From a conviction of the tender ground on which I stood, and entertaining a latent suspicion that some, whom I could wish to have pleased, would still censure, as unjustifiable exposure, what with me was the result of conscience; I repeat, with all these searching apprehensions, the reader will judge what my complicated feelings must have been, of joy and sorrow; a momentary satisfaction, succeeded by the deepest pungency of affliction, when, (after all the preceding was written) Mr. Josiah Wade, presented to me the following mournful and touching letter, addressed to him by Mr. Coleridge, in the year 1814, which, whilst it relieved my mind from so onerous a burden, fully corroborated all that I had presumed, and all that I had affirmed. Mr. W. handed this letter to me, that it might be made public, in conformity with his departed friend's injunction.
"Bristol, June 26th, 1814.
Dear sir,
For I am unworthy to call any good man friend—much less you, whose hospitality and love I have abused; accept, however, my intreaties for your forgiveness, and for your prayers.
Conceive a poor miserable wretch, who for many years has been attempting to beat off pain, by a constant recurrence to the vice that reproduces it. Conceive a spirit in bell, employed in tracing out for others the road to that heaven, from which his crimes exclude him! In short, conceive whatever is most wretched, helpless, and hopeless, and you will form as tolerable a notion of my state, as it is possible for a good man to have.
I used to think the text in St. James that 'he who offended in one point, offends in all,' very harsh: but I now feel the awful, the tremendous truth of it. In the one crime of OPIUM, what crime have I not made myself guilty of!—Ingratitude to my Maker! and to my benefactors—injustice! and unnatural cruelty to my poor children!—self-contempt for my repeated promise—breach, nay, too often, actual falsehood!
After my death, I earnestly entreat, that a full and unqualified narration of my wretchedness, and of its guilty cause, may be made public, that at least, some little good may be effected by the direful example.
May God Almighty bless you, and have mercy on your still affectionate, and in his heart, grateful—
S. T. Coleridge."
This is indeed a redeeming letter. We here behold Mr. Coleridge in the lowest state of human depression, but his condition is not hopeless. It is not the insensibility of final impenitence; it is not the slumber of the grave. A gleam of sunshine bursts through the almost impenetrable gloom; and the virtue of that prayer "May God Almighty have mercy!" in a penitent heart, like his, combined as we know it was, with the recognition of Him, who is "the Way, the Truth, and the Life," authorizes the belief, that a spirit thus exercised, had joys in reserve, and was to become the recipient of the best influences that can illumine regenerate man.