The Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey
Robert Southey to Grosvenor C. Bedford, 30 April 1816
“Time passes on. I employ myself, and have recovered
strength; but in point of spirits, I rather lose ground. The cause, perhaps, is
obvious. At first, we make great efforts to force the mind from thoughts which
are intolerably painful; but as, from time, they become endurable, less effort
is made to avoid them, and the poignancy of grief settles into melancholy. Both
with Edith and myself, this seems to be
the case. Certain I am that nothing but the full assurance of immortality could
prevent me from sinking under an affliction which is greater than any stranger
could possibly believe; and thankful I am that my feelings have been so long
and so habitually directed toward this point. You probably know my poems better
than most people, and may perceive how strongly my mind has been impressed upon
this most consoling subject.
“Yesterday I finished the main part of the Lay. There remain only six or
eight stanzas as a L’Envoy, ![]()
| 174 | LIFE AND CORRESPONDENCE | Ætat. 42. |
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which I may, perhaps,
complete this night; then I shall send you the whole in one packet through
Gifford. I have said nothing about
it to Longman, for I think it very
probable that you may advise me not to publish the poem now it is written, lest
it should give offence; and having satisfied myself by writing it, it is quite
indifferent to me whether it appears now or after my decease. The emolument to
be derived from it is too insignificant to be thought of, and the credit which
I should gain, I can very well do without. So take counsel with any body you
please, and remember that I, who am easily enough persuaded in any case, am in
this perfectly unconcerned; for were it a thing of course that I should produce
a poem on this occasion, there is at this time, God knows, sufficient reason
why I might stand excused.
“Do not imagine that the poem has derived the
slightest cast of colouring from my present state of mind. The plan is
precisely what was originally formed. William
Nichol is likely to judge as well as any man whether there be
any unfitness in publishing it. You are quite aware that I neither wish to
court favour nor to give offence, and that the absurdity of taking offence (if
it were taken) would excite in me more pity than resentment.
“Good night! I am going to the poem in hope of
completing it. I cannot yet bear to be unemployed, and this I feel severely.
You know how much I used to unbend, and play with the children, in frequent
intervals of study, as though I were an idle man. Of this I am quite incapable,
and shall long ![]()
| Ætat. 42. | OF ROBERT SOUTHEY. | 175 |
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continue so. No circumstance of my former
life ever brought with it so great a change as that which I daily and hourly
feel, and perhaps shall never cease to feel. Yet I am thankful for having
possessed this child so long; for worlds I would not but have been his father.
Of all the blessings which it has pleased God to vouchsafe me, this was and is
the greatest.
Grosvenor Charles Bedford (1773-1839)
The son of Horace Walpole's correspondent Charles Bedford; he was auditor of the
Exchequer and a friend of Robert Southey who contributed to several of Southey's
publications.
William Gifford (1756-1826)
Poet, scholar, and editor who began as a shoemaker's apprentice; after Oxford he
published
The Baviad (1794),
The Maeviad
(1795), and
The Satires of Juvenal translated (1802) before becoming
the founding editor of the
Quarterly Review (1809-24).
Thomas Norton Longman (1771-1842)
A leading London publisher whose authors included Southey, Wordsworth, Scott, and
Moore.
William Nicol (1777-1857)
London printer, the son of George Nicol of the Shakespeare Press (1790?-1829).
Edith Southey [née Fricker] (1774-1837)
The daughter of Stephen Fricker, she was the first wife of Robert Southey and the mother
of his children; they married in secret in 1795.
