further discussion of these qualities is not preserved; but from the fact that Shakespeare's Venus and Adonis is analysed in illustration of them, and with our knowledge of Coleridge's tendency to almost verbal repetition, the inference seems justified that the substance of his remarks in the lecture is embodied in chapter xi of the Biographia Literaria. In this chapter we read that the mere faithful reproduction of natural appearances does not of itself mark the poet that images drawn from nature become proofs of original genius only in respect of the transformation which they undergo under the action of the poetic spirit. This transformation is variously effected. 'They are modified by a predominant passion; or by associated thoughts and images awakened by that passion; or when they have the effect of reducing multitude to unity, or succession to an instant; or lastly, when a human or intellectual life is transferred to them from the poet's own spirit,

Which shoots its being thro' earth, sea, and air.

Of these various kinds of imagery, that is the most characteristic of poetic genius which 'moulds and colours itself to the circumstances, passion or character, foremost in the mind'. The imagination, then, (for it is this faculty, evidently, which Coleridge has in view,) attains its highest potency when transfusing into the outward forms which it contemplates the emotional life which determines its activity. It is thus the same process which years before Coleridge had poetically depicted in Dejection, and which in a letter of the same period he had characterized as He wrote that the lecturer's 'great object appears to be to exhibit in poetry the principles of moral wisdom, and the laws of our intellectual nature which form the basis of social existence'. His impression of Coleridge was of a man who on all occasions really thinks and feels for himself'. (The italics are mine.)

'a dim analogue of creation'. The conception of this analogy, then tentatively expressed, must in the intervening years have grown in definiteness and significance, as Coleridge pushed forward to an idealistic solution of the problem of knowledge.

In the next year two other courses of lectures were given, the only record of which is preserved in C. Robinson's Diary. But Robinson gives only general impressions. His allusion to the 'very German character of the lectures'1 need not be construed as implying that Coleridge was merely adopting German views. Indeed, Robinson elsewhere records how a German friend of his, who attended the lectures, was struck with the similarity between Coleridge and German authors whom (as Robinson adds) Coleridge had never read."

Of a series of lectures delivered in Bristol on similar topics in 1813, the best thing we know is that C. Leslie, the painter, carried away from them 'a much more distinct and satisfactory view of the nature and ends of poetry' than he had possessed before. A better fate awaited a series of essays 'On the principles of sound criticism', which have been preserved in Felix Farley's Journal for 1814. Of these essays Coleridge himself thought most highly, and towards the end of his life he expressed his regret that he had lost sight of them. Like all his writings on aesthetic, however, they are fragmentary and tentative. The distinctions and definitions of Kant's Critique of Judgement are illustrated and applied with appreciative insight, but there is no genuine advance beyond Kant's standpoint. Moreover, they come to an end without accomplishing their real purpose. This purpose was to furnish the critic with irrefutable principles of criticism, based upon the laws which govern the artist's 1 C. Robinson, Diary, &c., May 26, 1812. 2 lb., Nov. 4, 1811:

activity and upon the essential nature of the beautiful. But Coleridge never teaches us how to turn our knowledge of these things to practical account, by actually converting these metaphysical or psychological truths into effective instruments of criticism. Yet much as the incompleteness of these essays is to be regretted, we must not on that account underrate their significance. By the only method which could command assent (the appeal to incontrovertible principles) they exposed the unreasonableness of the prevailing individualism in questions of taste, and of the mistaken theories on which it leaned. They thus represent the first attempt to express philosophically the new spirit of artistic and literary criticism. The first attempt, that is, in writing; for in his lectures Coleridge's object had been the same.1

The lamentable breach with Wordsworth, which occurred at the end of 1810, brought with it a long lapse in the intercourse of the two poets. This is the more to be regretted from the fact that during these years the same problems were engaging the minds of both. For Wordsworth was busy preparing the new edition of his poems, and elaborating the principles of classification which he afterwards discussed in his preface. In various conversations with Crabb Robinson he discoursed upon these principles, and in especial upon the distinction of fancy and imagination. To these expositions Crabb Robinson proved an attentive, but not always an enlightened listener. Neither now' (he writes in 1816) 'nor in reading the preface' (to the new edition) 'have I been able to comprehend his ideas concerning the poetic imagination.' Elsewhere, however, he

1 See Payne Collier's Diary, 1811. He means very soon, to give a series of lectures... mainly upon Poetry, with a view to erect some standard by which all poets may be measured and ranked .. He thought something of this kind was much needed, in order to settle people's notions of what was, or was not, good poetry, and who was, or was not, a good poet.'

remarks that 'Wordsworth represents much, as, unknown to him, the German philosophers have done, that by the imagination the mere fact is exhibited in its connection. with infinity'. But Wordsworth's views would doubtless have largely gained in clearness, could he have maintained his exchange of ideas with Coleridge on a distinction which their intercourse had originated in years long past. To Robinson at least it seemed that Coleridge's own exposition of the subject had the effect of greatly illuminating 'Wordsworth's obscure discrimination '.2

VI. THE 'Biographia Literaria'.

In April 1816, after years of wandering, Coleridge found what proved to be a lasting home under the Gillmans' roof at Highgate. In December of the same year a visit was paid to him by Crabb Robinson, to whom Coleridge spoke of his memoirs, then about to appear, and gave the account of imagination and fancy alluded to above. Of fancy he spoke 'as not holding that place in a chart of the mind which imagination holds'; 'and which' (the Diary adds) 'he has in his Lay Sermon so admirably described.'"

The 'Lay Sermon' here alluded to is that published in 1816 under the title of The Statesman's Manual, and 'the memoirs' are the two volumes of the Biographia Literaria which appeared in July of the following year, some twenty months after it was first placed in the printer's hands. In the Lay Sermon 'the discussion of the imagination is quite incidental to the main subject: it is the Biographia Literaria

1 Compare e. g. Jean Paul (Vorschule der Aesthetik, ii. 7): 'Die Phantasie macht alle Teile zu Ganzen'.

Diary, &c., Sept. 10, 1816; ib., Dec. 26, 1816. Fancy is defined as 'memory without judgment'.

3 See Supplementary Note for a fuller account of the genesis of the Biographia Literaria.

which contains Coleridge's first and last genuine attempt to expound his conception of its nature.

The variety of motives which gave rise to the Biographia Literaria reveals itself in the miscellaneous character of the work. Intended in the first instance as a preface to the Sibylline Leaves, it grew into a literary autobiography which itself came to demand a preface. This preface itself outgrew its purposed limits, and was incorporated in the whole work, which was finally issued in two parts -the autobiography (two vols.) and the poems.1 Originally, no doubt, Coleridge's motive in writing the preface was to explain and justify his own style and practice in poetry. To this end it was necessary that he should state clearly the points on which he took exception to Wordsworth's theory. All this, however, seemed to involve an examination of the nature of poetry and the poetic faculty: and this in its turn suggested, if it did not demand, a radical inquiry into the preconditions of knowledge in general. To Coleridge, as we have seen, the distinction of fancy and imagination was a distinction of equal import for philosophy and for poetry. But having thus been led to a consideration of fundamental problems, there was danger that he would pursue them for their own sake; especially when the occasion was afforded him of attacking his old bugbear, the mechanical philosophy. This uncertainty of aim is illustrated in a letter of July 1815.1 After writing that he has given 'a full account (raisonné) of the controversy concerning Wordsworth's poems and theory,' he adds, 'I have elaborated a disquisition on the powers of association and the generic difference between the fancy and the imagination. . . . One long passage I did not (wholly) insert, but I certainly extended and elaborated with a view to your perusal, as laying the foundation-stone of

1 Letters to Dr. Brabant, printed in Westm. Review, April and July 1870.