Samuel Coleridge - The Complete Essays, Lectures & Letters of S. T. Coleridge (Illustrated)

GIORDANO BRUNO

Monday, April 1801, and Tuesday, read two works of Giordano Bruno, with one title-page: Jordani Bruni Nolani de Monade, Numero et Figurâ liber consequens. Quinque de Minimo, Magno et Mensurâ. Item. De Innumerabilibus Immenso, et Infigurabili seu de Universo et Mundis libri octo. Francofurti, Apud Joan. Wechelum et Petrum Fischerum consortes , 1591.

Then follows the dedication, then the index of contents of the whole volume, at the end of which index is a Latin ode, conceived with great dignity and grandeur of thought. Then the work De Monade, Numero et Figurâ, secretioris nempe Physicæ, Mathematicæ, et Metaphysicæ elementa commences, which, as well as the eight books De Innumerabili , &c., is a poem in Latin hexameters, divided (each book) into chapters, and to each chapter is affixed a prose commentary. If the five books de Minimo , &c., to which this book is consequent are of the same character, I lost nothing in not having it. As to the work De Monade , it was far too numerical, lineal and Pythagorean for my comprehension. It read very much like Thomas Taylor and Proclus, &c. I by no means think it certain that there is no meaning in these works. Nor do I presume even to suppose that the meaning is of no value (till I understand a man's ignorance I presume myself ignorant of his understanding), but it is for others, at present, not for me. Sir P. Sidney and Fulk Greville shut the doors at their philosophical conferences with Bruno. If his conversation resembled this book, I should have thought he would have talked with a trumpet.

The poems and commentaries, in the De Immenso et Innumerabili are of a different character. The commesntary is a very sublime enunciation of the dignity of the human soul, according to the principles of Plato.

[Here follows the passage, " Anima Sapiens ——ubique totus ," quoted in The Friend ( Coleridge's Works , ii. 109), together with a brief résumé of Bruno's other works. See, too, Biographia Literaria , chapter ix. ( Coleridge's Works , iii. 249).]

OBSERVATIONS AND REFLECTIONS

The spring with the little tiny cone of loose sand ever rising and sinking at the bottom, but its surface without a wrinkle.

Monday, September 14, 1801

Northern lights remarkably fine—chiefly a purple-blue—in shooting pyramids, moved from over Bassenthwaite behind Skiddaw. Derwent's birthday, one year old.

September 15, 1801

Observed the great half moon setting behind the mountain ridge, and watched the shapes its various segments presented as it slowly sunk—first the foot of a boot, all but the heel—then a little pyramid ∆—then a star of the first magnitude—indeed, it was not distinguishable from the evening star at its largest—then rapidly a smaller, a small, a very small star—and, as it diminished in size, so it grew paler in tint. And now where is it? Unseen—but a little fleecy cloud hangs above the mountain ridge, and is rich in amber light.

I do not wish you to act from those truths. No! still and always act from your feelings; but only meditate often on these truths, that sometime or other they may become your feelings.

The state should be to the religions under its protection as a well-drawn picture, equally eyeing all in the room.

Quære, whether or no too great definiteness of terms in any language may not consume too much of the vital and idea-creating force in distinct, clear, full-made images, and so prevent originality. For original might be distinguished from positive thought.

The thing that causes in stability in a particular state, of itself causes stability. For instance, wet soap slips off the ledge—detain it till it dries a little, and it sticks .

Is there anything in the idea that citizens are fonder of good eating and rustics of strong drink—the one from the rarity of all such things, the other from the uniformity of his life?

October 19, 1801

1797-1801

On the Greta, over the bridge by Mr. Edmundson's father-in-law, the ashes—their leaves of that light yellow which autumn gives them, cast a reflection on the river like a painter's sunshine.

October 20, 1801

My birthday. The snow fell on Skiddaw and Grysdale Pike for the first time.

[A life-long mistake. He was born October 21, 1772.]

Tuesday evening, 1/2 past 6, October 22, 1801

All the mountains black and tremendously obscure, except Swinside. At this time I saw, one after the other, nearly in the same place, two perfect moon-rainbows, the one foot in the field below my garden, the other in the field nearest but two to the church. It was grey-moonlight-mist-colour. Friday morning, Mary Hutchinson arrives.

The art in a great man, and of evidently superior faculties, to be often obliged to people, often his inferiors—in this way the enthusiasm of affection may be excited. Pity where we can help and our help is accepted with gratitude, conjoined with admiration, breeds an enthusiastic affection. The same pity conjoined with admiration, where neither our help is accepted nor efficient, breeds dyspathy and fear.

Nota bene to make a detailed comparison, in the manner of Jeremy Taylor, between the searching for the first cause of a thing and the seeking the fountains of the Nile—so many streams, each with its particular fountain—and, at last, it all comes to a name!

The soul a mummy embalmed by Hope in the catacombs.

To write a series of love poems truly Sapphic, save that they shall have a large interfusion of moral sentiment and calm imagery—love in all the moods of mind, philosophic, fantastic—in moods of high enthusiasm, of simple feeling, of mysticism, of religion—comprise in it all the practice and all the philosophy of love!

Ὁ μυριονους—hyperbole from Naucratius' panegyric of Theodoras Chersites. Shakspere, item , ὁ πολλτος και πολυειδης τη ποικιλοστροφω σοφια. Ὁ μεγαλοφρωνοτατος της αληθειας κηρυξ.—Lord Bacon.

[Compare Biographia Literaria , cap. xv., "our myriad-minded Shakspere" and footnote . Ανηρ μυριονους a phrase which I have borrowed from a Greek monk, who applies it to a Patriarch of Constantinople. I might have said that I have reclaimed rather than borrowed it; for it seems to belong to Shakspere, de jure singulari, et ex privilegio naturæ. Coleridge's Works , iii. 375.]

FOOTNOTES:

1Presumably George Dyer.

Table of Contents

"In a half sleep, he dreams of better worlds,

And dreaming hears thee still, O singing lark,

That singest like an angel in the clouds!"

S. T. C.

THOUGHTS AND FANCIES

No one can leap over his own shadow, but poets leap over death.

The old world begins a new year. That is ours , but this is from God.

We may think of time as threefold. Slowly comes the Future, swift the Present passes by, but the Past is unmoveable. No impatience will quicken the loiterer, no terror, no delight rein in the flyer, and no regret set in motion the stationary. Wouldst be happy, take the delayer for thy counsellor; do not choose the flyer for thy friend, nor the ever-remainer for thine enemy.