Roman om Frankenstein

Mary Shelley, Frankenstein or the Modern Prometheus, first published in 1818.

Roman om en videnskabsmand, Frankenstein, der skaber et levende monster ud af ligdele. Monstret skaber død og ødelæggelse og tvinger Frankenstein til at lave sig en mage. I det følgende reflekterer han over konsekvenserne:

Even if they were to leave Europe, and inhabit the deserts of the new world, yet one of the first results of those sympathies for which the daemon thirsted would be children, and a race of devils would be propagated upon the earth, who might make the very existence of the species of man a condition precarious and full of terror. Had I a right, for my own benefit, to inflict this curse upon everlasting generations? I had before been moved by the sophisms of the being I had created; I had been struck by his fiendish threats: but now, for the first time, the wickedness of my promise burst upon me; I shuddered to think that future ages might curse me as their pest, whose selfishness had not hesitated to buy its own peace at the price, perhaps of the existence of the whole human race. (chapter XX)