The Literary Remains of Samuel Taylor Coleridge Volume Iii Part 3

PS. CX.

v. 2.

'The Lord shall send the rod of thy power out of Sion'; (saying) 'Rule', &c.

v. 3. Understand:

'Thy people shall offer themselves willingly in the day of conflict in holy clothing, in their best array, in their best arms and accoutrements. As the dew from the womb of the morning, in number and brightness like dew-drops; so shall be thy youth, or the youth of thee, the young volunteer warriors.'

v. 5.

'He shall shake,'

concuss, 'concutiet reges die irae suae,'

v. 6. For

'smite in sunder, or wound, the heads;'

some word answering to the Latin 'conqua.s.sare'.

v. 7. For 'therefore,' translate 'then shall he lift up his head again;'

that is, as a man languid and sinking from thirst and fatigue after refreshment.

N.B. I see no poetic discrepancy between vv. 1 and 5.

PS. CXVIII.

To be interpreted of Christ's church.

PS. CXXVI.

v. 5.

'As the rivers in the south.'

Does this allude to the periodical rains? [1]

As a transparency on some night of public rejoicing, seen by common day, with the lamps from within removed--even such would the Psalms be to me uninterpreted by the Gospel. O honored Mr. Hurwitz! Could I but make you feel what grandeur, what magnificence, what an everlasting significance and import Christianity gives to every fact of your national history--to every page of your sacred records!

[Footnote 1: See Horne in loc. note.--Ed.]

ARTICLES OF RELIGION.

XX.

It is mournful to think how many recent writers have criminated our Church in consequence of their own ignorance and inadvertence in not knowing, or not noticing, the contra-distinction here meant between power and authority. Rites and ceremonies the Church may ordain 'jure proprio': on matters of faith her judgment is to be received with reverence, and not gainsaid but after repeated inquiries, and on weighty grounds.

x.x.xVII.

It is lawful for Christian men, at the commandment of the magistrate, to wear weapons, and to serve in the wars.

This is a very good instance of an unseemly matter neatly wrapped up.

The good men recoiled from the plain words:

'It is lawful for Christian men at the command of a king to slaughter as many Christians as they can!'

Well! I could most sincerely subscribe to all these articles.

September, 1831.

NOTES ON HOOKER. [1]

'LIFE OF HOOKER' BY WALTON.

p. 67.

Mr. Travers excepted against Mr. Hooker, for that in one of his sermons he declared, 'That the a.s.surance of what we believe by the word of G.o.d, is not to us so certain as that which we perceive by sense.' And Mr. Hooker confesseth he said so, and endeavours to justify it by the reasons following.

There is, I confess, a shade of doubt on my mind as to this position of Hooker's. Yet I do not deny that it expresses a truth. The question in my mind is, only, whether it adequately expresses the whole truth. The ground of my doubt lies in my inability to compare two things that differ in kind. It is impossible that any conviction of the reason, even where no act of the will advenes as a co-efficient, should possess the vividness of an immediate object of the senses; for the vividness is given by sensation. Equally impossible is it that any truth of the super-sensuous reason should possess the evidence of the pure sense.

Even the mathematician does not find the same evidence in the results of transcendental algebra as in the demonstrations of simple geometry. But has he less a.s.surance? In answer to Hooker's argument I say,--that G.o.d refers to our sensible experience to aid our will by the vividness of sensible impressions, and also to aid our understanding of the truths revealed,--not to increase the conviction of their certainty where they have been understood.

WALTON'S APPENDIX.

Ib. p. 116.

It is a strange blind story this of the last three books, and of Hooker's live relict, the Beast without Beauty. But Saravia?--If honest Isaac's account of the tender, confidential, even confessional, friends.h.i.+p of Hooker and Saravia be accurate, how chanced it that Hooker did not entrust the ma.n.u.scripts to his friend who stood beside him in his last moments? At all events, Saravia must have known whether they had or had not received the author's last hand. Why were not Mr. Charke and the other Canterbury parson called to account, or questioned at least as to the truth of Mrs. Joan's story? Verily, I cannot help suspecting that the doubt cast on the authenticity of the latter books by the high church party originated in their dislike of portions of the contents.--In short, it is a blind story, a true Canterbury tale, dear Isaac! [2]

OF THE LAWS OF ECCLESIASTICAL POLITY.

Pref. c. iii. 7. p. 182.

The next thing hereunto is, to impute all faults and corruptions, wherewith the world aboundeth, unto the kind of ecclesiastical government established.