in order to make the life of humans more bearable. Here, Shelley contrasts the forces of nature (some like the earthquake are destructive of human civilization) with the sunlight of liberty which, in the optimistic spirit of the early 19th century romantics, he concludes “From billow and mountain and exhalation, The sunlight is darted through vapour and blast; From spirit to spirit, from nation to nation, From city to hamlet thy dawning is cast,— And tyrants and slaves are like shadows of night in the van of the morning light.”
Other quotes from this week:
- 2009: Thomas Jefferson on the Draft as "the last of all oppressions" (1777)
- 2007: St. Thomas Aquinas discusses the three conditions for a just war (1265-74)
- 2005: Edward Gibbon believed that unless public liberty was defended by “intrepid and vigilant guardians” any constitution would degenerate into despotism (1776)
- 2004: Robert Nisbet on the Shock the Founding Fathers would feel if they could see the current size of the Military Establishment and the National Government (1988)
Other quotes about Literature & Music:
- 2010: On Achilles’ new shield Vulcan depicts the two different types of cities which humans can build on earth; one based on peace and the rule of law; the other based on war, killing, and pillage (900 BC)
- 2009: Beethoven’s hero Florestan in the opera Fidelio laments the loss of his liberty for speaking the truth to power (1805)
- 2009: Voltaire in Candide says that “tending one’s own garden” is not only a private activity but also productive (1759)
- 2009: Augustin Thierry relates the heroic tale of the Kentishmen who defeat William the Conqueror and so are able to keep their ancient laws and liberties (1856)
- 2008: Confucius edited this collection of poems which contains a poem about “Yellow Birds” who ravenously eat the crops of the local people, thus alienating them completely (520 BC)
- 2008: Shakespeare has King Henry IV reflect on the reasons for invading the Holy Land, namely to distract people from domestic civil war and to “march all one way” under his banner (1597)
- 2007: J.S. Bach and Martin Luther on how God (the “feste Burg”) helps us gain our freedom (1730)
- 2007: Percy Bysshe Shelley on the new Constitution of Naples which he hoped would be “as a mirror to make … blind slaves see” (1820)
- 2006: Shakespeare in Pericles on how the rich and powerful are like whales who eat up the harding working “little fish” (1608)
- 2006: In Measure for Measure Shakespeare has Isabella denounce the Duke’s deputy for being corrupted by power, “it is excellent To have a giant’s strength, but it is tyrannous To use it like a giant” (1623)
- 2006: In Shakespeare’s The Tempest Caliban complains about the way the European lord Prospero taught him language and science then enslaved him and dispossessed him of the island on which he was born (1611)
- 2006: In Shakespeare’s Henry V the king is too easily persuaded by his advisors that the English economy will continue to function smoothly, like obedient little honey-bees in their hive, while he is away with his armies conquering France (1598)
- 2006: In Shakespeare’s Henry V the soldier Williams confronts the king by saying that “few die well that die in a battle” and that “a heavy reckoning” awaits the king that led them to it (1598)
- 2005: Aeschylus has Prometheus denounce the lord of heaven for unjustly punishing him for giving mankind the gift of fire (5thC BC)
- 2005: John Milton in Paradise Regained has Christ deplore the “false glory” which comes from military conquest and the despoiling of nations in battle (1671)
- 2005: With the return of spring the memories of Petrarch’s beloved Laura awaken a new pang in him (late 14thC)
- 2005: In Joseph Addison’s play Cato Cato is asked what it would take for him to be Caesar’s “friend” - his answer is that Caesar would have to first “disband his legions” and then “restore the commonwealth to liberty” (1713)
- 2004: During the American Revolution Thomas Paine penned a patriotic song called “Hail Great Republic” which is to be sung to the tune of Rule Britannia (of course!) (1776)
- 2004: Shakespeare farewells his lover in a Sonnet using many mercantile and legal metaphors (1609)
17 July, 2006
 | In Percy Shelley’s poem Liberty liberty is compared to a force of nature sweeping the globe, where “tyrants and slaves are like shadows of night” which will disappear in “the van of the morning light” (1824) |
In a collection of his posthumously published poems there is this little gem about Liberty which likens it to a force of nature sweeping the globe:
LIBERTY.
The fiery mountains answer each other;
Their thunderings are echoed from zone to zone;
The empestuous oceans awake one another,
And the ice-rocks are shaken round winter’s zone
When the clarion of the Typhoon is blown.
From a single cloud the lightning flashes,
Whilst a thousand isles are illumined around,
Earthquake is trampling one city to ashes,
An hundred are shuddering and tottering; the sound
Is bellowing underground.
But keener thy gaze than the lightning’s glare,
And swifter thy step than the earthquake’s tramp;
Thou deafenest the rage of the ocean; thy stare
Makes blind the volcanos; the sun’s bright lamp
To thine is a fen-fire damp.
From billow and mountain and exhalation
The sunlight is darted through vapour and blast;
From spirit to spirit, from nation to nation,
From city to hamlet thy dawning is cast,—
And tyrants and slaves are like shadows of night
In the van of the morning light.
The full passage from which this quotation was taken can be be viewed below (front page quote in bold):
LIBERTY.
The fiery mountains answer each other;
Their thunderings are echoed from zone to zone;
The empestuous oceans awake one another,
And the ice-rocks are shaken round winter’s zone
When the clarion of the Typhoon is blown.
From a single cloud the lightning flashes,
Whilst a thousand isles are illumined around,
Earthquake is trampling one city to ashes,
An hundred are shuddering and tottering; the sound
Is bellowing underground.
But keener thy gaze than the lightning’s glare,
And swifter thy step than the earthquake’s tramp;
Thou deafenest the rage of the ocean; thy stare
Makes blind the volcanos; the sun’s bright lamp
To thine is a fen-fire damp.
From billow and mountain and exhalation
The sunlight is darted through vapour and blast;
From spirit to spirit, from nation to nation,
From city to hamlet thy dawning is cast,—
And tyrants and slaves are like shadows of night
In the van of the morning light.