NOTES. (a) p. 17. It now seems clear to me, that my Father here alludes to a course of lectures delivered in 1808, and I think it most probable . that, from some momentary confusion of mind, he wrote "sixteen or seventeen,' ," instead of "ten or eleven;" unless his writing was wrongly copied. It does not appear that he lectured on Shakspeare in 1801 or 1802; but in March, April, and May of 1808, and I doubt not in February likewise, he lectured on Poetry at the Royal Institution. Schlegel's lectures, the substance of which we now have in the Dramaturgische Vorlesungen, were read at Vienna that same Spring; but they were not published till 1809, and it is mentioned in an Observation prefixed to part of the work printed in 1811, that the portion respecting Shakspeare and the English Theatre was re-cast after the oral delivery. (b) p. 18. My Father appears to confound the date of publication with that of delivery, when he affirms that Schlegel's Dramatic Lectures were not delivered till two years after his on the same subjects: but the fact is, as has been mentioned in the last note, that those parts of Schlegel's Dram. Vorlesung. which contain the coincidences with my Father, in his view of Shakspeare, were not orally delivered at all-certainly not in the Spring of 1808, but added when the discourses were prepared for the press, at which time the part about Shakspeare was almost altogether re-written. Few auditors of Mr. Coleridge's earliest Shaksperian lectures probably now survive. None of those who attended his lectures before April in 1808 have I been able to discover or communicate with. But I have found this record in Mr. Payne Collier's edition of Shakspeare, vol. vii. p. 193. "Coleridge, after vindicating himself from the accusation that he had derived his ideas of Hamlet from Schlegel (and we heard him broach them some years before the Lectures Ueber Dramatische Kunst und Litteratur were published) thus in a few sentences sums up the character of Hamlet. "In Hamlet," &c. Introduction to Hamlet. (c) p. 22. It can hardly be necessary to remind any attentive reader, that my Father's declarations respecting independence of Schlegel relate to his view of the characteristic merits of Shakspeare, and to general principles of criticism, established and applied by him in 1808, and still earlier in conversation, not to his Lectures of 1818, fragments of which are contained in this volume. I think, however, that when in 1819 my Father wrote the record prefixed to the Notes on Hamlet (see p. 144) he could hardly have been aware how many of the German critic's sentences he had repeated in those latter lectures, how many of his illustrations had intertwined themselves with his own thoughts, especially in one part of his subject-the Greek Dramaby the time they were to be delivered in 1818. Had he been fully conscious of this, common caution would have induced him to acknowledge what he had obtained from a book which was in the hands of so many readers in England. I take this opportunity of giving notice that I shall make reference to Schlegel wherever I find thoughts or expressions of my Father's substantially the same as his, though I am by no means sure, that in all these passages there was a borrowing on the part of the former. Any one who has composed for the press, and has united with this practice habits of accurate revision and an anxiety to avoid both the reality and the appearance of plagiarism, will bear witness to the fact, that coincidences, both in the form and manner of thought, especially in criticism, are of the commonest occurrence. Several striking coincidences may be found between Schlegel in his Dramatic Lectures and Schelling's fine discourse Ueber der bildenden Künste (On the Imaging Arts). For example, Schelling observes respecting the Niobe of ancient sculpture, that "the expression is softened down by the very nature of the subject, since Sorrow, by transcending all expression, annuls itself, and thus that Beauty which could not have been lifesomely preserved, is saved from injury by the commencing torpor." Compare this with Schlegel's interesting criticism on the Niobe at the end of his third (now fifth) Lecture (vol. i. p. 90, 2d edit.). Der Schmerz enstellt den überirdischen Adel der Züge üm so weniger da er durch die plötzliche Anhaufung der Schlage, der bedeutenden Fabel gemäss, in Erstarrung überzugehen scheint. In proof of this also I would refer to Schelling's remarks on the difference between the nature and range of Sculpture and of Painting (Phil. Schrift. pp. 375–6), with those of Schlegel (vol. iii. p. 121), Lecture xii. (now xxii.) "Painting," says Schelling, “represents not by corporeal things, but by light and color,-through an incorporeal, and, in some measure, spiritual medium." "Its peculiar charm," says Schlegel of the same, "consists in this, that it makes visible in corporeal objects what is least corporeal, namely, light and air." Read also Schelling's parallel of the Ancient mode of thought with the Plastic Art, of the Modern with the Pictorial (Phil. Schrift. |