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Everything Must Have A Beginning ... And That Beginning Must Be Linked To Something That Went Before.
-Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
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Everything Must Have A

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
...
Everything Must Have A Beginning ... And That Beginning Must Be Linked To Something That Went Before.

Understanding the Quote: "everything must have a beginning ... and that beginning must be linked..."

This quote by Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley reflects deeply on the theme of linked. It connects to the universal human journey of purpose, motivation, and reflection. Often categorized under Linked, the quote offers insight, emotional clarity, and intellectual inspiration to readers worldwide.

Whether you’re a student exploring new ideas, a leader trying to motivate your team, or someone seeking direction in life — this quote provides value. It resonates because it’s more than words — it’s a bridge between experience and wisdom. It shows how Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley interprets life's core challenges and triumphs.

Lessons From the Quote

This quote teaches resilience and focus. It reminds readers that no matter where they stand in life, reflection and self-awareness lead to growth. Each word has meaning, and when studied, it becomes clear how impactful thoughtful language can be.

About Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley

Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley is celebrated for insightful thoughts on linked and motivation. Their legacy lives on through writings that guide, comfort, and inspire. Discover more on their profile page.

Actionable Takeaways

  • Reflect on how this quote applies to your current life path.
  • Share the message with someone who needs inspiration.
  • Write your thoughts on this quote in a journal or blog post.
  • Use it as a daily affirmation or reminder.

Closing Thoughts

Quotes like this endure because they capture universal truths. They comfort us in solitude and empower us in groups. Carry this quote forward — live by its wisdom, share its message, and keep its essence alive.

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Topic
Linked
More From Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley
It Is With Considerable Difficulty That I Remember The Original Era Of My Being
Eras
Remember
Difficulty
Unhappy Man! Do You Share My Maddness? Have You Drunk Also Of The Intoxicating Draught? Hear Me; Let Me Reveal My Tale, And You Will Dash The Cup From Your Lips!
Men
Drunk
Unhappy
Hateful Day When I Received Life!' I Exclaimed In Agony. 'accursed Creator! Why Did You Form A Monster So Hideous That Even You Turned From Me In Disgust? God, In Pity, Made Man Beautiful And Alluring, After His Own Image; But My Form Is A Filthy Type Of Yours, More Horrid Even From The Very Resemlance. Satan Had His Companions, Fellow-devils, To Admire And Encourage Him; But I Am Solitary And Abhorred.' - Frankenstein
Beautiful
Men
Agony
Evil Thenceforth Became My Good.
Evil
There Is Love In Me The Likes Of Which You've Never Seen. There Is Rage In Me The Likes Of Which Should Never Escape. If I Am Not Satisfied Int He One, I Will Indulge The Other.
Likes
Rage
Should
How Mutable Are Our Feelings, And How Strange Is That Clinging Love We Have Of Life Even In The Excess Of Misery!
Feelings
Excess
Strange
I, A Miserable Wretch, Haunted By A Curse That Shut Up Every Avenue To Enjoyment.
Shut Up
Miserable
Curse
A Lofty Sense Of Independence Is, In Man, The Best Privilege Of His Nature.
Men
Independence
Privilege
I Required Kindness And Sympathy, But I Did Not Believe Myself Utterly Unworthy Of It.
Sympathy
Kindness
Believe
If The Study To Which You Apply Yourself Has A Tendency To Weaken Your Affections And To Destroy Your Taste For Those Simple Pleasures In Which No Alloy Can Possibly Mix, Then That Study Is Certainly Unlawful, That Is To Say, Not Befitting The Human Mind.
Simple
Mind
Taste
To Examine The Causes Of Life, We Must First Have Recourse To Death.
Firsts
Causes
Recourse
Live, And Be Happy, And Make Others So.
Compassion
I Shall Commit My Thoughts To Paper, It Is True; But That Is A Poor Medium For The Communication Of Feeling. I Desire The Company Of A Man Who Could Sympathize With Me, Whose Eyes Would Reply To Mine.
Communication
Eye
Men
Of What A Strange Nature Is Knowledge! It Clings To A Mind When It Has Once Seized On It Like A Lichen On A Rock." - Frankenstein P115
Leadership
Knowledge
Rocks
The Modern Masters Promise Very Little
Promise
Littles
Modern
One Man's Life Or Death Were But A Small Price To Pay For The Acquirement Of The Knowledge Which I Sought
Men
Pay
Life Or Death
Thus Strangely Are Our Souls Constructed, And By Slight Ligaments Are We Bound To Prosperity And Ruin.
Soul
Ruins
Prosperity
I Do Know That For The Sympathy Of One Living Being, I Would Make Peace With All. I Have Love In Me The Likes Of Which You Can Scarcely Imagine And Rage The Likes Of Which You Would Not Believe. If I Cannot Satisfy The One, I Will Indulge The Other.
Believe
Likes
Imagine
None But Those Who Have Experienced Them Can Conceive Of The Enticements Of Science.
Enticement
But Success Shall Crown My Endeavours. Wherefore Not? Thus Far I Have Gone, Tracking A Secure Way Over The Pathless Seas: The Very Stars Themselves Being Witnesses And Testimonies Of My Triumph. Why Not Still Proceed Over The Untamed Yet Obedient Element? What Can Stop The Determined Heart And Resolved Will Of Man?
Stars
Heart
Men
What Are We, The Inhabitants Of This Globe, Least Among The Many That People Infinite Space? Our Minds Embrace Infinity; The Visible Mechanism Of Our Being Is Subject To Merest Accident.
Life
Space
People
I Also Became A Poet, And For One Year Lived In A Paradise Of My Own Creation; I Imagined That I Also Might Obtain A Niche In The Temple Where The Names Of Homer And Shakespeare Are Consecrated.
Years
Names
Paradise
But Her's Was The Misery Of Innocence, Which, Like A Cloud That Passes Over The Fair Moon, For A While Hides, But Cannot Tarnish Its Brightness.
Moon
Clouds
Brightness
I Leave A Sad And Bitter World; And If You Remember Me, And Think Of Me As Of One Unjustly Condemned, I Am Resigned To The Fate Awaiting Me.
Fate
Thinking
World
Sorrow Only Increased With Knowledge.
Sorrow
Seek Happiness In Tranquility And Avoid Ambition Even If It Be Only The Apparently Innocent One Of Distinguishing Yourself In Science And Discoveries.
Ambition
Discovery
Tranquility
I Trembled, And My Heart Failed Within Me; When, On Looking Up, I Saw, By The Light Of The Moon, The Daemon At The Casement.
Heart
Moon
Light
Devil, Do You Dare Approach Me? And Do You Not Fear The Fierce Vengeance Of My Arm Wreaked On Your Miserable Head?
Devil
Arms
Vengeance
Oh! Grief Is Fantastic; It Weaves A Web On Which To Trace The History Of Its Woe From Every Form And Change Around; It Incorporates Itself With All Living Nature; It Finds Sustenance In Every Object; As Light, It Fills All Things, And, Like Light, It Gives Its Own Colors To All.
Grief
Light
Color
How Dreadful It Is, To Emerge From The Oblivion Of Slumber, And To Receive As A Good Morrow The Mute Wailing Of One's Own Hapless Heart - To Return From The Land Of Deceptive Dreams To The Heavy Knowledge Of Unchanged Disaster!
Dream
Grief
Heart
With How Many Things Are We On The Brink Of Becoming Acquainted, If Cowardice Or Carelessness Did Not Restrain Our Inquiries.
Inquiry
Becoming
Cowardice
The Different Accidents Of Life Are Not So Changeable As The Feelings Of Human Nature.
Feelings
Different
Human Nature
The Day Of My Departure At Length Arrived. Clerval Spent The Last Evening With Us. He Had Endeavoured To Persuade His Father To Permit Him To Accompany Me And To Become My Fellow Student, But In Vain. His Father Was A Narrow-minded Trader, And Saw Idleness And Ruin In The Aspirations And Ambition Of His Son. Henry Deeply Felt The Misfortune Of Being Debarred From A Liberal Education. He Said Little, But When He Spoke I Read In His Kindling Eye And In His Animated Glance A Restrained But Firm Resolve Not To Be Chained To The Miserable Details Of Commerce.
Father
Eye
Ambition
There Is Something So Different In Venice From Any Other Place In The World, That You Leave At Once All Accustomed Habits And Everyday Sights To Enter An Enchanted Garden.
Garden
Sight
Venice
The Air Of Fashion, Which Many Young People Are So Eager To Attain, Always Strikes Me Like The Studied Attitudes Of Some Modern Prints, Copied With Tasteless Servility After The Antigue; The Soul Is Left Out, And None Of The Parts Are Tied Together By What May Properly Be Termed Character.
Fashion
Attitude
Character
Allow Me Now To Return To The Cottagers, Whose Story Excited In Me Such Various Feelings Of Indignation, Delight, And Wonder, But Which All Terminated In Additional Love And Reverence For My Protectors (for So I Loved, In An Innocent, Half Painful Self-deceit, To Call Them).
Love
Self
Feelings
It Was The Secrets Of Heaven And Earth That I Desired To Learn.
Knowledge
Science
Heaven
You Will Rejoice To Hear That No Disaster Has Accompanied The Commencement Of An Enterprise Which You Have Regarded With Such Evil Forebodings.
Evil
Disaster
Commencement
My Heart Was Fashioned To Be Susceptible Of Love And Sympathy, And When Wrenched By Misery To Vice And Hatred, It Did Not Endure The Violence Of The Change Without Torture Such As You Cannot Even Imagine.
Heart
Hatred
Vices
The World Was To Me A Secret Which I Desired To Devine.
Secret
World
We Never Do What We Wish When We Wish It, And When We Desire A Thing Earnestly, And It Does Arrive, That Or We Are Changed, So That We Slide From The Summit Of Our Wishes And Find Ourselves Where We Were.
Wish
Desire
Doe
For A Moment My Soul Was Elevated From Its Debasing And Miserable Fears To Which These Sights Were The Monuments And The Remembrances. For An Instant I Dared To Shake Off My Chains, And Look Around Me With A Free And Lofty Spirit; But The Iron Had Eaten Into My Flesh, And I Sank Again, Trembling And Hopeless, Into My Miserable Self.
Iron
Sight
Self
All Men Hate The Wretched; How, Then, Must I Be Hated, Who Am Miserable Beyond All Living Things! Yet You, My Creator, Detest And Spurn Me, Thy Creature, To Whom Thou Are Bound By Ties Only Dissoluble By The Annihilation Of One Of Us.
Hate
Science
Men
Standing Armies Can Never Consist Of Resolute Robust Men; They May Be Well-disciplined Machines, But They Will Seldom Contain Men Under The Influence Of Strong Passions, Or With Very Vigorous Faculties.
Strong
Passion
Army
I Ought To Be Thy Adam, But I Am Rather The Fallen Angel.
Angel
Adam
Fallen
The Time At Length Arrives, When Grief Is Rather An Indulgence Than A Necessity And The Smile That Plays Upon The Lips, Although It May Be Deemed A Sacrilege, Is Not Banished.
Grief
Play
May
Precious Attribute Of Woe-worn Humanity! That Can Snatch Ecstatic Emotion, Even From Under The Very Share And Harrow, That Ruthlessly Ploughs Up And Lays Waste Every Hope.
Grief
Humanity
Despair
I Expected This Reception. All Men Hate The Wretched; How, Then, Must I Be Hated, Who Am Miserable Beyond All Living Things! Yet You, My Creator, Detest And Spurn Me, Thy Creature, To Whom Thou Art Bound By Ties Only Dissoluble By The Annihilation Of One Of Us. You Purpose To Kill Me. How Dare You Sport Thus With Life? Do Your Duty Towards Me, And I Will Do Mine Towards You And The Rest Of Mankind. If You Will Comply With My Conditions, I Will Leave Them And You At Peace; But If You Refuse, I Will Glut The Maw Of Death, Until It Be Satiated With The Blood Of Your Remaining Friends.
Sports
Art
Hate
Teach Him To Think For Himself? Oh, My God, Teach Him Rather To Think Like Other People!
Teaching
Thinking
People
After Days And Nights Of Incredible Labor And Fatigue, I Succeeded In Discovering The Cause Of Generation And Life. Nay, More, I Became Myself Capable Of Bestowing Animation Upon Lifeless Matter.
Night
Causes
Generations
Curiosity, Earnest Research To Learn The Hidden Laws Of Nature, Gladness Akin To Rapture, As They Unfolded To Me, Are Among The Earliest Sensations I Can Remember.
Law
Intellectual
Curiosity
Listen To Me, Frankenstein. You Accuse Me Of Murder; And Yet You Would, With A Satisfied Conscience, Destroy Your Own Creature. Oh, Praise The Eternal Justice Of Man!
Men
Justice
Murder
The Moon Gazed On My Midnight Labours, While, With Unrelaxed And Breathless Eagerness, I Pursued Nature To Her Hiding Places.
Halloween
Moon
Midnight
His Conversation Was Marked By Its Happy Abundance.
Women
Abundance
Conversation
Oh! Stars And Clouds And Winds, Ye Are All About To Mock Me; If Ye Really Pity Me, Crush Sensation And Memory; Let Me Become As Nought; But If Not, Depart, Depart, And Leave Me In Darkness.
Crush
Stars
Memories
I Beheld The Wretch-the Miserable Monster Whom I Had Created.
Monsters
Miserable
Creation
The Guilty Are Allowed, By Human Laws, Bloody As They Are, To Speak In Their Own Defence Before They Are Condemned.
Law
Speak
Guilty
My Spirit Will Sleep In Peace; Or If It Thinks, It Will Not Surely Think Thus. Farewell.
Farewell
Sleep
Thinking
Truly Disappointment Is The Guardian Deity Of Human Life; She Sits At The Threshold Of Unborn Time, And Marshals The Events As They Come Forth.
Disappointment
Events
Deities
I Saw And Heard Of None Like Me. Was I Then A Monster, A Blot Upon The Earth, From Which All Men Fled, And Whom All Men Disowned?
Life
Men
Identity
Invention Consists In The Capacity Of Seizing On The Capabilities Of A Subject, And In The Power Of Moulding And Fashioning Ideas Suggested To It.
Ideas
Invention
Capacity
My Candle Was Nearly Burnt Out, When, By The Glimmer Of The Half-extinguished Light, I Saw The Dull Yellow Eye Of The Creature Open.
Halloween
Eye
Light
A Mind Of Moderate Capacity Which Closely Pursues One Study Must Infallibly Arrive At Great Proficiency In That Study.
Mind
Study
Capacity
He Is Dead Who Called Me Into Being, And When I Shall Be No More The Very Remembrance Of Us Both Will Speedily Vanish.
Remembrance
I Am Very Averse To Bringing Myself Forward In Print, But As My Account Will Only Appear As An Appendage To A Former Production, And As It Will Be Confined To Such Topics As Have Connection With My Authorship Alone, I Can Hardly Accuse Myself Of A Personal Intrusion.
Connections
Topics
Intrusion
Polluted By Crimes, And Torn By The Bitterest Remorse, Where Can I Find Rest But In Death?
Crime
Torn
Remorse
It Was Very Different When The Masters Of Science Sought Immortality And Power; Such Views, Although Futile, Were Grand: But Now The Scene Was Changed. The Ambition Of The Inquirer Seemed To Limit Itself To The Annihilation Of Those Visions On Which My Interest In Science Was Chiefly Founded. I Was Required To Exchange Chimeras Of Boundless Grandeur For Realities Of Little Worth.
Ambition
Reality
Views
All Judges Had Rather That Ten Innocent Should Suffer Than That One Guilty Should Escape.
Judging
Suffering
Guilty
Did You Not Call This A Glorious Expedition? And Wherefore Was It Glorious? Not Because The Way Was Smooth And Placid As A Southern Sea, But Because It Was Full Of Dangers And Terror, Because At Every New Incident Your Fortitude Was To Be Called Forth And Your Courage Exhibited, Because Danger And Death Surrounded It, And These You Were Brave To Overcome. For This Was It A Glorious , For This Was It An Honorable Undertaking
Sea
Southern
Brave
My Education Was Neglected, Yet I Was Passionately Fond Of Reading.
Reading
Neglected
Ah! It Is Well For The Unfortunate To Be Resigned, But For The Guilty There Is No Peace.
Guilt
Wells
Unfortunate
In Other Studies You Go As Far As Other Have Gone Before You, And There Is Nothing More To Know; But In A Scientific Pursuit There Is Continual Food For Discovery And Wonder.
Discovery
Gone
Study
I Am Not A Person Of Opinions Because I Feel The Counter Arguments Too Strongly.
Opinion
Argument
Feels
When I Run Over The Frightful Catalogue Of My Sins, I Cannot Believe That I Am The Same Creature Whose Thoughts Were Once Filled With Sublime And Transcendent Visions Of The Beauty And The Majesty Of Goodness. But It Is Even So; The Fallen Angel Becomes A Malignant Devil.
Running
Believe
Angel
I Saw No Cause For Their Unhappiness, But I Was Deeply Affected By It. If Such Lovely Creatures Were Miserable, It Was Less Strange That I, An Imperfect And Solitary Being, Should Be Wretched.
Lovely
Saws
Causes
You Seek For Knowledge And Wisdom As I Once Did; And I Ardently Hope That The Gratification Of Your Wishes May Not Be A Serpent To Sting You, As Mine Has Been.
Knowledge
Science
Wish
Even Where The Affections Are Not Strongly Moved By Any Superior Excellence, The Companions Of Our Childhood Always Possess A Certain Power Over Our Minds Which Hardly Any Later Friend Can Obtain. They Know Our Infantine Dispositions, Which, However They May Be Afterwards Modified, Are Never Eradicated; And They Can Judge Of Our Actions With More Certain Conclusions As To The Integrity Of Our Motives.
Integrity
Judging
Childhood
There Is Something At Work In My Soul Which I Do Not Understand. I Am Practically Industrious - Painstaking, A Workman To Execute With Perseverance And Labour - But Besides This There Is A Love For The Marvellous, A Belief In The Marvellous, Intertwined In All My Projects, Which Hurries Me Out Of The Common Pathways Of Men, Even To The Wild Sea And Unvisited Regions I Am About To Explore.
Perseverance
Men
Sea
If Our Impulses Were Confined To Hunger, Thirst, And Desire, We Might Be Nearly Free; But Now We Are Moved By Every Wind That Blows And A Chance Word Or Scene That That Word May Convey To Us.
Blow
Wind
Desire
From My Birth I Have Aspired Like The Eagle - But Unlike The Eagle, My Wings Have Failed. . . . Congratulate Me Then That I Have Found A Fitting Scope For My Powers.
Eagles
Wings
Birth
She Was No Longer That Happy Creature Who In Earlier Youth Wandered With Me On The Banks Of The Lake And Talked With Ecstasy Of Our Future Prospects. The First Of Those Sorrows Which Are Sent To Wean Us From The Earth Had Visited Her, And Its Dimming Influence Quenched Her Dearest Smiles.
Lakes
Sorrow
Earth
I Could Not Understand Why Men Who Knew All About Good And Evil Could Hate And Kill Each Other.
Hate
Men
Evil
When Falsehood Can Look So Like The Truth, Who Can Assure Themselves Of Certain Happiness?
Looks
Certain
Falsehood
We Could Almost Believe That We Are Destined By Providence To An Unsettled Position On The Globe, So Invariably Is A Love Of Change Implanted In The Young. It Seems As If The Eternal Lawgiver Intended That, At A Certain Age, Man Should Leave Father, Mother, And The Dwelling Of His Infancy, To Seek His Fortunes Over The Wide World.
Mother
Father
Believe
Her Countenance Was All Expression; Her Eyes Were Not Dark But Impenetrably Deep; You Seemed To Discover Space After Space In Their Intellectual Glance.
Eye
Dark
Expression
And The Violet Lay Dead While The Odour Flew On The Wings Of The Wind O'er The Waters Blue.
Blue
Wind
Wings
When I Step Into The Batter's Box, The Fans, The Noise, The Cheers, They All Disappear. For That Moment, The World Is Just A Battle Between Me And The Pitcher. And More Than Anything, I Want To Win.
Softball
Cheer
Winning
So Much Has Been Done, Exclaimed The Soul Of Frankenstein - More, Far More, Will I Achieve; Treading In The Steps Already Marked, I Will Pioneer A New Way, Explore Unknown Powers, And Unfold To The World The Deepest Mysteries Of Creation.
Soul
Way
Steps
My Dreams Were All My Own; I Accounted For Them To Nobody; They Were My Refuge When Annoyed - My Dearest Pleasure When Free.
Dream
Annoyed
Pleasure
Poetry, And The Principle Of Self, Of Which Money Is The Visible Incarnation, Are The God And The Mammon Of The World.
Self
Principles
World
Even The Eternal Skies Weep, I Thought; Is There Any Shame Then, That Mortal Man Should Spend Himself In Tears?
Grief
Rain
Men
Invention, It Must Be Humbly Admitted, Does Not Consist In Creating Out Of A Void, But Out Of Chaos; The Materials Must In The First Place Be Afforded; It Can Give Form To Dark, Shapeless Substances, But Cannot Bring Into Being The Substance Itself.
Writing
Dark
Creating
It Is A Strange Feeling For A Girl When First She Finds The Power Put Into Her Hand Of Influencing The Destiny Of Another To Happiness Or Misery. She Is Like A Magician Holding For The First Time A Fairy Wand, Not Having Yet Had Experience Of Its Potency.
Girl
Women
Destiny
I See By Your Eagerness, And The Wonder And Hope Which Your Eyes Express, My Friend, That You Expect To Be In Formed Of The Secret With Which I Am Acquainted. That Cannot Be.
Eye
Secret
Wonder
...once I Falsely Hoped To Meet The Beings Who, Pardoning My Outward Form, Would Love Me For The Excellent Qualities Which I Was Capable Of Unfolding.
Quality
Excellent
Form
If You Will Comply With My Conditions, I Will Leave Them And You At Peace; But If You Refuse, I Will Glut The Maw Of Death, Until It Be Satiated With The Blood Of Your Remaining Friends.
Blood
Refuse
Conditions
Life And Death Appeared To Me Ideal Bounds, Which I Should First Break Through, And Pour A Torrent Of Light Into Our Dark World.
Dark
Light
Break Through
...we Are Unfashioned Creatures, But Half Made Up, If One Wiser, Better, Dearer Than Ourselves - Such A Friend Ought To Be - Do Not Lend His Aid To Perfectionate Our Weak And Faulty Natures.
Half
Weak
Aids
Solitude Becomes A Sort Of Tangible Enemy, The More Dangerous, Because It Dwells Within The Citadel Itself.
Solitude
Enemy
Tangible
These Wonderful Narrations Inspired Me With Strange Feelings. Was Man, Indeed, At Once So Powerful, So Virtuous, And Magnificent, Yet So Vicious And Base? He Appeared At One Time A Mere Scion Of The Evil Principle And At Another As All That Can Be Conceived Of Noble And Godlike.
Powerful
Men
Evil
I Am Alone And Miserable. Only Someone As Ugly As I Am Could Love Me.
Ugly
Miserable
The Fallen Angel Becomes A Malignant Devil. Yet Even That Enemy Of God And Man Had Friends And Associates In His Desolation; I Am Alone.
Angel
Men
Enemy
It Is True, We Shall Be Monsters, Cut Off From All The World; But On That Account We Shall Be More Attached To One Another.
Cutting
Monsters
Asceticism
It Would Be An Endless Task To Trace The Variety Of Meannesses, Cares, And Sorrows Into Which Women Are Plunged By The Prevailing Opinion That They Were Created Rather To Feel Than Reason.
Sorrow
Care
Tasks
Women Are Told From Their Infancy, And Taught By The Example Of Their Mothers, That A Little Knowledge Of Human Weakness, Justly Termed Cunning, Softness Of Temper, Outward Obedience And A Scrupulous Attention To A Puerile Kind Of Propriety, Will Obtain For Them The Protection Of Man.
Mother
Men
Weakness
Look Forward To Future Years, If Not With Eager Anticipation, Yet With A Calm Reliance Upon The Power Of Good, Wholly Remote From Despair.
Years
Despair
Looks
One As Deformed And Horrible As Myself, Could Not Deny Herself To Me. My Companion Must Be Of The Same Species, And Have The Same Defects... With Whom I Can Live In The Interchange Of Those Sympathies Necessary For My Being.
Deny
Companion
Horrible
A Truce To Philosophy!—life Is Before Me, And I Rush Into Possession. Hope, Glory, Love, And Blameless Ambition Are My Guides, And My Soul Knows No Dread. What Has Been, Though Sweet, Is Gone; The Present Is Good Only Because It Is About To Change, And The To Come Is All My Own.
Sweet
Philosophy
Ambition
The Agony Of My Feelings Allowed Me No Respite; No Incident Occurred From Which My Rage And Misery Could Not Extract Its Food.
Agony
Feelings
Misery
What Terrified Me Will Terrify Others; And I Need Only Describe The Spectre Which Had Haunted My Midnight Pillow.
Scary
Midnight
Needs
Every Where I See Bliss, From Which I Alone Am Irrevocably Excluded.
Exclusion
Bliss
Excluded
The Labours Of Men Of Genius, However Erroneously Directed, Scarcely Ever Fail In Ultimately Turning To The Solid Advantage Of Mankind.
Men
Genius
Failing
Everything Must Have A Beginning ... And That Beginning Must Be Linked To Something That Went Before.
Linked
At The Age Of Twenty Six I Am In The Condition Of An Aged Person - All My Old Friends Are Gone... & My Heart Fails When I Think By How Few Ties I Hold To The World.
Heart
Thinking
Ties
But He Found That A Traveller's Life Is One That Includes Much Pain Amidst Its Enjoyments. His Feelings Are For Ever On The Stretch; And When He Begins To Sink Into Repose, He Finds Himself Obliged To Quit That On Which He Rests In Pleasure For Something New, Which Again Engages His Attention, And Which Also He Forsakes For Other Novelties.
Pain
Feelings
Attention
Nothing Is So Painful To The Human Mind As A Great And Sudden Change. The Sun Might Shine, Or The Clouds Might Lour: But Nothing Could Appear To Me As It Had Done The Day Before.
Clouds
Shining
Mind
What Is There So Fearful As The Expectation Of Evil Tidings Delayed? ... Misery Is A More Welcome Visitant When She Comes In Her Darkest Guise And Wraps Us In Perpetual Black, For Then The Heart No Longer Sickens With Disappointed Hope.
Fear
Heart
Evil
Once A King ... It Was Impossible, Without Risk Of Life, To Sink To A Private Station.
Kings
Risk
Impossible
I Collected The Instruments Of Life Around Me, That I Might Infuse A Spark Of Being Into The Lifeless Thing That Lay At My Feet. It Was Already One In The Morning; The Rain Pattered Dismally Against The Panes, And My Candle Was Nearly Burnt Out, When, By The Glimmer Of The Half-extinguished Light, I Saw The Dull Yellow Eye Of The Creature Open; It Breathed Hard, And A Convulsive Motion Agitated Its Limbs.
Morning
Rain
Eye
The World To Me Was A Secret, Which I Desired To Discover; To Her It Was A Vacancy, Which She Sought To People With Imaginations Of Her Own.
People
Imagination
Secret
Marriage Is Usually Considered The Grave, And Not The Cradle Of Love.
Marriage
Cradle
Graves
The Careful Rearer Of The Ductile Human Plant Can Instil His Own Religion, And Surround The Soul By Such A Moral Atmosphere, As Shall Become To Its Latest Day The Air It Breathes.
Air
Soul
Atmosphere
Satan Has His Companions, Fellow-devils, To Admire And Encourage Him; But I Am Solitary And Detested.
Devil
Satan
Admire
Oh! Be Men, Or Be More Than Men. Be Steady To Your Purposes And Firm As A Rock. This Ice Is Not Made Of Such Stuff As Your Hearts May Be; It Is Mutable And Cannot Withstand You If You Say That It Shall Not. Do Not Return To Your Families With The Stigma Of Disgrace Marked On Your Brows. Return As Heroes Who Have Fought And Conquered, And Who Know Not What It Is To Turn Their Backs On The Foe.
Hero
Heart
Men
Nothing Contributes So Much To Tranquilize The Mind As A Steady Purpose - A Point On Which The Soul May Fix Its Intellectual Eye.
Inspirational
Stay Strong
Motivation
Till Society Is Very Differently Constituted, Parents, I Fear, Will Still Insist On Being Obeyed Because They Will Be Obeyed, And Constantly Endeavor To Settle That Power On A Divine Right Which Will Not Bear The Investigation Of Reason.
Divine Right
Parent
Bears
I Felt Emotions Of Gentleness And Pleasure, That Had Long Appeared Dead, Revive Within Me. Half Surprised By The Novelty Of These Sensations, I Allowed Myself To Be Borne Away By Them, And Forgetting My Solitude And Deformity, Dared To Be Happy.
Long
Solitude
Half
In My Joy I Thrust My Hand Into The Live Embers, But Quickly Drew It Out With A Cry Of Pain. How Strange, I Thought That The Same Cause Should Produce Such Opposite Effects.
Pain
Hands
Opposites
The Instructor Can Scarcely Give Sensibility Where It Is Essentially Wanting, Nor Talent To The Unpercipient Block. But He Can Cultivate And Direct The Affections Of The Pupil, Who Puts Forth, As A Parasite, Tendrils By Which To Cling, Not Knowing To What - To A Supporter Or A Destroyer.
Block
Teaching
Knowing
I Am Malicious Because I Am Miserable
Miserable
Malicious
My Dreams Were At Once More Fantastic And Agreeable Than My Writings.
Dream
Writing
Fantastic
Ennui, The Demon, Waited At The Threshold Of His Noiseless Refuge, And Drove Away The Stirring Hopes And Enlivening Expectations, Which Form The Better Part Of Life.
Blessing
Expectations
Boredom
From My Infancy I Was Imbued With High Hopes And A Lofty Ambition.
Ambition
Infancy
Lofty
And Now, Once Again, I Bid My Hideous Progeny Go Forth And Prosper. I Have An Affection For It, For It Was The Offspring Of Happy Days, When Death And Grief Were But Words, Which Found No True Echo In My Heart.
Grief
Heart
Echoes
Our Feelings Probably Are Not Less Strong At Fifty Than They Were Ten Or Fifteen Years Before; But They Have Changed Their Objects, And Dwell On Far Different Prospects. At Five-and-thirty A Man Thinks Of What His Own Existence Is; When The Maturity Of Age Has Grown Into Its Autumn, He Is Wrapt Up In That Of Others. The Loss Of Wife Or Child Then Becomes More Deplorable, As Being Impossible To Repair; For No Fresh Connection Can Give Us Back The Companion Of Our Earlier Years, Nor A "new-sprung Race" Compensate For That, Whose Career We Hoped To See Run.
Running
Strong
Children
Our Faults Are Apt To Assume Giant And Exaggerated Forms To Our Eyes In Youth.
Eye
Giants
Faults
I Saw -- With Shut Eyes, But Acute Mental Vision -- I Saw The Pale Student Of Unhallowed Arts Kneeling Beside The Thing He Had Put Together. I Saw The Hideous Phantasm Of A Man Stretched Out, And Then, On The Working Of Some Powerful Engine, Show Signs Of Life, And Stir With An Uneasy, Half-vital Motion.
Art
Powerful
Eye
The Whole Series Of My Life Appeared To Me As A Dream; I Sometimes Doubted If Indeed It Were All True, For It Never Presented Itself To My Mind With The Force Of Reality.
Dream
Reality
Mind
I Cherished Hope, It Is True, But It Vanished When My Person Reflected . . .
Persons
...if I See But One Smile On Your Lips When We Meet, Occasioned By This Or Any Other Exertion Of Mine, I Shall Need No Other Happiness.
Others Happiness
Needs
Lips
My Reign Is Not Yet Over... You Live, And My Power Is Complete. Follow Me; I Seek The Everlasting Ices Of The North, Where You Will Feel The Misery Of Cold And Frost To Which I Am Impassive. You Will Find Near This Place, If You Follow Not Too Tardily, A Dead Hare; Eat And Be Refreshed. Come On, My Enemy; We Have Yet To Wrestle For Our Lives; But Many Hard And Miserable Hours Must You Endure Until That Period Shall Arrive.
Ice
Over You
Enemy
Life, Although It May Only Be An Accumulation Of Anguish, Is Dear To Me, And I Will Defend It.
May
Accumulation
Dear
Man," I Cried, "how Ignorant Art Thou In Thy Pride Of Wisdom!
Art
Pride
Men
Elegance Is Inferior To Virtue.
Virtue
Elegance
Inferiors
My Father Was Not Scientific, And I Was Left To Struggle With A Child's Blindness, Added To A Student's Thirst For Knowledge.
Children
Father
Struggle
Life Is Obstinate And Clings Closest Where It Is Most Hated.
Life
Atheism
Hated
My Own Mind Began To Grow, Watchful With Anxoius Thoughts.
Mind
Grows
My Own
Nothing Is More Painful To The Human Mind Than, After The Feelings Have Been Worked Up By A Quick Succession Of Events, The Dead Calmness Of Inaction And Certainty Which Follows And Deprives The Soul Both Of Hope And Fear.
Soul
Feelings
Mind
My Person Was Hideous And My Stature Gigantic. What Did This Mean? Who Was I? What Was I? Whence Did I Come? What Was My Destination? These Questions Continually Recurred, But I Was Unable To Solve Them.
Mean
Destination
Solve
He Was Soon Borne Away By The Waves And Lost In Darkness And Distance.
Distance
Darkness
Wave
But Soon, I Shall Die, And What I Now Feel Be No Longer Felt. Soon These Burning Miseries Will Be Extinct.
Burning
Misery
Feels
It May...be Judged Indecent In Me To Come Forward On This Occasion; But When I See A Fellow-creature About To Perish Through The Cowardice Of Her Pretended Friends, I Wish To Be Allowed To Speak, That I May Say What I Know Of Her Character.
Character
Wish
May
But I Am A Blasted Tree; The Bolt Has Entered My Soul; And I Felt Then That I Should Survive To Exhibit What I Shall Soon Cease To Be - A Miserable Spectacle Of Wrecked Humanity, Pitiable To Others And Intolerable To Myself.
Tree
Soul
Humanity
The Sentiment Of Immediate Loss In Some Sort Decayed, While That Of Utter, Irremediable Loneliness Grew On Me With Time.
Loneliness
Grief
Loss
Nothing Is So Painful To The Human Mind As A Great And Sudden Change.
Change
Mind
Painful
Supremely Frightful Would Be The Effect Of Any Human Endeavor To Mock The Stupendous Mechanism Of The Creator Of The World.
Would Be
World
Endeavor
Why Did I Not Die? More Miserable Than Man Ever Was Before, Why Did I Not Sink Into Forgetfulness And Rest? Death Snatches Away Many Blooming Children, The Only Hopes Of Their Doting Parents: How Many Brides And Youthful Lovers Have Been One Day In The Bloom Of Health And Hope, And The Next A Prey For Worms And The Decay Of The Tomb! Of What Materials Was I Made, That I Could Thus Resist So Many Shocks, Which, Like The Turning Of The Wheel, Continually Renewed The Torture? But I Was Doomed To Live.
Children
Men
Parent
Beware; For I Am Fearless, And Therefore Powerful.
Confidence
Powerful
Fear
We Are Fashioned Creatures, But Half Made Up. - Victor Frankenstein
Half
Made
Creatures
I Feel Exquisite Pleasure In Dwelling On The Recollections Of Childhood, Before Misfortune Had Tainted My Mind, And Changed Its Bright Visions Of Extensive Usefulness Into Gloomy And Narrow Reflections Upon Self.
Reflection
Self
Dwelling
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