In this demonstration he was moved by the desire to
set his friend on the road that would lead to the most triumphant
exercise of his own powers.
There is no doubt that Coleridge made both his points; but he made them,
in particular the former, at exceeding length, and at the cost of a good
deal of internal contradiction. He sets out, in the former case, to
maintain that the language of poetry is essentially different from the
language of prose. This he professes to deduce from a number of
principles. His axiom--and it is possibly a sound one--is that metre
originated in a spontaneous effort of the mind to hold in check the
workings of emotion. From this, he argues, it follows that to justify
the existence of metre, the language of a poem must show evidence of
emotion, by being different from the language of prose. Further, he
says, metre in itself stimulates the emotions, and for this condition of
emotional excitement 'correspondent food' must be provided. Thirdly, the
emotion of poetical composition itself demands this same 'correspondent
food.
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