Samuel Coleridge
Samuel Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridgewas an English poet, literary critic and philosopher who, with his friend William Wordsworth, was a founder of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake Poets. He wrote the poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla Khan, as well as the major prose work Biographia Literaria. His critical work, especially on Shakespeare, was highly influential, and he helped introduce German idealist philosophy to English-speaking culture. Coleridge coined many familiar words and phrases,...
circle close drunk eyes floating hath holy milk round weave
And all should cry, Beware! Beware! / His flashing eyes, his floating hair! / Weave a circle round him thrice, / And close your eyes with holy dread, / For he on honey-dew hath fed, / And drunk the milk of Paradise.
friend friends-or-friendship maid wept woo
Acquaintance many, and conquaintance few, But for inquaintance I know only two - The friend I've wept and the maid I woo
hidden month night noise quiet sleeping woods
A noise like of a hidden brook. / In the leafy month of June, / That to the sleeping woods all night / Singeth a quiet tune.
rush stars stride
The sun's rim dips; the stars rush out: / At one stride comes the dark.
contrary dialects dreams far images language less various
The Language of the Dream/Night is contrary to that of Waking/Day. It is a language of Images and Sensations, the various dialects of which are far less different from each other, than the various Day-Languages of Nations.
cracked ice noises
The ice was here, the ice was there, / The ice was all around; / It cracked and growled, and roared and howled, / Like noises in a swound!
feed ministers mortal sacred whatever
All thoughts, all passions, all delights, whatever stirs this mortal frame, all are but ministers of love, and feed his sacred flame.
greater ideas mankind possess possessed wise
Only the wise possess ideas; the greater part of mankind are possessed by them.
blind deaf happy imagine man marriage union
The most happy marriage I can imagine to myself would be the union of a deaf man to a blind woman.
land power strange
I pass, like night, from land to land; / I have strange power of speech.
beautiful
I see them all so excellently fair, / I see, not feel, how beautiful they are!
came floating green
And ice, mast-high, came floating by, / As green as emerald.
crawl legs
Yea, slimy things did crawl with legs / Upon the slimy sea.
fall frost hang heard ministry quietly secret shall shining silent whether
Whether the eave-drops fall / Heard only in the trances of the blast, / Or if the secret ministry of frost / Shall hang them up in silent icicles, / Quietly shining to the quiet moon.