An evil spirit's on thee, friend! of lat_The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Vol 2 (of 2)

Ev'n from the hour thou cam'st to thy Estate.

Thy mirth all gone, thy kindness, thy discretion,

Th' estate hath prov'd to thee a most complete _possession_.

Shame, shame, old friend! would'st thou be truly best,

Be thy wealth's Lord, not slave! _possessor_ not _possess'd_.

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23, 1802. Included in _P. R._

1802, ii. 317, and _The Friend_, No. 12, Nov. 9, 1809.

Here lies the Devil--ask no other name.

Well--but you mean Lord----? Hush! we mean the same.

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23, 1802. Included in _P. R._

1802, ii. 363, and _The Friend_, No. 12, Nov. 9, 1809.

TO ONE WHO PUBLISHED[964:1] IN PRINT

WHAT HAD BEEN ENTRUSTED TO HIM BY MY FIRESIDE

Two things hast thou made known to half the nation,

My secrets and my want of penetration:

For O! far more than all which thou hast penn'd

It shames me to have call'd a wretch, like thee, my friend!

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23, 1802. Adapted from

Wernicke's _Epigrams_ (Bk. I, No. 12), _An einen falschen Freund._ 'Weil

ich mich dir vertraut, eh' ich dich recht gekennet.'

'_Obscuri sub luce maligna._'--VIRG.

Scarce any scandal, but has a handle;

In truth most falsehoods have their rise;

Truth first unlocks Pandora's box,

And out there fly a host of lies.

Malignant light, by cloudy night,

To precipices it decoys one!

One nectar-drop from Jove's own shop

Will flavour a whole cup of poison.

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23, 1802.

Old Harpy jeers at castles in the air,

And thanks his stars, whenever Edmund speaks,

That such a dupe as that is not his heir--

But know, old Harpy! that these fancy freaks,

Though vain and light, as floating gossamer,

Always amuse, and sometimes mend the heart:

A young man's idlest hopes are still his pleasures,

And fetch a higher price in Wisdom's mart

Than all the unenjoying Miser's treasures.

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23, 1802. Included in _P. R._,

1802, ii. 868. Adapted from Wernicke, Bk. VII, No. 40, _An einen

Geizhals_.

'Steht's einem Geizhals an auf Aelius zu schmähn

Weil er vergebens hofft auf was nicht kann geschehn?'

TO A VAIN YOUNG LADY

Didst thou think less of thy dear self

Far more would others think of thee!

Sweet Anne! the knowledge of thy wealth

Reduces thee to poverty.

Boon Nature gave wit, beauty, health,

On thee as on her darling pitching;

Couldst thou forget thou'rt thus enrich'd

That moment would'st thou become rich in!

And wert thou not so self-bewitch'd,

Sweet Anne! thou wert, indeed, bewitching.

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 23 1802. Included in _The

Friend_, No. 12, Nov. 9, 1809.

A HINT TO PREMIERS AND FIRST CONSULS

FROM AN OLD TRAGEDY, VIZ. AGATHA TO KING ARCHELAUS

Three truths should make thee often think and pause;

The first is, that thou govern'st over men;

The second, that thy power is from the laws;

And this the third, that thou must die!--and then?--

First published in _Morning Post_, Sept. 27, 1802. Included in _Essays,

&c._, iii. 992. First collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 162.

From me, Aurelia! you desired

Your proper praise to know;

Well! you're the FAIR by all admired--

Some twenty years ago.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 2, 1802.

FOR A HOUSE-DOG'S COLLAR

When thieves come, I bark: when gallants, I am still--

So perform both my Master's and Mistress's will.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 2, 1802. Included in _The

Friend_ (title, 'For a French House-Dog's Collar'), No. 12, Nov. 9,

1809.

In vain I praise thee, Zoilus!

In vain thou rail'st at me!

Me no one credits, Zoilus!

And no one credits thee!

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 2, 1802. Adapted from a Latin

Epigram 'In Zoilum,' by George Buchanan:

'Frustra ego te laudo, frustra

Me, Zoile, laedis;

Nemo mihi credit,

Zoile, nemo, tibi.'

EPITAPH ON A MERCENARY MISER

A poor benighted Pedlar knock'd

One night at SELL-ALL'S door,

The same who saved old SELL-ALL'S life--

'Twas but the year before!

And Sell-all rose and let him in,

Not utterly unwilling,

But first he bargain'd with the man,

And took his only shilling!

That night he dreamt he'd given away his pelf,

Walk'd in his sleep, and sleeping hung himself!

And now his soul and body rest below;

And here they say his punishment and fate is

To lie awake and every hour to know

How many people read his tombstone GRATIS.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 9, 1802.

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN AN AUTHOR

AND HIS FRIEND

_Author._ Come; your opinion of my manuscript!

_Friend._ Dear Joe! I would almost as soon be whipt.

_Author._ But I _will_ have it!

_Friend._ If it must be had--(_hesitating_)

You write so ill, I scarce could read the hand--

_Author._ A mere evasion!

_Friend._ And you spell so bad,

That what I read I could not understand.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

+Môrosophia+ OR WISDOM IN FOLLY

Tom Slothful talks, as slothful Tom beseems,

What he shall shortly gain and what be doing,

Then drops asleep, and so prolongs his dreams

And thus _enjoys_ at once what half the world are _wooing_.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

Each Bond-street buck conceits, unhappy elf!

He shews his _clothes_! Alas! he shews _himself_.

O that they knew, these overdrest self-lovers,

What hides the body oft the mind discovers.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

FROM AN OLD GERMAN POET

That France has put us oft to rout

With _powder_, which ourselves found out;

And laughs at us for fools in _print_,

Of which our genius was the Mint;

All this I easily admit,

For we have genius, France has wit.

But 'tis too bad, that blind and mad

To Frenchmen's wives each travelling German goes,

Expands his manly vigour by _their_ sides,

Becomes the father of his country's foes

And turns _their warriors_ oft to parricides.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802. Adapted from

Wernicke's _Epigrams_ (Bk. VIII, No. 4), _Auf die Buhlerey der Deutschen

in Frankreich_.

'Dass Frankreich uns pflegt zu verwunden

Durch Pulver, welches wir erfunden.'

ON THE CURIOUS CIRCUMSTANCE,

THAT IN THE GERMAN LANGUAGE THE SUN IS FEMININE, AND

THE MOON IS MASCULINE

Our English poets, bad and good, agree

To make the Sun a male, the Moon a she.

He drives HIS dazzling diligence on high,

In verse, as constantly as in the sky;

And cheap as blackberries our sonnets shew

The Moon, Heaven's huntress, with HER silver bow;

By which they'd teach us, if I guess aright,

Man rules the day, and woman rules the night.

In Germany, they just reverse the thing;

The Sun becomes a queen, the Moon a king.

Now, that the Sun should represent the women,

The Moon the men, to me seem'd mighty humming;

And when I first read German, made me stare.

Surely it is not that the wives are there

As _common_ as the Sun, to lord and loon,

And all their husbands _hornéd_ as the Moon.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802. Adapted from

Wernicke's _Epigrams_ (Bk. VII, No. 15), _Die Sonne und der Mond_.

'Die Sonn' heisst die, der Mond heisst der

In unsrer Sprach', und kommt daher,

Weil meist die Fraun wie die _gemein_,

Wie der _gehörnt_ wir Männer sein.'

SPOTS IN THE SUN

My father confessor is strict and holy,

_Mi Fili_, still he cries, _peccare noli_.

And yet how oft I find the pious man

At Annette's door, the lovely courtesan!

Her soul's deformity the good man wins

And not her charms! he comes to hear her sins!

Good father! I would fain not do thee wrong;

But ah! I fear that they who oft and long

Stand gazing at the sun, to count each spot,

_Must_ sometimes find the sun itself too hot.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

When Surface talks of other people's worth

He has the weakest memory on earth!

And when his own good deeds he deigns to mention,

His _memory_ still is no whit better grown;

But then he makes up for it, all will own,

By a prodigious talent of _invention_.

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

TO MY CANDLE

THE FAREWELL EPIGRAM

Good Candle, thou that with thy brother, Fire,

Art my best friend and comforter at night,

Just snuff'd, thou look'st as if thou didst desire

That I on thee an epigram should write.

Dear Candle, burnt down to a finger-joint,

Thy own flame is an epigram of sight;

'Tis _short_, and _pointed_, and _all over_ light,

Yet gives _most_ light and burns the keenest at the point.

_Valete et Plaudite._

First published in _Morning Post_, Oct. 11, 1802.

EPITAPH

ON HIMSELF

Here sleeps at length poor Col., and without screaming--

Who died as he had always lived, a-dreaming:

Shot dead, while sleeping, by the Gout within--

Alone, and all unknown, at E'nbro' in an Inn.

'Composed in my sleep for myself while dreaming that I was dying' . . .

at the Black Bull, Edinburgh, Tuesday, Sept. 13, 1803. Sent in a letter

to Thomas Wedgwood, Sept. 16, 1803. First published Cottle's

_Reminiscences_, 1848, p. 467. First collected in 1893.

THE TASTE OF THE TIMES

Some whim or fancy pleases every eye;

For talents premature 'tis now the rage:

In Music how great Handel would have smil'd

T' have seen what crowds are raptur'd with a child!

A Garrick we have had in little Betty--

And now we're told we have a Pitt in Petty!

All must allow, since thus it is decreed,

He is a very _petty_ Pitt indeed!

? 1806.

First printed (from an autograph MS.) by Mr. Bertram Dobell in the

_Athenæum_, Jan. 9, 1904. Now collected for the first time.

ON PITT AND FOX

Britannia's boast, her glory and her pride,

Pitt in his Country's service lived and died:

At length resolv'd, like Pitt had done, to do,

For once to serve his Country, Fox died too!

First published by Mr. B. Dobell in the _Athenæum_, Jan. 6, 1904. This

epigram belongs to the same MS. source as the preceding, 'On the Taste

of the Times,' and may have been the composition of S. T. C.

In _Fugitive Pieces_ (1806) (see _P. W._, 1898, i. 34) Byron published a

reply 'for insertion in the _Morning Chronicle_ to the following

illiberal impromptu on the death of Mr. Fox, which appeared in the

_Morning Post_ [Sept. 26, 1806]:--

"Our Nation's Foes lament on Fox's death,

But bless the hour when Pitt resigned his breath:

These feelings wide let Sense and Truth unclue,

We give the palm where Justice points its due."'

I have little doubt that this 'illiberal impromptu' was published by S.

T. C., who had just returned from Italy and was once more writing for

the press. It is possible that he veiled his initials in the line, 'Let

Sense and Truth unClue.'

An excellent adage commands that we should

Relate of the dead that alone which is good;

But of the great Lord who here lies in lead

We know nothing good but that he is dead.

First published in _The Friend_, No. 12, Nov. 9, 1809. Included in

_Essays, &c._, iii. 986. First collected in _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii.

178.

COMPARATIVE BREVITY OF GREEK AND ENGLISH

+chryson anêr heurôn elipe brochon, autar ho chryson

hon lipen ouch heurôn hêpsen hon heure brochon.+

Jack finding gold left a rope on the ground:

Bill missing his gold used the rope which he found.

First published in _Omniana_, 1812, ii. 123. First collected in _P. and

D. W._ 1877, ii. 374.

EPIGRAM ON THE SECRECY OF A CERTAIN LADY

'She's secret as the grave, allow!'

'I do; I cannot doubt it.

But 'tis a grave with tombstone on,

That tells you all about it.'

First published in _The Courier_, Jan. 3, 1814. Included in _Essays,

&c._, iii. 986. Now collected for the first time.

MOTTO

FOR A TRANSPARENCY DESIGNED BY WASHINGTON ALLSTON AND EXHIBITED AT

BRISTOL ON 'PROCLAMATION DAY'--_June 29, 1814._

We've fought for Peace, and conquer'd it at last,

The rav'ning vulture's leg seems fetter'd fast!

Britons, rejoice! and yet be wary too:

The chain may break, the clipt wing sprout anew.

First published in Cottle's _Early Recollections_, 1836, ii. 145. First

collected 1890.

ANOTHER VERSION

We've conquered us a Peace, like lads true metalled:

And Bankrupt _Nap's_ accounts seem all now settled.

_Ibid._ ii. 145. First collected 1893.

Money, I've heard a wise man say,

Makes herself wings and flies away--

Ah! would she take it in her head

To make a pair for me instead.

First published (from an MS.) in 1893.

MODERN CRITICS

No private grudge they need, no personal spite,

The _viva sectio_ is its own delight!

All enmity, all envy, they disclaim,

Disinterested thieves of our good name--

Cool, sober murderers of their neighbours' fame!

First published in _Biog. Lit._, 1817, ii. 118. First collected in _P.

W._, 1885, ii. 363.

WRITTEN IN AN ALBUM

Parry seeks the Polar ridge,

Rhymes seeks S. T. Coleridge,

Author of Works, whereof--tho' not in Dutch--

The public little knows--the publisher too much.

First published in 1834.

TO A LADY WHO REQUESTED ME TO WRITE

A POEM UPON NOTHING

On nothing, Fanny, shall I write?

Shall I not one charm of thee indite?

The Muse is most unruly,

And vows to sing of what's more free,

More soft, more beautiful than thee;--

And that is _Nothing_, truly!

First published in the _Gazette of Fashion_, Feb. 22, 1822. Reprinted

(by Mr. Bertram Dobell) in _N. and Q._, 10th Series, vol. vi, p. 145.

Now collected for the first time.

SENTIMENTAL

The rose that blushes like the morn,

Bedecks the valleys low;

And so dost thou, sweet infant corn,

My Angelina's toe.

But on the rose there grows a thorn

That breeds disastrous woe;

And so dost thou, remorseless corn,

On Angelina's toe.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 59. First collected _P. and D. W._,

1877, ii. 366.

So Mr. Baker heart did pluck--

And did a-courting go!

And Mr. Baker is a buck;

For why? he _needs_ the _doe_.

First published in _Letters, Conversations, &c._, 1836, ii. 21. First

collected in _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 373.

AUTHORS AND PUBLISHERS

'A heavy wit shall hang at every lord,'

So sung Dan Pope; but 'pon my word,

He was a story-teller,

Or else the times have altered quite;

For wits, or heavy, now, or light

Hang each by a bookseller.

S. T. C.

First published in _News of Literature_, Dec. 10, 1825. See _Arch.

Constable and his Literary Correspondents_, 1873, iii. 482. First

collected in 1893.

THE ALTERNATIVE

This way or that, ye Powers above me!

I of my grief were rid--

Did Enna either really love me,

Or cease to think she did.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 59. Included in _Essays, &c._, iii.

987. First collected in _P. W._, 1885, ii. 364.

In Spain, that land of Monks and Apes,

The thing called Wine doth come from grapes,

But on the noble River Rhine,

The thing called Gripes doth come from Wine!

First published in _Memoirs of C. M. Young_, 1871, p. 221. First

collected in 1893.

INSCRIPTION FOR A TIME-PIECE

Now! It is gone--Our brief hours travel post,

Each with its thought or deed, its Why or How:--

But know, each parting hour gives up a ghost

To dwell within thee--an eternal Now!

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 60. First collected in 1844.

ON THE MOST VERACIOUS ANECDOTIST, AND

SMALL-TALK MAN, THOMAS HILL, ESQ.[974:1]

Tom Hill, who laughs at Cares and Woes,

As nauci--nili--pili--

What is _he_ like, as I suppose?

Why, to be sure, a Rose--a Rose.

At least, no soul that Tom Hill knows

Could e'er recall a _Li-ly_.

Now first published from an MS.

Nothing speaks our mind so well

As to speak Nothing. Come then, tell

Thy Mind in Tears, whoe'er thou be

That ow'st a name to Misery:

None can _fluency_ deny

To Tears, the Language of the Eye.

Now first published from an MS. in the British Museum.

EPITAPH OF THE PRESENT YEAR ON THE

MONUMENT OF THOMAS FULLER

A Lutheran stout, I hold for Goose-and-Gaundry

Both the Pope's Limbo and his fiery Laundry:

No wit e'er saw I in Original Sin,

And no Sin find I in Original Wit;

But if I'm all in the wrong, and, Grin for Grin,

Scorch'd Souls must pay for each too lucky hit,--

Oh, Fuller! much I fear, so vast thy debt,

Thou art not out of Purgatory yet;

Tho' one, eight, three and three this year is reckon'd,

And thou, I think, didst die _sub_ Charles the Second.

Nov. 28, 1833.

Now first published from an MS.

FOOTNOTES:

[951:1] A great, perhaps the greater, number of Coleridge's Epigrams are

adaptations from the German of Wernicke, Lessing, and other less known

epigrammatists. They were sent to the _Morning Post_ and other

periodicals to supply the needs of the moment, and with the rarest

exceptions they were deliberately excluded from the collected editions

of his poetical works which received his own sanction, and were

published in his lifetime. Collected for the first time by Mrs. H. N.

Coleridge and reprinted in the third volume of _Essays on His Own Times_

(1850), they have been included, with additions and omissions, in _P.

and D. W._, 1877-1880, _P. W._, 1885, _P. W._, 1890, and the Illustrated

Edition of Coleridge's _Poems_, issued in 1907. The adaptations from the

German were written and first published between 1799 and 1802. Of the

earlier and later epigrams the greater number are original. Four

epigrams were published anonymously in _The Watchman_, in April, 1796.

Seventeen epigrams, of which twelve are by Coleridge, two by Southey,

and three by Tobin, were published anonymously in the _Annual Anthology_

of 1800. Between January 2, 1798, and October 11, 1802 Coleridge

contributed at least thirty-eight epigrams to the _Morning Post_. Most

of these epigrams appeared under the well-known signature +ESTÊSE+. Six

epigrams, of which five had been published in the _Morning Post_, were

included in _The Friend_ (No. 11, Oct. 26, 1809). Finally, Coleridge

contributed six epigrams to the _Keepsake_, of which four had been

published in the _Morning Post_, and one in the _Annual Anthology_.

Epigrams were altogether excluded from _Sibylline Leaves_ and from the

three-volume editions of 1828 and 1829; but in 1834 the rule was relaxed

and six epigrams were allowed to appear. Two of these, _In An Album_

('Parry seeks the Polar Ridge') and _On an Insignificant_ (''Tis Cypher

lies beneath this Crust') were published for the first time.

For the discovery of the German originals of some twenty epigrams, now

for the first time noted and verified, I am indebted to the generous

assistance of Dr. Hermann Georg Fiedler, Taylorian Professor of the

German Language and Literature at Oxford, and of my friend Miss

Katharine Schlesinger.

[953:1] N.B. Bad in itself, and, as Bob Allen used to say of his puns,

looks damned ugly upon paper.

[954:1] Lines 3, 4, with the heading 'On an Insignificant,' were written

by S. T. C. in Southey's copy of the _Omniana_ of 1812 [see nos. 9, 11].

See _P. W._, 1885, ii. 402, _Note_.

[961:1] The antithesis was, perhaps, borrowed from an Epigram entitled

'Posthumous Fame', included in _Elegant Extracts_, ii. 260.

If on his spacious marble we rely,

Pity a worth like his should ever die!

If credit to his real life we give,

Pity a wretch like him should ever live.

[962:1] The first and second versions are included in _Essays, &c._,

1850, iii. 976: the third version was first published in 1893.

In 1830 Coleridge re-wrote (he did not publish) the second version as an

Epitaph on Hazlitt. The following apologetic note was affixed:--

'With a sadness at heart, and an earnest hope grounded on his

misanthropic sadness, when I first knew him in his twentieth or

twenty-first year, that a something existed in his bodily organism that

in the sight of the All-Merciful lessened his responsibility, and the

moral imputation of his acts and feelings.' _MS._

[964:1] The 'One who published' was, perhaps, Charles Lloyd, in his

novel, _Edmund Oliver_, 2 vols. 1798. Compare the following Epigram of

Prior's:--

To John I ow'd great obligation,

But John unhappily thought fit

To publish it to all the nation:

Sure John and I are more than quit.

[974:1] Extempore, in reply to a question of Mr. Theodore Hook's--'Look

at him, and say what you think: Is not he like a Rose?'

JEUX D'ESPRIT

MY GODMOTHER'S BEARD[976:1]

So great the charms of Mrs. Mundy,

That men grew rude, a kiss to gain:

This so provok'd the dame that one day

To Pallas chaste she did complain:

Nor vainly she address'd her prayer,

Nor vainly to that power applied;

The goddess bade a length of hair

In deep recess her muzzle hide:

Still persevere! to love be callous!

For I have your petition heard!

To snatch a kiss were vain (cried Pallas)

Unless you first should shave your beard.

? 1791

First published in _Table Talk and Omniana_, 1888, p. 392. The lines

were inscribed by Coleridge in Gillman's copy of the _Omniana_ of 1812.

An apologetic note is attached. J. P. Collier (_Old Man's Diary_, 1871,

March 5, 1832, Part I, p. 34) says that Coleridge 'recited the following

not very good epigram by him on his godmother's beard; the consequence

of which was that he was struck out of her will'. Most probably the

lines, as inscribed on the margin of _Omniana_, were written about 1830

or 1831. First collected in _Coleridge's Poems_, 1907.

LINENOTES:

[4] Pallas chaste] Wisdom's Power S. T. C.

LINES TO THOMAS POOLE

[Quoted in a letter from Coleridge to John Thelwall, dated

Dec. 17, 1796.]

. . . . Joking apart, I would to God we could sit by a fire-side and

joke _vivâ voce_, face to face--Stella [Mrs. Thelwall] and Sara [Mrs. S.

T. Coleridge], Jack Thelwall and I!--as I once wrote to my dear _friend_

T. Poole,--

Repeating

Such verse as Bowles, heart honour'd Poet sang,

That wakes the Tear, yet steals away the Pang,

Then, or with Berkeley, or with Hobbes romance it,

Dissecting Truth with metaphysic lancet.

Or, drawn from up these dark unfathom'd wells,

In wiser folly chink the Cap and Bells.

How many tales we told! what jokes we made,

Conundrum, Crambo, Rebus, or Charade;

Ænigmas that had driven the Theban mad,

And Puns, these best when exquisitely bad;

And I, if aught of archer vein I hit,

With my own laughter stifled my own wit.

1796. First published in 1893.

TO A WELL-KNOWN MUSICAL CRITIC, REMARKABLE

FOR HIS EARS STICKING THROUGH HIS HAIR.

O ----! O ----! of you we complain

For exposing those ears to the wind and the rain.

Thy face, a huge whitlow just come to a head,

Ill agrees with those ears so raw and so red.

A Musical Critic of old fell a-pouting

When he saw how his asinine honours were sprouting;

But he hid 'em quite snug, in a full friz of hair,

And the Barber alone smoked his donkeys [so] rare.

Thy judgment much worse, and thy _perkers_ as ample,

O give heed to King Midas, and take his example.

Thus to _publish_ your fate is as useless as wrong--

You but prove by your ears, what we guessed from your tongue.

LABERIUS.

First published in the _Morning Post_, January 4, 1798. First collected

_P. and D. W._, 1877-80, ii. 370.

TO T. POOLE

AN INVITATION

Plucking flowers from the Galaxy

On the pinions of Abstraction,

I did quite forget to ax 'e,

Whether you have an objaction,

With us to swill 'e and to swell 'e

And make a pig-stie of your belly.

A lovely limb most dainty

Of a _ci-devant_ Mud-raker,

I makes bold to acquaint 'e

We've trusted to the Baker:

And underneath it satis

Of the subterrene apple

By the erudite 'clep'd _taties_--

With which, if you'ld wish to grapple,

As sure as I'm a sloven,

The clock will not strike twice one,

When the said dish will be out of the oven,

And the dinner will be a nice one.

P.S.

Besides we've got some cabbage.

You Jew-dog, if you linger,

May the Itch in pomp of scabbage

Pop out between each finger.

January, 1797.

First published (_minus_ the postscript) in _Thomas Poole and His

Friends_, 1888, i. 211.

SONG

TO BE SUNG BY THE LOVERS OF ALL THE NOBLE LIQUORS COMPRISED

UNDER THE NAME OF ALE.

Ye drinkers of Stingo and Nappy so free,

Are the Gods on Olympus so happy as we?

They cannot be so happy!

For why? they drink no Nappy.

But what if Nectar, in their lingo,

Is but another name for Stingo?

Why, then we and the Gods are equally blest,

And Olympus an Ale-house as good as the best!

First published in _Morning Post_, September 18, 1801. Included in

_Essays, &c._, iii. 995-6. First collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii.

167.

DRINKING _VERSUS_ THINKING

OR, A SONG AGAINST THE NEW PHILOSOPHY

My Merry men all, that drink with glee

This fanciful Philosophy,

Pray tell me what good is it?

If _antient Nick_ should come and take,

The same across the Stygian Lake,

I guess we ne'er should miss it.

Away, each pale, self-brooding spark

That goes truth-hunting in the dark,

Away from our carousing!

To Pallas we resign such fowls--

Grave birds of wisdom! ye're but owls,

And all your trade but _mousing_!

My merry men all, here's punch and wine,

And spicy bishop, drink divine!

Let's live while we are able.

While Mirth and Sense sit, hand in glove,

This Don Philosophy we'll shove

Dead drunk beneath the table!

First published in _Morning Post_, September 25, 1801. Included in

_Essays, &c._, iii. 966-7. First collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii.

168.

THE WILLS OF THE WISP

A SAPPHIC

_Vix ea nostra voco_

Lunatic Witch-fires! Ghosts of Light and Motion!

Fearless I see you weave your wanton dances

Near me, far off me; you, that tempt the traveller

Onward and onward.

Wooing, retreating, till the swamp beneath him

Groans--and 'tis dark!--This woman's wile--I know it!

Learnt it from _thee_, from _thy_ perfidious glances!

Black-ey'd Rebecca!

First published in _Morning Post_, December 1, 1801. First collected _P.

and D. W._, 1877, ii. 169.

TO CAPTAIN FINDLAY

When the squalls were flitting and fleering

And the vessel was tacking and veering;

Bravo! Captain Findlay,

Who foretold a fair wind

Of a constant mind;

For he knew which way the wind lay,

Bravo! Captain Findlay.

A Health to Captain Findlay,

Bravo! Captain Findlay!

When we made but ill speed with the Speedwell,

Neither poets nor sheep could feed well:

Now grief rotted the Liver,

Yet Malta, dear Malta, as far off as ever!

Bravo! Captain Findlay,

Foretold a fair wind,

Of a constant mind,

For he knew which way the wind lay!

May 4, 1804.

Now first published from a Notebook. The rhymes are inserted between the

following entries:--'Thursday night--Wind chopped about and about, once

fairly to the west, for a minute or two--but now, 1/2 past 9, the

Captain comes down and promises a fair wind for to-morrow. We shall

see.' 'Well, and we have got a wind the right way at last!'

ON DONNE'S POEM 'TO A FLEA'

Be proud as Spaniards! Leap for pride ye Fleas!

Henceforth in Nature's mimic World grandees.

In Phoebus' archives registered are ye,

And this your patent of Nobility.

No skip-Jacks now, nor civiller skip-Johns,

Dread Anthropophagi! specks of living bronze,

I hail you one and all, sans Pros or Cons,

Descendants from a noble race of Dons.

What tho' that great ancestral Flea be gone,

Immortal with immortalising Donne,

His earthly spots bleached off a Papist's gloze,

In purgatory fire on Bardolph's nose.

1811.

Now first published from an MS.

[EX LIBRIS S. T. C.][981:1]

This, Hannah Scollock! may have been the case;

Your writing therefore I will not erase.

But now this Book, once yours, belongs to me,

The _Morning Post's_ and _Courier's_ S. T. C.;--

Elsewhere in College, knowledge, wit and scholarage

To Friends and Public known as S. T. Coleridge.

Witness hereto my hand, on Ashley Green,

One thousand, twice four hundred, and fourteen

Year of our Lord--and of the month November

The fifteenth day, if right I do remember.

15th Nov. 1814. Ashley, Box, Bath.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, iii. 57. First collected _P. and D. W._,

1877, ii. 387.

+EGÔENKAIPAN+

The following burlesque on the Fichtean Egoismus may, perhaps, be

amusing to the few who have studied the system, and to those who are

unacquainted with it, may convey as tolerable a likeness of Fichte's

idealism as can be expected from an avowed caricature. [S. T. C.]

The Categorical Imperative, or the annunciation of the New Teutonic God,

+EGÔENKAIPAN+: a dithyrambic Ode, by QUERKOPF VON KLUBSTICK, Grammarian,

and Subrector in Gymnasio. . . .

_Eu! Dei vices gerens, ipse Divus_,

(Speak English, Friend!) the God Imperativus,

Here on this market-cross aloud I cry:

'I, I, I! I itself I!

The form and the substance, the what and the why,

The when and the where, and the low and the high,

The inside and outside, the earth and the sky,

I, you, and he, and he, you and I,

All souls and all bodies are I itself I!

All I itself I!

(Fools! a truce with this starting!)

All my I! all my I!

He's a heretic dog who but adds Betty Martin!'

Thus cried the God with high imperial tone:

In robe of stiffest state, that scoff'd at beauty,

A pronoun-verb imperative he shone--

Then substantive and plural-singular grown,

He thus spake on:--'Behold in I alone

(For Ethics boast a syntax of their own)

Or if in ye, yet as I doth depute ye,

In O! I, you, the vocative of duty!

I of the world's whole Lexicon the root!

Of the whole universe of touch, sound, sight,

The genitive and ablative to boot:

The accusative of wrong, the nom'native of right,

And in all cases the case absolute!

Self-construed, I all other moods decline:

Imperative, from nothing we derive us;

Yet as a super-postulate of mine,

Unconstrued antecedence I assign,

To X Y Z, the God Infinitivus!'

1815.

First published in _Biographia Literaria_, 1817, i. 148_n._ First

collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 370.

THE BRIDGE STREET COMMITTEE

Jack Snipe

Eats Tripe:

It is therefore credible

That tripe is edible.

And therefore, perforce,

It follows, of course,

That the Devil will gripe

All who do not eat Tripe.

And as Nic is too slow

To fetch 'em below:

And Gifford, the attorney,

Won't quicken their journey;

The Bridge-Street Committee

That colleague without pity,

To imprison and hang

Carlile and his gang,

Is the pride of the City,

And 'tis Association

That, alone, saves the Nation

From Death and Damnation.

First published in _Letters and Conversations, &c._, 1836, i. 90, 91.

These lines, which were inscribed in one of Coleridge's notebooks, refer

to a 'Constitutional association' which promoted the prosecution of

Richard Carlile, the publisher of Paine's _Age of Reason_, for

blasphemy. See _Diary_ of H. C. Robinson, 1869, ii. 134, 135. First

collected _P. W._, 1885, ii. 405.

NONSENSE SAPPHICS[983:1]

Here's Jem's first copy of nonsense verses,

All in the antique style of Mistress Sappho,

Latin just like Horace the tuneful Roman,

Sapph's imitator:

But we Bards, we classical Lyric Poets,

Know a thing or two in a scurvy Planet:

Don't we, now? Eh? Brother Horatius Flaccus,

Tip us your paw, Lad:--

Here's to Mæcenas and the other worthies;

Rich men of England! would ye be immortal?

Patronise Genius, giving Cash and Praise to

Gillman Jacobus;

Gillman Jacobus, he of Merchant Taylors',

Minor ætate, ingenio at stupendus,

Sapphic, Heroic, Elegiac,--what a

Versificator!

First published in _Essays, &c._, 1850, iii. 987. First collected 1893.

TO SUSAN STEELE ON RECEIVING THE PURSE

EXTRUMPERY LINES

My dearest Dawtie!

That's never naughty--

When the Mare was stolen, and not before,

The wise man got a stable-door:

And he and I are brother Ninnies,

One Beast _he_ lost and I two guineas;

And as sure as it's wet when it above rains,

The man's brains and mine both alike had thick coverings,

For if he lost one mare, poor I lost two sovereigns!

A cash-pouch I have got, but no cash to put in it,

Tho' there's gold in the world and Sir Walter can win it:

For your sake I'll keep it for better or worse,

So here is a dear loving kiss for your purse.

S. T. COLERIDGE.

1829. Now first published from an MS.

ASSOCIATION OF IDEAS[984:1]

I.--_By Likeness_

Fond, peevish, wedded pair! why all this rant?

O guard your tempers! hedge your tongues about

This empty head should warn you on that point--

The teeth were quarrelsome, and so fell out.

S. T. C.

II.--_Association by Contrast_

Phidias changed marble into feet and legs.

Disease! vile anti-Phidias! thou, i' fegs!

Hast turned my live limbs into marble pegs.

III.--_Association by Time_

SIMPLICIUS SNIPKIN _loquitur_

I touch this scar upon my skull behind,

And instantly there rises in my mind

Napoleon's mighty hosts from Moscow lost,

Driven forth to perish in the fangs of Frost.

For in that self-same month, and self-same day,

Down Skinner Street I took my hasty way--

Mischief and Frost had set the boys at play;

I stept upon a slide--oh! treacherous tread!--

Fell smash with bottom bruised, and brake my head!

Thus Time's co-presence links the great and small,

Napoleon's overthrow, and Snipkin's fall.

? 1830. First published in _Fraser's Magazine_, Jan. 1835, Art.

'Coleridgeiana'. First collected 1893.

VERSES TRIVOCULAR

Of one scrap of science I've evidence ocular.

A heart of one chamber they call unilocular,

And in a sharp frost, or when snow-flakes fall floccular,

Your wise man of old wrapp'd himself in a Roquelaure,

Which was called a Wrap-rascal when folks would be jocular.

And shell-fish, the small, Periwinkle and Cockle are,

So with them will I finish these verses trivocular.

Now first published from an MS.

CHOLERA CURED BEFORE-HAND

Or a premonition promulgated gratis for the use of the Useful Classes,

specially those resident in St. Giles's, Saffron Hill, Bethnal Green,

etc.; and likewise, inasmuch as the good man is merciful even to the

beasts, for the benefit of the Bulls and Bears of the Stock Exchange.

Pains ventral, subventral,

In stomach or entrail,

Think no longer mere prefaces

For grins, groans, and wry faces;

But off to the doctor, fast as ye can crawl! 5

Yet far better 'twould be not to have them at all.

Now to 'scape inward aches,

Eat no plums nor plum-cakes;

Cry avaunt! new potato--

And don't drink, like old Cato. 10

Ah! beware of Dispipsy,

And don't ye get tipsy!

For tho' gin and whiskey

May make you feel frisky,

They're but crimps to Dispipsy; 15

And nose to tail, with this gipsy

Comes, black as a porpus,

The diabolus ipse,

Call'd Cholery Morpus;

Who with horns, hoofs, and tail, croaks for carrion to feed him, 20

Tho' being a Devil, no one never has seed him!

Ah! then my dear honies,

There's no cure for you

For loves nor for monies:--

You'll find it too true. 25

Och! the hallabaloo!

Och! och! how you'll wail,

When the offal-fed vagrant

Shall turn you as blue

As the gas-light unfragrant, 30

That gushes in jets from beneath his own tail;--

'Till swift as the mail,

He at last brings the cramps on,

That will twist you like Samson.

So without further blethring, 35

Dear mudlarks! my brethren!

Of all scents and degrees,

(Yourselves and your shes)

Forswear all cabal, lads,

Wakes, unions, and rows, 40

Hot dreams and cold salads,

And don't pig in styes that would suffocate sows!

Quit Cobbett's, O'Connell's and Beelzebub's banners,

And whitewash at once bowels, rooms, hands, and manners!

July 26, 1832. First published in _P. W._ 1834. These lines were

enclosed in a letter to J. H. Green, dated July 26, 1832, with the

following introduction: 'Address premonitory to the Sovereign People, or

the Cholera cured before-hand, promulgated _gratis_ for the use of the

useful classes, specially of those resident in St. Giles, Bethnal Green,

Saffron Hill, etc., by their Majesties', i. e. the People's, loyal

subject--Demophilus Mudlarkiades.'

LINENOTES:

[1-6] om. Letter 1832.

[7-8] To escape Belly ache Eat no plums nor plum cake Letter 1832.

[12] And therefore don't get tipsy Letter 1832.

[16] with this gipsy] of Dys Pipsy Letter 1832.

[22] And oh! och my dear Honies Letter 1832.

[28] offal-fed] horn-and-hoof'd Letter 1832.

[41] dreams] drams Letter 1832.

[44] And whitewash at once your Guts, Rooms and Manners Letter 1832.

[After 44]

Vivat Rex Popellio!

Vivat Regina Plebs!

Hurra! 3 times 3 thrice

repeated Hurra!

Letter, 1832.

TO BABY BATES

You come from o'er the waters,

From famed Columbia's land,

And you have sons and daughters,

And money at command.

But I live in an island,

Great Britain is its name,

With money none to buy land,

The more it is the shame.

But we are all the children

Of one great God of Love,

Whose mercy like a mill-drain

Runs over from above.

Lullaby, lullaby,

Sugar-plums and cates,

Close your little peeping eye,

Bonny Baby B----s.

First collected 1893. 'Baby Bates' was the daughter of Joshua Bates, one

of the donors of the Boston Library. Her father and mother passed a year

(1828-1829) at Highgate, 'close to the house of Dr. and Mrs. Gillman.'

See a letter to Mrs. Bates from S. T. C. dated Jan. 23, 1829. _N. and

Q._ 4th Series, i. 469.

TO A CHILD[987:1]

Little Miss Fanny,

So cubic and canny,

With blue eyes and blue shoes--

The Queen of the Blues!

As darling a girl as there is in the world--

If she'll laugh, skip and jump,

And not be _Miss Glump_!

1834. First published in _Athenæum_, Jan. 28, 1888. First collected

1893.

FOOTNOTES:

[976:1] 'There is a female saint (St. Vuilgefortis), whom the Jesuit

Sautel, in his _Annus Sacer Poeticus_, has celebrated for her beard--a

mark of divine favour bestowed upon her for her prayers.' _Omniana_,

1812, ii. 54. 'Pereant qui ante nos nostra dixere! What! can nothing be

one's own? This is the more vexatious, for at the age of eighteen I lost

a legacy of fifty pounds for the following epigram on my godmother's

beard, which she had the _barbarity_ to revenge by striking me out of

her will.' _S. T. C._

[981:1] These lines are written on a fly-leaf of a copy of _Five Bookes

of the Church_ by Richard Field (folio 1635), under the inscription:

'Hannah Scollock, her book, February 10, 1787.' The volume was

bequeathed to the poet's younger son, Derwent Coleridge, and is now in

the possession of the Editor.

[983:1] Written for James Gillman Junr. as a School Exercise, for

_Merchant Taylors'_, c. 1822-3.

[984:1] Written in pencil on the blank leaf of a book of lectures

delivered at the London University, in which the Hartleyan doctrine of

association was assumed as a true basis.

[987:1] To Miss Fanny Boyce, afterwards Lady Wilmot Horton.

FRAGMENTS FROM A NOTEBOOK[988:1]

_Circa_ 1796-98

Light cargoes waft of modulated Sound

From viewless Hybla brought, when Melodies

Like Birds of Paradise on wings, that aye

Disport in wild variety of hues,

Murmur around the honey-dropping flower.

First published in 1893. Compare _The Eolian Harp_ (Aug. 1795), lines

20-5 (_ante_ p. 101).

Broad-breasted rock--hanging cliff that glasses

His rugged forehead in the calmy sea.[988:2]

First published in 1893. Compare _Destiny of Nations_ (1796), lines 342,

343 (_ante_ p. 143).

Where Cam his stealthy flowings most dissembles

And scarce the Willow's watery shadow trembles.

First published in 1893. Compare line 1 of _A Fragment Found in a

Lecture-Room_, 'Where deep in mud Cam rolls his slumbrous stream'

(_ante_, p. 35).

With secret hand heal the conjectur'd wound,

[or]

Guess at the wound, and heal with secret hand.

First published in 1893. The alternative line was first published in

_Lit. Rem._, i. 279.

Outmalic'd Calumny's imposthum'd Tongue.

First published in 1893. A line from _Verses to Horne Tooke_, July 4,

1796, line 20 (_ante_, p. 151).

And write Impromptus

Spurring their Pegasus to tortoise gallop.

First published in 1893.

Due to the Staggerers, that made drunk by Power

Forget thirst's eager promise, and presume,

Dark Dreamers! that the world forgets it too.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, 1836, i. 27.

LINENOTES:

[1] Due] These L. R.

Perish warmth

Unfaithful to its seeming!

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 279.

Old age, 'the shape and messenger of Death,'

'His wither'd Fist still knocking at Death's door.'

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 279. Quoted from Sackville's

_Induction to a Mirrour for Magistrates_, stanza 48:

'His wither'd fist stil knocking at deathes dore,

Tumbling and driveling as he drawes his breth;

For briefe, the shape and messenger of death.'

God no distance knows,

All of the whole possessing!

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 279. Compare _Religious Musings_, ll.

156-7.

Wherefore art thou come? doth not the Creator of all things

know all things? And if thou art come to seek him, know that

where thou wast, there he was.

First published in 1893. Compare the _Wanderings of Cain_.

And cauldrons the scoop'd earth, a boiling sea.

First published in 1893.

Rush on my ear, a cataract of sound.

First published in 1893.

The guilty pomp, consuming while it flares.

First published in 1893.

My heart seraglios a whole host of Joys.

First published in 1893.

And Pity's sigh shall answer thy tale of Anguish

Like the faint echo of a distant valley.

First published in _Notizbuch_, 1896, p. 350.

A DUNGEON

In darkness I remain'd--the neighb'ring clock

Told me that now the rising sun shone lovely

On my garden.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 279. Compare _Osorio_, Act I, lines

219-21 (_ante_, p. 528), and _Remorse_, Act I, Scene II, lines 218-20

(_ante_, p. 830).

LINENOTES:

[2] sun at dawn L. R.

The Sun (for now his orb 'gan slowly sink)

Shot half his rays aslant the heath whose flowers

Purpled the mountain's broad and level top;

Rich was his bed of clouds, and wide beneath

Expecting Ocean smiled with dimpled face.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278. Compare _This Lime-Tree Bower_

(1797), lines 32-7 (_ante_, pp. 179, 180).

Leanness, disquietude, and secret Pangs.

First published in _Notizbuch_, p. 351.

Smooth, shining, and deceitful as thin Ice.

First published in _Notizbuch_, p. 355.

Wisdom, Mother of retired Thought.

First published in 1893.

Nature wrote Rascal on his face,

By chalcographic art!

First published in 1893.

In this world we dwell among the tombs

And touch the pollutions of the Dead.

First published in 1893. Compare _Destiny of Nations_, ll. 177-8

(_ante_, p. 137).

The mild despairing of a Heart resigned.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278.

Such fierce vivacity as fires the eye

Of Genius fancy-craz'd.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278. Compare _Destiny of Nations_,

ll. 257, 258 (_ante_, p. 139).

----like a mighty Giantess

Seiz'd in sore travail and prodigious birth

Sick Nature struggled: long and strange her pangs;

Her groans were horrible, but O! most fair

The Twins she bore--EQUALITY and PEACE!

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278. Compare concluding lines of the

second strophe of _Ode to the Departing Year_, 4{o}, 1796.

Discontent

Mild as an infant low-plaining in its sleep.

First published in 1893.

----terrible and loud,

As the strong Voice that from the Thunder-cloud

Speaks to the startled Midnight.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278.

The swallows

Interweaving there, mid the pair'd sea-mews

At distance wildly-wailing!

First published in 1893.

The Brook runs over sea-weeds.

Sabbath day--from the Miller's merry wheel

The water-drops dripp'd leisurely.

First published in 1893. It is possible the Fragments were some of the

'studies' for _The Brook_. See _Biog. Lit._, Cap. X, ed. 1907, i. 129.

On the broad mountain-top

The neighing wild-colt races with the wind

O'er fern and heath-flowers.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278.

A long deep lane

So overshadow'd, it might seem one bower--

The damp clay-banks were furr'd with mouldy moss.

First published in 1893.

Broad-breasted Pollards, with broad-branching heads.

First published in 1893.

'Twas sweet to know it only possible--

Some _wishes_ cross'd my mind and dimly cheer'd it--

And one or two poor melancholy Pleasures--

In these, the pale unwarming light of Hope

Silv'ring their flimsy wing, flew silent by,

Moths in the Moonlight.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 277, 278.

LINENOTES:

[4] In these] Each in L. R.

[5] their] its L. R.

Behind the thin

Grey cloud that cover'd but not hid the sky

The round full moon look'd small.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 277. Compare _Christabel_, ll. 16, 17

(_ante_, p. 216).

The subtle snow

In every breeze rose curling from the Grove

Like pillars of cottage smoke.

First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 278.

LINENOTES:

The Subtle snow in every passing breeze

Rose curling from the grove like shafts of smoke.

L. R.

The sunshine lies on the cottage-wall,

A-shining thro' the snow.

First published in 1893.

A MANIAC in the woods--She crosses heedlessly the woodman's

path--scourg'd by rebounding boughs.

First published in 1893.

Compare this with discarded stanza in 'Introduction to the Tale of the

Dark Ladié' as printed in the _Morning Post_, Dec. 21, 1799 (vide

_ante_, p. 333).

And how he cross'd the woodman's paths,

Thro' briars and swampy mosses beat;

How boughs rebounding scourg'd his limbs,

And low stubs gor'd his feet.

Note by J. D. Campbell, _P. W._, 1893, p. 456.

HYMNS--MOON

In a cave in the mountains of Cashmeer, an image of ice, which

makes its appearance thus: Two days before the new moon there

appears a bubble of ice, which increases in size every day

till the fifteenth day, at which it is an ell or more in

height;--then, as the moon decreases the Image does also till

it vanishes. _Mem._ Read the whole 107th page of Maurice's

_Indostan_.

First published in 1893. 'Hymns to the Sun, the Moon, and the Elements'

are included in a list of projected works enumerated in the Gutch

Notebook. The 'caves of ice' in _Kubla Khan_ may have been a

reminiscence of the 107th page of Maurice's _Hindostan_.

The tongue can't speak when the mouth is cramm'd with earth--

A little mould fills up most eloquent mouths,

And a square stone with a few pious texts

Cut neatly on it, keeps the mould down tight.

First published in 1893. Compare _Osorio_, Act III, lines 259-62

(_ante_, p. 560).

And with my whole heart sing the stately song,

Loving the God that made me.

First published in 1893. Compare _Fears in Solitude_, ll. 196-7 (_ante_,

p. 263).

God's Image, Sister of the Cherubim!

First published in 1893. Compare the last line of _The Ode to the

Departing Year_ (_ante_, p. 168).

And re-implace God's Image in the Soul.

First published in 1893.

And arrows steeled with wrath.

First published in 1893.

Lov'd the same Love, and hated the same hate,

Breath'd in his soul! etc. etc.

First published in 1893.

O man! thou half-dead Angel!

First published in 1893.

Thy stern and sullen eye, and thy dark brow

Chill me, like dew-damps of th' unwholesome Night.

My Love, a timorous and tender flower,

Closes beneath thy Touch, unkindly man!

Breath'd on by gentle gales of Courtesy

And cheer'd by sunshine of impassion'd look--

Then opes its petals of no vulgar hues.

First published in 1893. See _Remorse_, Act I, Sc. II, ll. 81-4 (_ante_,

p. 826). Compare _Osorio_, Act. I, ll. 80-3 (_ante_, p. 522).

With skill that never Alchemist yet told,

Made drossy Lead as ductile as pure Gold.

First published in 1893.

Grant me a Patron, gracious Heaven! whene'er

My unwash'd follies call for Penance drear:

But when more hideous guilt this heart infests

Instead of fiery coals upon my Pate,

O let a _titled_ Patron be my Fate;--

That fierce Compendium of Ægyptian Pests!

Right reverend Dean, right honourable Squire,

Lord, Marquis, Earl, Duke, Prince,--or if aught higher,

However proudly nicknamed, he shall be

Anathema Maránatha to me!

First published, _Lit. Rem._, i. 281.

FOOTNOTES:

[988:1] One of the earliest of Coleridge's Notebooks, which fell into

the hands of his old schoolfellow, John Mathew Gutch, the printer and

proprietor of _Felix Farley's Bristol Journal_, was purchased by the

Trustees of the British Museum in 1868, and is now included in _Add.

MSS._ as No. 27901. The fragments of verse contained in the notebook are

included in _P. W._ 1893, pp. 453-8. The notebook as a whole was

published by Professor A. Brandl in 1896 (_S. T. Coleridge's Notizbuch

aus den Jahren 1795-1798_). Nineteen entries are included by H. N.

Coleridge in _Poems and Poetical Fragments_ published in _Literary

Remains_, 1836, i. 277-80.

[988:2] An incorrect version of the lines was published in _Lit. Rem._,

ii. 280.

FRAGMENTS[996:1]

O'er the raised earth the gales of evening sigh;

And, see, a daisy peeps upon its slope!

I wipe the dimming waters from mine eye;

Even on the cold grave lights the Cherub Hope.[996:2]

? 1787. First published in _Poems_, 1852 (p. 379, Note 1). First

collected 1893.

Sea-ward, white gleaming thro' the busy scud

With arching Wings, the sea-mew o'er my head

Posts on, as bent on speed, now passaging

Edges the stiffer Breeze, now, yielding, drifts,

Now floats upon the air, and sends from far

A wildly-wailing Note.

Now first published from an MS. Compare Fragment No. 29 of Fragments

from a Notebook.

OVER MY COTTAGE

The Pleasures sport beneath the thatch;

But Prudence sits upon the watch;

Nor Dun nor Doctor lifts the latch!

1799. First published from an MS. in 1893. Suggested by Lessing's

_Sinngedicht_ No. 104.

In the lame and limping metre of a barbarous Latin poet--

Est meum et est tuum, amice! at si amborum nequit esse,

Sit meum, amice, precor: quia certe sum mage pauper.

'Tis mine and it is likewise yours;

But and if this will not do,

Let it be mine, because that I

Am the poorer of the Two!

Nov. 1, 1801. First published in the Preface to _Christabel_, 1816.

First collected 1893.

Names do not always meet with LOVE,

And LOVE wants courage without a _name_.[997:1]

Dec. 1801. Now first published from an MS.

The Moon, how definite its orb!

Yet gaze again, and with a steady gaze--

'Tis there indeed,--but where is it not?--

It is suffused o'er all the sapphire Heaven,

Trees, herbage, snake-like stream, unwrinkled Lake,

Whose very murmur does of it partake!

And low and close the broad smooth mountain is more a thing

of Heaven than when distinct by one dim shade, and yet

undivided from the universal cloud in which it towers infinite

in height.

? 1801. First published from an MS. in 1893.

Such love as mourning Husbands have

To her whose Spirit has been newly given

To her guardian Saint in Heaven--

Whose Beauty lieth in the grave--

(Unconquered, as if the Soul could find no purer Tabernacle, nor place

of sojourn than the virgin Body it had before dwelt in, and wished to

stay there till the Resurrection)--

Far liker to a Flower now than when alive,

Cold to the Touch and blooming to the eye.

Sept. 1803. Now first published from an MS.

[THE NIGHT-MARE DEATH IN LIFE]

I know 'tis but a dream, yet feel more anguish

Than if 'twere truth. It has been often so:

Must I die under it? Is no one near?

Will no one hear these stifled groans and wake me?

? 1803. Now first published from an MS.

Bright clouds of reverence, sufferably bright,

That intercept the dazzle, not the Light;

That veil the finite form, the boundless power reveal,

Itself an earthly sun of pure intensest white.

1803. First published from an MS. in 1893.

A BECK IN WINTER[998:1]

Over the broad, the shallow, rapid stream,

The Alder, a vast hollow Trunk, and ribb'd--

All mossy green with mosses manifold,

And ferns still waving in the river-breeze

Sent out, like fingers, five projecting trunks--

The shortest twice 6 (?) of a tall man's strides.--

One curving upward in its middle growth

Rose straight with grove of twigs--a pollard tree:--

The rest more backward, gradual in descent--

One in the brook and one befoamed its waters:

One ran along the bank in the elk-like head

And pomp of antlers--

Jan. 1804. Now first published from an MS. (pencil).

I from the influence of thy Looks receive,

Access in every virtue, in thy Sight

More wise, more wakeful, stronger, if need were

Of outward strength.--

1804. Now first published from an MS.

What never is, but only is to be

This is not Life:--

O hopeless Hope, and Death's Hypocrisy!

And with perpetual promise breaks its promises.

1804-5. Now first published from an MS.

The silence of a City, how awful at Midnight!

Mute as the battlements and crags and towers

That Fancy makes in the clouds, yea, as mute

As the moonlight that sleeps on the steady vanes.

(or)

The cell of a departed anchoret,

His skeleton and flitting ghost are there,

Sole tenants--

And all the City silent as the Moon

That steeps in quiet light the steady vanes

Of her huge temples.

1804-5. Now first published from an MS.

O beauty in a beauteous body dight!

Body that veiling brightness, beamest bright;

Fair cloud which less we see, than by thee see the light.

1805. First published from an MS. in 1893.

O th' Oppressive, irksome weight

Felt in an uncertain state:

Comfort, peace, and rest adieu

Should I prove at last untrue!

Self-confiding wretch, I thought

I could love thee as I ought,

Win thee and deserve to feel

All the Love thou canst reveal,

And still I chuse thee, follow still.

1805. First published from an MS. in 1893.

'Twas not a mist, nor was it quite a cloud,

But it pass'd smoothly on towards the sea--

Smoothly and lightly between Earth and Heaven:

So, thin a cloud,

It scarce bedimm'd the star that shone behind it:

And Hesper now

Paus'd on the welkin blue, and cloudless brink,

A golden circlet! while the Star of Jove--

That other lovely star--high o'er my head

Shone whitely in the centre of his Haze

. . . one black-blue cloud

Stretch'd, like the heaven, o'er all the cope of Heaven.

Dec. 1797. First published from an MS. in 1893.

[NOT A CRITIC--BUT A JUDGE]

Whom should I choose for my Judge? the earnest, impersonal reader,

Who, in the work, forgets me and the world and himself!

You who have eyes to detect, and Gall to Chastise the imperfect,

Have you the heart, too, that loves,--feels and rewards the

Compleat?

1805. Now first published from an MS.

A sumptuous and magnificent Revenge.

March 1806. First published from an MS. in 1893.

[DE PROFUNDIS CLAMAVI]

Come, come thou bleak December wind,

And blow the dry leaves from the tree!

Flash, like a love-thought, thro' me, Death!

And take a life that wearies me.

Leghorn, June 7, 1806. First published in _Letters of S. T. C._, 1875,

ii. 499, n. 1. Now collected for the first time. Adapted from Percy's

version of 'Waly, Waly, Love be bonny', st. 3.

Marti'mas wind when wilt thou blaw,

And shake the green leaves aff the tree?

O gentle death, when wilt thou cum?

For of my life I am wearie.

As some vast Tropic tree, itself a wood,

That crests its head with clouds, beneath the flood

Feeds its deep roots, and with the bulging flank

Of its wide base controls the fronting bank--

(By the slant current's pressure scoop'd away

The fronting bank becomes a foam-piled bay)

High in the Fork the uncouth Idol knits

His channel'd brow; low murmurs stir by fits

And dark below the horrid Faquir sits--

An Horror from its broad Head's branching wreath

Broods o'er the rude Idolatry beneath--

1806-7. Now first published from an MS.

Let Eagle bid the Tortoise sunward soar--

As vainly Strength speaks to a broken Mind.[1001:1]

1807. First published in _Thomas Poole and His Friends_, 1888, ii. 195.

The body,

Eternal Shadow of the finite Soul,

The Soul's self-symbol, its image of itself.

Its own yet not itself.

Now first published from an MS.

Or Wren or Linnet,

In Bush and Bushet;

No tree, but in it

A cooing Cushat.

May 1807. Now first published from an MS.

The reed roof'd village still bepatch'd with snow

Smok'd in the sun-thaw.

1798. Now first published from an MS. Compare _Frost at Midnight_, ll.

69-70, _ante_, p. 242.

And in Life's noisiest hour

There whispers still the ceaseless love of thee,

The heart's self-solace } and soliloquy.

commune }

1807. Now first published from an MS.

You mould my Hopes you fashion me within:

And to the leading love-throb in the heart,

Through all my being, through my pulses beat;

You lie in all my many thoughts like Light,

Like the fair light of Dawn, or summer Eve,

On rippling stream, or cloud-reflecting lake;

And looking to the Heaven that bends above you,

How oft! I bless the lot that made me love you.

1807. Now first published from an MS.

And my heart mantles in its own delight.

Now first published from an MS.

The spruce and limber yellow-hammer

In the dawn of spring and sultry summer,

In hedge or tree the hours beguiling

With notes as of one who brass is filing.

1807. Now first published from an MS.

FRAGMENT OF AN ODE ON NAPOLEON

O'erhung with yew, midway the Muses mount

From thy sweet murmurs far, O Hippocrene!

Turbid and black upboils an angry fount

Tossing its shatter'd foam in vengeful spleen--

Phlegethon's rage Cocytus' wailings hoarse

Alternate now, now mixt, made known its headlong course:

Thither with terror stricken and surprise,

(For sure such haunts were ne'er to Muse's choice)

Euterpe led me. Mute with asking eyes

I stood expectant of her heavenly voice.

Her voice entranc'd my terror and made flow

In a rude understrain the maniac fount below.

'Whene'er (the Goddess said) abhorr'd of Jove

Usurping Power his hands in blood imbrues--

? 1808. Now first published from an MS.

The singing Kettle and the purring Cat,

The gentle breathing of the cradled Babe,

The silence of the Mother's love-bright eye,

And tender smile answering its smile of Sleep.

1803. First published from an MS. in 1893.

Two wedded hearts, if ere were such,

Imprison'd in adjoining cells,

Across whose thin partition-wall

The builder left one narrow rent,

And where, most content in discontent,

A joy with itself at strife--

Die into an intenser life.

1808. First published from an MS. in 1893.

ANOTHER VERSION

The builder left one narrow rent,

Two wedded hearts, if ere were such,

Contented most in discontent,

Still there cling, and try in vain to touch!

O Joy! with thy own joy at strife,

That yearning for the Realm above

Wouldst die into intenser Life,

And Union absolute of Love!

1808. First published from an MS. in 1893.

Sole Maid, associate sole, to me beyond

Compare all living creatures dear--

Thoughts, which have found their harbour in thy heart

Dearest! _me_ thought of _him_ to thee so dear!

1809. First published from an MS. in 1893.

EPIGRAM ON KEPLER

FROM THE GERMAN

No mortal spirit yet had clomb so high

As Kepler--yet his Country saw him die

For very want! the _Minds_ alone he fed,

And so the _Bodies_ left him without bread.

1799. First published in _The Friend_, Nov. 30, 1809 (1818, ii. 95;

1850, ii. 69). First collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 374.

LINENOTES:

[1] spirit] Genius MS.

[2] yet] and MS.

[3] _Minds_] _Souls_ MS. erased.

When Hope but made Tranquillity be felt:

A flight of Hope for ever on the wing

But made Tranquillity a conscious thing;

And wheeling round and round in sportive coil,

Fann'd the calm air upon the brow of Toil.

1810. First published from an MS. in 1893.

I have experienced

The worst the world can wreak on me--the worst

That can make Life indifferent, yet disturb

With whisper'd discontent the dying prayer--

I have beheld the whole of all, wherein

_My_ heart had any interest in this life

To be disrent and torn from off my Hopes

That nothing now is left. Why then live on?

That hostage that the world had in its keeping

Given by me as a pledge that I would live--

That hope of Her, say rather that pure Faith

In her fix'd Love, which held me to keep truce

With the tyranny of Life--is gone, ah! whither?

What boots it to reply? 'tis gone! and now

Well may I break this Pact, this league of Blood

That ties me to myself--and break I shall.

1810. First published from an MS. in 1893.

As when the new or full Moon urges

The high, large, long, unbreaking surges

Of the Pacific main.

1811. First published from an MS. in 1893.

O mercy, O me, miserable man!

Slowly my wisdom, and how slowly comes

My Virtue! and how rapidly pass off

My Joys! _my Hopes_! my Friendships, and my Love!

1811. Now first published from an MS.

A low dead Thunder mutter'd thro' the night,

As 'twere a giant angry in his sleep--

Nature! sweet nurse, O take me in thy lap

And tell me of my Father yet unseen,

Sweet tales, and true, that lull me into sleep

And leave me dreaming.

1811. First published from an MS. in 1893.

His own fair countenance, his kingly forehead,

His tender smiles, Love's day-dawn on his lips,

Put on such heavenly, spiritual light,

At the same moment in his steadfast eye

Were Virtue's native crest, th' innocent soul's

Unconscious meek self-heraldry,--to man

Genial, and pleasant to his guardian angel.

He suffer'd nor complain'd;--though oft with tears

He mourn'd th' oppression of his helpless brethren,--

And sometimes with a deeper holier grief

Mourn'd for the oppressor--but this in sabbath hours--

A solemn grief, that like a cloud at sunset,

Was but the veil of inward meditation

Pierced thro' and saturate with the intellectual rays

It soften'd.

1812. First published (with many alterations of the MS.) in _Lit. Rem._,

i. 277. First collected _P. and D. W._, 1887, ii. 364. Compare Teresa's

speech to Valdez, _Remorse_, Act IV, Scene II, lines 52-63 (_ante_, p.

866).

[ARS POETICA]

In the two following lines, for instance, there is nothing

objectionable, nothing which would preclude them from forming, in their

proper place, part of a descriptive poem:--

'Behold yon row of pines, that shorn and bow'd

Bend from the sea-blast, seen at twilight eve.'

But with a small alteration of rhythm, the same words would be equally

in their place in a book of topography, or in a descriptive tour. The

same image will rise into a semblance of poetry if thus conveyed:--

'Yon row of bleak and visionary pines,

By twilight-glimpse discerned, mark! how they flee

From the fierce sea-blast, all their tresses wild

Streaming before them.'

1815. First published in _Biog. Lit._, 1817, ii. 18; 1847, ii. 20. First

collected 1893.

TRANSLATION OF THE FIRST STROPHE OF

PINDAR'S SECOND OLYMPIC

'_As nearly as possible word for word._'

Ye harp-controlling hymns!

(or)

Ye hymns the sovereigns of harps!

What God? what Hero?

What Man shall we celebrate?

Truly Pisa indeed is of Jove,

But the Olympiad (or, the Olympic games) did Hercules establish,

The first-fruits of the spoils of war.

But Theron for the four-horsed car

That bore victory to him,

It behoves us now to voice aloud:

The Just, the Hospitable,

The Bulwark of Agrigentum,

Of renowned fathers

The Flower, even him

Who preserves his native city erect and safe.

1815. First published in _Biog. Lit._, 1817, ii. 90; 1847, ii. 93. First

collected 1893.

O! Superstition is the giant shadow

Which the solicitude of weak mortality,

Its back toward Religion's rising sun,

Casts on the thin mist of th' uncertain future.

1816. First published from an MS. in 1893.

TRANSLATION OF A FRAGMENT OF HERACLITUS[1007:1]

Not hers

To win the sense by words of rhetoric,

Lip-blossoms breathing perishable sweets;

But by the power of the informing Word

Roll sounding onward through a thousand years

Her deep prophetic bodements.

1816. First published in _Lit. Rem._, iii. 418, 419. First collected _P.

and D. W._, 1877, ii. 367.

Truth I pursued, as Fancy sketch'd the way,

And wiser men than I went worse astray.

First published as Motto to Essay II, _The Friend_, 1818, ii. 37; 1850,

ii. 27. First collected 1893.

IMITATED FROM ARISTOPHANES

(_Nubes_ 315, 317.)

+megalai theai andrasin argois,

haiper gnômên kai dialexin kai noun hêmin parechousi

kai terateian kai perilexin kai krousin kai katalêpsin+

For the ancients . . . had their glittering VAPORS, which (as the comic

poet tells us) fed a host of sophists.

Great goddesses are they to lazy folks,

Who pour down on us gifts of fluent speech,

Sense most sententious, wonderful fine _effect_,

And how to talk about it and about it,

Thoughts brisk as bees, and pathos soft and thawy.

1817. First published in _The Friend_, 1818, iii. 179; 1850, iii. 138.

First collected 1893.

Let clumps of earth, however glorified,

Roll round and round and still renew their cycle--

Man rushes like a winged Cherub through

The infinite space, and that which has been

Can therefore never be again----

1820. First published from an MS. in 1893.

TO EDWARD IRVING

But _you_, honored IRVING, are as little disposed as myself to favor

_such_ doctrine! [as that of Mant and D'Oyly on Infant Baptism].

Friend pure of heart and fervent! we have learnt

A different lore! We may not thus profane

The Idea and Name of Him whose Absolute Will

_Is_ Reason--Truth Supreme!--Essential Order!

1824. First published in _Aids to Reflection_, 1825, p. 373. First

collected 1893.

[LUTHER--DE DÆMONIBUS]

_The devils are in woods, in waters, in wildernesses, and in dark pooly

places, ready to hurt and prejudice people, etc._--_Doctoris Martini

Lutheri Colloquia Mensalia_--(Translated by Captain Henry Bell. London,

1652, p. 370).

'The angel's like a flea,

The devil is a bore;--'

No matter for that! quoth S. T. C.,

I love him the better therefore.

Yes! heroic Swan, I love thee even when thou gabblest like

a goose; for thy geese helped to save the Capitol.

1826. First published in _Lit. Rem._, 1839, iv. 52. First collected _P.

and D. W._, 1877, ii. 367.

THE NETHERLANDS

Water and windmills, greenness, Islets green;--

Willows whose Trunks beside the shadows stood

Of their own higher half, and willowy swamp:--

Farmhouses that at anchor seem'd--in the inland sky

The fog-transfixing Spires--

Water, wide water, greenness and green banks,

And water seen--

June 1828. Now first published from an MS.

ELISA[1009:1]

TRANSLATED FROM CLAUDIAN

Dulce dona mihi tu mittis semper Elisa!

Et quicquid mittis Thura putare decet.

The above adapted from an Epigram of Claudian [No. lxxxii, Ad Maximum

Qui mel misit], by substituting _Thura_ for _Mella_: the original

Distich being in return for a present of Honey.

_Imitation_

Sweet Gift! and always doth Elisa send

Sweet Gifts and full of fragrance to her Friend

Enough for Him to know they come from HER:

Whate'er she sends is Frankincense and Myrrh.

ANOTHER ON THE SAME SUBJECT BY S. T. C. HIMSELF

Semper Elisa! mihi tu suaveolentia donas:

Nam quicquid donas, te redolere puto.

_Translation_

Whate'er thou giv'st, it still is sweet to me,

For _still_ I find it redolent of thee.

1833, 4. Now first published from an MS.

PROFUSE KINDNESS

+Nêpioi oude isasin hosô pleon hêmisy pantos.+

HESIOD. [_Works and Days_, l. 40.]

What a spring-tide of Love to dear friends in a shoal!

Half of it to one were worth double the whole!

Undated. First published in _P. W._, 1834.

I stand alone, nor tho' my heart should break,

Have I, to whom I may complain or speak.

Here I stand, a hopeless man and sad,

Who hoped to have seen my Love, my Life.

And strange it were indeed, could I be glad

Remembering her, my soul's betrothéd wife.

For in this world no creature that has life

Was e'er to me so gracious and so good.

Her loss is to my Heart, like the Heart's blood.

? S. T. C. Undated. First published from an MS. in 1893. These lines are

inscribed on a fly-leaf of Tom. II of Benedetto Menzini's _Poesie_,

1782.

NAPOLEON

The Sun with gentle beams his rage disguises,

And, like aspiring Tyrants, temporises--

Never to be endured but when he falls or rises.

? S. T. C. Undated. Now first published from an MS.

Thicker than rain-drops on November thorn.

Undated. Now first published from an MS.

His native accents to her stranger's ear,

Skill'd in the tongues of France and Italy--

Or while she warbles with bright eyes upraised,

Her fingers shoot like streams of silver light

Amid the golden haze of thrilling strings.

Undated. First published from an MS. in 1893.

Each crime that once estranges from the virtues

Doth make the memory of their features daily

More dim and vague, till each coarse counterfeit

Can have the passport to our confidence

Sign'd by ourselves. And fitly are they punish'd

Who prize and seek the honest man but as

A safer lock to guard dishonest treasures.

? S. T. C. Undated. First published in _Lit. Rem._, i. 281. First

collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 365.

Where'er I find the Good, the True, the Fair,

I ask no names--God's spirit dwelleth there!

The unconfounded, undivided Three,

Each for itself, and all in each, to see

In man and Nature, is Philosophy.

Undated. First published from an MS. in 1893.

A wind that with Aurora hath abiding

Among the Arabian and the Persian Hills.

Undated. First published from an MS. in 1893.

I [S. T. C.] find the following lines among my papers, in my own

writing, but whether an unfinished fragment, or a contribution to some

friend's production, I know not:--

What boots to tell how o'er his grave

She wept, that would have died to save;

Little they know the heart, who deem

Her sorrow but an infant's dream

Of transient love begotten;

A passing gale, that as it blows

Just shakes the ripe drop from the rose--

That dies and is forgotten.

O Woman! nurse of hopes and fears,

All lovely in thy spring of years,

Thy soul in blameless mirth possessing,

Most lovely in affliction's tears,

More lovely still than tears suppressing.

Undated. First published in Allsop's _Letters, Conversations_, &c. First

collected _P. and D. W._, 1877, ii. 373.

THE THREE SORTS OF FRIENDS

Though friendships differ endless _in degree_,

The _sorts_, methinks, may be reduced to three.

_Ac_quaintance many, and _Con_quaintance few;

But for _In_quaintance I know only two--

The friend I've mourned with, and the maid I woo!

MY DEAR GILLMAN--The ground and _matériel_ of this division of one's

friends into _ac_, _con_ and _in_quaintance, was given by Hartley

Coleridge when he was scarcely five years old [1801]. On some one asking

him if Anny Sealy (a little girl he went to school with) was an

acquaintance of his, he replied, very fervently pressing his right hand

on his heart, 'No, she is an _in_quaintance!' 'Well! 'tis a father's

tale'; and the recollection soothes your old friend and _in_quaintance,

S. T. COLERIDGE.

Undated. First published in _Fraser's Magazine_ for Jan. 1835, Art.

_Coleridgeiana_, p. 54. First collected 1893.

If fair by Nature

She honours the fair Boon with fair adorning,

And graces that bespeak a gracious breeding,

Can gracious Nature lessen Nature's Graces?

If taught by both she betters both and honours

Fair gifts with fair adorning, know you not

There is a beauty that resides within;--

A fine and delicate spirit of womanhood

Of inward birth?--

Now first published from an MS.

BO-PEEP AND I SPY--

In the corner _one_--

I spy Love!

In the corner _None_,

I spy Love.

1826. Now first published from an MS.

A SIMILE

As the shy hind, the soft-eyed gentle Brute

Now moves, now stops, approaches by degrees--

At length emerges from the shelt'ring Trees,

Lur'd by her Hunter with the Shepherd's flute,

Whose music travelling on the twilight breeze,

When all besides was mute--

She oft had heard, and ever lov'd to hear;

She fearful Beast! but that no sound of Fear----

Undated. Now first published from an MS.

BARON GUELPH OF ADELSTAN. A FRAGMENT

For ever in the world of Fame

We live and yet abide the same:

Clouds may intercept our rays,

Or desert Lands reflect our blaze.

The beauteous Month of May began,

And all was Mirth and Sport,

When Baron Guelph of Adelstan

Took leave and left the Court.

From Fête and Rout and Opera far

The full town he forsook,

And changed his wand and golden star

For Shepherd's Crown and Crook.

The knotted net of light and shade

Beneath the budding tree,

A sweeter day-bed for him made

Than Couch and Canopy.

In copse or lane, as Choice or Chance

Might lead him was he seen;

And join'd at eve the village dance

Upon the village green.

Nor endless--

Undated. Now first published from an MS.

FOOTNOTES:

[996:1] The following 'Fragments', numbered 1-63, consist of a few

translations and versicles inserted by Coleridge in his various prose

works, and a larger number of fragments, properly so called, which were

published from MS. sources in 1893, or are now published for the first

time. These fragments are taken exclusively from Coleridge's Notebooks

(the source of _Anima Poetæ_, 1895), and were collected, transcribed,

and dated by the present Editor for publication in 1893. The fragments

now published for the first time were either not used by J. D. Campbell

in 1893, or had not been discovered or transcribed. The very slight

emendations of the text are due to the fact that Mr. Campbell printed

from copies, and that the collection as a whole has now for the second

time been collated with the original MSS. Fragments numbered 64, 96, 98,

111, 113, in _P. W._, 1893, are quotations from the plays and poems of

William Cartwright (1611-1643). They are not included in the present

issue. Fragments 56, 58, 59, 61, 63, 67, 80, 81, 83, 88, 91, 93, 94,

117-120, are inserted in the text or among 'Jeux d'Esprit', or under

other headings. The chronological order is for the most part

conjectural, and differs from that suggested in 1893. It must be borne

in mind that the entries in Coleridge's Notebooks are not continuous,

and that the additional matter in prose or verse was inserted from time

to time, wherever a page or half a page was not filled up. It follows

that the context is an uncertain guide to the date of any given entry.

Pains have been taken to exclude quotations from older writers, which

Coleridge neither claimed nor intended to claim for his own, but it is

possible that two or three of these fragments of verse are not original.

[996:2] This quatrain, described as 'The concluding stanza of an Elegy

on a Lady who died in Early Youth', is from part of a memorandum in S.

T. C.'s handwriting headed 'Relics of my School-boy Muse; i. e.

fragments of poems composed before my fifteenth year'. It follows _First

Advent of Love_, 'O fair is Love's first hope,' &c. (vide _ante_, p.

443), and is compared with Age--a stanza written forty years later than

the preceding--'Dewdrops are the gems of morning,' &c. (p. 440).

ANOTHER VERSION.

O'er her piled grave the gale of evening sighs,

And flowers will grow upon its grassy slope,

I wipe the dimming waters from mine eye

Even on the cold grave dwells the Cherub Hope.

_Unpublished Letter to Thomas Poole_, Feb. 1. 1801, on the death of Mrs.

Robinson ('Perdita').

[997:1] These two lines, slightly altered, were afterwards included in

_Alice du Clos_ (ll. 111, 112), _ante_, p. 473.

[998:1] The lines are an attempt to reduce to blank verse one of many

minute descriptions of natural objects and scenic effects. The

concluding lines are illegible.

[1001:1] These lines, 'slip torn from some old letter,' are endorsed by

Poole, 'Reply of Coleridge on my urging him to exert himself.' First

collected in 1893.

[1007:1] The translation is embodied in a marginal note on the

following quotation from _The Select Discourses_ by John Smith, 1660:--

'_So the Sibyl was noted by Heraclitus as +mainomenô stomati gelasta

kai akallôpista phthengomenê+, as one speaking ridiculous and unseemly

speeches with her furious mouth._' The fragment is misquoted and

misunderstood: for +gelasta+, etc. should be +amyrista+ unperfumed,

inornate lays, not redolent of art.--Render it thus:

Not her's, etc.

+Stomati mainomenô+ is 'with ecstatic mouth'.

J. D. Campbell in a note to this Fragment (_P. W._, 1893, pp. 464-5)

quotes the 'following prose translation of the same passage', from

Coleridge's _Statesman's Manual_ (1816, p. 132); 'Multiscience (or a

variety and quantity of acquired knowledge) does not test intelligence.

But the Sibyll with wild enthusiastic mirth shrilling forth unmirthful,

inornate and unperfumed truths, reaches to a thousand years with her

voice through the power of God.'

The prose translation is an amalgam of two fragments. The first sentence

is quoted by Diogenes Laertius, ix. 1: the second by Plutarch, de Pyth.

orac. 6, p. 377.

[1009:1] These rhymes were addressed to a Miss Eliza Nixon, who supplied

S. T. C. with books from a lending library.

METRICAL EXPERIMENTS[1014:1]

AN EXPERIMENT FOR A METRE

I heard a voice pealing loud triumph to-day:

The voice of the Triumph, O Freedom, was thine!

Sumptuous Tyranny challeng'd the fray,[1014:2]

'Drunk with Idolatry, drunk with wine.'

Whose could the Triumph be Freedom but thine?

Stars of the Heaven shine to feed thee;

Hush'd are the Whirl-blasts and heed thee;--

By her depth, by her height, Nature swears thou art mine!

1. Amphibrach tetrameter catalectic [breve macron breve] | [breve

macron breve] | [breve macron breve] | [breve macron]

2. Ditto.

3. Three pseudo amphimacers, and one long syllable.

4. Two dactyls, and one perfect Amphimacer.

5. = 1 and 2.

6. [macron breve macron] | [macron breve macron breve] |

7. [macron breve macron] | [macron breve macron breve] |

8. [macron breve macron] | [macron breve macron], [macron breve macron],

[macron breve macron]

1801. Now first published from an MS.

TROCHAICS

Thus she said, and, all around,

Her diviner spirit, gan to borrow;

Earthly Hearings hear unearthly sound,

Hearts heroic faint, and sink aswound.

Welcome, welcome, spite of pain and sorrow,

Love to-day, and Thought to-morrow.

1801. Now first published from an MS.

THE PROPER UNMODIFIED DOCHMIUS

(_i. e._ antispastic Catalectic)

B[)e]n[=i]gn sh[=o][=o]t[)i]ng st[=a]rs, [)e]cst[=a]t[=i]c

d[)e]l[=i]ght.

_or_

The Lord's throne in Heaven [)a]m[=i]d [=a]ng[)e]l troops

Amid troops of Angels God throned on high.

1801. Now first published from an MS.

IAMBICS

No cold shall thee benumb,

Nor darkness stain thy sight;

To thee new Heat, new Light

Shall from this object come,

Whose Praises if thou now wilt sound aright,

My Pen shall give thee leave hereafter to be dumb.

1801. Now first published from an MS.

NONSENSE

Sing impassionate Soul! of Mohammed the complicate story:

Sing, unfearful of Man, groaning and ending in care.

Short the Command and the Toil, but endlessly mighty the Glory!

Standing aloof if it chance, vainly our enemy's scare:

What tho' we wretchedly fare, wearily drawing the Breath--,

Malice in wonder may stare; merrily move we to Death.

Now first published from an MS.

A PLAINTIVE MOVEMENT

[11´ 4` 11´ 4` | 10´ 6` 4´ 10`]

Go little Pipe! for ever I must leave thee,

Ah, vainly true!

Never, ah never! must I more receive thee?

Adieu! adieu!

Well, thou art gone! and what remains behind,

Soothing the soul to Hope?

The moaning Wind--

Hide with sere leaves my Grave's undaisied Slope.

(?) October. 1814.

[It would be better to alter this metre--

10´ 6` 6´ 10` | 11´ 4` 11´ 4`: and still more plaintive if the 1st and

4th were 11´ 11´ as well as the 5th and 7th.]

Now first published from an MS.

AN EXPERIMENT FOR A METRE

[breve breve macron], [breve breve macron]

[breve macron] }

[macron breve macron] } [breve breve macron]; [breve breve macron],

[breve breve macron]

[breve macron] }

[macron breve macron] } [breve breve macron], [breve breve macron],

[breve breve macron]

[breve macron] }

[breve breve macron] } [breve breve macron], [breve breve macron]

When thy Beauty appears,

In its graces and airs,

All bright as an Angel new dight from the Sky,

At distance I gaze, and am awed by my fears,

So strangely you dazzle my Eye.

Now first published from an MS.

NONSENSE VERSES

[AN EXPERIMENT FOR A METRE]

Ye fowls of ill presage,

Go vanish into Night!

Let all things sweet and fair

Yield homage to the pair:

From Infancy to Age

Each Brow be smooth and bright,

As Lake in evening light.

To-day be Joy! and Sorrow

Devoid of Blame

(The widow'd Dame)

Shall welcome be to-morrow.

Thou, too, dull Night! may'st come unchid:

This wall of Flame the Dark hath hid

With turrets each a Pyramid;--

For the Tears that we shed, are Gladness,

A mockery of Sadness!

Now first published from an MS.

NONSENSE

[AN EXPERIMENT FOR A METRE]

I wish on earth to sing

Of Jove the bounteous store,

That all the Earth may ring

With Tale of Wrong no more.

I fear no foe in field or tent,

Tho' weak our cause yet strong his Grace:

As Polar roamers clad in Fur,

Unweeting whither we were bent

We found as 'twere a native place,

Where not a Blast could stir:

{ For Jove had his Almighty Presence lent:

{ Each eye beheld, in each transfigured Face,

{ The radiant light of Joy, and Hope's forgotten Trace.

_or_

{ O then I sing Jove's bounteous store--

{ On rushing wing while sea-mews roar,

{ And raking Tides roll Thunder on the shore.

Now first published from an MS.

EXPERIMENTS IN METRE

There in some darksome shade

Methinks I'd weep

Myself asleep,

And there forgotten fade.

First published from an MS. in 1893.

Once again, sweet Willow, wave thee!

Why stays my Love?

Bend, and in yon streamlet--lave thee!

Why stays my Love?

Oft have I at evening straying,

Stood, thy branches long surveying,

Graceful in the light breeze playing,--

Why stays my Love?

1. Four Trochees /.

2. One spondee, Iambic \.

3. Four Trochees 1.

4. Repeated from 2.

5, 6, 7. A triplet of 4 Trochees--8 repeated.

First published from an MS. in 1893.

[macron breve], [macron breve breve], [macron breve breve],

[macron breve breve]

[macron breve], [macron breve breve], [macron breve breve],

[macron breve breve]

[breve macron breve], [macron breve breve], [macron breve breve],

[macron]

[macron breve breve], [macron breve]

[breve macron breve breve], [macron breve] etc.

Songs of Shepherds and rustical Roundelays,

Forms of Fancies and whistled on Reeds,

Songs to solace young Nymphs upon Holidays

Are too unworthy for wonderful deeds--

Round about, hornéd

Lucinda they swarméd,

And her they informéd,

How minded they were,

Each God and Goddess,

To take human Bodies

As Lords and Ladies to follow the Hare.

Now first published from an MS.

A METRICAL ACCIDENT

Curious instance of casual metre and rhyme in a prose narrative (_The

Life of Jerome of Prague_). The metre is Amphibrach dimeter Catalectic

[breve macron breve] | [breve macron], and the rhymes antistrophic.

Then Jerome did call _a_

From his flame-pointed Fence; _b_

Which under he trod, _c_

As upward to mount _d_

From the fiery flood,-- _e_

'I summon you all, _a_

A hundred years hence, _b_

To appear before God, _c_

To give an account _d_

Of my innocent blood!' _e_

July 7, 1826. Now first published from an MS.

NOTES BY PROFESSOR SAINTSBURY

1. I think most ears would take these as anapaestic throughout. But the

introduction of Milton's

Drunk with Idolatry, drunk with wine

as a _leit-motiv_ is of the first interest.

Description of it, l. 4, very curious. I should have thought no one

could have run 'drunk with wine' together as one foot.

2. Admirable! I hardly know better trochaics.

3. Very interesting: but the terminology odd. The dochmius, a

five-syllabled foot, is (in _one_ form--there are about thirty!) an

antispast [breve macron macron breve] _plus_ a syllable. Catalectic

means (_properly_) _minus_ a syllable. But the verses as quantified are

really dochmiac, and the only attempts I have seen. Shall I own I can't

get any _English_ Rhythm on them?

4. More ordinary: but a good arrangement and wonderful for the date.

5. Not nonsense at all: but, metrically, really his usual elegiac.

6. This, _if early_, is almost priceless. It is not only lovely in

itself, but an obvious attempt to recover the zig-zag outline and varied

cadence of seventeenth century born--the things that Shelley to some

extent, Beddoes and Darley more, and Tennyson and Browning most were to

master. I subscribe (most humbly) to his suggestions, especially his

second.

7. Very like some late seventeenth-century (Dryden time) motives and a

_leetle_ 'Moorish'.

8. Like 6, and charming.

9. A sort of recurrence to _Pindaric_--again pioneer, as the soul of S.

T. C. _had_ to be always.

10 and 11. Ditto.

13. Again, _I_ should say, anapaestic--but this anapaest and amphibrach

quarrel is +aspondos+.

FOOTNOTES:

[1014:1] 'He attributed in part, his writing so little, to the extreme

care and labour which he applied in elaborating his metres. He said that

when he was intent on a new experiment in metre, the time and labour he

bestowed were inconceivable; that he was quite an epicure in

sound.'--Wordsworth on Coleridge (as reported by Mr. Justice Coleridge),

_Memoirs of W. Wordsworth_, 1851, ii. 306.

In a letter to Poole dated March 16, 1801, Coleridge writes: 'I shall .

. . immediately publish my _Christabel_, with the Essays on the

"Preternatural", and on Metre' (_Letters of S. T. C._, 1895, i. 349).

Something had been done towards the collection of materials for the

first 'Essay', a great deal for the second. In a notebook (No. 22) which

contains dated entries of 1805, 1815, &c., but of which the greater

portion, as the context and various handwritings indicate, belongs to a

much earlier date, there are some forty-eight numbered specimens of

various metres derived from German and Italian sources. To some of these

stanzas or strophes a metrical scheme with original variants is

attached, whilst other schemes are exemplified by metrical experiments

in English, headed 'Nonsense Verses'. Two specimens of these

experiments, headed 'A Sunset' and 'What is Life', are included in the

text of _P. W._, 1893 (pp. 172, 178), and in that of the present issue,

pp. 393, 394. They are dated 1805 in accordance with the dates of

Coleridge's own comments or afterthoughts, but it is almost certain that

both sets of verses were composed in 1801. The stanza entitled 'An Angel

Visitant' belongs to the same period. Ten other sets of 'Nonsense

Verses' of uncertain but early date are now printed for the first time.

[1014:2] Sumptuous Tyranny floating this way. [MS.] On p. 17 of Notebook

22 Coleridge writes:--

--[u][u],--[u] [u],--[u],--

Drunk with I--dolatry--drunk with, Wine.

A noble metre if I can find a metre to precede or follow.

S[=u]mpt[)u][)o]us D[=a]l[)i]l[)a] fl[=o]at[)i]ng th[)i]s w[=a]y

Drunk with Idolatry, drunk with wine.

Both lines are from Milton's _Samson Agonistes_.

APPENDIX I

FIRST DRAFTS, EARLY VERSIONS, ETC.

[Vide _ante_, p. 100]

EFFUSION 35

Clevedon, August 20th, 1795.[1021:1]

(First Draft)

My pensive SARA! thy soft Cheek reclin'd

Thus on my arm, how soothing sweet it is

Beside our Cot to sit, our Cot o'ergrown

With white-flowr'd Jasmine and the blossom'd myrtle,

(Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love!) 5

And watch the Clouds, that late were rich with light,

Slow-sad'ning round, and mark the star of eve

Serenely brilliant, like thy polish'd Sense,

Shine opposite! What snatches of perfume

The noiseless gale from yonder bean-field wafts! 10

The stilly murmur of the far-off Sea

Tells us of Silence! and behold, my love!

In the half-closed window we will place the Harp,

Which by the desultory Breeze caress'd,

Like some coy maid half willing to be woo'd, 15

Utters such sweet upbraidings as, perforce,

Tempt to repeat the wrong!

[_M. R._]

EFFUSION, p. 96. (1797.)

(Second Draft)

My pensive SARA! thy soft Cheek reclin'd

Thus on my arm, most soothing sweet it is

To sit beside our Cot, our Cot o'ergrown

With white-flower'd Jasmin, and the broad-leav'd Myrtle

(Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love!) 5

And watch the Clouds that, late were rich with light,

Slow-sadd'ning round, and mark the Star of eve

Serenely brilliant (such should WISDOM be!)

Shine opposite. How exquisite the Scents

Snatch'd from yon Bean-field! And the world _so_ hush'd! 10

The stilly murmur of the far-off Sea

Tells us of Silence! And that simplest Lute

Plac'd lengthways in the clasping casement, hark!

How by the desultory Breeze caress'd

(Like some coy Maid half-yielding to her Lover) 15

It pours such sweet Upbraidings, as must needs

Tempt to repeat the wrong. And now it's strings

Boldlier swept, the long sequacious notes

Over delicious Surges sink and rise

In aëry voyage, Music such as erst 20

Round rosy bowers (so Legendaries tell)

To sleeping Maids came floating witchingly

By wand'ring West winds stoln from Faery land;

Where on some magic Hybla MELODIES

Round many a newborn honey-dropping Flower 25

Footless and wild, like Birds of Paradise,

Nor pause nor perch, warbling on untir'd wing.

And thus, my Love! as on the midway Slope

Of yonder Hill I stretch my limbs at noon

And tranquil muse upon Tranquillity. 30

Full many a Thought uncall'd and undetain'd

And many idle flitting Phantasies

Traverse my indolent and passive Mind

As wild, as various, as the random Gales

That swell or flutter on this subject Lute. 35

And what if All of animated Life

Be but as Instruments diversly fram'd

That tremble into thought, while thro' them breathes

One infinite and intellectual Breeze,

And all in diff'rent Heights so aptly hung, 40

That Murmurs indistinct and Bursts sublime,

Shrill Discords and most soothing Melodies,

Harmonious from Creation's vast concent--

Thus _God_ would be the universal Soul,

Mechaniz'd matter as th' organic harps 45

And each one's Tunes be that, which each calls I.

But thy more serious Look a mild Reproof

Darts, O beloved Woman, and thy words

Pious and calm check these unhallow'd Thoughts,

These Shapings of the unregen'rate Soul, 50

Bubbles, that glitter as they rise and break

On vain Philosophy's aye-babbling Spring:

Thou biddest me walk humbly with my God!

Meek Daughter in the family of Christ.

Wisely thou sayest, and holy are thy words! 55

Nor may I unblam'd or speak or think of Him,

Th' INCOMPREHENSIBLE! save when with Awe

I praise him, and with Faith that inly feels,

Who with his saving Mercies healèd me,

A sinful and most miserable man 60

Wilder'd and dark, and gave me to possess

PEACE and this COT, and THEE, my best-belov'd!

[_MS. R._]

FOOTNOTES:

[1021:1] Now first published from Cottle's MSS. preserved in the Library

of Rugby School.

LINENOTES:

[40-43]

In diff'rent heights, so aptly hung, that all

In half-heard murmurs and loud bursts sublime,

Shrill discords and most soothing melodies,

Raises one great concent--one concent formed,

Thus God, the only universal Soul--

Alternative version, MS. R.

RECOLLECTION[1023:1]

[Vide _ante_, pp. 53, 48]

As the tir'd savage, who his drowsy frame

Had bask'd beneath the sun's unclouded flame,

Awakes amid the troubles of the air,

The skiey deluge and white lightning's glare,

Aghast he scours before the tempest's sweep, 5

And sad recalls the sunny hour of sleep!

So tost by storms along life's wild'ring way

Mine eye reverted views that cloudless day,

When by my native brook I wont to rove,

While HOPE with kisses nurs'd the infant LOVE! 10

Dear native brook! like peace so placidly

Smoothing thro' fertile fields thy current meek--

Dear native brook! where first young POESY

Star'd wildly eager in her noon-tide dream;

Where blameless Pleasures dimpled Quiet's cheek, 15

As water-lilies _ripple_ thy slow stream!

How many various-fated years have past,

What blissful and what anguish'd hours, since last

I skimm'd the smooth thin stone along thy breast

Numb'ring its light leaps! Yet so deep imprest 20

Sink the sweet scenes of childhood, that mine eyes

I never shut amid the sunny blaze,

But strait, with all their tints, thy waters rise,

The crossing plank, and margin's willowy maze,

And bedded sand, that, vein'd with various dyes, 25

Gleam'd thro' thy bright transparence to the gaze--

Ah! fair tho' faint those forms of memory seem

Like Heaven's bright bow on thy smooth evening stream.

FOOTNOTES:

[1023:1] First published in _The Watchman_, No. V, April 2, 1796:

reprinted in Note 39 (p. 566) of _P. W._, 1892. The Editor (J. D.

Campbell) points out that this poem as printed in _The Watchman_ is made

up of lines 71-86 of _Lines on an Autumnal Evening_ (vide _ante_, p.

53), of lines 2-11 of _Sonnet to the River Otter_, and of lines 13, 14

of _The Gentle Look_, and _Anna and Harland_.

THE DESTINY OF NATIONS

[Add. (_MSS._) 34,225. f. 5. Vide _ante_, p. 131.]

[DRAFT I]

Auspicious Reverence! Hush all meaner song,

Till we the deep prelusive strain have pour'd

To the Great Father, only Rightful King,

Eternal Father! king omnipotent;

Beneath whose shadowing banners wide-unfurl'd 5

Justice leads forth her tyrant-quelling Hosts.

Such Symphony demands best Instrument.

The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Vol 2 (of 2) · 第 19 / 22 章

An evil spirit's on thee, friend! of late!