unfortunately retaining an external identity, _their_ mutual
contradictions and disagreeings are united under one name, and of course
are called lies, treachery, and rascality!"

Another letter from Lamb to Manning at this time tells the story of the
Charles Lloyd and Mary Hayes imbroglio. Lloyd had written to Miss Hayes
a very odd letter concerning her Godwinite creed, in which he refers to
her belief that she was in love with him and repeats old stories that
she had been in love both with Godwin and Frend. Here is one sentence:
"In the confounding medley of ordinary conversation, I have interwoven
my abhorrence of your principles with a glanced contempt for your
personal character." This letter Lloyd had given to his sister Olivia to
copy--"An ignorant Quaker girl," says Lamb, "I mean ignorant in the best
sense, who ought not to know, that such a thing was possible or in rerum
naturae that a woman should court a man." Later: "As long as Lloyd or I
have known Col. [Coleridge] so long have we known him in the daily and
hourly habit of quizzing the world by lyes, most unaccountable and most
disinterested fictions." And here is one more passage: "To sum up my
inferences from the above facts, I am determined to live a merry Life in
the midst of Sinners. I try to consider all men as such, and to pitch
any expectations from human nature as low as possible. In this view, all
unexpected Virtues are Godsends and beautiful exceptions."

Lamb had just met William Godwin (1756-1836), probably having been
introduced to him by Coleridge. Godwin, known chiefly by his _Political
Justice_, 1793; _Caleb Williams_, 1794, and _St. Leon_, 1799, stood at
that time for everything that was advanced in thought and conduct. We
shall meet with him often in the correspondence of the next few years.

Bishop Horsley (then of Rochester, afterwards St. Asaph's) was probably