The Complete Dramatic Works of Samuel Taylor Coleridge. Samuel Taylor Coleridge

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      Coleridge's mind was that extremely rara avis in terra, which combines the artistic with the philosophic temperament—two inherently-opposed qualities. His acute and sensitive perceptions of sound, sight, colour and romantic possibility did not in the least satisfy his heavy logical demands. Of art for art's sake he had the poorest opinion. He was of dual nature,—and where the philosopher, the metaphysician and the divine preponderated in him, they completely over-weighted the exquisite, ethereal imagination, which was so infinitely more precious, had he known it. And although in this golden year of his life, this annus mirabilis of his sojourn at Nether Stowey,—he was still allured to the marvellous, the strange and the supernatural, he sought to disguise his surrender to these phantasies, by clothing his desires in the garb of a severe philosophy of poetry. He decided, in concert with Wordsworth, that it would be well for him to undertake a series of poems in which, as he put it, "the incident and agents were to be, in part at least, supernatural: and the excellence arrived at was to consist in the interesting of the affections by the dramatic truth of such emotions as would naturally accompany such situations, supposing them real. And real in this sense they have been to every human being who, from whatever source of delusion, has at any time believed himself under supernatural agency."

      A cold and unproductive soil this, one would suppose, in which to grow the glowing flowers of Christabel, where night itself, peopled with occult alarms, cannot minimise the mingled horror and splendour of Geraldine's first appearance.

      Is the night chilly and dark?

       The night is chilly, but not dark.

       The thin gray cloud is spread on high,

       It covers but not hides the sky.

       The moon is behind, and at the full;

       And yet she looks both small and dull.

       The night is chill, the cloud is gray:

       'Tis a month before the month of May,

       And the Spring comes slowly up this way.

       The lovely lady, Christabel,

       Whom her father loves so well,

       What makes her in the wood so late,

       A furlong from the castle gate?

       She had dreams all yesternight

       Of her own betrothed knight;

       And she in the midnight wood will pray

       For the weal of her lover that's far away.

      She stole along, she nothing spoke,

       The sighs she heaved were soft and low,

       And naught was green upon the oak,

       But moss and rarest mistletoe:

       She kneels beneath the huge oak tree,

       And in silence prayeth she.

      The lady sprang up suddenly,

       The lovely lady, Christabel!

       It moaned as near, as near can be,

       But what it is, she cannot tell.—

       On the other side it seems to be,

       Of the huge, broad-breasted, old oak tree.

       · · · · · · There she sees a damsel bright,

       Drest in a silken robe of white,

       That shadowy in the moonlight shone:

       The neck that made that white robe wan,

       Her stately neck, and arms were bare;

       Her blue-veined feet unsandal'd were,

       And wildly glittered here and there

       The gems entangled in her hair.

       I guess, 'twas frightful there to see

       A lady so richly clad as she—

       Beautiful exceedingly!

      And a chilly basis, these solemnly-propounded theories, for the gorgeous fabric of The Ancient Mariner. Originally founded, as regards its main outlines, upon a dream which occurred to Cruikshank,—a dream of a skeleton ship with figures in it,—who could have anticipated such results as that unforgettable scene where "The Ancient Mariner beholdeth a sign in the element afar off"?—

      The western wave was all a-flame;

       The day was well nigh done;

       Almost upon the western wave

       Rested the broad bright Sun;

       When that strange shape drove suddenly

       Betwixt us and the Sun.

       And straight the Sun was flecked with bars

       (Heaven's Mother send us grace!)

       As if through a dungeon-grate he peered

       With broad and burning face.

      Alas! (thought I, and my heart beat loud)

       How fast she nears and nears!

       Are those her sails that glance in the Sun, Like restless gossameres!

      Are those her ribs through which the Sun Did peer, as through a grate? And is that Woman all her crew? Is that a Death? and are there two? Is Death that woman's mate?

      Her lips were red, her looks were free, Her locks were yellow as gold: Her skin was as white as leprosy, The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she, Who thicks man's blood with cold.

      The naked hulk alongside came,

       And the twain were casting dice;

       'The game is done! I've won! I've won!'

       Quoth she, and whistles thrice.

      The Sun's rim dips; the stars rush out:

       At one stride comes the dark;

       With far-heard whisper, o'er the sea,

       Off shot the spectre-bark.

      We listened, and looked sideways up!

       Fear at my heart, as at a cup,

       My life-blood seemed to sip!

       The stars were dim, and thick the night,

       The steersman's face by his lamp gleamed white;

      From the sails the dew did drip—

       Till clomb above the eastern bar

       The hornéd Moon, with one bright star

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