How we cite our quotes: (Line)
Quote #1
The inmates of my cottage, all at rest,
Have left me to that solitude, which suits
Abstruser musings: save that at my side
My cradled infant slumbers peacefully. (4-7)
By calling his family members "inmates" of the cottage, Coleridge isn't comparing them to prisoners. At the time, the word "inmate" was used to refer to people who, to put it super-simply, lived in a place. (The word is derived from "inn" plus "mate," originally meaning someone who stayed at an inn. It only gradually evolved to refer particularly to prisoners. In 1828, Webster's dictionary defined it simply as meaning, "a lodger, one who lives in the same house.")
Quote #2
And so I brooded all the following morn,
Awed by the stern preceptor's face, mine eye
Fixed with mock study on my swimming book:
Save if the door half opened, and I snatched
A hasty glance, and still my heart leaped up,
For still I hoped to see the stranger's face,
Townsman, or aunt, or sister more beloved,
My play-mate when we both were clothed alike! (37-44)
Even though Coleridge is day-dreaming about a "stranger" coming to visit him, the stranger is actually someone he already knows—one of his relatives or one of the townspeople. He's waiting for an unexpected visitor, whom he feels he's already known before—like any of the people he mentions, or like God, who Coleridge believes can visit humanity by sending his presence through Nature.
Quote #3
Dear Babe, that sleepest cradled by my side,
Whose gentle breathings, heard in this deep calm,
Fill up the intersperséd vacancies
And momentary pauses of the thought! (45-48)
The poem is, for the most part, addressed to Coleridge's baby son, Hartley. He's the one human presence in the room, visible to Coleridge as he contemplates the great stillness and silence of Nature. He reminds Coleridge of the existence of humanity, which coexists with that great, vast Nature.
Quote #4
My babe so beautiful! it thrills my heart
With tender gladness, thus to look at thee,
And think that thou shalt learn far other lore,
And in far other scenes! (49-52)
Coleridge is hoping that his son will have a purer education—a religious education in a way, since his son will become acquainted with God, who is present in Nature. Coleridge was raised in the city, which he feels helped divorce him from this closer contact with the Divine. He might be thinking about his own personal problems (his opium addiction, for example) and hoping that a life with Nature will help prevent his son from making the same kinds of mistakes.