Narrative and Miscellaneous PapersDe Quincey, Thomas
General
Narrative and Miscellaneous Papers
De Quincey, Thomas
English essays; English fiction
have done nothing that can be received for an estimate of the composite
Coleridge. This astonishing man, be it again remembered, besides being
an exquisite poet, a profound political speculator, a philosophic
student of literature through all its chambers and recesses, was also
a circumnavigator on the most pathless waters of scholasticism and
metaphysics. He had sounded, without guiding charts, the secret deeps
of Proclus and Plotinus; he had laid down buoys on the twilight, or
moonlight, ocean of Jacob Boehmen; [Footnote: 'JACOB BOEHMEN.' We
ourselves had the honor of presenting to Mr. Coleridge, Law's English
version of Jacob--a set of huge quartos. Some months afterwards we saw
this work lying open, and one volume at least overflowing, in parts,
with the commentaries and the _corollaries_ of Coleridge. Whither has
this work, and so many others swathed about with Coleridge's MS. notes,
vanished from the world?] he had cruised over the broad Atlantic of Kant
and Schelling, of Fichte and Oken. Where is the man who shall be equal
to these things? We at least make no such adventurous effort; or, if
ever we should presume to do so, not at present. Here we design only
to make a coasting voyage of survey round the headlands and most
conspicuous seamarks of our subject, as they are brought forward by
Mr. Gillman, or collaterally suggested by our own reflections; and
especially we wish to say a word or two on Coleridge as an opium-eater.
Naturally the first point to which we direct our attention, is the
history and personal relations of Coleridge. Living with Mr. Gillman for
nineteen years as a domesticated friend, Coleridge ought to have
been known intimately. And it is reasonable to expect, from so much
intercourse, some additions to our slender knowledge of Coleridge's
adventures, (if we may use so coarse a word,) and of the secret springs
at work in those early struggles of Coleridge at Cambridge, London,
Bristol, which have been rudely told to the world, and repeatedly told,
as showy romances, but never rationally explained.
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