308. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | the Pneumatic Institution | Bristol Single MS. Royal Institution. Pub. E. L. G. i. 130. The holograph of this letter has a number of holes burned in it. Postmark: 1 January 1800. JAN. 1. 1800 My dear Davy Longman deems it best for you to publish a Volume, & be determined by the Nature of the Sale at what interval you will publish a second -- the Volume of what size you find convenient. And you may of course begin printing when you like. All the tradesman part of the Business Longman will settle with Biggs & Cottle. 1 ----- I expected to have heard from Southey -- tell him, I have seen Longman, & find him all willingness. But I could only speak in generals; & am waiting anxiously for the arrival of the first Books. ----- Davy! Davy! if the public Good did not iron and adamant you to England & Bristol, what a little colony might we [no]t make -- / Tobin, I am sure, wo[uld] go -- & Wordsworth -- & I -- & Southey. -- Precious Stuff for Dreams -- & God knows, I have no time for them! -- Questions. On dipping my foot & leg into very hot water the first sensation ____________________ 1 Davy Researches, Chemical and Philosophical, chiefly concerning. Nitrous Oxide, or Dephlogisticated Nitrous Air, and its Respiration, published in 1800 by J. Johnson. -556- was identical with th[at] of having dipped it into very cold. -- This identity recurred as often as I took my leg out in order to pour in the hot water from the Kettle, & put it in again. How is this explained in a philosophical Language divested of corpuscular Theories? Define Disgust in philosophical Language --. -- Is it not, speaking as a materialist, always a stomach-sensation conjoined with an idea? What is the cause of that sense of cold, which accompanies inhalation, after having eat peppermint Drops? If you don't answer me these, I'll send them to the Lady's Diary -- where you may find fifty Questions of the same Depth & Kidney. -- A Private Query -- On our system of Death does [it] not follow, that killing a bad man mi[ght do] him a great deal of Good? And that [ Bon]aparte wants a gentle Dose of this kind, dagger or bullet ad libitum? -- I wish in your Researches that you & Beddoes would give a compact compressed History of the Human Mind for the last Century -- considered simply as to the acquisition of Ideas or new arrangement of them. Or if you won't do it there, do it for me -- & I will print it with an Essay I am now writing on the principles of Population & Progressiveness. -- Godwin talks evermore of you with lively affection. -- 'What a pity that such a Man should degrade his vast Talents to Chemistry' -- cried he to me. -- Why, quoth I, how, Godwin! can you thus talk of a science, of which neither you nor I understand an iota? &c &c -- & I defended Chemistry as knowingly at least as Godwin attacked it -- affirmed that it united the opposite advantages of immaterializing [the] mind without destroying the definiteness of [the] Ideas -- nay even while it gave clearness to them -- And eke that being necessarily [per]formed with the passion of Hope, it was p[oetica]l -- & we both agreed (for G. as we(ll as I] thinks himself a Poet) that the Poet is the Greatest possible character -- &c &c. Modest Creatures! -- Hurra, my dear Southey! -- You, [& I,] & Godwin, & Shakespere, & Milton, with what an athanasiophagous Grin we shall march together -- we poets: Down with all the rest of the World! -- By the word athanasiophagous I mean devouring Immortality by anticipation -- 'Tis a sweet Word! -- God bless you, my dear Davy! Take my nonsense like a pinch of snuff -- sneeze it off, it clears the head -- & to Sense & yourself again ----- With most affectionate esteem Your's ever S. T. Coleridge -557- 309. To Thomas Wedgwood Address: Thomas Wedgewood Esq. | Cornwallis House | Clifton | Bristol Single MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. with omis. Tom Wedgwood, 74. Postmark: 2 January 1800. No / 21, Buckingham Street, Strand. My dear Sir I am sitting by a fire in a rug great Coat. Your Room is doubtless to a greater degree air-tight than mine; or your notion of Tartarus would veer round to the Groenlanders' creed. It is most barbarously cold: and you, I fear, can shield yourself from it only by perpetual imprisonment. If any place in the southern Climates were in a state of real quiet & likely to continue so, should you feel no inclination to migrate? -- Poor Southey, from over great Industry, as I suspect, the Industry too of solitary Composition, has reduced himself to a terrible state of weakness -- & is determined to leave this Country as soon as he has finished the Poem on which he is now employed. 'Tis a melancholy thing -- so young a man & one whose Life has ever been so simple and self-denying! -- O for Peace & the South of France. -- I could almost too wish for a Bourbon King if it were only that Sieyes & Buonaparte might finish their career in the old orthodox way of Hanging. -- Thank God, I have my Health perfectly & I am working hard -- yet the present state of human affairs presses on me for days together, so as to deprive me of all my chearfulness. It is probable, that a man's private & personal connections & interests ought to be uppermost in his daily & hourly Thoughts, & that the dedication of much hope & fear to subjects which are perhaps disproportionate to our faculties & powers, is a disease. But I have had this disease so long, & my early Education was so undomestic, that I know not how to get rid of it; or even to wish to get rid of it. Life were so fiat a thing without Enthusiasm -- that if for a moment it leave me, I have a sort of stomach-sensation attached to all my Thoughts, like those which succeed to the pleasurable operation of a dose of Opium. Now I make up my mind to a sort of heroism in believing the progressiveness of all nature, during the present melancholy state of Humanity -- & on this subject I am now writing / and no work, on which I ever employed myself, makes me so happy while I am writing. -- I shall remain in London till April -- the expences of my last year made it necessary for me to exert my industry; and many other good ends are answered at the same time. Where I next settle, I -558- shall continue; & that must be in a state of retirement & rustication. It is therefore good for me to have a run of society -- & that various, & consisting of marked characters! -- Likewise by being obliged to write without much elaboration I shall greatly improve myself in naturalness & facility of style / & the particular subjects on which I write for money, are nearly connected with my future schemes. -- My mornings I give to compilations, which I am sure cannot be wholly useless -- & for which by the beginning of April I shall have earned nearly an 150£ -- my evenings to the Theatres -as I am to conduct a sort of Dramaturgy, a series of Essays on the Drama, both it's general principles, and likewise in reference to the present State of the English Theatres. This I shall publish in the Morning Post 1 -- the attendance on the Theatres costs me nothing, & Stuart, the Editor, covers my expences in London. Two mornings & one whole day I dedicate to the Essay on the possible Progressiveness of Man & on the principles of Population. -- In April I return to my greater work -- the Life of Lessing. -- My German Chests are arrived; but I have them not yet -- but expect them from Stowey daily ----- when they come, I shall send a little pacquet down to you --. To pay my Wife's travelling expences & al[so] my first expences in London I borrowed 25£ from my friend Purkis, for which I gave him an order on your Brother, York Street, dating it Jan. 5, 1800. 2 -- Will you be so kind as to mention this to him -- He will be kind enough to excuse my having done this without having previously written; but I have every reason to believe, that I shall have no occasion to draw again till the year 1801 -- & I believe, that as I now [stand], I have not anticipated beyond the year; if I have wholly anticipated that. -- I shall write to Jos. tomorrow for certain. -- I have seen a good deal of Godwin who has just published a novel. 3 I like him for thinking so well of Davy. He talks of him every where as the most extraordinary human Being, he had ever met with. I cannot say that: for I know one whom I feel to be the superior --; but I never met so extraordinary a young man. -- I have likewise dined with Horne Tooke. He is a clear-headed old man, as every man needs must be who attends to the real import of words; but there is a sort of charletannery [sic] in his manner that did not please me. He makes such a mystery & difficulty out of plain & palpable Things -- and never tells you any thing without first exciting & detaining your Curiosity. But it were a bad Heart ____________________ 1 For contributions recently identified see P.M.L.A., June 1954, p. 681. 2 See Letters826 and 329. 3 Godwin St. Leon, a Tate of the 16th Century, was published in 1799. -559- that could not pardon worse faults than these Author of the Epea Pteroenta. ----- Believe me, my dear Sir! with much affection your's S. T. C. 310. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | The Polygon | Sommers' Town MS.Lord Abinger. Pub. William Godwin, ii. 1. Postmark: 8 January 1800. Wednesday Morning Jan. 8. 1800 My dear Sir Tomorrow & Friday Business rises almost above smothering point with me, over chin & mouth --! but on Saturday Evening I shall be perfectly at leisure, and shall calender an Evening spent with you on so interesting a subject among my Noctes Atticae. If this do not suit your engagements, mention any other day, and I will make it suit mine -- Your's with esteem S. T. Coleridge P.S. How many Thousand Letter-writers will in the first fortnight of this month write a 7 first, & then transmogrify it into an 8 -- in the dates of their Letters! I like to catch myself doing that which involves any identity of the human Race. Hence I like to talk of the Weather -- & in the Fall never omit observing -- How short the Days grow! How the Days shorten! &c. Yet even that would fall, a melancholy phrase indeed on the heart of a Blind Man! -- 311. To the Editor of the 'Morning Post' Pub. Morning Post, 10 January 1800. January 10, 1800 Mr. Editor, An unmetrical letter from Talleyrand 1 to Lord Grenville 2 has already appeared, and from an authority too high to be questioned: otherwise I could adduce some arguments for the exclusive authenticity of the following metrical epistle. 3 The very epithet which the wise ancients used, 'aurea carmina,' might have been ____________________ 1 Charles Maurice de Talleyrand-Périgord ( 1754-1838) was appointed Minister of Foreign Affairs by Bonaparte in 1799. 2 William Wyndham Grenville( 1759-1884), Baron Grenville, was Secretary of State for Foreign Affairs from 1791 until 1801. 3 Coleridge lines, Talleyrand to Lord Grenville, were published in the Morning Post along with this letter. See Poems, i. 341. -560- supposed likely to have determined the choice of the French Minister in favour of verse; and the rather, when we recollect that this phrase of 'golden verses' is applied emphatically to the works of that philosopher, who imposed silenceon all with whom he had to deal. Besides, is it not somewhat improbable that Talleyrand should have preferred prose to rhyme, when the latter alone has got the chink? Is it not likewise curious, that in our official answer, no notice whatever is taken of the Chief Consul, Bonaparte, as if there had been no such person existing; notwithstanding that his existence is pretty generally admitted, nay, that some have been so rash as to believe, that he has created as great a sensation in the world as Lord Grenville, or even the Duke of Portland? But the Minister of Foreign Affairs, Talleyrand, is acknowledged, which, in our opinion, could not have happened, had he written only that insignificant prose-letter, which seems to precede Bonaparte's, as in old romances a dwarf always ran before to proclaim the advent or arrival of knight or giant. That Talleyrand's character and practices more resemble those of some regular Governments than Bonaparte's I admit; but this of itself does not appear a satisfactory explanation. However, let the letter speak for itself. The second line is supererogative in syllables, whether from the oscitancy of the transcriber, or from the trepidation which might have overpowered the modest Frenchman, on finding himself in the act of writing to so greata man, I shall not dare to determine. A few Notes are added by Your servant, GNOME. P.S. -- As mottoes are now fashionable, especially if taken from out of the way books, you may prefix, if you please, the following lines from Sidonius Apollinaris: Saxa, et robora, corneasque fibras Mollit dulciloquâ, canorus arte! 312. To Daniel Stuart Address: D. Stuart Esq. | Morning Post Office MS. British Museum. Pub. Letters from the Lake Poets, 1889, p. 3. [ January 1800] 1 Dear Stuart I have a particular reason for begging you not to expect to see me till Sunday Evening. At that time you will see me -- & I will ____________________ 1 This brief note is undated, but is endorsed by Stuart 'Supposed 1800 Jany.' -561- convince you that I am not trifling with your patience: & that what I am now doing is to secure the regularity of my future efforts with you. Your's, S. T. Coleridge. 313. To Thomas Poole Pub. Thomas Poole, ii. 1. [ January 1800] 1 . . . the situation, is delicious; all I could wish. . . . 2 Sara being Sara, and I being I, we must live in a town or else close to one, so that she may have neighbours and acquaintances. For my friends form not that society which is of itself sufficient to a woman. I know nowhere else but Stowey (for to Bristol my objections are insurmountable), but our old house in Stowey, and that situation will not do for us. God knows where we can go; for that situation which suits my wife does not suit me, and what suits me does not suit my wife. 3 However, that which is, is, -- a truth which always remains equally clear, but not always equally pleasant. . . . 314. To Robert Southey Addressed and franked: London Jan twenty-five 1800. | Mr southey| Kings. down Parade I Bristol H. Wycombe MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 322. Postmark: 25 1800. Sat. 25. 1800 -- Jan. My dear Southey No day passes in which I do not as it were yearn after you / but in truth my occupations have lately swoln above smothering Point -- I am over mouth & nostrils. I have inclosed a Poem which Mrs Robinson gave me for your Anthology -- She is a woman of undoubted Genius. There was a poem of her's in this Morning's paper which both in metre and matter pleased me much -- She overloads every thing; but I never knew a human Being with so full a mind -- bad, good, & indifferent, I grant you, but full, & overflowing. This Poem I asked for you, because I thought the metre stimulating -- & some of the Stanzas really good -- The first line of the 12th would of itself redeem a worse Poem. -- I think, ____________________ 1 This letter probably precedes Poole's letter to Coleridge of 21 Jan 1800. Thomas Poole, ii. 2. 2 Coleridge refers to a house at Aisholt, some three miles from Stowey. 3 Cf. the Latin passage in Letter 317. -562- you will agree with me; but should you not, yet still put it in, my dear fellow! for my sake, & out of respect to a Woman-poet's feelings. 1 -- Miss Hays I have seen. Charles Lloyd's conduct has been atrocious beyond what you stated --. Lamb himself confessed to me, that during the time in which he kept up his ranting sentimental Correspondence with Miss Hays, he frequently read her Letters in company, as a subject for laughter -- & then sate down & answered them quite a la Rosseau! Poor Lloyd! every Hour newcreates him -- he is his own Posterity in a perpetually flowing Series -- & his Body unfortunately retaining an external Identity, THEIR mutual contradictions & disagreeings are united under one name, & of course are called Lies, Treachery, & Rascality! -- I would not give him up; but that the same circumstances, which have wrenched his Morals, prevent in him any salutary Exercise of Genius --. / And therefore he is not worth to the World, that I should embroil & embrangle myself in his Interestst Of Miss Hay's intellect I do not think so highly, as you, or rather, to speak sincerely, I think, not contemptuously, but certainly very despectively thereof. -- Yet I think you likely in this case to have judged better than I -- for to hear a Thing, ugly & petticoated, ex-syllogize a God with cold-blooded Precision, & attempt to run Religion thro' the body with an Icicle -- an Icicle from a Scotch Hog-trough --! I do not endure it! -- my Eye beholds phantoms -- & 'nothing is, but what is not.' -- By your last I could not find, whether or no you still are willing to execute the History of the Levelling Principle -- Let me hear. -Tom Wedgewood is going to the Isle of St Nevis. -- As to myself, Lessing out of the Question, I must stay in England / for I fear, that a circumstance has taken place, which will render a Seavoyage utterly unfit for Sara. -- Indeed, it is a pretty clear case. -Dear Hartley is well, & in high force -- he sported of his own accord a theologico-astronomical Hypothesis -- Having so perpetually heard of good boys being put up into the Sky when they are dead, & being now beyond measure enamoured of the Lamps in the Streets, he said one night, coming thro' the Streets -- 'Stars are dead Lamps -- they be'nt naughty -- they are put up in the Sky.' -Two or three weeks ago he was talking to himself while I was writing, & I took down his soliloquy -- It would make a most original Poem. -- You say, I illuminize -- I think, that Property will some time ____________________ 1 Jasper by Mrs. Mary Robinson ('Perdita') appeared in the Annual Anthology, 1800. The line with which Coleridge was so struck reads: 'Pale Moon! thou Spectre of the Sky V Coleridge included this line in his poem, A Stranger Minstrel. See Poems, i. 852, line 58. -563- or other be modified by the predominance of Intellect, even as Rank & Superstition are now modified by & subordinated to Property, that much is to be hoped of the Future; but first those particular modes of Property which more particularly stop the diffusion must be done away, as injurious to Property itself -these are, Priesthood & the too great Patronage of Government. Therefore if to act on the belief that all things are a Process & that inapplicable Truths are moral Falsehoods, be to illuminize -- why then I illuminize! -- I know that I have been obliged to illuminize so late at night, or rather mornings, that my eyes have smarted as if I had allum in eyes! I believe I have mispelt the word -- & ought to have written Alum: ----- that aside, 'tis a humorous Pun! ----- Tell Davy, that I will soon write. -- God love him! -- You & I, Southey I know a good & great man or two in this World of ours! -- I have discovered so scoundrelly an act of Sheridan's & so dastardly a one of Stuart's -- that I am half-inclined to withdraw myself from the Morning Post. A Row has happened at Norwich, in which Tom Sheridan was concerned. Sheridan went himself to Norwich -- & on his re[turn] he gave in to Stuart, himself, an account of the affair c[ontaining] the most atrocious falsehoods, all of which he himself knew to be [falseh]oods -- [for] Stuart had given me an account of it from Sheridan's own mouth completely in contradiction -- / & Stuart had the dastardly meanness to put it first in the Courier, & afterwards in the Morning Post, under the lying Title of 'an Extract of a Letter from Norwich' 1 -- This Sheridan! -- Is he not an arch Scoundrel? -- This Extract breathed the spirit of the most foul & sanguinary Aristocracy -- & depend upon it, Sheridan is a thorough-paced bad man! -- God love you, my dear Southey! & your affectionate S. T. Coleridge My kind Love to Edith. Let me hear from you -- & do not be angry with me, that I don't [ans]wer your Letters regularly. -- 315. To William Taylor Pub. Memoir of William Taylor of Norwich, by J. W. Robberds, 2 vols., 1843, i. 318. London, January 25th, 1800 My dear Sir, I thank you for your kind attention to my letter. That 'extract of a letter from Norwich' was given in to the Morning Post by Sheridan himself, who knew the whole account to be a tissue of ____________________ 1 Cf. Morning Post, 22 Jan 1800. -564- atrocious falsehoods. Jacobinism evinces a gross and unthinking spirit; but the Jacobins as men are heroes in virtue, compared with Mr. Fox and his party. I know enough of them to know, that more profligate and unprincipled men never disgraced an honest cause. Robert Southey was mistaken -- it was merely an account in a letter from Göttingen of a ridiculous statue. I will transcribe the passage. 'A statue has lately been put up in Ulric's garden in honour of Bürger the poet. It represents the Genius of Germany weeping over an urn. The Genius, instead of being eight faces high, is only five; nor is there anything superhuman about it, except perhaps its position, in which it is impossible for man, woman or child to stand. But notwithstanding all this, you must own, there is something very sylvanly romantic in seeing the monument of a great poet put up in the garden of an alehouse.' If I were in time to get a frank, here I should conclude; but I cannot endure to make you pay postage for half a sheet of almost vacant paper. I will transcribe therefore a passage or two from some letters which passed between me and Wordsworth in Germany (I should say from Wordsworth, for I have no copies of my own) respecting the merits of Bürger. 'We have read "Leonora" and a few little things of Bürger; but upon the whole we were disappointed, particularly in "Leonora," which we thought in several passages inferior to the English translation. "Wie donnerten die Brücken", -- how inferior to "The bridges thunder as they pass, But earthly sound was none, &c., &c."' I admitted in my reply, that there are more passages of poetry in your translation, but affirmed that it wanted the rapidity and oneness of the original; and that in the beauty quoted the idea was so striking, that it made me pause, stand still and look, when I ought to have been driving on with the horse. Your choice of metre I thought unfortunate, and that you had lost the spirit of quotation from the Psalm-book, which gives such dramatic spirit and feeling to the dialogue between the mother and daughter, &c., &c. Answer. -- 'As to Bürger, I am yet far from that admiration of him which he has excited in you; but I am by nature slow to admire; and I am not yet sufficiently master of the language to understand him perfectly. In one point I entirely coincide with you, in your feeling concerning his versification. In "Lenore" the concluding double rhymes of the stanza have both a delicious and pathetic effect -- "Ach! aber für Lenoren War Gruss und Kuss verloren." -565- I accede too to your opinion that Bürger is always the poet; he is never the mobbist, one of those dim drivellers with which our island has teemed for so many years. Bürger is one of those authors whose book I like to have in my hand, but when I have laid the book down I do not think about him. I remember a hurry of pleasure, but I have few distinct forms that people my mind, nor any recollection of delicate or minute feelings which he has either communicated to me, or taught me to recognise. I do not perceive the presence of character in his personages. I see everywhere the character of Bürger himself; and even this, I agree with you, is no mean merit. But yet I wish him sometimes at least to make me forget himself in his creations. It seems to me, that in poems descriptive of human nature, however short they may be, character is absolutely necessary, &c.: incidents are among the lowest allurements of poetry. Take from Bürger's poems the incidents, which are seldom or ever of his own invention, and still much will remain; there will remain a manner of relating which is almost always spirited and lively, and stamped and peculiarized with genius. Still I do not find those higher beauties which can entitle him to the name of a great poet. I have read "Susan's Dream", and I agree with you that it is the most perfect and Shaksperian of his poems, &c., &c. Bürger is the poet of the animal spirits. I love his "Tra ra la" dearly; but less of the horn and more of the lute -- and far, far more of the pencil.' So much of my dear friend Wordsworth. Our controversy was continued, not that I thought Bürger a great poet, but that he really possessed some of the excellences which W. denied to him; and at last we ended in metaphysical disquisitions on the nature of character, &c., &c. My dear Sir, I feel a kind of conviction that one time or other we shall meet. Should choice or chance lead you to London, I have house-room for you, and, as far as loving some who dearly love you may entitle me to say so, heart-room too. I meet here a number of people who say, unconscious that they are lying, that they know you -- for a regiment of whom neither you nor I care twopence. Yours with unfeigned esteem, S. T. Coleridge. -566- 316. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Jos. Wedgewood Esq. | [Cornwallis House | Clifton | [ BristolSingle MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. with omis.Tom Wedgwood, 77. Postmark: 4 February 1800. Tuesday Morning. [ 4 February 1800] No / 21. Buckingham Street, Strand My dear Sir Your Brother's Health outweighs all other considerations; & beyond doubt he has made himself well-acquainted with the degree of Heat, which he is to experience there. The only objections that I see are so obvious, that it is idle in me to mention them -the total want of men, with whose Pursuits your Brother can have a fellow-feeling; the length & difficulty of the return, in case of a disappointment; and the necessity of Sea-voyages to almost every change of Scenery. I will not think of the Yellow Fever: that, I hope, is quite out of all probability. -- Believe me, my dear Friend! I have some difficulty in suppressing all that is within me of affection & Grief --! God knows my heart, wherever your Brother is, I shall follow him in spirit -- follow him with my thoughts & most affectionate Wishes! I read your Letter, & did as you desired me. Montague is very cool to me; whether I have still any of the leaven of the citizen & visionary about me, too much for his present zeal; or whether M. is incapable of attending to more than one man at a time; or whether from his dislike of my pressing him to do something for poor Wordsworth; or perhaps from all these causes combined -certain it is, that he is shy of me. Of course, I can be supposed to know but little of him directly from himself; this however in Montague's case implies no loss of any authentic source of Information. From his Friends I hear that the pressure of his immediate circumstances increases, and that (as how could it be otherwise, poor fellow!) he lives accumulating Debts & Obligations. He leaves Wordsworth without his Principal or Interest, 1 which of course he would not do, W.'s daily bread & Meat depending in great part on him, if he were not painfully embarrassed -- Embarrassed I should have said: for Pinny tells me, that he suffers no pain from it. -- As to his views, he is now gone to Cambridge to canvass for a fellow-ship in Trinity Hall; Mackintosh has kindly written to Dr Lawrence, who is very intimate with the master; & he has other interest. -- He is likewise trying hard for & in expectation of, a Commissionership of Bankruptcy, & means to pursue the Law with ____________________ 1 1 In 1795 Wordsworth loaned Basil Montagu most of the £900 legacy he had recently received from Raisley Calvert. -567- all ardour & steadiness. -- As to the state of his mind, it is that which it was & will be. God love him! he has a most incurable Forehead. John Pinny 1 called on him and looking on his Table saw by accident a Letter directed to himself -- Why, Montague! that Letter is for me -- & from Wordsworth! -- 'Yes! I have had it sometime.' -- Why did you not give it me? 'Oh! -- it wants some explanation first. You must not read it now -- for I can't give you the explanation now.' -- And Pinny, who you know is a right easynatured man has not been able to get his own Letter from him to this Hour! -- Of his Success at Cambridge Caldwell is doubtful, or more than doubtful. He says, that men at Cambridge don't trust overmuch these sudden changes of Principle. And most certainly, there is a zeal, an over acted fervor, a spirit of proselytism that distinguishes these men from the manners, & divides them from the sympathies, of the very persons, to whose party they have gone over. Smoking hot from the Oven of conversion they don't assort well with the old Loaves. So much of Montague; all that I know, & all, I suspect, that is to be known. A kind, gentlemanly, affectionate-hearted Man, possessed of an absolute Talent for Industry -- would to God! he had never heard of Philosophy! -- I have been three times to the House of Commons, each time earlier then the former, & each time hideously crowded -- the two first Day[s] the Debate was put off -- yesterday I went at a quarter before 8, and remained till 3 this morning -- & then sate writing, & correcting other men's writing till 8 -- a good 24 hours of unpleasant activity! 2 I have not felt myself sleepy yet -- / Pitt & Fox completely answered my pre-formed Ideas of them. The elegance, & high-finish of Pitt's Periods even in the most sudden replies, is curious; but that is all. He argues but so so; & does not reason at all. Nothing is rememberable in what he says. Fox possesses all the full & overflowing Eloquence of a man of clear head, clean heart, & impetuous feelings. He is to my mind a great orator. All the rest that spoke were mere creatures. I could make a better speech myself than any that I heard, excepting Pitt's & Fox's. I reported that part of Pitt's which I have inclosed in crotchets -- not that I report ex officio; but Curiosity having led me there, I did Stuart a service by taking a few Notes. I work from Morning to night; but in a few weeks I shall have accomplished my purpose -- & then ____________________ 1 John Frederick Pinney had loaned Racedown to the Wordsworths in 1795. 2 Coleridge's report of the debate on the continuation of the French war was published in the Morning Post, 6 Feb. 1800. See Essays on His Own Times, i. 285-92. Mrs. H. N. Coleridge attributes to Coleridge by internal evidence a commentary on this debate appearing in the Morning Post on 6 Feb. See Essays on His Own Times, ii. 367-71. -568- adieu to London for ever! We Newspaper scribes are true GalleySlaves-when the high winds of Events blow loud & frequent, then the Sails are hoisted, or the Ship drives on of itself -- when all is calm & Sunshine, then to our oars. Yet it is not unflattering to a man's Vanity to reflect that what he writes at 12 at night will before 12 hours is over have perhaps 5 or 6000 Readers! To trace a happy phrase, good image, or new argument running thro' the Town, & sliding into all the papers! Few Wine merchants can boast of creating more sensation. Then to hear a favorite & often urged argument repeated almost in your own particular phrases in the House of Commons -- & quietly in the silent self-complacence of your own Heart chuckle over the plagiarism, as if you were grand Monopolist of all good Reasons! -- But seriously, considering that I have Newspapered it merely as means of subsistence while I was doing other things, I have been very lucky -- the New Constitution, the Proposals for Peace, the Irish Union --; &c &c -- they are important in themselves, & excellent Vehicles for general Truths. I am not ashamed of what I have written. -- I desired Poole to send you all the Papers antecedent to your own. I think you will like the different Analyses of the French Constitution. -- I have attended Mackintosh regularly. He was so kind as to send me a Ticket, & I have not failed to profit by it. What I think of M. & all I think I will tell you in some future Letter. -- My affectionate respects to Mrs W. -- God love you, my dear Sir! I remain with grateful & most affectionate Esteem Your faithful Friend -- S. T. Coleridge Uxor mea -- &c. Sunt qui gemunt, quód sine sobole maneant; ast meo de pectore, spe, amore, religione nequaquam reclamantibus, suspiria aliquando eluctantur, anxia suspiria, ne mihi Juno et Dii maritales etiam plus optato faveant! ---- 317. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Kingsdown Parade | BristolSingle MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis.Letters, i.324. Postmark: 12 February 1800. Stamped: Strand. My dear Southey I shall give up this Newspaper Business -- it is too, too fatiguing. -I have attended the Debates twice, & the first time I was 25 Hours in activity, & that of a very unpleasant kind -- and the second Time from 10 in the Morning to 4 o/clock the next morning. -- I am sure, that you will excuse my silence, tho' indeed after two such Letters from you I cannot scarcely excuse it myself. First of the book -569- business -- I find resistance which I did not expect to the anonymousness of the Publication -- Longman seems confident, that a work on such a Subject without a name would not do.---- Translations & perhaps Satires, are, he says, the only works that Booksellers now venture on, without a name. He is very solicitous to have your Thalaba: & wonders (most wonderful!) that you do not write a Novel. That would be the Thing! And truly if by no more pains than a St Leon requires you could get 400£!! -- or half the money, I say so too!---- / If we were together, we might easily toss up a novel, to be published in the name of one of us -- or two, if that were all -- & then christen 'em by lots. As sure as Ink flows in my Pen, by help of an amanuensis, I could write a volume a week -- & Godwin got 400£!! for it -- think of that, Master Brooks! -I hope, that some time or other you will write a novel on that subject of your's -- I mean, the Rise & Progress of a Laugher -- Legrice in your Eye -- the effect of Laughing on Taste, Manners, morals, & happiness! -- But as to the Jacobin Book, I must wait till I hear from you. Phillips would be very glad to engage you to write a School book for him, the History of Poetry in all nations -- about 400 pages -- but this too must have your name -- He would give 60£ -- If poor dear Burnet were with you, he might do it under your eye & with your Instructions as well as you or I could do it -- but it is the name / Longman remarked acutely enough -- We Booksellers scarcely pretend to judge the merits of the Book, but we know the saleableness of the name I & as they continue to buy most books on the calculation of a first Edition of a 1000 Copies, they are seldom much mistaken:----for the name gives them the excuse for sending it to all the Gemmen in Great Britain & the Colonies, from whom they have standing Orders for new books of reputation. This is the secret, why Books published by Country Booksellers, or by Authors on their own account, so seldom succeed.---- As to my schemes of residence, I am as unfixed as yourself -- only that we are under the absolute necessity of fixing somewhere -- & that somewhere will, I suppose, be Stowey -- there are all my Books, & all our Furniture. -- In May I am under K kind of engagement to go with Sara to Ottery -- My family wish me to fix there, but that I must decline, in the names of public Liberty & individual Free-agency. Elder Brothers, not senior in Intellect, & not sympathizing in main opinions, are subjects of occasional Visits, not temptations to a Co-township. But if you go to Burton, Sara & I will waive the Ottery Plan, if possible, & spend May, & June with you -- & perhaps July -- but She must be settled in a house by the latter end of July, or the first week in August. -- Till we are with you, Sara means to spend 5 weeks with the Roskillies, & a week or -570- two at Bristol, where I shall join her. She will leave London in three weeks at least -- perhaps, a fortnight: & I shall give up Lodgings, & billet myself free of expence at my friend, Purkis's at Brentford. -- This is my present Plan----O my dear Southey! I would to God, that your Health did not enforce you to migratewe might most assuredly contrive to fix a residence somewhere, which might possess a sort of centrality -- / Alfoxden would make two Houses sufficiently divided for unimpinging Independence. -Sara is shockingly uncomfortable -- but that will be soon over -London does not suit either of us. -- My kindest Love to Edith -- admodum verisimile est, quód paucis annis constitutio ejus revolutionem patietur (ipse multa istiusmodi exempla scio --) et cum valetu[do] ejus confirmata fuerit, tum et mater erit. Vacillante veró valetudine, minime optandum est; quippe non pote[rit) esse sine periculo Consumptionis. Interea, mi carissime, meum Parvulum ames! -- Habes quod tibi gratuleris -- habes maximum Dei optimi Donum, uxorem carissimam tuae indoli omnino conformatam et quasi constellatam. Mulier mea purissimae mentis est, probabili ingenio praedita, et quae maternis curis se totam dat, dicat, dedicat; Indoles veró quotidiana, et Sympathiae minutiores, meis studiis, temperamento, infirmitatibus eheul minime consentiunt -- non possumus omni ex parte felices esse. -- In primis annis nuptialibus saepe vel miser fui -- nunc vero (ut omnia mitescunt) tranquillus, imo, animo grato! ---- Mi Amice, mi Frater, Φίλτατόν μοΙ κɑ + ́ρα, non possumus omni ex parte felices esse. Tell Davy that I have not forgotten him, because without an epilepsy I cannot forget him / & if I wrote to him as often as I think of him -- Lord have mercy on his Pocket! -- God bless you again & again -- S. T. Coleridge I pass this Evening with Charlotte Smith 1 at her house -- 318. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | N. Stowey | [Bridgewater | Somerset MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis.Thomas Poole, ii. 5. Postmark: 1 <4> February 1800. Friday Feb. 14 1800 My dearest Friend I am ashamed to address such a piece of Paper to you; but I am ____________________ 1 Charlotte Smith ( 1749-1806), poetess and novelist, was something of a literary celebrity. Coleridge had included two of her sonnets in his Sonnets from Various Authors in 1796. -571- weary of silence, & yet am so crowded with Business, that my very soul is squeezed out. -- How could you take such an absurd idea in your head, that my Affections have weakened towards you? Sometimes I have thought you rash in your Judgements of my Conduct -- but I perceived rather than felt it -- But enough of this -- my affections are what they are, & in all human probability ever will be.----I write now merely to desire you to be on the look out for a House -- I shall beyond all doubt settle at Stowey, if I can get a suitable House -- that is -- a House with a Garden, & large enough for me to have a Study out [of] the noise of Women & children -- this is absolutely necessary for me. -- I have given up the Morning Post; but the Editor is importunate against it-to night I must go with him to the House of Commons. By Hamburgh Mails received to day it is made probable that there will be a Peace on the Continent -- & a Congress for that Purpose at Prague. Ministers are the imbecil Dupes of all the other Powers of Europe. -- Sara is shockingly uncomfortable, but it will be soon over I hope. Give my kind Love to Ward -- my love to Cheister -- & write to me particulars of your dear Mother's Health --. If I can get a House, I should wish to be settled [by] Midsummer --; but if no House is to [be] got by that time, we shall take Lodgings at Minehead or Porlock. -- My health is pretty good, spite of bad hours -- On the great Debate I was in that terrible Crowd from 8 Monday Morning to 3 Tuesday Morning, & continued after that writing & correcting till 9-25 hours! -- God bless you, my dear Friend! & your most sincere & affectionate S. T. Coleridge Hartley is very well. 319. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Kingsdown Parade | Bristol MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis.Letters, i. 326. Postmark: 18 February 1800. Stamped: Strand. Tuesday Feb. 18. [ 1800] My dear Southey What do you mean by the words -- 'it is induced by expectation?' speaking of your state of Health. -- I can not bear to think of your going to a strange country, without any one with you who loves & understands you. -- But we will talk of all this. -- I have not -572- a moment's Time -- & my head aches -- I was up till 5 o clock this morning -- My Brain so overworked, that I could doze troublously & with cold limbs, so affected was my circulation / I shall do no more for Stewart. -- Read Pitt's Speech in the Morning Post of today (Tuesday Feb. 18.) I reported the whole with notes so scanty, that -- Mr Pitt is much obliged to me. 1 For by heaven he never talked half as eloquently in his Life time. He is a stupid insipid Charlatan, that Pitt -- Indeed, except Fox, I, you, or any Body might learn to speak better than any man in the House. -For the next fortnight I expect to be so busy, that I shall go out of London a mile or so to be wholly uninterrupted----I do not understand the Beguinages of Holland 2 ----Phillips is a good for nothing fellow; but what of that? -- He will give you 60£ and advance half the money now, for a Book which you can do in a Fortnight -- or three weeks at farthest. -- I would advise you not to give it up hastily. -- Phillips eats no flesh -- I observe wittily enough that whatever might be thought of innate Ideas, there could be no doubt to a man who had seen Phillips of the existence of innate Beef. Let my Mad Ox keep my name -- Fire & Famine do just what you like with -- I have no wish either way. -The fears in Solitude, I fear, is not my Property -- & I have no encouragement to think, it will be given up -- / but if I hear otherwise, I will let you know speedily -- in the mean time do not rely on it --. Your Review-Plan cannot answer for this reason -- It could exist only as long [as] the Ononymous Anti-anonymists remained in life, health, & the humor -- & no Publisher would undertake a periodical Publication on so Gossamery a tie. Besides, it really would not be right for any man to make so many people have strange & uncomfortable feelings towards him -- which must be the case, however kind the Reviews might be. -- And what but Nonsense is published? -- The Author of Gebir I cannot find out -- There are none of his Books in Town -- You have made a Sect of Gebirites by your Review 3 -- but it was not a fair, tho' a very kind, Review. -- I have sent a Letter to Mrs Fricker, which Sara directed to you -- I hope, it has come safe. Let me see, are there any other Questions. Sara. 4 ____________________ 1 William Pitt's speech on the continuance of the war with France was delivered on 17 Feb. 1800, and reported by Coleridge next day in the Morning Post. See Essays on His Own Times, ii. 293-306. 2 John Rickman proposed to Southey the development in England of religious establishments for women, similar to the beguinages in the Netherlands. 3 See Critical Review, Sept. 1799. 4 Coleridge did not finish his sentence, but he apparently intended to say Sara will write, since Mrs. Coleridge added a note after his signature. -573- So, my dear Southey -- God love you, & never, never cease to believe that I am affectionately your's S. T. Coleridge Love to Edith. -- Hartley well, save Cold -- Sara still miserable. -- 320. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole MS. Lord Latymer. Hitherto unpublished. Tuesday Evening. [ 25 February 1800] 1 My dear Poole I have received both your letters -- I should not write now, but, that Bathstone going to morrow, he must not go without a Letter -- if only to let you know that I am alive, & Stowey-sick -Stewart won't let me go, but I don't do much for him -- as you have seen / I am translating three manuscript Plays of Schiller 2 -- & positively for the last week have worked with my pen in my hand 14 hours evety day. -- Hartley is quite well -- Sara better -- I middling. -- I heard from Wordsworth -- he is well & happy. Of your dear Mother I can say nothing -- you know what I feel -- Of Darwin's work 3 I have heard nothing -- If I can get it given me by any Bookseller, I will send it you --. Poor Virgin! -- My Love to Ward & tell him to write me all the Particulars -- & of the Girl -directing to Lambe 4 -- as usual. You have a little Deal Box in your little Room -- you must unnail it -- & there are my loose Papers, & letters----The Letters I don't want; but all the loose Papers I wish to [ha]ve -- & Bathstone can [bri]ng'em up for me.----Cruckshankum tantum vidi -- but he has written me an affectionate Letter. -- My report of Pitt's Speech made a great noise here -- ____________________ 1 This letter was written in answer to one from Poole, dated 22 Feb. 1800. 2 The Piccolomini, or the First Part of Wallenstein. A Drama in Five Acts, and The Death of Wallenstein, A Tragedy in Five Acts, both translated from the German of Frederick Schiller by S. T. Coleridge, 1800, for which Coleridge received £50 from Longman. See Letter 459. A third play, Wallenstein's Camp, and an Essay on the Genius of Schiller, promised in the advertisement to The Piccolomini, never appeared. 3 Coleridge refers to Erasmus Darwin Phytologia; or the Philosophy of Agriculture and Gardening, 1799. 4 Coleridge had resumed his old intimacy with Lamb. Letters sent to London in care of Lamb but intended for Coleridge were addressed to Mr. Lambe, East India House, to identify them as Coleridge's. See Letter 592, and Lamb Letters, i. 313. -574- What a degraded Animal Man is to see any thing to admire in that wretched Rant --!---- I have a huge Hankering for Alfoxden / Sara's Love -- 'and my Lub -- Hartley Cöidge's Lub.' -- Hartley said some time ago -- that 'the Stars be dead Lamps -they be'nt naughty -- they be put up in the Sky with my Brother Berkley.[']---- God love you, my dearest Poole -- & S. T. Coleridge 321. To William Wordsworth Pub. Memoirs of Wordsworth, i. 160. [ February 1800) I grieve that 'The Recluse' sleeps. 322. To Robert Southey Address: Mr Southey | Kingsdown Parade | Bristol Single MS. Lord Latymer. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 331. Postmark: 28 February 1800. Stamped: Strand. It goes to my Heart, my dear Southey! to sit down & write to you, knowing that I can scarcely fill half a side -- the Postage lies on my Conscience -- I am translating Manuscript Plays of Schiller -they are Poems, full of long Speeches -- in very polish'd Blank Verse----. The Theatre! the Theatre! my dear Southey! -- it will never, never, never do --! -- If you go to Portugal, your History thereof will do---- / but for the present money Novels, or Translations --. I do not see, that a Book said by you in the Preface to have been written merely as a Book for young Persons could injure your reputation more than Milton's Accidence injured his -- I would do it -- because you can do it so easily----. It is not necessary that you should say much about French or German Literature -Do it so -- Poetry of savage Nations. -- Poetry of rudely civilized -Homer, & the Hebrew Poetry, &c -- Poetry of civilized Nations, under Republics & Politheism -- / State of Poetry under the Roman & Greek Empires -- revival of it in Italy -- in Spain -- & England -- then go steadily on with England to the end, except one Chapter about German Poetry to conclude with -- which I can write for you---- / In the Morning Post was a poem of fascinating Metre by Mary Robinson -- 'twas on Wednesday, Feb. 26. -- & entitled the Haunted -575- Beach. 1 I was so struck with it that I sent to her to desire that [it] might be preserved in the Anthology -- She was extremely flattered by the Idea of it's being there, as she idolizes you & your Doings. So if it be not too late, I pray you, let it be in -- if you should not have received that Day's paper, write immediately that I may transcribe it -- it falls off sadly to the last -- wants Tale -- & Interest; but the Images are new & very distinct -- that 'silvery carpet' is so just, that it is unfortunate it should seem so bad -- for it is really good -- but the Metre -- ay! that Woman has an Ear. 2 -- William Taylor, from whom I have received a couple of Letters full of thought & information says, what astounded me -- that Double Rhymes in our Language have always a ludicrous association -Mercy on the Man! Where are his Ears & Feelings? -- His taste cannot be quite right, from this observation -- but he is a famous Fellow, that is not to be denied.---- Sara is poorly still -- Hartley rampant, & Emperorizes with your pictures -- Harry is a fine Boy -- Hartley told a Gentleman 'me tinks, you are like Southey.' -- And he was not wholly unlike you -but the chick calling you simple -- Southey -- so pompously!---God love you & your Edith -- S. T. Coleridge Love to Davy---- Your Simile of the Cucumbers & Dung tickled me hugely. 323. To John Prior Estlin Address: Revd. J. P. Estlin | St Michael's Hill | Bristol Single MS. Bristol Central Lib. Pub. E. L. G. i. 135. Postmark: 1 March 1800. Saturday, March 1st [ 1800] My very dear Friend When I received your letter -- some three minutes ago -- I turned to my Guide des Voyageurs En Europe to know where Marburg was -- I guess it to be Marburg in the Dishoprich of Padderbourn ____________________ 1 Published Annual Anthology, 1800. 2 The SPECTRE band, his MESSMATES bold, Sunk in the yawning ocean! While to the mast, he lash'd him fast, And brav'd the storm's conunotion! The winter MOON upon the sand A silvery carpet made, And mark'd the sailor reach the land -- And mark'd his MURDERER wash his hand, Where the green billows play'd! The Haunted Beach, stanza 6. -576- between Frankfort & Cassel -- If so, I have not been within 40 miles at least of it, having never been many miles below Cassel -- At all events, the name of the person, you mention, is wholly unknown to me -- I once knew a Miss Bouclerc in Devonshire.----As to myself, I am fagging -- & am delivering to the Press some plays of Schiller's---- / I shall soon however slide away from this place, & devote myself to works of more importance. -- I have seen Mr & Mrs Barbauld 1 two or three times -- once at their own House -admirable people! -- Dr Disney's Sons, at all events, the younger, with his Shirt collar half way up his cheek, gave me no high idea of the propriety of Unitarian Dissenters sending their Sons to Established & Idolatrous Universities -- / It may be very true, tha[t] at Hackney they learnt, too many of them, Infidelity -- the Tutors, the whole plan of Education, the place itself, were all wrong -- but many will return to the Good Cause, in which alone plain practical Reason can find footing -- at Cambridge & Oxford they will not learn Infidelity perhaps, or perhaps they may -- for now 'tis common enough even there, to my certain knowlege -but one thing they will learn -- Indifference to all Religions but the Religion of the Gentleman -- Gentlemanliness will be the word -- / & bring with it a deep Contempt for those Dissenters among whom they were born. -- We Dissenters (for I am proud of the Distinction) have somewhat of a simple & scholarly formality, perhaps: God forbid, we should wholly lose it --! but with th[e] young men at Oxford & Cambridge'the Gentleman[' is] the all-implying Word of Honor -- a thing more blasting to real Virtue, real Utility, real Standing forth for the Truth in Christ, than all the Whoredoms & Impurities which this Gentlemanliness does most generally bring with it.----My dear Friend! -- in the crowded heartless Party at Dr Disney's O! how I did think of your Sunday Suppers -- their light uncumbrous Simplicity, the heartiness of manner, the literary Christianness of Conversation -- Dr Disney himself I respect, highly respect -- in the Pulpit he is an Apostle / but there -- there it stops. -- My best & overflowing Love to Mrs Estlin / kisses & love to your Children -- Sara is better -- Hartley rampant -- Heaven bless you & your affectionate Friend S. T. Coleridge Mrs Coleridge begs to be remembered to you & dear Mrs Estlin 'with all, all, all my Heart' -- There you have her own Words. -- P.S. Nothing is more common than for conscious Infidels to ____________________ 1 Mrs. Anna Letitia Barbauld ( 1743-1825), poet and miscellaneous writer whom Coleridge had met in Bristol in the summer of 1797. -577- go into the Church -- Conscious Arians or Socinians swarm in it -So much for the Morals of Oxford & Cambridge. -- With their too early reasonings, and logic-cuttings, & reading Hume & such like Trash, the young Dissenters are prone to Infidelity -- but do you know any Instance of such an Infidel accepting an office that implied the belief of Christianity? -- It cannot be said, that this is owing to our Preferments being so much smaller: for the majority are but Curates in the Established Church, or on small Livings -- & not so well off as George Burnet was, or Sam. Reed would have been / but thus is it, my dear Friend! -- The Education, which Dissenters receive among Dissenters, generates Conscientiousness & a scrupulous Turn / will this be gained at the Wine Parties at Cambridge? -- The truth is, Dr Disney himself sees only with too much pleasure this Gentlemanliness --. I say thus much, my dear Friend! because I once heard you speak in Commendation of that which I am now deprecating. -- P.S. The more I see of Mrs Barbauld the more I admire her -- that wonderful Propriety of Mind! -- She has great acuteness, very great -- yet how steadily she keeps it within the bounds of practical Reason. This I almost envy as well as admire -- My own Subtleties too often lead me into strange (tho' God be praised) transient Out-of-the-waynesses. Oft like a winged 1 Spider, I am entangled in a new Spun web -- but never fear for me, 'tis but the flutter of my wings -- & off I am again!---- The little man so full of great affections -- you cannot love him better than I. -- 324. To Daniel Stuart Address: Mr Stuart MS. British Museum. Pub. Letters from the Lake Poets, 4. Eleven o/clock -- [ 1 March 1800] 2 Dear Sir I feel more uncomfortably respecting my conduct to you for these last ten day[s,] than I have had occasion to feel on any occasion for these last 20 months -- Your last note has just reached me / the former is here, but I have not read it, having been out of London to avoid Interruptions --. -- Whether we continue con- ____________________ 1 By the bye, there is no such Creature. But in similies if a Phoenix, why not a winged spider? [Note by S. T. C.] 2 This letter mentions that Mrs. Coleridge and Hartley 'leave London to morrow'. They were in London on 1 Mar.; on 3 Mar. Coleridge was already at Lamb's, and had been 'tipsy' the night before at Godwin's. Mrs. Coleridge left London, therefore, on 2 Mar., to spend a month with the Roskillys at Kempsford. -578- nected or no, I consider myself as two full weeks' Work in your Debt for that which I have already received --. -- These cursed Plays play the Devil with me -- I have been working from morning to night, & almost half the night too, & yet get on too slowly for the Printer -- & Mr Longman is kept in constant [dread] that some rival Translation may pop out before mine -- and beside this, my wife & child leave London to morrow, & I was particularly desirous to have done enough to give me some claim to draw on him for the few Pounds which I must draw on him, for their Journey. -- These Things I mention not as justifications of my breach of Promise, but as palliations. So much for the Past -- for the future thus much. -- In about four or five Days I shall have finish'd the first Play -- & that 'being finished, I may go on more leisurely with the others. -- I shall then be able to give you some assistance -- probably as much as you may want -- a certain number of Essays I consider myself bound to send you as soon as possible, in common honesty. After these, if it be worth your while, I will do what I can -- only not for any regular Stipend. -- That harrasses me -- I know, that hitherto I have received from you much more than I have earned -& this must not be----I have no objection to be payed for what I do, but a great objection to be paid for what I ought to do----. This Translation Fag has almost knocked me up -- / & I am so confused that I scarcely know whether I have expressed myself intelligibly --. My Wife goes to morrow Evening -- & I shall be at No 36, Chapel Street, Pentonville 1 -- My Papers you will be so kind as to have left at your Office, till they are called for -- but Mr Wedgewood's must be sent among your other papers -- the Address Jos. Wedgewood Esq. | Cornwallis House | Clifton, | Bristol -- I will certainly fill you out a good Paper on Sunday / Mrs Coleridge desires me to send her respects, & to thank you for your civilities to her---- Your's S. T. Coleridge 325. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers Town MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. William Godwin, ii. 2. Postmark: 3 March 1800. Mr Lamb's No / 36 Chapel Street Pentonville -8, Monday Morning [ 8 March 1800] Dear Godwin The Punch after the Wine made me tipsy last night -- this I ____________________ 1 After Mrs. Coleridge's departure Coleridge stayed with Charles Lamb. -579- mention, not that my head aches, or that I felt after I quitted you, any unpleasantness, or titubancy --; but because tipsiness has, and has always, one unpleasant effect -- that of making me talk very extravagantly / & as when sober, I talk extravagantly enough for any common Tipsiness, it becomes a matter of nicety in discrimination to know when I am or am not affected. -- An idea starts up in my hand [head?] -- away I follow it thro' thick & thin, Wood & Marsh, Brake and Briar -- with all the apparent Interest of a man who was defending one of his old and long-established Principles -- Exactly of this kind was the Conversation, with which I quitted you / I do not believe it possible for a human Being to have a greater horror of the Feelings that usually accompany such principles as I then supported, or a deeper Conviction of their irrationality than myself -- but the whole Thinking of my Life will not bear me up against the accidental Press & Crowd of my mind, when it is elevated beyond it's natural Pitch / . -- We shall talk wiselier with the Ladies on Tuesday -- God bless you, & give your dear little ones a kiss a piece for me -- The Agnus Dei & the Virgin Mary desire their kind respects to you, you sad Atheist --! Your's with affectionate | Esteem S. T. Coleridge 326. To Samuel Purkis Address: Samuel Purkis E[sqre] | Brentford MS. New York Public Lib. Hitherto unpublished. Postmark: 15 March 1800. Saturday 2 o clock [ 15 March 1800] My dear Purkis Just before your [Draft arrived] 1 I concluded a Bargain with Longman, who is to give me a 100£ for my Tour in the North of England 2 -- to be advanced immediately. -- Of course, I shall [return your Draft] -- nay, to talk big, I can accomodate you with a Draft for 50£. 3 -- Amazing, how a little Prosperity turns an Author's head! -- I find, that I can with tolerable ease get 300£ a year by my pen -- so that Authorship is really no such very bad speculation. -- I will not quit Town without spending 2 or three Days with you, provided it be to you perfectly convenient---- ____________________ 1 Words in brackets inked out in manuscript. 2 Coleridge did not publish his tour of the north of England, but Letter 300 shows that he had such a plan in mind. His notebook entries for the tour were published by the Rev. G. H. B. Coleridge in 1989. See headnote to Letter 299. 3 For Coleridge's complicated financial dealings with Purkis see Letters 309 and 329. -580- Don't come to town without calling----Affectionate Respects to Mrs Purkis -- & love to your dear Children. Mrs Coleridge is rather better, I think -- 1 Your's affectionately, S. T. Coleridge 327. To Daniel Stuart Address: Mr Stuart MS. British Museum. Pub. Letters from the Lake Poets, 4.] [ March 1800] 2 Dear Stuart I am very unwell -- if you are pressed for the Paragraph to day, I will write it; but I cannot come out -- but if it will do as well tomorrow, so much the better. For in truth my head is shockingly giddy -- if you want matter, Lamb has got plenty of 'My Great Aunt's Manuscript' -- I would advise you by all means to make it an Article in the Morning Post -- please to send me the Pa[pers.] Your's very sincerely -S. T. Coleridge P.S. I will send you by Lamb this Evening three or four paragraphs of 7 or 8 lines each -- 328. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr. T. Poole [N. Stowey I Bridgewater MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis. Essays on His Own Times, i, p. xci, and Thomas Poole, ii. 7. Friday Night ( 21 March 1800] 3 My dear Poole I received your letter this night, left for me at Stuart's by I know not whom -- Bastone I have not seen. -- By my silence you will conclude, how much I have been occupied -- indeed, I never worked so hard in my Life. In one day I wrote 500 blank Verse Lines, and that character of Pitt, in the same Evening, without previous meditation on it -- / . ____________________ 1 'I think' indicates that Mrs. Coleridge had left London. 2 Coleridge made overtures to Stuart on behalf of Lamb in Mar. 1800 -Coleridge, Lamb wrote to Manning on 17 Mar., 'has lugged me to the brink of engaging to a newspaper' ( Lamb Letters, i. 178). This letter, as the postscript suggests, was written while Coleridge was staying with Lamb, after Mrs. Coleridge's departure. 3 The reference to the famous 'character of Pitt', which appeared in the Morning Post on 19 Mar 1800, dates this letter. See Essays on His Own Times, ii. 319-29. -581- Now for the Business -- I like the Scheme very much, & shall write by the same post with this to my Wife, desiring her, if she thinks it will do, as well as I do, to write you immediately -- the chief objection I see at present, is the use of the Garden -- I suffered so much the last summer for want of Vegetables, that I am determined whatever it cost me in money, to have a Garden -- not that I mean to work in it -- that is out of the Question -- but a Garden I will have -- I shall not be down at Stowey for these two months; but Sara, I suppose, will -- however, if the scheme suit her wishes, she will write you, concerning the Time, &c -- As to money, I am not anxious -- I am sure, if God give me health, to make all even before the End of this year -- & I find that I can without any straining gain 500 guineas a year, if I give up poetry----i.e. original Poetry----. If I had the least love of money, I could make almost sure of 2000£ a year / for Stuart has offered me half shares in the two Papers, the M.P. & Courier, if I would devote myself with him to them -- but I told him, that I would not give up the Country, & the lazy reading of Old Folios for two Thousand Times two thousand Pound -- in short, that beyond 250£ a year, I considered money as a real Evil -- at which he stared; for such Ideas are not animals indigenous in the Longitudes & Latitudes of a Scotchman's Soul. I shall continue to write for him, because three half Evenings in the week will suffice to earn four guineas a week -& I think there are but 2 good ways of writing -- one for immediate, & wide impression, tho' transitory -- the other for permanence -- / Newspapers the first -- the best one can do is the second -- that middle class of translating Books &c is neither the one or the other -- When I have settled myself clear, I shall write nothing for money but for the newspaper. You, of course, will not hint a word to any [one] of Stuart's offer to me. -- He has behaved with th[e] most abundant honor & generosity. -- I would to God, I could get Wordsworth to re-take Alfoxden -the Society of so great a Being is of priceless Value -- but he will never quit the North of England -- his habits are more assimilated with the Inhabitants there -- there he & his Sister are exceedingly beloved, enthusiastically. Such difference do small Sympathies make -- such as Voice, Pronunciation, &c -- for from what other Cause can I account for it --. Certainly, no one, neither you, or the Wedgewoods, altho' you far more than any one else, ever entered into the feeling due to a man like Wordsworth -- of whom I do not hesitate in saying, that since Milton no man has manifested himself equal to him. I am at Lamb's, No/ 86, Chapel Street, Pentonville -- & never receive my papers, but when I go, or send for them -- which is the -582- reason, you have them so irregularly -- You must write -- Mr Lambe, East India House as usual. -- I am very quiet here -- but wish, I were at Stoweyo -- My kind Love to your Mother & to Ward. Your's ever most affectionately, S. T. Coleridge 329. To Samuel Purkis Address: Samuel Purkis Esq. | Brentford MS. McGill University. Hitherto unpublished. The top and the bottom of this manuscript have been cut off. The words in brackets have been heavily inked out, but through the courtesy of Mr. Richard Pennington of the Redpath Library I have been able to examine the holograph and decipher the partially obliterated passages. Postmark: 27 March 1800. . . . Without some apology, for having neglected it so long, my next & wiser way is to ask you -- if there be not some mistake. I [drew on you for 5£ --] while at your house, [my Debt was augmented to 20£] for which I gave you a [Draft on] Mr Wedgewood -- [I opened the Draft & altered it to 25£] for which you [payed me the difference --] I afterwards wrote to you, [begging you to Lend me 10£ for 14 days] -- you sent me [a Draft to that amount --] stating that you should want it at the end of that time / I in the meantime had concluded a Bargain with Longman, & did not [want the Draft -- ] accordingly I destroyed it -- & wrote you in answer that I should not use it --. -- Believe me my dear Fellow! it is so improbable that I should be more accurate [in money matters] than you, that I cannot convey to you my perplexity. . . at your Service -- / I pray you, write to me immediately. O this Translation is indeed a Bore -- never, never, never will I be so taken in again -- Newspaper writing is comparative extacy -I do not despair of making Bonaparte as good as Pitt -- but there is a 2nd Part of Pitt to come 1 -- & a Review of a curious Pamphlet connected with it 2 -- That on Pitt has made sensation -- I am at present at Lamb's -- Direct to me No/ 36 | Chapel Street, | Pentonville. Give my kind Love to Mrs P. -- & believe me, my dear Purkis! very affectionately Your's S. T. Coleridge ____________________ 1 Neither the character of Bonaparte nor the '2nd Part of Pitt' was ever written. 2 On 27 Mar 1800 Coleridge printed in the Morning Post a brief review of Arthur Young pamphlet, The Question of Scarcity Plainly Stated. Essays on His Own Times, ii. 895-403. -583- I have heard thrice from Sara -- She & Hartley are both well -- / I have taken a House, or rather half a house, at Stowey----when I go there, I cannot determine. Remember me kindly to Miss Fox-and to Mary: my love & to John. 330. To Thomas Poole Pub. Thomas Poole, ii. 8-9. March 31, 1800 . . . You charge me with prostration in regard to Wordsworth. Have I affirmed anything miraculous of W.? Is it impossible that a greater poet than any since Milton may appear in our days? Have there any great poets appeared since him? . . . Future greatness! Is it not an awful thing, my dearest Poole? What if you had known Milton at the age of thirty, and believed all you now know of him? -- What if you should meet in the letters of any then living man, expressions concerning the young Milton totidem verbis the same as mine of Wordsworth, would it not convey to you a most delicious sensation? Would it not be an assurance to you that your admiration of the Paradise Lost was no superstition, no shadow of flesh and bloodless abstraction, but that the Man was even so, that the greatness was incarnate and personal? Wherein blame I you, my best friend? Only in being borne down by other men's rash opinions concerning W. You yourself, for yourself, judged wisely. . . . Do not, 1 my dearest Poole, deem me cold, or finical, or indifferent to Stowey, full and fretful in objection; but on so important an affair to a man who has, and is likely to have, a family, and who must have silence and a retired study, as a house is, it were folly not to consult one's own feelings, folly not to let them speak audibly, and having heard them, hypocrisy not to utter them. . . . My dearest friend, when I have written to you lately, I have written with a mind and heart completely worn out with the fag of the day. I trust in God you have not misinterpreted this into a change of character. I was a little jealous at an expression in your last letter----'I am happy you begin to feel your power.' Truly and in simple verity, my dear Tom, I feel not an atom more power ____________________ 1 In introducing this paragraph Mrs. Sandford writes: 'In relation to the question of lodgings Tom Poole seems to have mentioned some possibility of renting part of a farmhouse, which would, however, involve the joint-use of a kitchen. This Coleridge fears would lead to continual squabbles between their servant and the farmer's wife, and "be worse than the old hovel fifty times over".' ( Thomas Poole, ii. 8.) Apparently Coleridge had first determined to take the farm-house. See Letter 329. -584- than I have ever done, except the power of gaining a few more paltry guineas than I had supposed. On the contrary, my faculties appear to myself dwindling, and I do believe if I were to live in London another half year, I should be dried up wholly. . . . 331. To Robert Southey MS. Lord Latymer, Pub. Ill. London News, 27 May 1893, p. 634. Thursday, April [10,] 1800 1 Amblesides, Westmoreland. My dear Southey If you stay longer, than the year on the Continent, I and mine will join you -- & if you return at that Time, you must join us. Where we shall be, God knows! but in some interesting Country it will be, in Heaven or Earth. I feel assurances & comfortable Hopes of your full Recovery -- Of all that you have written to me I need not say I will be the Performer if needs be -- and so help me God & my Conscience, as all your's shall be to me as my very own. My next I will direct to Lisbon -- In a few days I move for Bristol -- I have been in excessive Perplexity of mind lately on sundry subjects -- and have besides over-worked myself -- but all will be calm again. Of your History of Portugal I anticipate great Things -it is a noble Subject & of a certain Sale. -- But still, Southeyl be ever a Poet in your higher moments. -- I will find out some Lisbon merchant in London or Liverpool, & manage to send you regularly, what is interesting, without expence. Wordsworth publishes a second Volume of Lyrical Ballads, & Pastorals. He meditates a novel -- & so do I -- but first I shall re-write my Tragedy. If that Reverend Sir continues his Insolence, 2 I will give him a scourging that shall flea him / I promise you to exert myself to procure subscribers for the Chatterton -- I have ample materials for a most interesting Historical & Metaphysical Essay on Literary Forgery from the Hymns of Orpheus which deceived Aristotle to the Vortigern of Shakespere that deceived Dr Parr -- but Dr Parr was the greater Booby. -- I cannot wholly approve of your Anthologizing; but you judge, I will believe, wisely. My objections are various -- & one of them of a moral nature. But on all this I will write. -- Edith! my Love! May God in Heaven bless you! -- ____________________ 1 This letter was written in answer to one from Southey, dated 1 Apr. 1800, in which he announced his impending departure for Lisbon. 2 Coleridge refers to a controversy between Southey and Sir Herbert Croft concerning Chatterton. See Monthly Magazine, Nov 1799, and the Gentleman's Magazine, Feb., Mar., and Apr 1800. -585- The time returns upon me, Southey! when we dreamt one Dream, & that a glorious one -- when we eat together, & thought each other greater & better than all the World beside, and when we were bed fellows. Those days can never be forgotten, and till they are forgotten, we cannot, if we would, cease to love each other. S. T. Coleridge 332. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | No 39 | Gloucester Place | Portman Square | London MS. British Museum. Hitherto unpublished. Postmark: 25 April 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Monday, April 21 1800 Mr Wordsworth's Grasmere near Ambleside, Westmoreland My dear Sir You may well suppose, what a pain at heart it is to me to have an explanation to make to you concerning money matters. -- So far back as four years ago my Bill to Cottle for various articles, for cash among the rest, was 20£ -- Cottle was then in prosperous & promising circumstances, & gave me to understand that he should never consider me in his Debt, till I became a richer man than he& refused to send me in his Bill. Lately, poor fellow! his affairs have fallen to rack & ruin / my debt stood on his Ledger -- & he wrote me a very importunate Letter. He had suffered deeply from the very mean opinion, which I had frankly expressed to him of his Epic Poem -- expressed wholly as an expedient to prevent him from publishing it at his own expence -- & he made the application not without expressions of a wounded & angry mind. At the time I received his Letter I knew that within three weeks I should receive more than the 20£ from the Bookseller -- & I sent him therefore a Draft on you -- imagining of course that he would not present it till the expiration of the three weeks, before which time I should have not only advertised you of it, but included the 20£. This indeed was the sole reason of my not doing what, I am now sensible, I should have done -- written to you immediately -- but in truth, I was sore all over with the apprehension, that you might accuse me of irregularity & a presumption wholly unjustifiable, well knowing that I have already more than overdrawn myself. With an unlucky, but I should hope, not very blameable Cowardice of feeling I felt a repugnance to acquaint you of it without at the same time sending the money. To morrow morning I send off the last sheet -586- of my irksome & soul-wearying Labor, the Translation of Schiller -and as soon as I have received my stipend, I will remit to you. 1 -My dear Sir -- how much you have been harrassed by irregular men, what disgust have you associated, of necessity, with them, & the idea of meanness that attaches to the expedients of embarrassment, I well know -- and I am sure, the extreme pain & agitation, which your letter gave me, did not seduce me into the slightest censure of you, as unkind----but I anticipate a sort of comfort in knowing that you can understand how much I suffered from pride & far honester feelings than Pride.---- For these last six months I have worked incessantly----and have lived with as much economy as is practicable by any man / but many expences, not expected, & not immediately my own, have still thrown me back. In this engagement of translating the prolix Plays of Schiller I made too a very, very foolish bargain -the Bookseller indeed has given me his word, that in case of their success he will consider [me] as entitled to an additional Remuneration -- but of their Success I have no hope -- / for I can say with truth, that I could have written a far better play myself in half the time. But with all this I have learnt that I have Industry & Perseverance -- and before the end of the year, if God grant me health, I shall have my wings wholly unbirdlim'd. -- This is Monday -- and I shall be in London the beginning of next week -I pray you, my dear Sir! be so kind as to write to me -- for God forbid that so sore an affliction should befall me, as that the connection between us should ever be a source of Doubt to you, or otherwise than honorable to me --. -- Believe me most affectionately | & | gratefully | Your's S. T. Coleridge 333. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sonuners' Town | Londonsingle MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. E. L. G. i. 137. Postmark: May 28, 1800. Mr T. Poole's N. Stowey Bridgewater. Wednesday, May 21 1800 Dear Godwin I received your letter this morning, & had I not, still I am almost confident, that I should have written to you before the end of the week. Hitherto the Translation of the Wallenstein has prevented me; not that it so engrossed my time, but that it wasted and depressed my spirits, & left a sense of wearisomeness & disgust which unfitted me for any thing but sleeping or immediate society. ____________________ 1 See Letters 335 and 341. -587- I say this, because I ought to have written to you first; & as I am not behind you in affectionate esteem, so I would not be thought to lag in those outward & visible signs, that both shew & vivify the inward & spiritual grace. -- Believe me, you recur to my thoughts frequently, & never without pleasure, never without my making out of the past a little day dream for the future. I left Wordsworth on the 4th of this month -- if I cannot procure a suitable house at Stowey, I return to Cumberland & settle at Keswick -in a house of such prospect, that if, according to you & Hume, impressions & ideas constitute our Being, I shall have a tendency to become a God -- so sublime & beautiful will be the series of my visual existence. But whether I continue here, or migrate thither, I shall be in a beautiful country -- & have house-room and heartroom for you / and you must come & write your next work at my house. -- My dear Godwin! I remember you with so much pleasure & our conversations so distinctly, that, I doubt not, we have been mutually benefited -- but as to your poetic & physiopathic feelings, I more than suspect, that dear little Fanny & Mary 1 have had more to do in that business than I. Hartley sends his Love to Mary. 'What? & not to Fanny?' Yes -- & to Fanny -- but I'll have Mary. -- He often talks about them. My poor Lamb! -- how cruelly affliceions crowd upon him! 2 I am glad, that you think of him as I think -- he has an affectionate heart, a mind sui generis, his taste acts so as to appear like the unmechanic simplicity of an Instinct -- in brief, he is worth an hundred men of mere Talents. Conversation with the latter tribe is like the use of leaden Bells -- one warms by exercise -- Lamb every now & then eradiates, & the beam, tho' single & fine as a hair, yet is rich with colours, & I both see & feel it.----In Bristol I was much with Davy -- almost all day. He always talks of you with great affection / & defends you with a friend's zeal against the Animalcula, who live on the dung of the great Dung-fly Mackintosh. -If I settle at Keswick, he will be with me in the fall of the year -& so must you----and let me tell you, Godwin! four such men as you, I, Davy, & Wordsworth, do not meet together in one house every day in the year -- I mean, four men so distinct with so many sympathies. -- I received yesterday a letter from Southey -- he arrived at Lisbon after a prosperous Voyage on the last day of April. His letter to me is dated May day. He girds up his loins for a great ____________________ 1 Fanny Imlay, natural daughter of Mary Wollstonecraft, and Mary Wollstonecraft Godwin ( 1797-1851), Shelley's second wife. 2 Hetty, the Lambs' aged servant, had died, and Mary Lamb suffered her first serious mental attack since her father's death in Apr. 1799. -588- History of Portugal -- which will be translated into the Portuguese, in the first year of the Lusitanian Republic. Have you seen Mrs Robinson lately? How is she? -- Remember me in the kindest & most respectful phrases to her. -- I wish, I knew the particulars of her complaint. For Davy'has discovered a perfectly new Acid, by which he has restored the use of limbs to persons who had lost them for many years, (one woman 9 years) in cases of supposed Rheumatism. At all events, Davy says, it can do no harm, in Mrs Robinson's case -- & if she will try it, he will make up a little parcel & write her a letter of instructions &c.---Tell her, & it is the truth, that Davy is exceedingly delighted with the two Poems in the Anthology. -- N.B. Did you get my Attempt at a Tragedy from Mrs Robinson? -- To Mrs Smith I am about to write a letter, with a book -- be so kind as to inform me of her direction. Mrs Inchbald 1 I do not like at all -- every time, I recollect her, I like her less. That segment of a look at the corner of her eye -- O God in heaven! it is so cold & cunning --! thro' worlds of wildernesses I would run away from that look, that heart-picking look. 'Tis marvellous to me, that you can like that Woman. -- I shall remain here about ten days for certain. If you have leisure & inclination in that time, write -- if not, I will write to you where I am going or at all events whither I am gone. God bless you | & | Your sincerely affectionate S. T. Coleridge Sara desires to be remembered kindly to you -- and sends a kiss to Fanny & 'dear meek little Mary.' 334. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic Institution | Hotwells | BristolSingle MS. Royal Institution. Pub. E. L. G. i. 139. Statnped: Bridg. Saturday Morning [ 7 June 1800] 2 Mr T. Poole's Nether Stowey, Somerset. My dear Davy I sent you on Tuesday last a letter, inclosing 5£, being 5 shillings less than I owe you----in the same letter I craved a little of your acid, with a scrawl stating in what cases it might be used.----As my Letters go by cross post, I am anxious to know whether you have received it -- because by the same post I sent a much larger ____________________ 1 Mrs. Elizabeth Inchbald ( 1753-1821), novelist, dramatist, and actress. 2 Since Coleridge tells Davy that the acid must be sent 'before Thursday, if at all', and since he was in Bristol on Thursday, 12 June, this letter must have been written on 7 June. -589- sum up to the North. -- If you can, send me a little tiny bottle of the acid, sending it to Mrs Fricker, No / 10, Stokes Croft, with a note to her -- desiring her to have it delivered to Milton, the Stowey Carrier, for me. This must be done before Thursday, if at all. I have now finally determined on the North -- so Much for Business. -- I received a very kind Letter from Godwin, in which he says, that he never thinks of you but with a brother's feelings of love & expectation.-----Indeed, I am sure, he does not. -- I think of translating Blumenbach's manual of natural History 1 -it is very well written, & would, I think, be useful to Students as an admirable direction to their studies, & to others it would supply a general Knowlege of the subject -- I will state the contents of the book -- 1 Of the Naturalia in general, and their division into three Kingdoms. 2 of organized Bodies in general. 3. of animals in general. 4 of the Mammalia. 5. Birds. 6. -- Amphibions. 7 Fishes. 8. Insects. 9 Worms. 10. Plants. 11. of Minerals in general. 12. of Stones, and earthy Fossils. 13. of Mineral Salts. 14. combustible minerals. 15. of Metals. 16. Petrifactions -- at the end there is an alphabetical Index---- / so that it is at once, a Natural History & a dictionary of Natural History. To each animal &c all the European names are given -- with, of course, the scientific characteristics --. -I have the last Edition, i.e. that of April 1799. -- Now I wish to know from you whether there is in English already any work, any work of one Volume (this would make 800 pages) that renders this useless.----In short, should I be right in advising Longman to undertake it?----Answer me as soon as you conveniently can. -Blumenbach has been no very great discoverer, tho' he has done some respectable things in that way; but he is a man of enormous knowlege, & has an arranging head.----Ask Beddoes, if you do not know. -- When you have leisure, you would do me a great service, if you would briefly state your metaphysical system of Impressions, Ideas, Pleasures, & Pains, the laws that govern them, & the reasons which induce you to consider them as essentially distinct from each other. -- My motive for this request is the following -- As soon as I settle, I shall read Spinoza & Leibnitz -- and I particularly wish to know wherein they agree with, & wherein differ from, you. If you will do this, I promise you to send you the result -- & with it my own creed. -- God bless you | & S. T. Coleridge ____________________ 1 J. F. Blumenbach, Beyträge zur Naturgeschichte, 1790. Coleridge did not carry out his intention of translating the work. -590- Blumenbach's Book contains references to all the best writers on each subject. -- My friend T. Poole begs me to ask what in your opinion are the parts or properties in the Oak bark which tan skins, and is cold water a complete menstruum for those parts or properties? -- I understand from Poole, that nothing is so lit[tie] understood as the chemical Theory of Tan[ning], tho' nothing is of more importance, in the circle of Manufactures. -- In other words, does Oak bark give out to cold water all those of it's parts which tan[?] -- 335. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | 39 | Gloucester Place | Portman Square | London MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. with omis. Tom Wedgwood, 93. Stamped: Bristol, 12 June 1800. Bristol Thursday June 12 1800 My dear Sir Enclosed is 20£ -- I have had it by me these 4 weeks, in the purpose of seeing you in London; but have been prevented by my own affairs & other people's. -- I had heard such very pleasing accounts of your dear Brother, accounts exaggerated at second hand by the joy of the narrators, that T. Wedgewood's own statement came on me as a disappointment. Still however Bloxam must have seen a great difference, or he could not have written as he did. God in heaven bless him!---Your letter to me, that is, the account in your letter made the tears roll down Poole's face----. I did not receive your letter till some time after it's arrival, having been down to Porlock a house hunting -- but neither there, nor any where in the vicinity of Stowey can I get a suitable House -So I shall move Northward -- but of this I shall write to you from Ambleside -- At present the Bustle of the Office, in which I am writing, dings about me like Tavern Bells. -- Old Mrs Poole is, I am afraid, dying. -- I will write this day to Stuart to prevent the paper --. -- My respectful remembrances to Mrs Wedgewood-believe me with affectionate & grateful esteem your sincere Friend S. T. Coleridge I leave Bristol to morrow -- -591- 336. To Biggs and Cottle Address: Messrs Biggs and Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back | Bristol 1 Single MS. Yale University Lib. Hitherto unpublished. From the time of his return from Germany in May 1799, Wordsworth had been preoccupied with the sale and reception of Lyrical Ballads, and during Coleridge's visit to Grasmere in April 1800, he apparently determined to reissue the Lyrical Ballads of 1798 as volume 1, to prepare a second volume made up of new poems, and to publish the work in his own name. Accordingly, when Coleridge left for Bristol on 4 May, he took with him copies of several of Wordsworth's poems intended for the second volume. These poems he gave to Humphry Davy, who was to look over the proof sheets. He probably made arrangements with Biggs and Cottle to print the volumes; certainly, as an unpublished letter from Wordsworth shows, he made an agreement on Wordsworth's behalf for the publication of the two volumes by Longman. On his return to Grasmere on 29 June, he plunged whole-heartedly into the labour of preparing the work for the printers. The manuscripts of the two volumes of Lyrical Ballads, except for one sheet containing the second instalment of the Preface and another containing three of Wordsworth's poems, are extant in the form in which they were transmitted to the printers. (See W. H. White, A Description of the Wordsworth & Coleridge Manuscripts in the possession of T. N. Longman, 1897, pp. 1-44.) Very little of this material is in Wordsworth's handwriting; instead, it was Dorothy and Coleridge who carried the burden of transcription. Indeed, an examination of the manuscript sheets sent to Biggs and Cottle and a review of Coleridge's activities during the latter half of 1800 reveal a devotion as disinterested as it was remarkable. Coleridge was faced with several obligations when he arrived in Grasmere at the end of June: he had accepted an advance from Phillips, possibly for a 'bookseller's compilation'; he had agreed to prepare a volume of his German tour for Longman; and beyond all this, he was under a moral responsibility to write his life of Lessing, a work long promised to the Wedgwoods. Instead, however, of rescuing himself from a sea of embarrassments and paying heed to his own reputation, Coleridge gave his best efforts to Wordsworth's project. He unhesitatingly agreed to the inclusion of the four poems he had earlier contributed to the 1798 volume, and he rewrote his poem Love, which replaced Wordsworth The Convict. He made far-reaching revisions of The Ancient Mariner, probably at the instigation of Wordsworth who was convinced that the poem had been 'an injury' to the Lyrical Ballads and that its 'strangeness' had 'deterred readers from going on' ( Early Letters, 226-7). He agreed that Christabel should conclude the second volume, and, after a tremendous expenditure of creative energy, he succeeded in composing Part II of Christabel, before Wordsworth determined not to include it. Not only did he transcribe many of Wordsworth's poems and prepare directions to the printers; but once Lyrical Ballads was published, he did his utmost to win favourable reception for the volumes by writing long letters to several persons of eminence (see Letters 368 and 875). Poole had earlier cautioned against 'prostration in regard to Wordsworth'. Coleridge's utter disregard of anything but Wordsworth's reputation shown how rightly Poole had assessed the situation. (Letters 336, 337, 345, ____________________ 1 The following note appears on the address sheet: 'Begin the Printing immediately. W. W. --' -592- 346, 347, 359, and 872 are drawn from the manuscripts of Lyrical Ballads and contain Coleridge's instructions to the printers.) This letter is the first communication to the printers and is drawn from a sheet entirely in Coleridge's handwriting, except for two brief passages written by Dorothy. Stamped: Kendal. [ Mid-July 1800] The first Volume of the Lyrical Ballads is to be printed in the following order. The Advertisement is to be omitted -- and the Volume to begin with 1 Expostulation and Reply. 2 The Tables turned: an evening scene, on the same subject. 3 Old man travelling, &c 4 The Complaint of a forsaken Indian Woman 5 The last of the Flock 6 Lines left upon a seat in a Yew tree which stands near the Lake of Esthwaite, &c 7 The Foster mother's Tale, &c 8 Goody Blake & Harry Gill 9 The Thorn 10 We are seven. 11 Anecdote for Fathers, &c 12 Lines written at a small Distance from my House, and sent by my little Boy to the Person, to whom they are addressed 13 The Female Vagrant 14 The Dungeon 15 Simon Lee, the old Huntsman, &c 16 Lines written in early Spring 17 The Nightingale 18 Lines written when sailing in a Boat at Evening. Vide 19 Lines written near Richmond upon the Thames. Alterations 20 The ideot Boy 21 Love. -- (Vide Alteration) 22 The Mad Mother 23 The ancient mariner, a Poet's Reverie. 24 Lines written a few Miles above Tintern Abbey, &c N.B. The Convict is to be omitted -- & in the rest the following Alterations are to be made from the printed Copy. Mr Biggs will be so good as to be careful that the printed Copy, which he uses, shall be that which contains the Nightingale & not one of those first Copies which contained Lewti, or the Circassian Love-chant. 1 ---- ____________________ 1 It was at first intended to include Lewti in the 1798 Lyrical Ballads and a few copies containing that poem were printed. Later Lewti was cancelled and The Nightingale substituted. See Wise, Bibliography, 211. -593- N.B. all the Titles are to be printed at full length from the printed Copy -- except where an alteration is noticed in this & the following letter. -- Alterations to be made. 1 The Foster mother's ale, a Dramatic Fragment -- to be printed The Foster mother's Tale a Narration in Dramatic blank Verse, & to begin at the words 'But that entrance Mother?' The first 15 lines to be omitted. -- Likewise Page 56th line 14th -- instead of 'hole' print 'cell.' Likewise line 18th for sung print sang. Likewise Page 57th Line 2nd instead of 'He always doted' Print 'Leoni doted.' In the same page omit the two lines 'Such as would lull a listening child to sleep His rosy face besoiled with unwiped tears' The Dungeon. Line 2Φ the comma after wisdom. Line 10Φ the colon after 'plague-spot', & put a full stop instead. Line 14 ˄ a comma after the words 'clanking hour,' The Nightingale. In the title omit the words 'a conversational Poem'. In p. 67 omit the following lines. On moonlight Bushes, Whose dewy leafits are but half disclos'd, You may perchance behold them on the Twigs, Their bright, bright eyes, their eyes both bright & full, Glist'ning, while many a Glow-worm in the shade Lights up her love-torch. 337. To Biggs and Cottle Address: Messrs Biggs and Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back | Bristol Single MS. Yale University Lib. Hitherto unpublished. This second communication to the printers is entirely in Coleridge's handwriting and concludes the instructions for the first volume of Lyrical Ballads. It contains a new version of Love, earlier published in the Morning Post, 21 December 1799, under the title, Introduction to the Tale of the Dark Ladie; revisions for The Ancient Mariner; and slight corrections, not included here, for three of Wordsworth's poems. Stamped: Kendal. ____________________ 1 In the manuscript Coleridge wrote out corrections for the first nineteen poems, Dorothy adding part of the directions for the Yew Tree and The Foster-mother's Tale. Only those changes affecting Coleridge's own poems are included here. -594- [Mid- July 1800] [Poem] 21. In room of the Convict print the following Poem. LOVE.] 1 All Thoughts, all Passions, all Delights, Whatever stirs this mortal Frame, All are but Ministers of Love And feed his sacred flame. Oft in my waking dreams do I Live o'er again that happy hour, 2 When midway on the Mount I lay Beside the Ruin'd Tower. The Moonshine stealing o'er the scene Had blended with the Lights of Eve; And she was there, my Hope, my Joy, My own dear Genevieve! She lean'd against the armed Man, The Statue of the armed Knight: She stood and listen'd to my Harp Amid the ling'ring Light. Few Sorrows hath she of her own, My Hope, my Joy, my Gnevieve! She loves me best, whene'er I sing The Songs, that make her grieve. I play'd a soft 3 and doleful Air, I sang an old and moving Story 4 -- An old rude Song, that fitted well The Ruin wild and hoary. She listen'd with a flitting Blush, With downcast Eyes and modest Grace; For well she knew, I could not choose But gaze upon her Face. I told her of the Knight, that wore Upon his Shield a burning Brand; And that 5 for ten long Years he woo'd The Lady of the Land. ____________________ 1 Poems, i. 330. 2 O ever in my waking dreams I dwell upon that happy hour, [Cancelled version of lines 5 and 6 above.] 3 sad [Cancelled word in line above.] 4 Ditty [Cancelled word in line above.] 5 how [Cancelled word in line above.] -595- I told her, how he pin'd: and, ah! The low, the deep, the pleading tone, With which I sang another's Love, Interpreted my own. She listen'd with a flitting Blush, With downcast Eyes and modest Grace; And she forgave me, that I gaz'd Too fondly on her Face! But when I told the cruel scorn Which craz'd this bold and lovely Knight, And that 1 he cross'd the mountain woods Nor rested day nor night; That 2 sometimes from the savage Den, And sometimes from the darksome Shade, And sometimes starting up at once In green and sunny Glade, There came, and look'd him in the face, An Angel beautiful and bright; And that 3 he knew, it was a Fiend, This miserable Knight! And that, 4 unknowing what he did, He leapt amid a murd'rous Band, And sav'd from outrage worse than Death The Lady of the Land; And how she wept and clasp'd his knees, And how she tended him in vain -- And ever 5 strove to expiate The Scorn, that craz'd his Brain. And that 6 she nurs'd him in a Cave; And how his Madness went away When on the yellow forest leaves A dying Man he lay; ____________________ 1 how [Cancelled word in line above.] 2 How [Cancelled word in line above.] 3 how [Cancelled word in line above.] 4 how [Cancelled word in line above.] 5 For still she [Cancelled words in line above.] 6 how [Cancelled word in line above.] -596- His dying Words -- but when I reach'd That tenderest strain of all the Ditty, My falt'ring Voice and pausing Harp Disturb'd her soul with Pity! All Impulses of Soul and Sense Had thrill'd my guileless Genevieve, The Music, and the doleful Tale, The rich and balmy Eve; And Hopes, and Fears that kindle Hope, An undistinguishable Throng! And gentle Wishes long subdued, Subdued and cherish'd long! She wept with pity and delight, She blush'd with love and maiden shame; And, like the murmur of a dream, I heard her breathe my name. 1 Her Bosom heav'd 2 -- she stepp'd aside; As conscious of my Look, she stepp'd -- Then suddenly with timorous eye She fled to me and wept. She half-inclos'd me with her Arms, She press'd me with a meek embrace; And bending back her head look'd up, And gaz'd upon my face. 'Twas partly Love, and partly Fear, And partly 'twas a bashful Art That I might rather feel than see The Swelling of her Heart. I calm'd her fears; and she was calm, And told her love with virgin 3 Pride; And so I won my Genevieve, My bright and beauteous Bride. ____________________ 1 I saw her bosom heave and swell, Heave and swell with inward sighs; I could not choose but love to see Her gentle Bosom rise. [Cancelled stanza above.] [1 heave] rise 2 Her wet cheek glowd -- [Cancelled words in line above. 3 Maiden [Cancelled word in line above.] -597- [Poem] 28 The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere in seven Parts. Instead of this title print the Following -- The Ancient Mariner, A Poet's Reverie. Let the Argument be thus printed --How a Ship, having first sailed to the Equator, was driven by Storms to the cold Country towards the South Pole; how the Ancient Mariner cruelly, and in contempt of the laws of hospitality, killed a Sea-bird; and how he was followed by many and strange Judgements; 1 till having finished this penance1 and in what manner he came back to his own Country. p. 5. -- alter the title, as before. p. 5. First line of first stanza -- for 'ancyent Marinere' print 'ancient Mariner.' p. 6. line 4. for 'Marinere'! print 'Mariner'! p. 6. line 12 for 'Marinere' print '.Mariner.' p. 6. line 16 for 'Marinere' print 'Mariner[']. p. 8. line 8 for 'ancyent' print 'ancient'. p. 8. line 4 for 'Marinere' read 'Mariner.' p. 8. line 5 for 'Listen, Stranger! Storm & wind &c' print 'And now there came the stormy Wind 2 p. 8. line 9 for 'Listen, Stranger! Mist & snow' print 'And now there came both Mist and Snow'. p. 8. line 10. for 'cauld' print 'cold['] p. 8. line 12 for 'Emerauld' print 'Emerald' p. 8. line 15. for Ne-----ne print Nor-nor---- p. 9. line 4. for 'Like Noises of a swound' print A wild and ceaseless Sound. p. 9. line 7. for 'And an it were' print 'As if it had been' p. 9. line 9. For 'Marineres' print 'Mariners.['] p. 9. line 16. For 'Marinere's' print 'Mariner's' p. 10. line 3. For 'fog smoke-white' print 'fog-smoke white' ____________________ 1 Struck out in the MS. 2 Coleridge cancelled this direction to the printers and substituted: p. 8. let the second stanza be thus printed But now the Northwind came more fierce, There came a tempest strong; And southward still for days & weeks Like Chaff we drove along. -598- p. 10. line 5 For 'aneyent Maxinere!' print 'ancient Mariner! p. 11. print the first stanza thus The Sun now rose upon the Right; 1 Out of the Sea came he, Still hid in mist; and on the Left Went down into the Sea. p. 11. line 8. for 'Marinere's' print 'Mariner's' p. 12. line 1. for 'Ne dim ne red, like God's own head' print -- Nor dim nor red, like an Angel's Head. p. 18. line 6. For 'ne -- ne' print 'nor -- nor' p. 13. line 12 For 'Ne' print 'Nor' p. 15. Omit the two lines 'I saw a something in the Sky No bigger than my Fist' and in their stead insert the following separate Stanza So pass'd a weary Time; each Throat Was parch'd, and glaz'd each eye, When, looking westward, I beheld A something in the Sky. At first it seem'd a little speck, &c p. 15. line 9. For 'an' print 'as if' p. 16. after the first stanza thus -- With throat unslak'd, with black lips bak'd, We could nor laugh nor wail, Thro' utter Drouth all dumb we stood Till I bit my arm and suck'd the blood, and cry'd, A sail! a sail! p. 16. last line. but one instead of 'Withouten wind, withouten tide' print 'without or wind or current tide' in the same stanza instead of 'She doth not tack from side' print 'Seel see! (I cry'd) she tacks no morel['] 2 The last stanza of this page to be thus altered -- See! see!(I cry'd) 'she tacks no more! 'Hither to work us Weal 'Without a breeze, without a Tide 'She steddies with upright Keel['] ____________________ 1 Left [Cancelled word in line above.] 2 Prom last line . . . no more -- is struck out in the MS. -599- p. 18. Alter the first stanza of this page into the following: Are those her Ribs, thro' which the Sun Did peer, as thro' a Grate? And are those two all, all her crew, That Woman, and her Mate? p. 18. line 9. For 'They're' print 'They were' p. 18. last stanza alter the words' are -- are -- are -- is -- is -- makes' -into -- 'were -- were -- were -- was -- was -- made'. p. 19. line 10 For 'Oft' print 'Off'. p. 19. line 13. For 'atween' print 'between['] p. 21. line 1. For 'aneyent marinere' print 'ancient Marinerl['] p. 22. line 7. For 'eldritch' print 'ghastly' p. 28. line 2. For 'Ne -- ne' print 'Nor -- nor.['] p. 24. line 2. For 'Like morning Frosts yspread' print 'Like April Hoar-frost spread' p. 26. line 8. For 'yeven' print 'given'. p. 27. line 5. Instead of 'The roaring wind! it roar'd far off' print 'And soon I heard a roaring wind' p. 27. line 9. For 'bursts' print 'burst.' p. 27. line 11. For 'are' print 'were' p. 27. line 18. For 'The Stars dance on between' print 'The wan Stars danc'd between.' p. 27. Print the last stanza thus -- And the coming wind did roar more loud; And the Sails did sigh, like sedge; And the Rain pour'd down from one black cloud -- The Moon was at it's edge. p. 28. Print the two first lines thus - The thick black Cloud was cleft, and still The Moon was at it's side: p. 28. line 4. For'falls' print 'fell'. p. 28. Alter the two first lines of the second Stanza thus --/ The loud 1 Wind never reach'd the Ship, Yet now the Ship mov'd on! p. 28. line 11. For 'Ne -- ne' -- print 'Nor -- nor' -- p. 28. line 16. For 'Marineres' print 'Mariners' p. 29. -- Omit the 7th & 8th lines, 'And I quak'd &c' 2 p. 29. before the words 'The Day-light dawn'd' insert the following Stanza -- ____________________ 1 strong [Cancelled word in line above.] 2 For the omitted lines see Poems, ii. 1039, lines 387-8. -600- 'I fear thee, ancient Mariner!' Be calm 1," thou Wedding-Guest! 'Twas not those 2 Souls, that fled in pain Which to their corses came again, But a troop of Spirits blest: and alter the words, 'The Day-light dawn'd' -into 'For when it dawn'd,' P. 30. line 2. For 'Lavrock' print 'Sky-lark' P. 31. -- Omit the whole of this page. 3 P. 36. Line 6 -- For 'Withouten wave or wind?' print 'Without or wave or wind?' P. 36. Last line for 'Marinere's' print 'Mariner's'. P. 37. line 11. For 'een' print 'eyes' P. 37. line 12 For 'Ne' print 'Nor' P. 37. Alter the last Stanza of this page into the following -- And 4 now this Spell was snapt: once more I view'd the Ocean green, And look'd far forth, yet little saw Of what had else been seen. P. 88. line 1. For 'lonely' print 'lonesome' P. 88. line 8. For 'Ne -- ne' print 'Nor -- nor.' P. 40. Omit five stanzas here -- namely, the whole of this page, and the first Stanza of p. 41. 5 P. 42. line 13. For 'Eftsones' print 'But soon.' P. 48. Omit the first Stanza of this page. 6 P. 44. 1. 4. For 'Marineres' print 'Mariners'. P. 44. 1. 5. For 'Contree' print 'countrée.['] P. 45. line 1. for 'ne'rd' print 'ner'd' P. 46. line 6. For 'Ne -- ne' print 'Nor -- nor' P. 48. -- Alter the last stanza into the following Since then at an uncertain hour That Agony returns, And till my ghastly Tale is told, This 7 Heart within me burns. P. 50. line 12. Omit the comma after 'loveth well['] P. 50. line 14. Omit the comma after 'loveth best' ____________________ 1 Fear not [Cancelled words In line above.] 2 the (Cancelled word in line above.) 3 For the omitted stanzas see Poem, ii. 1040, lines 862-77. 4 But [Cancelled word in line above.] 5 For the omitted stanzas see Powa, ii. 1043, lines 481-502. 6 For the omitted stanza see Poems, ii. 1044, lines 581-6. 7 My [Cancelled word in line above.] -601- P. 51. line 1. For 'Marinere' print 'Mariner' 1 Directions will be sent by the next post for the second Volume -in the meantime, Mr Biggs will be pleased to make all convenient Dispatch with the first. He will probably find it advisable to take a printed Copy of the Lyrical Ballads, & correct it himself throughout, according to the directions in this & the preceding letter -- ____________________ 1 Despite these careful revisions, Wordsworth seems to have retained his objections to The Ancient Mariner; and in sending off to Biggs and Cottle the last two paragraphs of the Preface and a long note defending The Thorn, he added the following comment on Coleridge's poem, revealing thereby a critical blindness and a disregard for the feelings of a fellow poet. The sheet containing it must have been posted circa 1 Oct., since Dorothy Wordsworth says she wrote out the manuscript on 30 Sept. and corrected it the next day ( Journals, i. 62). Coleridge was not at Grasmere from 26 Sept. to 4 Oct., this being the time of his baby's serious illness, and I doubt that he saw Wordsworth's ungracious note before it appeared in print. I cannot refuse myself the gratification of informing such Readers as may have been pleased with this poem, or with any part of it, that they owe their pleasure in some sort to me; as the Author was himself very desirous that it should be suppressed. This wish had arisen from a consciousness of the defects of the poem, & from a knowledge that many persons had been much displeased with it. The Poem of my Friend has indeed great defects; first, that the principal person has no distinct character, either in his profession of Mariner, or as a human being who having been long under the controul of supernatural impressions might be supposed himself to partake of something supernatural: secondly, that he does not act, but is continually acted upon: thirdly, that the events having no necessary connection do not produce each other; and lastly, that the imagery is somewhat too laboriously accumulated. Yet the poem contains many delicate touches of passion, and indeed the passion is every where true to nature; a great number of the stanzas present beautiful images & are expressed with unusual felicity of language; and the versification, though the metre is itself unfit for long poems, is harmonious and artfully varied, exhibiting the utmost powers of that metre, & every variety of which it is capable. It therefore appeared to me that these several merits (the first of which, namely that of the passion, is of the highest kind,) gave to the poem a value which is not often possessed by better poems. On this account I requested of my Friend to permit me to republish it. (MS. Yale University Lib.) Lamb's strictures on Wordsworth's note may account for its omission after 1800. 'I totally differ from your idea that the Marinere should have had a character and profession. . . . The Ancient Marinere undergoes such Trials, as overwhelm and bury all individuality or memory of what he was. . . . Your other observation is I think as well a little unfounded: the Marinere from being conversant in supernatural events has acquired a supernatural and strange cast of phrase, eye, appearance, &c. which frighten the wedding guest. . . . I am hurt and vexed that you should think it necessary, with a prose apology, to open the eyes of dead men that cannot see.' Lamb Letters, i. 240. -602- 338. To Daniel Stuart Address: D. Stuart Esq. | No / 385 | Strand | London Morning Post Office MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis. Letters from the Lake Poets, 7. Postmark: 19 July 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Tuesday, July 15 1800 Dear Stuart Since I quitted you, I have never been within 150 miles of London -- I left Grasmere with the intention indeed, but at Kendal received letters which forced me Stowey-ward --. Since my rearrival here, I have been confined part of the time to my bed by a sort of rheumatic fever -- & till within this last brace of days, my eyelids have been swoln & inflamed to a degree which has made it imprudent even to wite a common letter. -- Why should I have wished to shun you? -- Surely, we have always behaved kindly & honorably -- to each other ----- Wordsworth's state of Health at this present time is such as to preclude all possibility of writing for a paper -- as to myself, I will do what I promised the very first thing I do -- this day & tomorrow I must write letters --. On Thursday I will set to, & will not leave off, on my word & honor, till I have done a second part of Pitt, & Buonaparte --. With these I will write you further, whether or no I shall be able to continue in any species of regular connection with your paper --. Whether I do or no, be assured that as a friend I shall be at your service, if you wish any thing particular at any particular time. Wordsworth requests me to be very express in the communication of his sincere thanks to you, for the interest which you have been so kind as to take in his poems. We are convinced you have been of great service to the sale. -- A second Edition is now printing, with a second Volume. With regard to the play business, Wordsworth has a Tragedy by him, in my opinion, a most masterly one / this he would transmit by you to Mr Sheridan, for Mr Sheridan's opinion, provided you would engage that the Copy shall be returned to him -- as he has but this one perfect Copy. Mr Sheridan will see by this of what kind Mr Wordsworth's dramatic Talents are; & if he should find the Tragedy unfit for representation, he might put Mr W. in the way of writing a play that should be fit for representation, by pointing out to him the defects that render the present one untheatrical. Mr Sheridan's conception of my obstinacy is a mistake --. When I sent my play to him, I gave at the same time expressly to him the whole & absolute power of alteration, addition, & omission --. I did indeed defend some parts of my play against Young Linley, -603- but only as a metaphysician; never supposing myself to have any voice or suffrage, or even opinion, as to what was or was not suited for representation. After all, I never blamed Mr Sheridan for not bringing my play on the stage. God knows my inmost heart, & knows that I never for an hour together thought it likely to succeed -- I blamed Mr Sheridan solely for taking no kind of notice even of the receipt of my play, for returning me no answer whatever, & for withholding from me the copy of my play after repeated applications; & those applications too made at a time when I had no copy in my possession, & wished to have disposed of it to the Booksellers -- when the 30£, I might have had for it, would have been a draught of Nepenthe & heavenly restoration to me. -- But this is all gone by! -- I am convinced, I have no Talents for so arduous a species of composition as the Drama. -- I should wish you however to state the foregoing account to Mr Sheridan. -- My address henceforward will be Mr Coleridge, | Greta Hall, ∣ Keswick ∣ Cumberland. I move thither on Tuesday next. -- N.B. The newspapers come very irregularly indeed. Your's sincerely S. T. Coleridge We have never had the Newspaper with the Verses I sent you from, Bristol. 1 339. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic Institution | Hotwells | Bristol MS. Royal Institution. Pub. E. L. G. i. 141. Postmark: 19 July 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Wed. July 15 [16], 1800 My dear Davy Since my arrival at Grasmere I have been afflicted with continued illness, in consequence of a cold from wet -- for days together I have been obliged to keep my bed; & when up, I have been prevented till within these few days from reading by a pair of swoln & inflamed Eyelids. I hope, that you have suffered no inconvenience from want of the money, which I borrowed of you -it has made me very uneasy; but in a few days I will take care, that it shall be remitted to you. We remove to our own House at Keswick on Tuesday week -- my address is, Mr Coleridge, Greta ____________________ 1 No poetical contributions to the Morning Post between 24 Jan. and 13 Oct. 1800 have been identified. -604- Hall, Keswick, Cumberland. My dear fellow, I would that I could wrap up the view from my House in a pill of opium, & send it to you I I should then be sure of seeing you in the fall of the year. But you will come. -- As soon as I have disembrangled my affairs by a couple of months' Industry, I shall attack chemistry, like a Shark --. In the mean time do not forget to fulfil your promise of sending me a synopsis of your metaphysical opinions. I am even anxious about this. -- I see your Researches on the nitrous oxyde regularly advertised -- Be so kind as to order one to be left for me at Longman's, that it may be sent with my box. The difficulty of -- procuring Books is the greatest disadvantage, under which I shall labor. The carriage from London by the waggon is cross-roadish & insecure; that by the Mail attacks the Purse with 7 Hydra Mouths all open. -- I read the day before yesterday in a German Book a fact which appeared to me analogous to those facts exhibited by the respiration of the nitrous Oxyde. The account of the sickness is circumstantially described by persons who attended the patient, 'a young, fiery, lively Youth in the 17th year of his age. At the commencement of the Summer of 1783 he was seized during dinner with a Cramp in his Chest, which was followed by a Fever that continued for four weeks; at the conclusion of which time symptoms of amelioration appeared; but one night he was attacked by the most frightful convulsions, which lasted in all their fury 24 hours without intermission. After these convulsions the Fever recommenced, & was accompanied by strong Delirium. The subject of Death, & his old occupations as a merchant's clerk formed the subjects of his Discourse -- in which he discovered a power of mind, a regularity, a logic, an eloquence, wholly unknown in him in his state of health. These orations lasted always till they were intercepted by the cramp in his chest -- and when the whole Paroxysm, all the Convulsions, delirious oration, & Cramp were over, instead of appearing exhausted he was to an extraordinary degree elevated, & in such extreme high spirits that whoever had seen him without knowing the previous circumstances would have concluded him to have been in rampant high health. -- The Paroxysms returned, and ever with such impetuosity that five stout men could scarcely keep him down; yet ever they left him in the same high spirits & undiminished strength. During his paroxysms he exhibited a proud & fierce contempt for all around him; the color of black was intolerable to him -- as were watch ribbons & watch chains & looking-glasses. If he saw one of these in the intervals, his Paroxysm returned instantly. After a Paroxysm, while he was in rampant high spirits, he was persuaded to have a vein opened -- the Blood -605- was almost black, burst from the vein with violence, foam'd, and was in every respect so remarkable' says the author ['] that it [was] easily comprehensible how it should have produced this strange revolution in the whole man. I asked him once how he felt when the Paroxysm was coming on. He answered that at first he had a sensation of heat from about the stomach spreading upwards till it reached his head, & that then he began to be more & more giddy & drunken, & objects grew more & more dim before his eyes, till he lost all consciousness -- and this was the moment in which the Convulsions always began, which convulsions lasted in their full fury never less than 8 minutes, but oftener for half an hour. -In this way the Disease continued without any apparent abatement ten weeks, at which time, after a violent Paroxysm, the Patient said that that would be the last. And so it proved. From this time the Convulsions ceased, and, to the astonishment of all, the Patient had lost nothing either of his former Powers, or bodily strength, or high animal spirits. He was ordered a medicinal Bath (eine Badekur) that was to secure him from all future attacks -but after three weeks the Paroxysms returned, tho' not so violently -- and without convulsions, except in [one] instance in which he had been suddenly frightened. At the end of 14 days he was completely cured [by] a violent Dysenterie. From this moment to the time in which the account was published ( May 81, 1784) he enjoyed the most perfect Health, had in no part of the Disease, & in no hour after, lost any strength, and his animal spirits appear more impetuous than they were before. But he has not the least consciousness of any one thing that past during his whole sickness -- the whole ten Weeks seem annihilated from his present Being.[']-----This account is in Moritz's Magazine for experimental Psychology, p. 12. of the third number of the second Volume. -- Does it not seem here, as if Nature herself had elaborated the nitrous oxyde out of the common Air? -- In Wordsworth's case, which I have sent to Beddoes, you will see a curious instance of ideas, linked with feeling habitually, at length forming blind associations with a particular pain, probably in the right hypochondrium -- so as immediately to excite that pain. I have read the little chemist's pocket-book twice over. -- Do, do, my dear Davy! come here in the fall of the year. -- Sheridan has sent to me again about my Tragedy -- I do not know what will come of it -- he is an unprincipled Rogue. Remember me to Mr Coates when you see [him] -- and be sure you do to Matthew Coates, & Mrs Coates. Will you be so kind as just to look over the sheets of the lyrical Ballads? -- What are you -606- now doing? -- God love you! Believe me most affectionately, my dear Davy, your friend S. T. Coleridge 340. To Thomas, Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | N. Stowey | Bridgewater | Somerset MS. British Museum. Pub. E. L. G. i. 144. Postmark: 28 July 1800. Stamped: Keswick. July 24, 1800 My dear Poole Within a few days of my arrival at Grasmere I increased the cold, which I had caught at Liverpool, to a rheumatic fever almost, which confined me to my bed for some days, & left me so weak, & listless, that writing was hateful to me -- & my eye lids were so swoln, that it was painful too. Had I written to you, I could have written only as a Duty -- and with that feeling never will I write to you. -- We met at Bristol a pleasant chaise companion who did not leave us till we arrived at Liverpool -- we travelled the first day to Tewksbury, the next night we slept at Shrewsbury, having passed thro' Worcester, Kidderminster, Bridgenorth & Colebrook Dale -- the next night at Chester, where we stayed a day & a half. It is a walled city, a walk on the walls all around it -- the Air of the city is thick enough to be edible, & stinks. From Chester we proceeded, crossing a ferry of 7 miles, to Liverpool. -- At Liverpool we took up our quarters with Dr Crompton, who lives at Eton, a noble seat four miles & a half from the town -- he received us with joyous hospitality, & Mrs Crompton, who is all I can conceive of an angel, with most affectionate gladness. Here we stayed 8 or 9 days, during which I saw a great deal of Dr Currie, Roscoe, Rathbone ( Colebrook Renyolds's Brother-in-law) & other literati. Currie is a genuine philosopher; a man of mild & rather solemn manners -- if you had ever keen my Brother George, I would have referred you to him for a striking resemblance of Currie. -- I would have you by all means order the late Edition in four Volumes of Burns's Works -- the Life is written by Currie, and a masterly specimen of philosophical Biography it is. -- Roscoe is a man of the most delightful manners -- natural, sweet, & cheerful -- zealous in kindness, and a republican with all the feelings of prudence & all the manners of good sense -- so that he is beloved by the Aristocrats themselves. He has a nice matronly wife, & 9 fine children. -- Rathbone is a quaker, as brimful of enthusiastic goodness as a vessel of mortality can be. He is a man of immense fortune. The union of all these men is most amiable -- they truly love each other, a -607- band of Brothers! And yet by their wisdom in keeping back all political trials of power in Liverpool they have stifled party spirit in that city, & enabled themselves to be the founders of a most magnificent Library -- magnificent as a Building, respectable in it's present stock of Books, & magnificent in what it is to be. They have received last week an accession of 3000£, all to be laid out in books of acknowleged reputation -- & the yearly income of the foundation is 1000£. The slave-merchants of Liverpool fly over the heads of the slave-merchants of Bristol, as Vultures over carrion crows. -- This library is called the Athenaeum. In religion Currie, I suppose, is a philosopher -- Roscoe is a pious Deist -- Rathbone, I suppose, is the same; or more probably he cloathes his Deism even to his own mind in the language of Scripture -- a Christian, as Taylor is a Platonist. -- But this is all guess. On this day I arrived at Keswick, & have entered on my habitation. Wordsworth will stay at Grasmere for a year to come at least -- it is possible, he may not quit it at all. -- He is well, unless when he uses any effort of mind -- then he feels a pain in his left side, which threatens to interdict all species of composition to him. -- Our goods are all arrived -- & now in house. -- Of Keswick, & [of] my house, heaven forbid that I shall begin to write at the fag end of such a beggarly sheet of paper as this --. No! as soon as the Stir & Hurry is over I shall open upon you in a sheet that might serve for a sheet! -My address is Greta Hall, Keswick, Cumberland. We are very anxious about your mother -- I have said to myself, that no news is good news. My love to Ward. -- My eyes still remain so weak that it is disagreeable to me to read over my own letter. -- I wish, that Ward would immediately copy for me the third letter which I wrote, descriptive of the Hartz Mountains. 1 I have got the two first; but the last is lost -- & I want it immediately. -- Sheridan has sent me a strange sort of a message about my Tragedy -- wishing me to write for the stage, making all his old offers over again, & charging the non-representation of my play on my extreme obstinacy in refusing to have it at all altered! -- Did you ever hear of such a damned impudent Dog? -- God for ever bless you, my dear Poole -- & your most affectionate | Friend S. T. Coleridge ____________________ 1 Cf. Letter 282. The copy made by Ward was sent to Coleridge and is now in the New York Public Library. -608- 341. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | Christ Church | Hampshire MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. with omis. Tom Wedgwood, 102. Postmark: 28 July 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Thursday, July 24, 1800 My dear Sir I found your letter on my arrival at Grasmere, namely, on the 29th of June -- since which time to the present with the exception of the last few days I have been more unwell, than I have ever been since I left School -- for many days I was forced to keep my bed, & when released from that worst incarceration, I suffered most grievously from a brace of swoln Eyelids, & a head into which on the least agitation the blood felt as rushing in & flowing back again like the raking of the Tide on a coast of loose stones. -However, thank God! I am now coming about again. That Tom receives such pleasure from natural scenery strikes me as it does you -- the total incapability, which I have found in myself to associate any but the most languid feelings with the godlike objects which have surrounded me lately, & the nauseous efforts to impress my admiration into the service of nature, has given me a sympathy with his former state of health which I never before could have had. -- I wish from the bottom of my soul that he may be enjoying similar pleasures with those which I am now enjoying with all that newness of sensation; that voluptuous correspondence of the blood & flesh about me with breeze & sun-heat; which make convalescence more than repay one for disease. I parted from Poole with pain & dejection. For him & for myself in him I should have given Stowey a decisive preference -- it was likewise so conveniently situated that I was in the way of almost all whom I love & esteem. But there was no suitable house, & no prospect of a suitable house -- & the utter desolation, which a small & inconvenient house spread thro' my literary efforts & hourly comforts, & the contagious fretfulness of the weaker vessels in my family, I had experienced to a degree which made it a duty for me to live in no house, in which I could not command one quiet room. Nor was Stowey without other objections -- Mrs Coleridge had scarcely any society there, and inter nos the nearness to Bristol connected me too intimately with all the affairs of her family. Likewise I will say to you what I should not say to another -- the antipathy of those of Poole's relations to whom he is most attached (& by the most delicate ties) to me, to my wife, & even to my poor little boy, was excessive -- in more than one instance it led his Brother's Widow into absolute insult to Mrs Coleridge, which -609- perhaps Poole should have noticed more than he did -- perhaps, & more probably, he could not & ought not to have been otherwise than passive. However, it required no overstrained sensibility to make this at times very painful. -- These things would have weighed as nothing, could I have remained at Stowey; but now they come upon me to diminish my regret. -- Add to this Poole's determination to spend a year or two on the continent in case of a Peace & his Mother's Death --. God in heaven bless her! I am sure, she will not live long. -- This is the first day of my arrival at Keswick -- my house is roomy, situated on an eminence a furlong from the Town -- before it an enormous Garden more than two thirds of which is rented as a Garden for sale articles, but the walks &c are our's most completely. Behind the house are shrubberies, & a declivity planted with flourishing trees of 15 years' growth or so, at the bottom of which is a most delightful shaded walk by the River Greta, a quarter of a mile in length. The room in which I sit, commands from one window the Basenthwaite Lake, Woods, & Mountains, from the opposite the Derwentwater & fantastic mountains of Borrowdale -- straight before me is a wilderness of mountains, catching & streaming lights or shadows at all times -behind the house & entering into all our views is Skiddaw. -- My acquaintance here are pleasant -- & at some distance is Sir Guilfrid Lawson's 1 Seat with a very large & expensive Library to which I have every reason to hope that I shall have free access. -- But when I have been settled here a few days longer, I will write you a minute account of my situation. -- Wordsworth lives 12 miles distant -- in about a year's time he will probably settle at Keswick likewise. -- It is no small advantage here that for two thirds of the year we are in complete retirement -- the other third is alive & swarms with Tourists of all shapes & sizes, & characters -- it is the very place I would recommend to a novellist or farce writer. -Besides, at that time of the year there is always hope that a friend may be among the number, & miscellaneous crowd, whom this place attracts. So much for Keswick at present. Have you seen my translation of the Wallenstein? It is a dull heavy play; but I entertain hopes, that you will think the language for the greater part, natural & good common-sense English -- to which excellence if I can lay fair claim in any book of poetry or prose, I shall be a very singular writer at least. -- I am now working at my introduction to the life of Lessing which I trust will be in the press before Christmas -- that is, the Introduction which will be ____________________ 1 Coleridge at first confused the names of father and son. Sir Gilfrid Lawson died in 1794 and was succeeded by his son, Sir Wilfrid Lawson, who died in 1806. The family seat, Brayton Hall, is located near Aspatria in Cumberland. -610- published first I believe. I shall write again in a few days. Respects to Mrs W. God bless you & S. T. Coleridge I have had a sort of a message from Sheridan about my Tragedy. -- I thank you for your kind offer respecting the 20£; but if my health continue, I trust, I shall be able to sail smoothly, without availing myself of it. 342. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic Institution | Hotwells | Bristol MS. Royal Institution. Pub. E. L. G. i. 147. Postmark: 28 July 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall, Keswick, Cumberland. Friday Evening -- July 25, 1800 My dear Davy Work hard, and if Success do not dance up like the bubbles in the Salt (with the Spirit Lamp under it) may the Devil & his Dam take Success! -- 'Sdeath, my dear fellow! from the Window before me there is a great Camp of Mountains -- Giants seem to have pitch'd their Tents there -- each Mountain is a Giant's Tent -- and how the light streams from them -- & the Shadows that travel upon them! -- Davy I ake for you to be with us --. W. Wordsworth is such a lazy fellow that I bemire myself by making promises for him -- the moment, I received your letter, I wrote to him. He will, I hope, write immediately to Biggs & Cottle 1 -- At all events those poems must not as yet be delivered up to them; because that beautiful Poem, the Brothers, which I read to you in Paul Street, I neglected to deliver to you -- & that must begin the Volume. 2 I trust however that I have invoked the ____________________ 1 On Tuesday, 28 [29] July, Wordsworth wrote at Coleridge's instigation to Humphry Davy, with whom he was as yet unacquainted, his letter accom. panying the first manuscript sheet of poems for the second volume of Lyrical Ballads: 'You would greatly oblige me by looking over the enclosed poems and correcting any thing you find amiss in the punctuation a business at which I am ashamed to say I am no adept. . . . I write to request that you would have the goodness to look over the proof-sheets of the 2ndvolume before they are finally struck off. In future I mean to send the Mss. to Biggs and Cottle with a request that along with the proof-sheets they may be sent to you. . . . Be so good as to put the enclosed Poems into Mr. Bigges hands as soon as you have looked them over in order that the printing may be commenced immediately.' Early Letters, 244-5. The 'enclosed Poems'. in Dorothy's handwriting, were Hart-leap Well, There was a Boy, Ellen Irwin, and the first part of The Brothers. 2 When Lyrical Ballads appeared, The Brothers was the third poem in the second volume. -611- sleeping Bard with a spell so potent, that he will awake & deliver up that Sword of Argantyr, which is to rive the Enchanter GAUDYVERSE from his Crown to his Fork. -- What did you think of that case, I translated for you from the German/? -- That I was a well meaning Sutor, who had ultracrepidated 1 with more zeal than wisdom!! -- I give myself credit for that word 'ultra-crepidated' -- it started up in my Brain like a creation. I write to Tobin by this Post. Godwin is gone Ireland-ward, on a visit to Curran, says the Morning Post -- to Grattan, writes C. Lamb. We drank tea the night before I left Grasmere on the Island in that lovely lake, our kettle swung over the fire hanging from the branch of a Fir Tree, and I lay & saw the woods, & mountains, & lake all trembling, & as it were idealized thro' the subtle smoke which rose up from the clear red embers of the fir-apples which we had collected. Afterwards, we made a glorious Bonfire on the Margin, by some alder bushes, whose twigs heaved & sobbed in the uprushing column of smoke -- & the Image of the Bonfire, & of us that danced round it -- ruddy laughing faces in the twilight -- the Image of this in a Lake smooth as that sea, to whose waves the Son of God had said, PEACE! May God & all his Sons love you as I do----- S. T. Coleridge Sara desires her kind remembrances-Hartley is a spirit that dances on an aspin leaf -- the air, which yonder sallow-faced & yawning Tourist is breathing, is to my Babe a perpetual Nitrous Oxyde. Never was more joyous creature born -- Pain with him is so wholly trans-substantiated by the Joys that had rolled on before, & rushed in after, that oftentimes 5 minutes after his Mother has whipt him, he has gone up & asked her to whip him again.----- 343. To James Webbe Tobin Address: Mr. Tobin, Junr., | Berkeley Square, Bristol. Pub. Atlantic Monthly, July 1894, p. 97. Friday, July 25,1800 From the leads on the housetop of Greta Hall, Keswick, Cumberland, at the present time in the occupancy and usufruct-possession of S. T. Coleridge, Esq., Gentleman-poet and Philosopher in a mist. Yes, my dear Tobin, here I am, with Skiddaw behind my back; ____________________ 1 'Ne Sutor ultra crepidam.' [Note by S. T. C.] See Lamb Letters, i. 193. -612- the Lake of Bassenthwaite, with its simple and majestic case of mountains, on my right hand; on my left, and stretching far away into the fantastic mountains of Borrowdale, the Lake of Derwentwater; straight before me a whole camp of giants' tents, -- or is it an ocean rushing in, in billows that, even in the serene sky, reach halfway to heaven? When I look at the feathery top of this scoundrel pen, with which I am making desperate attempts to write, I see (in that slant direction) the sun almost setting, -- in ten minutes it will touch the top of the crag; the vale of Keswick lies between us. So much for the topography of the letter; as to the chronology, it is half past seven in the evening. I left Wordsworth yesterday; he was tolerably well, and meditates more than his side permits him even to attempt. He has a bed for you; but I absolutely stipulate that you shall be half the time at Keswick. We have house-room enough, and I am sure I need say nothing of anything else. What should prevent you from coming and spending the next brace of months here? I will suppose you to set off in the second week of August, and Davy will be here in the first week of September at the farthest; and then, my dear fellow, for physiopathy and phileleutherism -- sympathy lemonaded with a little argument -- punning and green peas with bacon, or very ham; rowing and sailing on the lake (there is a nice boat obsequious to my purposes). Then, as to chemistry, there will be Davy with us. We shall be as rich with reflected light as yon cloud which the sun has taken to his very bosom! When you come, I pray you do not forget to bring Bartram's Travels 1 with you. Where is John Pinny? He talked of accompanying you. Wordsworth builds on his coming down this autumn; if I knew his present address, I would write to him. Wordsworth remains at Grasmere till next summer (perhaps longer). His cottage is indeed in every respect so delightful a residence, the Sara Hutchinson | from | S. T. C. | Dec. 19. 1801 This is not a Book of Travels properly speaking; but a series of poems, chiefly descriptive, occasioned by the objects which the Traveller observed. -- It is a delicious Book; and like all delicious things, you must take but a little of it at a time. -- Was it not about this time of the year, that I read to you parts of the 'Introduction' of this Book when William and Dorothy had gone out to walk? -- I remember the evening well, but not what time of the year it was. [From a transcript kindly made by Mrs. E. F. Rawnsley of Allan Bank.] ____________________ 1 William Bartram, Travels through North and South Carolina, Georgia, East and West Florida, the Cherokee Country, the Extensive Territories of the Muscogulges, or Creek Confederacy, and the Country of the Chactaws; containing an Account of the Soil and Natural Productions of those Regions, together with Observations on the Manners of the Indians, Philadelphia, 1791. A copy of Bartram's Travels, with the following note from Coleridge to Sara Hutchinson pasted in the volume, belongs to Mrs. Dickson of Stepping Stones, Grasmere: -613- walks so dry after the longest rains, the heath and a silky kind of fern so luxurious a bedding on every hilltop, and the whole vicinity so tossed about on those little hills at the feet of the majestic mountains, that he moves in an eddy; he cannot get out of it. In the way of books, we are extraordinarily well off for a country place. My landlord has a respectable library, full of dictionaries and useful modern things; ex. gr., the Scotch Encyclopaedia, the authors of which may the devil scotch, for toothless serpents that poison with dribble! But there is at some distance Sir Wilfred Lawson's magnificent library, and Sir Wilfred talks of calling upon me, and of course I keep the man in good humor with me, and gain the use of his books. Hartley returns his love to you; he talks often about you. I hear his voice at this moment distinctly; he is below in the garden, shouting to some foxgloves and fern, which he has transplanted, and telling them what he will do for them if they grow like good boys! This afternoon I sent him naked into a shallow of the river Greta; he trembled with the novélty, yet you cannot conceive his raptures. God bless you! I remain, with affectionate esteem, | Yours sincerely, S. T. Coleridge. I open the letter, and make a new fold, to tell you that I have bit the wafer into the very shape of the young moon that is just above the opposite hill. 344. To Samuel Purkis Address: Samuel Purkis Esq. | Brentford | near | London MS. British Museum. Pub. E. L. G. i. 149. Postmark: 1 August 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall, Keswick, Cumberland. Tuesday, July 29. 1800 Dear Purkis I write to you from the Leads of Greta Hall, a Tenement in the possession of S. T. Coleridge, Esq. Gentleman-Poet & Philosopher in a mist -- this Greta Hall is a House on a Small eminence, a furlong from Keswick, in the county of Cumberland. -- Yes -- my dear Sir! here I am -- with Skiddaw at my back -- on my right hand the Bassenthwait Water with it's majestic Case of Mountains, all of simplest Outline -- looking slant, direct over the feather of this infamous Pen, I see the Sun setting -- my Godl what a scene --! Right before me is a great Camp of single mountains -- each in -614- shape resembles a Giant's Tent! -- and to the left, but closer to it far than the Bassenthwaite Water to my right, is the lake of Keswick, with it's Islands & white sails, & glossy Lights of Evening -- crowned with green meadows, but the three remaining sides are encircled by the most fantastic mountains, that ever Earthquakes made in sport; as fantastic, as if Nature had laughed herself into the convulsion, in which they were made. -- Close behind me at the foot of Skiddaw flows the Greta, I hear it's murmuring distinctly -- then it curves round almost in a semicircle, & is now catching the purple Lights of the scattered Clouds above it directly before me -- A.A. A. Is the river & B. my House. -- Till now I have been grievously indisposed -- now I am enjoying the Godlikeness of the Place, in which I am settled, with the voluptuous & joy-trembling Nerves of Convalescence. We arrived here last week -- I was confined a fortnight at Grasmere. -- At Liverpool I was very much with Roscoe, a man of the most fascinating manners -- if good sense, sweetness, simplicity, hilarity, joining in a literary man who is a good Husband & the excellent Father of nine children, can give any man's manners the claim to that word. -- Sara Coleridge is well -- she expects to be confined in the first weeks of September. Hartley is all Health & extacy -- He is a Spirit dancing on an aspen Leaf -- unwearied in Joy, from morning to night indefatigably joyous.----- And how do you go on? and dear Mrs Purkis? -- And your little ones? -- Surely 'tis but a needless form for me to say, with what sincere exultation I should stretch out the right-hand of fellowship to you, if chance or choice should lead you hither! I would, I knew the spell that could force you. -- We have pleasant acquaintance here -- & I shall have free access to the magnificent Library of Sir Wilfred Lawson -- yet you may well suppose, I did not quit Stowey without dejection, and that I cannot now think of my separation from Poole without a Pang. Now, while I gaze, there is one dark Slip of Cloud that lies across the bright Sun on the Mountain Top! -- And such, my dear Purkist! is that thought to me. I have greatly regretted, that my engagements in London prevented me from cultivating the acquaintance of Mr Howard. 1 I was exceedingly struck with him / & at that time & since have often wished for an opportunity of experimenting concerning the benefit ____________________ 1 Probably Henry Howard ( 1769-1847), the painter. -615- which a Poet & Painter might be of to each other's minds, if they were long together. When you see him, remember me to him expressly -- and add, that if wearied with town or permitted by his occupations to leave it for a while, he should feel any inclination to see how Nature [has been divers]ified at once to gratify & baff[le every responsive] 1 Feeling, I have a plain table & a quiet room at his service, for any length of time he can stay with me. In short, I should be very glad to see him. Can't you come down together? Hang it -- don't stand deliberating, but come. My wife will not let me stay on the Leads -- I must go, & unpack a Trunk for her -- she cannot stoop to it -- thanks to my late Essay on Population! God bless you & [Signature cut off.] 345. To Biggs and Cottle Address: Messrs Biggs & Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back | Bristol. Single MS. Yale University Lib. Hitherto unpublished. This note appears in the second manuscript sheet of poems for vol. ii of Lyrical Ballads. Stamped: Kendal. [Circa 1 August 1800] 2 Memorandum. If the Printing of the second Volume have not commenced let 'The Brothers' begin the Volume 3 -- and then the Hart-leap-well, etc, as stated in a former letter. But if the Printing should have commenced, follow the old order. But if not, thus: 1. The Brothers. 2. Hart-leap-well. 8. There was a Boy, .&c. 4. Ellen Irwin. 5. 6. 7. The Poems written overleaf.4 346. To Biggs and Cottle Address: Messrs Biggs and Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back, | Bristol Single sheet. MS. Yale University Lib. Hitherto unpublished. This note appears in the third manuscript sheet of poems for vol. ii of Lyrical Ballads. The sheet, which is entirely in Coleridge's handwriting, contains five poems, The Waterfall and the Eglantine, The Oak and the Broom, The Fly, Lucy Gray, and The Idle Shepherd. Boys, along with two notes. Coleridge prepared the sheet during Wordsworth's ____________________ 1 Manuscript cut off for signature. 2 Coleridge was at Grasmere from 31 July to 2 Aug.; Dorothy copied The Brothers on 1 Aug. Journals, i. 58. 3 See Letter 842. 4 The poems in this sheet were the conclusion of The Brothers and Strange fits of passion in Dorothy's handwriting; She dwelt among the untrodden ways and A slumber did my spirit seal in Coleridge's. -616- stay at Keswick from 2 to 6 August, and the manuscript contains a few corrections by Wordsworth. Postmark: 7 August 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Monday, August [4,] 1800 Memorandum -- This is the second letter addressed to Messrs Biggs & Cottle -- the first having been directed to Mr Davy. 1 W. Wordsworth particularly wishes, that the proof sheets may be sent to Mr Davy, with the copy -- as Mr D. has kindly undertaken to correct them. 347. To Biggs and Cottle [Addressed by D. W.] Messrs Biggs and Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back Bristol Single sheet MS. Yale University Lib. Pub. A Description of the Wordsworth & Coleridge Manuscripts, by W. H. White, 1897, p. 13. The fourth and fifth manuscript sheets for vol. ii of Lyrical Ballads contain sixteen poems in Dorothy's handwriting and must have been prepared during the Wordsworths' stay at Keswick from 8 to 17 August. The address page of the fifth sheet contains Coleridge's brief memorandum and the following note by Wordsworth: The preface is not yet ready: I shall send it in a few days. I have written to Mr Longman requesting him to inform you whether he wishes to have the 1st Vol: sent up immediately before the preface is printed, which may with as much propriety be prefixed to the 2nd Vol: -- The Title Page must stand thus Lyrical Ballads with other poems. By W. Wordsworth Quam nihil ad genium, Papiniane, tuum. 2nd Edition -- This Latin motto appears in John Selden's introductory letter to Drayton's Poly.Olbio. See The Complete Works of Michael Drayton, 1876, i, p. xlv. Postmark: <16?> 2 August 1800. Stamped: Keswick. [Circa 18 August, 1800} Be careful to print the motto accurately -Quam nihil ad genium, Papiniane, tuum! 348. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole I N. Stowey I Bridgewater I Somerset. MS. British Mtaeum. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 335. Postmark: 18 August 1800. Stamped: Keswick. My dear Poole Aug. 14. 1800 Your two letters I received exactly four days ago -- some days they must have been lying at Ambleside, before they were sent to ____________________ 1 Coleridge refers to Wordsworth's letter to Davy of 28 [29] July. See Letter 842. -617- Grasmere -- and some days at Grasmere before they moved to Keswick. I read them / & liked them -- and was writing them off in AGRICULTURAL LETTERS, with notes of my own, 1 when I received letters from Phillips so pressing that I was obliged to put the thing, I had engaged for, out of hand. -- I meant to have sent the Letters to Stuart with orders to have them first in his paper, & then republished in the form of a Pamphlet. -- A most important Question rises -- has there been any Scarcity? The Newspapers are now running down the Monopolists &c --. Is it not a burning Shame, that the Government have not taken absolute means to decide a question so important? It grieved me, that you had felt so much from my silence -- believe me, I have been harrassed with business, & shall remain so -- for the remainder of this year --. Our house is a delightful residence, something less than half a mile from the Lake of Keswick, & something more than a furlong from the town. It commands both that Lake, & the Lake Bassenthwaite -- Skiddaw is behind us -- to the left, the right, & in front, Mountains of all shapes & sizes -- the waterfall of Lodore is distinctly visible --. In gardens, etc we are uncommonly well off, & our Landlord who resides next door in this twofold House, is already much attached to us -- he is a quiet sensible man, with as large a Library as your's -- & perhaps rather larger -- well stored with Encyclopaedias, Dictionaries, & Histories &c -- all modern. -- The gentry of the Country, titled & untitled, have all called or are about to call on me -- & I shall have free access to the magnificent Library of Sir Gilfred Lawson, a weak but good natured Man --. I wish, you could come here in October, after your harvesting --& stand Godfather at the christening of my child. Sara expects to lie in in the first week of September. In October the country is in all it's blaze of Beauty. -- We are well -- & the Wordsworths are well -- / The two Volumes of the Lyrical Ballads will appear in about a fortnight or three weeks 2 --. Sara sends her best kind love to your Mother -- how much we rejoice in her health, I need not say. Love to Ward -- & to Chester, to whom I shall write as soon as I am at Leisure. -- I was standing on the very top of Skiddaw, by a little Shed of Slatestones on which I had scribbled with a bit of slate my name among the other names -- a lean expressive-faced Man came up the Hill, stood beside me, a little while, then running over the names, ____________________ 1 These articles, "Monopolists and Farmers", appeared in the Morning Post on 8, 4, 6, 8, and 9 Oct. 1800. Most of them are Poole's, but Coleridge wrote that of 8 Oct. and the introduction to the one of 6 Oct. See Essays on His Own Times, ii. 413-50. 2 Actually the second edition of Lyrical Ballads did not come out until Jan. 1801, though 1800 appears on the title-page. -618- exclaim[ed,] Coleridge! I lay my life, that is the Poet Coleridge. / -God bless you, & for God's sake never doubt that I am attached to you beyond all other men. -- S. T. Coleridge I will order the M. Posts to you that contain the Letters. -- 349. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | London Single MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. E. L. G. i. 151. Postmark: 11 September 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Monday [ 8 September 1800] Dear Godwin There are vessels every week from Dublin to Workington, which place is about 16 miles from my house thro' a divine Country -- but this is an idle regret. I know not the nature of your present pursuits, whether or no they are such as to require the vicinity of large and curious Libraries -- / if you were engaged in any work of imagination, or reasoning, not biographical, not historical, I should repeat & urge my invitation, after my wife's confinement. -- Our House is situated on a rising Ground, not two furlongs from Keswick, about as much from the Lake, Derwentwater, & about 2 miles or so from the Lake, Bassenthwaite -- both lakes & their mountains we command -- the River Greta runs behind our house, & before it too -- & Skiddaw is behind us, not half a mile distant -- indeed just distant enough, to enable us to view it as a Whole. The Garden, Orchard, Fields, & immediate country, all delightful. -- I have, or have the use of, no inconsiderable collection of Books -- in my Library you will find all the Poets & Philosophers, & many of our best old Writers -- below in our Parlor, belonging to my Landlord, but in my possession, are almost all the usual Trash of the Johnsons, Gibbons, Robertsons, &c with the Encyclopaedia Britannica, &c &c. Sir Wilfrid Lawson's magnificent Library is at some 8 or 9 miles distant -- and he is liberal in the highest degree in the management of it. -- And now for your letter. I swell out my chest, & place my hand on my heart, & swear aloud to all that you have written, or shall write, against Lawyers & the Practice of the Law. When you next write so eloquently & so well, against it or against anything, be so good as to leave a larger space for your wafer; as by neglect of this a part of your last was obliterated -- The character of Curran, which you have sketched most ably, 1 is ____________________ 1 For Godwin's description of John Philpot Curran ( 1750-1817), the Irish judge, see William Godwin, ii. 5-6. -619- a frequent one in it's moral Essentials; tho', of course, among the most rare, if we take it with all it's intellectual accompaniments. Whatever I have read of Curran's has impressed me with a deep conviction of his Genius. Are not the Irish in general a more eloquent race, than we? -- Of North Wales my recollections are faint; and as to Wicklow, I know only from the Newspapers, that it is a mountainous Country. As far as my memory will permit me to decide on the grander parts of Caernarvonshire, I may say, that the single objects are superior to any, which I have seen elsewhere -- but there is a deficiency in combination. I know of no mountain in the north altogether equal to Snowdon, but then we have an encampment of huge Mountains, in no harmony perhaps to the eye of a mere painter, but always interesting, various, and, as it were, nutritive. Height is assuredly an advantage, as it connects the Earth with the Sky, by the clouds that are ever skimming the summits, or climbing up, or creeping down the sides, or rising from the chasms, like smokes from a Cauldron, or veiling or bridging the higher parts or the lower parts of the water -- falls. That you were less impressed by N. Wales, I can easily believe -- it is possible, that the scenes of Wicklow may be superior, but it is certain, that you were in a finer irritability of Spirit to enjoy them. The first pause & silence after a return from a very interesting Visit is somewhat connected with languor in all of us -- / Besides, as you have observed, Mountains & mountainous Scenery, taken collectively & cursorily, must depend for their charms on their novelty -- / they put on their immortal interest then first, when we have resided among them, & learnt to understand their language, their written characters, & intelligible sounds, and all their eloquence so various, so unwearied. -- Then you will hear no'twice-told tale.' -- I question, if there be a room in England which commands a view of Mountains & Lakes & Woods & Vales superior to that, in which I am now sitting. I say this, because it is destined for your Study, if you come. -- You are kind enough to say, that you feel yourself more natural and unreserved with me, than with others. I suppose, that this arises in great measure from my own ebullient Unreservedness -- something too, I will hope, may be attributed to the circumstance, that my affections are interested deeply in my opinions --. But here you will meet too with Wordsworth 'the latch of whose Shoe I am unworthy to unloose' -- and four miles from Wordsworth Charles Lloyd has taken a house 1 -- Wordsworth is publishing a second Volume of the Lyrical Ballads -- which title is to be dropt, ____________________ 1 The Lloyds settled at Old Brathay near Ambleside, where they remained until 1815. -620- & his 'Poems' substituted 1 / Have you seen Sheridan since your return? How is it with your Tragedy? 2 Were you in town, when Miss Bayley's Tragedy was represented? 3 How was it, that it proved so uninteresting? Was the fault in the Theatre, the Audience, or the Play? -- It must have excited a deeper feeling in you than that of mere curiosity: for doubtless, the Tragedy had great merit. I know not indeed, how far Kemble might have watered & thinned it's consistence -- I speak of the printed Play. -Have you read the Wallenstein? -- Prolix & crowded & dragging as it is, yet it is quite a model for it's judicious management of the Sequence of Scenes -- and such it is held on the German Theatres. Our English Acting Plays are many of them wofully deficient in this part of the dramatic Trade & Mystery. Hartley is well & all life, and action / I expect that Mrs Coleridge will lay down her burthen in 7 or 8 days -- she desires to be remembered to you. -- Let me hear from you when you have leisure & inclination -- Your's with | unfeigned Esteem S. T. Coleridge Kisses for Mary & Fanny -- God love them! I wish, you would come & look out for a house for yourself here. You know 'I wish' is privileged to have something silly follow it.----- 350. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | London MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. Mary Shelley. A Biography, by R. Glynn Grylla, 1938, p. 278. Postmark: 19 September 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Tuesday, September 16. [ 1800] Dear Godwin Is it in your power to remit me 10£ -- You may depend on it's being redelivered to you on the first of next month. 4 This, I am ____________________ 1 Learning that Mrs. Robinson was publishing a volume entitled Lyrical Takes, Wordsworth planned to alter his title, but it was not changed. See Early Letters, 250 and note. 2 Godwin Antonio was produced by Kemble at Drury Lane on 13 Dec. 1800, and hopelessly damned. It was published in the same year. 3 Joanna Baillie ( 1762-1851) published A Series of Plays in 1798. One of these, De Montfort, was produced in Apr. 1800 by Kemble, with himself and Mrs. Siddons in the leading roles, but despite the spiendour of the production, the play was not a success. 4 Coleridge kept his word. See Letter 854 to Stuart: 'You would oblige by inclosing to Mr Godwin, . . . lot in my name.' -621- afraid, will prove an untimely application / but the truth is, that by the first of October I shall have claim to as much money as I shall want -- & the persons, to whom I could with more propriety have addressed myself in the mean time, than to you, opposed my settling in the North so strongly, 1 that I feel a great disinclination to write to them on any pecuniary Embarrassment, which they will attribute to my journey hither -- & the consequent expences. This no doubt is the remote cause, but the immediate cause was the unexpected necessity of paying an old Cambridge Debt, which had pressed very little on my Conscience, and intruded very rarely into my memory. However, I was forced to part with eight pound at a very unseasonable time: / for, the day after, my wife presented Hartley with a little Brother. 2 She is as well as any woman in her situation, & in this climate, ever was or can be -- the child is a very large one. She was brought to bed on Sunday Night 1/2 past 10. Will you come & stand Godfather? If it be out of your power, I pray you, give yourself no concern about it -- somehow or other I shall rub thro' the ensuing fortnight -- and regard this letter only as a proof that I esteem you so much as not to be ashamed of suffering you to know any thing that befalls me --. Your's sincerely, S. T. Coleridge -- 351. To James Webbe Tobin Address: Mr J. W. [Tobin] | Berkley Square | Bristol Single MS. Harvard College Lib. A few lines pub. Christabel, ed. by E. H. Coleridge, 1907, p. 39, and Letters Hitherto Uncollected, ed. W. F. Prideaux, 1913, 10. Both E. H. Coleridge and Prideaux suggest that the letter was addressed to Humphry Davy, but J. W. Tobin was the addressee. The holograph bears evidence of tampering, the name Tobin in the salutation and address being pencilled in, probably over erasures. Postmark: 20 September 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Wednesday, Sept. 17. 1800. Grieta Hall, Keswick. -- My dear [ Tobin] Both Wordsworth and I shall be at home for these six months at least -- & for aught I know to the contrary, for these six years. I need not say, how happy I shall be to see you & your friend -- we ____________________ 1 The Wedgwoods and Poole, to whom Coleridge probably refers, strongly opposed his settling in the north. In 1818 Coleridge wrote to Poole of 'T. Wedgewood's farewell Prophecy to me respecting W., which he made me write down, and which no human Eye ever saw -- but mine'. See also Letter 330. 2 Derwent Coleridge was born 14 Sept. 1800. -622- have room for you --. The Miss Speddings are very good friends of our's, and are not amiss in their exteriors, yet nothing remarkable, in minds or bodies. They are chatty sensible women, republicans in opinion, and just like other Ladies of their rank, in practice --. You will no doubt see them. From Davy's long silence I augured that he was doing something for me -- I mean for me inclusive, as a member of the Universe -- God bless him I I feel more than I think wise to express, from the disappointment in not seeing him --. From the commencement of November next I give myself exclusively to the Life of Lessing -- till then I occupy myself with a volume of Letters from Germany -- to the publication of which my Poverty but not my Will consents. -- The delay in Copy has been owing in part to me, as the writer of Christabel 1 -- Every line has been produced by me with labor-pangs. I abandon Poetry altogether -- I leave the higher & deeper Kinds to Wordsworth, the delightful, popular & simply dignified to Southey; & reserve for myself the honorable attempt to make others feel and understand their writings, as they deserve to be felt & understood. There is no thought of ever collecting my Morning Post Essays -- they are not worth it. Wordsworth, after these volumes have been published, will set about adapting his Tragedy for the Stage -- Sheridan has sent to him about it. What W. & I have seen of the Farmer's Boy= 2 (only a few short extracts) pleased us very much. -- When you come, do not by any means forget to bring with you a bottle of Davy's Acid for Wordsworth --. Does not Davy admire Wordsworth's RUTH? I think it the finest poem in the collection. -Excuse the brevity of this letter, for I am busied in writing out a sheet for Biggs. -- Your's with unfeigned Esteem S. T. Coleridge P.S. My wife was safely & speedily delivered of a very fine boy on last Sunday Night -- both he & she are as well as it is possible that Mother & new born Child can be. She dined & drank Tea up, in the parlor with me, this day-----and this is only Wednesday Night! -- There's for you. Wordsworth's Health is but so so -- Hartley is the same Animal as ever -- he moves & lives, ____________________ 1 Prior to 15 Sept., Coleridge sent to the printers all or a portion of Part I of Christabel; for on that date Wordsworth wrote to Biggs informing him that the printing of Christabel, if it had begun, must be delayed so that three of his poems, which were to precede Coleridge's poem, could be inserted. See Early Letters, 255, Letter 111. 2 Robert Bloomfield's Farmer's Boy was published in a sumptuous quarto in Mar. 1800 and sold an estimated 26,000 copies within three years. -623- As if his Heritage were Joy And Pleasure were his Trade. I heard from Godwin a few days hence -- he is delighted with Ireland & Curran -- 352. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. E. L. G. i. 154. Postmark: 25 September 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Monday, Sept. 22. 1800 Dear Godwin I received your letter, and with it the inclosed Note, which shall be punctually redelivered to you on the first of October. -- Your Tragedy to be exhibited at Christmas! -- I have indeed merely read thro' your letter; so it is not strange, that my heart still continues beating out of time. Indeed, indeed, Godwin! such a stream of hope & fear rushed in on me, when I read the sentence, as you would not permit yourself to feel. If there be any thing yet undreamt of in our philosophy; if it be, or if it be possible, that thought can impel thought out of the visual limit of a man's own scull & heart; if the clusters of ideas, which constitute our identity, do ever connect & unite into a greater Whole; if feelings could ever propagate themselves without the servile ministrations of undulating air or reflected light; I seem to feel within myself a strength & a power of desire, that might dart a modifying, commanding impulse on a whole Theatre. What does all this mean? Alas! that sober sense should know no other way to construe all this except by the tame phrase -- I wish you success. -- That which Lamb informed you, is founded in truth. Mr Sheridan sent thro' the medium of Stewart a request to Wordsworth to present a Tragedy to his stage, & to me a declaration that the failure of my piece was owing to my obstinacy in refusing any alteration. I laughed & Wordsworth smiled; but my Tragedy will remain at Keswick, and Wordsworth's is not likely to emigrate from Grasmere. Wordsworth's Drama is in it's present state not fit for the stage, and he is not well enough to submit to the drudgery of making it so. Mine is fit for nothing except to excite in the minds of good men the hope, that 'the young man is likely to do better.' In the first moments I thought of re-writing it, & sent to Lamb for the copy with this intent -- I read an act, & altered my opinion, & with it my wish. -- Your feelings respecting. Baptism are, I suppose, much like mine! At times I dwell on Man with such reverence, -624- resolve all his follies & superstitions into such grand primary laws of intellect, & in such wise so contemplate them as ever-varying incarnations of the eternal Life, that the Lama's Dung-pellet, or the Cow-tail which the dying Brahman clutches convulsively, become sanctified & sublime by the feelings which cluster round them. In that mood I exclaim, My boys shall be christened! -- But then another fit of moody philosophy attacks me -- I look at my doted-on Hartley -- he moves, he lives, he finds impulses from within & from without -- he is the darling of the Sun and of the Breeze! Nature seems to bless him as a thing of her own I He looks at the clouds, the mountains, the living Beings of the Earth, & vaults & jubilatesl Solemn Looks & solemn Words have been hitherto connected in his mind with great & magnificent objects only -- with lightning, with thunder, with the waterfall blazing in the Sunset -- / -- then I say, Shall I suffer the Toad of Priesthood to spurt out his foul juice in this Babe's Face? Shall I suffer him to see grave countenances & hear grave accents, while his face is sprinkled, & while the fat paw of a Parson crosses his Forehead? -Shall I be grave myself, & tell a lie to him? Or shall I laugh, and teach him to insult the feelings of his fellow-men? Besides, are we not all in this present hour fainting beneath the duty of Hope? From such thoughts I start up, & vow a book of severe analysis, in which I will tell all I believe to be Truth in the nakedest Language in which it can be told. -- My wife is now quite comfortable -- Surely, you might come, & spend the very next four weeks not without advantage to both of us. The very Glory of the place is coming on -- the local Genius is just arraying himself in his higher Attributes. But above all, I press it, because my mind has been busied with speculations, that are closely connected with those pursuits which have hitherto constituted your utility & importance; and ardently as I wish you success on the stage, I yet cannot frame myself to the thought, that you should cease to appear as a bold moral thinker. I wish you to write a book on the power of words, and the processes by which human feelings form affinities with them -- in short, I wish you to philosophize Horn Tooke's System, and to solve the great Questions-whether there be reason to hold, that an action bearing all the semblance of pre-designing Consciousness may yet be simply organic, & whether a series of such actions are possible -- and close on the heels of this question would follow the old 'Is Logic the Essence of Thinking?' in other words -- Is thinking impossible without arbitrary signs? & -- how far is the word 'arbitrary' a misnomer? Are not words &c parts & germinations of the Plant? And what is the Law of their Growth? -- In something of this order -625- I would endeavor to destroy the old antithesis of Words & Things, elevating, as it were, words into Things, & living Things too. All the nonsense of vibrations etc you would of course dismiss. If what I have here written appear nonsense to you, or commonplace thoughts in a harlequinade of outré expressions, suspend your judgement till we see each other. Your's sincerely, S. T. Coleridge I was in the Country when Wallenstein was published. Longman sent me down half a dozen -- the carriage back the book was not worth -- 353. To Daniel Stuart Address: Daniel St[uart] / No Double Sheet. MS. British Museum. Pub. Letters from the Lake Poets, 11. [ 28 September 1800] 1 Dear Stuart I have written five more Essays of the same length on this subject ----- namely, two on the War as respecting Agriculture, one on the Raising of Rents in consequence of high Prices of Provisions, one on the Riots -- and one on the countenance which Government have given to the calumnies, &c of foolish people, on the King's Proclamation, and the probable Views of the Minister. ----- To morrow I shall transmit you two -- two on Tuesday, and the last on Wednesday or Thursday 2 ----- immediately after these I will send you without fail a second Part of Pitt, & Bonaparte -- better late than never. -- My wife has given me another Son -- but alas! I fear, he will not live. 3 She is now sobbing & crying by the side of me. -- Be so good as to have my Paper directed to me, Mr Coleridge, Greta Hall, | Keswick, Cumberland -- As it is, I never see them, till too late. . . . [Remainder of manuscript missing.] ____________________ 1 This letter, written on Sunday, obviously antedates Letter 354 by two or three days. 2 In addition to the essays on Monopolists and Farmers referred to in Letter 348, only one further prose contribution to the Morning Post during this period has been identified, that of 14 Oct. 1800. See Essays on His Own Times, ii. 451. 3 ' September 27, 1800. The child being very ill was baptized by the name of Derwent. The child, hour after hour, made a noise exactly like the creaking of a door which is being shut very slowly to prevent its creaking.' MS. note S. T. C. See Letters, i. 338 n. -626- 354. To Daniel Stuart Address: Daniel Stuart Esq. | No / 335 | (Morning Post Office.) | Strand | London Double Sheet MS. British Museum. Pub. Letters from the Lake Poets, 12. Postmark: > 3? < October 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall, Keswick, Cumberland. [Circa 80 September 1800] Dear Stuart I am prevented by Mrs Coleridge's distress concerning our Infant from transcribing the fifth Essay, on this blank Paper. -I have sent you the third and fourth. I am fearful the third is too long, especially if you print it (as I confess, I think it well deserves) leaded. -- / In the fifth & sixth Essays I return to the monopolists & the Riots -- and advert on the conduct & probable motives of ministry. In [the] 7th I take a survey of what is called the Prosperity of the Kingdom. -- You may [th]en republish PITT, to which I shall lead -- / then you shall have a second part of Pitt, & Bonaparte. -- When these are finished, I should [wis]h the whole to be published together in the form of a Pamphlet / but of this [y]ou will be the best Judge. -- I shall send you the fifth Essay to morrow. / -- I have by me, tho' in a rough state, a very long Letter to Sir Francis Burdett Jones, 1 on the subject of solitary imprisonment; concerning which I am in doubt, whether I shall publish it just before the meeting of Parliament, in the form of a Pamphlet, or whether I shall split [it) into a series of Letters, & send it forth in your paper. If I were convinced, that it would be serviceable to your paper, I should not hesitate a moment; but altho' it will not, I trust, be found deficient in eloquence indignant & pathetic, nor in examples various, apt, and entertaining, yet a large part of it is devoted to the austerest metaphysical (re]asoning / and this I suspect would ill harmonize with the tastes of [Lond]on Coffee house men & breakfast-table People of Quality, on whom [poss]ibly your paper depends in a great degree. But if it would [do yo]ur paper no good, no positive good, I mean, I should be [reluc]tant that a work on which I had exerted so much thought, should [be] inserted at all. I would far rather send it to the Baronet, in manuscript, & never publish it. -- Wordsworth's health declines constantly -- in a few days his Poems will be published, with a long poem of mine. Of course, you will procure them. The Preface contains our joint opinions on Poetry. 2 ____________________ 1 Sir Francis Burdett ( 1770-1844), the politician, whose mother was the heiress, Eleanor Jones. 2 Within two years Coleridge was to disavow complete agreement with -627- You will be so good as not to forget to have the Newspaper addressed to me, at Keswick -- If these Essays should please you, & suit your purpose, and if you are not deterred by my long Silence from entering into any engagement with me, I am willing to recommence my old occupation, binding myself down to send you six columns a week / any week in which I do not send at least five Columns I should consent to be counted as nothing. -- At all events, whether you enter on any engagement or no, you would oblige by inclosing to Mr Godwin, the Polygon, Sommers' Town, 10£ in my name. 1 -- Before this week has passed I trust I shall have gone a good way towards earning it. -- Your's sincerely S. T. Coleridge 355. To Daniel Stuart MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis. Letters from the Lake Poets, 15. The bottom of pages 1 and 2 of the holograph is cut off and the remainder of the manuscript is missing. Apparently Stuart crossed out the letter and turned over to the printer Coleridge draft of Alcaeus to Sappho. The missing part of the manuscript may have contained The Two Round Spaces; A Skeltoniad, a blatant satire on James Mackintosh, Stuart's brother-in-law. ( Coleridge sent the poem to Davy two days later. See Letter 356.) Writing in the Gentleman's Magazine in May 1838, Stuart said: 'Coleridge sent one [poem] attacking Mackintosh, too obviously for me not to understand it, and of course it was not published.' Stuart was in error. The poem appeared in the Morning Post, 4 December 1800, with the omission of seven offensive lines on Mackintosh. Greta Hall, Keswick -- Tuesday Night, Octr. 7 -- 1800 Dear Stuart The illness of my dear friend, Wordsworth, called me peremptorily to Grasmere; I have this moment returned -- & found your letter. -- To be known to Schiller was a thought, that passed across my brain & vanished -- I would not stir 20 yards out of my way to know him. To see Bonaparte I would doubtless stir many a score miles --; but as I freely believe you, so I trust you will believe me when I say, that his praise or admiration or notice, were it ever in my power to attain it, might amuse me but would gratify no higher feeling. -- If I know my own heart, or rather if I be not profoundly ignorant of it, I have not a spark of ambition / and tho' my vanity is flattered, more than it ought to be, by what Dr John- ____________________ Wordsworth (see Letters 444 and 449), and later, in the Biographia Literaria, he dealt at length | with the Preface. Many years afterwards Wordsworth asserted that he 'was put upon to write' the Preface by Coleridge's 'urgent entreaties'. See The Later Years, i. 537, ii. 910, iii. 1248-9. 1 See Letter 350. -628- son calls 'colloquial prowess', yet it leaves me in my study. This is no virtue in me, but depends on the accidental constitution of my intellect -- in which my taste in judging is far, far more perfect than my power to execute -- & I do nothing, but almost instantly it's defects & sillinesses come upon my mind, and haunt me, till I am completely disgusted with my performance, & wish myself a Tanner, or a Printer, or any thing but an Author. -- To morrow you may depend on my sending you two other Numbers -- and Bonaparte shall not loiter. -- I should like to see Mr Street's Character. -I shall fill up these Blanks with a few Poems --. It grieves me to hear of poor Mrs Robinson's illness. 1 -- Pray, who was the Author of the Imitation of Modern Poetry? 2 -- It was very droll -- the only fault . . . [an]d mingled the vices of other kinds of poetry . . . & A[LC]AEUS to SAPPHO. 3 How sweet, when crimson colors dart Across a breast of snow, To see, that you are in the heart That beats and throbs below! All Heaven is in a Maiden's Blush In which the Soul doth speak, That it was you who sent the Flush Into the Maiden's cheek! Large stedfast Eyes, Eyes gently roll'd In shades of changing Blue, How sweet are they, if they behold No dearer Sight than you! And can a Lip more richly glow Or be more fair than this? The World will surely answer, No! I, SAPPHO! answer, Yes! Then grant one smile, tho' it should mean A Thing of doubtful Birth, That I may say, these Eyes have seen The fairest Face on Earth! ____________________ 1 Mary Robinson died 26 Dec. 1800. 2 Cf. Morning Post, 2 Oct 1800. The Imitation is signed merely H. 3 First published Morning Post, 24 Nov 1800. Although this poem is printed in Poems, i. 358, as Coleridge's, it was written by Wordsworth. See Early Letters, 222 n., and Wordsworth, Poet. Works, ii. 531. Coleridge did not claim the poem as his own, but merely said: 'I shall fill up these Blanks with a few Poems.' -629- 356. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic | Institution | Hot Wells | BristolSingle Sheet MS. Royal.Institution. Pub. with omis. Letters, i. 336. Postmark: 13 October 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Thursday Night -- Oct. 9. 1800 My dear Davy I was right glad, glad with a Stagger of the Heart, to see your writing again -- /Many a moment have I had all my France-& England-Curiosity suspended & lost, looking in the advertisement front-columns of the Morning Post Gazetteer on Mr Davy's Galvanic Habitudes of Charcoal -- Upon my soul, I believe there is not a Letter in those words, round which a world of imagery does not circumvolve -- your room, the Garden, the cold bath, the Moonlight Rocks, Barrister Moore & simple-looking Frere / 1 and dreams of wonderful Things attached to your name -- and Skiddaw, & Glaramára, and Eagle Crag, and you, and Wordsworth, & me on the top of them! -- I pray you, do write to me immediately, & tell me what you mean by the possibility of your assuming a new occupation / have you been successful to the extent of your expectations in your late chemical Inquiries? -- In your Poem 2 'impressive' is used for impressible or passive, is it not? -- If so, it is not English -- life-diffusive likewise is not English -- / The last Stanza introduces confusion into my mind, and despondency -- & has besides been so often said by the Materialists &c, that it is not worth repeating --. If the Poem had ended more originally, in short, but for the last Stanza, I will venture to affirm that there were never so many lines which so uninterruptedly combined natural & beautiful words with strict philosophic Truths, i.e. scientifically philosophic. -- Of the 2, 8, 4, 5, 6th, & 7th Stanzas I am doubtful which is the most beautiful. -Do not imagine, that I cling to a fond love of future identity -- but the thought, which you have expressed in the last Stanza, might be more grandly, & therefore more consolingly, exemplified -- I had forgot to say -- that 'sameness & identity' are words too etymologically the same to be placed so close to each other. -- ____________________ 1 Probably John Hookham Frere ( 1769-1846), diplomatist and translator, afterwards one of Coleridge's intimate friends. 2 This poem was entitled, Written after Recovery from a Dangerous Illness. For the text see John Davy, Memoirs of the Life of Sir Humphry Davy, 2 vols., 1836, i. 890. ' Coleridge's critical remarks apply to it as it was first written; the words objected to are not to be found in it in its corrected printed state.' John Davy, Fragmentary Remains of Sir Humphry Davy, 1858, p. 81 n. -630- As to myself, I am doing little worthy the relation -- I write for Stuart in the Morning Post -- & I am compelled by the God Pecunia, which was one name of the supreme Jupiter, to give a Volume of Letters from Germany / which will be a decent Loungebook -- & not an atom more. -- The Christabel was running up to 1800 lines 1 -- and was so much admired by Wordsworth, that he thought it indelicate to print two Volumes with his name in which so much of another man's was included -- & which was of more consequence -- the poem was in direct opposition to the very purpose for which the Lyrical Ballads were published -- viz -- an experiment to see how far those passions, which alone give any value to extraordinary Incidents, were capable of interesting, in & for themselves, in the incidents of common Life. 2 -- We mean to publish the Christabel therefore with a long Blank Verse Poem of Wordsworth's entitled the Pedlar -- I assure you, I think very ____________________ 1 A puzzling statement. Christabel, including the conclusion to Part II, has 677 lines. Chambers's suggestion is as good as any: 'conceivably part remained only in Coleridge head'. Life, 186. 2 2 On 4 Oct. Coleridge came to Grasmere, and the Wordsworths were' exceedingly delighted with the second part of Christabel'. The next day ' Coleridge read a 2nd time Christabel; we had increasing pleasure'. But on 6 Oct. Dorothy Wordsworth's Journal remarks laconically, 'Determined not to print Christabel with the. L.B.'. ( Journals, i. 64.) Coleridge accepted this decision with apparent equanimity, but subsequent letters show that the exclusion of Christabel increased in him a sense of his shortcomings as a poet. (See Letters 369, 371, and 390.) In 1818 he spoke of the Wordsworths' 'cold praise and effective discouragement of every attempt of mine to roll onward in a distinct current of my own -- who admitted that the Ancient Mariner [and] the Christabel . . . were not without merit, but were abundantly anxious to acquit their judgements of any blindness to the very numerous defects'. (MS. New York Public Lib.) The determination to abandon Christabel involved Wordsworth in some difficulty. The first sheet of the Preface, which has a Bristol postmark of 80 September, contained the following comment: 'For the sake of variety and from a consciousness of my own weakness I have again requested the assistance of a Friend who contributed largely to the first volume, and who has now furnished me with the long and beautiful [long and beautiful struck out in MS.] Poem of Christabel, without which I should not yet have ventured to present a second volume to the public.' When Wordsworth decided on 6 Oct. to exclude Christabel, however, the Preface and all the copy, except that of Coleridge's poem, were in the printers' hands, and he was now faced with the necessity of adding more poems. Accordingly, he wrote a letter, postmarked 10 Oct., ordering the printers to cancel the sheets of Christabel already printed, and altering the passage from the Preface cited above to read: 'It is proper to inform the Reader that the Poems entitled The Ancient Mariner, The Foster-mother's Tale, The Nightingale, The Dungeon, and Love are written by a friend, who has also furnished me with a few of those Poems in the second volume, which are classed under the title of Poems on the Naming of Places.' Early Letters, 255-6. Finally, when Coleridge did not compose any such poems (see Letter 359), Wordsworth again amended the passage in the Preface to the form in which it appeared in the 1800 edition. -631- differently of CHRISTABEL. -- I would rather have written Ruth, and Nature's Lady 1 than a million such poems / but why do I calumniate my own spirit by saying, I would rather ----- God knows -- it is as delightful to me that they are written -- I know, that at present (& I hope, that it will be so,) my mind has disciplined itself into a willing exertion of it's powers, without any reference to their comparative value. -- I cannot speak favorably of W's health -but indeed he has not done common justice to Dr Beddoes's kind Prescription. I saw his countenance darken, and all his Hopes vanish, when he saw the Prescriptions -- his scepticism concerning medicines -- nay, it is not enough scepticism! -- Yet now that Peas & Beans are over, I have hopes that he will in good earnest make a fair & full Trial. I rejoice with sincere joy at Beddoes's recovery. ----- Wordsworth is fearful, you have been much teized by the Printers on his account -- but you can sympathize with him --. The works which I gird myself up to attack as soon as moneyconcerns will permit me, are the Life of Lessing -- & the Essay on Poetry. The latter is still more at my heart than the former -- it's Title would be an Essay on the Elements of Poetry / it would in reality be a disguised System of Morals & Politics --. When you write (& do write soon) tell me how I can get your Essay on the nitrous oxyd -- if you desired Johnson to have one sent to Lackington's to be placed in Mr Crosthwaite's Monthly parcel for Keswick, I should receive it. Are your Galvanic discoveries important? What do they lead to? -- All this is ultra-crepidation / but would to Heaven, I had as much knowlege as I have sympathy -- ! ----- My Wife & Children are well -- the Baby was dying some week ago -- so the good People would have it baptized -- his name is Derwent Coleridge -- so called from the River: for fronting our House the Greta runs into the Derwent -- / had it been a Girl, the name should have been Greta -----. By the bye, Greta, or rather Grieta, is exactly the Cocytus of the Greeks -- the word litterally rendered in modern English is "The loud Lamenter" -- to Griet in the Cumbrian Dialect signifying to roar aloud for grief or pain --: and it does roar with a vengeance! -- By way of an oddity I fill up the blank space with the following Skeltoniad 2 (to be read in the Recitative Lilt) The Devil believes, that the Lord will come Stealing a March without beat of Drum ____________________ 1 Presumably Three years she grew in sun and shower. 2 Poems, i. 358. See also headnote to Letter 355. -632- About the same Hour, that he came last, On an old Christmas Day in a snowy Blast. Till he bids the Trump sound, nor Body nor Soul stirs, For the Dead Men's Heads have slipp'd under their Bolsters. Ho! Ho! Brother Bard! -- In our Church Yard Both Beds and Bolsters are soft and green; Save one alone, and that's of Stone And under it lies a Counsellor Keen. 'Twould be a square Tomb if it were not too long, And 'tis rail'd round with Irons tall, spear like, and strong. From Aberdeen hither this Fellow did skip 1 With a waxy Face and a blabber Lip, And a black Tooth in front to shew in part 2 What was the Colour of his whole Heart! This Counsellor sweet! This Scotchman compleat! Apollyon scotch him for a Snake -- I trust, he lies in his Grave awake! * On the 6th of January When all is white, both high & low, As a Cheshire Yeoman's Dairy, Brother Bard, ho! ho! -- believe it or no, On that tall Tomb to you I'll shew After Sun sèt and before Cock Cròw Two round Spaces clear of snow. I swear by our Knight and his Forefathers' Souls, Both in Shape and in size they are just like the Holes In the House of Privity Of that ancient Family. On these round spaces clear of snow There have sate in the night for an hour or so (He kicking his Heels, she cursing her Corns All to the tune of the Wind in their Horns) The Dev'l and his Grannam With a snow-drift to fan 'em, Expecting and hoping the Trumpet to blow! For they are cock-sure of the Fellow below! I will say nothing about Spring -- a thirsty man tries to think ____________________ * (a humane Wish) inserted by S. T. C. in the margin. 1 This and the six lines following were not printed in the Morning Post. 2 'Mackintosh had had one of his front teeth broken and the stump was black.' Note by Daniel Stuart, Gentleman's Magazine, May 1838. -633- of any thing, but the Stream when he knows it to be 10 miles off! -- God bless you & Your most affectionate S. T. Coleridge P.S. -- Love to Tobin -- tell him to set off ----- 357. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | Stowey | Bridgewater | Somerset MS. British Museum. Pub. E. L. G. i. 156. Postmark: 14 October 1800. Stamped: Keswick. [Circa 11 October 1800] For this last fortnight, my dear Poole, I have been about to write you -- but jolts & ruts, and flings have constantly unhorsed my Resolves. The truth is, the endeavor to finish Christabel, (which has swelled into a Poem of 1400 lines 1 ) for the second Volume of the Lyrical Ballads threw my business terribly back -- & now I am sweating for it -- / Dunning Letters &c &c -- all the hell of an Author. I wish, I had been a Tanner. -- However to come to business -- The Essays have been published in the Morning Post / and have (to use the cant phrase) made great sensation. In one place only I ventured to make a slight alteration / and I prefixed one Essay, chiefly of my own Writing, & made two or three additions in the enumeration of the effects of War -- Now I wish all to be republished in a small pamphlet; but should like to have one more Essay, of considerable length, detailing the effect & operations of paper currency on the price of the articles of Life. 2 You have Sir Frederic Eden's Book 3 which would furnish important Documents --. In the meantime, I wish you could contrive between you & Chester or Macky to take in the Morning Post ----- You will see therein all I am able to say & reason, and your arguments will come up in the Rear like the Roman Triarii, on whom alone, you know, depended the Stress of the Battle, and the Hope of the Victory. -Those hitherto published I shall cut out, & inclose in a letter (paying the postage, that you may not lose your temper.) I shall write for Stuart till Christmas; and intend to carry on a periodical Work, in numbers, to be afterwards republished in a Volume. Mrs Coleridge & Child are well -- I am tolerable, only my eyes are bad -Indeed this complaint in my poor eyes & eye lids recurs with alarm- ____________________ 1 See Letter 856, p. 631, note 1. 2 For Poole's reply of 14 Nov. 1800, see Thomas Poole, ii. 17-20. No such 'small pamphlet' as Coleridge mentions was issued. 3 Frederick Eden, The State of the Poor, 3 vols., 1797. The work has taken a permanent place in economic literature. -634- ing frequency. Wordsworth's Health is very indifferent -- I see him upon an average about once a month, or perhaps three weeks. Love to Ward & your Mother -- God love you, & your affectionate S. T. Coleridge 358. To Wiftiam Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | London MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. William Godwin, ii. 11. Postmark: 16 October 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Monday, Oct. 13, 1800 Dear Godwin I have been myself too frequently a grievous Delinquent in the article of Letter-writing to feel any inclination to reproach my friends when peradventure they have been long silent. But, this out of the question, I did not expect a speedier answer: for I had anticipated the circumstances which you assign as the causes of your delay. -- An attempt to finish a poem of mine for insertion in the second Volume of the Lyrical Ballads has thrown me so fearfully back in my bread-and-beef occupations, that I shall scarcely be able to justify myself in putting you to the expence of the few lines, which I may be able to scrawl in the present paper -- but some points in your letter interested me deeply -- & I wished to tell you so. -- First then, you know Kemble, & I do not. But my conjectural Judgements concerning his character lead me to persuade an absolute passive obedience to his opinions -- and this too, because I would leave to every man his own Trade. Your Trade has been in the present Instance, 1st to furnish a wise pleasure to your fellowbeings in general, & 2ndly to give to Mr Kemble and his associates the means of themselves delighting that part of your fellow-beings assembled in a Theatre. As to what relates to the first point, I should be sorry indeed if greater Men than Mr Kemble could induce you to alter a 'but' to a 'yet', contrary to your own convictions -above all things, an Author ought to be sincere to the public, and when William Godwin stands in the title page, it is implied, that W. G. approves that which follows. Besides, the mind & finer feelings are blunted by such obsequiousness. -- But in the Theatre it is Godwin & Co ex professo. -- I should regard it in almost the same light as if I had written a song for Haydn to compose, & Mara 1 to sing -- I know indeed what is poetry, but I do not know so ____________________ 1 Franz Joseph Haydn ( 1782-1809), the Austrian composer, and Mrs. Gertrude Elizabeth Mara ( 1749-1833), the singer. -635- well as he & she, what will suit his notes & her voice. That actors & managers are often wrong, is true; but still their Trade is their Trade, & the presumption is in favor of their being right ----- For the Press, I should wish you to be solicitously nice; because you are to exhibit before a larger & more respectable Multitude, than a Theatre presents to you, & in a new part -- that of a Poet employing his philosophic knowlege practically. If it be possible, come therefore, and let us discuss every page & every line. The Time depends, of course, on the day fixed for the representation of the Piece. -- Now for something which I would fain believe, is still more important, namely, the propriety of your future philosophical Speculations. Your second objection derived from the present Ebb of opinion will be best answered by the fact, that Mackintosh & his Followers have the Flow. This is greatly in your favor -- for mankind are at present gross reasoners -- they reason in a perpetual antithesis. Mackintosh is an oracle, & Godwin therefore a Fool. -Now it is morally impossible that Mackintosh & the Sophists of his School can retain this opinion -- you may well exclaim with Job, O that my Adversary would write a Book -- when he publishes, depend on it, it will be all over with him & then the minds of men will incline strongly in favor of those who would point out in intellectual perceptions a source of moral progressiveness. Every man in his heart is in favor of your general principles ----- A party of dough-baked Democrats of Fortune were weary of being dissevered from their Fellow Rich men -- they want to say something in defence of turning round --: Mackintosh puts that something in their mouths-and for a while they will admire & bepraise him. In a little while these men will have fallen back into the ranks from which they had stepped out / and life is too melancholy a thing to men in general for the doctrine of iinprogressiveness to remain popular. Men cannot long retain their Faith in the Heaven above the blue sky -- but a Heaven they will have -- & he who reasons best on the side of that universal Wish will be [the] most popular philosopher. -- As to your first objection, that you are no logician, let me say, that your habits are analytic; but that you have not read enough of Travels, Voyages, & Biography -- especially, of Men's Lives of themselves -- & you have too soon submitted your notions to other men's censures in conversation. A man should nurse his opinions in privacy & self-fondness for a long time -- and seek for sympathy & love, not for detection or censure --. Dismiss, my dear fellow I your theory of Collision of Ideas, & take up that of mutual Propulsions. -- I wish to write more -- to state to you a lucrative Job, which would I think be eminently serviceable to your own mind, & which you would have every opportunity of -636- doing here -- I now express a serious wish that you would come & look out for a house. Did Stuart remit you log on my account? S. T. Coleridge I would gladly write any Verses, but to a Prologue or Epilogue I am absolutely incompetent. What did you mean by -- Alfred? 359. To Biggs and Cottle [Addressed by D. W.] Messrs Biggs & Cottle, Printers | St Augustine's Back | Bristol Single sheet MS. Yale University Lib. Pub. with omis. Wordsworth Poet. Works, ii. 111. Coleridge's memorandum appears on a manuscript sheet containing copies of several of Wordsworth's poems in Dorothy's handwriting. Stamped: Keswick. [Circa 17 October 1800] 1 To the Printer. The poems beginning at 'It was an April Morning:' -- are to have a separate Title page & advertisement. The Title Page to be Poems on the Naming of Places. 2 The Advertisement as follows: Advertisement. By Persons resident in the country & attached to rural Objects, many places will be found unnamed or of unknown names, where little Incidents will have occurred, or feelings been experienced, which will have given to such places a private & peculiar Interest. From a wish to give some sort of record to such Incidents or renew the gratification of such Feelings Names have been given to Places by the Author & some of his Friends -- & the following Poems written in consequence. ----- 360. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic Institution | Hot Wells | Bristol MS. Royal Institution. Pub.Letters, i. 339. Postmark: 21 October 1800. Stamped: Keswick. October 18, 1800 My dear Davy Our Mountains Northward end in the Mountain Carrock -- one huge steep enormous Bulk of Stones, desolately variegated with the heath-plant -- at it's foot runs the river Caldew, & a narrow vale ____________________ 1 Since this sheet begins with the concluding part of A Poet's Epitaph, of which the first instalment was sent to Bristol on 10 Oct. in a sheet now lost, Coleridge's note was probably written during Wordsworth's visit to Keswick of 15-17 Oct. Journals, i. 65-67. 2 It would appear that Wordsworth came to Keswick with the purpose of obtaining Coleridge contributions to Poems on the Naming of Places. See Letter 356, p. 631, note 2. His disappointment is reflected in an entry made in Dorothy journal: "Coleridge had done nothing for the L.B." Journals, i. 67. -637- between it & the Mountain Bowscale -- so narrow, that in it's greatest width it is not more than a Furlong. But that narrow vale is so green, so beautiful! there are moods, in which a man would weep to look at it. On this mountain Carrock, at the summit of which are the remains of a vast Druid Circle of Stones, I was wandering --; when a thick cloud came on, and wrapped me in such Darkness that I could not see ten yards before me -- and with the cloud a storm of Wind & Hail, the like of which I had never before seen & felt. At the very summit is a cone of Stones, built by the Shepherds, & called the Carrock Man -- Such Cones are on the Tops of almost all our Mountains, and they are all called Men. At the bottom of this Carrock Man I seated myself for shelter; but the wind became so fearful & tyrannous that I was apprehensive, some of the stones might topple down upon me. So I groped my way further down, and came to 3 Rocks, placed in this wise each supported by the other like a Child's House of Cards, & in the Hollow & Screen which they made I sate for a long while sheltered as if I had been in my own Study, in which I am now writing -Here I sate, with a total feeling worshipping the power & 'eternal Link' of Energy. The Darkness vanished, as by enchantment --: far off, far far off, to the South the mountains of Glaramàra & Great Gavel, and their Family, appeared distinct, in deepest sablest Blue -- I rose, & behind me was a Rainbow bright as the brightest. -- I descended by the side of a Torrent, & passed or rather crawled (for I was forced to descend on all fours) by many a naked Waterfall, till fatigued & hungry (& with one finger almost broken, & which remains swelled to the size of two Fingers) I reached the narrow vale, & the single House nested in Ashes & Sycamores --. I entered to claim the universal hospitality of this County; but instead of the life & comfort usual in these lonely Houses I saw dirt & every appearance of misery -- a pale Wo[man] sitting by a peat Fire -- I asked her [for] Bread & Milk, & she sent. a small Child to fetch it, but did not rise herself --. I eat very heartily of the black sour bread, & drank a bowl of milk -- & asked her to permit me to pay her. Nay, says she -- we are not so scant as that -- you are right welcome -- but do you know any Help for the Rheumaties; for I have been so long ailing that I am almost fain to die. -- So I advised her to eat a great deal of Mustard, having seen in an advertisement something about Essence of Mustard curing the most obstinate cases of Rheumatism -- but do write me, & tell me some cure for the Rheumatism -- it is in her Shoulders & the small of her back, chiefly -- I wish much to go off with some -638- bottles of Stuff to the poor Creature -- I should walk the 10 miles, as ten yards. -- With love & honor, my dear Davy, your's S. T. Coleridge 361. To the Editor of the 'Morning Post' MS. New York Public Lib. Pub. Poems, i. 356. E. H. Coleridge and Campbell print Coleridge To the Snow Drop from the rough draft in the following letter and date it 1800. Recent studies indicate that a corrected version of the poem with an added ninth stanza and signed 'Francini' appeared in the Morning Post of 8 Jan. 1798, although no copy of that issue has been traced. Mrs. Robinson Ode to the Snow-drop to which Coleridge refers was published in the Morning Post on 26 Dec 1797. The present letter, therefore, was written in late December 1797 and should follow Letter 215. See D. V. Erdman, "Lost Poem Found", Bulletin of the New York Public Lib., April 1961, pp. 249-68. Sir I am one among your many readers, who have been highly gratified by your extracts from Mrs Robinson's Walsingham; you will oblige me by inserting the following lines [written] immediately on the perusal of her beautiful poem, the Snow Drop. ZAGRI. To the Snow Drop 1 Fear no more, thou timid Flower! Fear thou no more the winter's might; The whelming thaw, the ponderous shower, The silence of the freezing night! Since Laura murmur'd o'er thy leaves The potent sorceries of song, To thee, meek Flowret! gentler gales And cloudless skies belong. 1 3 whelming thaw] first tempest storm, second howling Blast 7 meek] originally sweet ____________________ 1 Coleridge first wrote and then cancelled the following stanza: 1 Fear thou no More the wintry storm, Sweet Flowret, blest by LAURA's song! She gaz'd upon thy slender form, The mild Enchantress gaz'd so long; That trembling as she saw thee droop, Poor Trembler! o'er thy snowy bed, With imitative sympathy She too inclin'd her head. -639- 2 3 She droop'd her head, she stretch'd her arm, She whisper'd low her witching rhymes: Fame unreluctant heard the charm, And bore thee to Pierian climes! Fear thou no more the matin frost That sparkled on thy bed of snow: For there mid laurels evergreen Immortal thou shalt blow. 2 She droop'd her head, she stretch'd her arm, She whisper'd low her witching rhymes: A gentle Sylphid heard the charm, And bore thee to Pierian climes! Fear thou no more the sparkling Frost, The Tempest's howl, the Fog-damp's gloom: For there mid laurels ever-green Immortal thou shalt bloom! 5 sparkling Frost] originally Tempest's Howl ____________________ 3 Fame unreluctant] originally A gentle Sylphid 6 sparkled] originally glitter'd 1 Coleridge first wrote and then cancelled the following stanza, incorporating most of the lines into stanza 3. -640- 4 Thy petals boast a White more soft, The spell hath so perfumed thee, That careless Love shall deem thee oft A Blossom from his myrtle tree. Then laughing at the fair deceit Shall race with some Etesian wind To seek the woven arboret Where LAURA lies reclin'd. 1 White more soft] originally richer white 3 That careless Lovz] originally LOVE's careless eye 5 Then] originally Now 6 Shall race] originally He races 6 some Etesian] originally the western 5 All them, whom Love and Fancy grace, When grosser eyes are clos'd in sleep, The gentle Spirits of the place Waft up th' insuperable steep On whose vast summit broad & smooth Her nest the Phoenix Bird conceals; And where by cypresses o'erhung The heavenly Lethe steals. 1 All) originally For 4 insuperable] originally unvoyageable 5 Vast] originally strange 7 where] originally there 8 The] originally A 6 A sea-like sound the branches breathe Stirr'd by the Breeze that loiters there: And, all that stretch their limbs beneath Forget the coil of mortal care -- Such mists along the margin rise As heal the guests who thither come, And fit the soul to re-endure It's earthly martyrdom. 3 that] originally who 5 Such] first Such second Strange 5 along the margin] originally of magic odour 6 As] originally To 7 The margin dear to moonlight elves Where Zephyr-trembling Lilies grow And bend to kiss their softer Selves That tremble in the stream below -- 1 moonlight] originally midnight -641- There, nightly born, does Laura lie A magic slumber heaves her breast: Her arm, white wanderer of the Harp, Beneath her cheek is prest. 5 There, nightly born,] originally Along that marge 6 A magic] originally Full oft, when 3 The Harp, uphung by golden chains, Of that low Wind which whispers round With coy reproachfulness complains In snatches of reluctant sound. The music hovers half-perceiv'd And only moulds the slumberer's dreams: Remember'd LovEs illume her cheek With Youth's returning gleams. 2 Which] originally that 7 illume] originally relume 8 Youth's returning) originally Beauty's morning 362. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | Gunville | near | Blandford | Dorset Single MS. Wedgzwod Museum. Pub.E. L. G. i. 157. Postmark: 4 November 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Nov. 1. 1800. -- Keswick My dear Sir I would fain believe, that the experiment which your Brother has made in the W. Indies, is not wholly a discouraging one. If a warm climate did nothing but only prevented him from growing worse, it surely evidenced some power -- and perhaps a climate equally favorable in a country of more various interest, Italy or the South of Frànce, may tempt your Brother to make a longer trial. If (disciplining myself into silent cheerfulness) I could be of any comfort to him by being his companion & attendant for two or three months, on the supposition that he should wish to travel & was at a loss for a companion more fit, I would go with him with a willing affection. You will easily see, my dear friend, that I say this, only to increase the Range of your Brother's choice -- for even in chusing there is some pleasure. -- There happen frequently little odd coincidences in time, that recall a momentary faith in the notion of sympathies acting in absence. I heard of your Brother's Return for the first time on -642- Monday last (the day on which your Letter is dated) from Stod. dart. 1 -- Had it rained on my naked Skin, I could not have felt more strangely. The three or 4 hundred miles that are between us, seemed converted into a moral distance; & I knew that the whole of this Silence I was myself accountable for, for I ended my last letter by promising to follow it with a second & longer one before you could answer the first. -- But immediately on my arrival in this country I undertook to finish a poem which I had begun, entitled Christabel, for a second volume of the Lyrical Ballads. I tried to perform my promise; but the deep unutterable Disgust, which I had suffered in the translation of that accursed Wallenstein, seemed to have stricken me with barrenness -- for I tried & tried, & nothing would come of it. I desisted with a deeper dejection than I am willing to remember. The wind from Skiddaw & Borrodale was often as loud as wind need be -- & many a walk in the clouds on the mountains did I take; but all would not do -- till one day I dined out at the house of a neighbouring clergyman, & some how or other drank so much wine, that I found some effort & dexterity requisite to balance myself on the hither Edge of Sobriety. The next day, my verse making faculties returned to me, and I proceeded successfully -- till my poem grew so long & in Wordsworth's opinion so impressive, that he rejected it from his volume as disproportionate both in size & merit, & as discordant in it's character. 2 -- In the meantime, I had gotten myself entangled in the old Sorites of the old Sophist, Procrastination -- I had suffered my necessary businesses to accumulate so terribly, that I neglected to write to any one -- till the Pain, I suffered from not writing, made me waste as many hours in dreaming about it, as would have sufficed for the Letter-writing of half a Life. But there is something beside Time requisite for the writing of a Letter -- at least with me. My situation here is indeed a delightful situation; but I feel what I have lost -- feel it deeply -- it recurs more often & more painfully, than I had anticipated -- indeed, so much so that I scarcely ever feel myself impelled, that is to say, pleasurably impelled to write to Poole. I used to feel myself more at home in his great windy Parlour, than in my own cottage. We were well suited for each other -- my animal Spirits corrected his inclinations to melancholy; ____________________ 1 Sir John Stoddart ( 1778-1856), the King's and the Admiralty Advocate at Malta, 1808-7. His sister, Sarah, married William Hazlitt. It was mainly because of Stoddart that Coleridge went to Malta in 1804. See Letter 513. 2 In an unpublished letter to Longman Wordsworth explains his reason for not including Christabel: 'A Poem of Mr Coleridge's was to have concluded the Volumes; but upon mature deliberation, I found that the Style of this Poem was so discordant from my own that it could not be printed along with my poems with any propriety.' MS. New York Public Lib. -643- and there was some thing both in his understanding & in his affection so healthy & manly, that my mind freshened in his company, and my ideas & habits of thinking acquired day after day more of substance & reality. -- Indeed, indeed, my dear Sir, with tears in my eyes, and with all my heart & soul I wish it were as easy for us all to meet, as it was when you lived at Upcott. -Yet when I revise the step, I have taken, I know not how I could have acted otherwise than I did act. Every thing, I promised myself in this country, has answered far beyond my expectation. The room in which I write commands six distinct Landscapes -- the two Lakes, the Vale, River, & mountains, & mists, & Clouds, & Sunshine make endless combinations, as if heaven & Earth were for ever talking to each other. -- Often when in a deep Study I have walked to the window & remained there looking without seeing, all at once the Lake of Keswic[k] & the fantastic Mountains of Borrodale at the head of it have entered into my mind with a suddenness, as if I had been snatched out of Cheapside & placed for the first time on the spot where I stood. -- And that is a delightful Feeling -- these Fits & Trances of Novelty received from a long known Object. The river Greta flows behind our house, roaring like an untamed Son of the Hills, then winds round, & glides away in the front -- so that we live in a penins[ula.] -- But besides this etherial Eye-feeding, we have very substantial Conveniences. We are close to the town, where we have a respectable & neighbourly acquainta[nce] and a sensible & truly excellent medical man. -Our Garden is part of a large nursery Garden / which is the same to us & as private as if the whole had been our own, & thus too we have delightful walks without passing our garden gate. My Landlord, 1 who lives in the Sister House (for the two Houses are built so as to look like one great one) is a modest & kind man, & a singular character. By the severest economy he raised himself from a Carrier into the possession of a comfortable Independence -he was always very fond of reading, and has collected nearly 500 volumes of our most esteemed modern Writers, such as Gibbon, Hume, Johnson, &c &c. -- / His habits of economy & simplicity remain with him -- & yet so very disinterested a man I scarcely ever knew. Lately when I wished to settle with him about the Rent of our House he appeared much affected, told me that my living near him & the having so much of Hartley's company were great comforts to him & his housekeeper 2 -- that he had no children to provide for, & did not mean to marry -- & in short, that he did not want any rent at all from me. -- This of course I laughed him ____________________ 1 William Jackson was the owner of Greta Hall. 2 Mrs. Wilson, the children's beloved 'Wilsy'. -644- out of; but he absolutely refused to receive any rent for the first half year under the Pretext, that the house was not completely finished. ----- Hartley quite lives at the house -- & it [is] as you may suppose no small joy to my wife to have a good affectionate motherly woman divided from her only by a Wall. Eighteen miles from our House lives Sir Guilfred Lawson, who has a princely Library, chiefly of natural History -- a kind, & generous, but weak & ostentatious sort of man, who has been abundantly civil to me. -Among other raree shews he keeps a wild beast or two, with some eagles &c ----- The Master of the Beasts at the Exeter change sent him down a large Bear -- with it a long letter [of] directions concerning the food &c of the animal, & many solicitations respecting other agreeable Quadrupeds which he was desirous to send to the Baronet at a moderate Price, concluding in this manner -- 'and remain your Honor's most devoted humble Servant, J.P. -P.S. -- Permit me, Sir Guilfred, to send you a Buffalo and a Rhinoceros.'-- ! ----- As neat a Postscript as I ever heard -- ! the tradesmanlike coolness with which those pretty little animals occurred to him just at the finishing of his Letter -----!! -- You will in the course of three weeks see the Letters on the rise & condition of the German Boors. 1 I found it convenient to make up a volume out of my Journeys &c in North Germany -- & the Letters (your name of course erased) are in the Printers' Hands -- /. I was so weary of transcribing & composing, that when I found those more carefully written than the rest, I even sent them off as they were. -- Poor Alfred! I have not seen it in print -- Charles Lamb wrote me the following account of it -- I have just received from Cottle a magnificent Copy of his Guinea Alfred! Four & 20 books to read in the Dog Days. I got as far as the mad Monk the first day, & fainted. Mr Cottle's Genius strongly points him to the very simple Pastoral, but his inclinations divert him perpetually from his calling. He imitates Southey as Row did Shakespeare with his Good morrow to you, good Master Lieutenant! -- Instead of a man, a woman, a daughter he constantly writes 'one, a man,' 'one, a woman,' 'one, his daughter' -- instead of the King, the Hero, he constantly writes 'He, the King' -- [']He, the Hero' -- two flowers of Rhetoric palpably from the Joan. But Mr Cottle soars a higher pitch, and when he is original, it is in a most original way indeed. His terrific Scenes are indefatigable. Serpents, Asps, Spiders, Ghosts, Dead Bodies, & Stair-cases made of NOTHING with Adders' Tongues for Bannisters -- my God! what a Brain he must have! he puts as many Plums in his Pudding as my Grandmother ____________________ 1 See Letter 271 headnote. -645- used to do -- & then his Emerging from Hell's Horrors into Light, & treading on pure Flats of this Earth for 23 Books together! -C.L. 1 ----- My littlest One is a very Stout Boy indeed-he is christened by the name of 'DERWENT' -- a sort of sneaking affection, you see, for the poetical & the novellish which I disguised to myself under the Shew, that my Brothers had so many children, Johns, James, Georges, &C &C -- that a handsome Christian-like name was not to be had, except by incroaching on the names of my little Nephews. If you are at Gunville at Christmas, I hold out Hopes to myself that I shall be able to pass a week with you then. -- I mentioned to you at Upcott a kind of a Comedy that I had committed -- to writing, in part. -- This is in the wind. Wordsworth's second Volume of the Ly. Ball. will, I hope & almost believe, afford you as unmingled pleasure as is in the nature of a collection of very various poems to afford to one individual mind. Sheridan has sent to him too, requesting him to write Tragedy for Drury Lane. But W. will not be diverted by any thing from the prosecution of his Great Work. I shall request permission to draw upon you shortly for 20£ -but if it be in the least inconvenient to you, I pray you, tell me so -- for I can draw on Longman, who in less than a month will owe me 60£, tho' I would rather not do it. Southey's Thalaba in 12 books is going to the Press. I hear -- his Madoc is to be nonum-in-annum'd. 2 -- Besides these, I have heard of four other Epic Poems -- all in Quarto I a happy age this for tossing off an Epic or two! ----- Remember me with great affection to your Brother-& present my kindest respects to Mrs Wedgewood. -- Your late Governess wanted one thing which, where there is Health, is I think indispensable in the moral character of a young person -- a light & chearful Heart --. She interested me a good deal; she appears to me to have been injured by going out of the common way without any of that Imagination, which if it be a Jack o'Lanthorn to lead us out of that way is however at the same time a Torch to light us whither we are going. A whole Essay might be written on the Danger of thinking without Images. -- God bless you, my dear Sir, & him who is with grateful and affectionate Esteem Your's ever S. T. Coleridge ____________________ 1 Cf. Lamb Letters, i. 211-12. For Lamb's kindly words to Cottle on the subject of the epic, ibid. i. 216-17. 2 Cf. Horace, Ars Poetica,388. The publication of Madoc was delayed until 1805. -646- 363. To Josiah Wedgwood Address: Josiah Wedgewood Esq. | Gunville | near | Blandford | Dorset. MS. Wedgwood Museum. Pub. Tom Wedgwood, 110. Postmark: 15 November 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Wednesday, Nov. 12 1800 My dear Sir I received your kind letter with the 20£ -- My eyes are in such a state of inflammation that I might as well write blindfold -- they are so blood-red, that I should make a very good Personification of Murder. I have had Leaches twice, & have now a blister behind my right Ear. How I caught this Cold, in the first instance, I can scarcely guess; but I improved it to it's present glorious state by taking long walks all the mornings, spite of the wind, & writing late at night, while my eyes were weak. I have made some rather curious observations on the rising up of Spectra in the eye in it's inflamed state, & their influence on Ideas &c -- but I cannot see to make myself intelligible to you. Present my kindest remembrances to Mrs W. & your Brother. Pray, did you ever pay any particular attention to the first time of your little One's smiling & laughing[?] Both I & Mrs Coleridge have carefully watched our little one and noted down all the circumstances &c, under which he smiled & under which he laughed for the first six times -- nor have we remitted our attention -- but I have not been able to derive the least confirmation of Hartley's or Darwin's Theory. You say most truly, my dear Sir! that a Purmit is necessary -Pursuit, I say -- for even praise-worthy Employment, merely for good, or general good, is not sufficient for happiness, is not fit for Man -- God bless you, my dear Sir! and Your sincerely affectionate Friend, S. T. Coleridge P.S. I cannot at present make out how I stand in [a] pecuniary way -- but I believe that I have anticipated on the next year to the amount of 80 or 40 pound probably more -- 364. To the Editor of the 'Monthly Review' Pub. Monthly Review, November 1800, p. 336. Coleridge's letter was answered by the editor as follows: 'As Mr. Coleridge has thought it worth his while to transmit the above letter, we readily insert it: but we do not see that the matter to which it relates is of much importance. We used the words "partizan of the German theatre" solely with reference to the occasion on which they were written: but perhaps the expression was too comprehensive.' -647- Greta Hall, Keswick Nov. 18, 1800. Sir, In the review of my Translation of Schiller Wallenstein (Rev. for October) I am numbered among the Partizans of the German Theatre. As I am confident that there is no passage in my Preface or Notes from which such an opinion can be legitimately formed; and, as the truth would not have been exceeded, if the direct contrary had been affirmed, I claim it of your justice that in your answers to Correspondents you would remove this misrepresentation. The mere circumstance of translating a manuscript play is not even evidence that I admired that one play, much less that I am a general admirer of the plays in that language. I remain, Sir, with respect etc. S. T. Coleridge. 365. To Humphry Davy Address: Mr Davy | Pneumatic institution | Hot Wells | Bristol MS. Royal Institution. Pub.Letters, i. 341. Postmark: 5 December 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall, Tuesday Night, Decemb. 2, 1800 My dear Davy By an accident I did not receive your Letter till this Evening. I would, that you had added to the account of your indisposition the probable causes of it. It has left me anxious, whether or no you have not exposed yourself to unwholesome influences in your chemical pursuits. There are few Beings both of Hope & Performance, but few who combine the 'Are' & the 'will be' -- For God's sake'therefore, my dear fellow, do not rip open the Bird, that lays the golden Eggs. I have not received your Book -- I read yesterday a sort of a Medical Review about it. I suppose, Longman will send it to me when he sends down the Lyrical Ballads to Wordsworth. I am solicitous to read the latter part -- did there appear to you any remote analogy between the case, I translated from the German Magazine, & the effects produced by your gas? -- Did Carlisle 1 ever communicate to you, or has he in any way published, his facts concerning Pain, which he mentioned when we were with him? It is a subject which exceedingly interests me -- I want to read something by somebody expressly on Pain, if only to give an arrangement to my own thoughts, though if it were well treated, I have little doubt it would revolutionize them. -- For the last month I have been tumbling on through sands and swamps of Evil, & bodily ____________________ 1 Sir Anthony Carlisle ( 1768-1840), the surgeon. -648- grievance. My eyes have been inflamed to a degree, that rendered reading & writing scarcely possible; and strange as it seems, the act of poetic composition, as I lay in bed, perceptibly affected them, and my voluntary ideas were every minute passing, more or less transformed into vivid spectra. I had leaches repeatedly applied to my Temples, & a Blister behind my ear -- and my eyes are now my own, but in the place, where the Blister was, six small but excruciating Boils have appeared, & harrass me almost beyond endurance. In the mean time, my darling Hartley has been taken with a stomach Illness, which has ended in the yellow Jaundice; & this greatly alarms me. -- So much for the doleful! Amid all these changes & humiliations & fears, the sense of the Eternal abides in me, and preserves unsubdued My chearful Faith that all which I endure Is full of Blessings! 1 At times indeed I would fain be somewhat of a more tangible utility than I am, but so, I suppose, it is with all of us -- one while cheerful, stirring, feeling in resistance nothing but a joy & a stimulus; another while drowsy, self-distrusting, prone to rest, loathing our own Self-promises, withering our own Hopes, our Hopes, the vitality & cohesion of our Being! -- I purpose to have Christabel published by itself -- this I publish with confidence -- but my Travels in Germany come from me with mortal Pangs. Nothing but the most pressing necessity for the money could have induced me -- & even now I hesitate & tremble. Be so good as to have a copy of all that is printed of Christabel sent to me per post. 2 Wordsworth has nearly finished the concluding Poem. 3 It is of a mild unimposing character; but full of beauties to those shortnecked men who have their hearts sufficiently near their heads -the relative distance of which (according to Citizen Tourdes, the French Translator of Spallanzani) 4 determines the sagacity or stupidity of all Bipeds & Quadrupeds. -- There is a deep Blue Cloud over the Heavens; the Lakes, & the vale, & the Mountains are in darkness; -- only the summits of all the mountains in long ridges, covered with snow, are bright to a dazzling excess. A glorious Scene! -- Hartley was in my arms the other evening looking at the Sky -- he saw the moon glide into a ____________________ 1 Tintern Abbey, lines 133-4. 2 No such printed sheets have survived. 3 Michael. 4 J. Tourdes, author of Lettre sur les Médicaments administrés à l'Extérieur de la Peau dans les Maladies, 1797?, and translator of Spallanzani Expériences sur la Circulation. -649- large Cloud -- Shortly after, at another part of the Cloud several Stars sailed in. Says he -- 'Pretty Creatures! they are going in to s[ee] after their mother Moon.' Remember me kindly to King. Write as often as you can; but above all things, my loved & honored dear fellow, do not give up the idea of letting me & Skiddaw see you. God love you & S. T. Coleridge Tobin writes me that Thompson has made some lucrative Discovery -- do you know aught about it? -- Have you seen T. Wedgewood since his return? 366. To Thomas Poole Address: Mr T. Poole | N. Stowey | Bridgewater | Somerset MS. British Museum. Pub. with omis.Letters, i. 343. Postmark: 9 December 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Saturday Night -- Dec. 6 1800 Greta Hall, Keswick. My dearest Friend I have been prevented from answering your last letter entirely by the state of my eyes, & my wish to write more fully to you than their weakness would permit. For the last month & more I have indeed been a very crazy machine, & I write at this present with 6 Boils behind my ear, the discharges from which have however both relieved the inflammation in my eyes & the rheumatic pains in the back of my head. THAT consequence of this long continued ill-health, which I most regret is that it has thrown me so sadly behindhand in the performance of my engagements with the Booksellers that I almost fear I shall not be able to raise money enough by Christmas to make it prudent for me to journey Southward. I shall however try hard for it. My plan was to go to London, & make a faint Trial whether or no I could get a sort of dramatic Romance which I had more than half finished upon the stage 1 -- & from London to visit Stowey & Gunville. Dear little Hartley has been ill in a stomach complaint which ended in the yellow Jaundice & frightened me sorely as you may well believe. But praise be to God, he is recovered & begins to look like himself. -- He is a very extraordinary creature, & if he live, will I doubt not prove a great Genius. Derwent is a fat pretty child, healthy & hungry. I de- ____________________ 1 Coleridge may refer to The Triumph of Loyalty, of which a fragment exists. Poems, ii. 1060-73. -650- liberated long whether I should not call him Thomas Poole Coleridge, & at least [sic] gave up the idea only because your Nephew is called Thomas Poole, & because if ever it should be my destiny once again to live near you, I believed that such a name would give pain to some branches of your Family -- You will scarcely exact a very severe account of what a man has been doing who has been obliged for days & days together to keep his Bed. Yet I have not been altogether idle, having in my own conceit gained great light into several parts of the human mind which have hitherto remained either wholly unexplained or most falsely explained. / To one resolution I am wholly made up -- to wit, that as soon as I am a Free Man in the World of Money I will never write a line for the express purpose of money / but only as believing it good & useful, in some way or other. Altho' I am certain, that I have been greatly improving both in knowlege & power in these last twelve months, yet still at times it presses upon me with a painful Weight, that I have not evidenced a more tangible utility. I have too much trifled with my reputation. -- You have conversed much with Davy -- he is delighted with you. What do you think of him? Is he not a great Man, think you? -- Wordsworth's second Vol. is on the point of publication -- of a mild unimposing character, but full of beauties to those short-necked Men who have their heads sufficiently near to their hearts -- the distance between which (according to Citizen Tourdes, the Fr. Translator of Spallanzani) determines the sagacity or stupidity of all Bipeds & Quadrupeds. I and my Wife were beyond measure delighted by your account of your Mother's health -- give our best & kindest Loves to her. Charles Lloyd has settled at Ambleside, 16 miles from Keswick. I shall not see him. If I cannot come, I will write you a very, very long Letter -- containing the most important of the many thoughts & feelings, which I want to communicate to you but hope to do it face to face. Give my Love to Ward -- & to J. Chester --. How is poor Old Mr Rich & his Wife? -- God have you ever in his keeping, making Life tranquil to you. Believe me to be what I have been ever & am, attached to you one degree more at least than to any other living man. S. T. Coleridge. -651- 367. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | London MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. William Godwin, ii. 13. Postmark: 9 December 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Saturday Night. [ 6 December 1800] Dear Godwin The cause of my not giving you that immediate explanation which you requested was merely your own intimation that you could attend to nothing until the fate of your Melpomenie was decided. The plan was this -- a System of Geography taught by a re-writing of the most celebrated Travels into the different climates of the world, chusing for each climate one Traveller, but interspersing among his adventures all that was interesting in incident or observation from all former or after travellers or voyagers -annexing to each Travel a short Essay, pointing out what facts in it illustrate what laws of mind, &c &c. -- If a Bookseller of Spirit would undertake this work, I have no doubt of it's becoming a standard School Book -- It should be as large as the last Editions of Guthriel 1 -- 12 or 1400 pages. I mentioned it to you, because I thought that sort of Reading would be serviceable to your own mind -- but if you reject the idea, mention it to no one, for in that case I will myself undertake it. The Life of Bolin[g]broke will never do, in my opinion -- unless you have many original unpublished papers &c. The Good People will cry it down as a Satan's Hell-broth warmed up anew by Beelzebub. Besides, entre nous, my Lord Bolingbroke was but a very shallow Gentleman -- he had great, indeed amazing living Talents -- but there is absolutely nothing in his Writings, his philosophical Writings to wit, which had not been more accurately developed before him. All this, you will understand, goes on the supposition of your being possessed of no number of original Letters. If you are, & if they enable you to explain the junction of intellectual power & depraved Appetites, for heaven's sake, go on boldly -- & dedicate the work to your Friend Sheridan. For myself, I would rather have written the Mad Mother, 2 than all the works of all the Bolingbrokes & Sheridans, & their Brother Meteors, that have been exhaled from the Morasses of human depravity since the loss of Paradise. -- But this, my contempt of their intellectual powers as worthless, does not prevent me from feeling an interest & a curiosity in their moral Temperament: and I am not weak enough to hope or wish, that you should think or' feel as I think & feel. ____________________ 1 William Guthrie A New System of Modern Geography, or a Geographical, Historical, and Commercial Grammar, 1770, was frequently reprinted. 2 Later entitled Her Eyes are Wild. -652- One phrase in your letter distressed me. You say, much of your tranquillity depends on the coming hour. I hope that this does not allude to any immediate embarrassment. -- If not, I should cry out against you loudly -- the motto which I prefixed to my Tragedy when I sent it to the manager I felt & have continued to feel -- Valeat res scenica, si me Palma negata macrum, donata reducit opimum! 1 The success of a Tragedy in the present size of the Theatres ( Pizarro 2 is a Pantomime) the success of a TRAGEDY is in my humble opinion rather improbable than probable --. What Tragedy has succeeded for the last 15 years? You will probably answer the Question by another -- What Tragedy has deserved to succeed? and to that I can give no answer. -- Be my Thoughts therefore sacred to Hope --! If EVERY Wish of mine had but a pair of Hands, your Play should be clapped thro' 160 successive nights -- and I would reconcile it to my conscience (in part) by two thoughts, first that you are a good man; & secondly that the divinity of Shakespere would remain all that while unblasphemed by the applauses of a Rabble, who if he were now for the first time to present his pieces would hiss them into infamy. Kου + ̑ϕον ἠ + ̑τορ ἔχει τὸ Πλεστον ι+̑νΘρώπων. The mass of Mankind are blind in heart, & I have been almost blind in my eyes. For the last 5 weeks I have been tormented by a series of bodily grievances and for great part of the time deprived of the use of my poor Eyes by inflammation / and at present I have six excruciating Boils behind my right Ear, the largest of which I have christened Captain Robert, in honor of Defoe's Capt. Robert Boyle 3 -- / Eke I have the Rheumatism in my hand -- If therefore there be any thing fretful & splenetic in this Letter, you know where to lay the fault -only do not cease to believe that I am interested in all that relates to you & your Comforts. God grant, I may receive your Tragedy, with the Πότνια Nίκη in the Title page. My darling Hartley has been ill; but is now better. My youngest is a fat little creature not unlike little Mary. God love you & S. T. Coleridge. P.S. -- Do you continue to see dear Charles Lamb often? -Talking of Tragedies, at every perusal my love & admiration of his ____________________ 1 Horace, Ep. II, i. 180-1; for scenica read ludicra. 2 Sheridan'patriotic melodrama', Pizarro, was produced at Drury Lane on 24 May 1799. 3 The Voyages of Captain R. Boyle, 1728, was not written by Defoe, but W. R. Chetwood. -653- Play 1 rises a peg. C. Lloyd is settled at Ambleside -- but I have not seen him. I have no wish to see him, & likewise no wish not to see him.) 368. To Thomas N. Longman Transcript Coleridge family. Pub.E. L. G. i. 163. Stamped: Keswick. Monday Dec. 15 1800 Dear Sir It gives me great pleasure that I am able to inform you, that the last sheet of the Lyrical Ballads is sent off 2 -- I have already commenced negotiations for securing them a fair & honest Review -- I should advise that 3 or 4 Copies should be sent to different people of eminence: one to Mrs Jordan 3 (who intended to sing stanzas of the Mad Mother in Pizarro if she acted Cora again --) one to Mrs Barbauld and one to Mr Wilberforce 4 -- if you agree with me Mr Wordsworth will write appropriate complimentary Letters with each / With neither of these has Mr W. any acquaintance. I propose it only as likely to push the sale -- of their ultimate & permanent success I have no doubt -- I am especially pleased that I have contributed nothing to the second volume, as I can now exert myself loudly and everywhere in their favor without suspicion of vanity or self-interest. I have written Letters to all my acquaintance whose voices I think likely to have any Influence. In all this I am guided, if I know my own heart, wholly & exclusively by my almost unbounded admiration of the poems -- The second volume is indeed greatly superior to the first. -- Now for myself. In Christmas week I shall be in London, & I will explain to you the delay in my manuscript / tho' indeed the explanation is short enough. After I had finished the work & written you, I was convinced by a friend that a long account which I had given of the Illuminati would raise a violent clamour against me & my publisher -- yet I have said nothing but what I am afraid was the truth / at the same time Mr Wordsworth who had been in a different part of Germany offered me the use of his Journal tho' not of his name -- I immediately resolved to throw my work into Chapters instead of Letters, & substitute my friend's account of Germany farther south than I ____________________ 1 John Woodvil, published 1802. 2 Actually, the last of the material for the Lyrical Ballads did not arrive in Bristol until 23 Dec. 3 Mrs. Dorothea Jordan ( 1762-1816), the actress. 4 William Wilberforce ( 1759-1833), the parliamentary leader of the abolitionists. For Wordsworth's letter to Wilberforce, which was composed by Coleridge, see Letter 375. -654- had been instead of the obnoxious Letters. This however would have taken so little time that you would have had the copy, within a week or ten days at most later than the day appointed -but at that time a complaint seized my head & eyes, which made it impracticable for me even to read, and after a six weeks' continuance, during which time I had in vain used Leaches, Blisters, & God knows what, it was carried off by six large Boils which appeared behind my ear down to my shoulder & which are not yet quite healed -- I leave this place the day after Christmas Day, & you may depend on it that from the first of January to the printing of the last page your Printer shall not have to complain of an hour's delay. 1 Mrs Coleridge & my two children are well. You will present my best respects to Mrs Longman & believe me, dear Sir, with a great sense of your constant civility Your obliged humble Servant, S. T. Coleridge. 369. To John Thelwall Address: Mr Thelwall | Llynswen | (by the three cocks) | near the | Hay | Brecknockshire [Readdressed in another hand] Widemarsh Street | Hereford MS. Pierpont Morgan Lib. Hitherto unpublished. Stamped: Keswick. Keswick, Cumberland Dec. 17th, 1800. Dear Thelwall I should have ruined a richer man than you or myself, if I had written to you as often as I have thought of you with tender recollections, or as often as I have felt for your afflictions with dim eyes. -- But, in truth, my old aversion from letter-writing has become tenfold -- I am hardened in the sin, and enjoy that deep calm of a seared Conscience, which precedes the Devil's Whirlwinds in Reprobate Spirits. -- I write now to know certainly whether you are still at Lyswin Farm -- & whether I have directed the present Letter so as to find you in the best & speediest way. A young man (I am not permitted to mention his name) whose principles are not over democratic, but who honours your talents & purity of intention, desired me in my own person, and as from myself, to assume the privilege of friendship & send you 10£ -- this of course I would not do, both because it would give you a most inaccurate idea of the state of my pecuniary circumstances, & because it is right for you to know that you are honored where you have never been seen, ____________________ 1 It is worth remarking once for all that Coleridge did not publish a German tour. -655- and by others than of your own political sentiments, & because, I cannot but believe, that it will gratify you to be assured, that to all, who know me intimately, I labor to communicate my own affectionate Esteem for you. I shall receive the money to a certainty at the latter end of this week -- a trifle in itself, but probably it may be useful to you, and it should contribute to your pleasure in receiving it, that it was no trifle in the pocket from which it came, inasmuch as the most honorable situation an ill-used Man can occupy, is to be considered by good men as the object of a public Duty. -- Write to me all particulars of yourself, I mean, your present Self -- & whether in the higher excitements of mind, ratiocinating or imaginative, you have been able to conjure up religious Faith in your Heart, and whether if only as a Ventriloquist unconscious of his own agency you have in any mood or moment thrown the voice of your human wishes into the space without you, & listened to it as to a Reality. -- For even that is something. I am settled in this delightful county comfortably -- Wordsworth lives 18 miles from me. My literary pursuits are, 1 the Northern Languages, the Sclavonic, Gothic, & Celtic, in their most ancient forms, as an amusing study, & 2. as a serious object, a metaphysical Investigation of the Laws, by which our Feelings form affinities with each other, with Ideas, & with words. As to Poetry, I have altogether abandoned it, being convinced that I never had the essentials of poetic Genius, & that I mistook a strong desire for original power. -- My Wife, and Hartley are well -- little Berkley is gone from us -- but we have another little one, christen'd Derwent, who was born Sept. 14. 1800. -- I would you had sympathy enough with my Christian Hope to receive comfort from my Wish, that our little ones may have met & talk'd of their Fathers in a happier Place. -- My kindest Love to your Wife. If you are writing any poems, & want a lively Idea of Murder personified, it is a pity you can not see me -- : for I have two blood-red Eyes that would do credit to Massacre itself! God bless You & S. T. Coleridge 370. To William Godwin Address: Mr Godwin | Polygon | Sommers' Town | London MS. Lord Abinger. Pub. with omis. William Godwin, ii. 15. Postmark: 20 December 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall, Keswick. Wednesday Night, Dec. 17. 1800 Dear Godwin I received the Newspaper with a beating heart & laid it down with a heavy one. But cheerily, Friend! it is worth something to -656- have learnt what will not please. Kemble, like Saul, is among the Prophets ----- The account in the Morning Post was so unusually well written & so unfeelingly harsh, that it induced suspicions in my mind of the Author -- Stuart assuredly, nor any of his regular workmen, wrote it. If your Interest in the Theatre is not ruined by the fate of this, your first piece, take heart, set instantly about a new one, and if you want a glowing Subject, take the Death of Myrza, as related in the Holstein Ambassador's Travels into Pe[r]sia,. in p. 93. Vol. II of Harris's Collections. 1 There is Crowd, Character, Passion, Incident, & Pageantry in it -- & the History is so little known, that you may take what Liberties you like without Danger. It is my present purpose to spend the two or three weeks after the Christmas Week in London / then we can discuss all & every thing. Your last play wanted one thing, which I believe is almost indispensable in a play -- a proper Rogue, in the cutting of whose throat the Audience may take an unmingled pleasure. I go to Grasmere at the end of the week ----- if you should wish to write to me, direct thus Mr Wordsworth, | Grasmere, | near | Ambleside, | Westmoreland. For | Mr Coleridge We are all tolerably well. -- God love you, and S. T. Coleridge P.S. There is a Paint, the first coating of which, put on paper, becomes a dingy black, but the second turns to a bright gold Color. -- So I say -- Put on a second Coating, Friend! -- 371. To Francis Wrangham Address: Revd F. Wrangham | Hunmanby | near | Burlington [Bridlington] MS. New York Public Lib. Pub.E. L. G. i. 165. Stamped: Keswick. Greta Hall Keswick. Dec. 19, 1800 My dear Wrangham Rather than not answer your kind letter immediately, I have made up my mind to write but half a dozen Lines, as a sort of promissory Note. Wordsworth received your letter, & meant to have answered it immediately. I'll write to him to day, quoth he. For you must understand, that W. has innovated very vilely the good old Common-Law of Procrastination -- instead of Tomorrow, ____________________ 1 John Harris, Navigantium, atque Itinerantium Bibliotheca, 2 vols., 1705. -657- & To Morrow, & To Morrow, it is To Day, To Day, and To Day, which I the more disapprove of, as it appears to me a tame Plagiarism from the Lie of the Taverns & Coffee Houses -- 'Coming this instant, your Honor!' -- But seriously, he is a hardened offender in these sins of Omission -- & has so many claims of an elder Date to satisfy, that verily I believe he had a scruple of conscience against writing to you, lest he should give that to Pleasure which he had in so many instances refused to Duty ----- Wordsworth & I have never resided together -- he lives at Grasmere, a place worthy of him, & of which he is worthy -- and neither to Man nor Place can higher praise be given. His address is, Grasmere, near Ambleside, | Westmoreland. As to our literary occupations they are still more distant than our residences -- He is a great, a true Poet -- I am only a kind of a Metaphysician. -- He has even now sent off the last sheet of a second Volume of his Lyrical Ballads --. I have ample House-room for you, and you shall have whenever you come a good bed, a good dinner, a kind welcome, & as Alcaeus say[s] ὴδὺν οἰ + ̑νον ἡδυτέρας τε Mώσας-- to which I may add, diviner Prospects than his Lesbos could boast. In truth, my Glass being opposite to the Window, I seldom shave without cutting myself. Some Mountain or Peak is rising out of the Mist, or some slanting Column of misty Sunlight is sailing cross me / so that I offer up soap & blood daily, as an Eye-servant of the Goddess Nature. -- I shall be glad to see a Poem from you on so interesting a subject -- Poor Godwin! -- I am told, it was a dull Tragedy damn'd -- from whence you may conclude that it was a damn'd dull Tragedy -- yet I liked it in it's unfinished state when I saw it in Manuscript ----- I have two fine little boys -- God bless you, & S. T. Coleridge P.S. My House stands on the River Grieta, which is a literal Translation of the Word Cocytus -- Nam'd from lamentation loud Heard on the rueful stream. 1 To griet is to lament aloud, and a is the masculine termination of the substantive -- ____________________ 1 Paradise Lost, ii. 579-80. -658- 372. To Biggs and Cottle [Addressed by D. W.] Messrs Biggs and Cottle | Printers | St Augustine's Back | Bristol Single Sheet MS. Yale University Lib. Hitherto unpublished. This memorandum precedes a copy made by Coleridge of the first 216 lines of Michael as it appeared in 1800; the remainder of the poem, probably transcribed by Sara Hutchinson, is in a separate sheet. Postmark: 28 December 1800. Stamped: Keswick. Michael, a pastoral Poem. (N.B. This poem with a separate title-page; & be so good as to put a very large Capital letter where there is one in the MS., with more than an ordinary interspace between the Paragraphs.) -659- [This page intentionally left blank.]