The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Volume I Part 161

_Eliz._ There is something _here_ (_pointing to her heart_) that _seems_ to understand you, but wants the _word_ that would make it understand itself.

_Kath._ I, too, seem to _feel_ what you mean. Interpret the feeling for us.

_Fri._ ---- I mean that _willing_ sense of the insufficingness of the _self_ for itself, which predisposes a generous nature to see, in the total being of another, the supplement and completion of its own;--that quiet perpetual _seeking_ which the presence of the beloved object modulates, not suspends, where the heart momently finds, and, finding, again seeks on;--lastly, when 'life's changeful orb has pa.s.s'd the full', a confirmed faith in the n.o.bleness of humanity, thus brought home and pressed, as it were, to the very bosom of hourly experience; it supposes, I say, a heartfelt reverence for worth, not the less deep because divested of its solemnity by habit, by familiarity, by mutual infirmities, and even by a feeling of modesty which will arise in delicate minds, when they are conscious of possessing the same or the correspondent excellence in their own characters. In short, there must be a mind, which, while it feels the beautiful and the excellent in the beloved as its own, and by right of love appropriates it, can call Goodness its Playfellow; and dares make sport of time and infirmity, while, in the person of a thousand-foldly endeared partner, we feel for aged Virtue the caressing fondness that belongs to the Innocence of childhood, and repeat the same attentions and tender courtesies which had been dictated by the same affection to the same object when attired in feminine loveliness or in manly beauty.

_Eliz._ What a soothing--what an elevating idea!

_Kath._ If it be not only an _idea_.

_Fri._ At all events, these qualities which I have enumerated, are rarely found united in a single individual. How much more rare must it be, that two such individuals should meet together in this wide world under circ.u.mstances that admit of their union as Husband and Wife. A person may be highly estimable on the whole, nay, amiable as neighbour, friend, housemate--in short, in all the concentric circles of attachment save only the last and inmost; and yet from how many causes be estranged from the highest perfection in this! Pride, coldness, or fastidiousness of nature, worldly cares, an anxious or ambitious disposition, a pa.s.sion for display, a sullen temper,--one or the other--too often proves 'the dead fly in the compost of spices', and any one is enough to unfit it for the precious balm of unction. For some mighty good sort of people, too, there is not seldom a sort of solemn saturnine, or, if you will, _ursine_ vanity, that keeps itself alive by sucking the paws of its own self-importance. And as this high sense, or rather sensation of their own value is, for the most part, grounded on negative qualities, so they have no better means of preserving the same but by _negatives_--that is, by _not_ doing or saying any thing, that might be put down for fond, silly, or nonsensical;--or (to use their own phrase) by _never forgetting themselves_, which some of their acquaintance are uncharitable enough to think the most worthless object they could be employed in remembering.

_Eliz._ (_in answer to a whisper from Katharine_). To a hair! He must have sate for it himself. Save me from such folks! But they are out of the question.

_Fri._ True! but the same effect is produced in thousands by the too general insensibility to a very important truth; this, namely, that the MISERY of human life is made up of large ma.s.ses, each separated from the other by certain intervals. One year, the death of a child; years after, a failure in trade; after another longer or shorter interval, a daughter may have married unhappily;--in all but the singularly unfortunate, the integral parts that compose the sum total of the unhappiness of a man's life, are easily counted, and distinctly remembered. The HAPPINESS of life, on the contrary, is made up of minute fractions--the little, soon-forgotten charities of a kiss, a smile, a kind look, a heartfelt compliment in the disguise of playful raillery, and the countless other infinitesimals of pleasurable thought and genial feeling.

_Kath._ Well, Sir; you have said quite enough to make me despair of finding a 'John Anderson, my Jo, John', with whom to totter down the hill of life.

_Fri._ Not so! Good men are not, I trust, so much scarcer than good women, but that what another would find in you, you may hope to find in another. But well, however, may that boon be rare, the possession of which would be more than an adequate reward for the rarest virtue.

_Eliz._ Surely, he, who has described it so well, must have possessed it?

_Fri._ If he were worthy to have possessed it, and had believingly antic.i.p.ated and not found it, how bitter the disappointment!

(_Then, after a pause of a few minutes_).

ANSWER, _ex improviso_

Yes, yes! that boon, life's richest treat He had, or fancied that he had; Say, 'twas but in his own conceit-- The fancy made him glad!

Crown of his cup, and garnish of his dish! 5 The boon, prefigured in his earliest wish, The fair fulfilment of his poesy, When his young heart first yearn'd for sympathy!

But e'en the meteor offspring of the brain Unnourished wane; 10 Faith asks her daily bread, And Fancy must be fed!

Now so it chanced--from wet or dry, It boots not how--I know not why-- She missed her wonted food; and quickly 15 Poor Fancy stagger'd and grew sickly.

Then came a restless state, 'twixt yea and nay, His faith was fix'd, his heart all ebb and flow; Or like a bark, in some half-shelter'd bay, Above its anchor driving to and fro. 20

That boon, which but to have possess'd In a _belief_, gave life a zest-- Uncertain both what it _had_ been, And if by error lost, or luck; And what it _was_;--an evergreen 25 Which some insidious blight had struck, Or annual flower, which, past its blow, No vernal spell shall e'er revive; Uncertain, and afraid to know, Doubts toss'd him to and fro: 30 Hope keeping Love, Love Hope alive, Like babes bewildered in a snow, That cling and huddle from the cold In hollow tree or ruin'd fold.

Those sparkling colours, once his boast 35 Fading, one by one away, Thin and hueless as a ghost, Poor Fancy on her sick bed lay; Ill at distance, worse when near, Telling her dreams to jealous Fear! 40 Where was it then, the sociable sprite That crown'd the Poet's cup and deck'd his dish!

Poor shadow cast from an unsteady wish, Itself a substance by no other right But that it intercepted Reason's light; 45 It dimm'd his eye, it darken'd on his brow, A peevish mood, a tedious time, I trow!

Thank Heaven! 'tis not so now.

O bliss of blissful hours!

The boon of Heaven's decreeing, 50 While yet in Eden's bowers Dwelt the first husband and his sinless mate!

The one sweet plant, which, piteous Heaven agreeing, They bore with them thro' Eden's closing gate!

Of life's gay summer tide the sovran Rose! 55 Late autumn's Amaranth, that more fragrant blows When Pa.s.sion's flowers all fall or fade; If this were ever his, in outward being, Or but his own true love's projected shade, Now that at length by certain proof he knows, 60 That whether real or a magic show, Whate'er it _was_, it _is_ no longer so; Though heart be lonesome, Hope laid low, Yet, Lady! deem him not unblest: The certainty that struck Hope dead, 65 Hath left Contentment in her stead: And that is next to Best!

1827.

FOOTNOTES:

[462:3] First published in the _Amulet_ for 1828 (with a prose introduction ent.i.tled 'New Thoughts on Old Subjects; or Conversational Dialogues on Interests and Events of Common Life.' By S. T. Coleridge): included in 1829 and 1834. The text of 1834 is identical with that of the _Amulet_, 1828, but the italics in the prose dialogue were not reproduced. They have been replaced in the text of the present issue.

The t.i.tle may have been suggested by L. E. L.'s _Improvisatrice_ published in 1824.

[463:1] 'Believe me if all those endearing young charms.'

[463:2] See Beaumont and Fletcher, _The Elder Brother_, Act III, Scene v. In the original the lines are printed as prose. In line 1 of the quotation Coleridge has subst.i.tuted 'neighbour' for 'wanton', and in line 6, 'close' for 'shut'.

TO MARY PRIDHAM[468:1]

[AFTERWARDS MRS. DERWENT COLERIDGE]

Dear tho' unseen! tho' I have left behind Life's gayer views and all that stirs the mind, Now I revive, Hope making a new start, Since I have heard with most believing heart, That all my glad eyes would grow bright to see, 5 My Derwent hath found realiz'd in thee, The boon prefigur'd in his earliest wish Crown of his cup and garnish of his dish!

The fair fulfilment of his poesy, When his young heart first yearn'd for sympathy! 10 Dear tho' unseen! unseen, yet long portray'd!

A Father's blessing on thee, gentle Maid!

S. T. COLERIDGE.

_16th October_ 1827.

FOOTNOTES:

[468:1] First published in 1893. Lines 7-10 are borrowed from lines 5-8 of the 'Answer _ex improviso_', which forms part of the _Improvisatore_ (ll. 7, 8 are transposed). An original MS. is inscribed on the first page of an alb.u.m presented to Mrs. Derwent Coleridge on her marriage, by her husband's friend, the Reverend John Moultrie. The editor of _P. W._, 1893, printed from another MS. dated Grove, Highgate, 15th October, 1827.

LINENOTES:

t.i.tle]: To Mary S. Pridham MS. S. T. C.

[1-3]

Dear tho' unseen! tho' hard has been my lot And rough my path thro' life, I murmur not-- Rather rejoice--

MS. S. T. C.

[5] That all this shaping heart has yearned to see MS. S. T. C.

[8] his] the MS. S. T. C. his] the MS. S. T. C.

ALICE DU CLOS[469:1]

OR THE FORKED TONGUE