Q TO JOHN THELWALL1 SOME, Thelwall! to the Patriot's meed aspire, Leapst on the wall: therefore shall Freedom choose R2 10 'Relative to a Friend remarkable for Georgoepiscopal Meanderings, and the combination of the utile dulci during his walks to and from any given place, composed, together with a book and a half of an Epic Poem, during one of the Halts:'Lest after this life it should prove my sad story That my soul must needs go to the Pope's Purgatory, Many prayers have I sighed, May T. P. ✶ ✶✶ ✶ be my guide, For so often he'll halt, and so lead me about, 'JOB JUNIOR. 1 Now first published from Cottle's MSS. in the Library of Rugby School. 2 Endorsed by T. P.: 'On my Walks. Written by Coleridge, September, 1807. First published Thomas Poole and His Friends, by Mrs. Henry Sandford, 1888, ii. 196. ALLEGORIC VISION1 A FEELING of sadness, a peculiar melancholy, is wont to take possession of me alike in Spring and in Autumn. But in Spring it is the melancholy of Hope: in Autumn it is the melancholy of Resignation. As I was journeying on foot through the Appennine, I fell in with a pilgrim in whom the Spring and 5 the Autumn and the Melancholy of both seemed to have combined. In his discourse there were the freshness and the colours of April: Qual ramicel a ramo, Tal da pensier pensiero 1 First published in The Courier, Saturday, August 31, 1811: included in 1829, 1834-5, &c. (3 vols.), and in 1844 (1 vol.). Lines 1-56 were first published as part of the Introduction' to A Lay Sermon, &c., 1817, pp. xix-xxxi. The Allegoric Vision' dates from August, 1795. It served as a kind of preface or prologue to Coleridge's first Theological Lecture on 'The Origin of Evil. The Necessity of Revelation deduced from the Nature of Man. An Examination and Defence of the Mosaic Dispensation' (see Cottle's Early Recollections, 1837, i. 27). The purport of these Lectures was to uphold the golden mean of Unitarian orthodoxy as opposed to the Church on the one hand, and infidelity or materialism on the other. 'Superstition' stood for and symbolized the Church of England. Sixteen years later this opening portion of an unpublished Lecture was rewritten and printed in The Courier (Aug. 31, 1811), with the heading 'An Allegoric Vision: Superstition, Religion, Atheism'. The attack was now diverted from the Church of England to the Church of Rome. 'Men clad in black robes,' intent on gathering in their Tenths, become 'men clothed in ceremonial robes, who with menacing countenances drag some reluctant victim to a vast idol, framed of iron bars intercrossed which formed at the same time an immense cage, and yet represented the form of a human Colossus. At the base of the Statue I saw engraved the words "To Dominic holy and merciful, the preventer and avenger of soul-murder" The vision was turned into a political jeu d'esprit levelled at the aiders and abettors of Catholic Emancipation, a measure to which Coleridge was more or less opposed as long as he lived. See Constitution of Church and State, 1830, passim. A third adaptation of the 'Allegorical Vision' was affixed to the Introduction to A Lay Sermon: Addressed to the Higher and Middle Classes, which was published in 1817. The first fifty-six lines, which contain a description of Italian mountain scenery, were entirely new, but the rest of the Vision' is an amended and softened reproduction of the preface to the Lecture of 1795. The moral he desires to point is the 'falsehood of extremes'. As Religion is the golden mean between Superstition and Atheism, so the righteous government of a righteous people is the mean between a selfish and oppressive aristocracy, and seditious and unbridled But as I gazed on his whole form and figure, I bethought me of the not unlovely decays, both of age and of the late season. in the stately elm, after the clusters have been plucked from 15 its entwining vines, and the vines are as bands of dried withies around its trunk and branches. Even so there was a memory on his smooth and ample forehead, which blended with the dedication of his steady eyes, that still looked-I know not, whether upward, or far onward, or rather to the line of meeting 20 where the sky rests upon the distance. But how may I express that dimness of abstraction which lay on the lustre of the pilgrim's eyes like the flitting tarnish from the breath of a sigh on a silver mirror! and which accorded with their slow and reluctant movement, whenever he turned them to any object 25 on the right hand or on the left? It seemed, methought, as if there lay upon the brightness a shadowy presence of disap pointments now unfelt, but never forgotten. It was at once the melancholy of hope and of resignation. We had not long been fellow-travellers, ere a sudden tempest 30 of wind and rain forced us to seek protection in the vaulted door-way of a lone chapelry; and we sate face to face each on the stone bench alongside the low, weather-stained wall, and as close as possible to the massy door. After a pause of silence: even thus, said he, like two strangers 35 that have fled to the same shelter from the same storm, not seldom do Despair and Hope meet for the first time in the porch of Death! All extremes meet, I answered; but yours was a strange and visionary thought. The better then doth it beseem both the place and me, he replied. From a Visionary 40 wilt thou hear a Vision? Mark that vivid flash through this torrent of rain! Fire and water. Even here thy adage holds true, and its truth is the moral of my Vision. I entreated him to proceed. Sloping his face toward the arch and yet averting his eye from it, he seemed to seek and prepare his words: till 45 listening to the wind that echoed within the hollow edifice, and to the rain without, mob-rule. A probable Source' of the first draft of the 'Vision' is John Aikin's Hill of Science, A Vision, which was included in Elegant Extracts, 1794, ii. 801. In the present issue the text of 1834 has been collated with that of 1817 and 1829, but not (exhaustively) with the MS. (1795), or at all with the Courier version of 1811. 21-3 the breathed tarnish, shall I name it ?-on the lustre of the pilgrim's eyes? Yet had it not a sort of strange accordance with 1817. 37 Compare: like strangers shelt'ring from a storm, Hope and Despair meet in the porch of Death! Constancy to an Ideal Object, p. 456. 39 VISIONARY 1817, 1829. 40 VISION 1817, 1829. Which stole on his thoughts with its two-fold sound, : he gradually sank away, alike from me and from his own purpose, and amid the gloom of the storm and in the duskiness of that 50 place, he sate like an emblem on a rich man's sepulchre, or like a mourner on the sodded grave of an only one-an aged mourner, who is watching the waned moon and sorroweth not. Starting at length from his brief trance of abstraction, with courtesy and an atoning smile he renewed his discourse, and commenced his 55 parable. During one of those short furloughs from the service of the body, which the soul may sometimes obtain even in this its militant state, I found myself in a vast plain, which I immediately knew to be the Valley of Life. It possessed an 60 astonishing diversity of soils: here was a sunny spot, and there a dark one, forming just such a mixture of sunshine and shade, as we may have observed on the mountains' side in an April day, when the thin broken clouds are scattered over heaven. Almost in the very entrance of the valley stood 65 a large and gloomy pile, into which I seemed constrained to enter. Every part of the building was crowded with tawdry ornaments and fantastic deformity. On every window was portrayed, in glaring and inelegant colours, some horrible tale, or preternatural incident, so that not a ray of light could enter, 70 untinged by the medium through which it passed. The body of the building was full of people, some of them dancing, in and out, in unintelligible figures, with strange ceremonies and antic merriment, while others seemed convulsed with horror, or pining in mad melancholy. Intermingled with these, I observed 75 a number of men, clothed in ceremonial robes, who appeared now to marshal the various groups, and to direct their move1 From the Ode to the Rain, 1802, 11. 15-16: O Rain! with your dull two-fold sound, 49 sank] sunk 1817. 63 51-2 or like an aged mourner on the sodden grave of an only one-a mourner, who 1817. 57-9 It was towards morning when the Brain begins to reassume its waking state, and our dreams approach to the regular trains of Reality, that I found MS. 1795. 60 VALLEY OF LIFE 1817, 1829. 61 and here was 1817, 1829. mountains' side] Hills MS. 1795. 75-86 intermingled with all these I observed a great number of men in Black Robes who appeared now marshalling the various Groups and now collecting with scrupulous care the Tenths of everything that grew within their reach. I stood wondering a while what these Things might be when one of these men approached me and with a reproachful Look bade me uncover my Head for the Place into which I had entered was the Temple of Religion. MS. 1795. ments; and now with menacing countenances, to drag some reluctant victim to a vast idol, framed of iron bars intercrossed, So which formed at the same time an immense cage, and the shape of a human Colossus. I stood for a while lost in wonder what these things might mean; when lo! one of the directors came up to me, and with a stern and reproachful look bade me uncover my head, for 85 that the place into which I had entered was the temple of the only true Religion, in the holier recesses of which the great Goddess personally resided. Himself too he bade me reverence, as the consecrated minister of her rites. Awestruck by the name of Religion, I bowed before the priest, and humbly 90 and earnestly intreated him to conduct me into her presence. He assented. Offerings he took from me, with mystic sprink lings of water and with salt he purified, and with strange sufflations he exorcised me; and then led me through many a dark and winding alley, the dew-damps of which chilled my 95 flesh, and the hollow echoes under my feet, mingled, methought, with moanings, affrighted me. At length we entered a large hall, without window, or spiracle, or lamp. The asylum and dormitory it seemed of perennial night-only that the walls were brought to the eye by a number of self-luminous inscriptions in 100 letters of a pale sepulchral light, which held strange neutrality with the darkness, on the verge of which it kept its rayless vigil. I could read them, methought; but though each of the words taken separately I seemed to understand, yet when I took them in sentences, they were riddles and incomprehensible. As I 105 stood meditating on these hard sayings, my guide thus addressed me-Read and believe: these are mysteries!'-At the extre mity of the vast hall the Goddess was placed. Her features, blended with darkness, rose out to my view, terrible, yet vacant. I prostrated myself before her, and then retired with my guide, Io soul-withered, and wondering, and dissatisfied. 1795. As I re-entered the body of the temple I heard a deep buzz as of discontent. A few whose eyes were bright, and either 80 shape] form 1817. 92-3 of water he purified me, and then led MS. 94-9 chilled and its hollow echoes beneath my feet affrighted me, till at last we entered a large Hall where not even a Lamp glimmered. Around its walls I observed a number of phosphoric Inscriptions MS. 1799. 96-102 large hall where not even a single lamp glimmered. It was made half visible by the wan phosphoric rays which proceeded from inscriptions on the walls, in letters of the same pale and sepulchral light. I could read them, methought; but though each one of the words 1817. 106 me. The fallible becomes infallible, and the infallible remains fallible. Read and believe these are MYSTERIES! In the middle of the vast 1817. 106 MYSTERIES 1829. 108 vacant. No definite thought, no distinct image was afforded me: all was uneasy and obscure feeling. I prostrated 1817. |