idealised in his mind. Endeared ever more and more to his affections,*-(I was with him, he said, in his daily thoughts, and in his nightly dreams,) -I had become exalted in his imagination, so that his judgments respecting his far-off brother are to be regarded simply as part of himself. The truth is, that "he held my temper in a high respect," and with this was joined, besides some painful reflections, which were but too natural, a morbid and excessive self-depreciation; so that when, after an absence of more than twenty years, I was enabled to visit him in 1843, he was at once excited and embarrassed. I had much communion with him in private, but in society he was nearly silent. * The following beautiful passage in one of his letters to a friend may well find a place here. "I cannot live much longer without a sight of my dear brother and his little ones. You cannot conceive how much my affections to my kindred are intensified by my increasing years. Time was that I thought lightly of the tres of blood, and held that every man should choose for himself a kindred and a brotherhood, not according to the flesh, but according to the spirit; but whether I be grown wiser or weaker, I now believe that nature, which, though not God, is the law and power, and manifestation of God, is wiser than man, a more permanent and trustworthy exponent of the eternal reason than the mere human understanding-at best but the balance-sheet of the debtor and creditor accounts of the senses, too often miscalculated and sophisticated by the corrupt will." +"To D. C. "We grappled like two wrestlers, long and hard, With many a strain and many a wily turn; The general testimony of friends and strangers, however, leaves no doubt that the conversational eloquence of his early manhood remained unimpaired to the last. It is of course impossible to recal the charm which was almost universally attributed to his manners and to his habits-the pregnant thought, the wide-spreading fancy, the playful, good-humoured causticity to which his striking countenance, his rich, rhythmical voice, and even his eccentric demeanour, gave additional effect. On this subject, one of his friends (Mr. James Spedding), one well able to give evidence on this point, thus writes to me :— "As to memoranda, I have some lively memoranda in my own mind of the impressions which his conversations The deep divine, the quaint fantastic bard, "The one was stiff as any bending reed Is stiff with ice, with frosty mail emboss'd, By nature flaccid as the lank sea-weed, But seeming stanch-by might of brittle frost. "The other, like a pine, was like to yield, But upward sprang, and heavenward pointed still: "Thou wert the pine, and I, with woeful ruth, left upon me; but I have never practised, nor indeed acquired, the art of setting such things down in writing; and they are like my impressions of a face which I know; which seems as definite and distinct as the life, until I try to draw it, and then I find that I can produce no resemblance. I could indeed quote several of his sayings with tolerable correctness, for his talk abounded in things quotable, but I believe that if we had a collection of as many of the sayings of Shakspeare as Ben Jonson could have remembered, set down one after the other as illustrations of his conversation, it would be very disappointing, and convey no part of a true impression of the thing." Another friend, the same to whom I am indebted for the interesting sketch, already given, of his earliest manhood, thus records his impression in later : years: "In days subsequent to those which I have been attempting to remember, I have been constantly struck with new astonishment in every new interview with Hartley. The mine of his knowledge was inexhaustible. He had an acquaintance with every subject-with all books. Though in later years living in distant and sequestered scenes, where one might have thought his communion with Nature would have been greater than his worldly information, his knowledge of all that was passing in the bustling haunts of men, of every work that had been recently published, was complete, nay, even it might have seemed intuitive and miraculous. In relating the smallest anecdote his powers of humour and pathos were alternately brought into play. He would bring every little circumstance of a scene or event before the very vision with astonishing vivacity; eye, and voice, and gesture, all speaking and working to one end. Accustomed to consider men as men, to him it mattered little to whom he disburthened himself of the load of mental treasure that literally seemed to oppress him, and to be ever seeking an utterance. I have known him enter into metaphysical disquisitions with a Cumberland peasant (be it not, however, forgotten that a Cumberland peasant is more or less an educated man), or (as it happened on one occasion, when we had taken shelter from the rain about the ingle-nook of a way-side hostel,) deliver what might be called an historical lecture to a party of Cumbrian farmers. Nor was his eloquence wholly lost even upon these less refined auditors. Their respect for his talents amounted to veneration; and even if they could not always follow him in his higher flights of speculation, a sort of consciousness that their being had been raised by communication with such a man remained to them, and it was with a sentiment of real veneration, in itself favourable to humanity, that they summed up the impression which Hartley's eloquence had made on them by the words-Aye, but Mr. Coleridge talks fine.' "How delightful, then, to more informed minds—what a valued privilege was Hartley's conversation! What a true enjoyment was a walk with him amidst the glorious scenery with which he was, and will long remain, identified! But it was not only by the qualities of his mind that Hartley was favourably known; he had a kind and affectionate heart, a kindly genial disposition, a fine temper and a peculiar generosity of sentiment; capable as he was of forcible and satiric painting, his word-pictures were ever free from offence, and always had the light of his own geniality over them ;—never have I heard one word from him of personal bitterness. The keenest arrow in his speech was 'tipped with good nature.' Yet, in detailing any act of injustice, his eyes, for a brief moment, would flash fire, his very teeth be ground, and his whole frame moved. "This freedom from all personality or narrow rancour caused that it might have been said emphatically of Hartley, that he had no enemies; the nature of his being was such as might more particularly be called 'attracting;' there was about him a child-like and confiding spirit, a oneness and VOL. I. k simplicity which bore witness to Wordsworth's wondrous penetration, when (in the lines to H. C., six years old, already alluded to,) he predicted that Hartley would retain, "By individual right, A young lamb's heart among the full-grown flocks.' He was not one whom any could coldly see as a mere intellectual curiosity, but he was of those who (to use an expression of Mr. Southey's) 'make the eye sparkle' when we meet them. That his talents were appreciated by the lower orders in Cumberland I have intimated; but, 'more than this, he was deeply beloved amongst them. I have heard some of that class say, they would 'go through fire and water for Mr. Coleridge.' To all, indeed, of any class who ever were in familiar intercourse with Hartley, I may appeal to bear me out in the assertion, that his memory will not be less identified with the affections, than honoured by the intellect. How often will those who shall re-seek the shores of Windermere, after having wandered by them in his company, recall to mind his own beautiful lines on the death of Mr. Jackson of Lowwood Inn! How often will they look around on the lovely lake and landscape, almost wondering that every inanimate object should be as it was, and the hills in beauty rise' as before, while the presiding spirit that animated those scenes is fled! So will they feel until the strain with which Hartley himself concludes the touching memorial alluded to may haply recur to them, with the high truths which it teaches : 66 : "The lake is still the same, the changeful skies Look not for sorrow in the changeful skies, But look to Him, who sometimes will chastise Those whom He loves, but never will forsake.'" 'Lausanne, Dec. 3, 1849." |