The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Volume I Part 155

The Complete Poetical Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Volume I Part 155

FOOTNOTES:

[447:1] First printed in the _Bijou_ for 1828: included in 1828, 1829, and 1834. These lines, as published in the _Bijou_ for 1828, were an excerpt from an entry in a notebook, dated Feb. 21, 1825. They were preceded by a prose introduction, now for the first time printed, and followed by a metrical interpretation or afterthought which was first published in the Notes to the Edition of 1893. For an exact reproduction of the prose and verse as they appear in the notebook, vide Appendices of this edition.

[447:2] Compare the last stanza of George Herbert's _Praise_:--

O raise me thus! Poor Bees that work all day, Sting my delay, Who have a work as well as they, And much, much more.

LINENOTES:

t.i.tle] Lines composed on a day in February. By S. T. Coleridge, Esq.

Bijou: Lines composed on the 21st of February, 1827 1828, 1829, 1834.

[1] Slugs] Snails erased MS. S. T. C.: Stags 1828, 1829, 1885.

[11]

{ With unmoist lip and wreathless brow I stroll { With lips unmoisten'd wreathless brow I stroll MS. S. T. C.

_SANCTI DOMINICI PALLIUM_[448:1]

A DIALOGUE BETWEEN POET AND FRIEND

FOUND WRITTEN ON THE BLANK LEAF AT THE BEGINNING OF BUTLER'S 'BOOK OF THE CHURCH' (1825)

POET

I note the moods and feelings men betray, And heed them more than aught they do or say; The lingering ghosts of many a secret deed Still-born or haply strangled in its birth; _These_ best reveal the smooth man's inward creed! 5 _These_ mark the spot where lies the treasure--Worth!

Milner, made up of impudence and trick,[448:2]

With cloven tongue prepared to hiss and lick, Rome's Brazen Serpent--boldly dares discuss The roasting of thy heart, O brave John Huss! 10 And with grim triumph and a truculent glee[448:3]

Absolves anew the Pope-wrought perfidy, That made an empire's plighted faith a lie, And fix'd a broad stare on the Devil's eye-- (Pleas'd with the guilt, yet envy-stung at heart 15 To stand outmaster'd in his own black art!) Yet Milner--

FRIEND

Enough of Milner! we're agreed, Who now defends would then have done the deed.

But who not feels persuasion's gentle sway, Who but must meet the proffered hand half way 20 When courteous Butler--

POET (_aside_)

(Rome's smooth go-between!)

FRIEND

Laments the advice that soured a milky queen-- (For 'b.l.o.o.d.y' all enlightened men confess An antiquated error of the press:) Who rapt by zeal beyond her s.e.x's bounds, 25 With actual cautery staunched the Church's wounds!

And tho' he deems, that with too broad a blur We d.a.m.n the French and Irish ma.s.sacre, Yet _blames_ them both--and thinks the Pope _might_ err!

What think you now? Boots it with spear and shield 30 Against such gentle foes to take the field Whose beckoning hands the mild Caduceus wield?

POET

What think I now? Even what I thought before;-- What Milner boasts though Butler may deplore, Still I repeat, words lead me not astray 35 When the _shown_ feeling points a different way.

Smooth Butler can say grace at slander's feast,[449:1]

And bless each haut-gout cook'd by monk or priest; Leaves the full lie on Milner's gong to swell, Content with half-truths that do just as well; 40 But duly decks his mitred comrade's flanks,[450:1]

And with him shares the Irish nation's thanks!

So much for you, my friend! who own a Church, And would not leave your mother in the lurch!

But when a Liberal asks me what I think-- 45 Scared by the blood and soot of Cobbett's ink, And Jeffrey's glairy phlegm and Connor's foam, In search of some safe parable I roam-- An emblem sometimes may comprise a tome!

Disclaimant of his uncaught grandsire's mood, 50 I see a tiger lapping kitten's food: And who shall blame him that he purs applause, When brother Brindle pleads the good old cause; And frisks his pretty tail, and half unsheathes his claws!

Yet not the less, for modern lights unapt, 55 I trust the bolts and cross-bars of the laws More than the Protestant milk all newly lapt, Impearling a tame wild-cat's whisker'd jaws!

1825, or 1826.

FOOTNOTES:

[448:1] First published in the _Evening Standard_, May 21, 1827. 'The poem signed ?S??S? appeared likewise in the _St. James's Chronicle_.' See Letter of S. T. C. to J. Blanco White, dated Nov. 28, 1827. _Life_, 1845, i. 439, 440. First collected in 1834. I have amended the text of 1834 in lines 7, 17, 34, 39 in accordance with a MS. in the possession of the poet's granddaughter, Miss Edith Coleridge. The poem as published in 1834 and every subsequent edition (except 1907) is meaningless. Southey's _Book of the Church_, 1825, was answered by Charles Butler's _Book of the Roman Catholic Church_, 1825, and in an anonymous pamphlet by the Vicar Apostolic, Dr. John Milner, ent.i.tled _Merlin's Strictures_. Southey retaliated in his _Vindiciae Ecclesiae Anglicanae_, 1826. In the latter work he addresses Butler as 'an honourable and courteous opponent'--and contrasts his 'habitual urbanity' with the malignant and scurrilous attacks of that 'ill-mannered man', Dr. Milner. In the 'Dialogue' the poet reminds his 'Friend' Southey that Rome is Rome, a 'brazen serpent', charm she never so wisely. In the _Vindiciae_ Southey devotes pp. 470-506 to an excursus on 'The Rosary'--the invention of St. Dominic. Hence the t.i.tle--'Sancti Dominici Pallium'.

[448:2] These lines were written before this Prelate's decease.

_Standard, 1827._

[448:3] Truculent: a tribrach as the isochronous subst.i.tute for the Trochee ?. N. B. If our accent, a _quality_ of sound were actually equivalent to the _Quant.i.ty_ in the Greek ? , or dactyl ? ? at least. But it is not so, accent shortens syllables: thus Spirit, sprite; Honey, money, n.o.body, &c. _MS. S. T. C._

[449:1] 'Smooth Butler.' See the Rev. Blanco White's Letter to C.

Butler, Esq. _MS. S. T. C._, _Sd. 1827_.

[450:1] 'Your coadjutor the t.i.tular Bishop Milner'--Bishop of Castabala I had called him, till I learnt from the present pamphlet that he had been translated to the see of Billingsgate.' _Vind. Ecl. Angl. 1826_, p.

228, _note_.

LINENOTES:

t.i.tle]--A dialogue written on a Blank Page of Butler's Book of the Roman Catholic Church. Sd. 1827.

[7] Milner] ---- 1834, 1852: Butler 1893.

[17] Milner--Milner] ----, ---- 1834, 1852: Butler--Butler 1893. Yet Milner] Yet Miln-- Sd. 1827.

[25] Who with a zeal that pa.s.sed Sd. 1827.

[30] spear] helm Sd. 1827.