The Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey
Robert Southey to Neville White, 6 July 1820
“There is no better proof that two fellow-travellers
are upon a proper understanding with each other, than when they travel together
for a good length of time in silence, each thinking his own ![]()
| 42 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 46. |
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thoughts, and neither of them feeling it necessary to open his lips for the
sake of politeness. So it is with real friends: I have not written to
congratulate you on your change of state till now, because I could not do it at
leisure, I would not do it hastily, and I knew that you knew how completely every day, hour, and minute of
my time must be occupied in London. Never, indeed, was I involved in a more
incessant succession of wearying and worrying engagements from morning till
night, day after day, without intermission; here, there, and everywhere, with
perpetual changes of every kind, except the change of tranquillity and rest.
During an absence of nearly eleven weeks, I seldom slept more than three nights
successively in the same bed. At length, God be thanked, I am once more seated
by my own fireside—perhaps it is the only fire in Keswick at this time; but
like a cat and a cricket, my habits or my nature have taught me to love a warm
hearth: so I sit with the windows open, and enjoy at the same time the breath
of the mountains and the heat of a sea-coal fire.
“And now, my dear Neville, I heartily wish you all that serious, sacred, and
enduring happiness in marriage which you have proposed to yourself, and which,
as far as depends upon yourself, you have every human probability of finding,
and I make no doubt as far as depends upon your consort also. Such drawbacks as
are inseparable from our present imperfect state, and such griefs as this poor
flesh is heir to, you must sometimes expect, and will know how to bear. But the
highest temporal blessings ![]()
| Ætat. 46. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 43 |
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as certainly attend upon a
well-regulated and virtuous course of conduct now, as they did during the
Mosaic dispensation; for what other blessings are comparable to tranquillity of
mind, resignation under the afflictive dispensations of Providence, faith,
hope, and that peace which passeth all understanding? However bitter upon the
palate the good man’s cup may be, this is the savour which it leaves:
whatever his future may be, his happiness depends upon himself, and must be his
own work. In this sense, I am sure you will be a happy man; may you be a
fortunate one also.
“I had the comfort of finding all my family well, the
children thoroughly recovered from the measles, though some of them somewhat
thinner, and the mother a good deal so, from the anxiety and the fatigue which
she had undergone during their illness. You hardly yet know how great a
blessing it is for a family to have got through that disease; one of the passes
perilous upon the pilgrimage of life. Cuthbert had not forgotten me; five minutes seemed to bring me
to his recollection; he is just beginning to walk alone,—a fine, stout,
good-humoured creature, with curling hair, and eyes full of intelligence. How
difficult it is not to build one’s hopes upon a child like this.
“I am returned to a world of business; enough to
intimidate any one of less habitual industry, less resolution, or less
hopefulness of spirit. My time will be sadly interrupted by visitors who, with
more or less claims, find their way to me during the season from all parts.
However, little by little, I ![]()
| 44 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 46. |
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shall get on with many things:
of which the first in point of time will be the long-intended Book of the Church. I told you,
if I recollect rightly, what the Bishop of
London had said to me concerning the Life of Wesley. You will be glad to hear
that Lord Liverpool expressed to me the
same opinion, when I met him at Mr.
Canning’s, and said that it was a book which could not
fail of doing a great deal of good. Had that book been written by a clergyman,
it would have made his fortune beyond all doubt. But it will do its work better
as having come from one who could have had no view to preferment, nor any undue
bias upon his mind. If I live, I shall yet do good service both to the Church
and State.
“My visit to Oxford brought with it feelings of the
most opposite kind. After the exhibition in the theatre, and the collation in
Brazenose Hall given by the Vice-Chancellor, I went alone into Christ Church walks, where I
had not been for six-and-twenty years. Of the friends with whom I used to walk
there, many (and among them some of the dearest) were in their graves. I was
then inexperienced, headstrong, and as full of errors as of youth and hope and
ardour. Through the mercy of God, I have retained the whole better part of my
nature, and as for the lapse of years, that can never be a mournful
consideration to one who hopes to be ready for a better world, whenever his
hour may come. God bless you!
George Canning (1770-1827)
Tory statesman; he was foreign minister (1807-1809) and prime minister (1827); a
supporter of Greek independence and Catholic emancipation.
Frodsham Hodson (1770-1822)
Educated at Manchester and Brasenose College, Oxford, where he was vice-chancellor (1818)
and regius professor of divinity.
William Howley, archbishop of Canterbury (1766-1848)
Educated at Winchester and New College, Oxford, he was regius professor of Divinity
(1809-13), bishop of London (1813-28), and archbishop of Canterbury (1828-48).
Charles Cuthbert Southey (1819-1888)
Son of Robert Southey whose
Life and Correspondence (1849-1850) he
edited. Educated at Queen's College, Oxford, he was curate of Plumbland in Cumberland,
vicar of Kingsbury Episcopi, Somerset (1855-79) and Askham, near Penrith (1885).
John Neville White (1785 c.-1845)
The elder brother of Henry Kirke White; after working in medicine he was educated at
Peterhouse College, Cambridge, and was rector of Rushall (1828) and Tivetshall in Norfolk
(1832-45). The rumor that he died a suicide was denied in the
Gentleman's
Magazine.
