Coleridge died in Highgate, London on 25 July 1834 as a result of heart failure compounded by an unknown lung disorder, possibly linked to his use of opium. Coleridge had spent 18 years under the roof of the Gillman family, who built an addition onto their home to accommodate the poet.

The broader context is that Coleridge, unhappily married, yet with divorce an impossibility legally and personally, had fallen deeply in love with Sara Hutchinson, the younger sister of Wordsworth's wife Mary Hutchinson.

John Duke Coleridge, 1st Baron Coleridge was a lawyer, judge and Liberal politician. He served as Solicitor General, Attorney General, Chief Justice of the Common Pleas and Lord Chief Justice of England. Coleridge was the eldest son of John Taylor Coleridge, and the great-nephew of the poet Samuel Taylor Coleridge.

It argues that Coleridge was immensely influenced by and distinguished himself from German philosophers like Immanuel Kant, Johann Gottlieb Fichte, Friedrich Wilhelm Joseph Schelling, Karl Wilhelm Schlegel, Friedrich Leopold, Freiherr von Hardenburg (Novalis) and Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel.