4139. Robert Southey to [John Taylor Coleridge], 20 February 1824

 

Endorsements: 1824/ Febry 24th/ R.S. Greta Hall.
MS: British Library, Add MS 47553. ALS; 4p.
Previously published: W. Braekman, ‘Letters by Robert Southey to Sir John Taylor Coleridge’, Studia Germanica Gandensia, 6 (1964), 135–136.
Note on MS: The letter contained an enclosure, a copy in Southey’s hand of a letter sent to him by Mark Robinson, 13 January 1824; this is now British Library, Add MS 47553, fols 40–41; the text of the enclosure is published in Charles Cuthbert Southey (ed.), Life and Correspondence of Robert Southey, 6 vols (London, 1849–1850), V, pp, 161–164.

Keswick. 20 Feby. 1824.
My dear Sir

I send you herewith a copy of Mark Robinsons letter,

(1)

Mark Robinson (d. 1836) was a linen-draper at Beverley in Yorkshire and a leading local Methodist. He wrote to Southey on 13 January 1824, soliciting his support for a scheme to reunite Methodism with Anglicanism. Later in 1824 Robinson and a group of local ‘Church Methodists’ left the main body of Wesleyanism and set up their own chapels in communion with the Church of England. The movement had petered out by the early 1830s, though Robinson continued to campaign for the reunion of Methodism and Anglicanism.

– which I shall communicate by the same post to the Bp. of London. My answer to it has merely expressed my wishes that this opening may be improved to good effect with a caution against connecting themselves too closely with the Evangelical Clergy, lest in seeking to mend one schism, they make another.

Perhaps I give a view of the progress of Methodism since Wesleys death,

(2)

John Wesley (1703–1791; DNB), founder of Methodism. Southey did not write the article he proposes here.

– in the QR: & so take occasion to examine in what manner the Establishment might enlist in its service some of those active spirits which, if not so enlisted would be actively engaged against it. It is not easy to discipline & direct that sort of zeal; – yet the Church of Rome has succeeded in it. They might be encouraged as Catechists, & as field & street preachers: there are whole classes who never can be reached by any other kind of preaching. They might possibly be made useful in those scandalous livings

(3)

Church of England livings where the income was so low that they could not attract well-qualified and energetic clergy.

which make scandalous ministers (there are such within reach of me;) – & possibly too something might by their means be attempted toward the restoration of parochial discipline. I am well aware what difficulties there are in the way; – but there can be no harm done by speculating upon the subject. And it is fitter to make some attempt at giving a right direction to the course of events, than unconcernedly to let them take their course.

Twenty years ago the notion of a rival Church which is touched upon in Robinsons letter,

(4)

Robinson had complained in his letter to Southey that Methodist ministers were increasingly behaving like Church of England clergy and even wished to introduce bishops into Methodism.

struck me – & I broadly stated it as a danger to be kept in view.

(5)

Southey’s review of William Myles (1756–1828), A Chronological History of the People called Methodists … With an Appendix, Containing Two Lists of the Itinerant Preachers … With the Last Will and Testament of the Rev. J. Wesley (1803) in the Annual Review for 1803, 2 (1804), 201–213.

At present it appears that the tendency of Methodism is neither t increases not faster than in the natural proportion of its numbers. It has become less extravagant, & therefore less contagious. And numbers are withheld, or withdrawn from it, by the greatly increased zeal of the Dissenters, by the Infidel Propagandists, & by the activity of the Catholic Priests. – I do not know what the progress is of the New Methodists,

(6)

The Methodist New Connexion, which had separated from the main body of Methodists in 1797 over issues of church government.

whose system is purely popular. – There is matter enough for enquiry, – & for a Chapter of Ecc. History which would be neither unimportant nor uninteresting.

I found all well at home. Sara spares her eyes in the evening, & they ail so little to appearance that I am persuaded the ailment might easily be removed by any practitioner who understood it. But it is playing at hap-hazard to deal with it in the dark. Kate who seems to be affected in the same manner, is getting better. So probably would Sara have done were it not for weeping – on Derwents account.

(7)

Derwent Coleridge had only obtained a pass degree from the University of Cambridge in January 1824 and had gone to work as an assistant master at a school in Plymouth. He had lost his religious faith and was in debt.

I have not yet fairly resumed my wonted employments. There was a heavy accumulation of letters to answer, & I have had the more pleasurable task of arranging an importation of old books sent me from Italy by Landor; & a cargo which I dispatched from Norwich.

I am now going doggedly to work upon the Tale of Paraguay

(8)

Southey’s A Tale of Paraguay (1825).

–

God bless you
RS.

I have not asked the Bp of London how far he thinks such an overture might be met, – nor what he thinks feasible. For I would not be supposed to interfere in such matters farther than becomes me. But I should like to know how the pulse of the hierarchy beats.

Notes

1. Mark Robinson (d. 1836) was a linen-draper at Beverley in Yorkshire and a leading local Methodist. He wrote to Southey on 13 January 1824, soliciting his support for a scheme to reunite Methodism with Anglicanism. Later in 1824 Robinson and a group of local ‘Church Methodists’ left the main body of Wesleyanism and set up their own chapels in communion with the Church of England. The movement had petered out by the early 1830s, though Robinson continued to campaign for the reunion of Methodism and Anglicanism.[back]
2. John Wesley (1703–1791; DNB), founder of Methodism. Southey did not write the article he proposes here.[back]
3. Church of England livings where the income was so low that they could not attract well-qualified and energetic clergy.[back]
4. Robinson had complained in his letter to Southey that Methodist ministers were increasingly behaving like Church of England clergy and even wished to introduce bishops into Methodism.[back]
5. Southey’s review of William Myles (1756–1828), A Chronological History of the People called Methodists … With an Appendix, Containing Two Lists of the Itinerant Preachers … With the Last Will and Testament of the Rev. J. Wesley (1803) in the Annual Review for 1803, 2 (1804), 201–213.[back]
6. The Methodist New Connexion, which had separated from the main body of Methodists in 1797 over issues of church government. [back]
7. Derwent Coleridge had only obtained a pass degree from the University of Cambridge in January 1824 and had gone to work as an assistant master at a school in Plymouth. He had lost his religious faith and was in debt.[back]
8. Southey’s A Tale of Paraguay (1825).[back]
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