[From
The Coleridge Bulletin New Series No 11, Spring
1998, pp.48-60]
It is on record that Coleridge was flogged at school for his
sceptical reading habits. (1) He apparently admitted to being an infidel.
At Cambridge,
however, he is keen to demonstrate that this brief period of infidelity is
over. A letter to his brother George (7 April 1794) explains that the nature of
his ‘religious creed’ had pivoted on the dilemma between Christianity and infidelity:
“I had too much Vanity to be altogether a Christian—too much tenderness of
Nature to be utterly an Infidel” (CL 1:44). The “pleasure” that Coleridge
gained from reading Voltaire and Helvetius is apparently overcome by “the
beauty of Holiness in the Gospel.”
The letter to his brother George is written at a time when
Coleridge is repenting for his misspent youth. An earlier letter (23 February
1794) lists some of the causes of his penitence: his “Tutor’s Bill”, a shameful
Cowardice of sensibility”, “idleness”, “Debauchery”, “the
uproar of senseless Mirth”, and of seizing “the empty gratifications of the
moment.” (CL 1:36). The ‘George’ letters of the period seem to contain a
genuine sense of remorse. Coleridge is trying to reassure his brother of his new
efforts to “cultivate such habits of thinking and acting” that will lead to a
more orthodox Christian way of life (CL 1:44). It could be that at this moment
of great self-reprobation, Coleridge felt that his fascination with sceptical
and heterodox systems had ceased. These interests, however, were not to be so
easily displaced.
[49]
McFarland has explained that Coleridge had an enduring
repulsion and attraction for pantheism. (2) The attraction to “one life”
philosophy that he shared with Wordsworth and Thelwall is apparent in
Coleridge’s poetry:
But ‘tis God/diffused through all, that doth make one whole
(Religious Musings, 1794-1796)
One intellectual breeze/At once the Soul of each, and God
of all
(The Eolian Harp, 1795)
Infinite myriads of self-conscious minds
Are one all-conscious Spirit
(Destiny of Nations, 1796)
Himself in all, and all things in himself
(Frost at Midnight, 1798)
The Mighty One that persecuteth me is on this side and on
that; he pursueth my soul like the wind, like the sand-blast he passeth through
me; he is around even as the air!
(The Wanderings of Caine, 1798)
Flirting with pantheist or materialist systems carried
historical dangers of association with atheism. This is apparent in the work of
one of Coleridge’s sonnet heroes (1794), the prominent Unitarian, Joseph
Priestley. In Disquisitions relating to Matter and Spirit (1777)
Priestley explained how his “hypothesis” on “the Materiality of the divine
nature” led to charges of atheism. By asserting that “the Deity” was not made of
“an immaterial substance”, but consisted of matter
[50]
like man and the
universe, Priestley was accused of denying the existence of God. (3)
Coleridge became alert to the possible atheistic dimension
of Priestley’s system. A note book entry dated 1796-7 suggests that Coleridge
was beginning to see a necessary connection between Unitarianism and Atheism:
“Unitarianism/travelling from orthodoxy to Atheism—why” (NB 1: 80, G74). He
responded by joining the historical attack against Priestley. In a letter (20
March 1796) to the Reverend John Edwards, Coleridge maintains that Priestley’s
system is equal to atheism: “But if God be every Thing, every Thing is
God—: which is all, the Atheists assert” (CL 1:112). Coleridge was dissatisfied
with Priestley’s system for not making God distinct as an intelligent first
cause in the universe. It is the same objection that he makes against the
materialist systems in the Bristol
lectures (1795) which I examine later in this paper.
Coleridge’s syncretic approach to religious
and philosophic systems demonstrate his explorative nature. McFarland
explains that Coleridge’s “persistent endeavour was to make a place for all
facts and view points, however varied.” (4) His interests in Hartley,
Priestley, Godwin, Spinoza and Berkeley (to list some) set him in opposition to
orthodox Christianity. He selected and rejected ideas as he saw fit. This is
apparent in his relationship with Godwin. The Bristol lectures demonstrate that Coleridge
incorporated many of Godwin’s ideas but emphatically contested his atheism.
Andrews called the incorporation of these ideas “Godwinism plus God.” (5)
[51]
Coleridge’s incorporation of different systems presented a
challenge to orthodox Christianity, but consistently fell short of embracing atheism.
The “mitred Atheism” of the Religious Musings was invested with “daemon
power” and was seen to embody “all evil things.” The “owlet Atheism” in Fears
in Solitude is obscured from the “glorious vision of “heaven.” In a
notebook entry dated 1795-6 we learn that Coleridge is planning to compose a
hymn as a means of “a dissection of Atheism” (NB 1: 174, G.169, 16). This
“dissection” materialises in the Lectures on Politics and Religion (LPR
92-164).
Six months after the penitent letter to his brother George
(CL 1:44), Mary Evans shows concern that Coleridge may have become an atheist.
A letter October 1794 explains: “There is a God—Coleridge! Though I have been
told (indeed I do not believe it) that you doubt of his existence and
disbelieve a hereafter.” The letter is a response to rumours. It addresses two
fundamental concerns: 1) that Coleridge is about to enter into a pantisocratic
scheme; 2) that he has ceased to believe in God.
On both accounts Coleridge is given the benefit of the doubt
by Mary Evans. On the pantisocratic issue it is claimed: “Were I for a moment
to imagine it true, I should be obliged to listen with a more patient
Ear to suggestions, which I have rejected a thousand times with scorn and
anger.” On the question of Coleridge’s atheism, her own fears are answered
positively: “No! You have too much sensibility to be an Infidel.” (6)
“Sensibility” in this letter alludes to Coleridge’s mental responsiveness, his
power of reason. This is set in opposition to the “rash”, “extravagant”, and
“extreme” characteristics of the “infidel.” Thus Mary Evans laments the day
when she might be “forced to exclaim” that Coleridge’s “noble mind is here
[52]
o’erthrown, Blasted with
ecstacy.” Mary Evans wants to think the best of the man she “once loved.” She
thus dismisses rumours that are partly true. Coleridge was involved in a
pantisocratic plan, but was certainly no atheist.
Certain historical factors have a bearing on why Coleridge
might have been incorrectly judged as an atheist. There was a tendency in
conservative opinion to make the link between the reform movement at home and
the Jacobinic atheism of revolutionary France. (7) Thus Coleridge’s
Unitarian, democratic, and pantisocratic beliefs implicate him notionally with
atheism. He supported the repeal of the Test/Corporation acts, opposed the war
with France,
and was committed to the principles of “aspheterizism” (“the equalisation of
property” - CL 1: 50, 1794).
Coleridge also gave support at the trial of William Frend, a
well known Unitarian reformer at Cambridge.
In doing so, he aligned himself with the side of rational dissenters who were
being categorised as atheists. (8) In his Account of the Proceedings
Frend says that he had been called a “heretick, deist, infidel” and “atheist”. (9)
He went on to explain that his expulsion from Cambridge had been prejudiced by a court
deliberation “that breathed nothing but atheism
[53]
and
anarchy.” (10) The Vice Chancellor of the University, Isaac Milner,
supported Frend’s expulsion. He saw it as “the ruin of the Jacobin party as a
university thing.” (11)
Coleridge was implicated in what James Mackintosh
called the “savage war-whoop of atheism”: (12) the tendency to treat all
dissenters as irreligionists. It is understandable that Mary Evans (and indeed
others) might have mistaken Coleridge’s involvement to entail a notion of
atheism. He kept her informed of his political tastes at Cambridge. He gave her an indication that he
was supporting the opposition against Pitt. A letter dated 7 February explains:
“Have you read Mr. Fox’s letter to the Westminster Electors? . . . It is quite
the political Go at Cambridge,
and has converted many souls to the Foxite Faith” (CL 1: 151). The pamphlet
dealt with the idea that the Government should negotiate peace with France
to “avert the calamities of war.” (13)
It is not until a year after he leaves Cambridge that Coleridge’s
position on atheism becomes clear. The Lectures on Politics and Religion
(1795) extricate him from the early rumours. They
supply a substantial discourse on atheists and atheism which we shall now
examine.
[54]
On the 15th May 1795, Coleridge borrowed Cudworth’s True
Intellectual System (1743) from the Bristol Library. (14) Some days
later (probably 19 May) he incorporates the work into his Lecture 1.
Coleridge refers to the two ancient systems of atheism mentioned by Cudworth: (15)
the “atomical” and “hylozoic” systems of Democritus and Strato. Coleridge
maintained that it was the legacy of the atomistic and hylozoic systems that
caused contemporary atheists “to exclude our God and Untenant the Universe”
(LPR 100). The atomic system views all life as accidental and corruptible with
no intelligent principle to guide affairs. (16) The hylozoic system
maintains an incorruptible “plastic nature” which gives matter an inner
directive principle without consciousness or intelligence. (17)
Like Cudworth, Coleridge sets out to contest both systems.
Coleridge starts with the atomistic theory. He disputes the idea that the
“accidental play of Atoms” could bring about “the ineffable Beauty of Things
from a lucky hit in the Blind Uproar” (LPR98). Here Coleridge calls upon
Maclaurin’s Account of Sir Isaac Newton (1748). (18) The
“ineffable Beauty” and “Blind Uproar” are terms that Maclaurin uses to present
a design argument in favour of a deity. (19) It is this position that
Coleridge follows earlier in the lecture (LPR 93):
[55]
“The universe seems to make the
belief of a Deity almost an Axiom.” (20) Coleridge finds it
inconceivable that the “accidental play of atoms” could create such “a polished
and accurate Watch or Timepiece” as the universe (LPR 98). (21) He
claims that the absurdity of this notion caused the hylozoic atheists to bring
in “plastic natures” to account for the organisation of atomic structure: (22)
Of this Absurdity later Atheists have been ashamed, and
have therefore substituted certain plastic Natures as inherent in each particle
of Matter—certain inconceivable Essences that are, as it were, the unthinking
Souls of each atom! But how these Unthinking Essences came to agree among each
other so as by their different & opposite operations to form one Whole is a
Mystery into which the pious Disciples of Atheism deem it irreverent to
inquire. (LPR 98-9).
The plastic nature of the hylozoic systems gives matter a
self-active power or inherent ability to organise itself. (23) The
universe then requires no deity in order to function. It is the lack of an
intelligent principle that Coleridge takes particularly to task. He does not
accept that elementary particles of matter can act independently of a higher
intelligent force. He thus describes these particles in incongruous terms: they
become “blind almighties”, or “Ignorant Omniscients” (LPR 98-100).
[56]
In Lecture 1, atheism is largely disputed on
intellectual grounds. The atomistic and hylozoic systems are seen to “have
demonstrated the limited nature of human intellect” (LPR 97). They fail to
recognise the intelligent force of God at work in nature.
In Lecture 3, Coleridge gives some reasons for this
deficiency in atheistic thinking. He sets out to demonstrate that the atheistic
state of mind is caused by amoral activity. Sensual pleasure is seen to play a
fundamental role in weakening the intellect:
But the unhappy man who has imbibed the detested System of
Atheism in his Childhood or Youth, him pity him avoid. All the
predisposing causes of Virtue are taken from him—nothing remains that can
enlargen or soften. The intellectual Pleasures which substitute a efined Luxury of Feelings for the grossness of bodily
Appetite, the emotions of heaven-directed Gratitude, the cheerings of
death-deriding Hope, are all vanished. (LPR 157-8).
Coleridge seems to incorporate two main sources here. The
first is Hartley’s Observations of Man (1749). Coleridge follows Hartley
in the idea that “gross” sensual pleasures have involuntary results on the
intellect. (24) Hartley claims that “sensible pleasures are the Foundation
of the intellectual ones, which are formed from them in Succession, according
to the law of association.” (25) The idea is that “sensible pleasures”
create lasting impressions on the mind. These impressions can be reactivated
through the association of ideas. Thus unwholesome bodily pursuits have
unwholesome results on the
[57]
thinking
process. (26) To demonstrate this point, Coleridge uses Epicurus as an
example. A moral system based on “the principle of gross self-interest” is seen
to lead to the false idea “that the World was formed by the blind Play of
Atoms” (LPR 157).
Much of what Coleridge says about the atheistic tendency to
gratify the sensual appetite (LPR158) is found in Cudworth’s True
Intellectual System (1743). Cudworth claims that “appetite and Passion”, an
“interest in carnality” and “sottishness”, all contribute to bias the mind
against truth. Thus it is a lack of morality “which inclines men to atheize.” (27)
Coleridge also takes issue with atheists for denying the
existence of benevolence in the universe (LPR 158). Coleridge turns his
attention to the anti-familial ideas of Godwin. Godwin denied the idea that
domestic affections were fundamental to the creation of benevolence. He
preferred a rational appraisal of familial relations: “I ought to prefer no
human to another, because that being is my father, my wife or my son, but
because, for reasons which equally appeal to all understandings.” (28)
In contrast to Godwin, Coleridge insists that “the most
expansive benevolence is that effected and rendered
permanent by social and domestic affections” (LPR 162). Coleridge follows
Hartley in the idea that benevolent feelings are first developed by association
within the family. This benevolence then extends to society and more widely to
the rest of humanity. (29)
[58]
Coleridge explains that the nurturing process may deliver a
child from “gross self-interest” to “pure benevolence” (LPR 113-9). (30)
Thus he has sympathy for anyone who is born and socialised in an atheistic
environment: “But an Atheist among Atheists and born of an Atheist is truly an
object of our pity” (LPR 339). Such a person, however, is not a lost cause. If
removed from the associative environment that causes atheism, moral progress
can be made. “Atheists” are “benefited by example”; if “educated within the
sphere of religious Influence” and “secluded from Temptation” they can be much
improved (LPR 339).
Coleridge maintains that there is potential for moral
development in the human condition. A letter (17 December 1796) to the atheist
John Thelwall explains: “Christianity regards morality as a process—it finds a
man vicious and unsusceptable of noble motives; & gradually leads him, at
least, desires to lead him, to the height of disinterested Virtue” (CL 1: 164).
The idea of morality as a “process” seems to play a fundamental part in
Coleridge’s relationship with Thelwall. Whilst Coleridge contests the system of
atheism, he looks for the redeeming features in the individual atheist. This is
apparent when Coleridge identifies certain characteristics in Thelwall that
correspond to the Christian ideal of universal benevolence:
I really love you, and can count but a few human beings,
whose hand I would welcome with a more hearty Grasp of Friendship . . . I must
be blind not to Perceive that you present in your daily & hourly practice
the Feelings of Universal Love . . . You possess fortitude, and
Purity, & a Large portion of brotherly - kindness & universal Love (CL
164).
[59]
The fact that they “hold different creeds” with
regard to “religion” (CL 1: 156, 1796) does not stop Coleridge befriending
Thelwall. Coleridge would like to see “a progression in Thelwall’s “moral
character” (CL 1:164). The potential for this progression is duly recognised in
the characteristics of “brotherly-kindness & universal love” (CL 1: 164).
Thelwall then, is judged on his virtue, not on his belief in the system of
atheism. He is seen to possess the qualities that would otherwise make him a
good Christian.
Coleridge objects to certain qualities that are seen to be
intrinsically linked to the system of atheism: intellectual malfunction,
immorality, and a lack of universal benevolence. These objections are mostly
expressed in dispassionate and intellectual terms. In other words, Coleridge
uses rational criteria to explain the flaws of atheism. Coleridge’s rejection
of atheism (and scepticism in general), however, is also seen to come about
through his emotive attraction to Christianity. He articulates this emotional
response in terms of the ‘heart’ gaining victory over the ‘head.’ The letter (7
April 1794) to his brother George explains:
Fond of the dazzle of Wit, fond of subtlety of Argument, I
could not read without some degree of pleasure the levities of Voltaire, or the
reasonings of Helvetius—but tremblingly alive to the feelings of humanity, and
su[s]ceptible of the charms of Truth my Heart forced me to admire the beauty of
Holiness in the Gospel. (CL 1:44)
Christianity is expressed as a
heartfelt truth. It triumphs over his speculative interests (Voltaire and
Helvetius). This is apparent much later in the Biographia Literaria
(1817). When talking of his radical years, Coleridge claims: “My head was with
Spinoza, though my whole heart remained with Paul and John” (BL 1.134).
The Lectures on Politics and Religion (1795) contain Coleridge’s first sustained challenge to atheism.
They dispel the type of doubts that Mary Evans raised with regard to Coleridge
being an
[60]
atheist at Cambridge. While he was emphatically
opposed to the system of atheism, Coleridge befriended and related to many
atheists in his life (Thelwall, Godwin, Holcroft). He
looked for the characteristics in people that corresponded to his own Christian
ideals. If men had potential for good, then Coleridge felt that this could be
developed into the eventual belief in God. He thus never seemed to tire in his
efforts to Christianise his fellow brethren.
Michael Murphy.
Notes
1. See Table Talk (London,
1990) p84; Colmer, J., Coleridge, Critic of society (Oxford, 1959) p2; Hanson, L., The
Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (London,
1938); Gillman, J., The Life of Samuel Taylor Coleridge (London, 1838) p17-18, 33.
2. McFarland, T., Coleridge and The
Pantheist Tradition (Oxford,
1969) p9.
3. Priestley, J., Disquisitions Relating to Matter and Spirit (London, 1777) p103-153.
4. Ibid, p98.
5. The Godwinian ideas in the Bristol lectures: “That property was the
source of inequality and injustice; that government was the cause of more evil
than good; that vice was the result of social circumstances; that the required
revolution would be bloodless and non-violent, and would take the form of the
intellectual and moral conversion of the masses.” See Andrews, S., in The
Coleridge Bulletin, Spring
(Somerset, 1996)
p22.
6. The terms ‘infidel’ and ‘atheist’ were often used synonymously in the
eighteenth century. Coleridge tended to be more specific in his usage of the
terms. He uses ‘infidel’ to refer to scriptural sceptics like Paine, and
‘atheist’ to those who deny the existence of God.
7. See Schofield, T., ‘Conservative Political Thought in Britain in
Response to the French Revolution’ in The Historical Journal, vol 29
(Cambridge, 1986) p602-5; Claeys, G., ‘The French Revolution Debate and British
Political Thought’ in History of Political Thought, vol 11 (Glasgow,
1990) p59-80; Thompson, E,P., ‘Hunting The Jacobin Fox’ in A Journal of
Historical Studies, numbers 142-5 (Oxford, 1994) p94-140; Mitchell, A.,
‘The Association Movement of 1792-3’ in The Historical Journal, vol 4
(Cambridge, 1961) p56-77.
8. Roe, N., Wordsworth and Coleridge, The Radical Years (London, 1988) p92-3; Henriques, U., Religious Toleration
in England 1787-1833 (London, 1961) p125.
9. Frend, W., An Account of the Proceedings in the University of
Cambridge against William Frend (Cambridge,
1793) p89.
10. Ibid, p181-2
11. Gunning, H., Reminiscences of the University,
Town and Country of Cambridge, from the year
1780 vol 2 (London,
1854) 1. 283.
12. Mackintosh, J., Vindiciae Gallicae, Defence
of the French Revolution and Its English Admirers 1780, against Accusations of
the Right Hon. Edmund Burke (1791).
13. See The Speech of the Right Hon.
Charles James Fox . . . at the opening of Parliament, December 13, 1792,
5th ed. B.M. 8135. b. in Colmer, J., Coleridge, Critic
of Society (Oxford,
1959) p2.
14. Cudworth (1617-88) was the foremost Cambridge Platonist. The first
edition of The True Intellectual System was in 1678. Coleridge borrowed
the 1743 edition. See Whalley, G., The Bristol Library Borrowings
of Southey and Coleridge, 1793-8, The Library, 5th series (1949)
p120.
15. Ibid, p104-5.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. Coleridge borrowed Maclaurin the day before Lecture 1 (18 May
1795). See Whalley, Ibid, p121.
19. Maclaurin, C., An Account of Sir Isaac Newton’s Philosophical
Discoveries (1748) (reprint, London,
1968) p4.
20. Ibid, p381.
21. Patton and Mann explain that although Paley’s Natural Theology
(1802) “gave the watch/universe analogy its widest currency . . . it appears in
many works within the sphere of C’s early reading from Cicero (De natura deorum 2.34) to Thomas
Burnett and Priestley.” See Lectures on Politics and Religion (London, 1971) p98,
n4.
22. Here Coleridge follows Cudworth, Ibid, p109, 144.
23. Ibid, p105.
24. Hartley, D., Observations of Man, His Frame, His Duty,
and His Expectations (1749), vol 1 (Hildesheim, 1967) p82, 416.
25. Ibid, p213.
26. Ibid, vol 2, p211.
27. Cudworth, Ibid, p12, 104, 134.
28. Godwin, W., An Enquiry concerning
Political Justice and its influence on general virtue and happiness, 2 vols
(London, 1793)
p852.
29. Compare Coleridge’s Lectures (1795), Ibid, p46, 48,133-4,
162, 164, with Hartley, Ibid, vol 1, p14-15, 216-7; vol 2, p271-282, 291-304.
30. Ibid, vol 1, p494.
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