of manner so marked, that it might be called gracious. The hospitable family, with whom he was domesticated, were distinguished for their amiable manners, and enlightened understandings; they were descendants from Chubb, the philosophic writer, and bore the same name. For Coleridge they all testified deep affection and esteem, sentiments which the whole town of Bridgewater seemed to share, for in the evening, when the heat of the day had declined, I walked out with him; and rarely, perhaps never, have I seen a person so much interrupted in one hour's space as Coleridge on this occasion, by the courteous attentions of young and old."* This appears so faithful a portraiture of Coleridge that it is impossible to read it without once more beholding him as in a mirror. Continuing his description, he speaks again of his extreme courtesy, and of his easy and gentlemanly manner of receiving strangers. A friend of mine seldom speaks of the past in connexion with Coleridge's name, but he reminds me of a visit he once made to me during my absence at the sea shore, and of the courteous grace he displayed in doing the honours of the house. In every thing wherein the comfort or happiness of others were concerned, Coleridge ever evinced how entirely he could devote himself to * Vide Tait's Magazine, No. 8. those he loved or who might require his sympathy: His own fair countenance, his kingly forehead, He suffered, nor complained; though oft with tears Was but the veil of purest meditation, Pierced through and saturate with the intellectual rays It softened. Literary Remains, vol. i. 277. These were characteristic beauties, that shone forth in Coleridge, and were deeply felt by all who were attached to him. With regard to the charge made by Mr. De Quincey, of Coleridge's so borrowing the property of other writers as to be guilty of 'petty larceny; with equal justice might we accuse the bee which flies from flower to flower in quest of food, and which, by means of the instinct bestowed upon it by the all-wise Creator, extracts its nourishment from the field and the garden, but digests and elaborates it by its own native powers. Coleridge began the use of opium from bodily pain (rheumatism), and for the same reason continued it, till he had acquired a habit too difficult under his own management to control. To him it was the thorn in the flesh, which will be seen in the following notes: 66 66 "I have never loved evil for its own sake: "no! nor ever sought pleasure for its own sake, "but only as the means of escaping from pains that coiled around my mental powers, as a serpent around the body and wings of an eagle! My sole sensuality was not to be in pain."-Note from Pocket Book, "The History of my own mind for my own improvement," Dec. 23, 1804. 66 66 66 "I wrote a few stanzas* three and twenty years ago, soon after my eyes had been opened "to the true nature of the habit into which I had "been ignorantly deluded by the seeming magic "effects of opium, in the sudden removal of a 66 66 supposed rheumatic affection, attended with "swellings in my knees, and palpitations of the heart, and pains all over me, by which I had “been bed-ridden for nearly six months. Unhappily, among my neighbour's and landlord's "books were a large parcel of medical reviews "and magazines. I had always a fondness (a "common case, but most mischievous turn with 66 66 reading men who are at all dyspeptic) for dab * These have not been found. bling in medical writings; and in one of these "reviews I met a case, which I fancied very like "my own, in which a cure had been effected by "the Kendal Black Drop. In an evil hour I pro"cured it-it worked miracles-the swellings disappeared, the pains vanished; I was all 66 66 66 66 66 66 66 66 alive, and all around me being as ignorant as myself, nothing could exceed my triumph. I "talked of nothing else, prescribed the newly"discovered panacea for all complaints, and "carried a bottle about with me, not to lose any opportunity of administering instant relief and speedy cure' to all complainers, stranger or friend, gentle or simple. Need I say that my own apparent convalescence was of no long continuance; but what then?—the remedy was " at hand and infallible. Alas! it is with a bit"ter smile, a laugh of gall and bitterness, that "I recall this period of unsuspecting delusion, " and how I first became aware of the Maelstrom, "the fatal whirlpool, to which I was drawing just when the current was already beyond my "strength to stem. The state of my mind is truly portrayed in the following effusion, for "God knows! that from that moment I was the "victim of pain and terror, nor had I at any "time taken the flattering poison as a stimulus, 66 66 66 or for any craving after pleasurable sensations. "I needed none; and oh! with what unutter"able sorrow did I read the Confessions of an 66 Opium-eater,' in which the writer with morbid vanity, makes a boast of what was my misfor"tune, for he had been faithfully and with an agony of zeal warned of the gulf, and yet wilfully struck into the current !- Heaven be "merciful to him!"-April, 1826. 66 66 66 “Oh! (will a vain imagination whisper) that "in the outset of life I could have felt as well as known the consequences of sin and error " before their tyranny had commenced! Though, compared with the average of my fellow men, "not a sinful man, yet I feel enough to be "assured that few indeed are there who might "not from their sins or sinful infirmities gain 66 66 66 a tongue of flame, wherewith to warn men "of the deadly poison of all, even the least "offence. Of all divines, Luther felt most deeply "the terrors of the LAW; and for that reason, "the unutterable goodness and love of the dis"pensation of grace!-To be one with God the "Father-an awful thought beyond all utterance of the awe which it inspires, but by no means wild or mystical. On the contrary, all our experience moves in this direction. In reason, in science, who shall set bounds to the "possible progress of man, as long as he is no longer in himself, but in the truth and power "of truth. The moment that disease reduces "himself to himself, the sage who was able to 66 66 66 |