Chapter II (3)

At the close of one of their academic studies, equivalent to, what in this country is called a term, it was agreed that the following party should visit the Hartz Mountains, &c. Namely, Coleridge, the two Parrys of Bath, Charles and Edward, sons of the celebrated physician of that name, the son also of Professor Blumenbach, Dr. Carlyon, Mr. Chester, and Mr. Greenough. Coleridge and the party made the ascent of the Brocken, on the Hanoverian side of this mountain. During the toil of the ascent, Coleridge amused his companions with recapitulating some trifling verses, which he was wont to do some twenty years afterwards to amuse children of five and six years old, as Miss Mary Rowe, Tity Mouse Brim, Dr. Daniel Dove, of Doncaster, and his Horse Nobbs. It should, however, be observed, that these Dr. Carlyon seemed to think worth notice, while the Christabel and Ancient Mariner were probably but little to his taste. His dress, a short jacket of coarse material, though convenient, was not quite classical in a party of philosophical erratics in quest of novelty. This tale of Dr. Daniel Dove, of Doncaster, has given a frame and pegs, on which some literary man has founded a story, and on which he has hung the contents of his scrap book. The invention is not Coleridge's; and the writer believes the story itself to be traditional. The following account of his ascent up the Brocken was written by himself, soon after his return from Germany:

FRAGMENT OF A JOURNEY OVER THE BROCKEN, &c. IN 1799.

"Through roads no way rememberable, we came to Gieloldshausen, over a
bridge, on which was a mitred statue with a great crucifix in its
arms. The village, long and ugly; but the church, like most Catholic
churches, interesting; and this being Whitsun Eve, all were crowding
to it, with their mass-books and rosaries, the little babies commonly
with coral crosses hanging on the breast. Here we took a guide, left
the village, ascended a hill, and now the woods rose up before us in a
verdure which surprised us like a sorcery. The spring had burst forth
with the suddenness of a Russian summer. As we left Göttingen there
were buds, and here and there a tree half green; but here were woods
in full foliage, distinguished from summer only by the exquisite
freshness of their tender green. We entered the wood through a
beautiful mossy path; the moon above us blending with the evening
light, and every now and then a nightingale would invite the others to
sing, and some or other commonly answered, and said, as we suppose,
'It is yet somewhat too early!' for the song was not continued. We
came to a square piece of greenery, completely walled on all four
sides by the beeches; again entered the wood, and having travelled
about a mile, emerged from it into a grand plain--mountains in the
distance, but ever by our road the skirts of the green woods. A very
rapid river ran by our side; and now the nightingales were all
singing, and the tender verdure grew paler in the moonlight, only the
smooth parts of the river were still deeply purpled with the
reflections from the fiery light in the west. So surrounded and so
impressed, we arrived at Prele, a dear little cluster of houses in the
middle of a semicircle of woody hills; the area of the semicircle
scarcely broader than the breadth of the village.

...

"We afterwards ascended another hill, from the top of which a large
plain opened before us with villages. A little village, Neuhoff, lay
at the foot of it: we reached it, and then turned up through a valley
on the left hand. The hills on both sides the valley were prettily
wooded, and a rapid lively river ran through it.

So we went for about two miles, and almost at the end of the valley,
or rather of its first turning, we found the village of Lauterberg.
Just at the entrance of the village, two streams come out from two
deep and woody coombs, close by each other, meet, and run into a third
deep woody coomb opposite; before you a wild hill, which seems the end
and barrier of the valley; on the right hand, low hills, now green
with corn, and now wooded; and on the left a most majestic hill
indeed--the effect of whose simple outline painting could not give,
and how poor a thing are words! We pass through this neat little
town--the majestic hill on the left hand soaring over the houses, and
at every interspace you see the whole of it--its beeches, its firs,
its rocks, its scattered cottages, and the one neat little pastor's
house at the foot, embosomed in fruit-trees all in blossom, the noisy
coomb-brook dashing close by it. We leave the valley, or rather, the
first turning on the left, following a stream; and so the vale winds
on, the river still at the foot of the woody hills, with every now and
then other smaller valleys on right and left crossing our vale, and
ever before you the woody hills running like groves one into another.
We turned and turned, and entering the fourth curve of the vale, we
found all at once that we had been ascending. The verdure vanished!
All the beech trees were leafless, and so were the silver birches,
whose boughs always, winter and summer, hang so elegantly. But low
down in the valley, and in little companies on each bank of the river,
a multitude of green conical fir trees, with herds of cattle wandering
about, almost every one with a cylindrical bell around its neck, of no
inconsiderable size, and as they moved--scattered over the narrow
vale, and up among the trees on the hill--the noise was like that of a
great city in the stillness of a sabbath morning, when the bells all
at once are ringing for church. The whole was a melancholy and
romantic scene, that was quite new to me. Again we turned, passed
three smelting houses, which we visited;--a scene of terrible beauty
is a furnace of boiling metal, darting, every moment blue, green, and
scarlet lightning, like serpents' tongues!--and now we ascended a
steep hill, on the top of which was St. Andrias Berg, a town built
wholly of wood.

"We descended again, to ascend far higher; and now we came to a most
beautiful road, which winded on the breast of the hill, from whence we
looked down into a deep valley, or huge basin, full of pines and firs;
the opposite hills full of pines and firs; and the hill above us, on
whose breast we were winding, likewise full of pines and firs. The
valley, or basin, on our right hand, into which we looked down, is
called the Wald Rauschenbach, that is, the Valley of the Roaring
Brook; and roar it did, indeed, most solemnly! The road on which we
walked was weedy with infant fir-trees, an inch or two high; and now,
on our left hand, came before us a most tremendous precipice of yellow
and black rock, called the Rehberg, that is, the Mountain of the Roe.
Now again is nothing but firs and pines, above, below, around us! How
awful is the deep unison of their undividable murmur; what a one thing
it is--it is a sound that impresses the dim notion of the Omnipresent!
In various parts of the deep vale below us, we beheld little dancing
waterfalls gleaming through the branches, and now, on our left hand,
from the very summit of the hill above us, a powerful stream flung
itself down, leaping and foaming, and now concealed, and now not
concealed, and now half concealed by the fir-trees, till, towards the
road, it became a visible sheet of water, within whose immediate
neighbourhood no pine could have permanent abiding place. The snow lay
every where on the sides of the roads, and glimmered in company with
the waterfall foam, snow patches and waterbreaks glimmering through
the branches in the hill above, the deep basin below, and the hill
opposite.

Over the high opposite hills, so dark in their pine forests, a far
higher round barren stony mountain looked in upon the prospect from a
distant country. Through this scenery we passed on, till our road was
crossed by a second waterfall; or rather, aggregation of little
dancing waterfalls, one by the side of the other for a considerable
breadth, and all came at once out of the dark wood above, and rolled
over the mossy rock fragments, little firs, growing in islets,
scattered among them. The same scenery continued till we came to the
Oder Seich, a lake, half made by man, and half by nature. It is two
miles in length, and but a few hundred yards in breadth, and winds
between banks, or rather through walls, of pine trees. It has the
appearance of a most calm and majestic river. It crosses the road,
goes into a wood, and there at once plunges itself down into a most
magnificent cascade, and runs into the vale, to which it gives the
name of the 'Vale of the Roaring Brook.' We descended into the vale,
and stood at the bottom of the cascade, and climbed up again by its
side. The rocks over which it plunged were unusually wild in their
shape, giving fantastic resemblances of men and animals, and the
fir-boughs by the side were kept almost in a swing, which unruly
motion contrasted well with the stern quietness of the huge forest-sea
every where else.

...

"In nature all things are individual, but a word is but an arbitrary
character for a whole class of things; so that the same description
may in almost all cases be applied to twenty different appearances;
and in addition to the difficulty of the thing itself, I neither am,
nor ever was, a good hand at description. I see what I write, but,
alas! I cannot write what I see. From the Oder Seich we entered a
second wood; and now the snow met us in large masses, and we walked
for two miles knee-deep in it, with an inexpressible fatigue, till we
came to the mount called Little Brocken; here even the firs deserted
us, or only now and then a patch of them, wind shorn, no higher than
one's knee, matted and cowering to the ground, like our thorn bushes
on the highest sea-hills. The soil was plashy and boggy; we descended
and came to the foot of the Great Brocken without a river--the highest
mountain in all the north of Germany, and the seat of innumerable
superstitions. On the first of May all the witches dance here at
midnight; and those who go may see their own ghosts walking up and
down, with a little billet on the back, giving the names of those who
had wished them there; for 'I wish you on the top of the Brocken,' is
a common curse throughout the whole empire. Well, we ascended--the
soil boggy--and at last reached the height, which is 573 toises above
the level of the sea. We visited the Blocksberg, a sort of
bowling-green, inclosed by huge stones, something like those at
Stonehenge, and this is the witches' ball-room; thence proceeded to
the house on the hill, where we dined; and now we descended. In the
evening about seven we arrived at Elbingerode. At the inn they brought
us an album, or stamm-buch, requesting that we would write our names,
and something or other as a remembrance that we had been there. I
wrote the following lines, which contain a true account of my journey
from the Brocken to Elbingerode.

I stood on Brocken's sovran height, and saw
Woods crowding upon woods, hills over hills;
A surging scene, and only limited
By the blue distance. Wearily my way
Downward I dragged, through fir groves evermore,
Where bright green moss moved in sepulchral forms,
Speckled with sunshine; and, but seldom heard,
The sweet bird's song become a hollow sound;
And the gale murmuring indivisibly,
Reserved its solemn murmur, more distinct
From many a note of many a waterbreak,
And the brook's chatter; on whose islet stones
The dingy kidling, with its tinkling bell,
Leapt frolicksome, or old romantic goat
Sat, his white beard slow waving. I moved on
With low and languid thought, for I had found
That grandest scenes have but imperfect charms
Where the eye vainly wanders, nor beholds
One spot with which the heart associates
Holy remembrances of child or friend,
Or gentle maid, our first and early love,
Or father, or the venerable name
Of our adored country. O thou Queen,
Thou delegated Deity of Earth,
O 'dear, dear' England! how my longing eyes
Turned westward, shaping in the steady clouds
Thy sands and high white cliffs! Sweet native isle,
This heart was proud, yea, mine eyes swam with tears
To think of thee; and all the goodly view
From sovran Brocken, woods and woody hills
Floated away, like a departing dream,
Feeble and dim. Stranger, these impulses
Blame thou not lightly; nor will I profane,
With hasty judgment or injurious doubt,
That man's sublimer spirit, who can feel
That God is every where, the God who framed
Mankind to be one mighty brotherhood,
Himself our Father, and the world our home.

We left Elbingerode, May 14th, and travelled for half a mile through a
wild country, of bleak stony hills by our side, with several caverns,
or rather mouths of caverns, visible in their breasts; and now we came
to Rubilland,--Oh, it was a lovely scene! Our road was at the foot of
low hills, and here were a few neat cottages; behind us were high
hills, with a few scattered firs, and flocks of goats visible on the
topmost crags. On our right hand a fine shallow river about thirty
yards broad, and beyond the river a crescent hill clothed with firs,
that rise one above another, like spectators in an amphitheatre. We
advanced a little farther,--the crags behind us ceased to be visible,
and now the whole was one and complete. All that could be seen was the
cottages at the foot of the low green hill, (cottages embosomed in
fruit trees in blossom,) the stream, and the little crescent of firs.
I lingered here, and unwillingly lost sight of it for a little while.
The firs were so beautiful, and the masses of rocks, walls, and
obelisks started up among them in the very places where, if they had
not been, a painter with a poet's feeling would have imagined them.
Crossed the river (its name Bodi), entered the sweet wood, and came to
the mouth of the cavern, with the man who shews it. It was a huge
place, eight hundred feet in length, and more in depth, of many
different apartments; and the only thing that distinguished it from
other caverns was, that the guide, who was really a character, had the
talent of finding out and seeing uncommon likenesses in the different
forms of the stalactite. Here was a nun;--this was Solomon's
temple;--that was a Roman Catholic Chapel;--here was a lion's claw,
nothing but flesh and blood wanting to make it completely a claw! This
was an organ, and had all the notes of an organ, &c. &c. &c.; but,
alas! with all possible straining of my eyes, ears, and imagination, I
could see nothing but common stalactite, and heard nothing but the
dull ding of common cavern stones. One thing was really striking;--a
huge cone of stalactite hung from the roof of the largest apartment,
and, on being struck, gave perfectly the sound of a death-bell. I was
behind, and heard it repeatedly at some distance, and the effect was
very much in the fairy kind,--gnomes, and things unseen, that toll
mock death-bells for mock funerals. After this, a little clear well
and a black stream pleased me the most; and multiplied by fifty, and
coloured ad libitum, might be well enough to read of in a novel or
poem. We returned, and now before the inn, on the green plat around
the Maypole, the villagers were celebrating Whit-Tuesday. This Maypole
is hung as usual with garlands on the top, and, in these garlands,
spoons, and other little valuables, are placed. The high smooth round
pole is then well greased; and now he who can climb up to the top may
have what he can get,--a very laughable scene as you may suppose, of
awkwardness and agility, and failures on the very brink of success.
Now began a dance. The women danced very well, and, in general, I have
observed throughout Germany that the women in the lower ranks
degenerate far less from the ideal of a woman, than the men from that
of man. The dances were reels and waltzes; but chiefly the latter.
This dance is, in the higher circles, sufficiently voluptuous; but
here the emotions of it were far more faithful interpreters of the
passion, which, doubtless, the dance was intended to shadow; yet, ever
after the giddy round and round is over, they walked to music, the
woman laying her arm, with confident affection, on the man's
shoulders, or around his neck. The first couple at the waltzing was a
very fine tall girl, of two or three and twenty, in the full bloom and
growth of limb and feature, and a fellow with huge whiskers, a long
tail, and woollen night-cap; he was a soldier, and from the more than
usual glances of the girl, I presumed was her lover. He was, beyond
compare, the gallant and the dancer of the party. Next came two boors:
one of whom, in the whole contour of his face and person, and, above
all, in the laughably would-be frolicksome kick out of his heel,
irresistibly reminded me of Shakespeare's Slender, and the other of
his Dogberry. Oh! two such faces, and two such postures! O that I were
an Hogarth! What an enviable gift it is to have a genius in painting!
Their partners were pretty lasses, not so tall as the former, and
danced uncommonly light and airy. The fourth couple was a sweet girl
of about seventeen, delicately slender, and very prettily dressed,
with a full-blown rose in the white ribbon that went round her head,
and confined her reddish-brown hair; and her partner waltzed with a
pipe in his mouth, smoking all the while; and during the whole of this
voluptuous dance, his countenance was a fair personification of true
German phlegm. After these, but, I suppose, not actually belonging to
the party, a little ragged girl and ragged boy, with his stockings
about his heels, waltzed and danced;--waltzing and dancing in the rear
most entertainingly. But what most pleased me, was a little girl of
about three or four years old, certainly not more than four, who had
been put to watch a little babe, of not more than a year old (for one
of our party had asked), and who was just beginning to run away, the
girl teaching him to walk, and who was so animated by the music, that
she began to waltz with him, and the two babes whirled round and
round, hugging and kissing each other, as if the music had made them
mad. There were two fiddles and a bass viol. The fiddlers,--above all,
the bass violer,--most Hogarthian phizzes! God love them! I felt far
more affection for them than towards any other set of human beings I
have met with since I have been in Germany, I suppose because they
looked so happy!"

Coleridge and his companions in their tour passed through a district belonging to the elector of Metz, and he often repeated the following story, which one of the party has since related in print; that, going through this district, chiefly inhabited by boors, who were Romanists, of the lowest form of this persuasion of Christians, the party fatigued and much exhausted, with the exception of Blumenbach, arrived somewhat late, though being a summer evening, it was still light, at a Hessian village, where they had hoped, as in England, to find quarters for the night. Most of the inhabitants had retired to rest, a few only loitering about, perhaps surprized at the sight of strangers. They shewed no inclination to be courteous, but rather eyed them with suspicion and curiosity. The party, notwithstanding this, entered the village ale-house, still open, asked for refreshments and a night's lodging, but no one noticed them. Though hungry, they could not procure any thing for supper, not even a cup of coffee, nor could they find beds; after some time, however, they asked for a few bundles of straw, which would probably have been granted, had not Coleridge, out of patience at seeing his friends' forlorn situation, imprudently asked one of them, if there lived any Christians in Hesse Cassel? At this speech, which was soon echoed by those within the house to the bystanders without, the boors became instantly so infuriated, that rushing in, the travellers were immediately driven out, and were glad to save themselves from the lighted fire-wood on the hearth, which was hurled at them. On this they went to seek a spot to bivouac for the night. Coleridge lay under the shelter of a furze-bush, annoyed by the thorns, which, if they did not disturb his rest, must have rendered it comfortless. Youth and fatigue, inducing sleep, soon rose above these difficulties. In the ascent of the Brocken, they despaired of seeing the famous spectre, in search of which they toiled, it being visible only when the sun is a few degrees above the horizon. Haué says, he ascended thirty times without seeing it, till at length he was enabled to witness the effect of this optical delusion. For the best account of it, see the Natural Magic of Sir D. Brewster, [26] who explains the origin of these spectres, and shews how the mind is deluded among an ignorant and easily deceived people, and thus traces the birth of various ghost stories in the neighbourhood, extending as far in Europe, as such stories find credence.

"In the course of my repeated tours through the Hartz," Mr. Jordan
says, "I ascended the Brocken twelve different times, but I had the
good fortune only twice (both times about Whitsuntide), to see that
atmospheric phenomenon called the Spectre of the Brocken, which
appears to me worthy of particular attention, as it must, no doubt, be
observed on other high mountains, which have a situation favourable
for producing it. The first time I was deceived by this extraordinary
phenomenon, I had clambered up to the summit of the Brocken, very
early in the morning, in order to wait there for the inexpressibly
beautiful view of the sun rising in the east. The heavens were already
streaked with red: the sun was just appearing above the horizon in
full majesty, and the most perfect serenity prevailed throughout the
surrounding country. When the other Hartz mountains in the south-west,
towards the Worm mountains, lying under the Brocken, began to be
covered by thick clouds; ascending at this moment the granite rocks
called the Teufelskauzel, there appeared before me, though at a great
distance towards the Worm mountains, the gigantic figure of a man, as
if standing on a large pedestal. But scarcely had I discovered it when
it began to disappear; the clouds sank down speedily and expanded, and
I saw the phenomenon no more. The second time, however, I saw the
spectre somewhat more distinctly, a little below the summit of the
Brocken, and near the Heinrichs-höhe, as I was looking at the sun
rising about four o'clock in the morning. The weather was rather
tempestuous, the sky towards the level country was pretty clear, but
the Harz mountains had attracted several thick clouds which had been
hovering around them, and which, beginning to settle on the Brocken,
confined the prospect. In these clouds, soon after the rising of the
sun, I saw my own shadow of a monstrous size, move itself for a couple
of seconds exactly as I moved, but I was soon involved in clouds, and
the phenomenon disappeared."

It is impossible to see this phenomenon, except when the sun is at such an altitude as to throw his rays upon the body in a horizontal direction; for, if he is higher, the shadow is thrown rather under the body than before it. After visiting the Hartz, Coleridge returned to Göttingen, and in his note-book in a leave-taking memorial as well as autograph, the following lines were written by Blumenbach, the son:--

"Wenn Sie, bester Freund, auch in Jhrer Heimath die
Natur bewundern werden, wie wir beide es auf dem Harze
gethan haben, so erinnern Sie sich des Harzes, und ich darf
dann hoffen, das Sie auch mich nicht vergessen werden.

"Leben Sie wohl, und reisen glücklich,

"Jhr. BLUMENBACH."

TRANSLATION.

If you perchance, my dearest friend, should still continue
to admire the works of nature at your home, as we have done
together on the Hartz; recall to your recollection the Hartz,
and then I dare hope that you will also think of me.

Farewell, may you have a prosperous voyage.

(Signed) yours, BLUMENBACH.

Coleridge returned to England after an absence of fourteen mouths, and arrived in London the 27th November, 1799.

He went to Germany but little versed in the language, and adopted the following plan of acquiring it, which he recommends to others

"To those," says he, "who design to acquire the language of a country
in the country itself, it may be useful, if I mention the incalculable
advantages which I derived from learning all the words that could
possibly be so learnt, with the objects before me, and without the
intermediation of the English terms. It was a regular part of my
morning studies for the first six weeks of my residence at Ratzeburg,
to accompany the good and kind old pastor, with whom I lived, from the
cellar to the roof, through gardens, farm-yards, &c., and to call
every the minutest thing by its German name. Advertisements, farces,
jest-books, and conversation of children while I was at play with
them, contributed their share to a more homelike acquaintance with the
language, than I could have procured from books of polite literature
alone, or even from polite society."

In support of this plan, he makes a quotation from the massive folios of Luther--a passage as he calls it of "_hearty_ sound sense," and gives the simple, sinewy, idiomatic words of the "original," with a translation of his own:

"For one must not ask the letters in the Latin tongue, how one ought
to speak German; but one must ask the mother in the house, the
children in the lanes and alleys, the common man in the market,
concerning this; yea, and look at the _moves_ of their mouths while
they are talking, and thereafter interpret. They understand then, and
mark that one talks German with them."

Whether he owed his successful acquirement of the language to these plans adopted by him, or whether to his extraordinary powers of mind, it must be left to others to judge. To form any thing like an accurate opinion, it may be necessary to re-state, that during this fourteen months' residence, he acquired such a knowledge of the German, as enabled him to make that extraordinary translation of the Wallenstein, (which will be presently noticed), reading at the same time several German authors, and storing up for himself the means of becoming familiar with others, on subjects in which the English language was deficient. In addition to what in this short period he effected, I may say that some part of this time was employed in receiving many lessons from professor Tychsen, in the Gothic of Ulphilas, which, says he,

"sufficed to make me acquainted with its grammar, and the radical
words of most frequent occurrence; and with the occasional assistance
of the same philosophical linguist, I read through Ottfried's Metrical
Paraphrase of the Gospel, and the most important remains of the
Theotiscan."

Coleridge's Biographia contains the history and developement of his mind till 1816, when it was published; he called it his Literary Life, but of necessity it is intermixed with his biography, as he must have found it impossible to separate them. He had even half promised himself to write his own biography, but the want of success in his literary labours, and the state of his health, caused him to think seriously that his life was diminishing too fast, to permit him to finish those great works, of which he had long planned the execution. The conception of these works was on such a scale, that even his giant intellect, with his great and continuous powers of application, could not have executed them. But to continue.--On his return to London, his first literary occupation was the translation of the Wallenstein, which he effected in six weeks, in a lodging in Buckingham-street, in the Strand; it was printed and published in 1800.

The MS. was purchased by Longman's house under the condition that the English Version and Schiller's Play in German were to be published at the same time. The play, as is well known to all German readers, is in three parts; the first part, the Camp, being considered by Coleridge as not sufficiently interesting to the British public to translate, it was not attempted; the second part, the Piccolomini, was translated with the occasional addition of some lines, in order to make out the thought when it appeared to require it, particularly in the Horological scene of the Watch Tower. In the last part the Death of Wallenstein is equally free, but the liberties taken with this play are those of omission.

German was not at that time cultivated in England, and the few plays which were translated, were but bad specimens of German Literature. The Wallenstein is an historical play, without any of those violent tragic events which the public expect to find in German plays, and this was one cause perhaps of disappointment.--It is a play of high thoughts-- ennobling sentiments, and for the reflecting individual with good feelings, one of those plays, by which, even without reference to the story, the head and the heart are both benefited. There is no violent excitement produced, and in quiet thought one can dwell on it with pleasure. Coleridge truly prophesied its fate, for when translating it, he said it would fall dead from the press, and indeed but few of the copies were sold;--his advice to the publishers, whom he had forewarned of this failure, was to reserve the unsold copies, and wait till it might become fashionable. They however parted with it as waste paper, though sixteen years afterwards it was eagerly sought for, and the few remaining copies doubled their price; but now that the German language has become more general, and the merit of this translation been appreciated, it has been reprinted with success.

Since the visit of these remarkable men to Germany, the taste for German literature has each year slowly increased, so as to make it almost appear that they have given the direction to this taste, which in England has caused a free inquiry into the writings of German authors, particularly of their poets and philosophers for the one class; and also into the interesting tales and stories to be found for the many who require such amusement.

The edition of Wallenstein, 1800, contains the following preface, which was afterwards abridged, but is here given as it was originally written; the first criticism on it was wholly made out of this preface, and these lines were quoted by the reviewer, in condemnation of the play and the translation, though it is well known that the critic was ignorant of German. The date of the MS. by Schiller is September 30th, 1799, the English is 1800. Coleridge indeed calls it a translation, but had it been verbatim, it would have required much longer time; take it however as we will, it displays wonderful powers; and as he noticed in a letter to a friend, it was executed in the prime of his life and vigour of his mind. Of the metre of this drama he spoke slightingly, and said according to his taste,

"it dragged, like a fly through a glue-pot. It was my intention," he
writes, "to have prefixed a life of Wallenstein to this translation;
but I found that it must either have occupied a space wholly
disproportionate to the nature of the publication, or have been merely
a meagre catalogue of events narrated, not more fully than they
already are in the play itself. The recent translation, likewise, of
Schiller's History of the Thirty Years' War, diminished the motives
thereto. In the translation, I have endeavoured to render my author
literally, wherever I was not prevented by absolute differences of
idiom; but I am conscious, that in two or three short passages, I have
been guilty of dilating the original; and, from anxiety to give the
full meaning, have weakened the force. In the metre I have availed
myself of no other liberties, than those which Schiller had permitted
to himself, except the occasional breaking up of the line, by the
substitution of a trochee for an iambus; of which liberty, so frequent
in our tragedies, I find no instance in these dramas.

The two Dramas, Piccolomini, or the first part of Wallenstein, and
Wallenstein, are introduced in the original manuscript by a prelude in
one act, entitled Wallenstein's camp. This is written in rhyme, and in
nine syllable verse, in the same lilting metre (if that expression may
be permitted) with the second eclogue of Spencer's Shepherd's
Calendar. This prelude possesses a sort of broad humour, and is not
deficient in character, but to have translated it into prose, or into
any other metre than that of the original, would have given a false
idea, both of its style and purport; to have translated it into the
same metre, would have been incompatible with a faithful adherence to
the sense of the German, from the comparative poverty of our language
in rhymes; and it would have been unadvisable, from the incongruity of
those lax verses with the present state of the English public.
Schiller's intention seems to have been merely to have prepared his
reader for the tragedies, by a lively picture of the laxity of
discipline, and the mutinous disposition of Wallenstein's soldiery. It
is not necessary as a preliminary explanation. For these reasons it
has been thought expedient not to translate it.

The admirers of Schiller, who have abstracted their idea of that
author from the Robbers, and the Cabal and Love plays, in which the
main interest is produced by the excitement of curiosity, and in which
the curiosity is excited by terrible and extraordinary incident, will
not have perused, without some portion of disappointment, the dramas
which it has been my employment to translate. They should, however,
reflect, that these are historical dramas, taken from a popular German
history; that we must therefore judge of them in some measure with the
feelings of Germans, or by analogy with the interest excited in us by
similar dramas in our own language. Few, I trust, would be rash or
ignorant enough, to compare Schiller with Shakspeare, yet, merely as
illustration, I would say, that we should proceed to the perusal of
Wallenstein, not from Lear or Othello, but from Richard the Second, or
the three parts of Henry the Sixth. We scarcely expect rapidity in an
historical drama; and many prolix speeches are pardoned from
characters, whose names and actions have formed the most amusing tales
of our early life. On the other hand, there exist in these plays more
individual beauties, more passages the excellence of which will bear
reflection than in the former productions of Schiller.

The description of the Astrological Tower, and the reflections of the
young lover, which follow it, form in the original a fine poem, and my
translation must have been wretched indeed, if it can have wholly
overclouded the beauties of the scene in the first act of the first
play, between Questenberg, Max. and Octavio Piccolomini.

If we except the scene of the setting sun in the Robbers, I know of no
part in Schiller's plays, which equals the whole of the first scene of
the fifth act of the concluding play. It would be unbecoming in me to
be more diffuse on this subject. A translator stands connected with
the original author by a certain law of subordination, which makes it
more decorous to point out excellencies than defects; indeed, he is
not likely to be a fair judge of either. The pleasure or disgust from
his own labour, will mingle with the feelings that arise from an after
view of the original poem; and in the first perusal of a work in any
foreign language, which we understand, we are apt to attribute to it
more excellence than it really possesses, from our own pleasurable
sense of difficulty overcome without effort. Translation of poetry
into poetry is difficult, because the translator must give a
brilliancy to his language without that warmth of original conception,
from which such brilliancy would follow of its own accord. But the
translator of a living author is encumbered with additional
inconveniences. If he render his original faithfully, as to the
'sense' of each passage, he must necessarily destroy a considerable
portion of the 'spirit'; if he endeavour to give a work executed
according to laws of 'compensation', he subjects himself to
imputations of vanity, or misrepresentation. I thought it my duty to
remain by the sense of my original, with as few exceptions as the
nature of the language rendered possible."

About this time, or soon after his return from Germany, the proprietor of the Morning Post, who was also the editor, engaged Coleridge to undertake the literary department. In this he promised to assist, provided the paper was conducted on fixed and announced principles, and that he should neither be requested nor obliged to deviate from them in favour of any party or any event. In consequence, that journal became, and for many years continued, 'anti-ministerial, yet with a very qualified approbation of the opposition, and with far greater earnestness and zeal, both anti-jacobin and anti-gallican. As contributors to this paper, the editor had the assistance of Mr. Wordsworth, Mr. Southey, and Mr. Lamb. Mr. Southey, from his extreme activity and industry, with powers best suited for such employment, with a rapidity and punctuality which made him invaluable to the proprietor, was the largest contributor. The others not possessing the same qualifications, although extremely powerful in their way, were not of the same value to the proprietor.

To Coleridge, he continued liberal and kind, and Coleridge appreciated his talents; often has he been heard to say, if Mr. Stuart "knew as much of man as he does of men, he would be one of the first characters in Europe." The world, and even that part of it, who either receive pleasure, or are benefited by the labours of literary men, often seem to forget how many there are who being compelled to work during the week for the provision of the week, are (if not possessed of much bodily strength) unfit to continue further mental exertions; nor can they find the leisure and repose necessary to produce any work of importance, though such efforts must always be found so much more congenial to the feelings of a man of genius. Whatever his enemies or his more envious friends may choose to have put forth, it was to him a most painful thought, particularly as he had made literature his profession, to have lived in vain. This feeling sometimes haunted him, and when the feelings are gloomily disposed, they often become in their turn depressing causes, which frequently ended in a deep and painful sigh, and a renewal of his laborious and inspiring thoughts as an antidote. The severest of his critics have not pretended to have found in his compositions triviality, or traces of a mind that shrank from the toil of thinking.

A respectable portion of literary talent will secure the success of a newspaper, provided that it impartially adheres "to a code of intelligible principles previously announced, and faithfully referred to in support of every judgment on men and events." Such were the opinions and feelings by which the contributors to this paper, as well as the proprietor was influenced during this period; and to these causes, as well as from the talents of the editor and of the writers, it mainly owed its success. Papers so conducted do not require the aid of party, nor of ministerial patronage. Yet a determination to make money by flattering the envy and cupidity, and the vindictive restlessness of unthinking men, seems frequently to have succeeded, not confining itself to the daily press, but diffusing itself into periodicals of a different stamp.

"I do derive," says Coleridge, "a gratification from the knowledge,
that my essays have contributed to introduce the practice of placing
the questions and events of the day in a moral point of view. In
Burke's writings, indeed, the germs of all political truths may be
found. But I dare assume to myself the merit of having first
explicitly defined and analysed the nature of Jacobinism; and in
distinguishing the Jacobin from the Republican, the Democrat, and the
mere Demagogue," ('vide Friend'.)

Whilst Coleridge retained the opinions of the Unitarians, or rather preached among them, they hailed him as the rising star of their society, but when he seceded from them on his change of opinions, many of them bruited his name in execration. Not so was it with Mr. Estlin and other amiable and intelligent men, they understood him, and felt he had acted on the full conviction of his mind, and that he was acting conscientiously when he declined the opportunity of possessing a fixed income, of which he stood so much in need. Those who knew him, knew how much he suffered, and how painful it was for him to have differed with such a friend as Mr. Estlin, one to whom he had been indebted for many kind offices: But Coleridge was too sincere a man to dissemble.--There were however others, who, from motives and feelings not honourable to them, dissemblers even in Unitarianism, who sought every opportunity of defaming him, and attempted to strip him of his virtues, and of his genius, by calumny and detraction. In this, however, they were foiled. On the other hand, the party more inclined to favour fanaticism, were so indiscreet in their praise as to become in their turn equally injurious to his character, and verified the old adage, that indiscreet friends are too often the worst of enemies; for this party considered his conversion as nothing less than a special miracle. It was impossible for a mind so philosophical and so constituted, to remain long in the trammels of a philosophy like Hartley's, or to continue to adhere to such a substitute for Christianity as Unitarianism; like the incarcerated chicken, he would on increase of growth and power, liberate himself from his imprisonment and breathe unencumbered the vital air, the pabulum of animal life, which by parallel reasoning, Coleridge was aiming at in a spiritual life. From such a substitute for Christianity, that imitation so unvitalizing in its effects, the studiously industrious and sincere man will recoil; but the vain and superficial man will find much in it for the display of his egotism, and superficial knowledge. Often did he remark when conversing on these subjects, there was a time, when

"I disbelieved down to Unitarianism, it would have been _more honest_
to have gone farther, to have denied the existence of a GOD! but that
my heart would not allow me to do."

But to this subject we shall have occasion to return. The mind which grows with its culture, seeks deeper research, and so was it with his. Certainly, one of the effects of his visits to Germany, was to root up whatever remained of the Mechanical Philosophy of Hartley, after whom he had named his eldest son, and to open to his mind in philosophy new and higher views, and in religion more established views. But change with the many, though the result of conviction and the growth of truth, is still a change; and with the unthinking, it deteriorates from the character of a man, rather than as it should do elevate him,

... unless _above_ himself he can
Erect himself, how mean a thing is man!

DANIEL.

In the years 1783, 1784, and 1786, Bishop Horsley wrote some of the tracts in controversy with Priestley, upon the historical question of the belief of the first ages in OUR LORD'S Divinity, which are collected in one volume, with large additional notes, dated 1789.

In a memorandum 'book', made by Coleridge, it appears that he never saw nor read this volume, till some time in 1805; therefore his views were not altered by the bishop's reasoning, but had undergone a great change previously.

Horsley's writings carry with them a conviction of their truth. His clear though concentrated style rivets the attention, and forcibly impresses the mind, with his depth of learning, and at the same time inspires the feeling of its practical utility. He was an opponent most aptly suited to Priestley. The times however greatly favoured the latter; the discoveries of Lavoisier, led the way to the study of chemistry, which became fashionable and generally cultivated, and with its brilliancy dazzled the multitude. Priestley displayed considerable expertness and fitness for the practical application of the discoveries of others; and he added also to the new mass of facts, which were daily presenting themselves, and thus science became enriched, enriching at the same time the pockets of the manufacturers, exciting national industry, and adding considerably to the national property. Priestley's researches and discoveries gave an irresistible weight to his name, and had an undue influence, as we shall presently see, in the arguments or opinions he advanced. This, Horsley foresaw, and felt, and therefore built his arguments on the permanent, in order to subdue the creatures founded on the impermanent and other worthless idols of the mind's forming.

How the world were delighted and wonder-struck by the supposed discovery, that it was the province of vegetable life to supply the vital air, which animal life destroyed! Priestley was hailed as the wonder of his age, and for a while its oracle. He was however no ordinary being, and even his enemies admitted him to be a kind and moral man. His intellectual powers will speak for themselves. We have now had sufficient experience to see how shifting all kind of theory must be when left to the will and ingenuity of man only--and how unsafe a guide in questions of importance as the one now referred to. Horsley saw the weak points of Priestley's argument, and was not to be dazzled and put aside by Priestley's philosophical display. Horsley fearlessly entered into this controversy, like a man who felt his own strength, and particularly the strength of his cause; though he needed not the courage of a Luther, he was apparently a man who possessed it, if called on. He used the best means to silence his adversary [27], with the Bible before him as his shield, (but at the same time his support as well as defence,) from behind which he assailed his opponent with his Biblical learning so powerfully, that his first attack made Priestley feel the strength of his adversary. In vaunting language, Priestley made the best defence which he thought he could, but not the most prudent, by promising to answer his opponent so efficiently, as to make him a convert to his doctrines. But in this vaunting prediction, that he would not only answer his opponent satisfactorily, to all who were interested in the controversy, but convert him to his opinions, it need not be added he failed, so completely, and at the same time displayed such a "ridiculous vanity," as to deprive him of that influence which he had so overrated in himself. Horsley's letters seem particularly to have attracted Coleridge's attention, and to have caused him to make one of his concise, pithy and powerful notes as a comment on this letter of Horsley's, entitled, "The Unitarian Doctrine not well calculated for the conversion of Jews, Mahometans, or Infidels, of any description." [28]

The following is Coleridge's Comment on the Letter, to which allusion has been made, and from the date seems to have been written during his residence at Malta:

"February 12, 1805.--Thinking during my perusal of Horsley's letters
in reply to Dr. Priestley's objections to the Trinity on the part of
Jews, Mahometans, and Infidels, it burst upon me at once as an awful
truth, what seven or eight years ago I thought of proving with a
'hollow faith', and for an 'ambiguous purpose', [29] my mind then
wavering in its necessary passage from Unitarianism (which, as I have
often said, is the religion of a man, whose reason would make him an
atheist, but whose heart and common sense will not permit him to be
so) through Spinosism into Plato and St. John. No Christ, no God! This
I now feel with all its needful evidence of the understanding: would
to God my spirit were made conform thereto--that no Trinity, no God!
That Unitarianism in all its forms is idolatry, and that the remark of
Horsley is most accurate; that Dr. Priestley's mode of converting the
Jews and Turks is, in the great essential of religious faith, to give
the name of Christianity to their present idolatry--truly the trick of
Mahomet, who, finding that the mountain would not come to him, went to
the mountain. O! that this conviction may work upon me and in me, and
that my mind may be made up as to the character of Jesus, and of
historical Christianity, as clearly as it is of the logos, and
intellectual or spiritual Christianity--that I may be made to know
either their especial and peculiar union, or their absolute disunion
in any peculiar sense. [30]

With regard to the Unitarians, it has been shamelessly asserted, that
I have denied them to be Christians. God forbid! For how should I know
what the piety of the heart may be, or what quantum of error in the
understanding may consist, with a saving faith in the intentions and
actual dispositions of the whole moral being, in any one individual?
Never will God reject a soul that sincerely loves him, be his
speculative opinions what they may: and whether in any given instance
certain opinions, be they unbelief, or misbelief, are compatible with
a sincere love of God, God only can know. But this I have said, and
shall continue to say, that if the doctrines, the sum of which I
'believe' to constitute the truth in Christ, 'be' Christianity, then
Unitarianism' is not, and vice versâ: and that in speaking
theologically and 'impersonally', i.e. of Psilanthropism and
Theanthropism, as schemes of belief--and without reference to
individuals who profess either the one or the other--it will be absurd
to use a different language, as long as it is the dictate of common
sense, that two opposites cannot properly be called by the same name.

I should feel no offence if a Unitarian applied the same to me, any
more than if he were to say, that 2 and 2 being 4, 4 and 4 must be 8."

Biog. Lit. vol. ii. p. 307.

[Footnote 1: In his 'Literary Life,' Mr. Coleridge has made the following observation regarding talent and genius:

"For the conceptions of the mind may be so vivid and adequate, as to
preclude that impulse to the realising of them, which is strongest and
most restless in those who possess more than mere 'talent' (or the
faculty of appropriating and applying the knowledge of others,) yet
still want something of the creative and self-sufficing power of
absolute 'Genius'. For this reason, therefore, they are men of
'commanding' genius. While the former rest content between thought and
reality, as it were in an intermundium of which their own living
spirit supplies the 'substance', and their imagination the
ever-varying 'form'; the latter must impress their preconceptions on
the world without, in order to present them back to their own view
with the satisfying degree of clearness, distinctness, and
individuality."

Vol. i. p. 31.]

[Footnote 2: In consequence of various reports traducing Coleridge's good name, I have thought it an act of justice due to his character, to notice several mistatements here and elsewhere, which I should otherwise have gladly passed over.]

[Footnote 3: Coleridge was always most ready to pass a censure on what appeared to him a defect in his own composition, of which the following is a proof:--In his introductory remarks to this Greek Ode, printed in the Sibylline Leaves, he observes:

"The Slaves in the West Indies consider Death as a passport to their
native country. This sentiment is expressed in the introduction to the
'Greek Ode on the Slave Trade,' of which the Ideas are better than the
language in which they are conveyed."

Certainly this is taking no merit to himself, although the Ode obtained the Prize.]

[Footnote 4: