{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_3673/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_3673","id":"gutenberg_3673","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3673","summary":null,"tags":["Alcott family","Category: American Literature","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Music","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Emerson, Ralph Waldo, 1803-1882","Hawthorne, Nathaniel, 1804-1864","Ives, Charles, 1874-1954. Sonatas, piano, no. 2","Music","Thoreau, Henry David, 1817-1862"],"text":"Produced by John Mamoun with help from the Online\nDistributed Proofreading Team of Charles Franks. HTML\nversion by Al Haines.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nESSAYS BEFORE A SONATA\n\n\nby\n\nCharles Ives\n\n\n\n\nTABLE OF CONTENTS:\n\n  BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH\n  INTRODUCTORY FOOTNOTE BY CHARLES IVES\n  INTRODUCTION\n  I--PROLOGUE\n  II--EMERSON\n  III--HAWTHORNE\n  IV--\"THE ALCOTS\"\n  V--THOREAU\n  VI--EPILOGUE\n  INFORMATION ABOUT THIS E-TEXT EDITION\n\n\n**********************************************************\n\n\nBRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH\n\n\nCharles Ives (1874-1954) was probably one of the most\npsycho-intellectually brilliant, imaginative and flexible Americans to\never \"walk the land of freedom.\"  A graduate of Yale, he became a\nmulti-millionaire in the American insurance industry, introducing\nbrilliant innovations within that industry.  He also, unlike a few\ncomposers, found the time and the money (being a shrewd and practical\nbusinessman) to get married and have children.\n\nHis accomplishments for which he is best known, however, are those in\nthe field of music.  At the time of its composition, Ives' music was\nprobably the most radically modern in history, and by itself had enough\nmaterial to serve as the foundation of modern 20th century music.  For\nexample, at the turn of the century, this eccentric composer created\nband works featuring multiple melodies of multiple time signatures\nopposing and complimenting each other within the same piece.  Ives was\nalso a revolutionary atonal composer, who created, essentially without\nprecedent, many atonal works that not only pre-date those of\nSchoenberg, but are just as sophisticated, and arguably even more so,\nthan those of the 12-tone serialist.\n\nAmong those atonal works was his second, \"Concord\" piano sonata, one of\nthe finest, and some would say the finest, works of classical music by\nan American.  It reflects the musical innovations of its creator,\nfeaturing revolutionary atmospheric effects, unprecedented atonal\nmusical syntax, and surprising technical approaches to playing the\npiano, such as pressing down on over 10 notes simultaneously using a\nflat piece of wood.\n\nWhat a mischievious creative genius!\n\nAnd yet, despite the musically innovative nature of these works, from a\nthematic standpoint, they are strictly 19th century. Ives, like\nAmerican band-composer Sousa, consciously infused patriotic or\n\"blue-blood\" themes into his pieces.  In the \"Concord,\" he attempted to\nproject, within the music, the 19th century philosophical ideas of the\nAmerican Transcendentalists, who obviously had a great impact on his\nworld-view.\n\nThus, while other atonal composers such as Schoenberg or Berg attempted\nto infuse their music with \"20th century\" themes of hostility, violence\nand estrangement within their atonal music, the atonal music of Ives\nis, from a thematic standpoint, really quite \"tonal.\"\n\nIves wrote the following essays as a (very big) set of program notes to\naccompany his second piano sonata.  Here, he puts forth his elaborate\ntheory of music and what it represents, and discusses Transcendental\nphilosophy and its relation to music. The essays explain Ives' own\nphilosophy of and understanding of music and art.  They also serve as\nan analysis of music itself as an artform, and provide a critical\nexplanation of the \"Concord\" and the role that the philosophies of\nEmerson, Hawthorne, Thoreau and the Alcotts play in forming its\nthematic structure.\n\n\n*************************************************************\n\n\"ESSAYS BEFORE A SONATA,\" BY CHARLES IVES\n\n*************************************************************\n\n\nINTRODUCTORY FOOTNOTE BY CHARLES IVES\n\n\n\"These prefatory essays were written by the composer for those who\ncan't stand his music--and the music for those who can't stand his\nessays; to those who can't stand either, the whole is respectfully\ndedicated.\"\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\n\nThe following pages were written primarily as a preface or reason for\nthe [writer's] second Pianoforte Sonata--\"Concord, Mass., 1845,\"--a\ngroup of four pieces, called a sonata for want of a more exact name, as\nthe form, perhaps substance, does not justify it. The music and\nprefaces were intended to be printed together, but as it was found that\nthis would make a cumbersome volume they are separate. The whole is an\nattempt to present [one person's] impression of the spirit of\ntranscendentalism that is associated in the minds of many with Concord,\nMass., of over a half century ago. This is undertaken in\nimpressionistic pictures of Emerson and Thoreau, a sketch of the\nAlcotts, and a Scherzo supposed to reflect a lighter quality which is\noften found in the fantastic side of Hawthorne. The first and last\nmovements do not aim to give any programs of the life or of any\nparticular work of either Emerson or Thoreau but rather composite\npictures or impressions. They are, however, so general in outline that,\nfrom some viewpoints, they may be as far from accepted impressions\n(from true conceptions, for that matter) as the valuation which they\npurport to be of the influence of the life, thought, and character of\nEmerson and Thoreau is inadequate.\n\n\n\n\nI--Prologue\n\n\nHow far is anyone justified, be he an authority or a layman, in\nexpressing or trying to express in terms of music (in sounds, if you\nlike) the value of anything, material, moral, intellectual, or\nspiritual, which is usually expressed in terms other than music? How\nfar afield can music go and keep honest as well as reasonable or\nartistic? Is it a matter limited only by the composer's power of\nexpressing what lies in his subjective or objective consciousness? Or\nis it limited by any limitations of the composer? Can a tune literally\nrepresent a stonewall with vines on it or with nothing on it, though it\n(the tune) be made by a genius whose power of objective contemplation\nis in the highest state of development? Can it be done by anything\nshort of an act of mesmerism on the part of the composer or an act of\nkindness on the part of the listener? Does the extreme materializing of\nmusic appeal strongly to anyone except to those without a sense of\nhumor--or rather with a sense of humor?--or, except, possibly to those\nwho might excuse it, as Herbert Spencer might by the theory that the\nsensational element (the sensations we hear so much about in\nexperimental psychology) is the true pleasurable phenomenon in music\nand that the mind should not be allowed to interfere? Does the success\nof program music depend more upon the program than upon the music? If\nit does, what is the use of the music, if it does not, what is the use\nof the program? Does not its appeal depend to a great extent on the\nlistener's willingness to accept the theory that music is the language\nof the emotions and ONLY that? Or inversely does not this theory tend\nto limit music to programs?--a limitation as bad for music itself--for\nits wholesome progress,--as a diet of program music is bad for the\nlistener's ability to digest anything beyond the sensuous (or\nphysical-emotional). To a great extent this depends on what is meant by\nemotion or on the assumption that the word as used above refers more to\nthe EXPRESSION, of, rather than to a meaning in a deeper sense--which\nmay be a feeling influenced by some experience perhaps of a spiritual\nnature in the expression of which the intellect has some part. \"The\nnearer we get to the mere expression of emotion,\" says Professor Sturt\nin his \"Philosophy of Art and Personality,\" \"as in the antics of boys\nwho have been promised a holiday, the further we get away from art.\"\n\nOn the other hand is not all music, program-music,--is not pure music,\nso called, representative in its essence? Is it not program-music\nraised to the nth power or rather reduced to the minus nth power? Where\nis the line to be drawn between the expression of subjective and\nobjective emotion? It is easier to know what each is than when each\nbecomes what it is. The \"Separateness of Art\" theory--that art is not\nlife but a reflection of it--\"that art is not vital to life but that\nlife is vital to it,\" does not help us. Nor does Thoreau who says not\nthat \"life is art,\" but that \"life is an art,\" which of course is a\ndifferent thing than the foregoing. Tolstoi is even more helpless to\nhimself and to us. For he eliminates further. From his definition of\nart we may learn little more than that a kick in the back is a work of\nart, and Beethoven's 9th Symphony is not. Experiences are passed on\nfrom one man to another. Abel knew that. And now we know it. But where\nis the bridge placed?--at the end of the road or only at the end of our\nvision? Is it all a bridge?--or is there no bridge because there is no\ngulf? Suppose that a composer writes a piece of music conscious that he\nis inspired, say, by witnessing an act of great self-sacrifice--another\npiece by the contemplation of a certain trait of nobility he perceives\nin a friend's character--and another by the sight of a mountain lake\nunder moonlight. The first two, from an inspirational standpoint would\nnaturally seem to come under the subjective and the last under the\nobjective, yet the chances are, there is something of the quality of\nboth in all. There may have been in the first instance physical action\nso intense or so dramatic in character that the remembrance of it\naroused a great deal more objective emotion than the composer was\nconscious of while writing the music. In the third instance, the music\nmay have been influenced strongly though subconsciously by a vague\nremembrance of certain thoughts and feelings, perhaps of a deep\nreligious or spiritual nature, which suddenly came to him upon\nrealizing the beauty of the scene and which overpowered the first\nsensuous pleasure--perhaps some such feeling as of the conviction of\nimmortality, that Thoreau experienced and tells about in Walden. \"I\npenetrated to those meadows ... when the wild river and the woods were\nbathed in so pure and bright a light as would have waked the dead IF\nthey had been slumbering in their graves as some suppose. There needs\nno stronger proof of immortality.\" Enthusiasm must permeate it, but\nwhat it is that inspires an art-effort is not easily determined much\nless classified. The word \"inspire\" is used here in the sense of cause\nrather than effect. A critic may say that a certain movement is not\ninspired. But that may be a matter of taste--perhaps the most inspired\nmusic sounds the least so--to the critic. A true inspiration may lack a\ntrue expression unless it is assumed that if an inspiration is not true\nenough to produce a true expression--(if there be anyone who can\ndefinitely determine what a true expression is)--it is not an\ninspiration at all.\n\nAgain suppose the same composer at another time writes a piece of equal\nmerit to the other three, as estimates go; but holds that he is not\nconscious of what inspired it--that he had nothing definite in\nmind--that he was not aware of any mental image or process--that,\nnaturally, the actual work in creating something gave him a satisfying\nfeeling of pleasure perhaps of elation. What will you substitute for\nthe mountain lake, for his friend's character, etc.? Will you\nsubstitute anything?  If so why? If so what? Or is it enough to let the\nmatter rest on the pleasure mainly physical, of the tones, their color,\nsuccession, and relations, formal or informal? Can an inspiration come\nfrom a blank mind? Well--he tries to explain and says that he was\nconscious of some emotional excitement and of a sense of something\nbeautiful, he doesn't know exactly what--a vague feeling of exaltation\nor perhaps of profound sadness.\n\nWhat is the source of these instinctive feelings, these vague\nintuitions and introspective sensations? The more we try to analyze the\nmore vague they become. To pull them apart and classify them as\n\"subjective\" or \"objective\" or as this or as that, means, that they may\nbe well classified and that is about all: it leaves us as far from the\norigin as ever. What does it all mean? What is behind it all? The\n\"voice of God,\" says the artist, \"the voice of the devil,\" says the man\nin the front row. Are we, because we are, human beings, born with the\npower of innate perception of the beautiful in the abstract so that an\ninspiration can arise through no external stimuli of sensation or\nexperience,--no association with the outward? Or was there present in\nthe above instance, some kind of subconscious, instantaneous, composite\nimage, of all the mountain lakes this man had ever seen blended as kind\nof overtones with the various traits of nobility of many of his friends\nembodied in one personality? Do all inspirational images, states,\nconditions, or whatever they may be truly called, have for a dominant\npart, if not for a source, some actual experience in life or of the\nsocial relation? To think that they do not--always at least--would be a\nrelief; but as we are trying to consider music made and heard by human\nbeings (and not by birds or angels) it seems difficult to suppose that\neven subconscious images can be separated from some human\nexperience--there must be something behind subconsciousness to produce\nconsciousness, and so on. But whatever the elements and origin of these\nso-called images are, that they DO stir deep emotional feelings and\nencourage their expression is a part of the unknowable we know. They do\noften arouse something that has not yet passed the border line between\nsubconsciousness and consciousness--an artistic intuition (well named,\nbut)--object and cause unknown!--here is a program!--conscious or\nsubconscious what does it matter? Why try to trace any stream that\nflows through the garden of consciousness to its source only to be\nconfronted by another problem of tracing this source to its source?\nPerhaps Emerson in the _Rhodora_ answers by not trying to explain\n\nThat if eyes were made for seeing Then beauty is its own excuse for\nbeing: Why thou wert there, O, rival of the rose! I never thought to\nask, I never knew; But, in my simple ignorance, suppose The self-same\nPower that brought me there brought you.\n\nPerhaps Sturt answers by substitution: \"We cannot explain the origin of\nan artistic intuition any more than the origin of any other primary\nfunction of our nature. But if as I believe civilization is mainly\nfounded on those kinds of unselfish human interests which we call\nknowledge and morality it is easily intelligible that we should have a\nparallel interest which we call art closely akin and lending powerful\nsupport to the other two. It is intelligible too that moral goodness,\nintellectual power, high vitality, and strength should be approved by\nthe intuition.\" This reduces, or rather brings the problem back to a\ntangible basis namely:--the translation of an artistic intuition into\nmusical sounds approving and reflecting, or endeavoring to approve and\nreflect, a \"moral goodness,\" a \"high vitality,\" etc., or any other\nhuman attribute mental, moral, or spiritual.\n\nCan music do MORE than this? Can it DO this? and if so who and what is\nto determine the degree of its failure or success? The composer, the\nperformer (if there be any), or those who have to listen? One hearing\nor a century of hearings?-and if it isn't successful or if it doesn't\nfail what matters it?--the fear of failure need keep no one from the\nattempt for if the composer is sensitive he need but launch forth a\ncountercharge of \"being misunderstood\" and hide behind it. A theme that\nthe composer sets up as \"moral goodness\" may sound like \"high\nvitality,\" to his friend and but like an outburst of \"nervous weakness\"\nor only a \"stagnant pool\" to those not even his enemies. Expression to\na great extent is a matter of terms and terms are anyone's. The meaning\nof \"God\" may have a billion interpretations if there be that many souls\nin the world.\n\nThere is a moral in the \"Nominalist and Realist\" that will prove all\nsums. It runs something like this: No matter how sincere and\nconfidential men are in trying to know or assuming that they do know\neach other's mood and habits of thought, the net result leaves a\nfeeling that all is left unsaid; for the reason of their incapacity to\nknow each other, though they use the same words. They go on from one\nexplanation to another but things seem to stand about as they did in\nthe beginning \"because of that vicious assumption.\" But we would rather\nbelieve that music is beyond any analogy to word language and that the\ntime is coming, but not in our lifetime, when it will develop\npossibilities unconceivable now,--a language, so transcendent, that its\nheights and depths will be common to all mankind.\n\n\n\n\nII--Emerson\n\n\n1\n\n\nIt has seemed to the writer, that Emerson is greater--his identity more\ncomplete perhaps--in the realms of revelation--natural disclosure--than\nin those of poetry, philosophy, or prophecy. Though a great poet and\nprophet, he is greater, possibly, as an invader of the\nunknown,--America's deepest explorer of the spiritual immensities,--a\nseer painting his discoveries in masses and with any color that may lie\nat hand--cosmic, religious, human, even sensuous; a recorder, freely\ndescribing the inevitable struggle in the soul's uprise--perceiving\nfrom this inward source alone, that every \"ultimate fact is only the\nfirst of a new series\"; a discoverer, whose heart knows, with Voltaire,\n\"that man seriously reflects when left alone,\" and would then discover,\nif he can, that \"wondrous chain which links the heavens with earth--the\nworld of beings subject to one law.\" In his reflections Emerson, unlike\nPlato, is not afraid to ride Arion's Dolphin, and to go wherever he is\ncarried--to Parnassus or to \"Musketaquid.\"\n\nWe see him standing on a summit, at the door of the infinite where many\nmen do not care to climb, peering into the mysteries of life,\ncontemplating the eternities, hurling back whatever he discovers\nthere,--now, thunderbolts for us to grasp, if we can, and\ntranslate--now placing quietly, even tenderly, in our hands, things\nthat we may see without effort--if we won't see them, so much the worse\nfor us.\n\nWe see him,--a mountain-guide, so intensely on the lookout for the\ntrail of his star, that he has no time to stop and retrace his\nfootprints, which may often seem indistinct to his followers, who find\nit easier and perhaps safer to keep their eyes on the ground. And there\nis a chance that this guide could not always retrace his steps if he\ntried--and why should he!--he is on the road, conscious only that,\nthough his star may not lie within walking distance, he must reach it\nbefore his wagon can be hitched to it--a Prometheus illuminating a\nprivilege of the Gods--lighting a fuse that is laid towards men.\nEmerson reveals the less not by an analysis of itself, but by bringing\nmen towards the greater. He does not try to reveal, personally, but\nleads, rather, to a field where revelation is a harvest-part, where it\nis known by the perceptions of the soul towards the absolute law. He\nleads us towards this law, which is a realization of what experience\nhas suggested and philosophy hoped for. He leads us, conscious that the\naspects of truth, as he sees them, may change as often as truth remains\nconstant. Revelation perhaps, is but prophecy intensified--the\nintensifying of its mason-work as well as its steeple. Simple prophecy,\nwhile concerned with the past, reveals but the future, while revelation\nis concerned with all time. The power in Emerson's prophecy confuses it\nwith--or at least makes it seem to approach--revelation. It is prophecy\nwith no time element. Emerson tells, as few bards could, of what will\nhappen in the past, for his future is eternity and the past is a part\nof that. And so like all true prophets, he is always modern, and will\ngrow modern with the years--for his substance is not relative but a\nmeasure of eternal truths determined rather by a universalist than by a\npartialist. He measured, as Michel Angelo said true artists should,\n\"with the eye and not the hand.\" But to attribute modernism to his\nsubstance, though not to his expression, is an anachronism--and as\nfutile as calling today's sunset modern.\n\nAs revelation and prophecy, in their common acceptance are resolved by\nman, from the absolute and universal, to the relative and personal, and\nas Emerson's tendency is fundamentally the opposite, it is easier,\nsafer and so apparently clearer, to think of him as a poet of natural\nand revealed philosophy. And as such, a prophet--but not one to be\nconfused with those singing soothsayers, whose pockets are filled, as\nare the pockets of conservative-reaction and radical demagoguery in\npulpit, street-corner, bank and columns, with dogmatic\nfortune-tellings. Emerson, as a prophet in these lower heights, was a\nconservative, in that he seldom lost his head, and a radical, in that\nhe seldom cared whether he lost it or not. He was a born radical as are\nall true conservatives. He was too much \"absorbed by the absolute,\" too\nmuch of the universal to be either--though he could be both at once. To\nCotton Mather, he would have been a demagogue, to a real demagogue he\nwould not be understood, as it was with no self interest that he laid\nhis hand on reality. The nearer any subject or an attribute of it,\napproaches to the perfect truth at its base, the more does\nqualification become necessary. Radicalism must always qualify itself.\nEmerson clarifies as he qualifies, by plunging into, rather than\n\"emerging from Carlyle's soul-confusing labyrinths of speculative\nradicalism.\" The radicalism that we hear much about today, is not\nEmerson's kind--but of thinner fiber--it qualifies itself by going to\n_A_ \"root\" and often cutting other roots in the process; it is usually\nimpotent as dynamite in its cause and sometimes as harmful to the\nwholesome progress of all causes; it is qualified by its failure. But\nthe Radicalism of Emerson plunges to all roots, it becomes greater than\nitself--greater than all its formal or informal doctrines--too advanced\nand too conservative for any specific result--too catholic for all the\nchurches--for the nearer it is to truth, the farther it is from a\ntruth, and the more it is qualified by its future possibilities.\n\nHence comes the difficulty--the futility of attempting to fasten on\nEmerson any particular doctrine, philosophic, or religious theory.\nEmerson wrings the neck of any law, that would become exclusive and\narrogant, whether a definite one of metaphysics or an indefinite one of\nmechanics. He hacks his way up and down, as near as he can to the\nabsolute, the oneness of all nature both human and spiritual, and to\nGod's benevolence. To him the ultimate of a conception is its vastness,\nand it is probably this, rather than the \"blind-spots\" in his\nexpression that makes us incline to go with him but half-way; and then\nstand and build dogmas. But if we can not follow all the way--if we do\nnot always clearly perceive the whole picture, we are at least free to\nimagine it--he makes us feel that we are free to do so; perhaps that is\nthe most he asks. For he is but reaching out through and beyond\nmankind, trying to see what he can of the infinite and its\nimmensities--throwing back to us whatever he can--but ever conscious\nthat he but occasionally catches a glimpse; conscious that if he would\ncontemplate the greater, he must wrestle with the lesser, even though\nit dims an outline; that he must struggle if he would hurl back\nanything--even a broken fragment for men to examine and perchance in it\nfind a germ of some part of truth; conscious at times, of the futility\nof his effort and its message, conscious of its vagueness, but ever\nhopeful for it, and confident that its foundation, if not its medium is\nsomewhere near the eventual and \"absolute good\" the divine truth\nunderlying all life. If Emerson must be dubbed an optimist--then an\noptimist fighting pessimism, but not wallowing in it; an optimist, who\ndoes not study pessimism by learning to enjoy it, whose imagination is\ngreater than his curiosity, who seeing the sign-post to Erebus, is\nstrong enough to go the other way. This strength of optimism, indeed\nthe strength we find always underlying his tolerance, his radicalism,\nhis searches, prophecies, and revelations, is heightened and made\nefficient by \"imagination-penetrative,\" a thing concerned not with the\ncombining but the apprehending of things. A possession, akin to the\npower, Ruskin says, all great pictures have, which \"depends on the\npenetration of the imagination into the true nature of the thing\nrepresented, and on the scorn of the imagination for all shackles and\nfetters of mere external fact that stand in the way of its\nsuggestiveness\"--a possession which gives the strength of distance to\nhis eyes, and the strength of muscle to his soul. With this he slashes\ndown through the loam--nor would he have us rest there. If we would dig\ndeep enough only to plant a doctrine, from one part of him, he would\nshow us the quick-silver in that furrow. If we would creed his\nCompensation, there is hardly a sentence that could not wreck it, or\ncould not show that the idea is no tenet of a philosophy, but a clear\n(though perhaps not clearly hurled on the canvas) illustration of\nuniversal justice--of God's perfect balances; a story of the analogy or\nbetter the identity of polarity and duality in Nature with that in\nmorality. The essay is no more a doctrine than the law of gravitation\nis. If we would stop and attribute too much to genius, he shows us that\n\"what is best written or done by genius in the world, was no one man's\nwork, but came by wide social labor, when a thousand wrought like one,\nsharing the same impulse.\" If we would find in his essay on Montaigne,\na biography, we are shown a biography of scepticism--and in reducing\nthis to relation between \"sensation and the morals\" we are shown a true\nMontaigne--we know the man better perhaps by this less presentation. If\nwe would stop and trust heavily on the harvest of originality, he shows\nus that this plant--this part of the garden--is but a relative thing.\nIt is dependent also on the richness that ages have put into the soil.\n\"Every thinker is retrospective.\"\n\nThus is Emerson always beating down through the crust towards the first\nfire of life, of death and of eternity. Read where you will, each\nsentence seems not to point to the next but to the undercurrent of all.\nIf you would label his a religion of ethics or of morals, he shames you\nat the outset, \"for ethics is but a reflection of a divine\npersonality.\" All the religions this world has ever known, have been\nbut the aftermath of the ethics of one or another holy person; \"as soon\nas character appears be sure love will\"; \"the intuition of the moral\nsentiment is but the insight of the perfection of the laws of the\nsoul\"; but these laws cannot be catalogued.\n\nIf a versatilist, a modern Goethe, for instance, could put all of\nEmerson's admonitions into practice, a constant permanence would\nresult,--an eternal short-circuit--a focus of equal X-rays. Even the\nvalue or success of but one precept is dependent, like that of a\nball-game as much on the batting-eye as on the pitching-arm. The\ninactivity of permanence is what Emerson will not permit. He will not\naccept repose against the activity of truth. But this almost constant\nresolution of every insight towards the absolute may get a little on\none's nerves, if one is at all partial-wise to the specific; one begins\nto ask what is the absolute anyway, and why try to look clear through\nthe eternities and the unknowable even out of the other end. Emerson's\nfondness for flying to definite heights on indefinite wings, and the\ntendency to over-resolve, becomes unsatisfying to the impatient, who\nwant results to come as they walk. Probably this is a reason that it is\noccasionally said that Emerson has no vital message for the rank and\nfile. He has no definite message perhaps for the literal, but messages\nare all vital, as much, by reason of his indefiniteness, as in spite of\nit.\n\nThere is a suggestion of irony in the thought that the power of his\nvague but compelling vitality, which ever sweeps us on in spite of\nourselves, might not have been his, if it had not been for those\ndefinite religious doctrines of the old New England theologians. For\nalmost two centuries, Emerson's mental and spiritual muscles had been\nin training for him in the moral and intellectual contentions, a part\nof the religious exercise of his forebears. A kind of higher\nsensitiveness seems to culminate in him. It gives him a power of\nsearching for a wider freedom of soul than theirs. The religion of\nPuritanism was based to a great extent, on a search for the unknowable,\nlimited only by the dogma of its theology--a search for a path, so that\nthe soul could better be conducted to the next world, while Emerson's\ntranscendentalism was based on the wider search for the unknowable,\nunlimited in any way or by anything except the vast bounds of innate\ngoodness, as it might be revealed to him in any phenomena of man,\nNature, or God. This distinction, tenuous, in spite of the\ndefinite-sounding words, we like to believe has something peculiar to\nEmerson in it. We like to feel that it superimposes the one that makes\nall transcendentalism but an intellectual state, based on the theory of\ninnate ideas, the reality of thought and the necessity of its freedom.\nFor the philosophy of the religion, or whatever you will call it, of\nthe Concord Transcendentalists is at least, more than an intellectual\nstate--it has even some of the functions of the Puritan church--it is a\nspiritual state in which both soul and mind can better conduct\nthemselves in this world, and also in the next--when the time comes.\nThe search of the Puritan was rather along the path of logic,\nspiritualized, and the transcendentalist of reason, spiritualized--a\ndifference in a broad sense between objective and subjective\ncontemplation.\n\nThe dislike of inactivity, repose and barter, drives one to the\nindefinite subjective. Emerson's lack of interest in permanence may\ncause him to present a subjectivity harsher on the outside than is\nessential. His very universalism occasionally seems a limitation.\nSomewhere here may lie a weakness--real to some, apparent to others--a\nweakness in so far as his relation becomes less vivid--to the many;\ninsofar as he over-disregards the personal unit in the universal. If\nGenius is the most indebted, how much does it owe to those who would,\nbut do not easily ride with it? If there is a weakness here is it the\nfault of substance or only of manner? If of the former, there is\norganic error somewhere, and Emerson will become less and less valuable\nto man. But this seems impossible, at least to us. Without considering\nhis manner or expression here (it forms the general subject of the\nsecond section of this paper), let us ask if Emerson's substance needs\nan affinity, a supplement or even a complement or a gangplank? And if\nso, of what will it be composed?\n\nPerhaps Emerson could not have risen to his own, if it had not been for\nhis Unitarian training and association with the churchmen emancipators.\n\"Christianity is founded on, and supposes the authority of, reason, and\ncannot therefore oppose it, without subverting itself.\" ... \"Its office\nis to discern universal truths, great and eternal principles ... the\nhighest power of the soul.\" Thus preached Channing. Who knows but this\npulpit aroused the younger Emerson to the possibilities of intuitive\nreasoning in spiritual realms? The influence of men like Channing in\nhis fight for the dignity of human nature, against the arbitrary\nrevelations that Calvinism had strapped on the church, and for the\nbelief in the divine in human reason, doubtless encouraged Emerson in\nhis unshackled search for the infinite, and gave him premises which he\nlater took for granted instead of carrying them around with him. An\nover-interest, not an under-interest in Christian ideal aims, may have\ncaused him to feel that the definite paths were well established and\ndoing their share, and that for some to reach the same infinite ends,\nmore paths might be opened--paths which would in themselves, and in a\nmore transcendent way, partake of the spiritual nature of the land in\nquest,--another expression of God's Kingdom in Man. Would you have the\nindefinite paths ALWAYS supplemented by the shadow of the definite one\nof a first influence?\n\nA characteristic of rebellion, is that its results are often deepest,\nwhen the rebel breaks not from the worst to the greatest, but from the\ngreat to the greater. The youth of the rebel increases this\ncharacteristic. The innate rebellious spirit in young men is active and\nbuoyant. They could rebel against and improve the millennium. This\nexcess of enthusiasm at the inception of a movement, causes loss of\nperspective; a natural tendency to undervalue the great in that which\nis being taken as a base of departure. A \"youthful sedition\" of Emerson\nwas his withdrawal from the communion, perhaps, the most socialistic\ndoctrine (or rather symbol) of the church--a \"commune\" above property\nor class.\n\nPicking up an essay on religion of a rather remarkable-minded\nboy--perhaps with a touch of genius--written when he was still in\ncollege, and so serving as a good illustration in point--we\nread--\"Every thinking man knows that the church is dead.\" But every\nthinking man knows that the church-part of the church always has been\ndead--that part seen by candle-light, not Christ-light. Enthusiasm is\nrestless and hasn't time to see that if the church holds itself as\nnothing but the symbol of the greater light it is life itself--as a\nsymbol of a symbol it is dead. Many of the sincerest followers of\nChrist never heard of Him. It is the better influence of an institution\nthat arouses in the deep and earnest souls a feeling of rebellion to\nmake its aims more certain. It is their very sincerity that causes\nthese seekers for a freer vision to strike down for more fundamental,\nuniversal, and perfect truths, but with such feverish enthusiasm, that\nthey appear to overthink themselves--a subconscious way of going\nGodward perhaps. The rebel of the twentieth century says: \"Let us\ndiscard God, immortality, miracle--but be not untrue to ourselves.\"\nHere he, no doubt, in a sincere and exalted moment, confuses God with a\nname. He apparently feels that there is a separable difference between\nnatural and revealed religion. He mistakes the powers behind them, to\nbe fundamentally separate. In the excessive keenness of his search, he\nforgets that \"being true to ourselves\" IS God, that the faintest\nthought of immortality IS God, and that God is \"miracle.\"\nOver-enthusiasm keeps one from letting a common experience of a day\ntranslate what is stirring the soul. The same inspiring force that\narouses the young rebel, brings later in life a kind of\n\"experience-afterglow,\" a realization that the soul cannot discard or\nlimit anything. Would you have the youthful enthusiasm of rebellion,\nwhich Emerson carried beyond his youth always supplemented by the\nshadow of experience?\n\nPerhaps it is not the narrow minded alone that have no interest in\nanything, but in its relation to their personality. Is the Christian\nReligion, to which Emerson owes embryo-ideals, anything but the\nrevelation of God in a personality--a revelation so that the narrow\nmind could become opened? But the tendency to over-personalize\npersonality may also have suggested to Emerson the necessity for more\nuniversal, and impersonal paths, though they be indefinite of outline\nand vague of ascent. Could you journey, with equal benefit, if they\nwere less so? Would you have the universal always supplemented by the\nshadow of the personal? If this view is accepted, and we doubt that it\ncan be by the majority, Emerson's substance could well bear a\nsupplement, perhaps an affinity. Something that will support that which\nsome conceive he does not offer. Something that will help answer Alton\nLocke's question: \"What has Emerson for the working-man?\" and questions\nof others who look for the gang-plank before the ship comes in sight.\nSomething that will supply the definite banister to the infinite, which\nit is said he keeps invisible. Something that will point a crossroad\nfrom \"his personal\" to \"his nature.\" Something that may be in Thoreau\nor Wordsworth, or in another poet whose songs \"breathe of a new morning\nof a higher life though a definite beauty in Nature\"--or something that\nwill show the birth of his ideal and hold out a background of revealed\nreligion, as a perspective to his transcendent religion--a counterpoise\nin his rebellion--which we feel Channing or Dr. Bushnell, or other\nsaints known and unknown might supply.\n\nIf the arc must be completed--if there are those who would have the\ngreat, dim outlines of Emerson fulfilled, it is fortunate that there\nare Bushnells, and Wordsworths, to whom they may appeal--to say nothing\nof the Vedas, the Bible, or their own souls. But such possibilities and\nconceptions, the deeper they are received, the more they seem to reduce\ntheir need. Emerson's Circle may be a better whole, without its\ncomplement. Perhaps his \"unsatiable demand for unity, the need to\nrecognize one nature in all variety of objects,\" would have been\nimpaired, if something should make it simpler for men to find the\nidentity they at first want in his substance. \"Draw if thou canst the\nmystic line severing rightly his from thine, which is human, which\ndivine.\" Whatever means one would use to personalize Emerson's natural\nrevelation, whether by a vision or a board walk, the vastness of his\naims and the dignity of his tolerance would doubtless cause him to\naccept or at least try to accept, and use \"magically as a part of his\nfortune.\" He would modestly say, perhaps, \"that the world is enlarged\nfor him, not by finding new objects, but by more affinities, and\npotencies than those he already has.\" But, indeed, is not enough\nmanifestation already there? Is not the asking that it be made more\nmanifest forgetting that \"we are not strong by our power to penetrate,\nbut by our relatedness?\" Will more signs create a greater sympathy? Is\nnot our weak suggestion needed only for those content with their own\nhopelessness?\n\nOthers may lead others to him, but he finds his problem in making\n\"gladness hope and fortitude flow from his page,\" rather than in\narranging that our hearts be there to receive it. The first is his\nduty--the last ours!\n\n\n2\n\n\nA devotion to an end tends to undervalue the means. A power of\nrevelation may make one more concerned about his perceptions of the\nsoul's nature than the way of their disclosure. Emerson is more\ninterested in what he perceives than in his expression of it. He is a\ncreator whose intensity is consumed more with the substance of his\ncreation than with the manner by which he shows it to others. Like\nPetrarch he seems more a discoverer of Beauty than an imparter of it.\nBut these discoveries, these devotions to aims, these struggles toward\nthe absolute, do not these in themselves, impart something, if not all,\nof their own unity and coherence--which is not received, as such, at\nfirst, nor is foremost in their expression. It must be remembered that\n\"truth\" was what Emerson was after--not strength of outline, or even\nbeauty except in so far as they might reveal themselves, naturally, in\nhis explorations towards the infinite. To think hard and deeply and to\nsay what is thought, regardless of consequences, may produce a first\nimpression, either of great translucence, or of great muddiness, but in\nthe latter there may be hidden possibilities. Some accuse Brahms'\norchestration of being muddy. This may be a good name for a first\nimpression of it. But if it should seem less so, he might not be saying\nwhat he thought. The mud may be a form of sincerity which demands that\nthe heart be translated, rather than handed around through the pit. A\nclearer scoring might have lowered the thought. Carlyle told Emerson\nthat some of his paragraphs didn't cohere. Emerson wrote by sentences\nor phrases, rather than by logical sequence. His underlying plan of\nwork seems based on the large unity of a series of particular aspects\nof a subject, rather than on the continuity of its expression. As\nthoughts surge to his mind, he fills the heavens with them, crowds them\nin, if necessary, but seldom arranges them, along the ground first.\nAmong class-room excuses for Emerson's imperfect coherence and lack of\nunity, is one that remembers that his essays were made from lecture\nnotes. His habit, often in lecturing, was to compile his ideas as they\ncame to him on a general subject, in scattered notes, and when on the\nplatform, to trust to the mood of the occasion, to assemble them. This\nseems a specious explanation, though true to fact. Vagueness, is at\ntimes, an indication of nearness to a perfect truth. The definite glory\nof Bernard of Cluny's Celestial City, is more beautiful than\ntrue--probably. Orderly reason does not always have to be a visible\npart of all great things. Logic may possibly require that unity means\nsomething ascending in self-evident relation to the parts and to the\nwhole, with no ellipsis in the ascent. But reason may permit, even\ndemand an ellipsis, and genius may not need the self-evident part. In\nfact, these parts may be the \"blind-spots\" in the progress of unity.\nThey may be filled with little but repetition. \"Nature loves analogy\nand hates repetition.\" Botany reveals evolution not permanence. An\napparent confusion if lived with long enough may become orderly.\nEmerson was not writing for lazy minds, though one of the keenest of\nhis academic friends said that, he (Emerson) could not explain many of\nhis own pages. But why should he!--he explained them when he discovered\nthem--the moment before he spoke or wrote them. A rare experience of a\nmoment at daybreak, when something in nature seems to reveal all\nconsciousness, cannot be explained at noon. Yet it is a part of the\nday's unity. At evening, nature is absorbed by another experience. She\ndislikes to explain as much as to repeat. It is conceivable, that what\nis unified form to the author, or composer, may of necessity be\nformless to his audience. A home-run will cause more unity in the grand\nstand than in the season's batting average. If a composer once starts\nto compromise, his work will begin to drag on HIM. Before the end is\nreached, his inspiration has all gone up in sounds pleasing to his\naudience, ugly to him--sacrificed for the first acoustic--an opaque\nclarity, a picture painted for its hanging. Easy unity, like easy\nvirtue, is easier to describe, when judged from its lapses than from\nits constancy. When the infidel admits God is great, he means only: \"I\nam lazy--it is easier to talk than live.\" Ruskin also says: \"Suppose I\nlike the finite curves best, who shall say I'm right or wrong? No one.\nIt is simply a question of experience.\" You may not be able to\nexperience a symphony, even after twenty performances. Initial\ncoherence today may be dullness tomorrow probably because formal or\noutward unity depends so much on repetition, sequences, antitheses,\nparagraphs with inductions and summaries. Macaulay had that kind of\nunity. Can you read him today? Emerson rather goes out and shouts: \"I'm\nthinking of the sun's glory today and I'll let his light shine through\nme. I'll say any damn thing that this inspires me with.\" Perhaps there\nare flashes of light, still in cipher, kept there by unity, the code of\nwhich the world has not yet discovered. The unity of one sentence\ninspires the unity of the whole--though its physique is as ragged as\nthe Dolomites.\n\nIntense lights--vague shadows--great pillars in a horizon are difficult\nthings to nail signboards to. Emerson's outward-inward qualities make\nhim hard to classify, but easy for some. There are many who like to say\nthat he--even all the Concord men--are intellectuals. Perhaps--but\nintellectuals who wear their brains nearer the heart than some of their\ncritics. It is as dangerous to determine a characteristic by manner as\nby mood. Emerson is a pure intellectual to those who prefer to take him\nas literally as they can. There are reformers, and in \"the form\" lies\ntheir interest, who prefer to stand on the plain, and then insist they\nsee from the summit. Indolent legs supply the strength of eye for their\ninspiration. The intellect is never a whole. It is where the soul finds\nthings. It is often the only track to the over-values. It appears a\nwhole--but never becomes one even in the stock exchange, or the\nconvent, or the laboratory. In the cleverest criminal, it is but a way\nto a low ideal. It can never discard the other part of its duality--the\nsoul or the void where the soul ought to be. So why classify a quality\nalways so relative that it is more an agency than substance; a quality\nthat disappears when classified. \"The life of the All must stream\nthrough us to make the man and the moment great.\" A sailor with a\nprecious cargo doesn't analyze the water. Because Emerson had\ngenerations of Calvinistic sermons in his blood, some cataloguers,\nwould localize or provincialize him, with the sternness of the old\nPuritan mind. They make him THAT, hold him THERE. They lean heavily on\nwhat they find of the above influence in him. They won't follow the\nrivers in his thought and the play of his soul. And their cousin\ncataloguers put him in another pigeon-hole. They label him \"ascetic.\"\nThey translate his outward serenity into an impression of severity. But\ntruth keeps one from being hysterical. Is a demagogue a friend of the\npeople because he will lie to them to make them cry and raise false\nhopes? A search for perfect truths throws out a beauty more spiritual\nthan sensuous. A sombre dignity of style is often confused by\nunder-imagination and by surface-sentiment, with austerity. If\nEmerson's manner is not always beautiful in accordance with accepted\nstandards, why not accept a few other standards? He is an ascetic, in\nthat he refuses to compromise content with manner. But a real ascetic\nis an extremist who has but one height. Thus may come the confusion, of\none who says that Emerson carries him high, but then leaves him always\nat THAT height--no higher--a confusion, mistaking a latent exultation\nfor an ascetic reserve. The rules of Thorough Bass can be applied to\nhis scale of flight no more than they can to the planetary system.\nJadassohn, if Emerson were literally a composer, could no more analyze\nhis harmony than a guide-to-Boston could. A microscope might show that\nhe uses chords of the 9th, 11th, or the 99th, but a lens far different\ntells us they are used with different aims from those of Debussy.\nEmerson is definite in that his art is based on something stronger than\nthe amusing or at its best the beguiling of a few mortals. If he uses a\nsensuous chord, it is not for sensual ears. His harmonies may float, if\nthe wind blows in that direction, through a voluptuous atmosphere, but\nhe has not Debussy's fondness for trying to blow a sensuous atmosphere\nfrom his own voluptuous cheeks. And so he is an ascetic! There is a\ndistance between jowl and soul--and it is not measured by the fraction\nof an inch between Concord and Paris. On the other hand, if one thinks\nthat his harmony contains no dramatic chords, because no theatrical\nsound is heard, let him listen to the finale of \"Success,\" or of\n\"Spiritual Laws,\" or to some of the poems, \"Brahma\" or \"Sursum Corda,\"\nfor example. Of a truth his Codas often seem to crystallize in a\ndramatic, though serene and sustained way, the truths of his\nsubject--they become more active and intense, but quieter and deeper.\n\nThen there comes along another set of cataloguers. They put him down as\na \"classicist,\" or a romanticist, or an eclectic. Because a prophet is\na child of romanticism--because revelation is classic, because\neclecticism quotes from eclectic Hindu Philosophy, a more sympathetic\ncataloguer may say, that Emerson inspires courage of the quieter kind\nand delight of the higher kind.\n\nThe same well-bound school teacher who told the boys that Thoreau was a\nnaturalist because he didn't like to work, puts down Emerson as a\n\"classic,\" and Hawthorne as a \"romantic.\" A loud voice made this doubly\nTRUE and SURE to be on the examination paper. But this teacher of\n\"truth AND dogma\" apparently forgot that there is no such thing as\n\"classicism or romanticism.\" One has but to go to the various\ndefinitions of these to know that. If you go to a classic definition\nyou know what a true classic is, and similarly a \"true romantic.\" But\nif you go to both, you have an algebraic formula, x = x, a\ncancellation, an apercu, and hence satisfying; if you go to all\ndefinitions you have another formula x > x, a destruction, another\napercu, and hence satisfying. Professor Beers goes to the dictionary\n(you wouldn't think a college professor would be as reckless as that).\nAnd so he can say that \"romantic\" is \"pertaining to the style of the\nChristian and popular literature of the Middle Ages,\" a Roman Catholic\nmode of salvation (not this definition but having a definition). And so\nProf. B. can say that Walter Scott is a romanticist (and Billy Phelps a\nclassic--sometimes). But for our part Dick Croker is a classic and job\na romanticist. Another professor, Babbitt by name, links up Romanticism\nwith Rousseau, and charges against it many of man's troubles. He\nsomehow likes to mix it up with sin. He throws saucers at it, but in a\nscholarly, interesting, sincere, and accurate way. He uncovers a\ndeformed foot, gives it a name, from which we are allowed to infer that\nthe covered foot is healthy and named classicism. But no Christian\nScientist can prove that Christ never had a stomach-ache. The\nArchitecture of Humanism [Footnote: Geoffrey Scott (Constable & Co.)]\ntells us that \"romanticism consists of ... a poetic sensibility towards\nthe remote, as such.\" But is Plato a classic or towards the remote? Is\nClassicism a poor relation of time--not of man? Is a thing classic or\nromantic because it is or is not passed by that biologic--that\nindescribable stream-of-change going on in all life? Let us settle the\npoint for \"good,\" and say that a thing is classic if it is thought of\nin terms of the past and romantic if thought of in terms of the\nfuture--and a thing thought of in terms of the present is--well, that\nis impossible! Hence, we allow ourselves to say, that Emerson is\nneither a classic or romantic but both--and both not only at different\ntimes in one essay, but at the same time in one sentence--in one word.\nAnd must we admit it, so is everyone. If you don't believe it, there\nmust be some true definition you haven't seen. Chopin shows a few\nthings that Bach forgot--but he is not eclectic, they say. Brahms shows\nmany things that Bach did remember, so he is an eclectic, they say.\nLeoncavallo writes pretty verses and Palestrina is a priest, and\nConfucius inspires Scriabin. A choice is freedom. Natural selection is\nbut one of Nature's tunes. \"All melodious poets shall be hoarse as\nstreet ballads, when once the penetrating keynote of nature and spirit\nis sounded--the earth-beat, sea-beat, heart-beat, which make the tune\nto which the sun rolls, and the globule of blood and the sap of the\ntrees.\"\n\nAn intuitive sense of values, tends to make Emerson use social,\npolitical, and even economic phenomena, as means of expression, as the\naccidental notes in his scale--rather than as ends, even lesser ends.\nIn the realization that they are essential parts of the greater values,\nhe does not confuse them with each other. He remains undisturbed except\nin rare instances, when the lower parts invade and seek to displace the\nhigher. He was not afraid to say that \"there are laws which should not\nbe too well obeyed.\" To him, slavery was not a social or a political or\nan economic question, nor even one of morals or of ethics, but one of\nuniversal spiritual freedom only. It mattered little what party, or\nwhat platform, or what law of commerce governed men. Was man governing\nhimself? Social error and virtue were but relative. This habit of not\nbeing hindered by using, but still going beyond the great truths of\nliving, to the greater truths of life gave force to his influence over\nthe materialists. Thus he seems to us more a regenerator than a\nreformer--more an interpreter of life's reflexes than of life's facts,\nperhaps. Here he appears greater than Voltaire or Rousseau and helped,\nperhaps, by the centrality of his conceptions, he could arouse the\ndeeper spiritual and moral emotions, without causing his listeners to\ndistort their physical ones. To prove that mind is over matter, he\ndoesn't place matter over mind. He is not like the man who, because he\ncouldn't afford both, gave up metaphysics for an automobile, and when\nhe ran over a man blamed metaphysics. He would not have us get\nover-excited about physical disturbance but have it accepted as a part\nof any progress in culture, moral, spiritual or aesthetic. If a poet\nretires to the mountain-side, to avoid the vulgar unculture of men, and\ntheir physical disturbance, so that he may better catch a nobler theme\nfor his symphony, Emerson tells him that \"man's culture can spare\nnothing, wants all material, converts all impediments into instruments,\nall enemies into power.\" The latest product of man's culture--the\naeroplane, then sails o'er the mountain and instead of an\ninspiration--a spray of tobacco-juice falls on the poet. \"Calm\nyourself, Poet!\" says Emerson, \"culture will convert furies into muses\nand hells into benefit. This wouldn't have befallen you if it hadn't\nbeen for the latest transcendent product of the genius of culture\" (we\nwon't say what kind), a consummation of the dreams of poets, from David\nto Tennyson. Material progress is but a means of expression. Realize\nthat man's coarseness has its future and will also be refined in the\ngradual uprise. Turning the world upside down may be one of its lesser\nincidents. It is the cause, seldom the effect that interests Emerson.\nHe can help the cause--the effect must help itself. He might have said\nto those who talk knowingly about the cause of war--or of the last war,\nand who would trace it down through long vistas of cosmic, political,\nmoral evolution and what not--he might say that the cause of it was as\nsimple as that of any dogfight--the \"hog-mind\" of the minority against\nthe universal mind, the majority. The un-courage of the former fears to\nbelieve in the innate goodness of mankind. The cause is always the\nsame, the effect different by chance; it is as easy for a hog, even a\nstupid one, to step on a box of matches under a tenement with a\nthousand souls, as under an empty bird-house. The many kindly burn up\nfor the few; for the minority is selfish and the majority generous. The\nminority has ruled the world for physical reasons. The physical reasons\nare being removed by this \"converting culture.\" Webster will not much\nlonger have to grope for the mind of his constituency. The\nmajority--the people--will need no intermediary. Governments will pass\nfrom the representative to the direct. The hog-mind is the principal\nthing that is making this transition slow. The biggest prop to the\nhog-mind is pride--pride in property and the power property gives.\nRuskin backs this up--\"it is at the bottom of all great mistakes; other\npassions do occasional good, but whenever pride puts in its word ... it\nis all over with the artist.\" The hog-mind and its handmaidens in\ndisorder, superficial brightness, fundamental dullness, then cowardice\nand suspicion--all a part of the minority (the non-people) the\nantithesis of everything called soul, spirit, Christianity, truth,\nfreedom--will give way more and more to the great primal truths--that\nthere is more good than evil, that God is on the side of the majority\n(the people)--that he is not enthusiastic about the minority (the\nnon-people)--that he has made men greater than man, that he has made\nthe universal mind and the over-soul greater and a part of the\nindividual mind and soul--that he has made the Divine a part of all.\n\nAgain, if a picture in economics is before him, Emerson plunges down to\nthe things that ARE because they are BETTER than they are. If there is\na row, which there usually is, between the ebb and flood tide, in the\nmaterial ocean--for example, between the theory of the present order of\ncompetition, and of attractive and associated labor, he would\nsympathize with Ricardo, perhaps, that labor is the measure of value,\nbut \"embrace, as do generous minds, the proposition of labor shared by\nall.\" He would go deeper than political economics, strain out the\nself-factor from both theories, and make the measure of each pretty\nmuch the same, so that the natural (the majority) would win, but not to\nthe disadvantage of the minority (the artificial) because this has\ndisappeared--it is of the majority. John Stuart Mill's political\neconomy is losing value because it was written by a mind more \"a\nbanker's\" than a \"poet's.\" The poet knows that there is no such thing\nas the perpetual law of supply and demand, perhaps not of demand and\nsupply--or of the wage-fund, or price-level, or increments earned or\nunearned; and that the existence of personal or public property may not\nprove the existence of God.\n\nEmerson seems to use the great definite interests of humanity to\nexpress the greater, indefinite, spiritual values--to fulfill what he\ncan in his realms of revelation. Thus, it seems that so close a\nrelation exists between his content and expression, his substance and\nmanner, that if he were more definite in the latter he would lose power\nin the former,--perhaps some of those occasional flashes would have\nbeen unexpressed--flashes that have gone down through the world and\nwill flame on through the ages--flashes that approach as near the\nDivine as Beethoven in his most inspired moments--flashes of\ntranscendent beauty, of such universal import, that they may bring, of\na sudden, some intimate personal experience, and produce the same\nindescribable effect that comes in rare instances, to men, from some\ncommon sensation. In the early morning of a Memorial Day, a boy is\nawakened by martial music--a village band is marching down the street,\nand as the strains of Reeves' majestic Seventh Regiment March come\nnearer and nearer, he seems of a sudden translated--a moment of vivid\npower comes, a consciousness of material nobility, an exultant\nsomething gleaming with the possibilities of this life, an assurance\nthat nothing is impossible, and that the whole world lies at his feet.\nBut as the band turns the corner, at the soldiers' monument, and the\nmarch steps of the Grand Army become fainter and fainter, the boy's\nvision slowly vanishes--his \"world\" becomes less and less probable--but\nthe experience ever lies within him in its reality. Later in life, the\nsame boy hears the Sabbath morning bell ringing out from the white\nsteeple at the \"Center,\" and as it draws him to it, through the autumn\nfields of sumac and asters, a Gospel hymn of simple devotion comes out\nto him--\"There's a wideness in God's mercy\"--an instant suggestion of\nthat Memorial Day morning comes--but the moment is of deeper\nimport--there is no personal exultation--no intimate world vision--no\nmagnified personal hope--and in their place a profound sense of a\nspiritual truth,--a sin within reach of forgiveness--and as the hymn\nvoices die away, there lies at his feet--not the world, but the figure\nof the Saviour--he sees an unfathomable courage, an immortality for the\nlowest, the vastness in humility, the kindness of the human heart,\nman's noblest strength, and he knows that God is nothing--nothing but\nlove! Whence cometh the wonder of a moment? From sources we know not.\nBut we do know that from obscurity, and from this higher Orpheus come\nmeasures of sphere melodies [note: Paraphrased from a passage in Sartor\nResartus.] flowing in wild, native tones, ravaging the souls of men,\nflowing now with thousand-fold accompaniments and rich symphonies\nthrough all our hearts; modulating and divinely leading them.\n\n\n3\n\n\nWhat is character? In how far does it sustain the soul or the soul it?\nIs it a part of the soul? And then--what is the soul? Plato knows but\ncannot tell us. Every new-born man knows, but no one tells us. \"Nature\nwill not be disposed of easily. No power of genius has ever yet had the\nsmallest success in explaining existence. The perfect enigma remains.\"\nAs every blind man sees the sun, so character may be the part of the\nsoul we, the blind, can see, and then have the right to imagine that\nthe soul is each man's share of God, and character the muscle which\ntries to reveal its mysteries--a kind of its first visible\nradiance--the right to know that it is the voice which is always\ncalling the pragmatist a fool.\n\nAt any rate, it can be said that Emerson's character has much to do\nwith his power upon us. Men who have known nothing of his life, have\nborne witness to this. It is directly at the root of his substance, and\naffects his manner only indirectly. It gives the sincerity to the\nconstant spiritual hopefulness we are always conscious of, and which\ncarries with it often, even when the expression is somber, a note of\nexultation in the victories of \"the innate virtues\" of man. And it is\nthis, perhaps, that makes us feel his courage--not a self-courage, but\na sympathetic one--courageous even to tenderness. It is the open\ncourage of a kind heart, of not forcing opinions--a thing much needed\nwhen the cowardly, underhanded courage of the fanatic would FORCE\nopinion. It is the courage of believing in freedom, per se, rather than\nof trying to force everyone to SEE that you believe in it--the courage\nof the willingness to be reformed, rather than of reforming--the\ncourage teaching that sacrifice is bravery, and force, fear. The\ncourage of righteous indignation, of stammering eloquence, of spiritual\ninsight, a courage ever contracting or unfolding a philosophy as it\ngrows--a courage that would make the impossible possible. Oliver\nWendell Holmes says that Emerson attempted the impossible in the\nOver-Soul--\"an overflow of spiritual imagination.\" But he (Emerson)\naccomplished the impossible in attempting it, and still leaving it\nimpossible. A courageous struggle to satisfy, as Thoreau says, \"Hunger\nrather than the palate\"--the hunger of a lifetime sometimes by one\nmeal. His essay on the Pre-Soul (which he did not write) treats of that\npart of the over-soul's influence on unborn ages, and attempts the\nimpossible only when it stops attempting it.\n\nLike all courageous souls, the higher Emerson soars, the more lowly he\nbecomes. \"Do you think the porter and the cook have no experiences, no\nwonders for you? Everyone knows as much as the Savant.\" To some, the\nway to be humble is to admonish the humble, not learn from them.\nCarlyle would have Emerson teach by more definite signs, rather than\ninterpret his revelations, or shall we say preach? Admitting all the\ninspiration and help that Sartor Resartus has given in spite of its\nvaudeville and tragic stages, to many young men getting under way in\nthe life of tailor or king, we believe it can be said (but very broadly\nsaid) that Emerson, either in the first or second series of essays,\ntaken as a whole, gives, it seems to us, greater inspiration, partly\nbecause his manner is less didactic, less personally suggestive,\nperhaps less clearly or obviously human than Carlyle's. How direct this\ninspiration is is a matter of personal viewpoint, temperament, perhaps\ninheritance. Augustine Birrell says he does not feel it--and he seems\nnot to even indirectly. Apparently \"a non-sequacious author\" can't\ninspire him, for Emerson seems to him a \"little thin and vague.\" Is\nEmerson or the English climate to blame for this? He, Birrell, says a\nreally great author dissipates all fears as to his staying power.\n(Though fears for our staying-power, not Emerson's, is what we would\nlike dissipated.) Besides, around a really great author, there are no\nfears to dissipate. \"A wise author never allows his reader's mind to be\nat large,\" but Emerson is not a wise author. His essay on Prudence has\nnothing to do with prudence, for to be wise and prudent he must put\nexplanation first, and let his substance dissolve because of it. \"How\ncarefully,\" says Birrell again, \"a really great author like Dr. Newman,\nor M. Renan, explains to you what he is going to do, and how he is\ngoing to do it.\" Personally we like the chance of having a hand in the\n\"explaining.\" We prefer to look at flowers, but not through a botany,\nfor it seems that if we look at them alone, we see a beauty of Nature's\npoetry, a direct gift from the Divine, and if we look at botany alone,\nwe see the beauty of Nature's intellect, a direct gift of the\nDivine--if we look at both together, we see nothing.\n\nThus it seems that Carlyle and Birrell would have it that courage and\nhumility have something to do with \"explanation\"--and that it is not \"a\nrespect for all\"--a faith in the power of \"innate virtue\" to perceive\nby \"relativeness rather than penetration\"--that causes Emerson to\nwithhold explanation to a greater degree than many writers. Carlyle\nasks for more utility, and Birrell for more inspiration. But we like to\nbelieve that it is the height of Emerson's character, evidenced\nespecially in his courage and humility that shades its quality, rather\nthan that its virtue is less--that it is his height that will make him\nmore and more valuable and more and more within the reach of\nall--whether it be by utility, inspiration, or other needs of the human\nsoul.\n\nCannot some of the most valuable kinds of utility and inspiration come\nfrom humility in its highest and purest forms? For is not the truest\nkind of humility a kind of glorified or transcendent democracy--the\npracticing it rather than the talking it--the not-wanting to level all\nfinite things, but the being willing to be leveled towards the\ninfinite? Until humility produces that frame of mind and spirit in the\nartist can his audience gain the greatest kind of utility and\ninspiration, which might be quite invisible at first? Emerson realizes\nthe value of \"the many,\"--that the law of averages has a divine source.\nHe recognizes the various life-values in reality--not by reason of\ntheir closeness or remoteness, but because he sympathizes with men who\nlive them, and the majority do. \"The private store of reason is not\ngreat--would that there were a public store for man,\" cries Pascal, but\nthere is, says Emerson, it is the universal mind, an institution\ncongenital with the common or over-soul. Pascal is discouraged, for he\nlets himself be influenced by surface political and religious history\nwhich shows the struggle of the group, led by an individual, rather\nthan that of the individual led by himself--a struggle as much\nprivately caused as privately led. The main-path of all social progress\nhas been spiritual rather than intellectual in character, but the many\nbypaths of individual-materialism, though never obliterating the\nhighway, have dimmed its outlines and caused travelers to confuse the\ncolors along the road. A more natural way of freeing the congestion in\nthe benefits of material progress will make it less difficult for the\nmajority to recognize the true relation between the important spiritual\nand religious values and the less important intellectual and economic\nvalues. As the action of the intellect and universal mind becomes more\nand more identical, the clearer will the relation of all values become.\nBut for physical reasons, the group has had to depend upon the\nindividual as leaders, and the leaders with few exceptions restrained\nthe universal mind--they trusted to the \"private store,\" but now,\nthanks to the lessons of evolution, which Nature has been teaching men\nsince and before the days of Socrates, the public store of reason is\ngradually taking the place of the once-needed leader. From the Chaldean\ntablet to the wireless message this public store has been wonderfully\nopened. The results of these lessons, the possibilities they are\noffering for ever coordinating the mind of humanity, the culmination of\nthis age-instruction, are seen today in many ways. Labor Federation,\nSuffrage Extension, are two instances that come to mind among the many.\nIn these manifestations, by reason of tradition, or the bad-habit part\nof tradition, the hog-mind of the few (the minority), comes in play.\nThe possessors of this are called leaders, but even these \"thick-skins\"\nare beginning to see that the MOVEMENT is the leader, and that they are\nonly clerks. Broadly speaking, the effects evidenced in the political\nside of history have so much of the physical because the causes have\nbeen so much of the physical. As a result the leaders for the most part\nhave been under-average men, with skins thick, wits slick, and hands\nquick with under-values, otherwise they would not have become leaders.\nBut the day of leaders, as such, is gradually closing--the people are\nbeginning to lead themselves--the public store of reason is slowly\nbeing opened--the common universal mind and the common over-soul is\nslowly but inevitably coming into its own. \"Let a man believe in God,\nnot in names and places and persons. Let the great soul incarnated in\nsome poor ... sad and simple Joan, go out to service and sweep chimneys\nand scrub floors ... its effulgent day beams cannot be muffled...\" and\nthen \"to sweep and scrub will instantly appear supreme and beautiful\nactions ... and all people will get brooms and mops.\" Perhaps, if all of\nEmerson--his works and his life--were to be swept away, and nothing of\nhim but the record of the following incident remained to men--the\ninfluence of his soul would still be great. A working woman after\ncoming from one of his lectures said: \"I love to go to hear Emerson,\nnot because I understand him, but because he looks as though he thought\neverybody was as good as he was.\" Is it not the courage--the spiritual\nhopefulness in his humility that makes this story possible and true? Is\nit not this trait in his character that sets him above all creeds--that\ngives him inspired belief in the common mind and soul? Is it not this\ncourageous universalism that gives conviction to his prophecy and that\nmakes his symphonies of revelation begin and end with nothing but the\nstrength and beauty of innate goodness in man, in Nature and in God,\nthe greatest and most inspiring theme of Concord Transcendental\nPhilosophy, as we hear it.\n\nAnd it is from such a world-compelling theme and from such vantage\nground, that Emerson rises to almost perfect freedom of action, of\nthought and of soul, in any direction and to any height. A vantage\nground, somewhat vaster than Schelling's conception of transcendental\nphilosophy--\"a philosophy of Nature become subjective.\" In Concord it\nincludes the objective and becomes subjective to nothing but freedom\nand the absolute law. It is this underlying courage of the purest\nhumility that gives Emerson that outward aspect of serenity which is\nfelt to so great an extent in much of his work, especially in his codas\nand perorations. And within this poised strength, we are conscious of\nthat \"original authentic fire\" which Emerson missed in Shelley--we are\nconscious of something that is not dispassionate, something that is at\ntimes almost turbulent--a kind of furious calm lying deeply in the\nconviction of the eventual triumph of the soul and its union with God!\n\nLet us place the transcendent Emerson where he, himself, places Milton,\nin Wordsworth's apostrophe: \"Pure as the naked heavens, majestic, free,\nso didst thou travel on life's common way in cheerful Godliness.\"\n\nThe Godliness of spiritual courage and hopefulness--these fathers of\nfaith rise to a glorified peace in the depth of his greater\nperorations. There is an \"oracle\" at the beginning of the Fifth\nSymphony--in those four notes lies one of Beethoven's greatest\nmessages. We would place its translation above the relentlessness of\nfate knocking at the door, above the greater human-message of destiny,\nand strive to bring it towards the spiritual message of Emerson's\nrevelations--even to the \"common heart\" of Concord--the Soul of\nhumanity knocking at the door of the Divine mysteries, radiant in the\nfaith that it will be opened--and the human become the Divine!\n\n\n\n\nIII--Hawthorne\n\n\nThe substance of Hawthorne is so dripping wet with the supernatural,\nthe phantasmal, the mystical--so surcharged with adventures, from the\ndeeper picturesque to the illusive fantastic, one unconsciously finds\noneself thinking of him as a poet of greater imaginative impulse than\nEmerson or Thoreau. He was not a greater poet possibly than they--but a\ngreater artist. Not only the character of his substance, but the care\nin his manner throws his workmanship, in contrast to theirs, into a\nkind of bas-relief. Like Poe he quite naturally and unconsciously\nreaches out over his subject to his reader. His mesmerism seeks to\nmesmerize us--beyond Zenobia's sister. But he is too great an artist to\nshow his hand \"in getting his audience,\" as Poe and Tschaikowsky\noccasionally do. His intellectual muscles are too strong to let him\nbecome over-influenced, as Ravel and Stravinsky seem to be by the\nmorbidly fascinating--a kind of false beauty obtained by artistic\nmonotony. However, we cannot but feel that he would weave his spell\nover us--as would the Grimms and Aesop. We feel as much under magic as\nthe \"Enchanted Frog.\" This is part of the artist's business. The effect\nis a part of his art-effort in its inception. Emerson's substance and\neven his manner has little to do with a designed effect--his\nthunderbolts or delicate fragments are flashed out regardless--they may\nknock us down or just spatter us--it matters little to him--but\nHawthorne is more considerate; that is, he is more artistic, as men say.\n\nHawthorne may be more noticeably indigenous or may have more local\ncolor, perhaps more national color than his Concord contemporaries. But\nthe work of anyone who is somewhat more interested in psychology than\nin transcendental philosophy, will weave itself around individuals and\ntheir personalities. If the same anyone happens to live in Salem, his\nwork is likely to be colored by the Salem wharves and Salem witches. If\nthe same anyone happens to live in the \"Old Manse\" near the Concord\nBattle Bridge, he is likely \"of a rainy day to betake himself to the\nhuge garret,\" the secrets of which he wonders at, \"but is too reverent\nof their dust and cobwebs to disturb.\" He is likely to \"bow below the\nshriveled canvas of an old (Puritan) clergyman in wig and gown--the\nparish priest of a century ago--a friend of Whitefield.\" He is likely\nto come under the spell of this reverend Ghost who haunts the \"Manse\"\nand as it rains and darkens and the sky glooms through the dusty attic\nwindows, he is likely \"to muse deeply and wonderingly upon the\nhumiliating fact that the works of man's intellect decay like those of\nhis hands\" ... \"that thought grows moldy,\" and as the garret is in\nMassachusetts, the \"thought\" and the \"mold\" are likely to be quite\nnative. When the same anyone puts his poetry into novels rather than\nessays, he is likely to have more to say about the life around\nhim--about the inherited mystery of the town--than a poet of philosophy\nis.\n\nIn Hawthorne's usual vicinity, the atmosphere was charged with the\nsomber errors and romance of eighteenth century New England,--ascetic\nor noble New England as you like. A novel, of necessity, nails an\nart-effort down to some definite part or parts of the earth's\nsurface--the novelist's wagon can't always be hitched to a star. To say\nthat Hawthorne was more deeply interested than some of the other\nConcord writers--Emerson, for example--in the idealism peculiar to his\nnative land (in so far as such idealism of a country can be conceived\nof as separate from the political) would be as unreasoning as to hold\nthat he was more interested in social progress than Thoreau, because he\nwas in the consular service and Thoreau was in no one's service--or\nthat the War Governor of Massachusetts was a greater patriot than\nWendell Phillips, who was ashamed of all political parties. Hawthorne's\nart was true and typically American--as is the art of all men living in\nAmerica who believe in freedom of thought and who live wholesome lives\nto prove it, whatever their means of expression.\n\nAny comprehensive conception of Hawthorne, either in words or music,\nmust have for its basic theme something that has to do with the\ninfluence of sin upon the conscience--something more than the Puritan\nconscience, but something which is permeated by it. In this relation he\nis wont to use what Hazlitt calls the \"moral power of imagination.\"\nHawthorne would try to spiritualize a guilty conscience. He would sing\nof the relentlessness of guilt, the inheritance of guilt, the shadow of\nguilt darkening innocent posterity. All of its sins and morbid horrors,\nits specters, its phantasmas, and even its hellish hopelessness play\naround his pages, and vanishing between the lines are the less guilty\nElves of the Concord Elms, which Thoreau and Old Man Alcott may have\nfelt, but knew not as intimately as Hawthorne. There is often a\npervading melancholy about Hawthorne, as Faguet says of de Musset\n\"without posture, without noise but penetrating.\" There is at times the\nmysticism and serenity of the ocean, which Jules Michelet sees in \"its\nhorizon rather than in its waters.\" There is a sensitiveness to\nsupernatural sound waves. Hawthorne feels the mysteries and tries to\npaint them rather than explain them--and here, some may say that he is\nwiser in a more practical way and so more artistic than Emerson.\nPerhaps so, but no greater in the deeper ranges and profound mysteries\nof the interrelated worlds of human and spiritual life.\n\nThis fundamental part of Hawthorne is not attempted in our music (the\n2nd movement of the series) which is but an \"extended fragment\" trying\nto suggest some of his wilder, fantastical adventures into the\nhalf-childlike, half-fairylike phantasmal realms. It may have something\nto do with the children's excitement on that \"frosty Berkshire morning,\nand the frost imagery on the enchanted hall window\" or something to do\nwith \"Feathertop,\" the \"Scarecrow,\" and his \"Looking Glass\" and the\nlittle demons dancing around his pipe bowl; or something to do with the\nold hymn tune that haunts the church and sings only to those in the\nchurchyard, to protect them from secular noises, as when the circus\nparade comes down Main Street; or something to do with the concert at\nthe Stamford camp meeting, or the \"Slave's Shuffle\"; or something to do\nwith the Concord he-nymph, or the \"Seven Vagabonds,\" or \"Circe's\nPalace,\" or something else in the wonderbook--not something that\nhappens, but the way something happens; or something to do with the\n\"Celestial Railroad,\" or \"Phoebe's Garden,\" or something personal,\nwhich tries to be \"national\" suddenly at twilight, and universal\nsuddenly at midnight; or something about the ghost of a man who never\nlived, or about something that never will happen, or something else\nthat is not.\n\n\n\n\nIV--\"The Alcotts\"\n\n\nIf the dictagraph had been perfected in Bronson Alcott's time, he might\nnow be a great writer. As it is, he goes down as Concord's greatest\ntalker. \"Great expecter,\" says Thoreau; \"great feller,\" says Sam\nStaples, \"for talkin' big ... but his daughters is the gals\nthough--always DOIN' somethin'.\" Old Man Alcott, however, was usually\n\"doin' somethin'\" within. An internal grandiloquence made him melodious\nwithout; an exuberant, irrepressible, visionary absorbed with\nphilosophy AS such; to him it was a kind of transcendental business,\nthe profits of which supported his inner man rather than his family.\nApparently his deep interest in spiritual physics, rather than\nmetaphysics, gave a kind of hypnotic mellifluous effect to his voice\nwhen he sang his oracles; a manner something of a cross between an\ninside pompous self-assertion and an outside serious benevolence. But\nhe was sincere and kindly intentioned in his eagerness to extend what\nhe could of the better influence of the philosophic world as he saw it.\nIn fact, there is a strong didactic streak in both father and daughter.\nLouisa May seldom misses a chance to bring out the moral of a homely\nvirtue. The power of repetition was to them a natural means of\nillustration. It is said that the elder Alcott, while teaching school,\nwould frequently whip himself when the scholars misbehaved, to show\nthat the Divine Teacher-God-was pained when his children of the earth\nwere bad. Quite often the boy next to the bad boy was punished, to show\nhow sin involved the guiltless. And Miss Alcott is fond of working her\nstory around, so that she can better rub in a moral precept--and the\nmoral sometimes browbeats the story. But with all the elder Alcott's\nvehement, impracticable, visionary qualities, there was a sturdiness\nand a courage--at least, we like to think so. A Yankee boy who would\ncheerfully travel in those days, when distances were long and\nunmotored, as far from Connecticut as the Carolinas, earning his way by\npeddling, laying down his pack to teach school when opportunity\noffered, must possess a basic sturdiness. This was apparently not very\nevident when he got to preaching his idealism. An incident in Alcott's\nlife helps confirm a theory--not a popular one--that men accustomed to\nwander around in the visionary unknown are the quickest and strongest\nwhen occasion requires ready action of the lower virtues. It often\nappears that a contemplative mind is more capable of action than an\nactively objective one. Dr. Emerson says: \"It is good to know that it\nhas been recorded of Alcott, the benign idealist, that when the Rev.\nThomas Wentworth Higginson, heading the rush on the U.S. Court House in\nBoston, to rescue a fugitive slave, looked back for his following at\nthe court-room door, only the apostolic philosopher was there cane in\nhand.\" So it seems that his idealism had some substantial virtues, even\nif he couldn't make a living.\n\nThe daughter does not accept the father as a prototype--she seems to\nhave but few of her father's qualities \"in female.\" She supported the\nfamily and at the same time enriched the lives of a large part of young\nAmerica, starting off many little minds with wholesome thoughts and\nmany little hearts with wholesome emotions. She leaves\nmemory-word-pictures of healthy, New England childhood days,--pictures\nwhich are turned to with affection by middle-aged children,--pictures,\nthat bear a sentiment, a leaven, that middle-aged America needs\nnowadays more than we care to admit.\n\nConcord village, itself, reminds one of that common virtue lying at the\nheight and root of all the Concord divinities. As one walks down the\nbroad-arched street, passing the white house of Emerson--ascetic guard\nof a former prophetic beauty--he comes presently beneath the old elms\noverspreading the Alcott house. It seems to stand as a kind of homely\nbut beautiful witness of Concord's common virtue--it seems to bear a\nconsciousness that its past is LIVING, that the \"mosses of the Old\nManse\" and the hickories of Walden are not far away. Here is the home\nof the \"Marches\"--all pervaded with the trials and happiness of the\nfamily and telling, in a simple way, the story of \"the richness of not\nhaving.\" Within the house, on every side, lie remembrances of what\nimagination can do for the better amusement of fortunate children who\nhave to do for themselves-much-needed lessons in these days of\nautomatic, ready-made, easy entertainment which deaden rather than\nstimulate the creative faculty. And there sits the little old\nspinet-piano Sophia Thoreau gave to the Alcott children, on which Beth\nplayed the old Scotch airs, and played at the Fifth Symphony.\n\nThere is a commonplace beauty about \"Orchard House\"--a kind of\nspiritual sturdiness underlying its quaint picturesqueness--a kind of\ncommon triad of the New England homestead, whose overtones tell us that\nthere must have been something aesthetic fibered in the Puritan\nseverity--the self-sacrificing part of the ideal--a value that seems to\nstir a deeper feeling, a stronger sense of being nearer some perfect\ntruth than a Gothic cathedral or an Etruscan villa. All around you,\nunder the Concord sky, there still floats the influence of that human\nfaith melody, transcendent and sentimental enough for the enthusiast or\nthe cynic respectively, reflecting an innate hope--a common interest in\ncommon things and common men--a tune the Concord bards are ever\nplaying, while they pound away at the immensities with a Beethovenlike\nsublimity, and with, may we say, a vehemence and perseverance--for that\npart of greatness is not so difficult to emulate.\n\nWe dare not attempt to follow the philosophic raptures of Bronson\nAlcott--unless you will assume that his apotheosis will show how\n\"practical\" his vision in this world would be in the next. And so we\nwon't try to reconcile the music sketch of the Alcotts with much\nbesides the memory of that home under the elms--the Scotch songs and\nthe family hymns that were sung at the end of each day--though there\nmay be an attempt to catch something of that common sentiment (which we\nhave tried to suggest above)-a strength of hope that never gives way to\ndespair--a conviction in the power of the common soul which, when all\nis said and done, may be as typical as any theme of Concord and its\ntranscendentalists.\n\n\n\n\nV--Thoreau\n\n\nThoreau was a great musician, not because he played the flute but\nbecause he did not have to go to Boston to hear \"the Symphony.\" The\nrhythm of his prose, were there nothing else, would determine his value\nas a composer. He was divinely conscious of the enthusiasm of Nature,\nthe emotion of her rhythms and the harmony of her solitude. In this\nconsciousness he sang of the submission to Nature, the religion of\ncontemplation, and the freedom of simplicity--a philosophy\ndistinguishing between the complexity of Nature which teaches freedom,\nand the complexity of materialism which teaches slavery. In music, in\npoetry, in all art, the truth as one sees it must be given in terms\nwhich bear some proportion to the inspiration. In their greatest\nmoments the inspiration of both Beethoven and Thoreau express profound\ntruths and deep sentiment, but the intimate passion of it, the storm\nand stress of it, affected Beethoven in such a way that he could not\nbut be ever showing it and Thoreau that he could not easily expose it.\nThey were equally imbued with it, but with different results. A\ndifference in temperament had something to do with this, together with\na difference in the quality of expression between the two arts. \"Who\nthat has heard a strain of music feared lest he would speak\nextravagantly forever,\" says Thoreau. Perhaps music is the art of\nspeaking extravagantly. Herbert Spencer says that some men, as for\ninstance Mozart, are so peculiarly sensitive to emotion ... that music is\nto them but a continuation not only of the expression but of the actual\nemotion, though the theory of some more modern thinkers in the\nphilosophy of art doesn't always bear this out. However, there is no\ndoubt that in its nature music is predominantly subjective and tends to\nsubjective expression, and poetry more objective tending to objective\nexpression. Hence the poet when his muse calls for a deeper feeling\nmust invert this order, and he may be reluctant to do so as these\ndepths often call for an intimate expression which the physical looks\nof the words may repel. They tend to reveal the nakedness of his soul\nrather than its warmth. It is not a matter of the relative value of the\naspiration, or a difference between subconsciousness and consciousness\nbut a difference in the arts themselves; for example, a composer may\nnot shrink from having the public hear his \"love letter in tones,\"\nwhile a poet may feel sensitive about having everyone read his \"letter\nin words.\" When the object of the love is mankind the sensitiveness is\nchanged only in degree.\n\nBut the message of Thoreau, though his fervency may be inconstant and\nhis human appeal not always direct, is, both in thought and spirit, as\nuniversal as that of any man who ever wrote or sang--as universal as it\nis nontemporaneous--as universal as it is free from the measure of\nhistory, as \"solitude is free from the measure of the miles of space\nthat intervene between man and his fellows.\" In spite of the fact that\nHenry James (who knows almost everything) says that \"Thoreau is more\nthan provincial--that he is parochial,\" let us repeat that Henry\nThoreau, in respect to thought, sentiment, imagination, and soul, in\nrespect to every element except that of place of physical being--a\nthing that means so much to some--is as universal as any personality in\nliterature. That he said upon being shown a specimen grass from Iceland\nthat the same species could be found in Concord is evidence of his\nuniversality, not of his parochialism. He was so universal that he did\nnot need to travel around the world to PROVE it. \"I have more of God,\nthey more of the road.\" \"It is not worth while to go around the world\nto count the cats in Zanzibar.\" With Marcus Aurelius, if he had seen\nthe present he had seen all, from eternity and all time forever.\n\nThoreau's susceptibility to natural sounds was probably greater than\nthat of many practical musicians. True, this appeal is mainly through\nthe sensational element which Herbert Spencer thinks the predominant\nbeauty of music. Thoreau seems able to weave from this source some\nperfect transcendental symphonies. Strains from the Orient get the best\nof some of the modern French music but not of Thoreau. He seems more\ninterested in than influenced by Oriental philosophy. He admires its\nways of resignation and self-contemplation but he doesn't contemplate\nhimself in the same way. He often quotes from the Eastern scriptures\npassages which were they his own he would probably omit, i.e., the\nVedas say \"all intelligences awake with the morning.\" This seems\nunworthy of \"accompanying the undulations of celestial music\" found on\nthis same page, in which an \"ode to morning\" is sung--\"the awakening to\nnewly acquired forces and aspirations from within to a higher life than\nwe fell asleep from ... for all memorable events transpire in the morning\ntime and in the morning atmosphere.\" Thus it is not the whole tone\nscale of the Orient but the scale of a Walden morning--\"music in single\nstrains,\" as Emerson says, which inspired many of the polyphonies and\nharmonies that come to us through his poetry. Who can be forever\nmelancholy \"with Aeolian music like this\"?\n\nThis is but one of many ways in which Thoreau looked to Nature for his\ngreatest inspirations. In her he found an analogy to the Fundamental of\nTranscendentalism. The \"innate goodness\" of Nature is or can be a moral\ninfluence; Mother Nature, if man will but let her, will keep him\nstraight--straight spiritually and so morally and even mentally. If he\nwill take her as a companion, and teacher, and not as a duty or a\ncreed, she will give him greater thrills and teach him greater truths\nthan man can give or teach--she will reveal mysteries that mankind has\nlong concealed. It was the soul of Nature not natural history that\nThoreau was after. A naturalist's mind is one predominantly scientific,\nmore interested in the relation of a flower to other flowers than its\nrelation to any philosophy or anyone's philosophy. A transcendent love\nof Nature and writing \"Rhus glabra\" after sumac doesn't necessarily\nmake a naturalist. It would seem that although thorough in observation\n(not very thorough according to Mr. Burroughs) and with a keen\nperception of the specific, a naturalist--inherently--was exactly what\nThoreau was not. He seems rather to let Nature put him under her\nmicroscope than to hold her under his. He was too fond of Nature to\npractice vivisection upon her. He would have found that painful, \"for\nwas he not a part with her?\" But he had this trait of a naturalist,\nwhich is usually foreign to poets, even great ones; he observed acutely\neven things that did not particularly interest him--a useful natural\ngift rather than a virtue.\n\nThe study of Nature may tend to make one dogmatic, but the love of\nNature surely does not. Thoreau no more than Emerson could be said to\nhave compounded doctrines. His thinking was too broad for that. If\nThoreau's was a religion of Nature, as some say,--and by that they\nmean that through Nature's influence man is brought to a deeper\ncontemplation, to a more spiritual self-scrutiny, and thus closer to\nGod,--it had apparently no definite doctrines. Some of his theories\nregarding natural and social phenomena and his experiments in the art\nof living are certainly not doctrinal in form, and if they are in\nsubstance it didn't disturb Thoreau and it needn't us... \"In proportion\nas he simplifies his life the laws of the universe will appear less\ncomplex and solitude will not be solitude, nor poverty poverty, nor\nweakness weakness. If you have built castles in the air your work need\nnot be lost; that is where they should be, now put the foundations\nunder them.\" ... \"Then we will love with the license of a higher order\nof beings.\" Is that a doctrine? Perhaps. At any rate, between the lines\nof some such passage as this lie some of the fountain heads that water\nthe spiritual fields of his philosophy and the seeds from which they\nare sown (if indeed his whole philosophy is but one spiritual garden).\nHis experiments, social and economic, are a part of its cultivation and\nfor the harvest--and its transmutation, he trusts to moments of\ninspiration--\"only what is thought, said, and done at a certain rare\ncoincidence is good.\"\n\nThoreau's experiment at Walden was, broadly speaking, one of these\nmoments. It stands out in the casual and popular opinion as a kind of\nadventure--harmless and amusing to some, significant and important to\nothers; but its significance lies in the fact that in trying to\npractice an ideal he prepared his mind so that it could better bring\nothers \"into the Walden-state-of-mind.\" He did not ask for a literal\napproval, or in fact for any approval. \"I would not stand between any\nman and his genius.\" He would have no one adopt his manner of life,\nunless in doing so he adopts his own--besides, by that time \"I may have\nfound a better one.\" But if he preached hard he practiced harder what\nhe preached--harder than most men. Throughout Walden a text that he is\nalways pounding out is \"Time.\" Time for inside work out-of-doors;\npreferably out-of-doors, \"though you perhaps may have some pleasant,\nthrilling, glorious hours, even in a poor house.\" Wherever the\nplace--time there must be. Time to show the unnecessariness of\nnecessities which clog up time. Time to contemplate the value of man to\nthe universe, of the universe to man, man's excuse for being. Time FROM\nthe demands of social conventions. Time FROM too much labor for some,\nwhich means too much to eat, too much to wear, too much material, too\nmuch materialism for others. Time FROM the \"hurry and waste of life.\"\nTime FROM the \"St. Vitus Dance.\" BUT, on the other side of the ledger,\ntime FOR learning that \"there is no safety in stupidity alone.\" Time\nFOR introspection. Time FOR reality. Time FOR expansion. Time FOR\npracticing the art, of living the art of living. Thoreau has been\ncriticized for practicing his policy of expansion by living in a\nvacuum--but he peopled that vacuum with a race of beings and\nestablished a social order there, surpassing any of the precepts in\nsocial or political history. \"...for he put some things behind and\npassed an invisible boundary; new, universal, and more liberal laws\nwere around and within him, the old laws were expanded and interpreted\nin a more liberal sense and he lived with the license of a higher\norder\"--a community in which \"God was the only President\" and \"Thoreau\nnot Webster was His Orator.\" It is hard to believe that Thoreau really\nrefused to believe that there was any other life but his own, though he\nprobably did think that there was not any other life besides his own\nfor him. Living for society may not always be best accomplished by\nliving WITH society. \"Is there any virtue in a man's skin that you must\ntouch it?\" and the \"rubbing of elbows may not bring men's minds closer\ntogether\"; or if he were talking through a \"worst seller\" (magazine)\nthat \"had to put it over\" he might say, \"forty thousand souls at a ball\ngame does not, necessarily, make baseball the highest expression of\nspiritual emotion.\" Thoreau, however, is no cynic, either in character\nor thought, though in a side glance at himself, he may have held out to\nbe one; a \"cynic in independence,\" possibly because of his rule laid\ndown that \"self-culture admits of no compromise.\"\n\nIt is conceivable that though some of his philosophy and a good deal of\nhis personality, in some of its manifestations, have outward colors\nthat do not seem to harmonize, the true and intimate relations they\nbear each other are not affected. This peculiarity, frequently seen in\nhis attitude towards social-economic problems, is perhaps more\nemphasized in some of his personal outbursts. \"I love my friends very\nmuch, but I find that it is of no use to go to see them. I hate them\ncommonly when I am near.\" It is easier to see what he means than it is\nto forgive him for saying it. The cause of this apparent lack of\nharmony between philosophy and personality, as far as they can be\nseparated, may have been due to his refusal \"to keep the very delicate\nbalance\" which Mr. Van Doren in his \"Critical Study of Thoreau\" says\n\"it is necessary for a great and good man to keep between his public\nand private lives, between his own personality and the whole outside\nuniverse of personalities.\" Somehow one feels that if he had kept this\nbalance he would have lost \"hitting power.\" Again, it seems that\nsomething of the above depends upon the degree of greatness or\ngoodness. A very great and especially a very good man has no separate\nprivate and public life. His own personality though not identical with\noutside personalities is so clear or can be so clear to them that it\nappears identical, and as the world progresses towards its inevitable\nperfection this appearance becomes more and more a reality. For the\nsame reason that all great men now agree, in principle but not in\ndetail, in so far as words are able to communicate agreement, on the\ngreat fundamental truths. Someone says: \"Be specific--what great\nfundamentals?\" Freedom over slavery; the natural over the artificial;\nbeauty over ugliness; the spiritual over the material; the goodness of\nman; the Godness of man; have been greater if he hadn't written plays.\nSome say that a true composer will never write an opera because a truly\nbrave man will not take a drink to keep up his courage; which is not\nthe same thing as saying that Shakespeare is not the greatest figure in\nall literature; in fact, it is an attempt to say that many novels, most\noperas, all Shakespeares, and all brave men and women (rum or no rum)\nare among the noblest blessings with which God has endowed\nmankind--because, not being perfect, they are perfect examples pointing\nto that perfection which nothing yet has attained.\n\nThoreau's mysticism at times throws him into elusive moods--but an\nelusiveness held by a thread to something concrete and specific, for he\nhad too much integrity of mind for any other kind. In these moments it\nis easier to follow his thought than to follow him. Indeed, if he were\nalways easy to follow, after one had caught up with him, one might find\nthat it was not Thoreau.\n\nIt is, however, with no mystic rod that he strikes at institutional\nlife. Here again he felt the influence of the great transcendental\ndoctrine of \"innate goodness\" in human nature--a reflection of the like\nin nature; a philosophic part which, by the way, was a more direct\ninheritance in Thoreau than in his brother transcendentalists. For\nbesides what he received from a native Unitarianism a good part must\nhave descended to him through his Huguenot blood from the\n\"eighteenth-century French philosophy.\" We trace a reason here for his\nlack of interest in \"the church.\" For if revealed religion is the path\nbetween God and man's spiritual part--a kind of formal\ncauseway--Thoreau's highly developed spiritual life felt, apparently\nunconsciously, less need of it than most men. But he might have been\nmore charitable towards those who do need it (and most of us do) if he\nhad been more conscious of his freedom. Those who look today for the\ncause of a seeming deterioration in the influence of the church may\nfind it in a wider development of this feeling of Thoreau's; that the\nneed is less because there is more of the spirit of Christianity in the\nworld today. Another cause for his attitude towards the church as an\ninstitution is one always too common among \"the narrow minds\" to have\ninfluenced Thoreau. He could have been more generous. He took the arc\nfor the circle, the exception for the rule, the solitary bad example\nfor the many good ones. His persistent emphasis on the value of\n\"example\" may excuse this lower viewpoint. \"The silent influence of the\nexample of one sincere life ... has benefited society more than all the\nprojects devised for its salvation.\" He has little patience for the\nunpracticing preacher. \"In some countries a hunting parson is no\nuncommon sight. Such a one might make a good shepherd dog but is far\nfrom being a good shepherd.\" It would have been interesting to have\nseen him handle the speculating parson, who takes a good salary--more\nper annum than all the disciples had to sustain their bodies during\ntheir whole lives--from a metropolitan religious corporation for\n\"speculating\" on Sunday about the beauty of poverty, who preaches:\n\"Take no thought (for your life) what ye shall eat or what ye shall\ndrink nor yet what ye shall put on ... lay not up for yourself treasure\nupon earth ... take up thy cross and follow me\"; who on Monday becomes a\n\"speculating\" disciple of another god, and by questionable investments,\nsuccessful enough to get into the \"press,\" seeks to lay up a treasure\nof a million dollars for his old age, as if a million dollars could\nkeep such a man out of the poor-house. Thoreau might observe that this\none good example of Christian degeneracy undoes all the acts of\nregeneracy of a thousand humble five-hundred-dollar country parsons;\nthat it out-influences the \"unconscious influence\" of a dozen Dr.\nBushnells if there be that many; that the repentance of this man who\ndid not \"fall from grace\" because he never fell into it--that this\nunnecessary repentance might save this man's own soul but not\nnecessarily the souls of the million head-line readers; that repentance\nwould put this preacher right with the powers that be in this\nworld--and the next. Thoreau might pass a remark upon this man's\nintimacy with God \"as if he had a monopoly of the subject\"--an intimacy\nthat perhaps kept him from asking God exactly what his Son meant by the\n\"camel,\" the \"needle\"--to say nothing of the \"rich man.\" Thoreau might\nhave wondered how this man NAILED DOWN the last plank in HIS bridge to\nsalvation, by rising to sublime heights of patriotism, in HIS war\nagainst materialism; but would even Thoreau be so unfeeling as to\nsuggest to this exhorter that HIS salvation might be clinched \"if he\nwould sacrifice his income\" (not himself) and come--in to a real\nSalvation Army, or that the final triumph, the supreme happiness in\ncasting aside this mere $10,000 or $20,000 every year must be denied\nhim--for was he not captain of the ship--must he not stick to his\npassengers (in the first cabin--the very first cabin)--not that the\nship was sinking but that he was ... we will go no further. Even Thoreau\nwould not demand sacrifice for sacrifice sake--no, not even from Nature.\n\nProperty from the standpoint of its influence in checking natural\nself-expansion and from the standpoint of personal and inherent right\nis another institution that comes in for straight and cross-arm jabs,\nnow to the stomach, now to the head, but seldom sparring for breath.\nFor does he not say that \"wherever a man goes, men will pursue him with\ntheir dirty institutions\"? The influence of property, as he saw it, on\nmorality or immorality and how through this it mayor should influence\n\"government\" is seen by the following: \"I am convinced that if all men\nwere to live as simply as I did, then thieving and robbery would be\nunknown. These take place only in communities where some have got more\nthan is sufficient while others have not enough--\n\n  Nec bella fuerunt,\n  Faginus astabat dum\n  Scyphus ante dapes--\n\nYou who govern public affairs, what need have you to employ\npunishments? Have virtue and the people will be virtuous.\" If Thoreau\nhad made the first sentence read: \"If all men were like me and were to\nlive as simply,\" etc., everyone would agree with him. We may wonder\nhere how he would account for some of the degenerate types we are told\nabout in some of our backwoods and mountain regions. Possibly by\nassuming that they are an instance of perversion of the species. That\nthe little civilizing their forbears experienced rendered these people\nmore susceptible to the physical than to the spiritual influence of\nnature; in other words; if they had been purer naturists, as the Aztecs\nfor example, they would have been purer men. Instead of turning to any\ntheory of ours or of Thoreau for the true explanation of this\ncondition--which is a kind of pseudo-naturalism--for its true diagnosis\nand permanent cure, are we not far more certain to find it in the\nradiant look of humility, love, and hope in the strong faces of those\ninspired souls who are devoting their lives with no little sacrifice to\nthese outcasts of civilization and nature. In truth, may not mankind\nfind the solution of its eternal problem--find it after and beyond the\nlast, most perfect system of wealth distribution which science can ever\ndevise--after and beyond the last sublime echo of the greatest\nsocialistic symphonies--after and beyond every transcendent thought and\nexpression in the simple example of these Christ-inspired souls--be\nthey Pagan, Gentile, Jew, or angel.\n\nHowever, underlying the practical or impractical suggestions implied in\nthe quotation above, which is from the last paragraph of Thoreau's\nVillage, is the same transcendental theme of \"innate goodness.\" For\nthis reason there must be no limitation except that which will free\nmankind from limitation, and from a perversion of this \"innate\"\npossession: And \"property\" may be one of the causes of this\nperversion--property in the two relations cited above. It is\nconceivable that Thoreau, to the consternation of the richest members\nof the Bolsheviki and Bourgeois, would propose a policy of liberation,\na policy of a limited personal property right, on the ground that\ncongestion of personal property tends to limit the progress of the soul\n(as well as the progress of the stomach)--letting the economic noise\nthereupon take care of itself--for dissonances are becoming\nbeautiful--and do not the same waters that roar in a storm take care of\nthe eventual calm? That this limit of property be determined not by the\nVOICE of the majority but by the BRAIN of the majority under a\ngovernment limited to no national boundaries. \"The government of the\nworld I live in is not framed in after-dinner conversation\"--around a\ntable in a capital city, for there is no capital--a government of\nprinciples not parties; of a few fundamental truths and not of many\npolitical expediencies. A government conducted by virtuous leaders, for\nit will be led by all, for all are virtuous, as then their \"innate\nvirtue\" will no more be perverted by unnatural institutions. This will\nnot be a millennium but a practical and possible application of\nuncommon common sense. For is it not sense, common or otherwise, for\nNature to want to hand back the earth to those to whom it belongs--that\nis, to those who have to live on it? Is it not sense, that the average\nbrains like the average stomachs will act rightly if they have an equal\namount of the right kind of food to act upon and universal education is\non the way with the right kind of food? Is it not sense then that all\ngrown men and women (for all are necessary to work out the divine \"law\nof averages\") shall have a direct not an indirect say about the things\nthat go on in this world?\n\nSome of these attitudes, ungenerous or radical, generous or\nconservative (as you will), towards institutions dear to many, have no\ndoubt given impressions unfavorable to Thoreau's thought and\npersonality. One hears him called, by some who ought to know what they\nsay and some who ought not, a crabbed, cold-hearted, sour-faced\nYankee--a kind of a visionary sore-head--a cross-grained, egotistic\nrecluse,--even non-hearted. But it is easier to make a statement than\nprove a reputation. Thoreau may be some of these things to those who\nmake no distinction between these qualities and the manner which often\ncomes as a kind of by-product of an intense devotion of a principle or\nideal. He was rude and unfriendly at times but shyness probably had\nsomething to do with that. In spite of a certain self-possession he was\ndiffident in most company, but, though he may have been subject to\nthose spells when words do not rise and the mind seems wrapped in a\nkind of dull cloth which everyone dumbly stares at, instead of looking\nthrough--he would easily get off a rejoinder upon occasion. When a\nparty of visitors came to Walden and some one asked Thoreau if he found\nit lonely there, he replied: \"Only by your help.\" A remark\ncharacteristic, true, rude, if not witty. The writer remembers hearing\na schoolteacher in English literature dismiss Thoreau (and a half hour\nlesson, in which time all of Walden,--its surface--was sailed over) by\nsaying that this author (he called everyone \"author\" from Solomon down\nto Dr. Parkhurst) \"was a kind of a crank who styled himself a\nhermit-naturalist and who idled about the woods because he didn't want\nto work.\" Some such stuff is a common conception, though not as common\nas it used to be. If this teacher had had more brains, it would have\nbeen a lie. The word idled is the hopeless part of this criticism, or\nrather of this uncritical remark. To ask this kind of a man, who plays\nall the \"choice gems from celebrated composers\" literally, always\nliterally, and always with the loud pedal, who plays all hymns, wrong\nnotes, right notes, games, people, and jokes literally, and with the\nloud pedal, who will die literally and with the loud pedal--to ask this\nman to smile even faintly at Thoreau's humor is like casting a pearl\nbefore a coal baron. Emerson implies that there is one thing a genius\nmust have to be a genius and that is \"mother wit.\" ... \"Doctor Johnson,\nMilton, Chaucer, and Burns had it. Aunt Mary Moody Emerson has it and\ncan write scrap letters. Who has it need never write anything but\nscraps. Henry Thoreau has it.\" His humor though a part of this wit is\nnot always as spontaneous, for it is sometimes pun shape (so is Charles\nLamb's)--but it is nevertheless a kind that can serenely transport us\nand which we can enjoy without disturbing our neighbors. If there are\nthose who think him cold-hearted and with but little human sympathy,\nlet them read his letters to Emerson's little daughter, or hear Dr.\nEmerson tell about the Thoreau home life and the stories of his\nboyhood--the ministrations to a runaway slave; or let them ask old Sam\nStaples, the Concord sheriff about him. That he \"was fond of a few\nintimate friends, but cared not one fig for people in the mass,\" is a\nstatement made in a school history and which is superficially true. He\ncared too much for the masses--too much to let his personality be\n\"massed\"; too much to be unable to realize the futility of wearing his\nheart on his sleeve but not of wearing his path to the shore of\n\"Walden\" for future masses to walk over and perchance find the way to\nthemselves. Some near-satirists are fond of telling us that Thoreau\ncame so close to Nature that she killed him before he had discovered\nher whole secret. They remind us that he died with consumption but\nforget that he lived with consumption. And without using much charity,\nthis can be made to excuse many of his irascible and uncongenial moods.\nYou to whom that gaunt face seems forbidding--look into the eyes! If he\nseems \"dry and priggish\" to you, Mr. Stevenson, \"with little of that\nlarge unconscious geniality of the world's heroes,\" follow him some\nspring morning to Baker Farm, as he \"rambles through pine groves ... like\ntemples, or like fleets at sea, full-rigged, with wavy boughs and\nrippling with light so soft and green and shady that the Druids would\nhave forsaken their oaks to worship in them.\" Follow him to \"the cedar\nwood beyond Flint's Pond, where the trees covered with hoary blue\nberries, spiring higher and higher, are fit to stand before Valhalla.\"\nFollow him, but not too closely, for you may see little, if you do--\"as\nhe walks in so pure and bright a light gilding its withered grass and\nleaves so softly and serenely bright that he thinks he has never bathed\nin such a golden flood.\" Follow him as \"he saunters towards the holy\nland till one day the sun shall shine more brightly than ever it has\ndone, perchance shine into your minds and hearts and light up your\nwhole lives with a great awakening, light as warm and serene and golden\nas on a bankside in autumn.\" Follow him through the golden flood to the\nshore of that \"holy land,\" where he lies dying as men say--dying as\nbravely as he lived. You may be near when his stern old aunt in the\nduty of her Puritan conscience asks him: \"Have you made your peace with\nGod\"? and you may see his kindly smile as he replies, \"I did not know\nthat we had ever quarreled.\" Moments like these reflect more nobility\nand equanimity perhaps than geniality--qualities, however, more\nserviceable to world's heroes.\n\nThe personal trait that one who has affection for Thoreau may find\nworst is a combative streak, in which he too often takes refuge. \"An\nobstinate elusiveness,\" almost a \"contrary cussedness,\" as if he would\nsay, which he didn't: \"If a truth about something is not as I think it\nought to be, I'll make it what I think, and it WILL be the truth--but\nif you agree with me, then I begin to think it may not be the truth.\"\nThe causes of these unpleasant colors (rather than characteristics) are\ntoo easily attributed to a lack of human sympathy or to the assumption\nthat they are at least symbols of that lack instead of to a\nsupersensitiveness, magnified at times by ill health and at times by a\nsubconsciousness of the futility of actually living out his ideals in\nthis life. It has been said that his brave hopes were unrealized\nanywhere in his career--but it is certain that they started to be\nrealized on or about May 6, 1862, and we doubt if 1920 will end their\nfulfillment or his career. But there were many in Concord who knew that\nwithin their village there was a tree of wondrous growth, the shadow of\nwhich--alas, too frequently--was the only part they were allowed to\ntouch. Emerson was one of these. He was not only deeply conscious of\nThoreau's rare gifts but in the Woodland Notes pays a tribute to a side\nof his friend that many others missed. Emerson knew that Thoreau's\nsensibilities too often veiled his nobilities, that a self-cultivated\nstoicism ever fortified with sarcasm, none the less securely because it\nseemed voluntary, covered a warmth of feeling. \"His great heart, him a\nhermit made.\" A breadth of heart not easily measured, found only in the\nhighest type of sentimentalists, the type which does not perpetually\ndiscriminate in favor of mankind. Emerson has much of this sentiment\nand touches it when he sings of Nature as \"the incarnation of a\nthought,\" when he generously visualizes Thoreau, \"standing at the\nWalden shore invoking the vision of a thought as it drifts heavenward\ninto an incarnation of Nature.\" There is a Godlike patience in\nNature,-in her mists, her trees, her mountains--as if she had a more\nabiding faith and a clearer vision than man of the resurrection and\nimmortality! There comes to memory an old yellow-papered composition of\nschool-boy days whose peroration closed with \"Poor Thoreau; he communed\nwith nature for forty odd years, and then died.\" \"The forty odd\nyears,\"--we'll still grant that part, but he is over a hundred now, and\nmaybe, Mr. Lowell, he is more lovable, kindlier, and more radiant with\nhuman sympathy today, than, perchance, you were fifty years ago. It may\nbe that he is a far stronger, a far greater, an incalculably greater\nforce in the moral and spiritual fibre of his fellow-countrymen\nthroughout the world today than you dreamed of fifty years ago. You,\nJames Russell Lowells! You, Robert Louis Stevensons! You, Mark Van\nDorens! with your literary perception, your power of illumination, your\nbrilliancy of expression, yea, and with your love of sincerity, you\nknow your Thoreau, but not my Thoreau--that reassuring and true friend,\nwho stood by me one \"low\" day, when the sun had gone down, long, long\nbefore sunset. You may know something of the affection that heart\nyearned for but knew it a duty not to grasp; you may know something of\nthe great human passions which stirred that soul--too deep for animate\nexpression--you may know all of this, all there is to know about\nThoreau, but you know him not, unless you love him!\n\nAnd if there shall be a program for our music let it follow his thought\non an autumn day of Indian summer at Walden--a shadow of a thought at\nfirst, colored by the mist and haze over the pond:\n\n  Low anchored cloud,\n  Fountain head and\n  Source of rivers...\n  Dew cloth, dream drapery--\n  Drifting meadow of the air....\n\nbut this is momentary; the beauty of the day moves him to a certain\nrestlessness--to aspirations more specific--an eagerness for outward\naction, but through it all he is conscious that it is not in keeping\nwith the mood for this \"Day.\" As the mists rise, there comes a clearer\nthought more traditional than the first, a meditation more calm. As he\nstands on the side of the pleasant hill of pines and hickories in front\nof his cabin, he is still disturbed by a restlessness and goes down the\nwhite-pebbled and sandy eastern shore, but it seems not to lead him\nwhere the thought suggests--he climbs the path along the \"bolder\nnorthern\" and \"western shore, with deep bays indented,\" and now along\nthe railroad track, \"where the Aeolian harp plays.\" But his eagerness\nthrows him into the lithe, springy stride of the specie hunter--the\nnaturalist--he is still aware of a restlessness; with these faster\nsteps his rhythm is of shorter span--it is still not the tempo of\nNature, it does not bear the mood that the genius of the day calls for,\nit is too specific, its nature is too external, the introspection too\nbuoyant, and he knows now that he must let Nature flow through him and\nslowly; he releases his more personal desires to her broader rhythm,\nconscious that this blends more and more with the harmony of her\nsolitude; it tells him that his search for freedom on that day, at\nleast, lies in his submission to her, for Nature is as relentless as\nshe is benignant.\n\nHe remains in this mood and while outwardly still, he seems to move\nwith the slow, almost monotonous swaying beat of this autumnal day. He\nis more contented with a \"homely burden\" and is more assured of \"the\nbroad margin to his life; he sits in his sunny doorway ... rapt in\nrevery ... amidst goldenrod, sandcherry, and sumac ... in undisturbed\nsolitude.\" At times the more definite personal strivings for the ideal\nfreedom, the former more active speculations come over him, as if he\nwould trace a certain intensity even in his submission. \"He grew in\nthose seasons like corn in the night and they were better than any\nworks of the hands. They were not time subtracted from his life but so\nmuch over and above the usual allowance.\" \"He realized what the\nOrientals meant by contemplation and forsaking of works.\" \"The day\nadvanced as if to light some work of his--it was morning and lo! now it\nis evening and nothing memorable is accomplished...\" \"The evening train\nhas gone by,\" and \"all the restless world with it. The fishes in the\npond no longer feel its rumbling and he is more alone than ever...\" His\nmeditations are interrupted only by the faint sound of the Concord\nbell--'tis prayer-meeting night in the village--\"a melody as it were,\nimported into the wilderness...\" \"At a distance over the woods the\nsound acquires a certain vibratory hum as if the pine needles in the\nhorizon were the strings of a harp which it swept... A vibration of the\nuniversal lyre... Just as the intervening atmosphere makes a distant\nridge of earth interesting to the eyes by the azure tint it imparts.\"\n... Part of the echo may be \"the voice of the wood; the same trivial\nwords and notes sung by the wood nymph.\" It is darker, the poet's flute\nis heard out over the pond and Walden hears the swan song of that \"Day\"\nand faintly echoes... Is it a transcendental tune of Concord? 'Tis an\nevening when the \"whole body is one sense,\" ... and before ending his\nday he looks out over the clear, crystalline water of the pond and\ncatches a glimpse of the shadow--thought he saw in the morning's mist\nand haze--he knows that by his final submission, he possesses the\n\"Freedom of the Night.\" He goes up the \"pleasant hillside of pines,\nhickories,\" and moonlight to his cabin, \"with a strange liberty in\nNature, a part of herself.\"\n\n\n\n\nVI--Epilogue\n\n\n1\n\n\nThe futility of attempting to trace the source or primal impulse of an\nart-inspiration may be admitted without granting that human qualities\nor attributes which go with personality cannot be suggested, and that\nartistic intuitions which parallel them cannot be reflected in music.\nActually accomplishing the latter is a problem, more or less arbitrary\nto an open mind, more or less impossible to a prejudiced mind.\n\nThat which the composer intends to represent as \"high vitality\" sounds\nlike something quite different to different listeners. That which I\nlike to think suggests Thoreau's submission to nature may, to another,\nseem something like Hawthorne's \"conception of the relentlessness of an\nevil conscience\"--and to the rest of our friends, but a series of\nunpleasant sounds. How far can the composer be held accountable? Beyond\na certain point the responsibility is more or less undeterminable. The\noutside characteristics--that is, the points furthest away from the\nmergings--are obvious to mostly anyone. A child knows a \"strain of\njoy,\" from one of sorrow. Those a little older know the dignified from\nthe frivolous--the Spring Song from the season in which the \"melancholy\ndays have come\" (though is there not a glorious hope in autumn!). But\nwhere is the definite expression of late-spring against early-summer,\nof happiness against optimism? A painter paints a sunset--can he paint\nthe setting sun?\n\nIn some century to come, when the school children will whistle popular\ntunes in quarter-tones--when the diatonic scale will be as obsolete as\nthe pentatonic is now--perhaps then these borderland experiences may be\nboth easily expressed and readily recognized. But maybe music was not\nintended to satisfy the curious definiteness of man. Maybe it is better\nto hope that music may always be a transcendental language in the most\nextravagant sense. Possibly the power of literally distinguishing these\n\"shades of abstraction\"--these attributes paralleled by \"artistic\nintuitions\" (call them what you will)-is ever to be denied man for the\nsame reason that the beginning and end of a circle are to be denied.\n\n\n2\n\n\nThere may be an analogy--and on first sight it seems that there must\nbe--between both the state and power of artistic perceptions and the\nlaw of perpetual change, that ever-flowing stream partly biological,\npartly cosmic, ever going on in ourselves, in nature, in all life. This\nmay account for the difficulty of identifying desired qualities with\nthe perceptions of them in expression. Many things are constantly\ncoming into being, while others are constantly going out--one part of\nthe same thing is coming in while another part is going out of\nexistence. Perhaps this is why the above conformity in art (a\nconformity which we seem naturally to look for) appears at times so\nunrealizable, if not impossible. It will be assumed, to make this\ntheory clearer, that the \"flow\" or \"change\" does not go on in the\nart-product itself. As a matter of fact it probably does, to a certain\nextent--a picture, or a song, may gain or lose in value beyond what the\npainter or composer knew, by the progress and higher development in all\nart. Keats may be only partially true when he says that \"A work of\nbeauty is a joy forever\"--a thing that is beautiful to ME, is a joy to\nME, as long as it remains beautiful to ME--and if it remains so as long\nas I live, it is so forever, that is, forever to ME. If he had put it\nthis way, he would have been tiresome, inartistic, but perhaps truer.\nSo we will assume here that this change only goes on in man and nature;\nand that this eternal process in mankind is paralleled in some way\nduring each temporary, personal life.\n\nA young man, two generations ago, found an identity with his ideals, in\nRossini; when an older man in Wagner. A young man, one generation ago,\nfound his in Wagner, but when older in Cesar Franck or Brahms. Some may\nsay that this change may not be general, universal, or natural, and\nthat it may be due to a certain kind of education, or to a certain\ninherited or contracted prejudice. We cannot deny or affirm this,\nabsolutely, nor will we try to even qualitatively--except to say that\nit will be generally admitted that Rossini, today, does not appeal to\nthis generation, as he did to that of our fathers. As far as prejudice\nor undue influence is concerned, and as an illustration in point, the\nfollowing may be cited to show that training may have but little effect\nin this connection, at least not as much as usually supposed--for we\nbelieve this experience to be, to a certain extent, normal, or at\nleast, not uncommon. A man remembers, when he was a boy of about\nfifteen years, hearing his music-teacher (and father) who had just\nreturned from a performance of Siegfried say with a look of anxious\nsurprise that \"somehow or other he felt ashamed of enjoying the music\nas he did,\" for beneath it all he was conscious of an undercurrent of\n\"make-believe\"--the bravery was make-believe, the love was\nmake-believe, the passion, the virtue, all make-believe, as was the\ndragon--P. T. Barnum would have been brave enough to have gone out and\ncaptured a live one! But, that same boy at twenty-five was listening to\nWagner with enthusiasm, his reality was real enough to inspire a\ndevotion. The \"Preis-Lied,\" for instance, stirred him deeply. But when\nhe became middle-aged--and long before the Hohenzollern hog-marched\ninto Belgium--this music had become cloying, the melodies threadbare--a\nsense of something commonplace--yes--of make-believe came. These\nfeelings were fought against for association's sake, and because of\ngratitude for bygone pleasures--but the former beauty and nobility were\nnot there, and in their place stood irritating intervals of descending\nfourths and fifths. Those once transcendent progressions, luxuriant\nsuggestions of Debussy chords of the 9th, 11th, etc., were becoming\nslimy. An unearned exultation--a sentimentality deadening something\nwithin hides around in the music. Wagner seems less and less to measure\nup to the substance and reality of Cesar Franck, Brahms, d'Indy, or\neven Elgar (with all his tiresomeness), the wholesomeness, manliness,\nhumility, and deep spiritual, possibly religious feeling of these men\nseem missing and not made up for by his (Wagner's) manner and\neloquence, even if greater than theirs (which is very doubtful).\n\nFrom the above we would try to prove that as this stream of change\nflows towards the eventual ocean of mankind's perfection, the art-works\nin which we identify our higher ideals come by this process to be\nidentified with the lower ideals of those who embark after us when the\nstream has grown in depth. If we stop with the above experience, our\ntheory of the effect of man's changing nature, as thus explaining\nartistic progress, is perhaps sustained. Thus would we show that the\nperpetual flow of the life stream is affected by and affects each\nindividual riverbed of the universal watersheds. Thus would we prove\nthat the Wagner period was normal, because we intuitively recognized\nwhatever identity we were looking for at a certain period in our life,\nand the fact that it was so made the Franck period possible and then\nnormal at a later period in our life. Thus would we assume that this is\nas it should be, and that it is not Wagner's content or substance or\nhis lack of virtue, that something in us has made us flow past him and\nnot he past us. But something blocks our theory! Something makes our\nhypotheses seem purely speculative if not useless. It is men like Bach\nand Beethoven.\n\nIs it not a matter nowadays of common impression or general opinion\n(for the law of averages plays strongly in any theory relating to human\nattributes) that the world's attitude towards the substance and quality\nand spirit of these two men, or other men of like character, if there\nbe such, has not been affected by the flowing stream that has changed\nus? But if by the measure of this public opinion, as well as it can be\nmeasured, Bach and Beethoven are being flowed past--not as fast perhaps\nas Wagner is, but if they are being passed at all from this deeper\nviewpoint, then this \"change\" theory holds.\n\nHere we shall have to assume, for we haven't proved it, that artistic\nintuitions can sense in music a weakening of moral strength and\nvitality, and that it is sensed in relation to Wagner and not sensed in\nrelation to Bach and Beethoven. If, in this common opinion, there is a\nparticle of change toward the latter's art, our theory stands--mind\nyou, this admits a change in the manner, form, external expression,\netc., but not in substance. If there is no change here towards the\nsubstance of these two men, our theory not only falls but its failure\nsuperimposes or allows us to presume a fundamental duality in music,\nand in all art for that matter.\n\nDoes the progress of intrinsic beauty or truth (we assume there is such\na thing) have its exposures as well as its discoveries? Does the\nnon-acceptance of the foregoing theory mean that Wagner's substance and\nreality are lower and his manner higher; that his beauty was not\nintrinsic; that he was more interested in the repose of pride than in\nthe truth of humility? It appears that he chose the representative\ninstead of the spirit itself,--that he chose consciously or\nunconsciously, it matters not,--the lower set of values in this\ndualism. These are severe accusations to bring--especially when a man\nis a little down as Wagner is today. But these convictions were present\nsome time before he was banished from the Metropolitan. Wagner seems to\ntake Hugo's place in Faguet's criticism of de Vigny that, \"The staging\nto him (Hugo) was the important thing--not the conception--that in de\nVigny, the artist was inferior to the poet\"; finally that Hugo and so\nWagner have a certain pauvrete de fond. Thus would we ungenerously make\nWagner prove our sum! But it is a sum that won't prove! The theory at\nits best does little more than suggest something, which if it is true\nat all, is a platitude, viz.: that progressive growth in all life makes\nit more and more possible for men to separate, in an art-work, moral\nweakness from artistic strength.\n\n\n3\n\n\nHuman attributes are definite enough when it comes to their\ndescription, but the expression of them, or the paralleling of them in\nan art-process, has to be, as said above, more or less arbitrary, but\nwe believe that their expression can be less vague if the basic\ndistinction of this art-dualism is kept in mind. It is morally certain\nthat the higher part is founded, as Sturt suggests, on something that\nhas to do with those kinds of unselfish human interests which we call\nknowledge and morality--knowledge, not in the sense of erudition, but\nas a kind of creation or creative truth. This allows us to assume that\nthe higher and more important value of this dualism is composed of what\nmay be called reality, quality, spirit, or substance against the lower\nvalue of form, quantity, or manner. Of these terms \"substance\" seems to\nus the most appropriate, cogent, and comprehensive for the higher and\n\"manner\" for the under-value. Substance in a human-art-quality suggests\nthe body of a conviction which has its birth in the spiritual\nconsciousness, whose youth is nourished in the moral consciousness, and\nwhose maturity as a result of all this growth is then represented in a\nmental image. This is appreciated by the intuition, and somehow\ntranslated into expression by \"manner\"--a process always less important\nthan it seems, or as suggested by the foregoing (in fact we apologize\nfor this attempted definition). So it seems that \"substance\" is too\nindefinite to analyze, in more specific terms. It is practically\nindescribable. Intuitions (artistic or not?) will sense it--process,\nunknown. Perhaps it is an unexplained consciousness of being nearer\nGod, or being nearer the devil--of approaching truth or approaching\nunreality--a silent something felt in the truth-of-nature in Turner\nagainst the truth-of-art in Botticelli, or in the fine thinking of\nRuskin against the fine soundings of Kipling, or in the wide expanse of\nTitian against the narrow-expanse of Carpaccio, or in some such\ndistinction that Pope sees between what he calls Homer's \"invention\"\nand Virgil's \"judgment\"--apparently an inspired imagination against an\nartistic care, a sense of the difference, perhaps, between Dr.\nBushnell's Knowing God and knowing about God. A more vivid explanation\nor illustration may be found in the difference between Emerson and Poe.\nThe former seems to be almost wholly \"substance\" and the latter\n\"manner.\" The measure in artistic satisfaction of Poe's manner is equal\nto the measure of spiritual satisfaction in Emerson's \"substance.\" The\ntotal value of each man is high, but Emerson's is higher than Poe's\nbecause \"substance\" is higher than \"manner\"--because \"substance\" leans\ntowards optimism, and \"manner\" pessimism. We do not know that all this\nis so, but we feel, or rather know by intuition that it is so, in the\nsame way we know intuitively that right is higher than wrong, though we\ncan't always tell why a thing is right or wrong, or what is always the\ndifference or the margin between right and wrong.\n\nBeauty, in its common conception, has nothing to do with it\n(substance), unless it be granted that its outward aspect, or the\nexpression between sensuous beauty and spiritual beauty can be always\nand distinctly known, which it cannot, as the art of music is still in\nits infancy. On reading this over, it seems only decent that some kind\nof an apology be made for the beginning of the preceding sentence. It\ncannot justly be said that anything that has to do with art has nothing\nto do with beauty in any degree,--that is, whether beauty is there or\nnot, it has something to do with it. A casual idea of it, a kind of a\nfirst necessary-physical impression, was what we had in mind. Probably\nnobody knows what actual beauty is--except those serious writers of\nhumorous essays in art magazines, who accurately, but kindly, with club\nin hand, demonstrate for all time and men that beauty is a quadratic\nmonomial; that it _is_ absolute; that it is relative; that it _is _not_\nrelative, that it _is _not_... The word \"beauty\" is as easy to use as\nthe word \"degenerate.\" Both come in handy when one does or does not\nagree with you. For our part, something that Roussel-Despierres says\ncomes nearer to what we like to think beauty is ... \"an infinite source\nof good ... the love of the beautiful ... a constant anxiety for moral\nbeauty.\" Even here we go around in a circle--a thing apparently\ninevitable, if one tries to reduce art to philosophy. But personally,\nwe prefer to go around in a circle than around in a parallelepipedon,\nfor it seems cleaner and perhaps freer from mathematics--or for the\nsame reason we prefer Whittier to Baudelaire--a poet to a genius, or a\nhealthy to a rotten apple--probably not so much because it is more\nnutritious, but because we like its taste better; we like the beautiful\nand don't like the ugly; therefore, what we like is beautiful, and what\nwe don't like is ugly--and hence we are glad the beautiful is not ugly,\nfor if it were we would like something we don't like. So having\nunsettled what beauty is, let us go on.\n\nAt any rate, we are going to be arbitrary enough to claim, with no\ndefinite qualification, that substance can be expressed in music, and\nthat it is the only valuable thing in it, and moreover that in two\nseparate pieces of music in which the notes are almost identical, one\ncan be of \"substance\" with little \"manner,\" and the other can be of\n\"manner\" with little \"substance.\" Substance has something to do with\ncharacter. Manner has nothing to do with it. The \"substance\" of a tune\ncomes from somewhere near the soul, and the \"manner\" comes from--God\nknows where.\n\n\n4\n\n\nThe lack of interest to preserve, or ability to perceive the\nfundamental divisions of this duality accounts to a large extent, we\nbelieve, for some or many various phenomena (pleasant or unpleasant\naccording to the personal attitude) of modern art, and all art. It is\nevidenced in many ways--the sculptors' over-insistence on the \"mold,\"\nthe outer rather than the inner subject or content of his\nstatue--over-enthusiasm for local color--over-interest in the\nmultiplicity of techniques, in the idiomatic, in the effect as shown,\nby the appreciation of an audience rather than in the effect on the\nideals of the inner conscience of the artist or the composer. This lack\nof perceiving is too often shown by an over-interest in the material\nvalue of the effect. The pose of self-absorption, which some men, in\nthe advertising business (and incidentally in the recital and composing\nbusiness) put into their photographs or the portraits of themselves,\nwhile all dolled up in their purple-dressing-gowns, in their twofold\nwealth of golden hair, in their cissy-like postures over the piano\nkeys--this pose of \"manner\" sometimes sounds out so loud that the more\ntheir music is played, the less it is heard. For does not Emerson tell\nthem this when he says \"What you are talks so loud, that I cannot hear\nwhat you say\"? The unescapable impression that one sometimes gets by a\nglance at these public-inflicted trade-marks, and without having heard\nor seen any of their music, is that the one great underlying desire of\nthese appearing-artists, is to impress, perhaps startle and shock their\naudiences and at any cost. This may have some such effect upon some of\nthe lady-part (male or female) of their listeners but possibly the\nmembers of the men-part, who as boys liked hockey better than\nbirthday-parties, may feel like shocking a few of these picture-sitters\nwith something stronger than their own forzandos.\n\nThe insistence upon manner in its relation to local color is wider than\na self-strain for effect. If local color is a natural part, that is, a\npart of substance, the art-effort cannot help but show its color--and\nit will be a true color, no matter how colored; if it is a part, even a\nnatural part of \"manner,\" either the color part is bound eventually to\ndrive out the local part or the local drive out all color. Here a\nprocess of cancellation or destruction is going on--a kind of\n\"compromise\" which destroys by deadlock; a compromise purchasing a\nselfish pleasure--a decadence in which art becomes first dull, then\ndark, then dead, though throughout this process it is outwardly very\nmuch alive,--especially after it is dead. The same tendency may even be\nnoticed if there is over-insistence upon the national in art. Substance\ntends to create affection; manner prejudice. The latter tends to efface\nthe distinction between the love of both a country's virtue and vices,\nand the love of only the virtue. A true love of country is likely to be\nso big that it will embrace the virtue one sees in other countries and,\nin the same breath, so to speak. A composer born in America, but who\nhas not been interested in the \"cause of the Freedmen,\" may be so\ninterested in \"negro melodies,\" that he writes a symphony over them. He\nis conscious (perhaps only subconscious) that he wishes it to be\n\"American music.\" He tries to forget that the paternal negro came from\nAfrica. Is his music American or African? That is the great question\nwhich keeps him awake! But the sadness of it is, that if he had been\nborn in Africa, his music might have been just as American, for there\nis good authority that an African soul under an X-ray looks identically\nlike an American soul. There is a futility in selecting a certain type\nto represent a \"whole,\" unless the interest in the spirit of the type\ncoincides with that of the whole. In other words, if this composer\nisn't as deeply interested in the \"cause\" as Wendell Phillips was, when\nhe fought his way through that anti-abolitionist crowd at Faneuil Hall,\nhis music is liable to be less American than he wishes. If a\nmiddle-aged man, upon picking up the Scottish Chiefs, finds that his\nboyhood enthusiasm for the prowess and noble deeds and character of Sir\nWm. Wallace and of Bruce is still present, let him put, or try to put\nthat glory into an overture, let him fill it chuck-full of Scotch\ntunes, if he will. But after all is said and sung he will find that his\nmusic is American to the core (assuming that he is an American and\nwishes his music to be). It will be as national in character as the\nheart of that Grand Army Grandfather, who read those Cragmore Tales of\na summer evening, when that boy had brought the cows home without\nwitching. Perhaps the memories of the old soldier, to which this man\nstill holds tenderly, may be turned into a \"strain\" or a \"sonata,\" and\nthough the music does not contain, or even suggest any of the old\nwar-songs, it will be as sincerely American as the subject, provided\nhis (the composer's) interest, spirit, and character sympathize with,\nor intuitively coincide with that of the subject.\n\nAgain, if a man finds that the cadences of an Apache war-dance come\nnearest to his soul, provided he has taken pains to know enough other\ncadences--for eclecticism is part of his duty--sorting potatoes means a\nbetter crop next year--let him assimilate whatever he finds highest of\nthe Indian ideal, so that he can use it with the cadences, fervently,\ntranscendentally, inevitably, furiously, in his symphonies, in his\noperas, in his whistlings on the way to work, so that he can paint his\nhouse with them--make them a part of his prayer-book--this is all\npossible and necessary, if he is confident that they have a part in his\nspiritual consciousness. With this assurance his music will have\neverything it should of sincerity, nobility, strength, and beauty, no\nmatter how it sounds; and if, with this, he is true to none but the\nhighest of American ideals (that is, the ideals only that coincide with\nhis spiritual consciousness) his music will be true to itself and\nincidentally American, and it will be so even after it is proved that\nall our Indians came from Asia.\n\nThe man \"born down to Babbitt's Corners,\" may find a deep appeal in the\nsimple but acute \"Gospel Hymns of the New England camp meetin',\" of a\ngeneration or so ago. He finds in them--some of them--a vigor, a depth\nof feeling, a natural-soil rhythm, a sincerity, emphatic but\ninartistic, which, in spite of a vociferous sentimentality, carries him\nnearer the \"Christ of the people\" than does the Te Deum of the greatest\ncathedral. These tunes have, for him, a truer ring than many of those\ngroove-made, even-measured, monotonous, non-rhythmed, indoor-smelling,\npriest-taught, academic, English or neo-English hymns (and\nanthems)--well-written, well-harmonized things, well-voice-led,\nwell-counterpointed, well-corrected, and well O.K.'d, by well corrected\nMus. Bac. R.F.O.G.'s-personified sounds, correct and inevitable to\nsight and hearing--in a word, those proper forms of stained-glass\nbeauty, which our over-drilled mechanisms-boy-choirs are limited to.\nBut, if the Yankee can reflect the fervency with which \"his gospels\"\nwere sung--the fervency of \"Aunt Sarah,\" who scrubbed her life away,\nfor her brother's ten orphans, the fervency with which this woman,\nafter a fourteen-hour work day on the farm, would hitch up and drive\nfive miles, through the mud and rain to \"prayer meetin'\"--her one\narticulate outlet for the fullness of her unselfish soul--if he can\nreflect the fervency of such a spirit, he may find there a local color\nthat will do all the world good. If his music can but catch that\n\"spirit\" by being a part with itself, it will come somewhere near his\nideal--and it will be American, too, perhaps nearer so than that of the\ndevotee of Indian or negro melody. In other words, if local color,\nnational color, any color, is a true pigment of the universal color, it\nis a divine quality, it is a part of substance in art--not of manner.\nThe preceding illustrations are but attempts to show that whatever\nexcellence an artist sees in life, a community, in a people, or in any\nvaluable object or experience, if sincerely and intuitively reflected\nin his work, and so he himself, is, in a way, a reflected part of that\nexcellence. Whether he be accepted or rejected, whether his music is\nalways played, or never played--all this has nothing to do with it--it\nis true or false by his own measure. If we may be permitted to leave\nout two words, and add a few more, a sentence of Hegel appears to sum\nup this idea, \"The universal need for expression in art lies in man's\nrational impulse to exalt the inner ... world (i.e., the highest ideals\nhe sees in the inner life of others) together with what he finds in his\nown life--into a spiritual consciousness for himself.\" The artist does\nfeel or does not feel that a sympathy has been approved by an artistic\nintuition and so reflected in his work. Whether he feels this sympathy\nis true or not in the final analysis, is a thing probably that no one\nbut he (the artist) knows but the truer he feels it, the more substance\nit has, or as Sturt puts it, \"his work is art, so long as he feels in\ndoing it as true artists feel, and so long as his object is akin to the\nobjects that true artists admire.\"\n\nDr. Griggs in an Essay on Debussy, [John C. Griggs, \"Debussy\" Yale\nReview, 1914] asks if this composer's content is worthy the manner.\nPerhaps so, perhaps not--Debussy himself, doubtless, could not give a\npositive answer. He would better know how true his feeling and sympathy\nwas, and anyone else's personal opinion can be of but little help here.\n\nWe might offer the suggestion that Debussy's content would have been\nworthier his manner, if he had hoed corn or sold newspapers for a\nliving, for in this way he might have gained a deeper vitality and\ntruer theme to sing at night and of a Sunday. Or we might say that what\nsubstance there is, is \"too coherent\"--it is too clearly expressed in\nthe first thirty seconds. There you have the \"whole fragment,\" a\ntranslucent syllogism, but then the reality, the spirit, the substance\nstops and the \"form,\" the \"perfume,\" the \"manner,\" shimmer right along,\nas the soapsuds glisten after one has finished washing. Or we might say\nthat his substance would have been worthier, if his adoration or\ncontemplation of Nature, which is often a part of it, and which rises\nto great heights, as is felt for example, in La Mer, had been more the\nquality of Thoreau's. Debussy's attitude toward Nature seems to have a\nkind of sensual sensuousness underlying it, while Thoreau's is a kind\nof spiritual sensuousness. It is rare to find a farmer or peasant whose\nenthusiasm for the beauty in Nature finds outward expression to compare\nwith that of the city-man who comes out for a Sunday in the country,\nbut Thoreau is that rare country-man and Debussy the city-man with his\nweekend flights into country-aesthetics. We would be inclined to say\nthat Thoreau leaned towards substance and Debussy towards manner.\n\n\n5\n\n\nThere comes from Concord, an offer to every mind--the choice between\nrepose and truth, and God makes the offer. \"Take which you\nplease ... between these, as a pendulum, man oscillates. He in whom the\nlove of repose predominates will accept the first creed, the first\nphilosophy, the first political party he meets,\" most likely his\nfather's. He gets rest, commodity, and reputation. Here is another\naspect of art-duality, but it is more drastic than ours, as it would\neliminate one part or the other. A man may aim as high as Beethoven or\nas high as Richard Strauss. In the former case the shot may go far\nbelow the mark; in truth, it has not been reached since that \"thunder\nstorm of 1828\" and there is little chance that it will be reached by\nanyone living today, but that matters not, the shot will never rebound\nand destroy the marksman. But, in the latter case, the shot may often\nhit the mark, but as often rebound and harden, if not destroy, the\nshooter's heart--even his soul. What matters it, men say, he will then\nfind rest, commodity, and reputation--what matters it--if he find there\nbut few perfect truths--what matters (men say)--he will find there\nperfect media, those perfect instruments of getting in the way of\nperfect truths.\n\nThis choice tells why Beethoven is always modern and Strauss always\nmediaeval--try as he may to cover it up in new bottles. He has chosen\nto capitalize a \"talent\"--he has chosen the complexity of media, the\nshining hardness of externals, repose, against the inner, invisible\nactivity of truth. He has chosen the first creed, the easy creed, the\nphilosophy of his fathers, among whom he found a half-idiot-genius\n(Nietzsche). His choice naturally leads him to glorify and to magnify\nall kind of dull things--stretched-out geigermusik--which in turn\nnaturally leads him to \"windmills\" and \"human heads on silver\nplatters.\" Magnifying the dull into the colossal, produces a kind of\n\"comfort\"--the comfort of a woman who takes more pleasure in the fit of\nfashionable clothes than in a healthy body--the kind of comfort that\nhas brought so many \"adventures of baby-carriages at county\nfairs\"--\"the sensation of Teddy bears, smoking their first\ncigarette\"--on the program of symphony orchestras of one hundred\nperformers,--the lure of the media--the means--not the end--but the\nfinish,--thus the failure to perceive that thoughts and memories of\nchildhood are too tender, and some of them too sacred to be worn\nlightly on the sleeve. Life is too short for these one hundred men, to\nsay nothing of the composer and the \"dress-circle,\" to spend an\nafternoon in this way. They are but like the rest of us, and have only\nthe expectancy of the mortality-table to survive--perhaps only this\n\"piece.\" We cannot but feel that a too great desire for \"repose\"\naccounts for such phenomena. A MS. score is brought to a\nconcertmaster--he may be a violinist--he is kindly disposed, he looks\nit over, and casually fastens on a passage \"that's bad for the fiddles,\nit doesn't hang just right, write it like this, they will play it\nbetter.\" But that one phrase is the germ of the whole thing. \"Never\nmind, it will fit the hand better this way--it will sound better.\" My\nGod! what has sound got to do with music! The waiter brings the only\nfresh egg he has, but the man at breakfast sends it back because it\ndoesn't fit his eggcup. Why can't music go out in the same way it comes\nin to a man, without having to crawl over a fence of sounds, thoraxes,\ncatguts, wire, wood, and brass? Consecutive-fifths are as harmless as\nblue laws compared with the relentless tyranny of the \"media.\" The\ninstrument!--there is the perennial difficulty--there is music's\nlimitations. Why must the scarecrow of the keyboard--the tyrant in\nterms of the mechanism (be it Caruso or a Jew's-harp) stare into every\nmeasure? Is it the composer's fault that man has only ten fingers? Why\ncan't a musical thought be presented as it is born--perchance \"a\nbastard of the slums,\" or a \"daughter of a bishop\"--and if it happens\nto go better later on a bass-drum (than upon a harp) get a good\nbass-drummer. [Footnote: The first movement (Emerson) of the music,\nwhich is the cause of all these words, was first thought of (we\nbelieve) in terms of a large orchestra, the second (Hawthorne) in terms\nof a piano or a dozen pianos, the third (Alcotts)--of an organ (or\npiano with voice or violin), and the last (Thoreau), in terms of\nstrings, colored possibly with a flute or horn.] That music must be\nheard, is not essential--what it sounds like may not be what it is.\nPerhaps the day is coming when music--believers will learn \"that\nsilence is a solvent ... that gives us leave to be universal\" rather than\npersonal.\n\nSome fiddler was once honest or brave enough, or perhaps ignorant\nenough, to say that Beethoven didn't know how to write for the\nviolin,--that, maybe, is one of the many reasons Beethoven is not a\nVieuxtemps. Another man says Beethoven's piano sonatas are not\npianistic--with a little effort, perhaps, Beethoven could have become a\nThalberg. His symphonies are perfect-truths and perfect for the\norchestra of 1820--but Mahler could have made them--possibly did make\nthem--we will say, \"more perfect,\" as far as their media clothes are\nconcerned, and Beethoven is today big enough to rather like it. He is\nprobably in the same amiable state of mind that the Jesuit priest said,\n\"God was in,\" when He looked down on the camp ground and saw the priest\nsleeping with a Congregational Chaplain. Or in the same state of mind\nyou'll be in when you look down and see the sexton keeping your\ntombstone up to date. The truth of Joachim offsets the repose of\nPaganini and Kubelik. The repose and reputation of a successful\npianist--(whatever that means) who plays Chopin so cleverly that he\ncovers up a sensuality, and in such a way that the purest-minded see\nnothing but sensuous beauty in it, which, by the way, doesn't disturb\nhim as much as the size of his income-tax--the repose and fame of this\nman is offset by the truth and obscurity of the village organist who\nplays Lowell Mason and Bach with such affection that he would give his\nlife rather than lose them. The truth and courage of this organist, who\nrisks his job, to fight the prejudice of the congregation, offset the\nrepose and large salary of a more celebrated choirmaster, who holds his\njob by lowering his ideals, who is willing to let the organ smirk under\nan insipid, easy-sounding barcarolle for the offertory, who is willing\nto please the sentimental ears of the music committee (and its\nwives)--who is more willing to observe these forms of politeness than\nto stand up for a stronger and deeper music of simple devotion, and for\na service of a spiritual unity, the kind of thing that Mr. Bossitt, who\nowns the biggest country place, the biggest bank, and the biggest\n\"House of God\" in town (for is it not the divine handiwork of his\nown-pocketbook)--the kind of music that this man, his wife, and his\nparty (of property right in pews) can't stand because it isn't \"pretty.\"\n\nThe doctrine of this \"choice\" may be extended to the distinction\nbetween literal-enthusiasm and natural-enthusiasm (right or wrong\nnotes, good or bad tones against good or bad interpretation, good or\nbad sentiment) or between observation and introspection, or to the\ndistinction between remembering and dreaming. Strauss remembers,\nBeethoven dreams. We see this distinction also in Goethe's confusion of\nthe moral with the intellectual. There is no such confusion in\nBeethoven--to him they are one. It is told, and the story is so well\nknown that we hesitate to repeat it here, that both these men were\nstanding in the street one day when the Emperor drove by--Goethe, like\nthe rest of the crowd, bowed and uncovered--but Beethoven stood bolt\nupright, and refused even to salute, saying: \"Let him bow to us, for\nours is a nobler empire.\" Goethe's mind knew this was true, but his\nmoral courage was not instinctive.\n\nThis remembering faculty of \"repose,\" throws the mind in unguarded\nmoments quite naturally towards \"manner\" and thus to the many things\nthe media can do. It brings on an itching to over-use them--to be\noriginal (if anyone will tell what that is) with nothing but numbers to\nbe original with. We are told that a conductor (of the orchestra) has\nwritten a symphony requiring an orchestra of one hundred and fifty men.\nIf his work perhaps had one hundred and fifty valuable ideas, the one\nhundred and fifty men might be justifiable--but as it probably contains\nnot more than a dozen, the composer may be unconsciously ashamed of\nthem, and glad to cover them up under a hundred and fifty men. A man\nmay become famous because he is able to eat nineteen dinners a day, but\nposterity will decorate his stomach, not his brain.\n\nManner breeds a cussed-cleverness--only to be clever--a satellite of\nsuper-industrialism, and perhaps to be witty in the bargain, not the\nwit in mother-wit, but a kind of indoor, artificial, mental arrangement\nof things quickly put together and which have been learned and\nstudied--it is of the material and stays there, while humor is of the\nemotional and of the approaching spiritual. Even Dukas, and perhaps\nother Gauls, in their critical heart of hearts, may admit that \"wit\" in\nmusic, is as impossible as \"wit\" at a funeral. The wit is evidence of\nits lack. Mark Twain could be humorous at the death of his dearest\nfriend, but in such a way as to put a blessing into the heart of the\nbereaved. Humor in music has the same possibilities. But its quantity\nhas a serious effect on its quality, \"inverse ratio\" is a good formula\nto adopt here. Comedy has its part, but wit never. Strauss is at his\nbest in these lower rooms, but his comedy reminds us more of the\nphysical fun of Lever rather than \"comedy in the Meredithian sense\" as\nMason suggests. Meredith is a little too deep or too subtle for\nStrauss--unless it be granted that cynicism is more a part of comedy\nthan a part of refined-insult. Let us also remember that Mr. Disston,\nnot Mr. Strauss, put the funny notes in the bassoon. A symphony written\nonly to amuse and entertain is likely to amuse only the writer--and him\nnot long after the check is cashed.\n\n\"Genius is always ascetic and piety and love,\" thus Emerson reinforces\n\"God's offer of this choice\" by a transcendental definition. The moment\na famous violinist refused \"to appear\" until he had received his\ncheck,--at that moment, precisely (assuming for argument's sake, that\nthis was the first time that materialism had the ascendancy in this\nman's soul) at that moment he became but a man of\n\"talent\"--incidentally, a small man and a small violinist, regardless\nof how perfectly he played, regardless to what heights of emotion he\nstirred his audience, regardless of the sublimity of his artistic and\nfinancial success.\n\nd'Annunzio, it is told, becoming somewhat discouraged at the result of\nsome of his Fiume adventures said: \"We are the only Idealists left.\"\nThis remark may have been made in a moment of careless impulse, but if\nit is taken at its face value, the moment it was made that moment his\nidealism started downhill. A grasp at monopoly indicates that a sudden\nshift has taken place from the heights where genius may be found, to\nthe lower plains of talent. The mind of a true idealist is great enough\nto know that a monopoly of idealism or of wheat is a thing nature does\nnot support.\n\nA newspaper music column prints an incident (so how can we assume that\nit is not true?) of an American violinist who called on Max Reger, to\ntell him how much he (the American) appreciated his music. Reger gives\nhim a hopeless look and cries: \"What! a musician and not speak German!\"\nAt that moment, by the clock, regardless of how great a genius he may\nhave been before that sentence was uttered--at that moment he became\nbut a man of \"talent.\" \"For the man of talent affects to call his\ntransgressions of the laws of sense trivial and to count them nothing\nconsidered with his devotion to his art.\" His art never taught him\nprejudice or to wear only one eye. \"His art is less for every deduction\nfrom his holiness and less for every defect of common sense.\" And this\ncommon sense has a great deal to do with this distinguishing difference\nof Emerson's between genius and talent, repose and truth, and between\nall evidences of substance and manner in art. Manner breeds\npartialists. \"Is America a musical nation?\"--if the man who is ever\nasking this question would sit down and think something over he might\nfind less interest in asking it--he might possibly remember that all\nnations are more musical than any nation, especially the nation that\npays the most--and pays the most eagerly, for anything, after it has\nbeen professionally-rubber stamped. Music may be yet unborn. Perhaps no\nmusic has ever been written or heard. Perhaps the birth of art will\ntake place at the moment, in which the last man, who is willing to make\na living out of art is gone and gone forever. In the history of this\nyouthful world the best product that human-beings can boast of is\nprobably, Beethoven--but, maybe, even his art is as nothing in\ncomparison with the future product of some coal-miner's soul in the\nforty-first century. And the same man who is ever asking about the most\nmusical nation, is ever discovering the most musical man of the most\nmusical nation. When particularly hysterical he shouts, \"I have found\nhim! Smith Grabholz--the one great American poet,--at last, here is the\nMoses the country has been waiting for\"--(of course we all know that\nthe country has not been waiting for anybody--and we have many Moses\nalways with us). But the discoverer keeps right on shouting \"Here is\nthe one true American poetry, I pronounce it the work of a genius. I\npredict for him the most brilliant career--for his is an art\nthat...--for his is a soul that ... for his is a...\" and Grabholz is\nruined;--but ruined, not alone, by this perennial discoverer of pearls\nin any oyster-shell that treats him the best, but ruined by his own\n(Grabholz's) talent,--for genius will never let itself be discovered by\n\"a man.\" Then the world may ask \"Can the one true national \"this\" or\n\"that\" be killed by its own discoverer?\" \"No,\" the country replies,\n\"but each discovery is proof of another impossibility.\" It is a sad\nfact that the one true man and the one true art will never behave as\nthey should except in the mind of the partialist whom God has\nforgotten. But this matters little to him (the man)--his business is\ngood--for it is easy to sell the future in terms of the past--and there\nare always some who will buy anything. The individual usually \"gains\"\nif he is willing to but lean on \"manner.\" The evidence of this is quite\nwidespread, for if the discoverer happens to be in any other line of\nbusiness his sudden discoveries would be just as important--to him. In\nfact, the theory of substance and manner in art and its related\ndualisms, \"repose and truth, genius and talent,\" &c., may find\nillustration in many, perhaps most, of the human activities. And when\nexamined it (the illustration) is quite likely to show how \"manner\" is\nalways discovering partisans. For example, enthusiastic discoveries of\nthe \"paragon\" are common in politics--an art to some. These\nrevelations, in this profession are made easy by the pre-election\ndiscovering-leaders of the people. And the genius who is discovered,\nforthwith starts his speeches of \"talent\"--though they are hardly\nthat--they are hardly more than a string of subplatitudes,\nsquare-looking, well-rigged things that almost everybody has seen,\nknown, and heard since Rome or man fell. Nevertheless these signs of\nperfect manner, these series of noble sentiments that the \"noble\" never\nget off, are forcibly, clearly, and persuasively handed\nout--eloquently, even beautifully expressed, and with such personal\ncharm, magnetism, and strength, that their profound messages speed\nright through the minds and hearts, without as much as spattering the\nwalls, and land right square in the middle of the listener's vanity.\nFor all this is a part of manner and its quality is of splendor--for\nmanner is at times a good bluff but substance a poor one and knows it.\nThe discovered one's usual and first great outburst is probably the\ngreatest truth that he ever utters. Fearlessly standing, he looks\nstraight into the eyes of the populace and with a strong ringing voice\n(for strong voices and strong statesmanship are inseparable) and with\nwords far more eloquent than the following, he sings \"This honor is\ngreater than I deserve but duty calls me--(what, not stated)... If\nelected, I shall be your servant\" ... (for, it is told, that he\nbelieves in modesty,--that he has even boasted that he is the most\nmodest man in the country)... Thus he has the right to shout, \"First,\nlast and forever I am for the people. I am against all bosses. I have\nno sympathy for politicians. I am for strict economy, liberal\nimprovements and justice! I am also for the--ten commandments\" (his\nintuitive political sagacity keeps him from mentioning any particular\none).--But a sublime height is always reached in his perorations. Here\nwe learn that he believes in honesty--(repeat \"honesty\");--we are even\nallowed to infer that he is one of the very few who know that there is\nsuch a thing; and we also learn that since he was a little boy\n(barefoot) his motto has been \"Do Right,\"--he swerves not from the\nright!--he believes in nothing but the right; (to him--everything is\nright!--if it gets him elected); but cheers invariably stop this great\nfinal truth (in brackets) from rising to animate expression. Now all of\nthese translucent axioms are true (are not axioms always true?),--as\nfar as manner is concerned. In other words, the manner functions\nperfectly. But where is the divine substance? This is not there--why\nshould it be--if it were he might not be there. \"Substance\" is not\nfeatured in this discovery. For the truth of substance is sometimes\nsilence, sometimes ellipses,--and the latter if supplied might turn\nsome of the declarations above into perfect truths,--for instance\n\"first and last and forever I am for the people ('s votes). I'm against\nall bosses (against me). I have no sympathy for (rival) politicians,\"\netc., etc. But these tedious attempts at comedy should stop,--they're\ntoo serious,--besides the illustration may be a little hard on a few,\nthe minority (the non-people) though not on the many, the majority (the\npeople)! But even an assumed parody may help to show what a power\nmanner is for reaction unless it is counterbalanced and then saturated\nby the other part of the duality. Thus it appears that all there is to\nthis great discovery is that one good politician has discovered another\ngood politician. For manner has brought forth its usual talent;--for\nmanner cannot discover the genius who has discarded platitudes--the\ngenius who has devised a new and surpassing order for mankind, simple\nand intricate enough, abstract and definite enough, locally impractical\nand universally practical enough, to wipe out the need for further\ndiscoveries of \"talent\" and incidentally the discoverer's own fortune\nand political \"manner.\" Furthermore, he (this genius) never will be\ndiscovered until the majority-spirit, the common-heart, the\nhuman-oversoul, the source of all great values, converts all talent\ninto genius, all manner into substance--until the direct expression of\nthe mind and soul of the majority, the divine right of all\nconsciousness, social, moral, and spiritual, discloses the one true art\nand thus finally discovers the one true leader--even itself:--then no\nleaders, no politicians, no manner, will hold sway--and no more\nspeeches will be heard.\n\nThe intensity today, with which techniques and media are organized and\nused, tends to throw the mind away from a \"common sense\" and towards\n\"manner\" and thus to resultant weak and mental states--for example, the\nByronic fallacy--that one who is full of turbid feeling about himself\nis qualified to be some sort of an artist. In this relation \"manner\"\nalso leads some to think that emotional sympathy for self is as true a\npart of art as sympathy for others; and a prejudice in favor of the\ngood and bad of one personality against the virtue of many\npersonalities. It may be that when a poet or a whistler becomes\nconscious that he is in the easy path of any particular idiom,--that he\nis helplessly prejudiced in favor of any particular means of\nexpression,--that his manner can be catalogued as modern or\nclassic,--that he favors a contrapuntal groove, a sound-coloring one, a\nsensuous one, a successful one, or a melodious one (whatever that\nmeans),--that his interests lie in the French school or the German\nschool, or the school of Saturn,--that he is involved in this\nparticular \"that\" or that particular \"this,\" or in any particular brand\nof emotional complexes,--in a word, when he becomes conscious that his\nstyle is \"his personal own,\"--that it has monopolized a geographical\npart of the world's sensibilities, then it may be that the value of his\nsubstance is not growing,--that it even may have started on its way\nbackwards,--it may be that he is trading an inspiration for a bad habit\nand finally that he is reaching fame, permanence, or some other\nunder-value, and that he is getting farther and farther from a perfect\ntruth. But, on the contrary side of the picture, it is not unreasonable\nto imagine that if he (this poet, composer, and laborer) is open to all\nthe overvalues within his reach,--if he stands unprotected from all the\nshowers of the absolute which may beat upon him,--if he is willing to\nuse or learn to use, or at least if he is not afraid of trying to use,\nwhatever he can, of any and all lessons of the infinite that humanity\nhas received and thrown to man,--that nature has exposed and\nsacrificed, that life and death have translated--if he accepts all and\nsympathizes with all, is influenced by all, whether consciously or\nsub-consciously, drastically or humbly, audibly or inaudibly, whether\nit be all the virtue of Satan or the only evil of Heaven--and all,\neven, at one time, even in one chord,--then it may be that the value of\nhis substance, and its value to himself, to his art, to all art, even\nto the Common Soul is growing and approaching nearer and nearer to\nperfect truths--whatever they are and wherever they may be.\n\nAgain, a certain kind of manner-over-influence may be caused by a\ngroup-disease germ. The over-influence by, the over-admiration of, and\nthe over-association with a particular artistic personality or a\nparticular type or group of personalities tends to produce equally\nfavorable and unfavorable symptoms, but the unfavorable ones seem to be\nmore contagious. Perhaps the impulse remark of some famous man (whose\nname we forget) that he \"loved music but hated musicians,\" might be\nfollowed (with some good results) at least part of the time. To see the\nsun rise, a man has but to get up early, and he can always have Bach in\nhis pocket. We hear that Mr. Smith or Mr. Morgan, etc., et al. design\nto establish a \"course at Rome,\" to raise the standard of American\nmusic, (or the standard of American composers--which is it?) but\npossibly the more our composer accepts from his patrons \"et al.\" the\nless he will accept from himself. It may be possible that a day in a\n\"Kansas wheat field\" will do more for him than three years in Rome. It\nmay be, that many men--perhaps some of genius--(if you won't admit that\nall are geniuses) have been started on the downward path of subsidy by\ntrying to write a thousand dollar prize poem or a ten thousand dollar\nprize opera. How many masterpieces have been prevented from blossoming\nin this way? A cocktail will make a man eat more, but will not give him\na healthy, normal appetite (if he had not that already). If a bishop\nshould offer a \"prize living\" to the curate who will love God the\nhardest for fifteen days, whoever gets the prize would love God the\nleast. Such stimulants, it strikes us, tend to industrialize art,\nrather than develop a spiritual sturdiness--a sturdiness which Mr.\nSedgwick says [footnote: H. D. Sedgwick. The New American Type.\nRiverside Press.] \"shows itself in a close union between spiritual life\nand the ordinary business of life,\" against spiritual feebleness which\n\"shows itself in the separation of the two.\" If one's spiritual\nsturdiness is congenital and somewhat perfect he is not only conscious\nthat this separation has no part in his own soul, but he does not feel\nits existence in others. He does not believe there is such a thing. But\nperfection in this respect is rare. And for the most of us, we believe,\nthis sturdiness would be encouraged by anything that will keep or help\nus keep a normal balance between the spiritual life and the ordinary\nlife. If for every thousand dollar prize a potato field be substituted,\nso that these candidates of \"Clio\" can dig a little in real life,\nperhaps dig up a natural inspiration, arts--air might be a little\nclearer--a little freer from certain traditional delusions, for\ninstance, that free thought and free love always go to the same\ncafe--that atmosphere and diligence are synonymous. To quote Thoreau\nincorrectly: \"When half-Gods talk, the Gods walk!\" Everyone should have\nthe opportunity of not being over-influenced.\n\nAgain, this over-influence by and over-insistence upon \"manner\" may\nfinally lead some to believe \"that manner for manner's sake is a basis\nof music.\" Someone is quoted as saying that \"ragtime is the true\nAmerican music.\" Anyone will admit that it is one of the many true,\nnatural, and, nowadays, conventional means of expression. It is an\nidiom, perhaps a \"set or series of colloquialisms,\" similar to those\nthat have added through centuries and through natural means, some\nbeauty to all languages. Every language is but the evolution of slang,\nand possibly the broad \"A\" in Harvard may have come down from the\n\"butcher of Southwark.\" To examine ragtime rhythms and the syncopations\nof Schumann or of Brahms seems to the writer to show how much alike\nthey are not. Ragtime, as we hear it, is, of course, more (but not much\nmore) than a natural dogma of shifted accents, or a mixture of shifted\nand minus accents. It is something like wearing a derby hat on the back\nof the head, a shuffling lilt of a happy soul just let out of a Baptist\nChurch in old Alabama. Ragtime has its possibilities. But it does not\n\"represent the American nation\" any more than some fine old senators\nrepresent it. Perhaps we know it now as an ore before it has been\nrefined into a product. It may be one of nature's ways of giving art\nraw material. Time will throw its vices away and weld its virtues into\nthe fabric of our music. It has its uses as the cruet on the\nboarding-house table has, but to make a meal of tomato ketchup and\nhorse-radish, to plant a whole farm with sunflowers, even to put a\nsunflower into every bouquet, would be calling nature something worse\nthan a politician. Mr. Daniel Gregory Mason, whose wholesome influence,\nby the way, is doing as much perhaps for music in America as American\nmusic is, amusingly says: \"If indeed the land of Lincoln and Emerson\nhas degenerated until nothing remains of it but a 'jerk and rattle,'\nthen we, at least, are free to repudiate this false patriotism of 'my\nCountry right or wrong,' to insist that better than bad music is no\nmusic, and to let our beloved art subside finally under the clangor of\nthe subway gongs and automobile horns, dead, but not dishonored.\" And\nso may we ask: Is it better to sing inadequately of the \"leaf on Walden\nfloating,\" and die \"dead but not dishonored,\" or to sing adequately of\nthe \"cherry on the cocktail,\" and live forever?\n\n\n6\n\n\nIf anyone has been strong enough to escape these rocks--this \"Scylla\nand Charybdis,\"--has survived these wrong choices, these under-values\nwith their prizes, Bohemias and heroes, is not such a one in a better\nposition, is he not abler and freer to \"declare himself and so to love\nhis cause so singly that he will cleave to it, and forsake all else?\nWhat is this cause for the American composer but the utmost musical\nbeauty that he, as an individual man, with his own qualities and\ndefects, is capable of understanding and striving towards?--forsaking\nall else except those types of musical beauty that come home to him,\"\n[footnote: Contemporary Composers, D. G. Mason, Macmillan Co., N. Y.]\nand that his spiritual conscience intuitively approves.\n\n\"It matters not one jot, provided this course of personal loyalty to a\ncause be steadfastly pursued, what the special characteristics of the\nstyle of the music may be to which one gives one's devotion.\"\n[footnote: Contemporary Composers, D. G. Mason, Macmillan Co., N. Y.]\nThis, if over-translated, may be made to mean, what we have been trying\nto say--that if your interest, enthusiasm, and devotion on the side of\nsubstance and truth, are of the stuff to make you so sincere that you\nsweat--to hell with manner and repose! Mr. Mason is responsible for too\nmany young minds, in their planting season to talk like this, to be as\nrough, or to go as far, but he would probably admit that, broadly\nspeaking--some such way, i.e., constantly recognizing this ideal\nduality in art, though not the most profitable road for art to travel,\nis almost its only way out to eventual freedom and salvation. Sidney\nLanier, in a letter to Bayard Taylor writes: \"I have so many fair\ndreams and hopes about music in these days (1875). It is gospel whereof\nthe people are in great need. As Christ gathered up the Ten\nCommandments and redistilled them into the clear liquid of the wondrous\neleventh--love God utterly and thy neighbor as thyself--so I think the\ntime will come when music rightly developed to its now little forseen\ngrandeur will be found to be a late revelation of all gospels in one.\"\nCould the art of music, or the art of anything have a more profound\nreason for being than this? A conception unlimited by the narrow names\nof Christian, Pagan, Jew, or Angel! A vision higher and deeper than art\nitself!\n\n\n7\n\n\nThe humblest composer will not find true humility in aiming low--he\nmust never be timid or afraid of trying to express that which he feels\nis far above his power to express, any more than he should be afraid of\nbreaking away, when necessary, from easy first sounds, or afraid of\nadmitting that those half truths that come to him at rare intervals,\nare half true, for instance, that all art galleries contain\nmasterpieces, which are nothing more than a history of art's beautiful\nmistakes. He should never fear of being called a high-brow--but not the\nkind in Prof. Brander Matthews' definition. John L. Sullivan was a\n\"high-brow\" in his art. A high-brow can always whip a low-brow.\n\nIf he \"truly seeks,\" he \"will surely find\" many things to sustain him.\nHe can go to a part of Alcott's philosophy--\"that all occupations of\nman's body and soul in their diversity come from but one mind and\nsoul!\" If he feels that to subscribe to all of the foregoing and then\nsubmit, though not as evidence, the work of his own hands is\npresumptuous, let him remember that a man is not always responsible for\nthe wart on his face, or a girl for the bloom on her cheek, and as they\nwalk out of a Sunday for an airing, people will see them--but they must\nhave the air. He can remember with Plotinus, \"that in every human soul\nthere is the ray of the celestial beauty,\" and therefore every human\noutburst may contain a partial ray. And he can believe that it is\nbetter to go to the plate and strike out than to hold the bench down,\nfor by facing the pitcher, he may then know the umpire better, and\npossibly see a new parabola. His presumption, if it be that, may be but\na kind of courage juvenal sings about, and no harm can then be done\neither side. \"Cantabit vacuus coram latrone viator.\"\n\n\n8\n\n\nTo divide by an arbitrary line something that cannot be divided is a\nprocess that is disturbing to some. Perhaps our deductions are not as\ninevitable as they are logical, which suggests that they are not\n\"logic.\" An arbitrary assumption is never fair to all any of the time,\nor to anyone all the time. Many will resent the abrupt separation that\na theory of duality in music suggests and say that these general\nsubdivisions are too closely inter-related to be labeled\ndecisively--\"this or that.\" There is justice in this criticism, but our\nanswer is that it is better to be short on the long than long on the\nshort. In such an abstruse art as music it is easy for one to point to\nthis as substance and to that as manner. Some will hold and it is\nundeniable--in fact quite obvious--that manner has a great deal to do\nwith the beauty of substance, and that to make a too arbitrary\ndivision, or distinction between them, is to interfere, to some extent,\nwith an art's beauty and unity. There is a great deal of truth in this\ntoo. But on the other hand, beauty in music is too often confused with\nsomething that lets the ears lie back in an easy chair. Many sounds\nthat we are used to, do not bother us, and for that reason, we are\ninclined to call them beautiful. Frequently,--possibly almost\ninvariably,--analytical and impersonal tests will show, we believe,\nthat when a new or unfamiliar work is accepted as beautiful on its\nfirst hearing, its fundamental quality is one that tends to put the\nmind to sleep. A narcotic is not always unnecessary, but it is seldom a\nbasis of progress,--that is, wholesome evolution in any creative\nexperience. This kind of progress has a great deal to do with\nbeauty--at least in its deeper emotional interests, if not in its moral\nvalues. (The above is only a personal impression, but it is based on\ncarefully remembered instances, during a period of about fifteen or\ntwenty years.) Possibly the fondness for individual utterance may throw\nout a skin-deep arrangement, which is readily accepted as\nbeautiful--formulae that weaken rather than toughen up the\nmusical-muscles. If the composer's sincere conception of his art and of\nits functions and ideals, coincide to such an extent with these\ngroove-colored permutations of tried out progressions in expediency,\nthat he can arrange them over and over again to his transcendent\ndelight--has he or has he not been drugged with an overdose of\nhabit-forming sounds? And as a result do not the muscles of his\nclientele become flabbier and flabbier until they give way altogether\nand find refuge only in a seasoned opera box--where they can see\nwithout thinking? And unity is too generally conceived of, or too\neasily accepted as analogous to form, and form (as analogous) to\ncustom, and custom to habit, and habit may be one of the parents of\ncustom and form, and there are all kinds of parents. Perhaps all unity\nin art, at its inception, is half-natural and half-artificial but time\ninsists, or at least makes us, or inclines to make us feel that it is\nall natural. It is easy for us to accept it as such. The \"unity of\ndress\" for a man at a ball requires a collar, yet he could dance better\nwithout it. Coherence, to a certain extent, must bear some relation to\nthe listener's subconscious perspective. For example, a critic has to\nlisten to a thousand concerts a year, in which there is much\nrepetition, not only of the same pieces, but the same formal relations\nof tones, cadences, progressions, etc. There is present a certain\nroutine series of image-necessity-stimulants, which he doesn't seem to\nneed until they disappear. Instead of listening to music, he listens\naround it. And from this subconscious viewpoint, he inclines perhaps\nmore to the thinking about than thinking in music. If he could go into\nsome other line of business for a year or so perhaps his perspective\nwould be more naturally normal. The unity of a sonata movement has long\nbeen associated with its form, and to a greater extent than is\nnecessary. A first theme, a development, a second in a related key and\nits development, the free fantasia, the recapitulation, and so on, and\nover again. Mr. Richter or Mr. Parker may tell us that all this is\nnatural, for it is based on the classic-song form, but in spite of your\nteachers a vague feeling sometimes creeps over you that the form-nature\nof the song has been stretched out into deformity. Some claim for\nTchaikowsky that his clarity and coherence of design is unparalleled\n(or some such word) in works for the orchestra. That depends, it seems\nto us, on how far repetition is an essential part of clarity and\ncoherence. We know that butter comes from cream--but how long must we\nwatch the \"churning arm!\" If nature is not enthusiastic about\nexplanation, why should Tschaikowsky be? Beethoven had to churn, to\nsome extent, to make his message carry. He had to pull the ear, hard\nand in the same place and several times, for the 1790 ear was tougher\nthan the 1890 one. But the \"great Russian weeper\" might have spared us.\nTo Emerson, \"unity and the over-soul, or the common-heart, are\nsynonymous.\" Unity is at least nearer to these than to solid geometry,\nthough geometry may be all unity.\n\nBut to whatever unpleasantness the holding to this theory of duality\nbrings us, we feel that there is a natural law underneath it all, and\nlike all laws of nature, a liberal interpretation is the one nearest\nthe truth. What part of these supplements are opposites? What part of\nsubstance is manner? What part of this duality is polarity? These\nquestions though not immaterial may be disregarded, if there be a\nsincere appreciation (intuition is always sincere) of the \"divine\"\nspirit of the thing. Enthusiasm for, and recognition of these higher\nover these lower values will transform a destructive iconoclasm into\ncreation, and a mere devotion into consecration--a consecration which,\nlike Amphion's music, will raise the Walls of Thebes.\n\n\n9\n\n\nAssuming, and then granting, that art-activity can be transformed or\nled towards an eventual consecration, by recognizing and using in their\ntrue relation, as much as one can, these higher and lower dual\nvalues--and that the doing so is a part, if not the whole of our old\nproblem of paralleling or approving in art the highest attributes,\nmoral and spiritual, one sees in life--if you will grant all this, let\nus offer a practical suggestion--a thing that one who has imposed the\nforegoing should try to do just out of common decency, though it be but\nan attempt, perhaps, to make his speculations less speculative, and to\nbeat off metaphysics.\n\nAll, men-bards with a divine spark, and bards without, feel the need at\ntimes of an inspiration from without, \"the breath of another soul to\nstir our inner flame,\" especially when we are in pursuit of a part of\nthat \"utmost musical beauty,\" that we are capable of\nunderstanding--when we are breathlessly running to catch a glimpse of\nthat unforeseen grandeur of Mr. Lanier's dream. In this beauty and\ngrandeur perhaps marionettes and their souls have a part--though how\ngreat their part is, we hear, is still undetermined; but it is morally\ncertain that, at times, a part with itself must be some of those\ngreater contemplations that have been caught in the \"World's Soul,\" as\nit were, and nourished for us there in the soil of its literature.\n\nIf an interest in, and a sympathy for, the thought-visions of men like\nCharles Kingsley, Marcus Aurelius, Whit tier, Montaigne, Paul of\nTarsus, Robert Browning, Pythagoras, Channing, Milton, Sophocles,\nSwedenborg, Thoreau, Francis of Assisi, Wordsworth, Voltaire, Garrison,\nPlutarch, Ruskin, Ariosto, and all kindred spirits and souls of great\nmeasure, from David down to Rupert Brooke,--if a study of the thought\nof such men creates a sympathy, even a love for them and their\nideal-part, it is certain that this, however inadequately expressed, is\nnearer to what music was given man for, than a devotion to \"Tristan's\nsensual love of Isolde,\" to the \"Tragic Murder of a Drunken Duke,\" or\nto the sad thoughts of a bathtub when the water is being let out. It\nmatters little here whether a man who paints a picture of a useless\nbeautiful landscape imperfectly is a greater genius than the man who\npaints a useful bad smell perfectly.\n\nIt is not intended in this suggestion that inspirations coming from the\nhigher planes should be limited to any particular thought or work, as\nthe mind receives it. The plan rather embraces all that should go with\nan expression of the composite-value. It is of the underlying spirit,\nthe direct unrestricted imprint of one soul on another, a portrait, not\na photograph of the personality--it is the ideal part that would be\ncaught in this canvas. It is a sympathy for \"substance\"--the over-value\ntogether with a consciousness that there must be a lower value--the\n\"Demosthenic part of the Philippics\"--the \"Ciceronic part of the\nCatiline,\" the sublimity, against the vileness of Rousseau's\nConfessions. It is something akin to, but something more than these\npredominant partial tones of Hawthorne--\"the grand old countenance of\nHomer; the decrepit form, but vivid face of Aesop; the dark presence of\nDante; the wild Ariosto; Rabelais' smile of deep-wrought mirth; the\nprofound, pathetic humor of Cervantes; the all-glorious Shakespeare;\nSpenser, meet guest for allegoric structure; the severe divinity of\nMilton; and Bunyan, molded of humblest clay, but instinct with\ncelestial fire.\"\n\nThere are communities now, partly vanished, but cherished and sacred,\nscattered throughout this world of ours, in which freedom of thought\nand soul, and even of body, have been fought for. And we believe that\nthere ever lives in that part of the over-soul, native to them, the\nthoughts which these freedom-struggles have inspired. America is not\ntoo young to have its divinities, and its place legends. Many of those\n\"Transcendent Thoughts\" and \"Visions\" which had their birth beneath our\nConcord elms--messages that have brought salvation to many listening\nsouls throughout the world--are still growing, day by day, to greater\nand greater beauty--are still showing clearer and clearer man's way to\nGod!\n\nNo true composer will take his substance from another finite being--but\nthere are times, when he feels that his self-expression needs some\nliberation from at least a part of his own soul. At such times, shall\nhe not better turn to those greater souls, rather than to the external,\nthe immediate, and the \"Garish Day\"?\n\nThe strains of one man may fall far below the course of those Phaetons\nof Concord, or of the Aegean Sea, or of Westmorland--but the greater\nthe distance his music falls away, the more reason that some greater\nman shall bring his nearer those higher spheres.\n\n\n**************************************************************\n\n\nINFO ABOUT THIS E-TEXT EDITION\n\nThis edition of Charles Ives' \"Essays Before a Sonata\" was originally\npublished in 1920 by The Knickerbocker Press. It has also been\nrepublished unabridged by Dover Publications, Inc., in a 1962 edition,\nISBN 0-486-20320-4.\n\nThis electronic text was prepared by John Mamoun with help from\nnumerous other proofreaders, including those associated with Charles\nFranks' Distributed Proofreaders website. This e-text is public domain,\nfreely copyable and distributable for any non-commercial purpose, and\nmay be included without royalty or permission on a mass media storage\nproduct, such as a cd-rom, that contains at least 50 public domain\nelectronic texts, whether offered for non-commercial or commercial\npurposes. Any other commercial usage requires permission.\n\n\nUse of the Project Gutenberg Trademark requires separate permission.","title":"Essays Before a Sonata","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":32695}