akers or something else.

It was on the occasion of his publishing _Thalaba_, that his name was
first coupled with that of Wordsworth. His own words are, "I happened to
be residing at Keswick when Mr. Wordsworth and I began to be acquainted.
Mr. Coleridge also had resided there; and this was reason enough for
classing us together as a school of poets." There is not much external
resemblance, it is true, between _Thalaba_ and the _Excursion_; but the
same poetical motives will cause both to remain unread by the
multitude--unnatural comparisons, recondite theology, and a great lack of
common humanity. That there was a mutual admiration is found in Southey's
declaration that Wordsworth's sonnets contain the profoundest poetical
wisdom, and that the _Preface_ is the quintessence of the philosophy of
poetry.

SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE.--More individual, more eccentric, less
commonplace, in short, a far greater genius than either of his fellows,
Coleridge accomplished less, had less system, was more visionary and
fragmentary than they: he had an amorphous mind of vast proportions. The
man, in his life and conversation, was great; the author has left little
of value which will last when the memory of his person has disappeared. He
was born on the 21st of October, 1772, at Ottery St. Mary. His father was
a clergyman and vicar of the parish. He received his education at Christ's
Hospital in London, where, among others, he had Charles Lamb as a comrade,
and formed with him a friendship which lasted as long as they both lived.

EARLY LIFE.--There he was an erratic student, but always a great reader;
and while he was yet a lad, at the age of fourteen, he might have been
called a learned man.

He had little self-respect, and from stress of poverty he intended to
apprentice himself to a shoemaker; but friends who admired his learning
interfered to prevent this, and he was sent with a scholarship to Jesus
College, Cambridge, in 1791. Like Wordsworth and Southey, he was an
intense Radical at first; and on this account left college without his
degree in 1793. He then enlisted as a private in the 15th Light Dragoons;
but, although he was a favorite with his comrades, whose letters he wrote,
he made a very poor soldier. Having written a Latin sentence under his
saddle on the stable wall, his superior education was recognized; and he
was discharged from the service after only four months' duty. Eager for
adventure, he joined Southey a