and intelligent men north
of the Tweed, he would find it impossible to make any intelligible
communication respecting himself; for of him and his writings there
would prevail only a perplexing dream, or the most untroubled ignorance.
We cannot see in what the state of literature would have been different
had he been cut off in childhood, or had he never been born; for except
a few wild and fanciful ballads, he has produced nothing worthy
remembrance. Yet, insignificant as he assuredly is, he cannot put pen to
paper without a feeling that millions of eyes are fixed upon him; and he
scatters his Sibylline Leaves around him, with as majestical an air as
if a crowd of enthusiastic admirers were rushing forward to grasp the
divine promulgations, instead of their being, as in fact they are,
coldly received by the accidental passenger, like a lying lottery puff
or a quack advertisement.

This most miserable arrogance seems, in the present age, confined almost
exclusively to the original members of the Lake School, and is, we
think, worthy of especial notice, as one of the leading features of
their character. It would be difficult to defend it either in Southey or
Wordsworth; but in Coleridge it is altogether ridiculous. Southey has
undoubtedly written four noble Poems--Thalaba, Madoc, Kehama, and
Roderick; and if the Poets of this age are admitted, by the voice of
posterity, to take their places by the side of the Mighty of former
times in the Temple of Immortality, he will be one of that sacred
company. Wordsworth, too, with all his manifold errors and defects, has,
we think, won to himself a great name, and, in point of originality,
will be considered as second to no man of this age. They are entitled to
think highly of themselves, in comparison with their most highly gifted
contemporaries; and therefore, though their arrogance may be offensive,
as it often is, it is seldom or ever utterly ridiculous. But Mr.
Coleridge stands on much lower ground, and will be known to future times
only as a man who overrated and abused his talents--who saw glimpses of
that glory which he could not grasp--who presumptuously came forward to
officiate as High-Priest at mysteries beyond his ken--and who carried
himself as if he had been familiarly admitted into the Penetralia of
Nature, when in truth he kept perpetually stumbling at the very
Threshold.

This absurd self-elevation forms a striking contrast with the dignified
deportment of all