Literary Studies Volume 1 (Paperback)

Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: HARTLEY COLERIDGE. (1852.) Hartley Coleridge was not like the Duke of Wellington. Children are urged by the example of the great statesman and warrior just departed?not indeed to neglect ' their book ' as he did?but to be industrious and thrifty; to ' always perform business,' to ' beware of procrastination,' to ' Never fail to do their best:' good ideas, as may be ascertained by referring to the masterly despatches on the Mahratta transactions?' great events,' as the preacher continues,' which exemplify the efficacy of diligence even in regions where the very advent of our religion is as yet but partially made known.' But ' What a wilderness were this sad world, If man were always man and never child !' And it were almost a worse wilderness if there were not some, to relieve the dull monotony of activity, who are children through life; who act on wayward impulse, and whose will has never come ; who toil not and who spin not; who always have 'fair Eden's simpleness:' and of such was Hartley Coleridge. ' Don't you remember,' writes Gray to Horace Walpole, when Lord B. and Sir H. C. and Viscount D., who are now great statesmen, were little dirty boys playing at cricket ? For my part I do not feel one bit older or wiser now than I did then.' For as some apply their minds to what is next them, and labour ever, and attain to governing the Tower, and entering theTrinity House,?to commanding armies, and applauding pilots, ?so there are also some who are ever anxious to-day about what ought only to be considered to-morrow; who never get on; whom the earth neglects, and whom tradesmen little esteem; who are where they were; who cause grief, and are loved; that are at once a by-word and a blessing; who do not live in life, and it seems will not die in death : and of such was Hart...