favour the only good; so that the grand work, about to appear, may add strength to the strong, and give endurance to the finished pediment, of his usefulness and his fame.

But although all these cheering anticipations should be fully realized, regrets will still exist. It will ever be deplored, that Mr. Coleridge's system of Christian Ethics, had not yet been deliberately recorded by himself. This feeling, however natural, is still considerably moderated, by reflecting on the ample competence of the individual on whom the distinction of preparing this system has devolved: a security, that it will be both well and faithfully executed, and which, in the same proportion that it reflects credit on the editor, will embalm with additional honours, the memory of SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE ; a genius, who in the opulence of his imagination, and his rich and inexhaustible capabilities, as a poet, a logician, and a metaphysician, has not perhaps been surpassed since the days of Milton.

Mr. Coleridge, in the smaller class of his "Literary Remains," recently published (Vol. 1. p. 368.) has hypothetically referred to two characters, one of which evidently pourtrays himself,

and a more pathetic appeal has rarely been made to the heart.

"There are two sides to every question. If thou hast genius and poverty to thy lot, dwell on the foolish, perplexing, imprudent, dangerous, and even immoral conduct of promise-breach in small things, of want of punctuality, of procrastination in all its shapes and disguises. Force men to reverence the dignity of thy moral strength in and for itself,—seeking no excuses or palliation, from fortune, or sickness, or a too full mind that, in opulence of conception, overrated its powers of application.

But if thy fate should be different, shouldest thou possess competence, health, and ease of mind, and then be thyself called upon to judge such faults, in another so gifted,-O! then, on the other view of the question, say, am I in ease and comfort, and dare I wonder that he, poor fellow! acted so and so? Dare I accuse him? Ought I not to shadow forth to myself that, glad and luxuriating in a short escape from anxiety, his mind over-promised for itself; that, want combating with his eager desire to produce things worthy of fame, he dreamed of the nobler, when he should have been producing the meaner, and so had the meaner obtruded on his moral being, when the nobler was making full way on his intellectual? Think of the manifoldness of his petty calls! Think in short on that which should

be as a voice from Heaven to warn thyself against this and that, and call it all up for pity, and for palliation."

Mr. Coleridge, in his succeeding and better days, thus expressed his religious creed.-Literary Remains, (Vol 1. p. 392.)

"I believe and hold it as the fundamental article of Christianity, that I am a fallen creature; that I am of myself capable of moral evil, but not of myself capable of moral good, and that an evil ground existed in my will, previously to any given act, or assignable moment of time, in my consciousness. I am born a child of wrath. This fearful mystery I pretend not to understand. I cannot even conceive the possibility of it,but I know that it is so. My conscience, the sole fountain of certainty, commands me to believe it, and would itself be a contradiction, were it not so-and what is real must be possible.

I receive with full and grateful faith, the assurance of Revelation, that the Word, which is from all eternity with God, and is God, assumed our human nature in order to redeem me, and all mankind from this our connate corruption. My reason convinces me, that no other mode of Redemption is conceivable, and, as did Socrates, would have yearned after the Redeemer, though it would not dare expect so wonderful an

act of divine love, except only as an effort of my mind to conceive the utmost of the infinite greatness of that love.

I believe that this assumption of humanity by the Son of God, was revealed and realized to us by the Word made flesh, and manifested to us in Christ Jesus; and that his miraculous birth, his agony, his crucifixion, death, resurrection, and ascension, were all both symbols of our redemption, and necessary parts of the awful process.

I believe in the descent and sending of the Holy Spirit, by whose free grace obtained for me by the merits of my Redeemer, I can alone be sanctified, and restored from my natural inheritance of sin and condemnation, be a child of God, and an "inheritor of the Kingdom of Heaven.""

No more befitting conclusion to the present Memoir can be offered, than the following letter of Mr. Coleridge, written a short time before his death, to a young friend. This deliberate exposition of his faith, and at such a season, utterly cancels every random word, or sentence, Mr. C. may ever have expressed, or written, of an opposing tendency, and which the inconsideracy of some, or the malignity of others may now advance, in derogation of his memory. In thoughtless

moments Mr. C. may sometimes have expressed himself unguardedly, attended, on reflection, no doubt with self-accusation, but here in the full prospect of dissolution, he pours forth the genuine and ulterior feelings of his soul.

"TO ADAM STEINMETZ Kinnaird.

My dear godchild,—I offer up the same fervent prayer for you now, as I did kneeling before the altar, when you were baptized into Christ, and solemnly received as a living member of his spiritual body, the church. Years must pass before you will be able to read with an understanding heart what I now write. But I trust that the all-gracious God, the Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, the Father of mercies, who, by his only begotten Son (all mercies in one sovereign mercy!) has redeemed you from evil ground, and willed you to be born out of darkness, but into light; out of death, but into life; out of sin, but into righteousness; even into the Lord our righteousness;' I trust that he will graciously hear the prayers of your dear parents, and be with you as the spirit of health and growth, in body and in mind. My dear godchild! you

received from Christ's minister, at the baptismal

VOL. II

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