The publication of a lascivious book is one of the worst offences which can be committed against the well-being of society. It is a sin, to the consequences of which no limits can be assigned, an those consequences no after repentance in the wrier can counteract. Whatever remorse of conscience he may feel when his hour comes (and come it must!) will be of no avail. The poignancy of a death-bed repentance cannot cancel one copy of the thousands which are sent abroad; and as long as it continue to be read, so long is he the pander of posterity, and so long is he heaping up guilt upon his soul in perpetual accumulation.
______________
The school which they have set up may properly be called the Satanic school; for though their productions breathe the spirit of Belial in their lascivious parts, and spirit of Moloch in those loathsome images of atrocities and horrors which they delight to represent, they are more especially characterized by a Satanic spirit of pride and audacious impiety, which still betrays the wretched feeling of hopelessness wherewith it is allied.
Robert Southey is, of course, the “Bob Southey… the poet laureate” referred to in the dedication to Don Juan.
Link/cite this page
If you use any of the content on this page in your own work, please use the code below to cite this page as the source of the content.
Link will appear as Hanson, Marilee. "Lord Byron Critical Opinion By Robert Southey 1821" https://englishhistory.net/byron/lord-byron-critical-opinion-by-robert-southey-1821/, March 4, 2015