I have now to present the Reader with a series of letters from Mr.
Coleridge to the late Josiah and Thomas Wedgewood, Esqrs.; obligingly
communicated to me by Francis Wedgewood, Esq., of Etruria, son of Mr.
Josiah Wedgewood.
"May 21st, 1799. Gottingen.
My dear sir,
I have lying by my side six huge letters, with your name on each of them,
and all, excepting one, have been written for these three months. About
this time Mr. Hamilton, by whom I send this and the little parcel for my
wife, was, as it were, setting off for England; and I seized the
opportunity of sending them by him, as without any mock-modesty I really
thought that the expense of the postage to me and to you would be more
than their worth. Day after day, and week after week, was Hamilton going,
and still delayed. And now that it is absolutely settled that he goes
to-morrow, it is likewise absolutely settled that I shall go this day
three weeks, and I have therefore sent only this and the picture by him,
but the letters I will now take myself, for I should not like them to be
lost, as they comprize the only subject on which I have had an
opportunity of making myself thoroughly informed, and if I carry them
myself, I can carry them without danger of their being seized at
Yarmouth, as all my letters were, yours to ---- excepted, which were,
luckily, not sealed. Before I left England, I had read the book of which
you speak. I must confess that it appeared to me exceedingly illogical.
Godwin's and Condorcet's extravagancies were not worth confuting; and yet
I thought that the Essay on 'Population' had not confuted them. Professor
Wallace, Derham, and a number of German statistic, and
physico-theological writers had taken the same ground, namely, that
population increases in a geometrical, but the accessional nutriment only
in arithmetical ratio--and that vice and misery, the natural consequences
of this order of things, were intended by providence as the counterpoise.
I have here no means of procuring so obscure a book, as Rudgard's; but to
the best of my recollection, at the time that the Fifth Monarchy
enthusiasts created so great a sensation in England, under the
Protectorate, and the beginning of Charles the Second's reign, Rudgard,
or Rutgard (I am not positive even of the name) wrote an Essay to the
same purpose, in which he asserted, that if war, pestilence, vice, and
poverty, were wholly removed, the world could not exist two hundred
years, &c. Seiffmilts, in his great work concerning the divine order and
regularity in the destiny of the human race, has a chapter entitled a
confutation of this idea; I read it with great eagerness, and found
therein that this idea militated against the glory and goodness of God,
and must therefore be false,--but further confutation found I none!--This
book of Seiffmilts has a prodigious character throughout Germany; and
never methinks did a work less deserve it. It is in three huge octavos,
and wholly on the general laws that regulate the population of the human
species--but is throughout most unphilosophical, and the tables, which he
has collected with great industry, prove nothing. My objections to the
Essay on Population you will find in my sixth letter at large--but do
not, my dear sir, suppose that because unconvinced by this essay, I am
therefore convinced of the contrary. No, God knows, I am sufficiently
sceptical, and in truth more than sceptical, concerning the possibility
of universal plenty and wisdom; but my doubts rest on other grounds. I
had some conversation with you before I left England, on this subject;
and from that time I had purposed to myself to examine as thoroughly as
it was possible for me, the important question. Is the march of the human
race progressive, or in cycles? But more of this when we meet.
What have I done in Germany? I have learned the language, both high and
low German, I can read both, and speak the former so fluently, that it
must be a fortune for a German to be in my company, that is, I have words
enough and phrases enough, and I arrange them tolerably; but my
pronunciation is hideous. 2ndly, I can read the oldest German, the
Frankish, and the Swabian. 3rdly, I have attended the lectures on
Physiology, Anatomy, and Natural History, with regularity, and have
endeavoured to understand these subjects. 4thly, I have read and made
collections for a history of the. 'Belles Lettres,' in Germany, before
the time of Lessing: and 5thly, very large collections for a 'Life of
Lessing;' to which I was led by the miserably bad and unsatisfactory
biographies that have been hitherto given, and by my personal
acquaintance with two of Lessing's friends. Soon after I came into
Germany, I made up my mind fully not to publish anything concerning my
travels, as people call them; yet I soon perceived that with all possible
economy, my expenses would be greater than I could justify, unless I did
something that would to a moral certainty repay them. I chose the 'Life
of Lessing' for the reasons above assigned, and because it would give me
an opportunity of conveying under a better name than my own ever will be,
opinions which I deem of the highest importance. Accordingly, my main
business at Gottingen, has been to read all the numerous controversies in
which Lessing was engaged, and the works of all those German poets before
the time of Lessing, which I could not afford to buy. For these last four
months, with the exception of last week, in which I visited the Hartz, I
have worked harder than I trust in God Almighty, I shall ever have
occasion to work again: this endless transcription is such a
body-and-soul-wearying purgatory. I shall have bought thirty pounds'
worth of books, chiefly metaphysics, and with a view to the one work, to
which I hope to dedicate in silence, the prime of my life; but I believe
and indeed doubt not, that before Christmas I shall have repaid myself.
I never, to the best of my recollection, felt the fear of death but once;
that was yesterday when I delivered the picture to Hamilton. I felt, and
shivered as I felt it, that I should not like to die by land or water
before I see my wife and the little one; that I hope yet remains to me.
But it was an idle sort of feeling, and I should not like to have it
again. Poole half mentioned, in a hasty way, a circumstance that
depressed my spirits for many days:--that you and Thomas were on the
point of settling near Stowey, but had abandoned it. "God Almighty! what
a dream of happiness it held out to me!" writes Poole. I felt
disappointment without having had hope.
In about a month I hope to see you. Till then may heaven bless and
preserve us! Believe me, my dear sir, with every feeling of love, esteem,
and gratitude,
Your affectionate friend,
S. T. Coleridge.