But the picture has a darker side which it is necessary to notice in order to understand Hunt's personal relations. An imaginative and over-sensitive brain in a feeble body had peopled his childhood with creatures of fear, the precursors of the morbid fancies of later years. From 1805 to 1807 he suffered from a trouble that seems to have been mental rather than physical, probably a form of melancholia or hypochondria. He tortured himself with problems of metaphysics and philosophy. He was haunted with the hallucination that he was deficient in physical courage, and therefore subjected himself to all kinds of tests. At the beginning of his imprisonment he was suffering from a second attack of his malady. The injurious effects upon his health of close confinement at this time can be traced to the end of his life. After his release his morbid fear of cowardice and his habit of seclusion were so strong upon him that for months at a time he would not venture out upon the streets. Yet in spite of all this and of frequent illnesses, his animal spirits were invincible. His optimism was proverbial; indeed, it was a part of his religion. Coventry Patmore tells us that on entering a room and being presented to Hunt for the first time, he received the greeting "This is a beautiful world, Mr. Patmore."[7] His wonderful fancy colored his life as it colored his poetry. With his flowers and his friends and his fancies he turned life into a perpetual Arcadia. It has been many times asserted that Leigh Hunt was morally weak. His self-depreciation is largely responsible for such assertions. It is true that he fell short of great accomplishment and that he was guilty of small foibles which Haydon exaggerated into "petticoat twaddling and Grandisonian cant."[8] Yet the struggle and the suffering of his life show more virility and nobility than he is generally credited with, and prove that beneath a veneer of affectation lay strong and healthy qualities. A second lasting and disastrous result that followed Hunt's incarceration and that greatly affected his relations with Byron and Shelley was the crippling of his finances. While it cannot be said that he ever showed any real business ability, yet, at the beginning of the trials for libel, his money matters were in fair condition. The heavy fine and costs permanently disabled him. In 1821 his affairs were in such a bad state that, with the hope of bettering them, he left England on a precarious journalistic venture, an injudicious step, the cause of which can be traced to the lingering effects of his labors in the cause of liberalism. From 1834 to 1840 his misfortunes reached a climax. He sold his books to get something to eat. The pain of giving up his beloved _Parnaso Italiano_ was like that of a violinist parting with his instrument. He lived in continual fear of arrest for debt. At the same time, family troubles and ill-health combined to torment him.