How like herrings and onions our vices are in the morning after we have committed them. Samuel Taylor Coleridge More Quotes by Samuel Taylor Coleridge More Quotes From Samuel Taylor Coleridge Seldom can philosophic genius be more usefully employed than in thus rescuing admitted truths from the neglect caused by the very circumstance of their universal admission. Samuel Taylor Coleridge neglectgeniuscircumstances The intelligible forms of ancient poets, The fair humanities of old religion, The power, the beauty, and the majesty That had their haunts in dale or piny mountain, Or forest by slow stream, or pebbly spring, Or chasms and watery depths, all these have vanished; They live no longer in the faith of reason. Samuel Taylor Coleridge mountainhumanityspring Never to see or describe any interesting appearance in nature, without connecting it by dim analogies with the moral world, proves faintness of Impression. Nature has her proper interest; & he will know what it is, who believes & feels, that every Thing has a life of it's own, & that we are all one Life. Samuel Taylor Coleridge analogiesbelieveinteresting Hamlet 's character is the prevalence of the abstracting and generalizing habit over the practical. He does not want courage, skill, will, or opportunity; but every incident sets him thinking; and it is curious, and at the same time strictly natural, that Hamlet, who all the play seems reason itself, should he impelled, at last, by mere accident to effect his object. I have a smack of Hamlet myself, if I may say so. Samuel Taylor Coleridge opportunitycharacterthinking O let me be awake, my God! Or let me sleep alway. Samuel Taylor Coleridge awakelet-mesleep The blue and bright-eyed floweret of the brook, Hope's gentle gem, the sweet Forget-me-not. Samuel Taylor Coleridge blueforgetsweet The man hath penance done, And penance more will do. Samuel Taylor Coleridge penancedonemen I stood in unimaginable trance And agony that cannot be remembered. Samuel Taylor Coleridge trancerememberedagony Be that blind bard who on the Chian strand, By those deep sounds possessed with inward light, Beheld the Iliad and the Odyssey Rise to the swelling of the voiceful sea. Samuel Taylor Coleridge lightseasound But metre itself implies a passion , i.e. a state of excitement, both in the Poet's mind, & is expected in that of the Reader. Samuel Taylor Coleridge excitementpassionmind I am never very forward in offering spiritual consolation to any one in distress or disease. I believe that such resources, to be of any service, must be self-evolved in the first instance. I am something of the Quaker's mind in this, and am inclined to wait for the spirit. Samuel Taylor Coleridge offeringspiritualbelieve The Earth with its scarred face is the symbol of the Past; the Air and Heaven, of Futurity. Samuel Taylor Coleridge airheavenpast The secondary Imagination I consider as an echo of the former, co-existing with the conscious will, yet still as identical with the primary in the kind of its agency, and differing only in degree, and in the mode of its operation. It dissolves, diffuses, dissipates, in order to recreate: or where this process is rendered impossible, yet still at all events it struggles to idealize and to unify. It is essentially vital, even as all objects (as objects) are essentially fixed and dead. Samuel Taylor Coleridge echoesagencystruggle ...from the time of Kepler to that of Newton, and from Newton to Hartley, not only all things in external nature, but the subtlest mysteries of life and organization, and even of the intellect and moral being, were conjured within the magic circle of mathematical formulae. Samuel Taylor Coleridge circlesorganizationlife Of no agenor of any religion, or party or profession. The body and substance of his works came out of the unfathomable depths of his own oceanic mind. Samuel Taylor Coleridge partydepthmind A wild rose roofs the ruined shed, And that and summer well agree. Samuel Taylor Coleridge wild-rosesroofsummer The present system of taking oaths is horrible. It is awfully absurd to make a man invoke God's wrath upon himself, if he speaks false; it is, in my judgment, a sin to do so. Samuel Taylor Coleridge wrathspeakmen Experience informs us that the first defence of weak minds is to recriminate. Samuel Taylor Coleridge weakmindfirsts The Reformation in the sixteenth century narrowed Reform. As soon as men began to call themselves names, all hope of further amendment was lost. Samuel Taylor Coleridge reformnamesmen Dryden 's genius was of that sort which catches fire by its own motion; his chariot wheels get hot by driving fast. Samuel Taylor Coleridge geniusfirehot