courteous a manner as words of such a character would permit, "Why, Sir,
I think I've got rid of the greatest part of it already!"

Such were Coleridge's peculiarities, which were sometimes construed into
irregularities; but through his whole life, attracting notice by his
splendid genius, he fell too often under the observation of men who
busied themselves in magnifying small things, and minifying large ones.
About this period, that Volcano, in which all the worst passions of men
were collected, and which had been for some time emitting its black
smoke, at length exploded and rent society asunder. The shock was felt
throughout Europe; each party was over-excited, and their minds
enthralled by a new slavery--the one shouting out the blessings of
liberty and equality--the other execrating them, and prophesying the
consequences that were to follow:--

"There's no philosopher but sees
That rage and fear are one disease;
_Tho' that may burn, and this may freeze_,
They're both alike tho ague."

'Mad Ox'.

Combustibles composed of such ardent and evil spirits soon blaze out;
yet the evil does not stop when the blaze has ceased; it leaves an
excitement which is constantly disclosing itself in a restless morbid
vanity, a craving for distinction, and a love of applause, in its way as
dangerous as the thirst of gain, and the worship of the mammon of
unrighteousness.

Alas! the circulation of such anecdotes as have been here related of