Beschreibung:

COLERIDGE, Samuel Taylor (1772-1834). Autograph letter signed to Charles Augustus Tulk, Highgate, 15 March 1828 , apologising for not having contacted Tulk since the death of the latter's wife [in October 1824], 'If I said, that not a day has past since the hour of the tidings of desolation, in which I have not thought of you, and often (O how often!) with intense sympathy, I should affirm less than the truth', saying that he had written a long letter, then had a vision of Mrs. Tulk, after which the letter seemed so inadequate that he destroyed it, relating the illnesses of various members of the Gillman household, and of vexations with his publishers, and promising to write again, one page, 4to (224 x 188mm) , integral address leaf (slightly soiled, repaired in fold and address leaf); together with an autograph letter signed from Hartley Coleridge on the anniversary of his father's death, a memorandum on the latter, and an engraved portrait of the author. A very emotional letter on the death of a woman, to whom he was particularly attached. He explains how he was unable to write, and having written, 'On the fourth day, as I was sitting alone at my breakfast, I felt a sudden sensation of heat and fullness about my eyes as I was bending to take up a paper-knife that I had let fall - and instantly I had the most distinct ocular spectrum of the now blessed One exactly as I once saw her in your Carriage in Pall Mall, when she raised her eye-lid & streamed forth that soft yet rich light from her eyes as she returned my greeting - and of which I had spoken afterwards. - Instantly, a total change of my feelings took place - I became hysterically affected', but then destroyed the letter. The illness in the Gillman household included that of Mrs. Gillman, 'a Being inexpressively dear and valuable in my eyes', and he was reading the proofs of Aids to Reflection at the time. C.A. Tulk (1786-1849) was a man of fortune with a taste for philosophical speculation and an eminent Swedenborgian. He had met Coleridge in Littlehampton in 1817, had introduced him to Blake's poems and often attended Coleridge's Thursday evenings at Highgate. Published in Collected Correspondence , vol.V (Oxford: 1971). (4)