Mrs. Shelley by Lucy M. Rossetti

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Apart from sectarian doctrines, his tutor, Mr. Newton, seems to have
given Godwin the advantage of the free range of his library; and
doubtless this was excellent education for him at that time. After he
had acted as usher for over a year, from the age of fifteen, his
mother, at his father's death in 1772, wished him to enter Homerton
Academy; but the authorities would not admit him on suspicion of
Sandemanianism. He, however, gained admittance to Hoxton College. Here
he planned tragedies on Iphigenia and the death of Caesar, and also
began to study Sandeman's work from a library, to find out what he was
accused of. This probably caused, later, his horror of these ideas,
and also started his neverending search after truth.

In 1777 he became, in his turn, a dissenting minister; until, with
reading and fresh acquaintances ever widening his views, gradually his
profession became distasteful to him, and in 1788, on quitting
Beaconsfield, he proposed opening a school. His _Life of Lord
Chatham_, however, gained notice, and he was led to other political
writing, and so became launched on a literary career. With his simple
tastes he managed not only for years to keep himself till he became
celebrated, but he was also a great help to different members of his
family; several of these did not come as well as William out of the
ordeal of their strict education, but caused so little gratification
to their mother and elder brother--a farmer who resided near the
mother--that she destroyed all their correspondence, nearly all
William's also, as it might relate to them. Letters from the cousin,
Mrs. Sotheran, show, however, that William Godwin's novel-writing was
likewise a sore point in his family.

In the midst of his literary work and philosophic thought, it was
natural that Godwin should get associated with other men of advanced
opinions. Joseph Fawcet, whose literary and intellectual eminence was
much admired in his day, was one of the first to influence Godwin--his
declamation against domestic affections must have coincided well with
Godwin's unimpassioned justice; Thomas Holcroft, with his curious
ideas of death and disease, whose ardent republicanism led to his
being tried for his life as a traitor; George Dyson, whose abilities
and zeal in the cause of literature and truth promised much that was
unfortunately never realised: these, and later Samuel Taylor
Coleridge, were acknowledged by Godwin to have greatly influenced his
ideas. Godwin acted according to his own theories of right in adopting
and educating Thomas Cooper, a second cousin, whose father died,
ruined, in India. The rules laid down in his diary show that Godwin
strove to educate him successfully, and he certainly gained the
youth's confidence, and launched him successfully in his own chosen
profession as an actor. Godwin seems always to have adhered to his
principles, and after the success of his _Life of Chatham_, when
he became a contributor to the _Political Herald_, he attracted
the attention of the Whig Party, to whose cause he was so useful that
Fox proposed, through Sheridan, to set a fund aside to pay him as
Editor. This, however, was not accepted by Godwin, who would not lose
his independence by becoming attached to any party.

He was naturally, to a great extent, a follower of Rousseau, and a
sympathiser with the ideas of the French Revolution, and was one of
the so-called "French Revolutionists," at whose meetings Horne Tooke,
Holcroft, Stanhope, and others figured. Nor did he neglect to defend,
in the _Morning Chronicle_, some of these when on their trial for
high treason; though, from his known principles, he was himself in
danger; and without doubt his clear exposition of the true case
greatly modified public opinion and helped to prevent an adverse
verdict. Among Godwin's multifarious writings are his novels, some of
which had great success, especially _Caleb Williams_; also his
sketch of English History, contributed to the _Annual Register_.
His historical writing shows much research and study of old documents.
On comparing it with the contemporary work of his friends, such as
Coleridge, it becomes evident that his knowledge and learning were
utilized by them. But these works were anonymous; by his _Political
Justice_ he became famous. This work is a philosophical treatise
based on the assumption, that man, as a reasoning being, can be guided
wholly by reason, and that, were he educated from this point of view,
laws would be unnecessary. It must be observed here that Godwin could
not then take into consideration the laws of heredity, now better
understood; how the criminal has not only the weight of bad education
and surroundings against him, but also how the very formation of the
head is in certain cases an almost insuperable evil. He considered
many of the laws relating to property, marriage, &c., unnecessary, as
people guided by reason would not, for instance, wish for wealth at
the expense of starving brethren. Far in the distance as the
realisation of this doctrine may seem, it should still be remembered
that, as with each physical discovery, the man of genius must foresee.
As Columbus imagined land where he found America; as a planet is fixed
by the astronomer before the telescope has revealed it to his mortal
eye; so in the world of psychology and morals it is necessary to point
out the aim to be attained before human nature has reached those
divine qualifications which are only shadowed forth here and there by
more than usually elevated natures. In fact Godwin, who sympathised
entirely with the theories of the French Revolution, and even
surpassed French ideas on most subjects, disapproved of the immediate
carrying out of these ideas and views; he wished for preaching and
reasoning till people should gradually become convinced of the truth,
and the rich should be as ready to give as the poor to receive. Even
in the matter of marriage, though strongly opposed to it personally
(on philosophical grounds, not from the ordinary trite reasoning
against it), he yielded his opinion to the claim of individual justice
towards the woman whom he came to love with an undying affection, and
for whom, fortunately for his theories, he needed not to set aside the
impulse of affection for that of justice; and these remarks bring us
again to the happy time in the lives of Godwin and Mary
Wollstonecraft, when friendship melted into love, and they were
married shortly afterwards, in March 1797, at old St. Pancras Church,
London.

This new change in her life interfered no more with the energy for
work with Mary Wollstonecraft than with Godwin. They adopted the
singular, though in their case probably advantageous, decision to
continue each to have a separate place of abode, in order that each
might work uninterruptedly, though, as pointed out by an earnest
student of their character, they probably wasted more time in their
constant interchange of notes on all subjects than they would have
lost by a few conversations. On the other hand, as their thoughts were
worth recording, we have the benefit of their plan. The short notes
which passed between Mary and Godwin, as many as three and four in a
day, as well as letters of considerable length written during a tour
which Godwin made in the midland counties with his friend Basil
Montague, show how deep and simple their affection was, that there was
no need of hiding the passing cloud, that they both equally disliked
and wished to simplify domestic details. There was, for instance, some
sort of slight dispute as to who should manage a plumber, on which
occasion Mary seems to have been somewhat hurt at its being put upon
her, as giving an idea of her inferiority. This, with the tender jokes
about Godwin's icy philosophy, and the references to a little
"William" whom they were both anxiously expecting, all evince the
tender devotion of husband and wife, whose relationship was of a
nature to endure through ill or good fortune. Little Fanny was
evidently only an added pleasure to the two, and Godwin's thought of
her at a distance and his choice of the prettiest mug at Wedgewood's
with "green and orange-tawny flowers," testify to the fatherly
instinct of Godwin. But, alas! this loving married friendship was not
to last long, for the day arrived, August 30, 1797, which had been
long expected; and the hopeful state of the case is shown in three
little letters written by Mary to her husband, for she wished him to
be spared anxiety by absence. And there was born a little girl, not
the William so quaintly spoken of; but the Mary whose future life we
must try and realise. Even now her first trouble comes, for, within a
few hours of the child's birth, dangerous symptoms began with the
mother; ten days of dread anxiety ensued, and not all the care of
intelligent watchers, nor the constant waiting for service of the
husband's faithful intimate friends, nor the skill of the first
doctors could save the life which was doomed: Fate must wreak its
relentless will. Her work remains to help many a struggling woman, and
still to give hope of more justice to follow; perchance at one
important moment it misled her own child. And so the mysteries of the
workings of Fate and the mysteries of death joined with those of a new
life.

CHAPTER II.

GIRLHOOD OF MARY--PATERNAL TROUBLES.

And now with the beginning of this fragile little life begin the
anxieties and sorrow of poor Godwin. The blank lines drawn in his
diary for Sunday 10th September 1797, show more than words how
unutterable was his grief. During the time of his wife's patient agony
he had managed to ask if she had any wishes concerning Fanny and Mary.
She was fortunately able to reply that her faith in his wisdom was
entire.

On the very day of his wife's death Godwin himself wrote some letters
he considered necessary, nor did he neglect to write in his own
characteristic plain way to one who he considered had slighted his
wife. His friends Mr. Basil Montague and Mr. Marshall arranged the
funeral, and Mrs. Reveley, who had with her the children before the
mother's death, continued her care till they returned to the father on
the 17th. Mrs. Fenwick, who had been in constant attendance on Mary,
then took care of them for a time. Indeed, Mary's fame and character
brought forward many willing to care for the motherless infant, whose
life was only saved from a dangerous illness by this loving zeal.
Among others Mr. and Mrs. Nicholson appeared with offers of help, and
as early as September 18 we find that Godwin had requested Mr.
Nicholson to give an opinion as to the infant's physiognomy, with a
view to her education, which he (with Trelawny later) considered could
not begin too soon, or as the latter said: "Talk of education
beginning at two years! Two months is too late."

Thus we see Godwin conscientiously trying to bring in an imperfect
science to assist him in the difficult task of developing his infant's
mind, in place of the watchful love of an intelligent mother, who
would check the first symptoms of ill-temper, be firm against
ill-placed determination, encourage childish imagination, and not let
the idea of untruth be presented to the child till old enough to
discriminate for itself. A hard task enough for any father, still
harder for Godwin, beset by all kinds of difficulties, and having to
work in the midst of them for his and the two children's daily
sustenance. Friends, and good friends, he certainly had; but most
people will recognise that strength in these matters does not rest in
numbers. The wet nurse needed by little Mary, though doubtless the
essential necessity of the time, would not add to the domestic
comfort, especially to that of Miss Louisa Jones, a friend of Harriet
Godwin, who had been installed to superintend Godwin's household. This
latter arrangement, again, did not tend to Godwin's comfort, as from
Miss Jones's letters it is evident that she wished to marry him. Her
wish not being reciprocated, she did not long remain an inmate of his
house, and the nurse, who was fortunately devoted to the baby, was
then over-looked from time to time by Mrs. Reveley and other ladies.

Of anecdotes of Mary's infancy and childhood there are but few, but
from the surroundings we can picture the child. Her father about this
time seems to have neglected all his literary work except the one of
love--writing his wife's "Memoirs" and reading her published and
unpublished work. In this undertaking he was greatly assisted by Mr.
Skeys. Her sisters, on the contrary, gave as little assistance as
possible, and ended all communication with Godwin at this difficult
period of his life, and for a long while utterly neglected their poor
sister's little children, when they might have repaid to some extent
the debt of gratitude they owed to her.

All these complicated and jarring circumstances must have suggested to
Godwin that another marriage might he the best expedient, and he
accordingly set to work in a systematic way this time to acquire his
end. Passion was not the motive, and probably there was too much
system, for he was unsuccessful on two occasions. The first was with
Miss Harriet Lee, the authoress of several novels and of _The
Canterbury Tales_. Godwin seems to have been much struck by her,
and, after four interviews at Bath, wrote on his return to London a
very characteristic and pressing letter of invitation to her to stay
in his house if she came to London, explaining that there was a lady
(Miss Jones) who superintended his home. As this letter met with no
answer, he tried three additional letters, drafts of all being extant.
The third one was probably too much considered, for Miss Lee returned
it annotated on the margin, expressing her disapproval of its
egotistical character. Godwin, however, was not to be daunted, and
made a fourth attempt, full of many sensible and many quaint reasons,
not all of which would be pleasing to a lady; but he succeeded in
regaining Miss Lee's friendship, though he could not persuade her to
be his wife. This was from April to August 1798.

About the same time there was a project of Godwin and Thomas Wedgewood
keeping house together; but as they seem to have much differed when
together, the plan was wisely dropped. Godwin's notes in his plan of
work for the year 1798 are interesting, as showing how he was anxious
to modify some of his opinions expressed in _Political Justice_,
especially those bearing on the affections, which he now admits must
naturally play an important part in human action, though he avers his
opinion that none of his previous conclusions are affected by these
admissions. Much other work was planned out during this time, and many
fresh intellectual acquaintances made, Wordsworth and Southey among
others. His mother's letters to Godwin show what a constant drain his
family were upon his slender means, and how nobly he always strove to
help them when in need. These letters are full of much common sense,
and though quaintly illiterate are, perhaps, not so much amiss for the
period at which they were written, when many ladies who had greater
social and monetary advantages were, nevertheless, frequently astray
in these matters.

Godwin's novel of _St. Leon_, published in 1799, was another
attempt to give the domestic affections their due place in his scheme
of life; and the description of Marguerite, drawn from Mary
Wollstonecraft, and that of her wedded life with St. Leon, are
beautiful passages illustrative of Godwin's own happy time of
marriage.

In July 1799, the death of Mr. Reveley suggested a fresh attempt at
marriage to Godwin; but now he was probably too prompt, for, knowing
that Mr. Reveley and his wife had not always been on the best of
terms, although his sudden death had driven her nigh frantic, Godwin,
relying on certain previous expressions of affection for himself by
Mrs. Reveley, proposed within a month after her husband's death, and
begged her to set aside prejudices and cowardly ceremonies and be his.
As in the previous case, a second and a third lengthy letter, full of
subtle reasoning, were ineffectual, and did not even bring about an
interview till December 3rd, when Godwin and Mrs. Reveley met, in
company with Mr. Gisborne. To this gentleman Mrs. Reveley was
afterwards married. We shall meet them both again later on.

All this time there is little though affectionate mention of Mary
Godwin in her father's diary. Little Fanny, who had always been a
favourite, used to accompany Godwin on some of his visits to friends.

Many of Godwin's letters at this time show that he was not too
embarrassed to be able to assist his friends in time of need; twenty
pounds sent to his friend Arnot, ten pounds shortly afterwards through
Mrs. Agnes Hall to a lady in great distress, whose name is unknown,
prove that he was ready to carry out his theories in practice. It is
interesting to observe these frequent instances of generosity, as they
account to some extent for his subsequent difficulties. In the midst
of straits and disappointments Godwin managed to have his children
well taken care of, and there was evidently a touching sympathy and
confidence between himself and them, as shown in Godwin's letters to
his friend Marshall during a rare absence from the children occasioned
by a visit to friends in Ireland. His thought and sincere solicitude
and messages, and evident anxiety to be with them again, are all
equally touching; Fanny having the same number of kisses sent her as
Mary, with that perfect justice which is so beneficial to the
character of children. We can now picture the scarcely three year old
Mary and little Fanny taken to await the return of the coach with
their father, and sitting under the Kentish Town trees in glad
expectancy.

But this time of happy infancy was not to last long; for doubtless
Godwin felt it irksome to have to consider whether the house-linen was
in order, and such like details, and was thus prepared, in 1801, to
accept the demonstrative advances of Mrs. Clairmont, a widow who took
up her residence next door to him in the Polygon, Somers Town. She had
two children, a boy and a girl, the latter somewhat younger than Mary.
The widow needed no introduction or admittance to his house, as from
the balcony she was able to commence a campaign of flattery to which
Godwin soon succumbed. The marriage took place in December 1801, at
Shoreditch Church, and was not made known to Godwin's friends till
after it had been solemnised. Mrs. Clairmont evidently did her best to
help Godwin through the pecuniary difficulties of his career. She was
not an ignorant woman, and her work at translations proves her not to
have been without cleverness of a certain kind; but this probably made
more obvious the natural vulgarity of her disposition. For example,
when talking of bringing children up to do the work they were fitted
to, she discovered that her own daughter Jane was fitted for
accomplishments, while little Mary and Fanny were turned into
household drudges. These distinctions would naturally engender an
antipathy to her, which later on would help in estranging Mary from
her father's house; but occasionally we have glimpses of the little
ones making themselves happy, in childlike fashion, in the midst of
difficulties and disappointments on Godwin's part. On one occasion
Mary and Jane had concealed themselves under a sofa in order to hear
Coleridge recite _The Ancient Mariner_. Mrs. Godwin, unmindful of
the delight they would have in listening to poetry, found the little
ones and was banishing them to bed; when Coleridge with
kind-heartedness, or the love ever prevalent in poets of an audience,
however humble, interceded for the small things who could sit under a
sofa, and so they remained up and heard the poet read his poem. The
treat was never afterwards forgotten, and one cannot over-estimate
such pleasures in forming the character of a child. Nor were such the
only intellectual delights the children shared in, for Charles Lamb
was among Godwin's numerous friends at this period, and a frequent
visitor at his house; and we can still hear in imagination the merry
laughter of children, old and young, whom he gathered about him, and
who brightened at his ever ready fun. One long-remembered joke was how
one evening, at supper at Godwin's, Lamb entered the room first,
seized a leg of mutton, blew out the candle, and placed the mutton in
Martin Burney's hand, and, on the candle being relit, exclaimed, "Oh,
Martin! Martin! I should never have thought it of you."

This and such like whimsies (as when Lamb would carry off a small
cruet from the table, making Mrs. Godwin go through a long search, and
would then quietly walk in the next day and replace it as if it were
the most natural thing for a cruet to find its way into a pocket),
would break the monotony of the children's days. It was infinitely
more enlivening than the routine in some larger houses, where poor
little children are frequently shut up in a back room on a third floor
and left for long hours to the tender mercies of some nurse, whose
small slaves or tyrants they become, according to their nature. And
when we remember that the Polygon at that time was touching fields and
lanes, we know that little Mary must have had one of the delights most
prized by children, picking buttercups and daisies, unmolested by a
gardener. But during this happy age, when the child would probably
have infinitely more pleasure in washing a cup and saucer than in
playing the scales, however superior the latter performance may be,
Godwin had various schemes and hopes frustrated. At times his health
was very precarious, with frequent fainting fits, causing grave
anxiety for the future. In 1803 his son William was born, making the
fifth member of his miscellaneous family. At times Mrs. Godwin's
temper seems to have been very much tried or trying, and on one
occasion she expressed the wish for a separation; but the idea appears
to have been dropped on Godwin's writing one of his very calm and
reasonable letters, saying that he had no obstacle to oppose to it,
and that, if it was to take place, he hoped it would not be long in
hand; he certainly went on to say that the separation would be a
source of great misery to himself. Either this reason mollified Mrs.
Godwin, or else the apparent ease with which she might have carried
out her project, made her hesitate, as we hear no more of it. Godwin,
however, had occasion to write her philosophically expostulatory
letters on her temper, which we must hope, for the children's sake,
produced a satisfactory effect; for surely nothing can be more
injurious to the happiness of children than to witness the
ungovernable temper of their elders; but with Godwin's calm
disposition, quarrels must have been one-sided, and consequently less
damaging.

Godwin superintended the education of his children himself, and wrote
many books for this purpose, which formed part of his juvenile library
later on. "Baldwin's" fables and his histories for children were
published by Godwin under this cognomen, owing to his political views
having prejudiced many people against his name. His chief aim appears
to have been to keep a certain moral elevation before the minds of
children, as in the excellent preface to the _History of Rome_,
where he dwells on the fact of the stories of Mucius, Curtius, and
Regulus being disputed; but considers that stories--if they be no
more--handed down from the great periods of Roman history are
invaluable to stimulate the character of children to noble sentiments
and actions. But in Godwin's case, as in many others, it must have
been a difficult task counteracting the effect of example; for we
cannot imagine the influence of a woman to have been ennobling who
could act as Mrs. Godwin did at an early period of her married life;
who, when one of her husband's friends, whom she did not care about,
called to see Godwin, explained that it was impossible, as the kettle
had just fallen off the hob and scalded both his legs. When the same
friend met Godwin the next day in the street, and was surprised at his
speedy recovery, the philosopher replied that it was only an invention
of his wife. The safe-guard in such cases is often in the quick
apprehension of children themselves, who are frequently saved from the
errors of their elders by their perception of the consequences.
Unfortunately, Mrs. Godwin's influence must have been lessened in
other matters where her feeling for propriety, if with her only from a
conventional and time-serving point of view, might have averted the
fatal consequences which ensued later. Could she have gained the love
and respect of the children instead of making them, as afterwards
expressed by Mary, hate her, her moral precepts would have worked to
more effect. It may have appeared to the girls, who could not
appreciate the self-devotion of Godwin in acting against theories for
the sake of individual justice, that the cause of all their
unhappiness (and doubtless at times they felt it acutely) was owing to
their father not having adhered to his previous anti-matrimonial
opinions, and they were thus prepared to disregard what seemed to them
social prejudices.

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