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20 CAMBRIDGE [1791may
be some exaggeration in all this. Coleridge did indeed
get an anonymous letter in 1796, which referred to him as
'the digito-monstratus of Cambridge'. 1 But Charles Le Grice,
who came up in 1792 and was on friendly terms with him,
says nothing of dissipation. He describes Coleridge as
studious, but desultory and capricious in his reading. He
took little exercise, and his rooms, on the right-hand groundfloor
of the staircase facing the great gate, were a centre of
conversation, largely on politics.
What evenings have I spent in those rooms! What little suppers,
or sizingsy as they were called, have I enjoyed; when Aeschylus, and
Plato, and Thucydides were pushed aside, with a pile of lexicons, &c,
to discuss the pamphlets of the day. Ever and anon, a pamphlet issued
from the pen of Burke. There was no need of having the book before
us. Coleridge had read it in the morning, and in the evening he would
repeat whole pages verbatim. 2
Coleridge was an admirer of Burke's genius, and was
ultimately to become, in some sense, the inheritor of his
convictions. But his politics of 1793, if not strictly democratic,
were certainly anti-war and anti-Pitt. This was the
general tone of undergraduate Cambridge, and in Coleridge's
case we may once more suspect the influence of William
Frend. Early in 1793, at the very moment when the French
declaration of war was forcing Pitt's hand, Frend published
a pamphlet on Peace and Union, which caused an uproar. Its
theology was attacked as derogatory to the doctrines and
rites of the Church, and its politics as disturbing the harmony
of society. The Fellows of Jesus excluded Frend from
residence, and the Visitor upheld them. In May, Frend was
brought before the Vice-Chancellor's court, on a charge of
offending against a University statute by his publication.
The undergraduates demonstrated in his favour. Coleridge
and John Copley of Trinity, afterwards Lord Lyndhurst,
were active among them. Trend for Ever' was chalked
upon the walls of all the colleges. A train of gunpowder
traced 'Liberty' and 'Equality' on the shaven lawns of Trinity
and St. John's. At the trial, which dragged on throughout
the month, Coleridge made himself conspicuous by
1 C. 94; G. 8, 27, 316.
2 2 Gent. Mag. ii. 605.