unfortunately for Shelley, his favourite subjects of conversation were
tabooed, had it not been for one light-hearted and amusing friend,
Thomas Jefferson Hogg, a gentleman whose acquaintance Shelley made
shortly after his settling in Oxford in the Michaelmas term of 1810.
This friendship, like all that Shelley entered on, was intended to
endure "for ever," and, as usual, Shelley impulsively for a time threw
so much of his own personality into his idea of the character of his
friend as to prepare the way for future disappointment.

Hogg was decidedly intellectual, but with a strong conservative
tendency, making him quite content with the existing state of things
so long as he could take life easily and be amused. His intellect,
however, was clear enough to make him perceive that it is the poet who
raises life from the apathy which assails even the most worldly-minded
and contented, so that he in his turn was able to love Shelley with
the love which is not afraid of a laugh, without the possibility of
which no friendship, it has been said, can be genuine. Many are the
charming stories giving a living presence to Shelley while at Oxford,
preserved by this friend; here we meet with him taking an infant from
its mother's arms while crossing the bridge with Hogg, and questioning
it as to its previous existence, which surely the babe had not had
time to forget if it would but speak--but alas, the mother declared
she had never heard it speak, nor any other child of its age; here
comes also the charming incident of the torn coat, and Shelley's
ecstasy on its having been fine drawn. These and such-like amusing
anecdotes show the genuine and unpedantic side of Shelley's character,
the delightfully natural and loveable personality which is ever allied
to genius. With the fun and humour were mixed long readings and
discussions on the most serious and solemn subjects. Plato was
naturally a great delight to him; he had a decided antipathy to Euclid