BIB_ID
415345
Accession number
MA 1850.6
Creator
Coleridge, Samuel Taylor, 1772-1834.
Display Date
Place not specified, 1832 January 10.
Credit line
Purchased from Joanna Langlais, 1957.
Description
1 item (4 pages, with address) ; 22.2 x 18.7 cm
Notes
This collection, MA 1850, is comprised of five autograph letters signed and one autograph letter from Samuel Taylor Coleridge to James Gillman, written from November 10, 1816 through January 10, 1832.
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 individually as MA 1848- MA 1857.
Address panel with penciled notation, in an unknown hand, "Miss Steel."
Identity of recipients and date of writing from published letter cited below.
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 individually as MA 1848- MA 1857.
Address panel with penciled notation, in an unknown hand, "Miss Steel."
Identity of recipients and date of writing from published letter cited below.
Provenance
Purchased from Joanna Langlais in 1957 as a gift of the Fellows with the special assistance of Mrs. W. Murray Crane, Mr. Homer D. Crotty, Mr. and Mrs. Donald F. Hyde, Mr. Robert H. Taylor and Mrs. Landon K. Thorne. Formerly in the possession of Ernest Hartley Coleridge and Thomas Burdett Money-Coutts, Baron Latymer.
Summary
Giving his blessing to their betrothal, commenting, at length, on their relationship and suggesting they wait until they are financially more secure; saying "If two young Persons, both having arrived at years of discretion, have formed such and so exclusive an attachment to each other, that they calmly and reflectingly prefer the inward satisfaction and sense of security grounded on a mutual avowal of their affection, and the pledge and prospect of an ultimate union, at an indefinite period, to the chance - or even the probability of an earlier settlement in life under circumstances of equal or even great worldly ease and respectability - I see no moral or religious objection to such a betrothment...No good or wise man will wish or expect you to demand security against providence itself, and to defer your marriage till you have an independent fortune sufficient to set all contingencies at defiance! But every wise, every good man, and all who truly love you, must and will expect you not to marry, till there exist the regular means of maintenance adequate to the present expences, according to the rank of life, in which you have both been bred up, and to the Appearances desirable in a Clergyman and with a fair probability of income increasing with increased demands. And I do trust, that in determining this point you will agree to take your Parents on both sides, but especially your Mothers, as the Arbiters. I say the Mothers; because as the experienced Housewives, they are most competent to determine the Minimum on which you may with economy and no burthensome self-denial hope to live respectably. A pledge of this nature, on your parts, would, I should hope, go far to remove every important objection to what has now passed -- and I have so much confidence in the good sense and good principles of both of you, that I will not doubt but that God will sanctify this betrothment to the present moral discipline of your minds, and to your future happiness, here and hereafter;"
Catalog link
Department