CHAPTER V
FROM SOUTH TO NORTH
1799-1800
XCIX. TO ROBERT SOUTHEY.
Nether Stowey, July 29, 1799.
I am doubtful, Southey, whether the circumstances which impel me to write to you ought not to keep me silent, and, if it were only a feeling of delicacy, I should remain silent, for it is good to do all things in faith. But I have been absent, Southey! ten months, and if you knew that domestic affection was hard upon me, and that my own health was declining, would you not have shootings within you of an affection which (“though fallen, though changed”) has played too important a part in the event of our lives and the formation of our character, ever to be forgotten? I am perplexed what to write, or how to state the object of my writing. Any participation in each other’s moral being I do not wish, simply because I know enough of the mind of man to know that [it] is impossible. But, Southey, we have similar talents, sentiments nearly similar, and kindred pursuits; we have likewise, in more than one instance, common objects of our esteem and love. I pray and intreat you, if we should meet at any time, let us not withhold from each other the outward expressions of daily kindliness; and if it be no longer in your power to soften your opinions, make your feelings at least more tolerant towards me—(a debt of humility which assuredly we all of us owe to our most feeble, imperfect, and self-deceiving nature). We are few of us good enough to know our own hearts, and as to the hearts of others, let us struggle to hope that they are better than we think them, and resign the rest to our common Maker. God bless you and yours.
S. T. Coleridge.
[Southey’s answer to this appeal has not been preserved, but its tenor was that Coleridge had slandered him to others. In his reply Coleridge “avers on his honour as a man and a gentleman” that he never charged Southey with “aught but deep and implacable enmity towards himself,” and that his authorities for this accusation were those on whom Southey relied, that is, doubtless, Lloyd and Lamb. He appeals to Poole, the “repository” of his every thought, and to Wordsworth, “with whom he had been for more than one whole year almost daily and frequently for weeks together,” to bear him out in this statement. A letter from Poole to Southey dated August 8, and forwarded to Minehead by “special messenger,” bears ample testimony to Coleridge’s disavowal. “Without entering into particulars,” he writes, “I will say generally, that in the many conversations I have had with Coleridge concerning yourself, he has never discovered the least personal enmity against, but, on the contrary, the strongest affection for you stifled only by the untoward events of your separation.” Poole’s intervention was successful, and once again the cottage opened its doors to a distinguished guest. The Southeys remained as visitors at Stowey until, in company with their host, they set out for Devonshire.]
C. TO THOMAS POOLE.
Exeter, Southey’s Lodgings, Mr. Tucker’s, Fore Street Hill,
September 16, 1799.[206]