Robert Southey."
The succeeding post brought me the following letter.
"Keswick, April 18, 1814.
My dear Cottle,
I ought to have slept upon your letter before I answered it. In thinking over the subject (for you may be assured it was not in my power to get rid of the thought) the exceeding probability occurred to me….
When you talked, in the proposed letter you sent me, of Coleridge producing valuable works if his mind were relieved by the certainty of a present income, you suffered your feelings to overpower your memory. Coleridge had that income for many years. It was given him expressly that he might have leisure for literary productions; and to hold out the expectation that he would perform the same conditions, if a like contract were renewed, is what experience will not warrant.
You will probably write to Poole on this subject. In that case, state to him distinctly what my opinion is: that Coleridge should return home to Keswick, raising a supply for his present exigencies, by lecturing at Birmingham, and Liverpool, and then, if there be a necessity, as I fear there will be (arising solely and wholly from his own most culpable habits of sloth and self-indulgence) of calling on his friends to do that which he can and ought to do,—for that time the humiliating solicitation should be reserved….
God bless you,
Robert Southey."
No advantage would arise from recording dialogues with Mr. Coleridge, it is sufficient to state that Mr. C.'s repugnance to visit Greta Hall, and to apply his talents in the way suggested by Mr. Southey, was invincible; neither would he visit T. Poole, nor lecture at Birmingham nor Liverpool.