It appears that Shelley sees validity in the reality that both nature and nurture work in their own overlapping contexts to contribute to the development of a person/monster. In the earlier part of the novel, Victor talks about his wonderful childhood in Geneva, and this invokes the idea that it may be nurture. She makes little reference to nature at first, but nature's role is first shown when Frankenstein goes off to live by himself for the first time at the university. Before this his life had been promising, "remarkably secluded and domestic" (25). He goes to the university where he can finally commence the acquisition of knowledge of his personal interests. "I ardently desired the acquisition of knowledge, I had often, when at home, thought it hard to remain during my youth cooped up in one place, and had longed to enter the world, and take my station among other human beings." (25) His environment as a child had "given [him] invisible repugnance to new countenances" (25), making that the primary way that nature affects him (the nature being his domestic relatively low-stress wealthy life). As soon as he begins his work to recreate life, and delves into the philosophies of science and galvanism, Shelley illustrates nature starting to take hold of his development. By becoming obsessed with galvanism, he risks his mental well-being by devoting his entire being to his desire, his quest -- and this destroys him. "One secret which I alone possessed was the hope to which I had dedicated myself; and the moon gazed on my midnight labors, while, with unrelaxed and breathless eagerness, I pursued nature to her hiding places." (33) He has been partially directed by the two professors, but at his own propulsion, meaning that this is the first time when his nature really begins to take ahold on his development. The environment he builds for himself- his laboratory, charnel houses, his overly devoted and zealous mind, and his classes- focus almost entirely on the defiance of nature but do not undermine the "nature" portion of the argument because they come full circle as soon as he views his creation with disgust, and this, too affects him. "My limbs tremble now, and my eyes swim with the remembrance; but then a resistless, and almost frantic impulse, urged me forward; I seemed to have lost all soul or sensation but for this one pursuit. It was indeed but a passing trance, that only made me feel with renewed acuteness so soon as, the unnatural stimulus ceasing to operate I had returned to my old habits. I collected bones from charnel houses…" (33) In this passage, his attitude and hindsight of his frenzied mind state suggests that Shelley intended for the reader to understand that this is a turning point when Victor's nourishment of his own egotistical plot takes over and degrades his sense of morality, thereby causing pain for both him and his creature. Now, let us compare it with Part 2 in order to understand Shelley's further commentary on the subject.
The creature, it can be safely said, is the product of nature and not nurture. There is no nurturing for the creature besides hate, scorn, disgust, horror, misery and banishment by a disgusted and shameful creator: Victor. In wake of these feelings he leaves Victor: not human by nature, but affected and developed through nature's affect. The first effects are when he is in the forest, he learns how fire functions, how cold and hunger feel and how to deal with those problems; about shelter, and relative levels of comfort, and fire's innate ability to provide heat, light, and food. These are all distinguished by the monster's own efforts and especially necessity. The monster receives no guidance, no affection, and must reconstruct reality based on his experience. He watches the De Lacey family with extreme vigilance, curiosity, and develops a strong affinity for them, referring them to him as his "friends" and "protectors" even though they do not know of him and are disgusted by him eventually. He learns to read, learns of geopolitical realities and the darkness of man by watching this family. He learns French. He learns all about Safie's father and the situation surrounding the family that made them poor. He explores dimensions of humans without actually interacting with them. Eventually, he can read the notebook in the lab coat pocket and learns of his creation -- and develops a hatred towards his creator. Shelley makes the point that no one can be happy or healthy without nurture as well as nature. Because the creature cannot sympathize with other humans and is alone and doesn't have anyone who put love or time or effort into him, he sees disproportionately the evil ways of men (because of how they see/treat him) and it embitters him. Thus, this is nature's effect at work. Nature without nurture is harsh, cold, and has a desolate effect on the mind. and impossible for a healthy person.
The proof is found, as already paraphrased, in the year he spends "with" the De Laceys and also experiencing human-ness.. A more specific piece of evidence is his reaction to the books he reads: Paradis Lost, Plutarch's Lives, and Sorrows of Werter.. "I can hardly describe to you the effect of these books. " (91) "Many times I considered Satan as the fitter emblem of my condition; for often, like him, when I viewed the bliss of my protectors, the bitter gall of envy rose within me." (92). At one point, he does say that these books were taken literally when he first read them. Without anyone to help him interpret the themes that "surpassed my understanding." He "inclined towards the opinions of the hero, whose extinction I wept, without precisely understanding it." The books provoke many questions about his origins, problems inevitably solved by humans with loving parents. Thus I assert again: Nature without nurture is harsh, cold, experience-based; it has a desolate and devastating effect on the mind, and doesn't produce a healthy person. Nurture without too much nature (as in Frankenstein's case) may result in an equally devastating effect if the person is unprepared for storms when they cannot be nurtured anymore, and do something like distance themselves from nature and try to recreate life.
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