" This was the store whence he acquired his perfect
intimacy with the Greek mythology; here was he "suckled In that creed
outworn"; for his amount of classical attainment extended no farther
than the "Aeneid"; with which epic, indeed, he was so fascinated, that
before leaving school he had _voluntarily_ translated in writing a
considerable portion. And yet I remember that at that early age,--mayhap
under fourteen,--notwithstanding and through all its incidental
attractiveness, he hazarded the opinion to me that there was feebleness
in the structure of the work. He must have gone through all the better
publications in the school-library, for he asked me to lend him some of
my own books; and I think I now see him at supper, (we had all our meals
in the school-room,) sitting back on the form, and holding the folio
volume of Burnet's "History of his own Time" between himself and the
table, eating his meal from beyond it. This work, and Leigh Hunt's
"Examiner" newspaper,--which my father took in, and I used to lend to
Keats,--I make no doubt laid the foundation of his love of civil and
religious liberty.
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