“You will find in Mrs. Nelson Coleridge’s Introduction to the ‘Biographia Literaria’ an eloquent and even passionate vindication of her father from the charge of plagiarism. It does her honor as a daughter, but is hardly convincing. Coleridge’s acknowledgment of general indebtedness to Schelling and others was, to speak mildly, wholly inadequate, and his evasions in regard to Schlegel leave a very painful impression on the mind. If he was not lying, he was so shamefully inaccurate in dates (to his own advantage) as to have all the appearance of it.
“Now, your case (I mean the one you present) is in many respects very like this--almost identical with it indeed....
“In the old trials, one of the questions on which the jury were called on to pass was, ‘Did he fly for it?’ That is, I suppose, ‘Did he give that proof of conscious guilt?’ I should ask the same question in this case. Is there any evidence of an attempt at concealment?
“But, abstractedly from any opinion we may form of the _person_, the action was one altogether discreditable and contemptible. We cannot be too scrupulous on any point of morals in a country where members of Congress see no dishonor in selling appointments to the Army and Navy.”
Dr. Thomas Hill, who was president of Harvard in 1868, asked Lowell in the summer of that year to look over some papers he had received from Virginia and to give his opinion of them. They were the letters and journals of a Virginian gentleman, Mr. John B. Minor, who had visited New England in 1834, and Lowell found them exceedingly interesting. “Not the least engaging thing in the journal,” he wrote to the lady who had sent the papers, “is the character of the author, everywhere showing itself and everywhere amiable. So far as he is concerned, the whole journal might be printed _verbatim_, for there is not an indiscreet word, much less a breach of hospitality, from beginning to end. At the same time there are, of course, passages here and there which should be omitted in printing--I think not more than two or three at most--where he describes the personal appearance of those he met.”
The next day he wrote to Mr. Fields: “There has been put into my hands to dispose of, the Journal of a Virginia gentleman during a short tour in New England, partly on foot. The date--1834, which is now ages ago. There is not a great deal of it, but I found it truly entertaining. I think I could make selections from it that would run through four or five numbers of the _Atlantic_.... Now, do you want it? and if so, what do you think it would be worth? When I say it is entertaining, I do not mean for fanatics like me, who would cradle I know not how many tons of common earth for a grain of the gold of human nature, but for folks in general. It is not only interesting but valuable, and the character of the author, as it blinks out continually, most engaging. It seems to me remarkable that there is positively not an ill-natured word from the first page to the last. Now you know that I have once or twice pressed Sibylline books upon you which you wouldn’t take. Don’t let this one slip through your fingers. I think it might be published afterwards in a small volume with advantage, but of its adaptation to the _Atlantic_ I have no doubt.”