If the reader regards this phrase ironically, it would seem commensurate (or nearly
so) with death. The last third of Frankenstein is dominated by the withdrawal of its
protagonists behind psychic barricades that wall them off increasingly from the forces
of life. Again, one senses the context of P.B. Shelley's recently-published Alastor;
or, The Spirit of Solitude behind Mary Shelley's text.