otion ages since, and that cannot cease forever; but chiefly it is born
of a dream-like, brooding eternity of speculation, which we can trace
neither to the eye alone, nor to the mouth, but rather to the effect
which both together produce in the countenance.

This is the face which for more than half a century opium veiled to
mortal eyes, and which refuses to reveal itself save through hints the
most fugitive and impalpable. Here are draperies and involutions of
mystery from which mere curiosity stands aloof. This is the head which
we have loved, and which in our eyes wears a triple wreath of glory: the
laurel for his Apollo-like art, the lotos-leaf for his impassioned
dreams, and roses for his most gentle and loving nature.

How much of that which glorified De Quincey was due to opium? Very
little as to quality, but very much as to the degree and the peculiar
manner in which original qualities and dispositions are developed, for
here it is that the only field of influence open to abnormal agencies
lies. Coleridge, as an opium-eater, is the only individual worthy of
notice in the same connection. Had _he_ also confessed, it is uncertain
what new revelations might have been made. It is certain that opium
exercised a very potent effect upon him; for it was generally after his
dose that his remarkable intellectual displays occurred. These displays
were mostly confined to his conversations, which were usually
long-winded metaphysical epics, evolving a continued series of
abstractions and analyses, and, for their movement, depending upon a
sort of poetic construction. A pity it is that we must content ourselves
with empty descriptions of this nature. Here, doubtless, if anywhere,
opium was an auxiliary to Coleridge. For a laudanum negus, whatever
there may be about it that is pernicious, will, to a mind that is
metaphysically predisposed, open up thoroughfares of thought which are
raised above the level of the gross material, and which lead into the
region of the shadowy. Show us the man who habitually carries pills of
_any_ sort in his waistcoat-pocket, be they opium or whatever else, and
we can assure you that that man is an _aerobat_,--that somehow, in one
sense or another, he walks in the air above other men's heads. Whatever
disturbs the healthful isolation of the nervous system is prosperous to
metaphysics, because it attracts the mental attention to the organism
through which thought is carried on. Numerous are the in