The American essayist Ralph Waldo Emerson was at a pivotal
time in his life when, in 1833, at the age of 29, he travelled to Europe. One
of his ambitions was to meet Samuel Taylor Coleridge. In fact, he met a great
many people on his travels, being favoured with a host of introductions,
notably John Stuart Mill who introduced him to Carlyle. But there was a special
interest for him in coming face to face with Coleridge, whose ideas on
religion, nature and philosophy had been an inspiration for him. What he didn’t
expect was to find the encounter the most disappointing of his trip.
It seems that Emerson met just about everybody who, in those
days, was anybody. In a footnote to his account of the visit, he reels off a
list: “every day in London gave me new opportunities of meeting men and women
who give splendour to society. I saw Rogers, Hallam, Macaulay, Milnes, Milman,
Dickens, Thackaray, Tennyson, Leigh Hunt, Disraeli, Helps, Wilkinson, Bailey,
Kenyon and Forster: the younger poets, Clough, Arnold and Patmore… men of
science, Robert Brown, Owen, Sedgwick, Faraday, Buckland, Lyell, De La Beche,
Hooker, Carpenter, Babbage and Edward Forbes. It was my privilege also to
converse with Miss Baillie, with Lady Morgan, with Mrs Jameson, and Mrs
Somerville.” He also had an enjoyable trip to see Wordsworth.
But it was Coleridge he wanted to see more than anyone.
Here’s the start of his account.
“On 5th August I went to Highgate… he appeared a
short, thick old man, with bright blue eyes and fine clear complexion,
leaning on his cane. He took snuff freely, which presently soiled his cravat
and neat black suit… he burst into a declamation on the folly and ignorance of
Unitarianism… when he stopped to take breath, I interposed that, whilst I
highly valued all his explanations, I was bound to tell him that I was born and
bred a Unitarian. ‘Yes’ he said, ‘I supposed so’: and continued as before…. “
Coleridge was 61 but seemed older, partly because of his
opium addiction. He was past his brilliant best, largely housebound, and, as a
sonnet of the previous year suggests, feeling he was nearing the end: “That
only serves to make us grieve / In our old age / Whose bruised wings quarrel
with the bars / Of the still narrowing cage.”
Coleridge gave Emerson a taste of his poetry at the end of
the meeting. Emerson writes that he “recited with strong emphasis, standing,
some ten or twelve lines beginning ‘Born unto God in Christ’.” This will have
been the poem “My Baptismal Birthday”, composed the previous November.
God's child in Christ adopted, -- Christ my all, --
What that earth boasts were not lost cheaply, rather
Than forfeit that blest name, by which I call
The Holy One, the Almighty God, my Father? --
Father! in Christ we live, and Christ in Thee --
Eternal Thou, and everlasting we.
The heir of heaven, henceforth I fear not death:
In Christ I live! in Christ I draw the breath
Of the true life! -- Let then earth, sea, and sky
Make war against me! On my front I show
Their mighty master's seal. In vain they try
To end my life, that can but end its woe. --
Is that a death-bed where a Christian lies? --
Yes! but not his -- 'tis Death itself there dies.
Poor Emerson did his best to do justice to his hero, but in
all honesty was forced to accept the visit was rather a failure. Coleridge was no longer the forward-looking idealist that he idolised. “I was in his
company for about an hour but find it impossible to recall the largest part of
his discourse, which was often like so many printed paragraphs in his book –
perhaps the same – so readily did he fall into certain commonplaces. As I might
have foreseen, the visit was rather a spectacle than a conversation, of no use
beyond the satisfaction of my curiosity. He was old and preoccupied, and could
not bend to a new companion and think of him.”
Coleridge died the next year, but his influence on Emerson
persisted. A few years after this trip, Emerson was to join and then lead the “Transcendentalist”
movement, a philosophical development of Unitarianism and the Romantic movement,
which was much inspired by Coleridge’s promotion of Kant’s “transcendental
philosophy”.
Sources
R W Emerson: English Traits: First Voyage to England https://emersoncentral.com/texts/english-traits/first-visit-to-england/
Richard Holmes: Coleridge: Darker Reflections (1998)
https://www.notablebiographies.com/Co-Da/Coleridge-Samuel-Taylor.html
https://plato.stanford.edu/entries/transcendentalism/
https://www.kingsreview.co.uk/essays/emerson-and-the-poets
https://wordsworth.org.uk/blog/2018/07/15/the-enigma-of-coleridge/
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