Shelley believed in a Soul of the Universe, a Spirit in which all things live and move and have their being which, as one feels in the Prometheus, is unable, inconceivable even to man, for “the deep truth is imageless.” His most passionate desire was not, as was Browning’s, for an increased and ennobled individuality, but for the mystical fusion of his own personality with this Spirit, this object of his worship and adoration. To Shelley, death itself was but the rending of a veil which would admit to the full vision of the ideal, which alone is true life. The sense of unity in all things is most strongly felt in Adonais, where Shelley's maturest thought and philosophy are to be found; and indeed the mystical favour in this poem, especially towards the end, is greater than anywhere else in his writings. The Hymn to Intellectual Beauty is in some ways Shelley's clearest and most obvious expression of his devotion to the Spirit of ideal Beauty, its reality to him, and his vow of dedication to its service. But the Prometheus is the most deeply mystical of his poems: indeed, as Mrs. Shelley says, “It requires a mind as subtle and penetrating as Shelley's own to understand the mystic meaning scattered throughout the poem.”
Shelley, like Blake, regarded the human imagination, as a divine creative force; Prometheus stands for the human imagination, or the genius of the world; and it is his union with the Divine ideas, Spirit of Beauty and of Love, from which a new Universe is born. It is this union, which consummates the aspirations of humanity that Shelley celebrates in the marvellous love - song of Prometheus. As befitted the disciple of Godwin, he believed in the divine potentiality of man, convinced that all good is to be found within man's own being, and that his progress depends on his own will.
It is our will
That thus enchains us to permitted ill—
We might be otherwise —We might be all
We dream of happy. high majestical.
Where is the love, beauty and truth we seek
But in our mind? —Julian and Maddalo.
In the allegorical introduction to the Revolt of Islam, which is an interesting example of Shelley's mystical mythology, we have an insight into the poet's view of the good power in the world. It is not an almighty creator standing outside mankind, but a power which suffers and rebels, and evolves, and is, in fact, incarnate in humanity, so it is unrecognized by men, and indeed confounded with evil:
And the Great Spirit of Good did creep among
The nations of mankind, and every tongue
Cursed and blasphemed him as he passed, for none
Knew good from evil.
Shelley was always searching for love; although he knew well, through his study of Plato, the difference between earthly and spiritual love, that the one is but the lowest step on the ladder which leads to the other, yet in actual practice he confounded the two. He knew that he did so; and only a month before his death, he summed up in a sentence the tragedy of his life. He writes to Mr. Gisborne about the Epipsychidion, saying that he cannot look at it now, for “the person whom it celebrates was a cloud instead of Juno” and continues, “If you are curious, however, to hear what I am and have been, it will tell you something thereof. It is an idealized history of my life and feelings. I think one is always in love with something or other; the error — and I confess it is not easy for spirits encased in flesh and blood to avoid it — consists in seeking in a moral image the likeness of what is perhaps, eternal.” -C. F. E. Spurgeon.
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