[From _Blackwood's Magazine_, October, 1817]
SOME OBSERVATIONS ON THE "BIOGRAPHIA LITERARIA" OF S. T. COLERIDGE,
ESQ., 1817
When a man looks back on his past existence, and endeavours to recall
the incidents, events, thoughts, feelings, and passions of which it was
composed, he sees something like a glimmering land of dreams, peopled
with phantasms and realities undistinguishably confused and
intermingled--here illuminated with dazzling splendour, there dim with
melancholy mists,--or it may be shrouded in impenetrable darkness. To
bring, visibly and distinctly before our memory, on the one hand, all
our hours of mirth and joy, and hope and exultation,--and, on the other,
all our perplexities, and fears and sorrows, and despair and agony,--
(and who has been so uniformly wretched as not to have been often
blest?--who so uniformly blest as not to have been often wretched?)--
would be as impossible as to awaken, into separate remembrance, all the
changes and varieties which the seasons brought over the material
world,--every gleam of sunshine that beautified the Spring,--every cloud
and tempest that deformed the Winter. In truth, were this power and
domination over the past given unto us, and were we able to read the
history of our lives all faithfully and perspicuously recorded on the
tablets of the inner spirit,--those beings, whose existence had been
most filled with important events and with energetic passions, would be
the most averse to such overwhelming survey--would recoil from trains of
thought which formerly agitated and disturbed, and led them, as it were,
in triumph beneath the yoke of misery or happiness. The soul may be
repelled from the contemplation of the past as much by the brightness
and magnificence of scenes that shifted across the glorious drama of
youth, as by the storms that scattered the fair array into disfigured
fragments; and the melancholy that breathes from vanished delight is,
perhaps, in its utmost intensity, as unendurable as the wretchedness
left by the visitation of calamity. There are spots of sunshine sleeping
on the fields of past existence too beautiful, as there are caves among
its precipices too darksome to be looked on by the eyes of memory; and
to carry on an image borrowed from the analogy between the moral and
physical world, the soul may turn away in sickness from the untroubled
silence of a resplendent Lake, no less than from the haunted gloom of
the thundering Cataract. It is from such thoughts, and dreams, and
reveries, as these, that all men feel how terrible it would be to live
over again their agonies and their transports; that the happiest would
fear to do so as much as the most miserable; and that to look back to
our cradle seems scarcely less awful than to look forward to the grave.
But if this unwillingness to bring before our souls, in distinct array,
the more solemn and important events of our lives, be a natural and
perhaps a wise feeling, how much more averse must every reflecting man
be to the ransacking of his inmost spirit for all its hidden emotions
and passions, to the tearing away that shroud which oblivion may have
kindly flung over his vices and his follies, or that fine and delicate
veil which Christian humility draws over his virtues and acts of
benevolence. To scrutinize and dissect the character of others is an
idle and unprofitable task; and the most skilful anatomist will often be
forced to withhold his hand when he unexpectedly meets with something he
does not understand--some confirmation of the character of his patient
which is not explicable on his theory of human nature. To become
operators on our own shrinking spirits is something worse; for by
probing the wounds of the soul, what can ensue but callousness or
irritability. And it may be remarked, that those persons who have busied
themselves most with inquiries into the causes, and motives, and
impulses of their actions, have exhibited, in their conduct, the most
lamentable contrast to their theory, and have seemed blinder in their
knowledge than others in their ignorance.
It will not be supposed that any thing we have now said in any way bears
against the most important duty of self-examination. Many causes there
are existing, both in the best and the worst parts of our nature, which
must render nugatory and deceitful any continued diary of what passes
through the human soul; and no such confessions could, we humbly
conceive, be of use either to ourselves or to the world. But there are
hours of solemn inquiry in which the soul reposes on itself; the true
confessional is not the bar of the public, but it is the altar of
religion; there is a Being before whom we may humble ourselves without
being debased; and there are feelings for which human language has no
expression, and which, in the silence of solitude and of nature, are
known only unto the Eternal.
The objections, however, which might thus be urged against the writing
and publishing accounts of all our feelings,--all the changes of our
moral constitution,--do not seem to apply with equal force to the
narration of our mere speculative opinions. Their rise, progress,
changes, and maturity may be pretty accurately ascertained; and as the
advance to truth is generally step by step, there seems to be no great
difficulty in recording the leading causes that have formed the body of
our opinions, and created, modified, and coloured our intellectual
character. Yet this work would be alike useless to ourselves and others,
unless pursued with a true magnanimity. It requires, that we should
stand aloof from ourselves, and look down, as from an eminence, on our
souls toiling up the hill of knowledge;--that we should faithfully
record all the assistance we received from guides or brother pilgrims;--
that we should mask the limit of our utmost ascent, and, without
exaggeration, state the value of our acquisitions. When we consider how
many temptations there are even here to delude ourselves, and by a
seeming air of truth and candour to impose upon others, it will be
allowed, that, instead of composing memoirs of himself, a man of genius
and talent would be far better employed in generalizing the observations
and experiences of his life, and giving them to the world in the form of
philosophic reflections, applicable not to himself alone, but to the
universal mind of Man.
What good to mankind has ever flowed from the confessions of Rousseau,
or the autobiographical sketch of Hume? From the first we rise with a
confused and miserable sense of weakness and of power--of lofty
aspirations and degrading appetencies--of pride swelling into blasphemy,
and humiliation pitiably grovelling in the dust--of purity of spirit
soaring on the wings of imagination, and grossness of instinct brutally
wallowing in "Epicurus' stye,"--of lofty contempt for the opinion of
mankind, yet the most slavish subjection to their most fatal prejudices--
of a sublime piety towards God, and a wild violation of his holiest
laws. From the other we rise with feelings of sincere compassion for the
ignorance of the most enlightened. All the prominent features of Hume's
character were invisible to his own eyes; and in that meagre sketch
which has been so much admired, what is there to instruct, to rouse, or
to elevate--what light thrown over the duties of this life or the hopes
of that to come? We wish to speak with tenderness of a man whose moral
character was respectable, and whose talents were of the first order.
But most deeply injurious to every thing lofty and high-toned in human
Virtue, to every thing cheering, and consoling, and sublime in that
Faith which sheds over this Earth a reflection of the heavens, is that
memoir of a worldly-wise Man; in which he seems to contemplate with
indifference the extinction of his own immortal soul, and jibes and
jokes on the dim and awful verge of Eternity.
We hope that our readers will forgive these very imperfect reflections
on a subject of deep interest, and accompany us now on our examination
of Mr. Coleridge's "Literary Life," the very singular work which caused
our ideas to run in that channel. It does not contain an account of his
opinions and literary exploits alone, but lays open, not unfrequently,
the character of the Man as well as of the Author; and we are compelled
to think, that while it strengthens every argument against the
composition of such Memoirs, it does, without benefiting the cause
either of virtue, knowledge, or religion, exhibit many mournful
sacrifices of personal dignity, after which it seems impossible that Mr.
Coleridge can be greatly respected either by the Public or himself.
Considered merely in a literary point of view, the work is most
execrable. He rambles from one subject to another in the most wayward
and capricious manner; either from indolence, or ignorance, or weakness,
he has never in one single instance finished a discussion; and while he
darkens what was dark before into tenfold obscurity, he so treats the
most ordinary common-places as to give them the air of mysteries, till
we no longer know the faces of our old acquaintances beneath their cowl
and hood, but witness plain flesh and blood matters of fact miraculously
converted into a troop of phantoms. That he is a man of genius is
certain; but he is not a man of a strong intellect nor of powerful
talents. He has a great deal of fancy and imagination, but little or no
real feeling, and certainly no judgment. He cannot form to himself any
harmonious landscape such as it exists in nature, but beautified by the
serene light of the imagination. He cannot conceive simple and majestic
groupes of human figures and characters acting on the theatre of real
existence. But his pictures of nature are fine only as imaging the
dreaminess, and obscurity, and confusion of distempered sleep; while all
his agents pass before our eyes like shadows, and only impress and
affect us with a phantasmagorial splendour.
It is impossible to read many pages of this work without thinking that
Mr. Coleridge conceives himself to be a far greater man than the Public
is likely to admit; and we wish to waken him from what seems to us a
most ludicrous delusion. He seems to believe that every tongue is
wagging in his praise--that every ear is open to imbibe the oracular
breathings of his inspiration. Even when he would fain convince us that
his soul is wholly occupied with some other illustrious character, he
breaks out into laudatory exclamations concerning himself; no sound is
so sweet to him as that of his own voice; the ground is hallowed on
which his footsteps tread; and there seems to him something more than
human in his very shadow. He will read no books that other people read;
his scorn is as misplaced and extravagant as his admiration; opinions
that seem to tally with his own wild ravings are holy and inspired; and
unless agreeable to his creed, the wisdom of ages is folly; and wits,
whom the world worship, dwarfed when they approach his venerable side.
His admiration of nature or of man, we had almost said his religious
feelings towards his God, are all narrowed, weakened, and corrupted, and
poisoned by inveterate and diseased egotism; and instead of his mind
reflecting the beauty and glory of nature, he seems to consider the
mighty universe itself as nothing better than a mirror in which, with a
grinning and idiot self-complacency, he may contemplate the Physiognomy
of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Though he has yet done nothing in any one
department of human knowledge, yet he speaks of his theories, and plans,
and views, and discoveries, as if he had produced some memorable
revolution in Science. He at all times connects his own name in Poetry
with Shakespeare, and Spenser, and Milton; in politics with Burke, and
Fox, and Pitt; in metaphysics with Locke, and Hartley, and Berkely, and
Kant--feeling himself not only to be the worthy compeer of those
illustrious Spirits, but to unite, in his own mighty intellect, all the
glorious powers and faculties by which they were separately
distinguished, as if his soul were endowed with all human power, and was
the depository of the aggregate, or rather the essence of all human
knowledge. So deplorable a delusion as this, has only been equalled by
that of Joanna Southcote, who mistook a complaint in the bowels for the
divine afflatus; and believed herself about to give birth to the
regenerator of the world, when sick unto death of an incurable and
loathsome disease.
The truth is that Mr. Coleridge is but an obscure name in English
literature. In London he is well known in literary society, and justly
admired for his extraordinary loquacity: he has his own little circle of
devoted worshippers, and he mistakes their foolish babbling for the
voice of the world. His name, too, has been often foisted into Reviews,
and accordingly is known to many who never saw any of his works. In
Scotland few know or care any thing about him; and perhaps no man who
has spoken and written so much, and occasionally with so much genius and
ability, ever made so little impression on the public mind. Few people
know how to spell or pronounce his name; and were he to drop from the
clouds among any given number of well informed and intelligent men north
of the Tweed, he would find it impossible to make any intelligible
communication respecting himself; for of him and his writings there
would prevail only a perplexing dream, or the most untroubled ignorance.
We cannot see in what the state of literature would have been different
had he been cut off in childhood, or had he never been born; for except
a few wild and fanciful ballads, he has produced nothing worthy
remembrance. Yet, insignificant as he assuredly is, he cannot put pen to
paper without a feeling that millions of eyes are fixed upon him; and he
scatters his Sibylline Leaves around him, with as majestical an air as
if a crowd of enthusiastic admirers were rushing forward to grasp the
divine promulgations, instead of their being, as in fact they are,
coldly received by the accidental passenger, like a lying lottery puff
or a quack advertisement.
This most miserable arrogance seems, in the present age, confined almost
exclusively to the original members of the Lake School, and is, we
think, worthy of especial notice, as one of the leading features of
their character. It would be difficult to defend it either in Southey or
Wordsworth; but in Coleridge it is altogether ridiculous. Southey has
undoubtedly written four noble Poems--Thalaba, Madoc, Kehama, and
Roderick; and if the Poets of this age are admitted, by the voice of
posterity, to take their places by the side of the Mighty of former
times in the Temple of Immortality, he will be one of that sacred
company. Wordsworth, too, with all his manifold errors and defects, has,
we think, won to himself a great name, and, in point of originality,
will be considered as second to no man of this age. They are entitled to
think highly of themselves, in comparison with their most highly gifted
contemporaries; and therefore, though their arrogance may be offensive,
as it often is, it is seldom or ever utterly ridiculous. But Mr.
Coleridge stands on much lower ground, and will be known to future times
only as a man who overrated and abused his talents--who saw glimpses of
that glory which he could not grasp--who presumptuously came forward to
officiate as High-Priest at mysteries beyond his ken--and who carried
himself as if he had been familiarly admitted into the Penetralia of
Nature, when in truth he kept perpetually stumbling at the very
Threshold.
This absurd self-elevation forms a striking contrast with the dignified
deportment of all the other great living Poets. Throughout all the works
of Scott, the most original-minded man of this generation of Poets,
scarcely a single allusion is made to himself; and then it is with a
truly delightful simplicity, as if he were not aware of his immeasurable
superiority to the ordinary run of mankind. From the rude songs of our
forefathers he has created a kind of Poetry, which at once brought over
the dull scenes of this our unimaginative life all the pomp, and glory,
and magnificence of a chivalrous age. He speaks to us like some ancient
Bard awakened from his tomb, and singing of visions not revealed in
dreams, but contemplated in all the freshness and splendour of reality.
Since he sung his bold, and wild, and romantic lays, a more religious
solemnity breathes from our mouldering Abbeys, and a sterner grandeur
frowns over our time-shattered Castles. He has peopled our hills with
Heroes, even as Ossian peopled them; and, like a presiding spirit, his
Image haunts the magnificent cliffs of our Lakes and Seas. And if he be,
as every heart feels, the author of those noble Prose Works that
continue to flash upon the world, to him exclusively belongs the glory
of wedding Fiction and History in delighted union, and of embodying in
imperishable records the manners, character, soul, and spirit of
Caledonia; so that, if all her annals were lost, her memory would in
those tales be immortal. His truly is a name that comes to the heart of
every Briton with a start of exultation, whether it be heard in the hum
of cities or in the solitude of nature. What has Campbell ever obtruded
on the Public of his private history? Yet his is a name that will be
hallowed for ever in the souls of pure, and aspiring, and devout youth;
and to those lofty contemplations in which Poetry lends its aid to
Religion, his immortal Muse will impart a more enthusiastic glow, while
it blends in one majestic hymn all the noblest feelings which can spring
from earth, with all the most glorious hopes that come from the silence
of eternity. Byron indeed speaks of himself often, but his is like the
voice of an angel heard crying in the storm or the whirlwind; and we
listen with a kind of mysterious dread to the tones of a Being whom we
scarcely believe to be kindred to ourselves, while he sounds the depths
of our nature, and illuminates them with the lightnings of his genius.
And finally, who more gracefully unostentatious than Moore, a Poet who
has shed delight, and joy, and rapture, and exultation, through the
spirit of an enthusiastic People, and whose name is associated in his
native Land with every thing noble and glorious in the cause of
Patriotism and Liberty. We could easily add to the illustrious list; but
suffice it to say, that our Poets do in general bear their faculties
meekly and manfully, trusting to their conscious powers, and the
susceptibility of generous and enlightened natures, not yet extinct in
Britain, whatever Mr. Coleridge may think; for certain it is, that a
host of worshippers will crowd into the Temple, when the Priest is
inspired, and the flame he kindles is from Heaven.
Such has been the character of great Poets in all countries and in all
times. Fame is dear to them as their vital existence--but they love it
not with the perplexity of fear, but the calmness of certain possession.
They know that the debt which nature owes them must be paid, and they
hold in surety thereof the universal passions of mankind. So Milton felt
and spoke of himself, with an air of grandeur, and the voice as of an
Archangel, distinctly hearing in his soul the music of after
generations, and the thunder of his mighty name rolling through the
darkness of futurity. So divine Shakespeare felt and spoke; he cared not
for the mere acclamations of his subjects; in all the gentleness of his
heavenly spirit he felt himself to be their prophet and their king, and
knew,
When all the breathers of this world are dead,
That he entombed in men's eyes would lie.
Indeed, who that knows any thing of Poetry could for a moment suppose it
otherwise? Whatever made a great Poet but the inspiration of delight and
love in himself, and an empassioned desire to communicate them to the
wide spirit of kindred existence? Poetry, like Religion, must be free
from all grovelling feelings; and above all, from jealousy, envy, and
uncharitableness. And the true Poet, like the Preacher of the true
religion, will seek to win unto himself and his Faith, a belief whose
foundation is in the depths of love, and whose pillars are the noblest
passions of humanity.
It would seem that in truly great souls all feeling of self-importance,
in its narrower sense, must be incompatible with the consciousness of a
mighty achievement. The idea of the mere faculty or power is absorbed as
it were in the idea of the work performed. That work stands out in its
glory from the mind of its Creator; and in the contemplation of it, he
forgets that he himself was the cause of its existence, or feels only a
dim but sublime association between himself and the object of his
admiration; and when he does think of himself in conjunction with
others, he feels towards the scoffer only a pitying sorrow for his
blindness--being assured, that though at all times there will be
weakness, and ignorance, and worthlessness, which can hold no communion
with him or with his thoughts, so will there be at all times the pure,
the noble, and the pious, whose delight it will be to love, to admire,
and to imitate; and that never, at any point of time, past, present, or
to come, can a true Poet be defrauded of his just fame.
But we need not speak of poets alone (though we have done so at present
to expose the miserable pretensions of Mr. Coleridge), but look through
all the bright ranks of men distinguished by mental power, in whatever
department of human science. It is our faith, that without moral there
can be no intellectual grandeur; and surely the self-conceit and
arrogance which we have been exposing, are altogether incompatible with
lofty feelings and majestic principles. It is the Dwarf alone who
endeavours to strut himself into the height of the surrounding company;
but the man of princely stature seems unconscious of the strength in
which nevertheless he rejoices, and only sees his superiority in the
gaze of admiration which he commands. Look at the most inventive spirits
of this country,--those whose intellects have achieved the most
memorable triumphs. Take, for example, Leslie in physical science, and
what airs of majesty does he ever assume? What is Samuel Coleridge
compared to such a man? What is an ingenious and fanciful versifier to
him who has, like a magician, gained command over the very elements of
nature,--who has realized the fictions of Poetry,--and to whom Frost and
Fire are ministering and obedient spirits? But of this enough.--It is a
position that doubtless might require some modification, but in the
main, it is and must be true, that real Greatness, whether in Intellect,
Genius, or Virtue, is dignified and unostentatious; and that no potent
spirit ever whimpered over the blindness of the age to his merits, and,
like Mr. Coleridge, or a child blubbering for the moon, with clamorous
outcries implored and imprecated reputation.
The very first sentence of this Literary Biography shows how incompetent
Mr. Coleridge is for the task he has undertaken.
It has been my lot to have had my name introduced both in conversation
and in print, more frequently than I find it easy to explain; _whether
I consider the fewness, unimportance, and limited circulation of my
writings, or the retirement and distance in which I have lived, both
from the literary and political world_.
Now, it is obvious, that if his writings be few, and unimportant, and
unknown, Mr. Coleridge can have no reason for composing his Literary
Biography. Yet in singular contradiction to himself--
"If," says he, at p. 217, vol. i, "_the compositions which I have made
public_, and that too in a form the most certain of an extensive
circulation, though the least flattering to an author's self-love, had
been published in books, they _would have filled a respectable number of
volumes."_
He then adds,
Seldom have I written that in a day, the acquisition or investigation
of which had not cost me _the precious labour of a month!_
He then bursts out into this magnificent exclamation,
Would that the criterion of a scholar's ability were the number and
moral value of the truths which he has been the means of throwing
into general circulation!
And he sums up all by declaring,
By what I _have_ effected am I to be judged by my fellow men.
The truth is, that Mr. Coleridge has lived, as much as any man of his
time, in literary and political society, and that he has sought every
opportunity of keeping himself in the eye of the public, as restlessly
as any charlatan who ever exhibited on the stage. To use his own words,
"In 1794, when I had barely passed the verge of manhood, I published a
small volume of juvenile poems." These poems, by dint of puffing,
reached a third edition; and though Mr. Coleridge pretends now to think
but little of them, it is amusing to see how vehemently he defends them
against criticism, and how pompously he speaks of such paltry trifles.
"They were marked _by an ease and simplicity_ which I have studied,
_perhaps with inferior success,_ to bestow on my latter compositions."
But he afterwards repents of this sneer at his later compositions, and
tells us, that they have nearly reached his standard of perfection!
Indeed, his vanity extends farther back than his juvenile poems; and he
says, "For a school boy, I was _above par in English versification_, and
had already produced two or three compositions, which I may venture to
say, _without reference to my age, were somewhat above mediocrity_."
Happily he has preserved one of those wonderful productions of his
precocious boyhood, and our readers will judge for themselves what a
clever child it was.
Underneath a huge oak-tree,
There was of swine a huge company;
That grunted as they crunch'd the mast,
For that was ripe and fell full fast.
Then they trotted away for the wind grew high,
One acorn they left and no more might you spy.
It is a common remark, that wonderful children seldom perform the
promises of their youth, and undoubtedly this fine effusion has not been
followed in Mr. Coleridge's riper years by works of proportionate merit.
We see, then, that our author came very early into public notice; and
from that time to this, he has not allowed one year to pass without
endeavouring to extend his notoriety. His poems were soon followed (they
may have been preceded) by a tragedy, entitled, the "Fall of
Robespierre," a meagre performance, but one which, from the nature of
the subject, attracted considerable attention. He also wrote a whole
book, utterly incomprehensible to Mr. Southey, we are sure, on that
Poet's Joan of Arc; and became as celebrated for his metaphysical
absurdities, as his friend had become for the bright promise of genius
exhibited by that unequal, but spirited poem. He next published a Series
of political essays, entitled, the "Watchman," and "Conciones ad
Populum." He next started up, fresh from the schools of Germany, as the
principal writer in the Morning Post, a _strong opposition paper_. He
then published various outrageous political poems, some of them of a
gross personal nature. He afterwards assisted Mr. Wordsworth in planning
his Lyrical Ballads; and contributing several poems to that collection,
he shared in the notoriety of the Lake School. He next published a
mysterious periodical work, "The Friend," in which he declared it was
his intention to settle at once, and for ever, the principles of
morality, religion, taste, manners, and the fine arts, but which died of
a galloping consumption in the twenty-eighth week of its age. He then
published the tragedy of "Remorse," which dragged out a miserable
existence of twenty nights, on the boards of Drury-Lane, and then
expired for ever, like the oil of the orchestral lamps. He then forsook
the stage for the pulpit, and, by particular desire of his congregation,
published two "Lay Sermons." He then walked in broad day-light into the
shop of Mr. Murray, Albemarle Street, London, with two ladies hanging on
each arm, Geraldine and Christabel,--a bold step for a person at all
desirous of a good reputation, and most of the trade have looked shy at
him since that exhibition. Since that time, however, he has contrived
means of giving to the world a collected edition of all his poems, and
advanced to the front of the stage with a thick octavo in each hand, all
about himself and other Incomprehensibilities. We had forgot that he was
likewise a contributor to Mr. Southey's Omniana, where the Editor of the
Edinburgh Review is politely denominated an "ass," and then _became
himself a writer in the said Review_. And to sum up "the strange
eventful history" of this modest, and obscure, and retired person, we
must mention, that in his youth he held forth in a vast number of
Unitarian chapels--preached his way through Bristol, and "Brummagem,"
and Manchester, in a "blue coat and white waistcoat"; and in after
years, when he was not so much afraid of "the scarlet woman," did, in a
full suit of sables, lecture on Poesy, to "crowded, and, need I add,
highly respectable audiences," at the Royal Institution. After this
slight and imperfect outline of his poetical, oratorical, metaphysical,
political, and theological exploits, our readers will judge, when they
hear him talking of "his retirement and distance from the literary and
political world," what are his talents for autobiography, and how far he
has penetrated into the mysterious non-entities of his own character.
Mr. Coleridge has written conspicuously on the Association of Ideas, but
his own do not seem to be connected either by time, place, cause and
effect, resemblance, or contrast, and accordingly it is no easy matter
to follow him through all the vagaries of his Literary Life. We are
told,
At school _I enjoyed the inestimable advantage_ of a very sensible,
though at the same time a very severe master.--I learnt from
him that Poetry, even that of the loftiest and wildest odes, had a
logic of its own as severe as that of science.--Lute, harp, and lyre;
muse, muses, and inspirations; Pegasus, Parnassus, and Hippocrene;
were all an abomination to him. In fancy I can almost hear him now
exclaiming, _"Harp? Harp? Lyre? Pen and Ink! Boy you mean! Muse! boy!
Muse! your Nurse's daughter you mean! Pierian Spring! O Aye! the
cloister Pump!"_--Our classical knowledge was the least of the good
gifts which we derived from his zealous and conscientious tutorage.
With the then head-master of the grammar-school, Christ Hospital, we
were not personally acquainted; but we cannot help thinking that he has
been singularly unfortunate in his Eulogist. He seems to have gone out
of his province, and far out of his depth, when he attempted to teach
boys the profoundest principles of Poetry. But we must also add, that we
cannot credit this account of him; for this doctrine of poetry being at
all times logical, is that of which Wordsworth and Coleridge take so
much credit to themselves for the discovery; and verily it is one too
wilfully absurd and extravagant to have entered into the head of an
honest man, whose time must have been wholly occupied with the
instruction of children. Indeed Mr. Coleridge's own poetical practices
render this story incredible; for, during many years of his authorship,
his diction was wholly at variance with such a rule, and the strain of
his poetry as illogical as can be well imagined. When Mr. Bowyer
prohibited his pupils from using, in their themes, the above-mentioned
names, he did, we humbly submit, prohibit them from using the best means
of purifying their taste and exalting their imagination. Nothing could
be so graceful, nothing so natural, as classical allusions, in the
exercises of young minds, when first admitted to the fountains of Greek
and Latin Poetry; and the Teacher who could seek to dissuade their
ingenious souls from such delightful dreams, by coarse, vulgar, and
indecent ribaldry, instead of deserving the name of "sensible," must
have been a low-minded vulgar fellow, fitter for the Porter than the
Master of such an Establishment. But the truth probably is, that all
this is a fiction of Mr. Coleridge, whose wit is at all times most
execrable and disgusting. Whatever the merits of his Master were, Mr.
Coleridge, even from his own account, seems to have derived little
benefit from his instruction, and for the "inestimable advantage," of
which he speaks, we look in vain through this Narrative. In spite of so
excellent a teacher, we find Master Coleridge,
Even before my fifteenth year, bewildered _in metaphysicks and in
theological controversy_. Nothing else pleased me. _History and
particular facts_ lost all interest in my mind. Poetry itself, yea
novels and romances, became insipid to me. This preposterous pursuit
was beyond doubt _injurious, both to my natural powers and to the
progress of my education._
This deplorable condition of mind continued "even unto my seventeenth
year." And now our readers must prepare themselves for a mighty and
wonderful change, wrought, all on a sudden, on the moral and
intellectual character of this metaphysical Greenhorn. _"Mr. Bowles'
Sonnets, twenty in number, and just then published in a quarto volume_
(a most important circumstance!) _were put into my hand!"_ To those
sonnets, next to the School-master's lectures on Poetry, Mr. Coleridge
attributes the strength, vigour, and extension, of his own very original
Genius.
By those works, year after year, I was enthusiastically delighted and
inspired. My earliest acquaintances will not have forgotten the
undisciplined eagerness and impetuous zeal with which I labored to
make proselytes, not only _of my companions, but of all with whom I
conversed, of whatever rank, and in whatever place._ As my school
finances did not permit me to purchase copies, I made, within less
than a year and a half, _more than forty transcriptions, as the best
presents I could make to those who had in any way won my regard._ My
obligations to Mr. Bowles were indeed important, and for radical good!
There must be some grievous natural defect in that mind which, even at
the age of seventeen, could act so insanely; and we cannot but think,
that no real and healthy sensibility could have exaggerated to itself so
grossly the merits of Bowles' Sonnets. They are undoubtedly most
beautiful, and we willingly pay our tribute of admiration to the genius
of the amiable writer; but they neither did nor could produce any such
effects as are here described, except upon a mind singularly weak and
helpless. We must, however, take the fact as we find it; and Mr.
Coleridge's first step, after his worship of Bowles, was to see
distinctly into the defects and deficiencies of Pope (a writer whom
Bowles most especially admires, and has edited), and through all the
false diction and borrowed plumage of Gray! But here Mr. Coleridge drops
the subject of Poetry for the present, and proceeds to other important
matters.
We regret that Mr. Coleridge has passed over without notice all the
years which he spent "in the happy quiet of ever-honoured Jesus College,
Cambridge." That must have been the most important period of his life,
and was surely more worthy of record than the metaphysical dreams or the
poetical extravagancies of his boyhood. He tells us, that he was sent to
the University "an excellent Greek and Latin scholar, and a tolerable
Hebraist"; and there might have been something rousing and elevating to
young minds of genius and power, in his picture of himself, pursuits,
visions, and attainments, during the bright and glorious morning of
life, when he inhabited a dwelling of surpassing magnificence, guarded
and hallowed, and sublimed by the Shadows of the Mighty. We should wish
to know what progress he made there in his own favourite studies; what
place he occupied, or supposed he occupied, among his numerous
contemporaries of talent; how much he was inspired by the genius of the
place; how far he "pierced the caves of old Philosophy," or sounded the
depths of the Physical Sciences. All this unfortunately is omitted, and
he hurries on to details often trifling and uninfluential, sometimes
low, vile, and vulgar, and, what is worse, occasionally inconsistent
with any feeling of personal dignity and self-respect.
After leaving College, instead of betaking himself to some respectable
calling, Mr. Coleridge, with his characteristic modesty, determined to
set on foot a periodical work called "The Watchman," that through it
"_all might know the truth_." The price of this very useful article was
_"four-pence."_ Off he set on a tour to the north to procure
subscribers, "preaching in most of the great towns as a hireless
Volunteer, in a blue coat and white waistcoat, that not a rag of the
Woman of Babylon might be seen on me." In preaching, his object was to
show that our Saviour was the real son of Joseph, and that the
Crucifixion was a matter of small importance. Mr. Coleridge is now a
most zealous member of the Church of England--devoutly believes every
iota in the thirty-nine articles, and that the Christian Religion is
only to be found in its purity in the homilies and liturgy of that
Church. Yet, on looking back to his Unitarian zeal, he exclaims,
O, never can I remember those days _with either shame or regret!_
For I was _most sincere, most disinterested! Wealth, rank, life
itself,_ then seem'd cheap to me, compared with the interests of
truth, and the will of my Maker. I cannot even accuse myself of having
been actuated by _vanity!_ for in the expansion of my enthusiasm _I
did not think of myself at all!_
This is delectable. What does he mean by saying that life seemed cheap?
What danger could there be in the performance of his exploits, except
that of being committed as a Vagrant? What indeed could rank appear to a
person thus voluntarily degraded? Or who would expect vanity to be
conscious of its own loathsomeness? During this tour he seems to have
been constantly exposed to the insults of the vile and the vulgar, and
to have associated with persons whose company must have been most odious
to a Gentleman. Greasy Tallow-chandlers, and pursey Woollen-drapers, and
grim-featured dealers in Hard-ware, were his associates at Manchester,
Derby, Nottingham, and Sheffield; and among them the light of truth was
to be shed from its cloudy tabernacle in Mr. Coleridge's Pericranium. At
the house of a "Brummagem Patriot" he appears to have got dead drunk
with strong ale and tobacco, and in that pitiable condition he was
exposed to his disciples, lying upon a sofa, "with my face like a wall
that is white-washing, _deathly_ pale, and with the cold drops of
perspiration running down it from my forehead." Some one having said,
"Have you seen a paper to-day, Mr. Coleridge?" the wretched man replied,
with all the staring stupidity of his lamentable condition, "Sir! I am
far from convinced that a Christian is permitted to read either
newspapers, or any other works of merely political and temporary
interest." This witticism quite enchanted his enlightened auditors, and
they prolonged their festivities to an "early hour next morning." Having
returned to London with a thousand subscribers on his list, the
"Watchman" appeared in all his glory; but, alas! not on the day fixed
for the first burst of his effulgence; which foolish delay incensed many
of his subscribers. The Watchman, on his second appearance, spoke
blasphemously, and made indecent applications of Scriptural language;
then, instead of abusing Government and Aristocrats, as Mr. Coleridge
had pledged himself to his constituents to do, he attacked his own
Party; so that in seven weeks, before the shoes were old in which he
travelled to Sheffield, the Watchman went the way of all flesh, and his
remains were scattered "through sundry old iron shops," where for one
penny could be purchased each precious relic. To crown all, "his London
Publisher was a ----"; and Mr. Coleridge very narrowly escaped being
thrown into jail for this his heroic attempt to shed over the
manufacturing towns the illumination of knowledge. We refrain from
making any comments on this deplorable story. This Philosopher, and
Theologian, and Patriot, now retired to a village in Somersetshire, and,
after having sought to enlighten the whole world, discovered that he
himself was in utter darkness.
Doubts rushed in, broke upon me from the fountains of the great
deep, and fell from the windows of heaven. The fontal truths of
natural Religion, and the book of Revelation, alike contributed to the
flood; and it was long ere my Ark touched upon Ararat, and rested.
My head was with Spinoza, though my heart was with Paul and John....
We have no room here to expose, as it deserves to be exposed, the
multitudinous political inconsistence of Mr. Coleridge, but we beg leave
to state one single fact: He abhorred, hated, and despised Mr. Pitt,--
and he now loves and reveres his memory. By far the most spirited and
powerful of his poetical writings, is the War Eclogue, Slaughter, Fire,
and Famine; and in that composition he loads the Minister with
imprecations and curses, long, loud, and deep. But afterwards, when he
has thought it prudent to change his Principles, he denies that he ever
felt any indignation towards Mr. Pitt; and with the most unblushing
falsehood declares, that at the very moment his muse was consigning him
to infamy, death, and damnation, he would "have interposed his body
between him and danger." We believe that all good men, of all parties,
regard Mr. Coleridge with pity and contempt.
Of the latter days of his literary life, Mr. Coleridge gives us no
satisfactory account. The whole of the second volume is interspersed
with mysterious inuendoes. He complains of the loss of all his friends,
not by death, but estrangement. He tries to account for the enmity of
the world to him, a harmless and humane man, who wishes well to all
created things, and "of his wondering finds no end." He upbraids himself
with indolence, procrastination, neglect of his worldly concerns, and
all other bad habits,--and then, with incredible inconsistency, vaunts
loudly of his successful efforts in the cause of Literature, Philosophy,
Morality, and Religion. Above all, he weeps and wails over the malignity
of Reviewers, who have persecuted him almost from his very cradle, and
seem resolved to bark him into the grave. He is haunted by the Image of
a Reviewer wherever he goes. They "push him from his stool," and by his
bedside they cry, "Sleep no more." They may abuse whomsoever they think
fit, save himself and Mr. Wordsworth. All others are fair game--and he
chuckles to see them brought down. But his sacred person must be
inviolate, and rudely to touch it, is not high treason, it is impiety.
Yet his "ever-honoured friend, the laurel-honouring Laureate," is a
Reviewer--his friend Mr. Thomas Moore is a Reviewer--his friend Dr.
Middleton, Bishop of Calcutta, was the Editor of a Review--almost every
friend he ever had is a Reviewer;--and to crown all, he himself is a
Reviewer. Every person who laughs at his silly Poems--and his
incomprehensible metaphysics, is malignant--in which case, there can be
little benevolence in this world; and while Mr. Francis Jeffrey is alive
and merry, there can be no happiness here below for Mr. Samuel
Coleridge.
And here we come to speak of a matter, which, though somewhat of a
personal and private nature, is well deserving of mention in a Review of
Mr. Coleridge's Literary Life, for sincerity is the first of virtues,
and without it no man can be respectable or useful. He has, in this
Work, accused Mr. Jeffrey of meanness--hypocrisy--falsehood--and breach
of hospitality. That gentleman is able to defend himself--and his
defence is no business of ours. But we now tell Mr. Coleridge, that
instead of humbling his Adversary, he has heaped upon his own head the
ashes of disgrace--and with his own blundering hands, so stained his
character as a man of honour and high principles, that the mark can
never be effaced. All the most offensive attacks on the writings of
Wordsworth and Southey, had been made by Mr. Jeffrey before his visit to
Keswick. Yet, does Coleridge receive him with open arms, according to
his own account--listen, well-pleased, to all his compliments--talk to
him for hours on his Literary Projects--dine with him as his guest at an
Inn--tell him that he knew Mr. Wordsworth would be most happy to see
him--and in all respects behave to him with a politeness bordering on
servility. And after all this, merely because his own vile verses were
crumpled up like so much waste paper, by the grasp of a powerful hand in
the Edinburgh Review, he accuses Mr. Jeffrey of abusing hospitality
which he never received, and forgets, that instead of being the Host, he
himself was the smiling and obsequious Guest of the man he pretends to
have despised. With all this miserable forgetfulness of dignity and
self-respect, he mounts the high horse, from which he instantly is
tumbled into the dirt; and in his angry ravings collects together all
the foul trash of literary gossip to fling at his adversary, but which
is blown stifling back upon himself with odium and infamy. But let him
call to mind his own conduct, and talk not of Mr. Jeffrey. Many
witnesses are yet living of his own egotism and malignity; and often has
he heaped upon his "beloved Friend, the laurel-honouring Laureate,"
epithets of contempt, and pity, and disgust, though now it may suit his
paltry purposes to worship and idolize. Of Mr. Southey we at all times
think, and shall speak, with respect and admiration; but his open
adversaries are, like Mr. Jeffrey, less formidable than his unprincipled
Friends. When Greek and Trojan meet on the plain, there is an interest
in the combat; but it is hateful and painful to think, that a hero
should be wounded behind his back, and by a poisoned stiletto in the
hand of a false Friend.
The concluding chapter of this Biography is perhaps the most pitiful of
the whole, and contains a most surprising mixture of the pathetic and
the ludicrous.
"Strange," says he, "as the delusion may appear, yet it is most
true, that three years ago I did not know or believe that I had an
enemy in the world; and now even my strongest consolations of
gratitude are mingled with fear, and I reproach myself for being too
often disposed to ask,--Have I one friend?"
We are thus prepared for the narration of some grievous cruelty, or
ingratitude, or malice--some violation of his peace, or robbery of his
reputation; but our readers will start when they are informed, that this
melancholy lament is occasioned solely by the cruel treatment which his
poem of Christabel received from the Edinburgh Review and other
periodical Journals! It was, he tells us, universally admired in
manuscript--he recited it many hundred times to men, women, and
children, and always with an electrical effect--it was bepraised by most
of the great Poets of the day--and for twenty years he was urged to give
it to the world. But alas! no sooner had the Lady Christabel "come out,"
than all the rules of good-breeding and politeness were broken through,
and the loud laugh of scorn and ridicule from every quarter assailed the
ears of the fantastic Hoyden. But let Mr. Coleridge be consoled. Mr.
Scott and Lord Byron are good-natured enough to admire Christabel, and
the Public have not forgotten that his Lordship handed her Ladyship upon
the stage. It is indeed most strange, that Mr., Coleridge is not
satisfied with the praise of those he admires,--but pines away for the
commendation of those he contemns.
Having brought down his literary life to the great epoch of the
publication of Christabel, he there stops short; and that the world may
compare him as he appears at that aera to his former self, when "he set
sail from Yarmouth on the morning of the 10th September, 1798, in the
Hamburg Packet," he has republished, from his periodical work the
"Friend," seventy pages of Satyrane's Letters. As a specimen of his wit
in 1798, our readers may take the following:--
We were all on the deck, but in a short time I observed marks of
dismay. The Lady retired to the cabin in some confusion; and many
of the faces round me assumed a very doleful and frog-coloured
appearance; and within an hour the number of those on deck was
lessened by one half. I was giddy, but not sick; and the giddiness
soon went away, but left a feverishness and want of appetite, which I
attributed, in great measure, to the "_saeva mephitis_" of the
bilge-water; and it was certainly not decreased by the _exportations
from the cabin_. However, I was well enough to join the able-bodied
passengers, one of whom observed, not inaptly, that Momus might have
discovered an easier _way to see a man's inside_ than by placing a
window in his breast. He needed only have taken a salt-water trip in a
packet boat. I am inclined to believe, that a packet is far superior
to a stage-coach as a means of making men _open out to each other_!
The importance of his observations during the voyage may be estimated by
this one:--
At four o'clock I observed a wild duck swimming on the waves,_a single
solitary wild duck!_ It is not easy to conceive how interesting a
thing it looked in that round objectless desert of waters!
At the house of Klopstock, brother of the Poet, he saw a portrait of
Lessing, which he thus describes to the Public:--"His eyes were
uncommonly _like mine_! if any thing, rather larger and more prominent!
But the lower part of his face I and his nose--O what an exquisite
expression of elegance and sensibility!" He then gives a long account of
his interview with Klopstock the Poet, in which he makes that great man
talk in a very silly, weak, and ignorant manner. Mr. Coleridge not only
sets him right in all his opinions on English literature, but also is
kind enough to correct, in a very authoritative and dictatorial tone,
his erroneous views of the characteristic merits and defects of the most
celebrated German Writers. He has indeed the ball in his own hands
throughout the whole game; and Klopstock, who, he says, "was
seventy-four years old, with legs enormously swollen," is beaten to a
standstill. We are likewise presented with an account of a conversation
which his friend W. held with the German Poet, in which the author of
the Messiah makes a still more paltry figure. We can conceive nothing
more odious and brutal, than two young ignorant lads from Cambridge
forcing themselves upon the retirement of this illustrious old man, and,
instead of listening with love, admiration and reverence, to his
sentiments and opinions, insolently obtruding upon him their own crude
and mistaken fancies,--contradicting imperiously every thing he
advances,--taking leave of him with a consciousness of their own
superiority,--and, finally, talking of him and his genius in terms of
indifference bordering on contempt. This Mr. W. had the folly and the
insolence to say to Klopstock, who was enthusiastically praising the
Oberon of Wieland, that he never could see the smallest beauty in any
part of that Poem.
We must now conclude our account of this "unaccountable" production. It
has not been in our power to enter into any discussion with Mr.
Coleridge on the various subjects of Poetry and Philosophy, which he
has, we think, vainly endeavoured to elucidate. But we shall, on a
future occasion, meet him on his own favourite ground. No less than 182
pages of the second volume are dedicated to the poetry of Mr.
Wordsworth. He has endeavoured to define poetry--to explain the
philosophy of metre--to settle the boundaries of poetic diction--and to
show, finally, "What it is probable Mr. Wordsworth meant to say in his
dissertation prefixed to his Lyrical Ballads." As Mr. Coleridge has not
only studied the laws of poetical composition, but is a Poet of
considerable powers, there are, in this part of his Book, many acute,
ingenious, and even sensible observations and remarks; but he never
knows when to have done,--explains what requires no explanation,--often
leaves untouched the very difficulty he starts,--and when he has poured
before us a glimpse of light upon the shapeless form of some dark
conception, he seems to take a wilful pleasure in its immediate
extinction, and leads "us floundering on, and quite astray," through the
deepening shadows of interminable night.
One instance there is of magnificent promise, and laughable
non-performance, unequalled in the annals of literary History. Mr.
Coleridge informs us, that he and Mr. Wordsworth (he is not certain which
is entitled to the glory of the first discovery) have found out the
difference between Fancy and Imagination. This discovery, it is
prophesied, will have an incalculable influence on the progress of all
the Fine Arts. He has written a long chapter purposely to prepare our
minds for the great discussion. The audience is assembled--the curtain
is drawn up--and there, in his gown, cap, and wig, is sitting Professor
Coleridge. In comes a servant with a letter; the Professor gets up, and,
with a solemn voice, reads to the audience.--It is from an enlightened
Friend; and its object is to shew, in no very courteous terms either to
the Professor or his Spectators, that he may lecture, but that nobody
will understand him. He accordingly makes his bow, and the curtain
falls; but the worst of the joke is, that the Professor pockets the
admittance-money,--for what reason, his outwitted audience are left, the
best way they can, to "fancy or imagine."
But the greatest piece of Quackery in the Book is his pretended account
of the Metaphysical System of Kant, of which he knows less than nothing.
He wall not allow that there is a single word of truth in any of the
French Expositions of that celebrated System, nor yet in any of our
British Reviews. We do not wish to speak of what we do not understand,
and therefore say nothing of Mr. Coleridge's Metaphysics....
We have done. We have felt it our duty to speak with severity of this
book and its author--and we have given our readers ample opportunities
to judge of the justice of our strictures. We have not been speaking in
the cause of literature only, but, we conceive, in the cause of Morality
and Religion. For it is not fitting that He should be held up as an
example to the rising generation (but, on the contrary, it is most
fitting that he should be exposed as a most dangerous model), who has
alternately embraced, defended, and thrown aside all systems of
Philosophy--and all creeds of Religion,--who seems to have no power of
retaining an opinion,--no trust in the principles which he defends,--but
who fluctuates from theory to theory, according as he is impelled by
vanity, envy, or diseased desire of change,--and who, while he would
subvert and scatter into dust those structures of knowledge, reared by
the wise men of this and other generations, has nothing to erect in
their room but the baseless and air-built fabrics of a dreaming
Imagination.