Letter from Samuel Taylor Coleridge, Keswick, to William Godwin, 1803 June 10 : autograph manuscript signed.

Describing the work he is engaged to do for Daniel Stuart at the Morning Post and saying that this makes him reluctant to commit to any other projects; saying that he had intended to prepare a second edition of his Poems for the press, but, though there was relatively little work to do and strong incentives to do it, in the end he had to "give up the very Hope - the attempts acted so perniciously on my disorder;" adding that Wordsworth had asked him to write on a "poetic subject," but that project too he had to abandon: "It seemed a Dream, that I had ever thought on Poetry - or had ever written it - so remote were my Trains of Ideas from Composition, or Criticism on Composition;" adding that he has been very ill; saying that he is nevertheless anxious to help Godwin and that if Godwin will send him his biography of Chaucer, he will "instantly give it a perusal con amore - & partly from my reverential Love of Chaucer, & partly from my affectionate Esteem for his Biographer, the summer too bringing increase of Health with it, I doubt not, that my old mind will recur to me ; and I will FORTHWITH write a series of Letters containing a critique on Chaucer, & on the Life of Chaucer by W. Godwin, and publish them with my name either at once in a small volume - or in the Morning Post in the first instance - & republish them afterwards;" describing how he would address the subject: "The great Thing to be done is to present Chaucer stripped of all his adventitious matter - his Translations &c - to analyse his own real productions - to deduce his Province, & his Rank;" discussing how he would compare Chaucer to Shakespeare, Spenser and Dante, as well as the classical poets and dramatists: "For instance, in all the writings of the ancients I recollect nothing that strictly examined can be called Humour - yet Chaucer abounds with it - and Dante too, tho' in a very different way - Thus too, the passion for Personifications - & me judice, strong sharp practical good Sense, which I feel to constitute a strikingly characteristic Difference in favor of the feudal Poets;" adding that he could "give you a critical sketch of Poems, written by contemporaries of Chaucer, in Germany;" arguing that "a Life of Chaucer ought in the work itself, & in the appendices of the work, to make the Poet explain his Age, & to make the Age both explain the Poet, & evince the superiority of the Poet over his Age;" asking Godwin to do whatever he can to support Hazlitt's abridged edition of The Light of Nature Pursued (written by Abraham Tucker under the pseudonym of Edward Search - see the previous letter, MA 2204.20, for background); discussing the possible publication of the work on logic and philosophy described in the previous letter and saying that he could persuade his friends to publish it for him, but "I know, that the Booksellers not only do not encourage, but that they use unjustifiable artifices to injure works published on the Author's own account;" describing the state of the manuscript at the moment and his thoughts about turning it over to a printer; saying that he intends to present the work to booksellers as something practical and in demand, "a book, by which the Reader is to acquire not only Knowledge, but likewise Power;" requesting in a postscript that, if Godwin discusses the book with the publisher Richard Phillips, he will make sure to emphasize its practical nature.