It was in January, 1798, that I was one morning before daylight, to
walk ten miles in the mud, to hear this celebrated person preach.
Never, the longest day I have to live, shall I have such another
walk as this cold, raw, comfortless one in the winter of 1798. Il-y-
a des impressions que ni le tems ni les circonstances peuvent
effacer. Dusse-je vivre des siecles entiers, le doux tems de ma
jeunesse ne peut renaitre pour moi, ni s'effacer jamais dans ma
memoire. When I got there the organ was playing the 100th Psalm, and
when it was done Mr. Coleridge rose and gave out his text, 'And he
went up into the mountain to pray, HIMSELF, ALONE.' As he gave out
this text, his voice 'rose like a stream of distilled perfumes', and
when he came to the two last words, which he pronounced loud, deep,
and distinct, it seemed to me, who was then young, as if the sounds
had echoed from the bottom of the human heart, and as if that prayer
might have floated in solemn silence through the universe ... The
preacher then launched into his subject, like an eagle dallying with
the wind.
Coleridge visited Wem, walked and talked with young Hazlitt, and
wound up by inviting the disciple to visit him at Nether Stowey in
the Quantocks. Hazlitt went, made acquaintance with William and
Dorothy Wordsworth, and was drawn more deeply under the spell.
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