The letter is undated. In the Collected Letters of Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Griggs argues, based on Southey's letters from this period, that Coleridge must have written this letter in early August 1795. See the published edition of the correspondence, cited below, for additional information.
This collection, MA 1848, is comprised of 92 letters from Samuel Taylor Coleridge to Robert Southey, written between 1794 and 1819. See the collection-level record for more information (MA 1848.1-92).
This letter is from the Joanna Langlais Collection, a large collection of letters written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge to various recipients. The collection has been divided into subsets, based primarily on Coleridge's addressees, and these sub-collections have been cataloged as MA 1848-1857.
Address panel with part of a seal: "Robert Southey."
Assuring Southey that he does not doubt his "purposes and final determination" and saying that he is writing merely to provide possible ideas for Southey's response to his uncle Herbert Hill (who had recently written him a letter urging him to enter the church); arguing that "Pantisocracy is not the question" and its ultimate realization may take a "miraculous Millennium"; discussing the lure of money; writing "But the point is, whether or no you can perjure yourself"; saying that there are churchmen who "hold the necessity and moral optimism of our religious Establishment," who may disapprove of its "peculiar dogmas" but are fundamentally faithful to the institution; saying that he does not condemn these men, though he may disagree with them; arguing that Southey's case is different: "But you disapprove of an Establishment altogether -- you believe it iniquitous -- a mother of Crimes! -- It is impossible that you could uphold it by assuming the badge of Affiliation!"; discussing the prospects for Pantisocracy ("not bright -- but to the eye of reason as bright as when we first formed our Plan"); writing about the pull of "Domestic Happiness" and arguing that "it is not strange that those things, which in a pure form of society will constitute our first blessings, should in it's present morbid state, be our most perilous Temptations"; adding that he has written all this disinterestedly and Southey's decision "will in no wise affect my feelings, opinions, or conduct"; concluding "That Being, who is 'in will, in deed, Impulse of all to all' whichever be your determination, will make it ultimately the best" and "God love you, my dear Southey!"