qualities, and early love of domestic life, he would have been well
content to tread an humbler path, but it was otherwise ordained!

However excellent for the many, the system adopted by our universities
was ill suited for a mind like Coleridge's, and there were some who felt
that a College routine was not the kind of education which would best
evolve, cultivate, and bring into training powers so 'unique'. It has
been repeated, 'ad nauseam', that great minds will not descend to the
industrious accumulation of those acquirements best suited to fit them
for independence. To say that Coleridge would not 'condescend' would be
a calumny,--nay, when his health permitted, he would drudge and work
more laboriously at some of the mechanical parts of literature, than any
man I ever knew. To speak detractingly of great and good men is
frequently the result of malice combined with egotism. Though it would
be injustice not to admit that he has had warm admirers and deeply
affectionate friends, it is much to be regretted that there have been
persons who have strangely maligned Coleridge, and who have attributed
to him vices of which he was innocent. Had these vices existed, they
would not have found any unfair extenuation in this memoir, nor would
they have been passed over without notice. In answer to calumnies at
that time in circulation, (and with sorrow and just indignation it is
added that these reports originated with some who called themselves his
friends; but, alas! most false and hypocritical!) the following minute
from his notes is quoted:

"My academic adventures and indiscretions must have seemed
unpardonable sins," that is, as they were related by the tale-bearers
and gossips of the day. "I mention these," adds he, "because the only
immoralities that can without the grossest slander be laid to my
charge, were all comprised within the space of the last two years of