Note 782 — Chapter III · GOETHE AND HIS CONTEMPORARIES.

I have already waived the controversy between Coleridge and the Schlegels. The fact is that the resemblance is mainly one of attitude—one of those results of “skyey influences” which constantly manifest themselves in different persons of genius and talent more or less simultaneously. And it may be added that the general presence of this attitude in Coleridge before his German visit, before either Schlegel had attained any great notoriety, or had written anything likely to penetrate to England, or even anything very characteristic, is attested not merely by the concrete document, in not so very alien material, of The Ancient Mariner, but by testimonies as to his conversation, from half a dozen different people.