Abstract of a discourse with Mr. Coleridge on the state of the country in December 1830, written at the time by John Frere.[1]

[While staying with the daughter of Mr. John Frere I came across this paper in one of the many manuscript volumes in his writing. Educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge, he was one of those known as the ‘Apostles’ at Cambridge, and Charles and Alfred Tennyson were among his friends as well as Arthur Hallam, whom he admired greatly, and Coleridge.

The volume is a quaint collection of many things—original verses, extracts from books, and notes of sermons; and the reader can only wish that a few of the evenings spent with the Apostles might have been recorded within these marbled covers.

But this one conversation has a charm peculiarly its own, and we will no longer keep the reader from entering the Hampstead room well known to the literary men of the day, where silently he may observe an old-world courtesy and ceremony belonging to a past age, while listening to a discourse only too seldom to be heard.]

C. Is there anything stirring now in the world of letters, anything in the shape of poetry lately produced, for I see nothing of the sort, nor even a Review that is not a year old?

F. No, Sir, at least I have heard no talk of any such thing; these continual burnings occupy all men’s thoughts and conversation.

C. And what remedies are proposed? They talk I suppose of retrenchments, but what good can retrenchment do? Alas! revolutionary times are times of general demoralisation; what great men do they ever produce? What was produced by the late Revolutionary Spirit in France? There must be something uppermost to be sure in such disturbances; some military superiority, but what great—I mean truly great—man was produced?

In England the same spirit was curbed in and worsted by the moral sense, afterwards there followed times of repose, and the Muses began to show themselves. But now what is going forward? The depravity of the spirit of the times is marked by the absence of poetry. For it is a great mistake to suppose that thought is not necessary for poetry; true, at the time of composition there is that starlight, a dim and holy twilight; but is not light necessary before?

Poetry is the highest effort of the mind; all the powers are in a state of equilibrium and equally energetic, the knowledge of individual existence is forgotten, the man is out of himself and exists in all things, his eye in a fine &c.

There is no one perhaps who composes with more facility than your Uncle; but does it cost him nothing before? It is the result of long thought; and poetry as I have before observed must be the result of thought, and the want of thought in what is now called poetry is a bad sign of the times.

There is a want of the proper spirit; if a nation would flourish (politically speaking) there must be a desire in the breast of each man of something more than merely to live—he must desire to live well; and if men cannot live well at home they will go and live well elsewhere. The condition upon which a country circumstanced as ours is exists, is that it should become the Mother of Empires, and this Mr. W. Horton feels, but his plans are not extensive or universal enough. I had a conversation with him, but could not make him enter into my views. We ought to send out colonies, but not privately or by parishes; it should be a grand National concern; there should be in every family one or more brought up for this and this alone.

A Father should say, ‘There, John now is a fine strong fellow and an enterprising lad, he shall be a colonist.’

But then some fool-like Lord — gets up and tells us ‘Oh no! America should be a warning.’

Good Heavens, Sir! a warning, and of what? Are we to beware of having 2 [sets?] of men bound to us by the ties of allegiance and of affinity; 2 [sets] of men in a distant part of the world speaking the language of Shakspear and Milton, and living under the laws of Alfred. But a warning they should be to us, to give freely and in good time that liberty which is their due, and which they will properly extort from us if we withhold.

F. Is it not moreover true, Sir, that we should show ourselves really a Mother and not a Stepmother to those Empires which we found? We should with a nursing hand lead them through the dangers of infancy; but why keep them in leading strings when they are able to act for themselves? We should relax our hold by slow degrees as they are able to bear it, and nurture them to be free and manly states, and not the slaves of any, still less of their own Mother. What Mother ever complains of the ingratitude of her Son because he does not follow at her apron-strings all the days of his life? Why then do we complain of America, who with greater justice might complain of us that we have been far from remembering one great duty, namely that a Mother if need be should even sacrifice herself for her child?

C. What you say is very true; but with regard to the execution of a plan of Colonisation, why should we not make the absurd system of Poor Laws subservient to the measure?

Why not, since as Sir N. T.[2] told Bartle the other day, An offer and refusal is as good as an acceptance, propose to any person requiring assistance of the overseer the following terms:—We have it is true bound ourselves by a most foolish promise to find you work; we have none here, but if you choose to go out to the Swan River, you shall have as much as you want, and we will carry you out there, your wife and your children too, if you have them, and you shall get your livelihood in an honorable and independent way—and mind you are now to consider us discharged of our promise to find you work.

F. It is true that this would be fair enough, but as long as the poor man sees the rich enjoy a liberty which he does not, viz. that of living in the land in which he was born, he would complain, and not without reason. Let then the young and active in the higher ranks set them the example. And why should the unlearned be deprived of the countenance and assistance of the wiser? What can hand do without head, especially in untamed countries? Heaven knows the labouring classes have been most iniquitously considered for some time and are now becoming, as Mr. Coleridge says, more things than persons, and are therefore more than ever unfit to be sent alone.

C. And therefore the younger sons of noblemen and the fops of town would have been employed in a manner much better for their country, and more happy for themselves had they been brought up as members and limbs of a colony instead of thrusting themselves into situations to which they do not naturally belong, and to the exclusion of all competition, or wasting their energies at Newmarket or in Crockfords.

C. Almost all thinking Jews are Deists. I wonder Mr. — should ever have talked with you on those subjects; the persecution which a Jew would undergo from his brethren if it was known that he did so, is not to be calculated. The life, you know, of Spinoza was twice attempted, but he professed Christianity, at least in his way in a letter to a friend; for he said that if the Logos could be manifested in the flesh, it must converse and act as Jesus did. At the same time his notions of a God were very Pantheistic, a ⊙le. whose centre is everywhere and circumference nowhere. He had no notion of a Conscious Being of a God—but with these ideas to talk of God becoming flesh appears to me very much like talking of a square ⊙le.

Spinoza is a man whom I most deeply reverence, I was going to say whom I reverence as much as it is possible for me to reverence any creature. He was on the borders of the truth, and would no doubt had he lived have attained it.

But bless me! to talk of converting the Jews, people are not aware of what they undertake.

Mr. — say’d to me, and I thought very beautifully, ‘Convert the Jews! Alas, Sir, Mammon and Ignorance are the two giant porters who stand at the gates of Jerusalem and forbid the entrance of Truth.’

F. You have not read much of Keats, Sir, I think.

C. No, I have not. I have seen two Sonnets which I think showed marks of a great genius had he lived. I have also read a poem with a classical name—I forget what. Poor Keats, I saw him once. Mr. Green,[3] whom you have heard me mention, and I were walking out in these parts, and we were overtaken by a young man of a very striking countenance whom Mr. Green recognised and shook hands with, mentioning my name; I wish Mr. Green had introduced me, for I did not know who it was. He passed on, but in a few moments sprung back and said, ‘Mr. Coleridge, allow me the honour of shaking your hand.’

I was struck by the energy of his manner, and gave him my hand.

He passed on and we stood still looking after him, when Mr. Green said,

‘Do you know who that is? That is Keats, the poet.’

‘Heavens!’ said I, ‘when I shook him by the hand there was death!’ This was about two years before he died.

F. But what was it?

C. I cannot describe it. There was a heat and a dampness in the hand. To say that his death was caused by the Review is absurd, but at the same time it is impossible adequately to conceive the effect which it must have had on his mind.

It is very well for those who have a place in the world and are independent to talk of these things, they can bear such a blow, so can those who have a strong religious principle; but all men are not born Philosophers, and all men have not those advantages of birth and education.

Poor Keats had not, and it is impossible I say to conceive the effect which such a Review[4] must have had upon him, knowing as he did that he had his way to make in the world by his own exertions, and conscious of the genius within him.

Have you seen, Mr. F., anything of Lord Byron’s poetry?

F. Nothing, Sir, but the Translation of ‘Faust.’

C. And what do you think of that?

F. Being unacquainted, Sir, with the original I cannot speak of its merits as a translation. As a poem I think it meagre, nor do I conceive that the metres are adapted to the subject in English whatever they may be in German.

C. I have been asked why I did not translate the camp scenes in ‘Wallenstein.’

The truth is that the labour would have been immense, and besides it would not have been borne in English, to say nothing of the fact that Mrs. Barbauld reviewed my translation of the rest of the play and abused it through thick and thin, so that it sold for wastepaper. I remember your uncle telling me that he had picked it up—he approved it, so did Canning to whom he showed it—and so might one or two more, but the edition sold for wastepaper.

F. Had you ever any thought of translating the ‘Faust’?

C. Yes, Sir, I had, but I was prevented by the consideration that though there are some exquisite passages, the opening chorus, the chapel and the prison scenes for instance, to say nothing of the Brocken scene where he has shown peculiar strength in keeping clear of Shakspear, he has not taken that wonderful admixture of Witch Fate and Fairy but has kept to the real original witch, and this suits his purpose much better. I say that a great deal of it I do not admire, and some I reprobate. The conception of Wagner is bad: whoever heard of a man who had gained such wonderful proficiency in learning as to call up spirits &c. being discontented?

No, it is not having the power of knowledge that would make a man discontented—neither would such a man have suddenly become a sensualist. The discourses too with the pupil are dull. The Mephistapholes (sic), or whatever the name is, is well executed, but the conception is not original. It was — who had before said, ‘The Devil is the great humourist of the world.’ There are other parts too which I could not have translated without entering my protest against them in a manner which would hardly have been fair upon the author, for those things are understood in Germany in a spirit very different from what they would infuse here in England. To give you an example, the scene where Mephistopheles is introduced as coming before the Almighty and talking with Him would never be borne in English and this whole scene is founded on a mistranslation of a passage in Scripture, the opening of Job. You remember how Satan means properly one who goes his rounds, and hence it came to mean one of those officers whom the King in Eastern countries used to send round to see how his subjects were going on. This power was soon abused and the Satans used to accuse people falsely, and hence the word came to have the meaning now attached to it of a calumniator, a διάβολος, an accuser.

Now in the Book of Job (which is undoubtedly very ancient, before the law for there is no mention of the law in it, undoubtedly the most ancient book in the world) the word Satan meant only this officer, the prime vizier of the Sultan (you remember in the ‘Arabian Nights’ the Caliph and his vizier are very fond of going their rounds for the same purpose). God Almighty is shown to us under the semblance of a mortal king holding his court, and his officer comes, as the book tells us, ‘from going his rounds on the earth and walking up and down in it,’ but mind there is nothing like malignity attached to him.

The King asks him concerning Job—the officer answers that he is a perfect man—but (adds he) ‘He has yet had no temptation; he is prosperous, and he might alter if his circumstances were altered.’

The King then commands him to try and to destroy his possessions. (N.B.—This is a mistake, He gives him leave.)

Again on another day the same things happen and when the officer is asked about Job he says ‘He is yet integer but many men will do this. I can say nothing for his integrity as long as his possessions only are touched; but stretch out your hand against his person and see if he will curse Thee then?’ It is evident that there is no suggestion, no evil in the officer at all—indeed the belief in Angels and that sort of poultry is nowhere countenanced in the Old Testament and in the New, nowhere else.

F. Indeed, Sir, I think I know a very strong passage.

C. Well, what is it?

F. Our Saviour tells his disciples when alone with them and apart that a certain kind of Devils goeth not out but by prayer and fasting.

C. Well, and what has that to do with Angels?

F. I beg your pardon, Sir. I thought you included devils in your feathered fowl.

C. There is nothing I say in the New Testament to countenance the belief in Angels. For what are the three first Gospels? Every one must see that they are mere plain narrations, not of things as they are but of things as they appeared to the ignorant disciples—but when we come to John, Mr. F., there we find the difference. He told things as they were, and therefore you must not believe everything that you read implicitly; and with respect to Devils entering into a man, why it is quite absurd. What do we mean when we say a thing is in another? Why ‘in’ is merely a relative term. [The argument, though I was compelled to assent to it, I am sorry to say was far above my comprehension, and therefore I could not catch it, still less bag it and carry it away,—however it proved that there could be no Devils and still less could there be Devils in a man.] Spirit therefore was not more in a man than it was out of him, the mistake arising from a misconception of the word in. As for all notions of men with wings, of course they are absurd in the extreme.

I return however to ‘Faust.’

F. Did you ever see Shelley’s translation of the Chorus in ‘Faust’ you were just mentioning?

C. I have, and admire it very much. Shelley was a man of great power as a poet, and could he only have had some notion of order, could you only have given him some plane whereon to stand, and look down upon his own mind, he would have succeeded. There are flashes of the true spirit to be met with in his works. Poor Shelley, it is a pity I often think that I never met with him. I could have done him good. He went to Keswick on purpose to see me and unfortunately fell in with Southey instead. There could have been nothing so unfortunate. Southey had no understanding for a toleration of such principles as Shelley’s.

I should have laughed at his Atheism. I could have sympathised with him and shown him that I did so, and he would have felt that I did so. I could have shown him that I had once been in the same state myself, and I could have guided him through it. I have often bitterly regretted in my heart of hearts that I did never meet with Shelley.

F. It is time to be gone now I fear, Mr. Coleridge, and when I come up again I hope you will allow me to bring a volume of Keats with me.

C. I shall be most happy to see you for any night you like to come, and any day before 12 o’clock. Thursday nights are over now, but any night whether Thursday or not I shall be most happy to see you.

F. I must not allow you to come out into the passage, Sir. Good night....

It was nearly a hundred years ago, yet we seem to see Mr. Frere stepping out into the night, his mind busy with the thoughts of the last hour.

Were the link boys running through the streets with flaring torches, and did the stately sedan chair carry home the gay beauty of those far-off days?

The picture arises which each reader can colour according to his fancy, yet the impression left as we close the manuscript volume with its marbled cover, is less of contrast than of unity. The matters that were of interest in the state of the country in 1830 are of interest in 1917, though in some cases we see the fulfilment of what was then hoped for.

To-day as the Colonies send their sons in their thousands to uphold the Motherland in her fight for Justice and Freedom, we know that our colonial attitude has been more than justified, and England is indeed proud of her Dominions.

The marble-covered volume closely written in a scholarly hand is once more placed on the shelf. The ink has grown pale with age, and the question arises—‘Who to-day would find time to write down an evening’s conversation, however interesting?’ But another question is more insistent, as we compare the popular opinion expressed then about Keats, and other persons and subjects with the verdict of time:

Can a contemporary judgment be as good as a judgment formed when the person or matter is further from us? And this consideration brings the consoling thought that not all that may appear failure at the time is really failure. The age in which they live may be unworthy of its poets and prophets, yet none the less is their message Divine, and their voice will be heard at last.

But Mr. Coleridge and Mr. Frere have retired to rest, and we shall not again disturb them.

E. M. Green.