“It was our custom to walk on the sands and read Homer aloud, a practice adopted partly for the sake of the sea-breezes.... For several consecutive days Coleridge crossed us in our walk. The sound of the Greek, and especially the expressive countenance of the tutor, attracted his notice; so one day, as we met, he placed himself directly in my father’s way and thus accosted him: ‘Sir, yours is a face I should know. I am Samuel Taylor Coleridge.’” Memoir of H. F. Cary, ii. 18.
[151] It appears, however, that he underrated his position as a critic. A quotation from Cary’s Dante, and a eulogistic mention of the work generally, in a lecture on Dante, delivered by Coleridge at Flower-de-Luce Court, on February 27, 1818, led, so his son says, to the immediate sale of a thousand copies, and notices “reëchoing Coleridge’s praises” in the Edinburgh and Quarterly Reviews. Memoir of H. F. Cary, ii. 28.
[152] From the Destiny of Nations.
[153] Joseph Henry Green, 1791-1863, an eminent surgeon and anatomist. In his own profession he won distinction as lecturer and operator, and as the author of the Dissector’s Manual, and some pamphlets on medical reform and education. He was twice, 1849-50 and 1858-59, President of the College of Surgeons. His acquaintance with Coleridge, which began in 1817, was destined to influence his whole career. It was his custom for many years to pass two afternoons of the week at Highgate, and on these occasions as amanuensis and collaborateur, he helped to lay the foundations of the Magnum Opus. Coleridge appointed him his literary executor, and bequeathed to him a mass of unpublished MSS. which it was hoped he would reduce to order and publish as a connected system of philosophy. Two addresses which he delivered, as Hunterian Orations in 1841 and 1847, on “Vital Dynamics” and “Mental Dynamics,” were published in his lifetime, and after his death two volumes entitled Spiritual Philosophy, founded on the Teaching of S. T. Coleridge, were issued, together with a memoir, by his friend and former pupil, Sir John Simon.
His fame has suffered eclipse owing in great measure to his chivalrous if unsuccessful attempt to do honour to Coleridge. But he deserves to stand alone. Members of his own profession not versed in polar logic looked up to his “great and noble intellect” with pride and delight, and by those who were honoured by his intimacy he was held in love and reverence. To Coleridge he was a friend indeed, bringing with him balms more soothing than “poppy or mandragora,” the healing waters of Faith and Hope. Spiritual Philosophy, by J. H. Green; Memoir of the author’s life, i.-lix.
[154] This must have been the impromptu lecture “On the Growth of the Individual Mind,” delivered at the rooms of the London Philosophical Society. According to Gillman, who details the circumstances under which the address was given, but does not supply the date, the lecturer began with an “apologetic preface”: “The lecture I am about to give this evening is purely extempore. Should you find a nominative case looking out for a verb—or a fatherless verb for a nominative case, you must excuse it. It is purely extempore, though I have thought and read much on this subject.” Life of Coleridge, pp. 354-357.
[155] The “Essay on the Science of Method” was finished in December, 1817, and printed in the following January. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, a Narrative, by J. Dykes Campbell, 1894, p. 232.
[156] The Hebrew text and Coleridge’s translation were published in the form of a pamphlet, and sold by “T. Boosey, 4 Old Broad Street, 1817.” The full title was “Israel’s Lament. Translation of a Hebrew dirge, chaunted in the Great Synagogue, St. James’ Place, Aldgate, on the day of the Funeral of her Royal Highness the Princess Charlotte. By Hyman Hurwitz, Master of the Hebrew Academy, Highgate, 1817.”
The translation is below Coleridge at his worst. The “Harp of Quantock” must, indeed, have required stringing before such a line as “For England’s Lady is laid low” could have escaped the file, or “worn her” be permitted to rhyme with “mourner”! Poetical Works, p. 187; Editor’s Note, p. 638.
[157] The Kritik der praktischen Vernunft was published in 1797.