Reflections on Having Left a Place of Retirement
Encyclopedia
Reflections on Having Left a Place of Retirement was a poem written by English
poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge
in 1796. Like his earlier poem The Eolian Harp
, the poem discusses Coleridge's understanding of nature and his married life, which was suffering from problems that developed after the previous poem. Overall, the poem focuses on man's relationship with nature in its various aspects ranging from experiencing an Edenic state
to having to abandon a unity with nature in order to fulfill a moral obligation to mankind. The discussion of man's obligation to each other leads into a discussion on the difference between the life of a philosopher and the life of a poet. By the end of the poem, the narrator follows the philosophical path in a manner similar to what Coleridge sought to do. The response to the poem from critics was mostly positive with many of them emphasizing the religious aspects of the poem in their analysis.
and began to travel throughout England in order to meet with various philosophers and political theorists. In part, he was trying to meet with people so he could raise subscriptions for his various works. During this time, he would write home constantly to his pregnant wife and was concerned about her state of health. His feelings of guilt, along with a fever that he treated with laudanum, affected him greatly and caused him to express these feelings in a letter to Josiah Wade on 10 February 1796: "My past life seems to me like a dream, a feverish dream! all one gloomy huddle of strange actions, and dim-discovered motives! Friendships lost by indolence, and happiness murdered by mismanaged sensibilities."
After the letter, Coleridge returned to his wife who was now living with her family at Redcliffe Hill, Bristol
. As he wrote The Eolian Harp to commemorate coming to his home at Clevedon, Coleridge composed Reflections on Having Left a Place of Retirement on leaving it. The poem was not included in Coleridge's 1796 collection of poems as it was probably still incomplete, but it was published in the October 1796 Monthly Magazine under the title Reflections on Entering into Active Life. A poem Which Affects Not to be Poetry. Reflections was included in Coleridge's 28 October 1797 collection of poems and the collections that followed. Of his early poems, Coleridge believed that Reflections was his best.
The poem continues with a goodbye to the valley and asks if his life of pleasure was appropriate:
The narrator describes the reasons why he is leaving Clevedon along with the allowance of remembering his former life there after his work is done:
as the scene for both is the same. The land of Clevedon is praised and seen full of life, and it serves as contrast to escaping from the real world into fantasy and pondering about the abstract. Both poems also describe Coleridge's relationship with his wife and feelings of sexual desire. The imagination aspects of the poem represent an unwillingness to accept nature on its own and rejects the conclusion of The Eolian Harp. Although the land of Clevedon can bring one closer to God, one cannot just simply exist in such an area but must seek out truth.
Feeling the need to seek out truth creates a separation between the mind of a poet and the mind of a philosopher. The poem reconciles the two by allowing the pursuer of truth to reflect on his time of simply enjoying nature and God's presence. However, the philosopher aspect is dominant and the individual must go out and try to help humanity. Nature can be soothing, but the narrator must reject the Edenic
quality of nature because such a state is not yet appropriate. The Edenic imagery figures into many of Coleridge's poems and is reinforced with the image of myrtle trees and takes on many forms within his poetry. In Reflections, to dwell in an Edenic state is a paradise in which the narrator leaves voluntarily because he cannot ignore the problems of the world like a coward. Instead, the individual is compelled to join with mankind and even the lowest form of benefiting mankind is superior to doing nothing at all.
The image of nature and other themes reappears in Fears in Solitude
(1798). The later poem recreates the "Valley of Seclusion" image in the form of a dell. Even the image of a passerby looking in on the cottage found in Reflection is repeated. Similarly, the compulsion to enter into the world and help mankind is included, but it is altered from being motivated by guilt to a warning message against a possible invasion from outside forces. As such, Fears in Solitude does not seek to leave the location to help mankind, but to stay as a protector over his family.
In Coleridge's own life, he tried to follow the path of the philosopher, but the 10 July 1834 entry in Table Talk admits that he was unable to do so: "so I own I wish life and strength had been spared to me to complete my Philosophy. For, as God hears me, the originating, continuing, and sustaining wish and design in my heart were to exalt the glory of his name; and, which is the same thing in order words, to promote the improvement of mankind. But visum aliter Deo, and his will be done."
In terms of Coleridge's marriage, Reflections differs from The Eolian Harp by saying that there were problems within the marriage, especially with it distracting Coleridge from nature and the world outside of the home that he shared with his wife. The poem expresses feelings of solitude and confinement, and there is a difference between the worlds inside and outside of the cottage in a similar manner to the focus found within Coleridge's Kubla Khan
. This is especially true with a focus from the private to the public spheres. Within the outside world, the poem's narrator is separate from mankind, but his focus is ever on mankind and contains both a religious and political component. The image of "One Life" within the poem compels him to abandon the sensual pleasures of the cottage and to pursue a path of helping mankind.
, although in many versions it is misquoted. The line, "sermoni propiori", is from Horace's Satires 1.4.42 and is intended to describe the work as a whole as connecting to prose. The second stanza, where the narrator describes Dial Hill as the "stony Mount", is connected to William Crowe
's Lewesdon Hill (1788). It is possible that Reflections could have been an imitation of Crowe's poetry. In terms of Edenic imagery, including types of plant life, Coleridge's are connected to John Milton
's Paradise Lost
Book Four.
During the 20th century, Virginia Radley declares that Reflections "although not so striking in imagery as is the 'Eolian Harp,' still has much to recommend it in this respect [...] The impression left with the reader that the cottage and its surroundings are inestimably lovely, quiet, and peaceful is a paramount one, while the dead lines [...] do not move the reader at all, except to make him wonder if the move from Clevedon for the cause of humanity was a necessary one." Richard Haven argues that the poem's image of the moral path is weak because "the returned traveller can only dismiss his ascent to another mode of being as a pleasant but useless memory".
Anthony Harding believes "it is important to recognize that it steps outside the idyllic but circumscribed scene of 'The Eolian Harp', and admits the impossibility, in a fallen world, of human self-sufficiency." Oswald Doughty states that the "most important additions" to Coleridge's 1797 edition of poems included Reflections. Richard Holmes points out that both Reflections and The Eolian Harp "mark a new stage in Coleridge's exploration of the sacred relations between man and nature, which gradually become more serious and impassioned as they carry increasingly theological implications behind his Romanticism."
England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Scotland to the north and Wales to the west; the Irish Sea is to the north west, the Celtic Sea to the south west, with the North Sea to the east and the English Channel to the south separating it from continental...
poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was an English poet, Romantic, 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 is probably best known for his poems The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Kubla...
in 1796. Like his earlier poem The Eolian Harp
The Eolian Harp
The Eolian Harp was a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1795 and published in his 1796 poetry collection. It is one of the early conversation poems and discusses Coleridge's anticipation of a marriage with Sara Fricker along with the pleasure of conjugal love. However, The Eolian Harp is...
, the poem discusses Coleridge's understanding of nature and his married life, which was suffering from problems that developed after the previous poem. Overall, the poem focuses on man's relationship with nature in its various aspects ranging from experiencing an Edenic state
Garden of Eden
The Garden of Eden is in the Bible's Book of Genesis as being the place where the first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, lived after they were created by God. Literally, the Bible speaks about a garden in Eden...
to having to abandon a unity with nature in order to fulfill a moral obligation to mankind. The discussion of man's obligation to each other leads into a discussion on the difference between the life of a philosopher and the life of a poet. By the end of the poem, the narrator follows the philosophical path in a manner similar to what Coleridge sought to do. The response to the poem from critics was mostly positive with many of them emphasizing the religious aspects of the poem in their analysis.
Background
After marrying Sarah Fricker in autumn 1795, Coleridge left their home at ClevedonClevedon
Clevedon is a town and civil parish in the unitary authority of North Somerset, which covers part of the ceremonial county of Somerset, England...
and began to travel throughout England in order to meet with various philosophers and political theorists. In part, he was trying to meet with people so he could raise subscriptions for his various works. During this time, he would write home constantly to his pregnant wife and was concerned about her state of health. His feelings of guilt, along with a fever that he treated with laudanum, affected him greatly and caused him to express these feelings in a letter to Josiah Wade on 10 February 1796: "My past life seems to me like a dream, a feverish dream! all one gloomy huddle of strange actions, and dim-discovered motives! Friendships lost by indolence, and happiness murdered by mismanaged sensibilities."
After the letter, Coleridge returned to his wife who was now living with her family at Redcliffe Hill, Bristol
Bristol
Bristol is a city, unitary authority area and ceremonial county in South West England, with an estimated population of 433,100 for the unitary authority in 2009, and a surrounding Larger Urban Zone with an estimated 1,070,000 residents in 2007...
. As he wrote The Eolian Harp to commemorate coming to his home at Clevedon, Coleridge composed Reflections on Having Left a Place of Retirement on leaving it. The poem was not included in Coleridge's 1796 collection of poems as it was probably still incomplete, but it was published in the October 1796 Monthly Magazine under the title Reflections on Entering into Active Life. A poem Which Affects Not to be Poetry. Reflections was included in Coleridge's 28 October 1797 collection of poems and the collections that followed. Of his early poems, Coleridge believed that Reflections was his best.
Poem
The poem begins with an idealisation of a "Valley of Seclusion":-
- In the open air
- Our Myrtles blossom'd; and across the porch
- Thick Jasmins twined: the little landscape round
- Was green and woody, and refresh'd the eye.
- It was a spot which you might aptly call
- The Valley of Seclusion! (lines 4–9)
The poem continues with a goodbye to the valley and asks if his life of pleasure was appropriate:
- I was constrain'd to quit you. Was it right,
- While my unnumber'd brethren toil'd and bled,
- That I should dream away the entrusted hours
- On rose-leaf beds, pampering the coward heart
- With feelings all too delicate for use? (lines 44–48)
The narrator describes the reasons why he is leaving Clevedon along with the allowance of remembering his former life there after his work is done:
- I therefore go, and join head, heart, and hand,
- Active and firm, to fight the bloodless fight
- Of Science, Freedom, and the Truth in CHRIST.
- Yet oft when after honourable toil
- Rests the tir'd mind, and waking loves to dream
- My Spirit shall revisit thee, dear Cot! (lines 60–65)
Themes
The themes of Reflections are connected to Coleridge's The Eolian HarpThe Eolian Harp
The Eolian Harp was a poem written by Samuel Taylor Coleridge in 1795 and published in his 1796 poetry collection. It is one of the early conversation poems and discusses Coleridge's anticipation of a marriage with Sara Fricker along with the pleasure of conjugal love. However, The Eolian Harp is...
as the scene for both is the same. The land of Clevedon is praised and seen full of life, and it serves as contrast to escaping from the real world into fantasy and pondering about the abstract. Both poems also describe Coleridge's relationship with his wife and feelings of sexual desire. The imagination aspects of the poem represent an unwillingness to accept nature on its own and rejects the conclusion of The Eolian Harp. Although the land of Clevedon can bring one closer to God, one cannot just simply exist in such an area but must seek out truth.
Feeling the need to seek out truth creates a separation between the mind of a poet and the mind of a philosopher. The poem reconciles the two by allowing the pursuer of truth to reflect on his time of simply enjoying nature and God's presence. However, the philosopher aspect is dominant and the individual must go out and try to help humanity. Nature can be soothing, but the narrator must reject the Edenic
Garden of Eden
The Garden of Eden is in the Bible's Book of Genesis as being the place where the first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, lived after they were created by God. Literally, the Bible speaks about a garden in Eden...
quality of nature because such a state is not yet appropriate. The Edenic imagery figures into many of Coleridge's poems and is reinforced with the image of myrtle trees and takes on many forms within his poetry. In Reflections, to dwell in an Edenic state is a paradise in which the narrator leaves voluntarily because he cannot ignore the problems of the world like a coward. Instead, the individual is compelled to join with mankind and even the lowest form of benefiting mankind is superior to doing nothing at all.
The image of nature and other themes reappears in Fears in Solitude
Fears in Solitude
Fears in Solitude, written in April 1798, is one of the conversation poems by Samuel Taylor Coleridge. The poem was composed while France threatened to invade Great Britain. Although Coleridge was opposed to the British government, the poem sides with the British people in a patriotic defense of...
(1798). The later poem recreates the "Valley of Seclusion" image in the form of a dell. Even the image of a passerby looking in on the cottage found in Reflection is repeated. Similarly, the compulsion to enter into the world and help mankind is included, but it is altered from being motivated by guilt to a warning message against a possible invasion from outside forces. As such, Fears in Solitude does not seek to leave the location to help mankind, but to stay as a protector over his family.
In Coleridge's own life, he tried to follow the path of the philosopher, but the 10 July 1834 entry in Table Talk admits that he was unable to do so: "so I own I wish life and strength had been spared to me to complete my Philosophy. For, as God hears me, the originating, continuing, and sustaining wish and design in my heart were to exalt the glory of his name; and, which is the same thing in order words, to promote the improvement of mankind. But visum aliter Deo, and his will be done."
In terms of Coleridge's marriage, Reflections differs from The Eolian Harp by saying that there were problems within the marriage, especially with it distracting Coleridge from nature and the world outside of the home that he shared with his wife. The poem expresses feelings of solitude and confinement, and there is a difference between the worlds inside and outside of the cottage in a similar manner to the focus found within Coleridge's Kubla Khan
Kubla Khan
Kubla Khan is a poem by Samuel Taylor Coleridge, completed in 1797 and published in Christabel, Kubla Khan, and the Pains of Sleep in 1816...
. This is especially true with a focus from the private to the public spheres. Within the outside world, the poem's narrator is separate from mankind, but his focus is ever on mankind and contains both a religious and political component. The image of "One Life" within the poem compels him to abandon the sensual pleasures of the cottage and to pursue a path of helping mankind.
Sources
Besides the natural relationship of the poem with the land of Clevedon, there are literary connections within the poem. The poem begins with a line from HoraceHorace
Quintus Horatius Flaccus , known in the English-speaking world as Horace, was the leading Roman lyric poet during the time of Augustus.-Life:...
, although in many versions it is misquoted. The line, "sermoni propiori", is from Horace's Satires 1.4.42 and is intended to describe the work as a whole as connecting to prose. The second stanza, where the narrator describes Dial Hill as the "stony Mount", is connected to William Crowe
William Crowe (poet)
William Crowe was an English poet, born in Midgham, Berkshire, England. He was the son of a carpenter and was educated as a foundationer at Winchester. He then proceeded to Oxford, where he became Public Orator. He wrote a smooth, but somewhat...
's Lewesdon Hill (1788). It is possible that Reflections could have been an imitation of Crowe's poetry. In terms of Edenic imagery, including types of plant life, Coleridge's are connected to John Milton
John Milton
John Milton was an English poet, polemicist, a scholarly man of letters, and a civil servant for the Commonwealth of England under Oliver Cromwell...
's Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost
Paradise Lost is an epic poem in blank verse by the 17th-century English poet John Milton. It was originally published in 1667 in ten books, with a total of over ten thousand individual lines of verse...
Book Four.
Critical response
The Critical Review saw favor with "To the River Otter" and Reflections in their review of the 1797 collection of Coleridge's poem. The July review claims that the poem "evince a feeling heart. The comparison between the weeping eyes of a humane friend and the unmoved face of another equally benevolent, and the contrast between the latter and those who merely affect sympathy, are well drawn."During the 20th century, Virginia Radley declares that Reflections "although not so striking in imagery as is the 'Eolian Harp,' still has much to recommend it in this respect [...] The impression left with the reader that the cottage and its surroundings are inestimably lovely, quiet, and peaceful is a paramount one, while the dead lines [...] do not move the reader at all, except to make him wonder if the move from Clevedon for the cause of humanity was a necessary one." Richard Haven argues that the poem's image of the moral path is weak because "the returned traveller can only dismiss his ascent to another mode of being as a pleasant but useless memory".
Anthony Harding believes "it is important to recognize that it steps outside the idyllic but circumscribed scene of 'The Eolian Harp', and admits the impossibility, in a fallen world, of human self-sufficiency." Oswald Doughty states that the "most important additions" to Coleridge's 1797 edition of poems included Reflections. Richard Holmes points out that both Reflections and The Eolian Harp "mark a new stage in Coleridge's exploration of the sacred relations between man and nature, which gradually become more serious and impassioned as they carry increasingly theological implications behind his Romanticism."