Sir H. Davy was the chief agent in prevailing on Mr. Coleridge to give a
course of lectures on Shakspeare, at the Royal Institution, which he did,
eighteen in number, in the year 1808. Sir H. D. in writing to Mr. Poole,
this year, thus refers to him.
"Coleridge, after disappointing his audience twice from illness, is
announced to lecture again this week. He has suffered greatly from
excessive sensibility, the disease of genius. His mind is a wilderness,
in which the cedar and the oak, which might aspire to the skies, are
stunted in their growth by underwood, thorns, briars, and parasitical
plants. With the most exalted genius, enlarged views, sensitive heart,
and enlightened mind, he will be the victim of want of order, precision,
and regularity. I cannot think of him without experiencing the mingled
feelings of admiration, regard, and pity."
To this testimony in confirmation of Mr. Coleridge's intellectual
eminence, some high and additional authorities will be added; such as to
entitle him to the name of the Great Conversationalist. Professor Wilson
thus writes:
"If there be any man of great and original genius alive at this
moment, in Europe, it is S. T. Coleridge. Nothing can surpass the
melodious richness of words, which he heaps around his images; images
that are not glaring in themselves, but which are always affecting to
the very verge of tears, because they have all been formed and
nourished in the recesses of one of the most deeply musing spirits,
that ever breathed forth its inspirations, in the majestic language
of England."
"Not less marvellously gifted, though in a far different manner, is
Coleridge, who by a strange error has usually been regarded of the
same (lake) school. Instead, like Wordsworth, of seeking the sources
of sublimity and beauty in the simplest elements of humanity, he
ranges through all history and science, investigating all that has
really existed, and all that has had foundation only in the wildest,
and strangest minds, combining, condensing, developing and
multiplying the rich products of his research with marvellous
facility and skill; now pondering fondly over some piece of exquisite
loveliness, brought from an unknown recess, now tracing out the
hidden germ of the eldest, and most barbaric theories, and now
calling fantastic spirits from the vasty deep, where they have slept
since the dawn of reason. The term 'myriad-minded' which he has
happily applied to Shakspeare, is truly descriptive of himself. He is
not one, but legion, 'rich with the spoils of time,' richer in his
own glorious imagination and sportive fantasy. There is nothing more
wonderful than the facile majesty of his images, or rather of his
world of imagery, which, whether in his poetry or his prose, start up
before us, self-raised, and all perfect, like the palace of Aladdin.
He ascends to the sublimest truths by a winding track of sparkling
glory, which can only be described in his own language.
'The spirit's ladder
That from this gross and visible world of dust,
Even to the starry world, with thousand rounds
Builds itself up; on which the unseen powers
Move up and down on heavenly ministries--
The circles in the circles, that approach
The central sun from ever narrowing orbit.'
In various beauty of versification he has never been exceeded.
Shakspeare doubtless in liquid sweetness and exquisite continuity,
and Milton in pure majesty and classic grace--but this, in one
species of verse only; and taking all his trials of various metres,
the swelling harmony of his blank verse, the sweet breathing of his
gentle odes, and the sybil-like flutter, with the murmuring of his
wizard spells, we doubt if even these great masters have so fully
developed the sources of the English tongue. He has yet completed no
adequate memorial of his Genius, yet it is most unjust to say he has
done little or nothing.
To refute this assertion, there are his 'Wallenstein;' his love poems
of intensest beauty; his 'Ancient Mariner,' with his touches of
profoundest tenderness amidst the wildest and most bewildering
terrors; his holy and sweet tale of 'Christabel,' with its
enchantments, and richer humanities; the depths, the sublimities, and
the pensive sweetness of his 'Tragedy;' the heart-dilating sentiments
scattered through his 'Friend;' and the stately imagery which breaks
upon us at every turn of the golden paths of his metaphysical
labyrinth. And if he has a power within him mightier than that which
even these glorious creations indicate, shall he be censured because
he has deviated from the ordinary course of the age in its
development, and instead of committing his imaginative wisdom to the
press, has delivered it from his living lips? He has gone about in
the true spirit of an old Greek bard, with a noble carelessness of
self, giving fit utterance to the divine spirit within, him. Who that
has ever heard can forget him? His mild benignity, the unbounded
variety of his knowledge, the fast succeeding products of his
imagination, the child-like simplicity with which he rises from the
dryest and commonest theme into the wildest magnificence of thought,
pouring on the soul a stream of beauty and wisdom to mellow and
enrich it for ever? The seeds of poetry, the materials for thinking,
which he has thus scattered will not perish. The records of his fame
are not in books only, but on the fleshly tablets of young hearts,
who will not suffer it to die even in the general ear, however base
and unfeeling criticism may deride their gratitude."--_Mr. Sergeant
Talfourd._
Dr. Dibdin has given an animated description of Coleridge's lecturing and
conversation, which concurs with the universal opinion.
"I once came from Kensington in a snow-storm to hear Mr. Coleridge
lecture on Shakspeare, I might have sat as wisely, and more
comfortably by my own fire-side--for no Coleridge appeared.----I
shall never forget the effect his conversation made upon me at the
first meeting, at a dinner party. It struck me as something not only
quite out of the ordinary course of things, but an intellectual
exhibition altogether matchless. The viands were unusually costly,
and the banquet was at once rich and varied; but there seemed to be
no dish like Coleridge's conversation to feed upon--and no
information so instructive as his own. The orator rolled himself up
as it were in his chair, and gave the most unrestrained indulgence to
his speech; and how fraught with acuteness and originality was that
speech, and in what copious and eloquent periods did it flow. The
auditors seemed to be wrapt in wonder and delight, as one
conversation, more profound or clothed in more forcible language than
another, fell from his tongue. He spoke nearly for two hours with
unhesitating and uninterrupted fluency. As I returned homewards, to
Kensington, I thought a second Johnson had visited the earth, to make
wise the sons of men; and regretted that I could not exercise the
powers of a second Boswell to record the wisdom and the eloquence
that fell from the orator's lips.
The manner of Coleridge was emphatic rather than dogmatic, and thus
he was generally and satisfactorily listened to. It might be said of
Coleridge, as Cowper has so happily said of Sir Philip Sidney, that
he was 'the warbler of poetic prose.' There was always this
characteristic feature in his multifarious conversation,--it was
always delicate, reverend, and courteous. The chastest ear could
drink in no startling sound; the most serious believer never had his
bosom ruffled by one sceptical or reckless assertion. Coleridge was
eminently simple in his manner. Thinking and speaking were his
delight; and he would sometimes seem, during the more fervid
movements of discourse, to be abstracted from all, and everything
around and about him, and to be basking in the sunny warmth of his
own radiant imagination."--_Dr. Dibdin_.
"Last Thursday, my Uncle, S. T. C. dined with us; and ---- and ----
came to meet him. I have heard him more brilliant, but he was very
fine, and delighted both, ---- and ---- very much. It is impossible
to carry off, or commit to paper, his long trains of argument; indeed
it is not possible to understand them, he lays the foundation so
deep, and views every question in so original a manner. Nothing can
be finer than the principles which he lays down in morals and
religion. His deep study of scripture is very astonishing; ---- and
---- were but as children in his hands, not merely in general views
of theology, but in minute criticism.... Afterwards in the
drawing-room, he sat down by Professor Rigaud, with whom he entered
into a discussion of 'Kant's system of Metaphysics.' The little knots
of the company were speedily silent. Mr. Coleridge's voice grew
louder; and, abstruse as the subject was, yet his language was so
ready, so energetic, and eloquent, and his illustrations so very apt
and apposite, that the ladies even paid him the most solicitous, and
respectful attention.... This is nearly all I recollect of our
meeting with this most interesting, most wonderful man. Some of his
topics and arguments I have enumerated, but the connexion and the
words are lost. And nothing that I can say can give any notion of his
eloquence and manner."--_Mr. Justice Coleridge.--Table Talk_.
"To the honoured memory of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, the Christian
Philosopher, who through dark and winding paths of speculation was
led to the light, in order that others by his guidance might reach
that light, without passing through the darkness, these sermons on
the work of the spirit are dedicated with deep thankfulness and
reverence by one of the many pupils whom his writings have helped to
discern the sacred concord and unity of human and Divine truth.
"Of recent English writers, the one with whose sanction I have
chiefly desired whenever I could, to strengthen my opinions, is the
great religious philosopher to whom the mind of our generation in
England owes more than to any other man. My gratitude to him I have
endeavoured to express by dedicating the following sermons to his
memory; and the offering is so far at least appropriate, in that the
main work of his life was to spiritualize, not only our philosophy,
but our theology; to raise them both above the empiricism into which
they had long been dwindling, and to set them free from the technical
trammels of logical systems. Whether he is as much studied by the
genial young men of the present day, as he was twenty or thirty years
ago, I have no adequate means of judging: but our theological
literature teems with errors, such as could hardly have been
committed by persons whose minds had been disciplined by his
philosophical method, and had rightly appropriated his principles. So
far too as my observation has extended, the third and fourth volumes
of his 'Remains,' though they were hailed with delight by Arnold on
their first appearance, have not yet produced their proper effect on
the intellect of the age. It may be that the rich store of profound
and beautiful thought contained in them has been weighed down, from
being mixed with a few opinions on points of Biblical criticism,
likely to be very offensive to persons who know nothing about the
history of the Canon. Some of these opinions, to which Coleridge
himself ascribed a good deal of importance, seem to me of little
worth; some to be decidedly erroneous. Philological criticism, indeed
all matters requiring a laborious and accurate investigation of
details were alien from the bent and habits of his mind; and his
exegetical studies, such as they were, took place at a period when he
had little better than the meagre Rationalism of Eichhorn and
Bertholdt to help him. Of the opinions which he imbibed from them,
some abode with him through life. These however, along with
everything else that can justly be objected to in the 'Remains,' do
not form a twentieth part of the whole, and may easily be separated
from the remainder. Nor do they detract in any way from the sterling
sense, the clear and far-sighted discernment, the power of tracing
principles in their remotest operations, and of referring all things
to their first principles, which are manifested in almost every page,
and from which we might learn so much. There may be some indeed, who
fancy that Coleridge's day is gone by, and that we have advanced
beyond him. I have seen him numbered, along with other persons who
would have been no less surprised at their position and company,
among the pioneers who prepared the way for our new theological
school. This fathering of Tractarianism, as it is termed, upon
Coleridge, well deserves to rank beside the folly which would father
Rationalism upon Luther. Coleridge's far-reaching vision did indeed
discern the best part of the speculative truths which our new school
has laid hold on, and exaggerated and perverted. But in Coleridge's
field of view they were comprised along with the complimental truths
which limit them, and in their conjunction and co-ordination with
which alone they retain the beneficent power of truth. He saw what
our modern theologians see, though it was latent from the vulgar eyes
in his days; but he also saw what they do not see, what they have
closed their eyes on; and he saw far beyond them, because he saw
things in their universal principles and laws."--_Rev. Archdeacon
Charles Hare's "Mission of the Comforter."--Preface, pp. 13, 15. Two
Vols. 8vo_.
These various testimonies to the conversational eminence of Mr.
Coleridge, and from men the best qualified to decide, must satisfy every
mind, that in this one quality he scarcely ever had a superior, or
perhaps an equal. In the 103rd No. of the "Quarterly Review," there is a
description of his conversation, evidently written by one competent to
judge, and who well knew the subject of his praise; but though the
writer's language is highly encomiastic, corresponding with his
eloquence, yet to all who knew Coleridge, it will not be considered as
exceeding the soberest truth. When and where are such descriptions as the
preceding and the following to be found?
"Perhaps our readers may have heard repeated a saying of Mr.
Wordsworth, 'that many men of his age had done wonderful _things_, as
Davy, Scott, Cuvier, &c.; but that Coleridge was the only wonderful
_man_ he ever knew.' Something of course must be allowed in this, as
in all other such cases, for the antithesis; but we believe the fact
really to be, that the greater part of those who have occasionally
visited Mr. Coleridge, have left him with the feeling akin to the
judgment indicated in the above remark. They admire the man more than
his works, or they forget the works in the absorbing impression made
by the living author; and no wonder. Those who remember him in his
more vigorous days, can bear witness to the peculiarity and
transcendant power of his conversational eloquence. It was unlike
anything that could be heard elsewhere; the kind was different, the
degree was different, the manner was different. The boundless range
of scientific knowledge, the brilliancy and exquisite nicety of
illustration, the deep and ready reasoning, the strangeness and
immensity of bookish lore, were not all; the dramatic story, the
joke, the pun, the festivity, must be added; and with these, the
clerical looking dress, the thick waving silver hair, the youthful
coloured cheek, the indefinable mouth and lips, the quick yet steady
and penetrating greenish grey eye, the slow and continuous
enunciation, and the everlasting music of his tones,--all went to
make up the image, and to constitute the living presence of the man.
Even now his conversation is characterized by all the essentials of
its former excellence; there is the same individuality, the same
unexpectedness, the same universal grasp; nothing is too high,
nothing too low for it--it glances from earth to heaven, from heaven
to earth, with a speed and a splendour, an ease and a power, which
almost seemed inspired."
* * * * *
As a conclusion to these honourable testimonies, it may be added, the
wish has often been expressed, that more were known respecting Mr.
Coleridge's school and college life, so briefly detailed in his
"Biographia." There was one friend of whom he often used to talk, and
always with a kind feeling, who sat next to him at Christ Church School,
and who afterwards accompanied him to Cambridge, where their friendship
was renewed, and their intercourse uninterrupted. This gentleman was the
Rev. C. V. Le Grice, the respected and erudite incumbent of a living near
Penzance. Mr. Le G. might contribute largely toward the elucidation of
Mr. Coleridge's school and college life; but as the much has been denied,
we must be thankful for the little. The following are Mr. Le Grice's
brief, but interesting notices of his friend:
"Mr. Urban,
In the various and numerous memoirs, which have been published of the
late Mr. Coleridge, I have been surprised at the accuracy in many
respects, and at the same time their omission of a very remarkable,
and a very honourable anecdote in his history. In the memoir of him
in your last number, you do not merely omit, but you give an
erroneous account of this very circumstance, to which I mean to
allude. You assert that he did not obtain, and indeed did riot aim to
obtain, the honours of the University. So far is this from the fact,
that in his Freshman's year he won the gold medal for the Greek Ode;
and in his second year he became a candidate for the Craven
scholarship, a University scholarship, for which undergraduates of
any standing are entitled to become candidates. This was in the
winter of 1792. Out of sixteen or eighteen competitors a selection of
four was made to contend for the prize, and these four were Dr.
Butler, now the Head Master of Shrewsbury; Dr. Keate, the late Head
Master of Eton; Mr. Bethell, the late Member for Yorkshire; and S. T.
Coleridge. Dr. Butler was the successful candidate.
Pause a moment in Coleridge's history, and think of him at this
period! Butler! Keate! Bethell! and Coleridge!! How different the
career of each in future life! O Coleridge; through what strange
paths did the meteor of genius lead thee! Pause a moment, ye
distinguished men! and deem it not the least bright spot in your
happier career, that you and Coleridge were once rivals, and for a
moment running abreast in the pursuit of honour. I believe that his
disappointment at this crisis damped his ardour. Unfortunately, at
that period there was no classical Tripos; so that if a person did
not obtain the classical medal, he was thrown back among the totally
undistinguished; and it was not allowable to become a candidate for
the classical medal, unless you had taken a respectable degree in
mathematics. Coleridge had not the least taste for these, and here
his case was hopeless; so that he despaired of a Fellowship, and gave
up, what in his heart he coveted, college honours, and a college
life. He had seen his schoolfellow and dearest friend, Middleton,
(late Bishop of Calcutta) quit Pembroke under similar circumstances.
Not _quite_ similar, because Middleton studied mathematics so as to
take a respectable degree, and to enable him to try for the medal;
but he failed, and therefore all hopes failed of a Fellowship--most
fortunately, as it proved in after life, for Middleton, though he
mourned at the time most deeply, and exclaimed, 'I am Middleton,
which is another name for Misfortune!'
'There is a Providence which shapes our ends,
Rough hew them how you will.'
That, which Middleton deemed a misfortune, drew him from the cobwebs
of a college library to the active energies of a useful and honoured
life. But to return to Coleridge. When he quitted College, which he
did before he had taken a degree, in a moment of mad caprice--it was
indeed an inauspicious hour! 'In an inauspicious hour I left the
friendly cloisters, and the happy grove of quiet, ever honoured Jesus
College, Cambridge.' Short, but deep and heart-felt reminiscence! In
a literary Life of himself this short memorial is all that Coleridge
gives of his happy days at college. Say not, that he did not obtain,
and did not wish to obtain classical honours! He did obtain them, and
was eagerly ambitious of them; but he did not bend to that discipline
which was to qualify him for the whole course. He was very studious,
but his reading was desultory and capricious. He took little exercise
merely for the sake of exercise; but he was ready at any time to
unbend his mind in conversation, and for the sake of this, his room
(the ground-floor room on the right hand of the staircase facing the
great gate) was a constant rendezvous of conversation loving friends,
I will not call them loungers, for they did not call to kill time,
but to enjoy it. What evenings have I spent in those rooms! What
little suppers, or _sizing_, as they were called, have I enjoyed;
when Aeschylus, and Plato, and Thucydides, were pushed aside, with a
pile of lexicons, &c., to discuss the pamphlets of the day. Ever and
anon, a pamphlet issued from the pen of Burke. There was no need of
having the book before us. Coleridge had read it in the morning; and
in the evening he would repeat whole pages verbatim. Freud's trial
was then in progress. Pamphlets swarmed from the press. Coleridge had
read them all; and in the evening, with our negus, we had them _viva
voce_ gloriously. O Coleridge! it was indeed an inauspicious hour,
when you quitted the friendly cloisters of Jesus. The epithet
'friendly' implied what you were thinking of, when you thought of
college. To you, Coleridge, your contemporaries were indeed friendly,
and I believe, that in your literary life you have passed over your
college life so briefly, because you wished to banish from your view
the 'visions of long-departed joys.' To enter into a description of
your college days would have called up too sadly to your memory 'the
hopes which once shone bright,' and would have made your heart sink.
Yours, &c.,