THE POETICAL WORKS OF S. T. COLERIDGE. [The Publisher's Aldine anchor and dolphin.] Vol. I. [II. III.] LONDON: William Pickering. 1834.

8vo. Vol. I. pp. xiv.; 288. Vol. II. pp. vi. 338. Vol. III. pp. 331. [Frequently reprinted.]

PREFACE

[Same as in 1829.]

CONTENTS

[All the pieces contained in the edition of 1829, with the addition of sixty-six pieces not previously collected. Of these sixty-six, forty-eight then appeared in print for the first time. There were also included (in the second volume) two pieces, not by Coleridge, introduced by the following note: Anxious to associate the name of a most dear and honored friend with my own, I solicited and obtained the permission of Professor J. H. GREEN to permit the insertion of the two following poems, by him composed. S. T. COLERIDGE.' These two poems - Morning invitation to a child, and Consolations of a Maniac. continued to be included

among Coleridge's poems in Moxon's editions down (at least) to that re-edited by the Rev. Derwent Coleridge in 1870.

There was also included, but by mistake, a fragment of six lines with the heading The Same' [as 'On seeing a youth affectionately welcomed by a sister']. These lines formed part of the poem To a Friend [Charles Lamb] together with an unfinished Poem.

In the Preface to the one-volume edition of Coleridge's poems edited by Derwent and Sara Coleridge' (the poet's surviving son and daughter) in 1852, the edition of 1834 is thus described :-'That of 1834 was arranged mainly, if not tirely, at the discretion of his earliest Editor, H. N. Coleridge.']

XV

en

ridge, and will have an additional interest
to many readers as the last monument of
her highly-gifted mind. At her earnest
request, my name appears with hers on the
title-page, but the assistance rendered by
me has been, in fact, little more than
mechanical. The preface, and the greater
part of the notes, are her composition :-
the selection and arrangement have been
determined almost exclusively by her critical
judgment, or from records in her posses-
sion. A few slight corrections and unim-
portant additions are all that have been
found necessary, the first and last sheets
not having had the benefit of her own re-
vision.
DERWENT COLERIDGE.

ST. MARK'S COLLEGE, CHELSEA,
May 1852.

PREFACE TO THE PRESENT
EDITION [1852]

As a chronological arrangement of Poetry in completed collections is now beginning to find general favour, pains have been taken to follow this method in the present Edition of S. T. Coleridge's Poetical and Dramatic Works, as far as circumstances permittedthat is to say, as far as the date of composition of each poem was ascertainable, and as far as the plan could be carried out without effacing the classes into which the Author had himself distributed his most important poetical publication, the Sibylline Leaves, namely, POEMS OCCASIONED BY POLITICAL EVENTS, OR FEELINGS CONNECTED WITH THEM; LOVE POEMS; MEDITATIVE POEMS IN BLANK VERSE; ODES AND MISCELLANEOUS POEMS. Оп account of these impediments, together with the fact, that many a poem, such as it appears in its ultimate form, is the growth of different periods, the agreement with chronology in this Edition is approximative rather than perfect: yet in the majority of instances the date of each piece has been made out, and its place fixed accordingly.

In another point of view also, the Poems have been distributed with relation to time: they are thrown into three broad groups, representing, first the Youth, secondly, the Early Manhood and Middle Life. thirdly, the Declining Age of the Poet; and it will be readily perceived that each

division has its own distinct tone and colour, corresponding to the period of life in which it was composed. It has been suggested, indeed, that Coleridge had four poetical epochs, more or less diversely characterised, that there is a discernible difference betwixt the productions of his Early Manhood and of his Middle Age, the latter being distinguished from those of his Stowey life, which may be considered as his poetic prime, by a less buoyant spirit. Fire they have; but it is not the clear, bright, mounting fire of his earlier poetry, conceived and executed when he and youth were housemates still.' In the course of a very few years after three-and-twenty all his very finest poems were produced; his twentyfifth year has been called his annus mirabilis. To be a 'Prodigal's favouritethen, worse truth! a Miser's pensioner,' is the lot of Man. In respect of poetry, Coleridge was a Prodigal's favourite,' more, perhaps, than ever Poet was before.

[The poems] produced before the Author's twenty-fourth year [1796], devoted as he was to the soft strains of Bowles, have more in common with the passionate lyrics of Collins and the picturesque wildness of the pretended Ossian, than with the welltuned sentimentality of that Muse which the overgrateful poet has represented as his earliest inspirer. For the young they will ever retain a peculiar charm, because so fraught with the joyous spirit of youth; and in the minds of all readers that feeling which disposes men 'to set the bud above the rose full-blown' would secure them an in

terest, even if their intrinsic beauty and sweetness were less adequate to obtain it.

That of 1834, the last year of his earthly sojourning, a period when his thoughts were wholly engrossed, so far as the decays of his frail outward part left them free for intellectual pursuits and speculations, by a grand scheme of Christian Philosophy, to the enunciation of which in a long projected work his chief thoughts and aspirations had for many years been directed, was arranged mainly, if not entirely, at the discretion of his earliest Editor, H. N. Coleridge, who, not to mention the boon he has conferred on the public in preserving so valuable a record of his Uncle's conversation as is contained in the Table Talk of S. T. Coleridge, performed his task in editing The Friend, The Literary Remains, The Church and State and Lay Sermons, and The Confessions of an Inquiring Spirit, in a manner which must ever procure him sentiments of gratitude from all who prize the writings of Coleridge. Such alterations only have been made in this final arrangement of the Poetical and Dramatic Works of S. T.

Coleridge, by those into whose charge they

have devolved, as they feel assured, both the Author himself and his earliest Editor would at this time find to be either neces

sary or desirable. The observations and experience of eighteen years, a period long enough to bring about many changes in literary opinion, have satisfied them that the immature essays of boyhood and adolescence, not marked with any such prophetic note of genius as certainly does belong to the four school-boy poems they have retained, tend to injure the general effect of a body of poetry. That a writer, especially a writer of verse, should keep out of sight his third-rate performances, is now become a maxim with critics; for they are not, at the worst, effectless: they have an effect, that of diluting and weakening, to the reader's feelings, the general power of the collection. Mr. Coleridge himself constantly, after 1796, rejected a certain portion of his earliest published Juvenilia: never printed any attempts of his boyhood, except those four with which the present publication commences; and there can be

1 First Advent of Love [Love's first Hope, p. 1931, Genevieve, The Raven, and Time, Real and Imaginary.-ED.

It must be added, that time has robbed of their charm certain sportive effusions of Mr. C.'s later years, which were given to the public, in the first gloss and glow of novelty in 1834, and has proved that, though not devoid of the quality of genius, they possess, upon the whole, not more than an ephemeral interest. These the Editors have not scrupled to omit on the same grounds and in the same confidence that has been already explained.

Four short pieces only have been added, the third and ninth Sonnets1 (pages 37 and 40), from the edition of 1796, the DayDream' (page 196)," from the Appendix to Coleridge's Essays on his own Times,' and the Hymn (page 281), which is now printed for the first time.

THE last authorised edition of S. T. Coleridge's Poems, published by Mr. Moxon in 1852, bears the names of Derwent and Sara Coleridge, as joint editors. I shared in the responsibility, but cannot claim any share in the credit of the undertaking. This edition I propose to leave intact as it came from her own hands. I wish it to remain as one among other monuments of her fine taste, her solid judgment, and her scrupulous conscientiousness.

A few pieces of some interest appear, however, to have been overlooked. Two characteristic sonnets, not included in any former edition of the Poems, have been preserved in an anonymous work, entitled Letters, Recollections, and Conversations

of S. T. Coleridge.' These, with a further selection from the omitted pieces, principally from the Juvenile Poems, have been added in an Appendix. So placed, they will not at any rate interfere with the general effect of the collection, while they add to its completeness.

#

[The brief Life of the Author' mentioned on the title-page, appears under the heading, INTRODUCTORY ESSAY,' and occupies pp. xxiii. -lix.]

XIX

THE POETICAL AND DRAMATIC WORKS OF SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE, founded on the Author's latest edition of 1834, with many additional pieces now first included, and a collection of various readings. In Four Volumes. Volume One [Two, Three, Four]. London: Basil Montagu Pickering. 1877.

Reissued, with additions, and with the imprint of:-' London: Macmillan and Co. 1880.'

1 To Nature, p. 190, and Farewell to Love, p. 173. The first edition of the 'Letters,' etc., was anonymous, but when reprinted in 1864, the name of the author, Thomas Allsop, was given. --ED.

2 yet remain To mourn the hours of outh'-(printed by mistake as Coleridge's-the lines are by Bowles); Count Rumford, p. 64: Fragment from an unpublished Poem, p. 64; To the Rev. W. J. Hort, p. 44; To a Primrose, p. 64; On the Christening of a Friend's Child, p. 83; Mutual Passion, p. 143: The Silver Thimble, p. 51; Translation from Ottfried's Gospel, p. 144; Israel's Lament, p. 187; and The Rime of the Ancyent Marinere, verbatim from the Lyrical Ballads' of 1798, which will also be found in 'APPENDIX E' of the present volume.-ED.

Octavo; Vol. I. Contents, etc., pp. viii. ; Memoir of S. T. Coleridge [including bibliographical matter], pp. ix. - cxviii.; Poems, pp. 217; Appendix, pp. 218-224. Vol. II. Contents, etc., pp. xii.; Poems, pp. 352; Supplement, pp. 355*-364*; Appendix, pp. 353-381. Vol. III. Fall of Robespierre' and Wallenstein,' pp. 413. Vol. IV. 'Remorse' and 'Zapolya,' pp. 290.

XX

THE POETICAL WORKS OF SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE. Edited with Introduction and Notes by T. Ashe, B.A. of St. John's College, Cambridge. In two volumes. London George Bell and Sons, York Street, Covent Garden. 1885. [With Portrait of Coleridge after Hancock, and a view of Greta Hall, Keswick.]

Octavo; Vol. I. Title, etc., pp. v. ; Introduction, etc., pp. xv.-clxxxvi.; Poems,` pp. 1-212. Vol. II. Contents, etc., pp. xiii.; Poems, pp. 1-409.

An excellent edition of Coleridge's Poetical and Dramatic Works was published by Galignani of Paris in 1829, in a volume together with equally excellent editions of Shelley and Keats. Besides the whole of the Contents of the English edition of 1829, Galignani's contains Recantation; Introduction to the Ballad of the Dark Ladie, with the prose preface; To a Friend, with an unfinished Poem; The Hour when we shall meet again; the Lines to Cottle; On the Christening of a Friend's Child; Fall of Robespierre; What is Life? The Exchange; Fancy in nubibus; and several Epigrams. A Memoir of Coleridge is prefixed.