Letter from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Cambridge, to Robert Southey, 1794 September 19 : autograph manuscript signed.

Describing the effect Southey's letter had on him through the metaphor of a fire; saying that it did not make him angry, "but it did make me sorrowful. I was blameless -- it was therefore only 'a passing Cloud empictur'd on the Breast'"; explaining that, contrary to what Southey has accused him of, he took the first opportunity to write to Sara Fricker as soon as he arrived back in Cambridge; explaining further that he did not write to her earlier because "Miss F. did not authorize me to direct immediately to her -- It was settled, that through you in our weekly Parcels were the Letters to be conveyed"; saying that he found himself detained in London longer than he had hoped by illness and lack of money: "I was taken ill -- very ill. -- I exhausted my Finances -- and ill as I was I sat down and scrawled two guineas' Worth of Nonsense for the Booksellers -- which [George] Dyer disposed of for me -- Languid, sick at heart -- in the back Room of an Inn -- happy conjunction of circumstances for me to write to Miss F. --!"; arguing that he has kept his promise to write to her and asking Southey, if he is satisfied with Coleridge's explanation, to say so to her; telling him that the "Tragedy will be printed in less than a week" (probably referring to "The Fall of Robespierre," written jointly by Coleridge and Southey) and that he will list himself alone as the author, "because it will sell at least an hundred copies at Cambridge -- It would appear ridiculous to put two names to such a work"; saying that he will tell everyone who likes the tragedy of its true authorship, and "to those, who laugh at it, I laugh again -- and I am too well known at Cambridge to be thought the less of -- even tho' I had published James Jennings' Satire"; referring to "Watt" (possibly Wat Tyler) and Zephariah Fry; admitting his own faults ("I have been the Slave of Impulse, the Child of Imbecility"), praising Southey and warning of the pitfalls of judging too hastily: "Your undeviating Simplicity of Rectitude has made you too rapid in decision -- having never erred, you feel more indignation at Error, than Pity for it. There is Phlogiston in your heart. Yet I am grateful for it -- you would not have written so angrily -- but for the greatness of your affection & esteem"; concluding the letter "My heart is very heavy -- much more so than when I began to write --".