Quotes by Samuel Taylor Coleridge

On those two places clear of snow There have sat in the night for an hour or so, Before sunrise, and after cock-crow (He hicking his heels, she cursing her corns, All to the tune of the wind in their horns), The Devil and his Grannam, With the snow-drift to fan 'em; Expecting and hoping the trumpet to blow; For they are cock-sure of the fellow below! 180O. THE DEVIL'S THOUGHTS From his brimstone bed at break of day A walking the DEVIL is gone, To visit his little snug farm of the earth And see how his stock went on. Over the hill and over the dale, And he went over the plain, And backward and forward he swished his long tail As a gentleman swishes his cane. And how then was the Devil drest? Oh! he was in his Sunday's best: His jacket was red and his breeches were blue, And there was a hole where the tail came through. He saw a LAWYER killing a Viper On a dung heap beside his stable, And the Devil smiled, for it put him in mind Of Cain and _his_ brother, Abel. A POTHECARY on a white horse Rode by on his vocations, And the Devil thought of his old Friend DEATH in the Revelations. He saw a cottage with a double coach-house, A cottage of gentility! And the Devil did grin, for his darling sin Is pride that apes humility. He went into a rich bookseller's shop, Quoth he! we are both of one college, For I myself sate like a cormorant once Fast by the tree of knowledge. Down the river there plied, with wind and tide, A pig with vast celerity; And the Devil look'd wise as he saw how the while, It cut its own throat. "There!" quoth he with a smile, "Goes 'England's commercial prosperity.'" As he went through Cold-Bath Fields he saw A solitary cell; And the Devil was pleased, for it gave him a hint For improving his prisons in Hell. * * * * * * General ----------- burning face He saw with consternation, And back to hell his way did he take, For the Devil thought by a slight mistake It was general conflagration. 1799. COLOGNE In Kohln, a town of monks and bones, And pavements fang'd with murderous stones, And rags, and hags, and hideous wenches; I counted two and seventy stenches, All well denned, and several stinks!

Though alas! even our prose writings, nay even the style of our more set discourses, strive to be in the fashion, and trick themselves out in the soiled and over-worn finery of the meretricious muse. It is true that of late a great improvement in this respect is observable in our most popular writers. But it is equally true, that this recurrence to plain sense and genuine mother English is far from being general; and that the composition of our novels, magazines, public harangues, and the like is commonly as trivial in thought, and yet enigmatic in expression, as if Echo and Sphinx had laid their heads together to construct it. Nay, even of those who have most rescued themselves from this contagion, I should plead inwardly guilty to the charge of duplicity or cowardice, if I withheld my conviction, that few have guarded the purity of their native tongue with that jealous care, which the sublime Dante in his tract De la volgare Eloquenza, declares to be the first duty of a poet. For language is the armoury of the human mind; and at once contains the trophies of its past, and the weapons of its future conquests. Animadverte, says Hobbes, quam sit ab improprietate verborum pronum hominihus prolabi in errores circa ipsas res! Sat [vero], says Sennertus, in hac vitae brevitate et naturae obscuritate, rerum est, quibus cognoscendis tempus impendatur, ut [confusis et multivotis] sermonibus intelligendis illud consumere opus non sit. [Eheu! quantas strages paravere verba nubila, quae tot dicunt ut nihil dicunt;--nubes potius, e quibus et in rebus politicis et in ecclesia turbines et tonitrua erumpunt!] Et proinde recte dictum putamus a Platone in Gorgia: os an ta onomata eidei, eisetai kai ta pragmata: et ab Epicteto, archae paideuseos hae ton onomaton episkepsis: et prudentissime Galenus scribit, hae ton onomaton chraesis tarachtheisa kai taen ton pragmaton epitarattei gnosin. Egregie vero J. C. Scaliger, in Lib. I. de Plantis: Est primum, inquit, sapientis officium, bene sentire, ut sibi vivat: proximum, bene loqui, ut patriae vivat. Something analogous to the materials and structure of modern poetry I seem to have noticed--(but here I beg to be understood as speaking with the utmost diffidence)--in our common landscape painters.

All my experience from my first entrance into life to the present hour is in favour of the warning maxim, that the man, who opposes in toto the political or religious zealots of his age, is safer from their obloquy than he who differs from them but in one or two points, or perhaps only in degree. By that transfer of the feelings of private life into the discussion of public questions, which is the queen bee in the hive of party fanaticism, the partisan has more sympathy with an intemperate opposite than with a moderate friend. We now enjoy an intermission, and long may it continue! In addition to far higher and more important merits, our present Bible societies and other numerous associations for national or charitable objects, may serve perhaps to carry off the superfluous activity and fervour of stirring minds in innocent hyperboles and the bustle of management. But the poison-tree is not dead, though the sap may for a season have subsided to its roots. At least let us not be lulled into such a notion of our entire security, as not to keep watch and ward, even on our best feelings. I have seen gross intolerance shown in support of toleration; sectarian antipathy most obtrusively displayed in the promotion of an undistinguishing comprehension of sects: and acts of cruelty, (I had almost said,) of treachery, committed in furtherance of an object vitally important to the cause of humanity; and all this by men too of naturally kind dispositions and exemplary conduct. The magic rod of fanaticism is preserved in the very adyta of human nature; and needs only the re-exciting warmth of a master hand to bud forth afresh and produce the old fruits. The horror of the Peasants’ war in Germany, and the direful effects of the Anabaptists’ tenets, (which differed only from those of jacobinism by the substitution of theological for philosophical jargon,) struck all Europe for a time with affright. Yet little more than a century was sufficient to obliterate all effective memory of these events. The same principles with similar though less dreadful consequences were again at work from the imprisonment of the first Charles to the restoration of his son.

When thou to my true-love com'st Greet her from me kindly; When she asks thee how I fare? Say, folks in Heaven fare finely. When she asks, "What! Is he sick?" Say, dead!--and when for sorrow She begins to sob and cry, Say, I come to-morrow. ?1799. YOUTH AND AGE Verse, a breeze mid blossoms straying, Where Hope clung feeding, like a bee-- Both were mine! Life went a-maying With Nature, Hope, and Poesy, When I was young! _When_ I was young?--Ah, woeful When! Ah! for the change 'twixt Now and Then! This breathing house not built with hands, This body that does me grievous wrong, O'er aery cliffs and glittering sands, How lightly _then_ it flashed along:-- Like those trim skiffs, unknown of yore, On winding lakes and rivers wide, That ask no aid of sail or oar, That fear no spite of wind or tide! Nought cared this body for wind or weather When Youth and I lived in't together. Flowers are lovely; Love is flower-like; Friendship is a sheltering tree; O! the joys, that came down shower-like, Of Friendship, Love, and Liberty, Ere I was old! _Ere_ I was old? Ah woeful Ere, Which tells me, Youth's no longer here! O Youth! for years so many and sweet, 'Tis known, that Thou and I were one, I'll think it but a fond conceit-- It cannot be that Thou art gone! Thy vesper-bell hath not yet toll'd:- And thou wert aye a masker bold! What strange disguise hast now put on, To _make believe_, that thou art gone? I see these locks in silvery slips, This drooping gait, this altered size: But Spring-tide blossoms on thy lips, And tears take sunshine from thine eyes! Life is but thought: so think I will That Youth and I are house-mates still. Dew-drops are the gems of morning, But the tears of mournful eve! Where no hope is, life's a warning That only serves to make us grieve, When we are old: That only serves to make us grieve With oft and tedious taking-leave, Like some poor nigh-related guest, That may not rudely be dismist; Yet hath outstay'd his welcome while, And tells the jest without the smile.

Yet seem’d it winter still, and, you away, As with your shadow, I with these did play!” Scarcely less sure, or if a less valuable, not less indispensable mark Gonimon men poiaetou------ ------hostis rhaema gennaion lakoi, will the imagery supply, when, with more than the power of the painter, the poet gives us the liveliest image of succession with the feeling of simultaneousness:-- With this, he breaketh from the sweet embrace Of those fair arms, which bound him to her breast, And homeward through the dark laund runs apace;-- * * * * * * Look! how a bright star shooteth from the sky, So glides he in the night from Venus’ eye. 4. The last character I shall mention, which would prove indeed but little, except as taken conjointly with the former;--yet without which the former could scarce exist in a high degree, and (even if this were possible) would give promises only of transitory flashes and a meteoric power;--is depth, and energy of thought. No man was ever yet a great poet, without being at the same time a profound philosopher. For poetry is the blossom and the fragrancy of all human knowledge, human thoughts, human passions, emotions, language. In Shakespeare’s poems the creative power and the intellectual energy wrestle as in a war embrace. Each in its excess of strength seems to threaten the extinction of the other. At length in the drama they were reconciled, and fought each with its shield before the breast of the other. Or like two rapid streams, that, at their first meeting within narrow and rocky banks, mutually strive to repel each other and intermix reluctantly and in tumult; but soon finding a wider channel and more yielding shores blend, and dilate, and flow on in one current and with one voice. The VENUS AND ADONIS did not perhaps allow the display of the deeper passions. But the story of Lucretia seems to favour and even demand their intensest workings. And yet we find in Shakespeare’s management of the tale neither pathos, nor any other dramatic quality. There is the same minute and faithful imagery as in the former poem, in the same vivid colours, inspirited by the same impetuous vigour of thought, and diverging and contracting with the same activity of the assimilative and of the modifying faculties; and with a yet larger display, a yet wider range of knowledge and reflection; and lastly, with the same perfect dominion, often domination, over the whole world of language.

This perversion of words respecting the decrees of Providence to the caprices of James and his beslobbered minion the Duke of Buckingham, is somewhat nearer to blasphemy than even the euphuism of the age can excuse. Ib. s. 85. ... tuus, O Jacobe, quod optas Explorare labor, mihi jussa capessere fas est. In our times this would be pedantic wit: in the days of James I, and in the mouth of Archbishop Williams it was witty pedantry. Ib. s. 89. He that doth much in a short life products his mortality. 'Products' for 'produces;' that is, lengthens out, 'ut apud geometros'. But why Hacket did not say 'prolongs,' I know not. Ib. See what a globe of light there is in natural reason, which is the same in every man: but when it takes well, and riseth to perfection, it is called wisdom in a few. The good affirming itself--(the will, I am)--begetteth the true, and wisdom is the spirit proceeding. But in the popular acceptation, common sense in an uncommon degree is what the world calls wisdom. Ib. s. 92. A well-spirited clause, and agreeable to holy assurance, that truth is more like to win than love. Could the light of such a Gospel as we profess be eclipsed with the interposition of a single marriage? And yet Hacket must have lived to see the practical confutation of this shallow Gnathonism in the result of the marriage with the Papist Henrietta of France! Ib. s. 96. "Floud," says the Lord Keeper, "since I am no Bishop in your opinion, I will be no Bishop to you." I see the wit of this speech; but the wisdom, the Christianity, the beseemingness of it in a Judge and a Bishop,--what am I to say of that? Ib. And after the period of his presidency (of the Star Chamber), it is too well known how far the enhancements were stretched. 'But the wringing of the nose bringeth forth blood'. Prov. 30-33. We may learn from this and fifty other passages, that it did not require the factious prejudices of Prynne or Burton to look with aversion on the proceedings of Laud.

Spurzheim was the hearty good humour with which the Doctor bore the laughter of a party, in the presence of which he, unknowing of his man, denied any _Ideality_, and awarded an unusual share of _Locality_, to the majestic silver-haired head of my dear uncle and father-in-law. But Mr. Coleridge immediately shielded the craniologist under the distinction preserved in the text, and perhaps, since that time, there may be a couple of organs assigned to the latter faculty.--ED.] * * * * * Craniology is worth some consideration, although it is merely in its rudiments and guesses yet. But all the coincidences which have been observed could scarcely be by accident. The confusion and absurdity, however, will be endless until some names or proper terms are discovered for the organs, which are not taken from their mental application or significancy. The forepart of the head is generally given up to the higher intellectual powers; the hinder part to the sensual emotions. * * * * * Silence does not always mark wisdom. I was at dinner, some time ago, in company with a man, who listened to me and said nothing for a long time; but he nodded his head, and I thought him intelligent. At length, towards the end of the dinner, some apple dumplings were placed on the table, and my man had no sooner seen them, than he burst forth with--"Them's the jockies for me!" I wish Spurzheim could have examined the fellow's head. * * * * * Some folks apply epithets as boys do in making Latin verses. When I first looked upon the Falls of the Clyde, I was unable to find a word to express my feelings. At last, a man, a stranger to me, who arrived about the same time, said:--"How majestic!"--(It was the precise term, and I turned round and was saying--"Thank you, Sir! that _is_ the exact word for it"--when he added, _eodem flatu_)--"Yes! how very _pretty_!" * * * * * _July_ 8. 1827. BULL AND WATERLAND.--THE TRINITY. Bull and Waterland are the classical writers on the Trinity.

1] [Footnote 1: "And this, again, is evolved out of the yet higher idea of _person_ in contradistinction from _thing_, all social law and justice being grounded on the principle that a person can never, but by his own fault, become a thing, or, without grievous wrong, be treated as such; and the distinction consisting in this, that a thing may be used altogether, and merely as the _means_ to an end; but the person must always be included in the _end_; his interest must always form a part of the object,--a _mean_ to which he, by consent, that is, by his own act, makes himself. We plant a tree, and we fell it; we breed the sheep, and we shear, or we kill it,--in both cases wholly as means to _our_ ends: for trees and animals are things. The woodcutter and the hind are likewise employed as _means_; but on agreement, and that too an agreement of reciprocal advantage, which includes them as well as their employer in the _end_; for they are persons. And the government under which the contrary takes place is not worthy to be called a state, if, as in the kingdom of Dahomey, it be unprogressive; or only by anticipation, where, as in Russia, it is in advance to a better and more _manworthy_ order of things."--_Church and State_, p. 10.] * * * * * If men could learn from history, what lessons it might teach us! But passion and party blind our eyes, and the light which experience gives is a lantern on the stern, which shines only on the waves behind us! _December_ 27. 1831. BEAUTY.--GENIUS. The old definition of beauty in the Roman school of painting was, _il più nell' uno_--multitude in unity; and there is no doubt that such is the principle of beauty. And as one of the most characteristic and infallible criteria of the different ranks of men's intellects, observe the instinctive habit which all superior minds have of endeavouring to bring, and of never resting till they have brought, into unity the scattered facts which occur in conversation, or in the statements of men of business. To attempt to argue any great question upon facts only, is absurd; you cannot state any fact before a mixed audience, which an opponent as clever as yourself cannot with ease twist towards another bearing, or at least meet by a contrary fact, as it is called. I wonder why facts were ever called stubborn things: I am sure they have been found pliable enough lately in the House of Commons and elsewhere. Facts, you know, are not truths; they are not conclusions; they are not even premisses, but in the nature and parts of premisses.