Page:Imperial Dictionary of Universal Biography Volume 1.pdf/1157

COL hymns of Synesius into English anacreontic verse; his choice of these hymns having been prompted most probably by his predilection for metaphysics, in the subtilties of which, as well as of theological controversy, he had already, according to his own statement, bewildered himself. Lamb, in one of his most delightful essays, recalling these early years, denominates Coleridge the "young Mirandula," and the "inspired charity boy," and says that "even then he waxed not pale at such philosophic draughts as the mysteries of Jamblicus and Plotinus." But a more genial influence was destined to give a new direction to his precocious energies before leaving school. The sonnets of William Lisle Bowles had just appeared, and, having fallen into Coleridge's hands, made so delightful an impression on his poetic sensibility, that he "transcribed forty copies of them with his own pen, by way of presents to his youthful friends." This impression, singular as it may seem, continued for several years to influence the development of his powers, and to these sonnets must undoubtedly be attributed the awakening of the poet, whose "Ancient Mariner" still holds the world enraptured with the melody of his marvellous tale.

In the year 1791 Coleridge was, by privilege of his station at school, transferred to Jesus college, Cambridge. His reputation at Christ's hospital betokened for him an unusually brilliant career at college; but unfortunately, even before he quitted Christ's, he was noted for those habits of desultory study, resulting, it is to be feared, from native instability of purpose, which clung to him through life, and blighted so much of the promise of his enthusiastic youth. He won, however, some distinction in the classics at Cambridge, having obtained the prize for a Greek ode in Sapphic metre, and having also distinguished himself in a contest for the Craven scholarship, in which Butler, afterwards bishop of Lichfield, was the successful candidate. In after life he often regretted that he had not applied himself more diligently to mathematics. It was at Cambridge, probably, that he became acquainted with the philosophical system of Hartley. That distinguished man had also been educated at Jesus' college. His name would naturally, therefore, be still popular there in Coleridge's time. There, at all events, it was that Coleridge, in the rashness of his speculative humour and the exuberance of his enthusiasm for philosophic warfare, embraced the tenets of unitarianism. This, of course, utterly destroyed his chance of academical distinction. He left the university suddenly, and without cause assigned, during the second year of his residence; and, after coming up to London, and wandering about a few days in the metropolis, in a fit of chagrin—the consequence, it is said, of unrequited love—recklessly enlisted in a dragoon regiment. He was in a short time discovered by his friends, and immediately rescued from this degradation. There is another more romantic way of telling the story.

Robert Southey, with whom Coleridge had become acquainted in 1792, was now residing in Bristol, and thither accordingly Coleridge now betook himself. They had both hailed with enthusiasm the "ideas of liberty" promulgated by the French revolution; they were both devout unitarians, both had left the university without taking their degrees, and both were devoted heart and soul to literary pursuits, and particularly to poetry. There was another young man there, a poet, and also an enthusiast for liberty. This was Robert Lovell, a member of the Society of Friends, but possessed of a greater number of accomplishments than is usually approved of by the estimable class of persons to which he belonged. These three friends formed a harmless but extravagant project of trying the experiment of human perfectibility on the banks of the Susquehanna, "where," to use Coleridge's own words, "our little society, in its second generation, was to have combined the innocence of the patriarchal age with the knowledge and genuine refinements of European culture, and where I dreamed that in the sober evening of my life I should behold the cottages of independence in the undivided dale of industry,—

This vision of pantisocracy, as it was affectedly called, was soon dissipated by the marriage of Southey and Coleridge to two sisters, the Misses Fricker of Bristol, to whom Lord Byron made so unhandsome an allusion in his English Bards and Scotch Reviewers. Lovell, who had already married another sister, died soon after this; Southey went to Lisbon with his uncle; and Coleridge hired a cottage in Clevedon, a village on the Severn, and applied himself to the preparation of a volume of poetry, for which he had been paid in advance by Mr. Joseph Cottle, bookseller, Bristol. Indeed, the scheme of "establishing a genuine system of property" on the banks of the Susquehanna was so absolutely visionary, that, if the authors of the project had clubbed their resources, they could not have paid a steerage passage to the New World, far less have freighted a vessel and taken out all sorts of implements, as they innocently talked. It is said that at that time Coleridge knew nothing about the Susquehanna, not even through what part of America it held its course. The fine poetical name, if we may believe Mr. Cottle, who was a most indulgent friend, formed great part of the fascination with which the scheme was regarded. Coleridge had not yet parted company from his youthful enthusiasms. His friends hoped, however, that the cares of domestic life would steady his energies, and dissipate the day-dreams in which they were weakened as well as wasted. But that fatal irresolution which had so early revealed itself, grew upon him as he advanced in years. And this was not the worst—he had fairly acquired the habit of taking laudanum. This insidious practice was carried by him to such a pitch, that he drank for a considerable time at least as much as a pint a day. It destroyed his naturally robust constitution, unhinged the structure of his mind, and blighted for ever his prospect of happiness in this world. If we remember aright, he once seriously proposed placing himself in a mad-house, where he should be under control and medical treatment at the same time. In such circumstances it was impossible that he should contemplate the literary profession, upon which he was now wholly dependent, with other than dubious and apprehensive feelings. Accordingly, in a letter to Mr. Cottle, written about this time, he gave expression to those fears with which the thought of the future inspired him:—"It is my duty and business to thank God for all his dispensations, and to believe them the best possible; but, indeed, I think I should have been more thankful had he made me a journeyman shoemaker instead of an 'author by trade.' So I am forced to write for bread! Write the flights of poetic inspiration, when every moment I am hearing a groan from my wife; groans, and complaints, and sickness. The present hour I am in a quickset hedge of embarrassment, and whichever way I turn a thorn runs into me. The future is clouds and thick darkness! Poverty, perhaps, and the thin faces of them that want bread looking up to me. Nor is this all. My happiest moments for composition are broken in upon by the reflection that I must make haste."

The village of Clevedon did not long please him. He removed to Bristol. Bristol soon became as irksome as Clevedon, and he again sought the country; this time taking up his residence at Nether Stowey, a pleasant village at the foot of the Quantock hills in Somersetshire, where he was in the immediate neighbourhood of his friend and benefactor Mr. Poole, and of Mr. Wordsworth, who was then living with his sister at All-Foxden. We ought to have stated that he had already, in 1795, published his "Conciones ad Populum, or, Addresses to the People;" and in 1796 planned and set on foot a weekly paper called the Watchman, which did not, however, survive the tenth number. The period of his residence at Nether Stowey, was perhaps, in spite of many difficulties and apprehensions, the happiest of his life. "His poetical faculty, which had budded in his sixteenth year, was ripened under the genial impulses of nature, friendship, and domestic affection." He enjoyed the intimate society of William Wordsworth, with whom he had almost daily conversation on poetical and other matters. Out of these conversations grew the famous "Lyrical Ballads," which appeared in 1798, and attracted so great a share of the attention of the literary world. It was here also that he wrote his tragedy of "Remorse," and the first part of "Christabel." Coleridge still professed the unitarian faith, and for some time preached every Sunday at Taunton. Indeed, he had in 1798 accepted an offer to become preacher to a unitarian congregation in Shrewsbury, and had actually preached his first sermon, when his friends Josiah and Thomas Wedgewood, of Etruria in Staffordshire, granted him an annuity of £150. Upon this he set out for Germany, accompanied by Wordsworth. Of these travels, an account is given in the Biographia Literaria. They visited the celebrated author of the Messiah, whom Coleridge was in the habit of facetiously calling Klubstick. It should perhaps be mentioned, that the generosity of the Wedgewoods had some years previously enabled