1. _Nor let us weep,_ &c. So far as the broad current of
sentiment is concerned, this is the turning-point of Shelley's Elegy.
Hitherto the tone has been continuously, and through a variety of
phases, one of mourning for the fact that Keats, the great poetical
genius, is untimely dead. But now the writer pauses, checks himself, and
recognises that mourning is not the only possible feeling, nor indeed
the most appropriate one. As his thought expands and his rapture rises,
he soon acknowledges that, so far from grieving for Keats who _is_ dead,
it were far more relevant to grieve for himself who is _not_ dead. This
paean of recantation and aspiration occupies the remainder of the poem.
1. 2. _These carrion kites._ A term of disparagement corresponding
nearly enough to the 'ravens' and 'vultures' of st. 28.
1. 3. _He wakes or sleeps with the enduring dead._ With such of the dead
as have done something which survives themselves. It will be observed
that the phrase 'he wakes _or_ sleeps' leaves the question of personal
or individual immortality quite open. As to this point see the remarks
on p.
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