Lamb and his sister were always ready to appreciate every variety of
goodness, and doubtless their guests received an order something like
that which was addressed to the dwellers in Thomson's enchanting
castle:--

"Ye sons of Indolence! do what you will,
And wander where you list, through hall or glade;
Be no man's pleasure for another stayed:
Let each as likes him best his hours employ,
And cursed be he who minds his neighbor's trade!"

To these parties sometimes came Coleridge, who in conversation seems
to have been a happy mixture of a German philosopher and an Italian
_improvvisatore_. Here Hazlitt learned to utter the philosophic
criticisms which he most passionately believed in; and Lloyd, whose
intellect was one of peculiar refinement, discoursed modestly of
metaphysical problems, analyzing to an extent that Talfourd says was
positively painful. Here the social reformer Leigh Hunt came, and for
the moment forgot that social reforms were needed. Here the Opium-Eater
came, and his cloudy abstract loves and hates and visions were exploded
by the sparks of Elia's wit. Here the philosopher Godwin developed
philosophy out of whist. Here the pensive face of the Quaker poet,
Bernard Barton, shed a mild light upon the scene; and here the lawyer
Thomas Noon Talfourd came to admire the finest characters that he knew
of.

Having thus noticed the painful experience and unfaltering devotion to
noble aims which marked the career of Charles Lamb, we leave him with
his friends, and pass to notice the same elements in the life of his
brother wit.