“Could I disburse from the treasure of my memory, but one farthing in the pound of the mighty debt of happiness which I owe to dream-nourish’d childhood, and pay the dividend to the heirs and assignees of childhood.”

Imagining childhood happiness as a remembered wealth owed to later children · Letter to Mrs Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 1829

• Childhood
• Joy
• Memory

“One by one, my old friends drop away, and though I want not well-wishers, nor active benefactors, I feel painfully how few are left of those who were bound to me by nature, or a parent’s memory.”

Mourning the gradual loss of relationships rooted in shared history · Letter to Mrs Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 13 January 1838

• Friendship
• Memory
• Mortality

“The real truth was, this was a man of but moderate capacity, whom I had seen made a butt of by others not so much better in head as they were worse in heart.”

Defending an ordinary man against the cruelty of those who mocked him · Letter to Samuel Taylor Coleridge, 2 October 1820

• Compassion
• Friendship
• Truth