nation confound the language of the With long-tail'd words in osity and ation," (as our great living master of sweet and perfect English, Hookham Frere, has it,) would seem to argue the very contrary. In the train of these, methinks, object and subject, with the derivatives, look tame, and claim a place in the last, or, at most, in the humbler seats of the second species, in the far-noised classification-the longtailed pigs, and the short-tailed pigs, and the pigs without a tail. Aye, but not on such dry topics!—I submit. You have touched the vulnerable heel"lis, quibus siccum lumen abest," they must needs be dry. We have Lord Bacon's word for it. A topic that requires stedfast intuitions, clear conceptions, and ideas, as the source and substance of both, and that will admit of no substitute for these, in images, fictions, or factitious facts, must be dry as the broad-awake of sight and day-light, and desperately barren of all that interest which a busy yet sensual age requires and finds in the "uda somnia," and moist moonshine of an epicurean philosophy. For you, however, and for those who, like you, are not so satisfied with the present doctrines, but that you would fain try "another and an elder lore," (and such there are, I know, and that the . number is on the increase,) I hazard this assurance,-That let what will come of the terms, yet without the truths conveyed in these terms, there can be no self-knowledge; and without THIS, no knowledge of any kind. For the fragmentary recollections and recognitions of empiricism, usurping the name of experience, can amount to opinion only, and that alone is knowledge which is at once real and systematic-or, in one word, organic. Let monk and pietist pervert the precept into sickly, brooding, and morbid introversions of consciousness—you have learnt, that, even under the wisest regulations, THINKING can go but half way toward this knowledge. To know the whole truth, we must likewise ACT: and he alone acts, who makes-and this can no man do, estranged from Nature. Learn to know thyself in Nature, that thou mayest understand Nature in thyself. But I forget myself. My pledge and purpose was to help you over the threshold into the outer court; and here I stand, spelling the dim characters inwoven in the veil of Isis, in the recesses of the temple. I must conclude, therefore, if only to begin again without too abrupt a drop, lest I should remind you of Mr in his Survey of Middlesex, who having digressed, for some half a score of pages, into the heights of cosmogony, the old planet between Jupiter and Mars, that went off, and split into the four new ones, besides the smaller rubbish for stone showers, the formation of the galaxy, and the other worldworlds, on the same principles, and by similar accidents, superseding the hypothesis of a Creator, and demonstraand country parsons, takes up the ting the superfluity of church tithes stitch again with-But to return to the subject of dung. God bless you and your Affectionate Friend, S. T. COLERIDGE. * Let y express the conditions under which E, (that is, a series of forms, facts, circumstances, &c. presented to the senses of an individual,) will become Experienceand we might, not unaptly, define the two words thus: E+y=Experience; E—y= Empiricism. LETTER III. To Mr Blackwood. DEAR SIR, Here have I been sit ting, this whole long-lagging, muzzy, mizly morning, struggling without success against the insuperable disgust I feel to the task of explaining the abrupt chasm at the outset of our correspondence, and disposed to let your verdict take its course, rather than suffer over again by detailing the causes of the stoppage; though sure by so doing to acquit my will of all share in the result. Instead of myself, and of you, my dear sir, in relation to myself, I have been thinking, first, of the Edinburgh Magazine; then of maga zines generally and comparatively ;then of a magazine in the abstract; and lastly, of the immense importance and yet strange neglect of that prime dictate of prudence and common sense -DISTINCT MEANS TO DISTINCT ENDS.-But here I must put in one proviso, not in any relation though to the aphorism itself, which is of universal validity, but relatively to my intended application of it. I must assume-I mean, that the individuals disposed to grant me free access and fair audience for my remarks, have a conscience-such a portion at least, as being eked out with superstition and sense of character, will suffice to prevent them from seeking to realize the ultimate end, (i. e the maxim of profit) by base or disreputable means. This, therefore, may be left out of the present argument, an extensive sale being the common object of all publishers, of whatever kind the publications may be, morally considered. Nor do the means appropriate to this end differ. Be the work good or evil in its tendency, in both cases alike there is one question to be predetermined, viz. what class or classes of the reading world the work is intended for? I made the proviso, however, because I would not mislead any man even for an honest cause, and my experience will not allow me to promise an equal immediate circulation from a work addressed to the higher interests and blameless predilections of men, as from one constructed on the plan of flattering the envy and vanity of sciolism, and gratifying the cravings of vulgar curiosity. Such may be, and in some instances, I doubt not, has been, the result. But I dare not answer for it beforehand, even though both works should be equally well suited to their several purposes, which will not be thought a probable case, when it is considered, how much less talent, and of how much commoner a kind, is required in the latter. On the other hand, however, I am persuaded that a sufficient success, and, less liable to draw-backs from competition, would not fail to attend a work on the former plan, if the scheme and execution of the contents were as appropriate to the object, which the purchasers must be supposed to have in view, as the means adopted for its outward attraction and its general circulation were to the interest of its proprietors. During a long literary life, I have been no inattentive observer of periodical publications; and I can remember no failure, in any work deserving success, that might not have been antici-, pated from some error or deficiency in the means, either in regard to the mode of circulating the work, (as for instance by the vain attempt to unite the cha racters of author, editor, and publisher,) or to the typographical appear ance; or else from its want of suitableness to the class of readers, on whom, it should have been foreseen, the remunerating sale must principally depend. It would be misanthropy to suppose that the seekers after truth, information, and innocent amusement, are not sufficiently numerous to support a work, in which these attractions are prominent, without the dishonest aid of personality, literary faction, or treacherous invasions of the sacred recesses of private life, without slanders, which both reason and duty command us to disbelieve as well as abhor; for what but falsehood, or that half truth, which is falsehood in its most malignant form, can or ought to be expected from a self-convicted traitor and ingrate? If these remarks are well founded, we may narrow the problem to the few following terms,-it being understood, that the work now in question, is a monthly publication, not devoted to any one branch of knowledge or literature, but a magazine of whatever may be supposed to interest readers in general, not excluding the discoveries, or even the speculations of science, that are generallyintelligible and interesting, so that the portion devoted to any one subject or department, shall be kept proportionate to the number of readers for whom it may be supposed to have a particular interest. Here, however, we must not forget, that however few the actual dilettanti, or men of the fancy may be, yet, as long as the articles remain generally intelligible, (in pugilism, for instance,) Variety and Novelty communicate an attraction that interests all. Homo sum, nihil humani a me alienum. If to this we add the exclusion of theological controversy, which is endless, I shall have pretty accurately described the present EDINBURGH MAGAZINE, as to its characteristic plan and purposes; which may, I think, be comprised in three terms, as a Philosophical, Philological, and Esthetic Miscellany. The word miscellany, however, must be taken as involving a predicate in itself, in addition to the three preceding epithets, comprehending, namely, all the ephemeral births of intellectual life, which add to the gaiety and variety of the work, without interfering with its express and regular objects. Having thus a sufficiently definite notion of what your Magazine is, and is intended to be, I proposed to myself, as a problem, to find out, in detail, what the means would be to the most perfect attainment of this end. In other words, what the scheme, and of what nature, and in what order and proportion, the contents should be of a monthly publication; in order for it to verify the title of a Philosophical, Philological, and Æsthetic Miscellany and Magazine. The result of my lucubrations I hope to forward in my next, under the title of "The Ideal of a Magazine;" and to mark those departments, in the filling up of which, I flatter myself with the prospect of being a fellow labourer. But since I I wish I could find a more familiar word than æsthetic, for works of taste and criticism. It is, however, in all respects better, and of more reputable origin, than belletristic. To be sure, there is tasty; but that has been long ago emasculated for all unworthy uses by milliners, tailors, and the androgynous correlatives of both, formerly called its, and now yclept dandies. As our language, therefore, contains no other useable adjective, to express that coincidence of form, feeling, and intellect, that something, which, confirming the inner and the outward senses, becomes a new sense in itself, to be tried by laws of its own, and acknowledging the laws of the understanding so far only as not to contradict them; that faculty which, when possessed in a high degree, the Greeks termed φιλοκαλία, but when spoken of generally, or in kind only, το αισθητικον ; and for which even our substantive, Taste, is a not inappropriate--but very inadequate metaphor; there is reason to hope, that the term aesthetic, will be brought into common use as soon as distinct thoughts and definite expressions shall once more become the requisite accomplishment of a gentleman. So it was in the energetic days, and in the starry court of our English-hearted Eliza; when trade, the nurse of freedom, was the enlivening counterpoise of agriculture, not its alien and usurping spirit; when commerce had all the enterprize, and more than the romance of war; when the precise yet pregnant terminology of the schools gave bone and muscle to the diction of poetry and eloquence, and received from them in return passion and harmony; but, above all, when from the self-evident truth, that what in kind constitutes the superiority of man to animal, the same in degree must constitute the superiority of men to each other, the practical inference was drawn, that every proof of these distinctive faculties being in a tense and active state, that even the sparks and crackling of mental electricity, in the sportive approaches and collisions of ordinary intercourse, (such as we have in the wit-combats of Benedict and Beatrice, of Mercutio, and in the dialogues assigned to courtiers and gentlemen, by all the dramatic writers of that reign,) are stronger indications of natural superiority, and, therefore, more becoming signs and accompaniments of artificial rank, than apathy, studied mediocrity, and the ostentation of wealth. When I think of the vigour and felicity of style characteristic of the age, from Edward VI. to the restoration of Charles, and observable in the letters and family memoirs of noble families--take, for instance, the Life of Colonel Hutchinson, written by his widow-I cannot suppress the wish--Ó that the habits of those days could return, even though they should bring pedantry and Euphuism in their train ! began this scrawl, a friend reminded me of a letter I wrote him many years ago, on the improvement of the mind, by the habit of commencing our inquiries with the attempt to construct the most absolute or perfect form of the object desiderated, leaving its practicability, in the first instance, undetermined. An essay, in short, de emendatione intellectûs per ideas-the beneficial influence of which, on his mind, he spoke of with warmth. The main contents of the letter, the effect of which, my friend appreciated so highly, were derived from conversation with a great man, now no more. And as I have reason to regard that conversation as an epoch in the history of my own mind, I feel myself encouraged to hope that its publication may not prove useless to some of your numerous readers, to whom Nature has given the stream, and nothing is wanting but to be led into the right channel. There is one other motive to which I must plead conscious, not only in the following, but in all of these, my preliminary contributions; viz. That by the reader's agreement with the principles, and sympathy with the general feelings, which they are meant to impress, the interest of my future contributions, and still more, their permanent effect, will be heightened; and most so in those, in which, as narrative and imaginative compositions, there is the least shew of reflection, on my part, and the least necessity for it, though I flatter myself not the least opportunity on the part of my readers. It will be better too, if I mistake not, both for your purposes and mine, to have it said hereafter, that he dragged slow and stiff-knee'd up the first hill, but sprang forward as soon as the road was full before him, and got in fresh; than that he set off in grand stylebroke up midway, and came in brokenwinded. Finis coronat opus. Your's, &c. LETTER IV. To a Junior Soph, at Cambridge. OFTEN, my dear young friend! often, and bitterly, do I regret the stupid prejudice that made me neglect my mathematical studies, at Jesus. There is something to me enigmatically attractive and imaginative in the generation of curves, and in the whole geometry of motion. I seldom look at a fine prospect or mountain landscape, or even at a grand picture, without abstracting the lines with a feeling similar to that with which I should contemplate the graven or painted walls of some temple or palace in Mid Africa,-doubtful whether it were mere Arabesque, or undecyphered characters of an unknown tongue, framed when the language of men was nearer to that of nature a language of symbols and correspondences. I am, therefore, far more disposed to envy, than join in the laugh against your fellow-collegiate, for amusing himself in the geometrical construction of leaves and flowers. Since the receipt of your last, I never take a turn round the garden without thinking of his billow-lines and shell-lines, under the well-sounding names of Cumäids and Conchöids; they have as much life and poetry for me, as their elder sisters, the Naids, Nereids, and Hama-dryads. I pray you, present my best respects to him, S. T. COLERIDGE, and tell him, that he brought to my recollection the glorious passage in Plotinus," Should any one interrogate Nature how she works? if graciously she vouchsafe to answer, she will say, It behoves thee to understand me (or better, and more literally, to go along with me) in silence, even as I am silent, and work without words ;”—but you have a Plotinus, and may construe it for yourself.-(Ennead 3. 1. 8. c. 3.) attending particularly to the comparison of the process pursued by Nature, with that of the geometrician. And now for your questions respecting the moral influence of W.'s minor poems. Of course, this will be greatly modified by the character of the recipient. But that in the majority of instances it has been most salutary, I cannot for a moment doubt. But it is another question, whether verse is the best way of disciplining the mind to that spiritual alchemy, which communicates a sterling value to real or apparent trifles, by using them as moral diagrams, as your friend uses the oak and fig-leaves as geometrical ones. To have formed the habit of looking at every thing, not for what it is relative to the purposes and associations of men in general, but for the truths which it suited to represent-to contemplate objects as words * and pregnant symbols-the advantages: You did not know my revered friend of this, my dear D., are so many, and so important, so eminently calculated to excite and evolve the power of sound and connected reasoning, of distinct and clear conception, and of genial feeling, that there are few of W.'s finest passages-and who, of living poets, can lay claim to half the number?-that I repeat so often, as that homely quatrain, O reader! had you in your mind and patron; or rather, you do know the man, and mourn his loss, from the character I have lately given of him.The following supposed dialogue actually took place, in a conversation with him; and as in part, an illustration of what I have already said, and in part as text and introduction to much I would wish to say, I entreat you to read it with patience, spite of the triviality of the subject, and mock-heroic of the title. SUBSTANCE OF A DIALOGUE, WITH A COMMENTARY ON THE SAME. A. I never found yet, an ink-stand that I was satisfied with. B. What would you have an ink-stand to be? What qualities and properties would you wish to have combined in an ink-stand? Keflect! Consult your past experience; taking care, however, not to desire things demonstrably, or self-evidently incompatible with each other; and the union of these desiderata will be your ideal of an ink-stand. A friend, perhaps, suggests some additional excellence that might rationally be desired, till at length the catalogue may be considered as complete, when neither yourself, nor others, can think of any desideratum not anticipated or precluded by some one or more of the points already enumerated; and the conception of all these, as realized in one and the same artéfact, may be fairly entitled, the IDEAL of an Ink-stand. That the pen should be allowed, without requiring any effort or interruptive act of attention from the writer, to dip sufficiently low, and yet be prevented, without injuring its nib, from dipping too low, or taking up too much ink: That the ink-stand should be of such materials as not to decompose the ink, or occasion a deposition or discolouration of its specific ingredients, as, from what cause I know not, is the fault of the black Wedgewoodware ink-stands; that it should be so constructed, that on being overturned, the ink cannot escape; and so protect ed, or made of such stuff, that in case of a blow or a fall from any common height, the ink-stand itself will not be broken;-that from both these qualities, and from its shape, it may be safely and commodiously travelled with, and packed up with books, linen, or whatever else is likely to form the contents of the portmanteau, or travelling trunk ;-that it should stand steadily and commodiously, and be of as pleasing a shape and appearance as is compatible with its more important uses; and, lastly, though of minor regard, and non-essential, that it be capable of including other implements or requisites, always, or occasionally connected with the art of writing, as pen-knife, wafers, &c. without any addition to the size and weight, otherwise desirable, and without detriment to its more im❤ portant and proper advantages. Now, (continued B.) that we have an adequate notion of what is to be wished, let us try what is to be done! And my friend actually succeeded in constructing an ink-stand, in which, during the twelve years that have elapsed since this conversation, alas! I might almost say, since his death, I have never been able, though I have put my wits on the stretch, to detect any thing wanting that an ink-stand could be rationally desired to possess; or even to imagine any addition, detraction, or change, for use or appearance, that I could desire, without involving a contradiction. HERE! (methinks I hear the reader * In the 8th Number of the Friend, as first circulated by the post. I dare assert, that it is worthy of preservation, and will send a transcript in my next. |
