The Collected Writing of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. IIDe Quincey, Thomas
History
The Collected Writing of Thomas De Quincey, Vol. II
De Quincey, Thomas
De Quincey, Thomas, 1785-1859; English literature -- 19th century
that were more constant too often found reason to be disappointed with
the quality of his lecture. His appearance was generally that of a
person struggling with pain and overmastering illness. His lips were
baked with feverish heat, and often black in colour; and, in spite
of the water which he continued drinking through the whole course
of his lecture, he often seemed to labour under an almost paralytic
inability to raise the upper jaw from the lower. In such a state, it
is clear that nothing could save the lecture itself from reflecting
his own feebleness and exhaustion, except the advantage of having
been precomposed in some happier mood. But that never happened: most
unfortunately he relied upon his extempore ability to carry him
through. Now, had he been in spirits, or had he gathered animation,
and kindled by his own motion, no written lecture could have been
more effectual than one of his unpremeditated colloquial harangues.
But either he was depressed originally below the point from which
any re-ascent was possible, or else this re-action was intercepted by
continual disgust from looking back upon his own ill-success; for,
assuredly, he never once recovered that free and eloquent movement
of thought which he could command at any time in a private company.
The passages he read, moreover, in illustrating his doctrines, were
generally unhappily chosen, because chosen at haphazard, from the
difficulty of finding at a moment's summons those passages which his
purpose required. Nor do I remember any that produced much effect,
except two or three, which I myself put ready marked into his hands,
among the Metrical Romances edited by Ritson.
[74] The very accurate memoir prefixed to Messrs. Macmillan's
four-volume edition of Coleridge's Poetical Works states that
Stuart, who had been proprietor of the _Morning Post_, and had
become proprietor of the _Courier_, gave Coleridge apartments in
the _Courier_ office to save expense in his contributorship to
that newspaper.--M.
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