{"collection":"philosophy-ethics","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_75942/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_75942","id":"gutenberg_75942","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/75942","summary":null,"tags":["American essays -- 19th century","Category: American Literature","Category: Biographies","Category: Essays, Letters & Speeches","Category: Philosophy & Ethics","Speeches, addresses, etc., American -- 19th century"],"text":"Riverside Edition\n\n\n                       LECTURES AND BIOGRAPHICAL\n                               SKETCHES\n\n\n                            BEING VOLUME X.\n\n                                  OF\n\n                       EMERSON\u2019S COMPLETE WORKS\n\n\n\n\n                               LECTURES\n\n                                  AND\n\n                         BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCHES\n\n\n                                  BY\n\n                          RALPH WALDO EMERSON\n\n\n\n\n                                BOSTON\n                     HOUGHTON, MIFFLIN AND COMPANY\n                 NEW YORK: 11 EAST SEVENTEENTH STREET\n                    The Riverside Press, Cambridge\n                                 1884\n\n\n\n\n                           Copyright, 1883,\n                         BY EDWARD W. EMERSON.\n\n\n                        _All rights reserved._\n\n\n\n\n                   _The Riverside Press, Cambridge_:\n           Electrotyped and Printed by H. O. Houghton & Co.\n\n\n\n\n                                 NOTE.\n\n\nOF the pieces included in this volume the following, namely, those from\nthe \u201cDial,\u201d \u201cCharacter,\u201d \u201cPlutarch,\u201d and the biographical sketches\nof Dr. Ripley, of Mr. Hoar, and of Henry Thoreau, were printed by\nMr. Emerson before I took any part in the arrangement of his papers.\nThe rest, except the sketch of Miss Mary Emerson, I got ready for\nhis use in readings to his friends or to a limited public. He had\ngiven up the regular practice of lecturing, but would sometimes, upon\nspecial request, read a paper that had been prepared for him from\nhis manuscripts, in the manner described in the preface to \u201cLetters\nand Social Aims,\u201d--some former lecture serving as a nucleus for\nthe new. Some of these papers he afterwards allowed to be printed;\nothers, namely, \u201cAristocracy,\u201d \u201cEducation,\u201d \u201cThe Man of Letters,\u201d \u201cThe\nScholar,\u201d \u201cHistoric Notes of Life and Letters in New England,\u201d \u201cMary\nMoody Emerson,\u201d are now published for the first time.\n\n                                                           J. E. CABOT.\n\n\n\n\n                               CONTENTS.\n\n\n                                                   PAGE\n\n DEMONOLOGY                                           7\n\n ARISTOCRACY                                         33\n\n PERPETUAL FORCES                                    69\n\n CHARACTER                                           91\n\n EDUCATION                                          123\n\n THE SUPERLATIVE                                    157\n\n THE SOVEREIGNTY OF ETHICS                          175\n\n THE PREACHER                                       207\n\n THE MAN OF LETTERS                                 229\n\n THE SCHOLAR                                        247\n\n PLUTARCH                                           275\n\n HISTORIC NOTES OF LIFE AND LETTERS IN NEW\n        ENGLAND                                     305\n\n THE CHARDON STREET CONVENTION                      349\n\n EZRA RIPLEY, D. D.                                 355\n\n MARY MOODY EMERSON                                 371\n\n SAMUEL HOAR                                        405\n\n THOREAU                                            419\n\n CARLYLE                                            453\n\n\n\n\n                              DEMONOLOGY.\n\n\n    NIGHT-DREAMS trace on Memory\u2019s wall\n      Shadows of the thoughts of day,\n    And thy fortunes as they fall\n      The bias of thy will betray.\n\n    In the chamber, on the stairs,\n        Lurking dumb,\n        Go and come\n    Lemurs and Lars.\n\n\n\n\n                            DEMONOLOGY.[1]\n\n\nTHE name Demonology covers dreams, omens, coincidences, luck,\nsortilege, magic, and other experiences which shun rather than court\ninquiry, and deserve notice chiefly because every man has usually in a\nlifetime two or three hints in this kind which are specially impressive\nto him. They also shed light on our structure.\n\nThe witchcraft of sleep divides with truth the empire of our lives.\nThis soft enchantress visits two children lying locked in each other\u2019s\narms, and carries them asunder by wide spaces of land and sea, and wide\nintervals of time:--\n\n    \u201cThere lies a sleeping city, God of dreams!\n    What an unreal and fantastic world\n    Is going on below!\n    Within the sweep of yon encircling wall\n    How many a large creation of the night,\n    Wide wilderness and mountain, rock and sea,\n    Peopled with busy, transitory groups,\n    Finds room to rise, and never feels the crowd.\u201d\n\n\u2019Tis superfluous to think of the dreams of multitudes, the astonishment\nremains that one should dream; that we should resign so quietly this\ndeifying Reason, and become the theatre of delirious shows, wherein\ntime, space, persons, cities, animals, should dance before us in merry\nand mad confusion; a delicate creation outdoing the prime and flower of\nactual nature, antic comedy alternating with horrid pictures. Sometimes\nthe forgotten companions of childhood reappear:--\n\n    \u201cThey come, in dim procession led,\n    The cold, the faithless, and the dead,\n    As warm each hand, each brow as gay,\n    As if they parted yesterday:\u201d--\n\nor we seem busied for hours and days in peregrinations over seas\nand lands, in earnest dialogues, strenuous actions for nothings and\nabsurdities, cheated by spectral jokes and waking suddenly with ghastly\nlaughter, to be rebuked by the cold, lonely, silent midnight, and to\nrake with confusion in memory among the gibbering nonsense to find the\nmotive of this contemptible cachinnation. Dreams are jealous of being\nremembered; they dissipate instantly and angrily if you try to hold\nthem. When newly awaked from lively dreams, we are so near them, still\nagitated by them, still in their sphere,--give us one syllable, one\nfeature, one hint, and we should repossess the whole; hours of this\nstrange entertainment would come trooping back to us; but we cannot get\nour hand on the first link or fibre, and the whole is lost. There is a\nstrange wilfulness in the speed with which it disperses and baffles our\ngrasp.\n\nA dislocation seems to be the foremost trait of dreams. A painful\nimperfection almost always attends them. The fairest forms, the most\nnoble and excellent persons, are deformed by some pitiful and insane\ncircumstance. The very landscape and scenery in a dream seem not to\nfit us, but like a coat or cloak of some other person to overlap and\nencumber the wearer; so is the ground, the road, the house, in dreams,\ntoo long or too short, and if it served no other purpose would show us\nhow accurately nature fits man awake.\n\nThere is one memory of waking and another of sleep. In our dreams\nthe same scenes and fancies are many times associated, and that too,\nit would seem, for years. In sleep one shall travel certain roads in\nstage-coaches or gigs, which he recognizes as familiar, and has dreamed\nthat ride a dozen times; or shall walk alone in familiar fields and\nmeadows, which road or which meadow in waking hours he never looked\nupon. This feature of dreams deserves the more attention from its\nsingular resemblance to that obscure yet startling experience which\nalmost every person confesses in daylight, that particular passages of\nconversation and action have occurred to him in the same order before,\nwhether dreaming or waking; a suspicion that they have been with\nprecisely these persons in precisely this room, and heard precisely\nthis dialogue, at some former hour, they know not when.\n\nAnimals have been called \u201cthe dreams of nature.\u201d Perhaps for a\nconception of their consciousness we may go to our own dreams. In a\ndream we have the instinctive obedience, the same torpidity of the\nhighest power, the same unsurprised assent to the monstrous as these\nmetamorphosed men exhibit. Our thoughts in a stable or in a menagerie,\non the other hand, may well remind us of our dreams. What compassion\ndo these imprisoning forms awaken! You may catch the glance of a dog\nsometimes which lays a kind of claim to sympathy and brotherhood. What!\nsomewhat of me down there? Does he know it? Can he too, as I, go out\nof himself, see himself, perceive relations? We fear lest the poor\nbrute should gain one dreadful glimpse of his condition, should learn\nin some moment the tough limitations of this fettering organization.\nIt was in this glance that Ovid got the hint of his metamorphoses;\nCalidasa of his transmigration of souls. For these fables are our\nown thoughts carried out. What keeps those wild tales in circulation\nfor thousands of years? What but the wild fact to which they suggest\nsome approximation of theory? Nor is the fact quite solitary, for in\nvarieties of our own species where organization seems to predominate\nover the genius of man, in Kalmuck or Malay or Flathead Indian, we\nare sometimes pained by the same feeling; and sometimes too the\nsharp-witted prosperous white man awakens it. In a mixed assembly we\nhave chanced to see not only a glance of Abdiel, so grand and keen,\nbut also in other faces the features of the mink, of the bull, of the\nrat, and the barn-door fowl. You think, could the man overlook his own\ncondition, he could not be restrained from suicide.\n\nDreams have a poetic integrity and truth. This limbo and dust-hole of\nthought is presided over by a certain reason, too. Their extravagance\nfrom nature is yet within a higher nature. They seem to us to suggest\nan abundance and fluency of thought not familiar to the waking\nexperience. They pique us by independence of us, yet we know ourselves\nin this mad crowd, and owe to dreams a kind of divination and wisdom.\nMy dreams are not me; they are not Nature, or the Not-me: they are\nboth. They have a double consciousness, at once sub- and objective. We\ncall the phantoms that rise, the creation of our fancy, but they act\nlike mutineers, and fire on their commander; showing that every act,\nevery thought, every cause, is bipolar, and in the act is contained the\ncounteraction. If I strike, I am struck; if I chase, I am pursued.\n\nWise and sometimes terrible hints shall in them be thrown to the man\nout of a quite unknown intelligence. He shall be startled two or three\ntimes in his life by the justice as well as the significance of this\nphantasmagoria. Once or twice the conscious fetters shall seem to be\nunlocked, and a freer utterance attained. A prophetic character in all\nages has haunted them. They are the maturation often of opinions not\nconsciously carried out to statements, but whereof we already possessed\nthe elements. Thus, when awake, I know the character of Rupert, but\ndo not think what he may do. In dreams I see him engaged in certain\nactions which seem preposterous,--out of all fitness. He is hostile,\nhe is cruel, he is frightful, he is a poltroon. It turns out prophecy\na year later. But it was already in my mind as character, and the\nsibyl dreams merely embodied it in fact. Why then should not symptoms,\nauguries, forebodings be, and, as one said, the moanings of the spirit?\n\nWe are let by this experience into the high region of Cause, and\nacquainted with the identity of very unlike-seeming effects. We learn\nthat actions whose turpitude is very differently reputed proceed\nfrom one and the same affection. Sleep takes off the costume of\ncircumstance, arms us with terrible freedom, so that every will rushes\nto a deed. A skilful man reads his dreams for his self-knowledge; yet\nnot the details, but the quality. What part does he play in them,--a\ncheerful, manly part, or a poor drivelling part? However monstrous and\ngrotesque their apparitions, they have a substantial truth. The same\nremark may be extended to the omens and coincidences which may have\nastonished us. Of all it is true that the reason of them is always\nlatent in the individual. Goethe said: \u201cThese whimsical pictures,\ninasmuch as they originate from us, may well have an analogy with our\nwhole life and fate.\u201d\n\nThe soul contains in itself the event that shall presently befall\nit, for the event is only the actualizing of its thoughts. It is no\nwonder that particular dreams and presentiments should fall out and be\nprophetic. The fallacy consists in selecting a few insignificant hints\nwhen all are inspired with the same sense. As if one should exhaust\nhis astonishment at the economy of his thumb-nail, and overlook the\ncentral causal miracle of his being a man. Every man goes through the\nworld attended with innumerable facts prefiguring (yes, distinctly\nannouncing) his fate, if only eyes of sufficient heed and illumination\nwere fastened on the sign. The sign is always there, if only the eye\nwere also; just as under every tree in the speckled sunshine and shade\nno man notices that every spot of light is a perfect image of the sun,\nuntil in some hour the moon eclipses the luminary; and then first we\nnotice that the spots of light have become crescents, or annular, and\ncorrespond to the changed figure of the sun. Things are significant\nenough, Heaven knows; but the seer of the sign,--where is he? We doubt\nnot a man\u2019s fortune may be read in the lines of his hand, by palmistry;\nin the lines of his face, by physiognomy; in the outlines of the skull,\nby craniology: the lines are all there, but the reader waits. The long\nwaves indicate to the instructed mariner that there is no near land\nin the direction from which they come. Belzoni describes the three\nmarks which led him to dig for a door to the pyramid of Ghizeh. What\nthousands had beheld the same spot for so many ages, and seen no three\nmarks!\n\nSecret analogies tie together the remotest parts of nature, as the\natmosphere of a summer morning is filled with innumerable gossamer\nthreads running in every direction, revealed by the beams of the rising\nsun. All life, all creation, is tell-tale and betraying. A man reveals\nhimself in every glance and step and movement and rest:--\n\n    \u201cHead with foot hath private amity,\n    And both with moons and tides.\u201d\n\nNot a mathematical axiom but is a moral rule. The jest and byword to\nan intelligent ear extends its meaning to the soul and to all time.\nIndeed, all productions of man are so anthropomorphous that not\npossibly can he invent any fable that shall not have a deep moral and\nbe true in senses and to an extent never intended by the inventor.\nThus all the bravest tales of Homer and the poets, modern philosophers\ncan explain with profound judgment of law and state and ethics. Lucian\nhas an idle tale that Pancrates, journeying from Memphis to Coppus,\nand wanting a servant, took a door-bar and pronounced over it magical\nwords, and it stood up and brought him water, and turned a spit, and\ncarried bundles, doing all the work of a slave. What is this but a\nprophecy of the progress of art? For Pancrates write Watt or Fulton,\nand for \u201cmagical words\u201d write \u201csteam;\u201d and do they not make an iron\nbar and half a dozen wheels do the work, not of one, but of a thousand\nskilful mechanics?\n\n\u201cNature,\u201d said Swedenborg, \u201cmakes almost as much demand on our faith\nas miracles do.\u201d And I find nothing in fables more astonishing than\nmy experience in every hour. One moment of a man\u2019s life is a fact\nso stupendous as to take the lustre out of all fiction. The lovers\nof marvels, of what we call the occult and unproved sciences, of\nmesmerism, of astrology, of coincidences, of intercourse, by writing\nor by rapping or by painting, with departed spirits, need not reproach\nus with incredulity because we are slow to accept their statement. It\nis not the incredibility of the fact, but a certain want of harmony\nbetween the action and the agents. We are used to vaster wonders than\nthese that are alleged. In the hands of poets, of devout and simple\nminds, nothing in the line of their character and genius would surprise\nus. But we should look for the style of the great artist in it, look\nfor completeness and harmony. Nature never works like a conjuror, to\nsurprise, rarely by shocks, but by infinite graduation; so that we live\nembosomed in sounds we do not hear, scents we do not smell, spectacles\nwe see not, and by innumerable impressions so softly laid on that\nthough important we do not discover them until our attention is called\nto them.\n\nFor Spiritism, it shows that no man almost is fit to give evidence.\nThen I say to the amiable and sincere among them, these matters are\nquite too important than that I can rest them on any legends. If I\nhave no facts, as you allege, I can very well wait for them. I am\ncontent and occupied with such miracles as I know, such as my eyes and\nears daily show me, such as humanity and astronomy. If any others are\nimportant to me they will certainly be shown to me.\n\nIn times most credulous of these fancies the sense was always met and\nthe superstition rebuked by the grave spirit of reason and humanity.\nWhen Hector is told that the omens are unpropitious, he replies,--\n\n    \u201cOne omen is the best, to fight for one\u2019s country.\u201d\n\nEuripides said, \u201cHe is not the best prophet who guesses well, and he is\nnot the wisest man whose guess turns out well in the event, but he who,\nwhatever the event be, takes reason and probability for his guide.\u201d\n\u201cSwans, horses, dogs and dragons,\u201d says Plutarch, \u201cwe distinguish as\nsacred, and vehicles of the Divine foresight, and yet we cannot believe\nthat men are sacred and favorites of Heaven.\u201d The poor shipmaster\ndiscovered a sound theology, when in the storm at sea he made his\nprayer to Neptune, \u201cO God, thou mayst save me if thou wilt, and if thou\nwilt thou mayst destroy me; but, however, I will hold my rudder true.\u201d\nLet me add one more example of the same good sense, in a story quoted\nout of Hecateus of Abdera:--\n\n \u201cAs I was once travelling by the Red Sea, there was one among the\n horsemen that attended us named Masollam, a brave and strong man,\n and according to the testimony of all the Greeks and barbarians, a\n very skilful archer. Now while the whole multitude was on the way, an\n augur called out to them to stand still, and this man inquired the\n reason of their halting. The augur showed him a bird, and told him,\n \u2018If that bird remained where he was, it would be better for them all\n to remain; if he flew on, they might proceed; but if he flew back\n they must return.\u2019 The Jew said nothing, but bent his bow and shot\n the bird to the ground. This act offended the augur and some others,\n and they began to utter imprecations against the Jew. But he replied,\n \u2018Wherefore? Why are you so foolish as to take care of this unfortunate\n bird? How could this fowl give us any wise directions respecting our\n journey, when he could not save his own life? Had he known anything\n of futurity, he would not have come here to be killed by the arrow of\n Masollam the Jew.\u2019\u201d\n\nIt is not the tendency of our times to ascribe importance to whimsical\npictures of sleep, or to omens. But the faith in peculiar and alien\npower takes another form in the modern mind, much more resembling the\nancient doctrine of the guardian genius. The belief that particular\nindividuals are attended by a good fortune which makes them desirable\nassociates in any enterprise of uncertain success, exists not only\namong those who take part in political and military projects,\nbut influences all joint action of commerce and affairs, and a\ncorresponding assurance in the individuals so distinguished meets and\njustifies the expectation of others by a boundless self-trust. \u201cI have\na lucky hand, sir,\u201d said Napoleon to his hesitating Chancellor; \u201cthose\non whom I lay it are fit for anything.\u201d This faith is familiar in one\nform,--that often a certain abdication of prudence and foresight is an\nelement of success; that children and young persons come off safe from\ncasualties that would have proved dangerous to wiser people. We do not\nthink the young will be forsaken; but he is fast approaching the age\nwhen the sub-miraculous external protection and leading are withdrawn\nand he is committed to his own care. The young man takes a leap in\nthe dark and alights safe. As he comes into manhood he remembers\npassages and persons that seem, as he looks at them now, to have been\nsupernaturally deprived of injurious influence on him. His eyes were\nholden that he could not see. But he learns that such risks he may no\nlonger run. He observes, with pain, not that he incurs mishaps here and\nthere, but that his genius, whose invisible benevolence was tower and\nshield to him, is no longer present and active.\n\nIn the popular belief, ghosts are a selecting tribe, avoiding millions,\nspeaking to one. In our traditions, fairies, angels and saints show the\nlike favoritism; so do the agents and the means of magic, as sorcerers\nand amulets. This faith in a doting power, so easily sliding into the\ncurrent belief everywhere, and, in the particular of lucky days and\nfortunate persons, as frequent in America to-day as the faith in\nincantations and philters was in old Rome, or the wholesome potency\nof the sign of the cross in modern Rome,--this supposed power runs\nathwart the recognized agencies, natural and moral, which science and\nreligion explore. Heeded though it be in many actions and partnerships,\nit is not the power to which we build churches, or make liturgies\nand prayers, or which we regard in passing laws, or found college\nprofessorships to expound. Goethe has said in his Autobiography what is\nmuch to the purpose:--\n\n \u201cI believed that I discovered in nature, animate and inanimate,\n intelligent and brute, somewhat which manifested itself only in\n contradiction, and therefore could not be grasped by a conception,\n much less by a word. It was not god-like, since it seemed\n unreasonable; not human, since it had no understanding; not devilish,\n since it was beneficent; not angelic, since it is often a marplot. It\n resembled chance, since it showed no sequel. It resembled Providence,\n since it pointed at connection. All which limits us seemed permeable\n to that. It seemed to deal at pleasure with the necessary elements\n of our constitution; it shortened time and extended space. Only in\n the impossible it seemed to delight, and the possible to repel with\n contempt. This, which seemed to insert itself between all other\n things, to sever them, to bind them, I named the Demoniacal, after the\n example of the ancients, and of those who had observed the like.\n\n \u201cAlthough every demoniacal property can manifest itself in the\n corporeal and incorporeal, yes, in beasts too in a remarkable manner,\n yet it stands specially in wonderful relations with men, and forms in\n the moral world, though not an antagonist, yet a transverse element,\n so that the former may be called the warp, the latter the woof. For\n the phenomena which hence originate there are countless names, since\n all philosophies and religions have attempted in prose or in poetry\n to solve this riddle, and to settle the thing once for all, as indeed\n they may be allowed to do.\n\n \u201cBut this demonic element appears most fruitful when it shows itself\n as the determining characteristic in an individual. In the course of\n my life I have been able to observe several such, some near, some\n farther off. They are not always superior persons, either in mind or\n in talent. They seldom recommend themselves through goodness of heart.\n But a monstrous force goes out from them, and they exert an incredible\n power over all creatures, and even over the elements; who shall say\n how far such an influence may extend? All united moral powers avail\n nothing against them. In vain do the clear-headed part of mankind\n discredit them as deceivers or deceived,--the mass is attracted.\n Seldom or never do they meet their match among their contemporaries;\n they are not to be conquered save by the universe itself, against\n which they have taken up arms. Out of such experiences doubtless arose\n the strange, monstrous proverb, \u2018Nobody against God but God.\u2019\u201d[2]\n\nIt would be easy in the political history of every time to furnish\nexamples of this irregular success, men having a force which without\nvirtue, without shining talent, yet makes them prevailing. No equal\nappears in the field against them. A power goes out from them which\ndraws all men and events to favor them. The crimes they commit, the\nexposures which follow, and which would ruin any other man, are\nstrangely overlooked, or do more strangely turn to their account.\n\nI set down these things as I find them, but however poetic these\ntwilights of thought, I like daylight, and I find somewhat wilful, some\nplay at blindman\u2019s-buff, when men as wise as Goethe talk mysteriously\nof the demonological. The insinuation is that the known eternal laws\nof morals and matter are sometimes corrupted or evaded by this gipsy\nprinciple, which chooses favorites and works in the dark for their\nbehoof; as if the laws of the Father of the universe were sometimes\nbalked and eluded by a meddlesome Aunt of the universe for her pets.\nYou will observe that this extends the popular idea of success to the\nvery gods; that they foster a success to you which is not a success\nto all; that fortunate men, fortunate youths exist, whose good is not\nvirtue or the public good, but a private good, robbed from the rest.\nIt is a midsummer-madness, corrupting all who hold the tenet. The\ndemonologic is only a fine name for egotism; an exaggeration namely\nof the individual, whom it is Nature\u2019s settled purpose to postpone.\n\u201cThere is one world common to all who are awake, but each sleeper\nbetakes himself to one of his own.\u201d[3] Dreams retain the infirmities\nof our character. The good genius may be there or not, our evil genius\nis sure to stay. The Ego partial makes the dream; the Ego total the\ninterpretation. Life is also a dream on the same terms.\n\nThe history of man is a series of conspiracies to win from Nature\nsome advantage without paying for it. It is curious to see what grand\npowers we have a hint of and are mad to grasp, yet how slow Heaven\nis to trust us with such edge-tools. \u201cAll that frees talent without\nincreasing self-command is noxious.\u201d Thus the fabled ring of Gyges,\nmaking the wearer invisible, which is represented in modern fable by\nthe telescope as used by Schlemil, is simply mischievous. A new or\nprivate language, used to serve only low or political purposes; the\ntransfusion of the blood; the steam battery, so fatal as to put an end\nto war by the threat of universal murder; the desired discovery of the\nguided balloon, are of this kind. Tramps are troublesome enough in\nthe city and in the highways, but tramps flying through the air and\ndescending on the lonely traveller or the lonely farmer\u2019s house or the\nbank-messenger in the country, can well be spared. Men are not fit to\nbe trusted with these talismans.\n\nBefore we acquire great power we must acquire wisdom to use it well.\nAnimal magnetism inspires the prudent and moral with a certain terror;\nso the divination of contingent events, and the alleged second-sight\nof the pseudo-spiritualists. There are many things of which a wise man\nmight wish to be ignorant, and these are such. Shun them as you would\nthe secrets of the undertaker and the butcher. The best are never\ndemoniacal or magnetic; leave this limbo to the Prince of the power of\nthe air. The lowest angel is better. It is the height of the animal;\nbelow the region of the divine. Power as such is not known to the\nangels.\n\nGreat men feel that they are so by sacrificing their selfishness and\nfalling back on what is humane; in renouncing family, clan, country,\nand each exclusive and local connection, to beat with the pulse and\nbreathe with the lungs of nations. A Highland chief, an Indian sachem\nor a feudal baron may fancy that the mountains and lakes were made\nspecially for him Donald, or him Tecumseh; that the one question for\nhistory is the pedigree of his house, and future ages will be busy with\nhis renown; that he has a guardian angel; that he is not in the roll of\ncommon men, but obeys a high family destiny; when he acts, unheard-of\nsuccess evinces the presence of rare agents; what is to befall him,\nomens and coincidences foreshow; when he dies banshees will announce\nhis fate to kinsmen in foreign parts. What more facile than to project\nthis exuberant selfhood into the region where individuality is forever\nbounded by generic and cosmical laws? The deepest flattery, and that to\nwhich we can never be insensible, is the flattery of omens.\n\nWe may make great eyes if we like, and say of one on whom the sun\nshines, \u201cWhat luck presides over him!\u201d But we know that the law of\nthe Universe is one for each and for all. There is as precise and\nas describable a reason for every fact occurring to him, as for\nany occurring to any man. Every fact in which the moral elements\nintermingle is not the less under the dominion of fatal law. Lord Bacon\nuncovers the magic when he says, \u201cManifest virtues procure reputation;\noccult ones, fortune.\u201d Thus the so-called fortunate man is one who,\nthough not gifted to speak when the people listen, or to act with grace\nor with understanding to great ends, yet is one who, in actions of a\nlow or common pitch, relies on his instincts, and simply does not act\nwhere he should not, but waits his time, and without effort acts when\nthe need is. If to this you add a fitness to the society around him,\nyou have the elements of fortune; so that in a particular circle and\nknot of affairs he is not so much his own man as the hand of nature\nand time. Just as his eye and hand work exactly together,--and to hit\nthe mark with a stone he has only to fasten his eye firmly on the mark\nand his arm will swing true,--so the main ambition and genius being\nbestowed in one direction, the lesser spirits and involuntary aids\nwithin his sphere will follow. The fault of most men is that they are\nbusybodies; do not wait the simple movement of the soul, but interfere\nand thwart the instructions of their own minds.\n\nCoincidences, dreams, animal magnetism, omens, sacred lots, have great\ninterest for some minds. They run into this twilight and say, \u201cThere\u2019s\nmore than is dreamed of in your philosophy.\u201d Certainly these facts are\ninteresting, and deserve to be considered. But they are entitled only\nto a share of attention, and not a large share. _Nil magnificum,\nnil generosum sapit._ Let their value as exclusive subjects of\nattention be judged of by the infallible test of the state of mind\nin which much notice of them leaves us. Read a page of Cudworth or\nof Bacon, and we are exhilarated and armed to manly duties. Read\ndemonology or Colquhoun\u2019s Report, and we are bewildered and perhaps a\nlittle besmirched. We grope. They who love them say they are to reveal\nto us a world of unknown, unsuspected truths. But suppose a diligent\ncollection and study of these occult facts were made, they are merely\nphysiological, semi-medical, related to the machinery of man, opening\nto our curiosity how we live, and no aid on the superior problems why\nwe live, and what we do. While the dilettanti have been prying into the\nhumors and muscles of the eye, simple men will have helped themselves\nand the world by using their eyes.\n\nAnd this is not the least remarkable fact which the adepts have\ndeveloped. Men who had never wondered at anything, who had thought it\nthe most natural thing in the world that they should exist in this\norderly and replenished world, have been unable to suppress their\namazement at the disclosures of the somnambulist. The peculiarity\nof the history of Animal Magnetism is that it drew in as inquirers\nand students a class of persons never on any other occasion known\nas students and inquirers. Of course the inquiry is pursued on low\nprinciples. Animal magnetism peeps. It becomes in such hands a black\nart. The uses of the thing, the commodity, the power, at once come to\nmind and direct the course of inquiry. It seemed to open again that\ndoor which was open to the imagination of childhood--of magicians and\nfairies and lamps of Aladdin, the travelling cloak, the shoes of\nswiftness and the sword of sharpness that were to satisfy the uttermost\nwish of the senses without danger or a drop of sweat. But as Nature can\nnever be outwitted, as in the Universe no man was ever known to get a\ncent\u2019s worth without paying in some form or other the cent, so this\nprodigious promiser ends always and always will, as sorcery and alchemy\nhave done before, in very small and smoky performance.\n\nMesmerism is high life below stairs; Momus playing Jove in the kitchens\nof Olympus. \u2019Tis a low curiosity or lust of structure, and is separated\nby celestial diameters from the love of spiritual truths. It is wholly\na false view to couple these things in any manner with the religious\nnature and sentiment, and a most dangerous superstition to raise them\nto the lofty place of motives and sanctions. This is to prefer halos\nand rainbows to the sun and moon. These adepts have mistaken flatulency\nfor inspiration. Were this drivel which they report as the voice of\nspirits really such, we must find out a more decisive suicide. I say to\nthe table-rappers:--\n\n                            \u201cI well believe\n    Thou wilt not utter what thou dost not know,\n    And so far will I trust thee, gentle Kate.\u201d\n\nThey are ignorant of all that is healthy and useful to know, and by\nlaws of kind,--dunces seeking dunces in the dark of what they call\nthe spiritual world,--preferring snores and gastric noises to the\nvoice of any muse. I think the rappings a new test, like blue litmus\nor other chemical absorbent, to try catechisms with. It detects\norganic skepticism in the very heads of the Church. \u2019Tis a lawless\nworld. We have left the geometry, the compensation, and the conscience\nof the daily world, and come into the realm or chaos of chance and\npretty or ugly confusion; no guilt and no virtue, but a droll bedlam,\nwhere everybody believes only after his humor, and the actors and\nspectators have no conscience or reflection, no police, no foot-rule,\nno sanity,--nothing but whim and whim creative.\n\nMeantime far be from me the impatience which cannot brook the\nsupernatural, the vast; far be from me the lust of explaining away all\nwhich appeals to the imagination, and the great presentiments which\nhaunt us. Willingly I too say, Hail! to the unknown awful powers which\ntranscend the ken of the understanding. And the attraction which this\ntopic has had for me and which induces me to unfold its parts before\nyou is precisely because I think the numberless forms in which this\nsuperstition has re-appeared in every time and every people indicates\nthe inextinguishableness of wonder in man; betrays his conviction that\nbehind all your explanations is a vast and potent and living Nature,\ninexhaustible and sublime, which you cannot explain. He is sure no\nbook, no man has told him all. He is sure the great Instinct, the\ncircumambient soul which flows into him as into all, and is his life,\nhas not been searched. He is sure that intimate relations subsist\nbetween his character and his fortunes, between him and his world;\nand until he can adequately tell them he will tell them wildly and\nfabulously. Demonology is the shadow of Theology.\n\nThe whole world is an omen and a sign. Why look so wistfully in a\ncorner? Man is the Image of God. Why run after a ghost or a dream? The\nvoice of divination resounds everywhere and runs to waste unheard,\nunregarded, as the mountains echo with the bleatings of cattle.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 1: From the course of lectures on \u201cHuman Life,\u201d read in\nBoston, 1839-40. Published in the _North American Review_, 1877.]\n\n[Footnote 2: Goethe, _Wahrheit und Dichtung_, Book xx.]\n\n[Footnote 3: Heraclitus.]\n\n\n\n\n                             ARISTOCRACY.\n\n    BUT if thou do thy best,\n    Without remission, without rest,\n    And invite the sunbeam,\n    And abhor to feign or seem\n    Even to those who thee should love\n    And thy behavior approve;\n    If thou go in thine own likeness,--\n    Be it health or be it sickness,--\n    If thou go as thy father\u2019s son,\n    If thou wear no mask or lie,\n    Dealing purely and nakedly,--....\n\n\n\n\n                            ARISTOCRACY.[4]\n\n\nTHERE is an attractive topic, which never goes out of vogue and is\nimpertinent in no community,--the permanent traits of the Aristocracy.\nIt is an interest of the human race, and, as I look at it, inevitable,\nsacred and to be found in every country and in every company of men.\nMy concern with it is that concern which all well-disposed persons\nwill feel, that there should be model men,--true instead of spurious\npictures of excellence, and, if possible, living standards.\n\nI observe that the word _gentleman_ is gladly heard in all\ncompanies; that the cogent motive with the best young men who are\nrevolving plans and forming resolutions for the future, is the spirit\nof honor, the wish to be gentlemen. They do not yet covet political\npower, nor any exuberance of wealth, wealth that costs too much; nor do\nthey wish to be saints; for fear of partialism; but the middle term,\nthe reconciling element, the success of the manly character, they find\nin the idea of gentleman. It is not to be a man of rank, but a man of\nhonor, accomplished in all arts and generosities, which seems to them\nthe right mark and the true chief of our modern society. A reference\nto society is part of the idea of culture; science of a gentleman;\nart of a gentleman; poetry in a gentleman: intellectually held,\nthat is, for their own sake, for what they are; for their universal\nbeauty and worth;--not for economy, which degrades them, but not\nover-intellectually, that is, not to ecstasy, entrancing the man, but\nredounding to his beauty and glory.\n\nIn the sketches which I have to offer I shall not be surprised if my\nreaders should fancy that I am giving them, under a gayer title, a\nchapter on Education. It will not pain me if I am found now and then to\nrove from the accepted and historic, to a theoretic peerage: or if it\nshould turn out, what is true, that I am describing a real aristocracy,\na chapter of Templars who sit indifferently in all climates and under\nthe shadow of all institutions, but so few, so heedless of badges, so\nrarely convened, so little in sympathy with the predominant politics of\nnations, that their names and doings are not recorded in any Book of\nPeerage, or any Court Journal, or even Daily Newspaper of the world.\n\nI find the caste in the man. The Golden Book of Venice, the scale\nof European chivalry, the Barons of England, the hierarchy of India\nwith its impassable degrees, is each a transcript of the decigrade or\ncentigraded Man. A many-chambered Aristocracy lies already organized in\nhis moods and faculties. Room is found for all the departments of the\nState in the moods and faculties of each human spirit, with separate\nfunction and difference of dignity.\n\nThe terrible aristocracy that is in nature. Real people dwelling with\nthe real, face to face undaunted: then, far down, people of taste,\npeople dwelling in a relation, or rumor, or influence of good and\nfair, entertained by it, superficially touched, yet charmed by these\nshadows:--and, far below these, gross and thoughtless, the animal man,\nbillows of chaos, down to the dancing and menial organizations.\n\nI observe the inextinguishable prejudice men have in favor of a\nhereditary transmission of qualities. It is in vain to remind them\nthat nature appears capricious. Some qualities she carefully fixes and\ntransmits, but some, and those the finer, she exhales with the breath\nof the individual, as too costly to perpetuate. But I notice also that\nthey may become fixed and permanent in any stock, by painting and\nrepainting them on every individual, until at last Nature adopts them\nand bakes them into her porcelain.\n\nAt all events I take this inextinguishable persuasion in men\u2019s minds as\na hint from the outward universe to man to inlay as many virtues and\nsuperiorities as he can into this swift fresco of the day, which is\nhardening to an immortal picture.\n\nIf one thinks of the interest which all men have in beauty of character\nand manners; that it is of the last importance to the imagination\nand affection, inspiring as it does that loyalty and worship so\nessential to the finish of character--certainly, if culture, if laws,\nif primogeniture, if heraldry, if money could secure such a result as\nsuperior and finished men, it would be the interest of all mankind to\nsee that the steps were taken, the pains incurred. No taxation, no\nconcession, no conferring of privileges never so exalted would be a\nprice too large.\n\nThe old French Revolution attracted to its first movement all the\nliberality, virtue, hope and poetry in Europe. By the abolition of\nkingship and aristocracy, tyranny, inequality and poverty would end.\nAlas! no; tyranny, inequality, poverty, stood as last and fierce as\never. We likewise put faith in Democracy; in the Republican principle\ncarried out to the extremes of practice in universal suffrage, in the\nwill of majorities. The young adventurer finds that the relations of\nsociety, the position of classes, irk and sting him, and he lends\nhimself to each malignant party that assails what is eminent. He\nwill one day know that this is not removable, but a distinction in\nthe nature of things; that neither the caucus, nor the newspaper,\nnor the Congress, nor the mob, nor the guillotine, nor fire, nor all\ntogether, can avail to outlaw, cut out, burn, or destroy the offense\nof superiority in persons. The manners, the pretension, which annoy me\nso much, are not superficial, but built on a real distinction in the\nnature of my companion. The superiority in him is inferiority in me,\nand if this particular companion were wiped by a sponge out of nature,\nmy inferiority would still be made evident to me by other persons\neverywhere and every day.\n\nNo, not the hardest utilitarian will question the value of an\naristocracy if he love himself. For every man confesses that the\nhighest good which the universe proposes to him is the highest society.\nIf a few grand natures should come to us and weave duties and offices\nbetween us and them, it would make our bread ambrosial.\n\nI affirm that inequalities exist, not in costume, but in the powers of\nexpression and action; a primitive aristocracy; and that we, certainly,\nhave not come here to describe well-dressed vulgarity. I cannot tell\nhow English titles are bestowed, whether on pure blood, or on the\nlargest holder in the three-per-cents. The English government and\npeople, or the French government, may easily make mistakes; but Nature\nmakes none. Every mark and scutcheon of hers indicates constitutional\nqualities. In science, in trade, in social discourse, as in the state,\nit is the same thing. Forever and ever it takes a pound to lift a pound.\n\nIt is plain that all the deference of modern society to this idea of\nthe Gentleman, and all the whimsical tyranny of Fashion which has\ncontinued to engraft itself on this reverence, is a secret homage to\nreality and love which ought to reside in every man. This is the steel\nthat is hid under gauze and lace, under flowers and spangles. And it is\nplain that instead of this idolatry, a worship; instead of this impure,\na pure reverence for character, a new respect for the sacredness of the\nindividual man, is that antidote which must correct in our country the\ndisgraceful deference to public opinion, and the insane subordination\nof the end to the means. From the folly of too much association we must\ncome back to the repose of self-reverence and trust.\n\nThe game of the world is a perpetual trial of strength between man\nand events. The common man is the victim of events. Whatever happens\nis too much for him, he is drawn this way and that way, and his whole\nlife is a hurry. The superior man is at home in his own mind. We like\ncool people, who neither hope nor fear too much, but seem to have many\nstrings to their bow, and can survive the blow well enough if stock\nshould rise or fall, if parties should be broken up, if their money or\ntheir family should be dispersed; who can stand a slander very well;\nindeed on whom events make little or no impression, and who can face\ndeath with firmness. In short, we dislike every mark of a superficial\nlife and action, and prize whatever mark of a central life.\n\nWhat is the meaning of this invincible respect for war, here in the\ntriumphs of our commercial civilization, that we can never quite\nsmother the trumpet and the drum? How is it that the sword runs away\nwith all the fame from the spade and the wheel? How sturdy seem to\nus in the history, those Merovingians, Guelphs, Dorias, Sforzas,\nBurgundies and Guesclins of the old warlike ages! We can hardly believe\nthey were all such speedy shadows as we; that an ague or fever, a drop\nof water or a crystal of ice ended them. We give soldiers the same\nadvantage to-day. From the most accumulated culture we are always\nrunning back to the sound of any drum and fife. And in any trade, or in\nlaw-courts, in orchard and farm, and even in saloons, they only prosper\nor they prosper best who have a military mind, who engineer in sword\nand cannon style, with energy and sharpness. Why, but because courage\nnever loses its high price? Why, but because we wish to see those to\nwhom existence is most adorned and attractive, foremost to peril it\nfor their object, and ready to answer for their actions with their life.\n\nThe existence of an upper class is not injurious, as long as it is\ndependent on merit. For so long it is provocation to the bold and\ngenerous. These distinctions exist, and they are deep, not to be talked\nor voted away. If the differences are organic, so are the merits, that\nis to say the power and excellence we describe are real. Aristocracy is\nthe class eminent by personal qualities, and to them belongs without\nassertion a proper influence. Men of aim must lead the aimless; men of\ninvention the uninventive. I wish catholic men, who by their science\nand skill are at home in every latitude and longitude, who carry the\nworld in their thoughts; men of universal politics, who are interested\nin things in proportion to their truth and magnitude; who know the\nbeauty of animals and the laws of their nature, whom the mystery of\nbotany allures, and the mineral laws; who see general effects and are\nnot too learned to love the Imagination, the power and the spirits\nof Solitude;--men who see the dance in men\u2019s lives as well as in a\nball-room, and can feel and convey the sense which is only collectively\nor totally expressed by a population; men who are charmed by the\nbeautiful Nemesis as well as by the dire Nemesis, and dare trust\ntheir inspiration for their welcome; who would find their fellows in\npersons of real elevation of whatever kind of speculative or practical\nability. We are fallen on times so acquiescent and traditionary that we\nare in danger of forgetting so simple a fact as that the basis of all\naristocracy must be truth,--the doing what elsewhere is pretended to be\ndone. One would gladly see all our institutions rightly aristocratic in\nthis wise.\n\nI enumerate the claims by which men enter the superior class.\n\n1. A commanding talent. In every company one finds the best man; and if\nthere be any question, it is decided the instant they enter into any\npractical enterprise. If the finders of glass, gunpowder, printing,\nelectricity,--if the healer of small-pox, the contriver of the safety\nlamp, of the aqueduct, of the bridge, of the tunnel; if the finders of\nparallax, of new planets, of steam power for boat and carriage, the\nfinder of sulphuric ether and the electric telegraph,--if these men\nshould keep their secrets, or only communicate them to each other, must\nnot the whole race of mankind serve them as gods? It only needs to look\nat the social aspect of England and America and France, to see the rank\nwhich original practical talent commands.\n\nEvery survey of the dignified classes, in ancient or modern history,\nimprints universal lessons, and establishes a nobility of a prouder\ncreation. And the conclusion which Roman Senators, Indian Brahmins,\nPersian Magians, European Nobles and great Americans inculcate,--that\nwhich they preach out of their material wealth and glitter, out of\ntheir old war and modern land-owning, even out of sensuality and\nsneers, is, that the radical and essential distinctions of every\naristocracy are moral. Do not hearken to the men, but to the Destiny in\nthe institutions. An aristocracy is composed of simple and sincere men\nfor whom nature and ethics are strong enough, who say what they mean\nand go straight to their objects. It is essentially real.\n\nThe multiplication of monarchs known by telegraph and daily news\nfrom all countries to the daily papers, and the effect of freer\ninstitutions in England and America, has robbed the title of king of\nall its romance, as that of our commercial consuls as compared with\nthe ancient Roman. We shall come to add \u201cKings\u201d in the \u201cContents\u201d\nof the Directory, as we do \u201cPhysicians,\u201d \u201cBrokers,\u201d etc. In simple\ncommunities, in the heroic ages, a man was chosen for his knack; got\nhis name, rank and living for that; and the best of the best was the\naristocrat or king. In the Norse Edda it appears as the curious but\nexcellent policy of contending tribes, when tired of war, to exchange\nhostages, and in reality each to adopt from the other a first-rate\nman, who thus acquired a new country, was at once made a chief. And no\nwrong was so keenly resented as any fraud in this transaction. In the\nheroic ages, as we call them, the hero uniformly has some real talent.\nUlysses in Homer is represented as a very skilful carpenter. He builds\nthe boat with which he leaves Calypso\u2019s isle, and in his own palace\ncarves a bedstead out of the trunk of a tree and inlays it with gold\nand ivory. Epeus builds the wooden horse. The English nation down to a\nlate age inherited the reality of the Northern stock. In 1373, in writs\nof summons of members of Parliament, the sheriff of every county is to\ncause \u201ctwo dubbed knights, or the most worthy esquires, the most expert\nin feats of arms, and no others; and of every city, two citizens,\nand of every borough, two burgesses, such as have greatest skill in\nshipping and merchandising, to be returned.\u201d\n\nThe ancients were fond of ascribing to their nobles gigantic\nproportions and strength. The hero must have the force of ten men. The\nchief is taller by a head than any of his tribe. Douglas can throw the\nbar a greater cast. Richard can sever the iron bolt with his sword.\nThe horn of Roland, in the romance, is heard sixty miles. The Cid has\na prevailing health that will let him nurse the leper, and share his\nbed without harm. And since the body is the pipe through which we\ntap all the succors and virtues of the material world, it is certain\nthat a sound body must be at the root of any excellence in manners and\nactions; a strong and supple frame which yields a stock of strength\nand spirits for all the needs of the day, and generates the habit of\nrelying on a supply of power for all extraordinary exertions. When\nNature goes to create a national man, she puts a symmetry between the\nphysical and intellectual powers. She moulds a large brain, and joins\nto it a great trunk to supply it; as if a fine alembic were fed with\nliquor for its distillations from broad full vats in the vaults of the\nlaboratory.\n\nCertainly, the origin of most of the perversities and absurdities that\ndisgust us is, primarily, the want of health. Genius is health and\nBeauty is health and virtue is health. The petty arts which we blame in\nthe half-great seem as odious to them also;--the resources of weakness\nand despair. And the manners betray the like puny constitution.\nTemperament is fortune, and we must say it so often. In a thousand\ncups of life, only one is the right mixture,--a fine adjustment to the\nexisting elements. When that befalls, when the well-mixed man is born,\nwith eyes not too dull nor too good, with fire enough and earth enough,\ncapable of impressions from all things, and not too susceptible,--then\nno gift need be bestowed on him, he brings with him fortune, followers,\nlove, power.\n\n    \u201cI think he\u2019ll be to Rome\n    As is the osprey to the fish, who takes it\n    By sovereignty of nature.\u201d\n\nNot the phrenologist but the philosopher may well say, Let me see\nhis brain, and I will tell you if he shall be poet, king, founder of\ncities, rich, magnetic, of a secure hand, of a scientific memory, a\nright classifier; or whether he shall be a bungler, driveller, unlucky,\nheavy, and tedious.\n\nIt were to dispute against the sun, to deny this difference of brain.\nI see well enough that when I bring one man into an estate, he sees\nvague capabilities, what others might, could, would, or should do with\nit. If I bring another man, he sees what _he_ should do with it.\nHe appreciates the water-privilege, land fit for orchard, tillage,\npasturage, wood-lot, cranberry-meadow; but just as easily he foresees\nall the means, all the steps of the process, and could lay his hand\nas readily on one as on another point in that series which opens the\ncapability to the last point. The poet sees wishfully enough the\nresult; the well-built head supplies all the steps, one as perfect as\nthe other, in the series. Seeing this working head in him, it becomes\nto me as certain that he will have the direction of estates, as that\nthere are estates. If we see tools in a magazine, as a file, an\nanchor, a plough, a pump, a paint-brush, a cider-press, a diving-bell,\nwe can predict well enough their destination; and the man\u2019s\nassociations, fortunes, love, hatred, residence, rank, the books he\nwill buy, the roads he will traverse are predetermined in his organism.\nMen will need him, and he is rich and eminent by nature. That man\ncannot be too late or too early. Let him not hurry or hesitate. Though\nmillions are already arrived, his seat is reserved. Though millions\nattend, they only multiply his friends and agents. It never troubles\nthe Senator what multitudes crack the benches and bend the galleries to\nhear. He who understands the art of war, reckons the hostile battalions\nand cities, opportunities and spoils.\n\nAn aristocracy could not exist unless it were organic. Men are born to\ncommand, and--it is even so--\u201ccome into the world booted and spurred to\nride.\u201d The blood royal never pays, we say. It obtains service, gifts,\nsupplies, furtherance of all kinds from the love and joy of those who\nfeel themselves honored by the service they render.\n\nDull people think it Fortune that makes one rich and another poor. Is\nit? Yes, but the fortune was earlier than they think, namely, in the\nbalance or adjustment between devotion to what is agreeable to-day and\nthe forecast of what will be valuable to-morrow.\n\nCertainly I am not going to argue the merits of gradation in the\nuniverse; the existing order of more or less. Neither do I wish to go\ninto a vindication of the justice that disposes the variety of lot.\nI know how steep the contrast of condition looks; such excess here\nand such destitution there; like entire chance, like the freaks of\nthe wind, heaping the snow-drift in gorges, stripping the plain; such\ndespotism of wealth and comfort in banquet-halls, whilst death is in\nthe pots of the wretched,--that it behooves a good man to walk with\ntenderness and heed amidst so much suffering. I only point in passing\nto the order of the universe, which makes a rotation,--not like the\ncoarse policy of the Greeks, ten generals, each commanding one day and\nthen giving place to the next, or like our democratic politics, my turn\nnow, your turn next,--but the constitution of things has distributed\na new quality or talent to each mind, and the revolution of things is\nalways bringing the need, now of this, now of that, and is sure to\nbring home the opportunity to every one.\n\nThe only relief that I know against the invidiousness of superior\nposition is, that you exert your faculty; for whilst each does that,\nhe excludes hard thoughts from the spectator. All right activity is\namiable. I never feel that any man occupies my place, but that the\nreason why I do not have what I wish, is, that I want the faculty\nwhich entitles. All spiritual or real power makes its own place.\n\nWe pass for what we are, and we prosper or fail by what we are. There\nare men who may dare much and will be justified in their daring. But\nit is because they know they are in their place. As long as I am in\nmy place, I am safe. \u201cThe best lightning-rod for your protection is\nyour own spine.\u201d Let a man\u2019s social aims be proportioned to his means\nand power. I do not pity the misery of a man underplaced: that will\nright itself presently: but I pity the man overplaced. A certain\nquantity of power belongs to a certain quantity of faculty. Whoever\nwants more power than is the legitimate attraction of his faculty, is\na politician, and must pay for that excess; must truckle for it. This\nis the whole game of society and the politics of the world. Being will\nalways seem well;--but whether possibly I cannot contrive to seem,\nwithout the trouble of being? Every Frenchman would have a career. We\nEnglish are not any better with our love of making a figure. \u201cI told\nthe Duke of Newcastle,\u201d says Bubb Doddington in his Memoirs, \u201cthat it\nmust end one way or another, it must not remain as it was; for I was\ndetermined to make some sort of a figure in life; I earnestly wished\nit might be under his protection, but if that could not be, I must\nmake some figure; what it would be I could not determine yet; I must\nlook round me a little and consult my friends, but some figure I was\nresolved to make.\u201d\n\nIt will be agreed everywhere that society must have the benefit of the\nbest leaders. How to obtain them? Birth has been tried and failed.\nCaste in India has no good result. Ennobling of one family is good\nfor one generation; not sure beyond. Slavery had mischief enough to\nanswer for, but it had this good in it,--the pricing of men. In the\nSouth a slave was bluntly but accurately valued at five hundred to a\nthousand dollars, if a good field-hand; if a mechanic, as carpenter\nor smith, twelve hundred or two thousand. In Rome or Greece what sums\nwould not be paid for a superior slave, a confidential secretary and\nmanager, an educated slave; a man of genius, a Moses educated in Egypt?\nI don\u2019t know how much Epictetus was sold for, or \u00c6sop, or Toussaint\nl\u2019Ouverture, and perhaps it was not a good market-day. Time was, in\nEngland, when the state stipulated beforehand what price should be paid\nfor each citizen\u2019s life, if he was killed. Now, if it were possible, I\nshould like to see that appraisal applied to every man, and every man\nmade acquainted with the true number and weight of every adult citizen,\nand that he be placed where he belongs, with so much power confided to\nhim as he could carry and use.\n\nIn the absence of such anthropometer I have a perfect confidence in\nthe natural laws. I think that the community,--every community, if\nobstructing laws and usages are removed,--will be the best measure and\nthe justest judge of the citizen, or will in the long run give the\nfairest verdict and reward; better than any royal patronage; better\nthan any premium on race; better than any statute elevating families to\nhereditary distinction, or any class to sacerdotal education and power.\nThe verdict of battles will best prove the general; the town-meeting,\nthe Congress, will not fail to find out legislative talent. The\nprerogatives of a right physician are determined, not by his diplomas,\nbut by the health he restores to body and mind; the powers of a\ngeometer by solving his problem; of a priest by the act of inspiring\nus with a sentiment which disperses the grief from which we suffered.\nWhen the lawyer tries his case in court he himself is also on trial and\nhis own merits appear as well as his client\u2019s. When old writers are\nconsulted by young writers who have written their first book, they say,\nPublish it by all means; so only can you certainly know its quality.\n\nBut we venture to put any man in any place. It is curious how negligent\nthe public is of the essential qualifications of its representatives.\nThey ask if a man is a republican, a democrat? Yes. Is he a man of\ntalent? Yes. Is he honest and not looking for an office or any manner\nof bribe? He is honest. Well then choose him by acclamation. And they\ngo home and tell their wives with great satisfaction what a good thing\nthey have done. But they forgot to ask the fourth question, not less\nimportant than either of the others, and without which the others do\nnot avail. Has he a will? Can he carry his points against opposition?\nProbably not. It is not sufficient that your work follows your genius,\nor is organic, to give you the magnetic power over men. More than taste\nand talent must go to the Will. That must also be a gift of nature. It\nis in some; it is not in others. But I should say, if it is not in you,\nyou had better not put yourself in places where not to have it is to be\na public enemy.\n\nThe expectation and claims of mankind indicate the duties of this\nclass. Some service they must pay. We do not expect them to be saints,\nand it is very pleasing to see the instinct of mankind on this\nmatter,--how much they will forgive to such as pay substantial service\nand work energetically after their kind; but they do not extend the\nsame indulgence to those who claim and enjoy the same prerogative but\nrender no returns. The day is darkened when the golden river runs down\ninto mud; when genius grows idle and wanton and reckless of its fine\nduties of being Saint, Prophet, Inspirer to its humble fellows, baulks\ntheir respect and confounds their understanding by silly extravagances.\nTo a right aristocracy, to Hercules, to Theseus, Odin, the Cid,\nNapoleon; to Sir Robert Walpole, to Fox, Chatham, Mirabeau, Jefferson,\nO\u2019Connell;--to the men, that is, who are incomparably superior to the\npopulace in ways agreeable to the populace, showing them the way they\nshould go, doing for them what they wish done and cannot do;--of course\neverything will be permitted and pardoned,--gaming, drinking, fighting,\nluxury. These are the heads of party, who can do no wrong,--everything\nshort of infamous crime will pass.\n\nBut if those who merely sit in their places and are not, like them,\nable; if the dressed and perfumed gentleman, who serves the people in\nno wise and adorns them not, is not even _not afraid of them_, if\nsuch an one go about to set ill examples and corrupt them, who shall\nblame them if they burn his barns, insult his children, assault his\nperson, and express their unequivocal indignation and contempt? He\neats their bread, he does not scorn to live by their labor, and after\nbreakfast he cannot remember that there are human beings. To live\nwithout duties is obscene.\n\n2. Genius, what is so called in strictness,--the power to affect the\nImagination, as possessed by the orator, the poet, the novelist, or\nthe artist,--has a royal right in all possessions and privileges, being\nitself representative and accepted by all men as their delegate. It\nhas indeed the best right, because it raises men above themselves,\nintoxicates them with beauty. They are honored by rendering it honor,\nand the reason of this allowance is that Genius unlocks for all men\nthe chains of use, temperament and drudgery, and gives them a sense of\ndelicious liberty and power.\n\nThe first example that occurs is an extraordinary gift of eloquence.\nA man who has that possession of his means and that magnetism that he\ncan at all times carry the convictions of a public assembly, we must\nrespect, and he is thereby ennobled. He has the freedom of the city. He\nis entitled to neglect trifles. Like a great general, or a great poet,\nor a millionaire, he may wear his coat out at elbows, and his hat on\nhis feet, if he will. He has established relation, representativeness.\nThe best feat of genius is to bring all the varieties of talent and\nculture into its audience; the mediocre and the dull are reached\nas well as the intelligent. I have seen it conspicuously shown in\na village. Here are classes which day by day have no intercourse,\nnothing beyond perhaps a surly nod in passing. But I have seen a\nman of teeming brain come among these men, so full of his facts, so\nunable to suppress them, that he has poured out a river of knowledge\nto all comers, and drawing all these men round him, all sorts of men,\ninterested the whole village, good and bad, bright and stupid, in his\nfacts; the iron boundary lines had all faded away; the stupid had\ndiscovered that they were not stupid; the coldest had found themselves\ndrawn to their neighbors by interest in the same things. This was a\nnaturalist.\n\nThe more familiar examples of this power certainly are those who\nestablish a wider dominion over men\u2019s minds than any speech can; who\nthink, and paint, and laugh, and weep, in their eloquent closets, and\nthen convert the world into a huge whispering gallery, to report the\ntale to all men, and win smiles and tears from many generations. The\neminent examples are Shakspeare, Cervantes, Bunyan, Burns, Scott, and\nnow we must add Dickens. In the fine arts, I find none in the present\nage who have any popular power, who have achieved any nobility by\nennobling the people.\n\n3. Elevation of sentiment, refining and inspiring the manners, must\nreally take the place of every distinction whether of material power\nor of intellectual gifts. The manners of course must have that depth\nand firmness of tone to attest their centrality in the nature of the\nman. I mean the things themselves shall be judges, and determine. In\nthe presence of this nobility even genius must stand aside. For the two\npoles of nature are Beauty and Meanness, and noble sentiment is the\nhighest form of Beauty. He is beautiful in face, in port, in manners,\nwho is absorbed in objects which he truly believes to be superior to\nhimself. Is there any parchment or any cosmetic or any blood that can\nobtain homage like that security of air presupposing so undoubtingly\nthe sympathy of men in his designs? What is it that makes the true\nknight? Loyalty to his thought. That makes the beautiful scorn, the\nelegant simplicity, the directness, the commanding port which all men\nadmire and which men not noble affect. For the thought has no debts,\nno hunger, no lusts, no low obligations or relations, no intrigue or\nbusiness, no murder, no envy, no crime, but large leisures and an\ninviting future.\n\nThe service we receive from the great is a mutual deference. If\nyou deal with the vulgar, life is reduced to beggary indeed. The\nastronomers are very eager to know whether the moon has an atmosphere;\nI am only concerned that every man have one. I observe however that it\ntakes two to make an atmosphere. I am acquainted with persons who go\nattended with this ambient cloud. It is sufficient that they come. It\nis not important what they say. The sun and the evening sky are not\ncalmer. They seem to have arrived at the fact, to have got rid of the\nshow, and to be serene. Their manners and behavior in the house and in\nthe field are those of men at rest: what have they to conceal? what\nhave they to exhibit? Others I meet, who have no deference, and who\ndenude and strip one of all attributes but material values. As much\nhealth and muscle as you have, as much land, as much house-room and\ndinner, avails. Of course a man is a poor bag of bones. There is no\ngracious interval, not an inch allowed. Bone rubs against bone. Life is\nthus a Beggar\u2019s Bush. I know nothing which induces so base and forlorn\na feeling as when we are treated for our utilities, as economists do,\nstarving the imagination and the sentiment. In this impoverishing\nanimation, I seem to meet a Hunger, a wolf. Rather let us be alone\nwhilst we live, than encounter these lean kine. Man should emancipate\nman. He does so, not by jamming him, but by distancing him. The nearer\nmy friend, the more spacious is our realm, the more diameter our\nspheres have. It is a measure of culture, the number of things taken\nfor granted. When a man begins to speak, the churl will take him up by\ndisputing his first words, so he cannot come at his scope. The wise\nman takes all for granted until he sees the parallelism of that which\npuzzled him with his own view.\n\nI will not protract this discourse by describing the duties of the\nbrave and generous. And yet I will venture to name one, and the same\nis almost the sole condition on which knighthood is to be won; this,\nnamely, loyalty to your own order. The true aristocrat is he who is\nat the head of his own order, and disloyalty is to mistake other\nchivalries for his own. Let him not divide his homage, but stand for\nthat which he was born and set to maintain. It was objected to Gustavus\nthat he did not better distinguish between the duties of a carabine and\na general, but exposed himself to all dangers and was too prodigal of a\nblood so precious. For a soul on which elevated duties are laid will so\nrealize its special and lofty duties as not to be in danger of assuming\nthrough a low generosity those which do not belong to it.\n\nThere are all degrees of nobility, but amid the levity and giddiness\nof people one looks round, as for a tower of strength, on some\nself-dependent mind, who does not go abroad for an estimate, and has\nlong ago made up its conclusion that it is impossible to fail. The\ngreat Indian sages had a lesson for the Brahmin, which every day\nreturns to mind, \u201cAll that depends on another gives pain; all that\ndepends on himself gives pleasure; in these few words is the definition\nof pleasure and pain.\u201d The noble mind is here to teach us that failure\nis a part of success. Prosperity and pound-cake are for very young\ngentlemen, whom such things content; but a hero\u2019s, a man\u2019s success\nis made up of failures, because he experiments and ventures every\nday, and \u201cthe more falls he gets, moves faster on;\u201d defeated all the\ntime and yet to victory born. I have heard that in horsemanship he is\nnot the good rider who never was thrown, but rather that a man never\nwill be a good rider until he is thrown; then he will not be haunted\nany longer by the terror that he shall tumble, and will ride;--that\nis his business,--to _ride_, whether with falls or whether with\nnone, to ride unto the place whither he is bound. And I know no such\nunquestionable badge and ensign of a sovereign mind, as that tenacity\nof purpose which, through all change of companions, of parties, of\nfortunes,--changes never, bates no jot of heart or hope, but wearies\nout opposition, and arrives at its port. In his consciousness of\ndeserving success, the caliph Ali constantly neglected the ordinary\nmeans of attaining it; and to the grand interests, a superficial\nsuccess is of no account. It prospers as well in mistake as in luck,\nin obstruction and nonsense, as well as among the angels; it reckons\nfortunes mere paint; difficulty is its delight: perplexity is its\nnoonday: minds that make their way without winds and against tides. But\nthese are rare and difficult examples, we can only indicate them to\nshow how high is the range of the realm of Honor.\n\nI know the feeling of the most ingenious and excellent youth in\nAmerica; I hear the complaint of the aspirant that we have no prizes\noffered to the ambition of virtuous young men; that there is no Theban\nBand; no stern exclusive Legion of Honor, to be entered only by long\nand real service and patient climbing up all the steps. We have a\nrich men\u2019s aristocracy, plenty of bribes for those who like them; but\na grand style of culture, which, without injury, an ardent youth can\npropose to himself as a Pharos through long dark years, does not exist,\nand there is no substitute. The youth, having got through the first\nthickets that oppose his entrance into life, having got into decent\nsociety, is left to himself, and falls abroad with too much freedom.\nBut in the hours of insight we rally against this skepticism. We then\nsee that if the ignorant are around us, the great are much more near;\nthat there is an order of men, never quite absent, who enroll no\nnames in their archives but of such as are capable of truth. They are\ngathered in no one chamber; no chamber would hold them; but, out of the\nvast duration of man\u2019s race, they tower like mountains, and are present\nto every mind in proportion to its likeness to theirs. The solitariest\nman who shares their spirit walks environed by them; they talk to\nhim, they comfort him, and happy is he who prefers these associates to\nprofane companions. They also take shape in men, in women. There is no\nheroic trait, no sentiment or thought that will not sometime embody\nitself in the form of a friend. That highest good of rational existence\nis always coming to such as reject mean alliances.\n\nOne trait more we must celebrate, the self-reliance which is the\npatent of royal natures. It is so prized a jewel that it is sure to\nbe tested. The rules and discipline are ordered for that. The Golden\nTable never lacks members; all its seats are kept full; but with this\nstrange provision, that the members are carefully withdrawn into deep\nniches, so that no one of them can see any other of them, and each\nbelieves himself alone. In the presence of the Chapter it is easy for\neach member to carry himself royally and well; but in the absence of\nhis colleagues and in the presence of mean people he is tempted to\naccept the low customs of towns. The honor of a member consists in\nan indifferency to the persons and practices about him, and in the\npursuing undisturbed the career of a Brother, as if always in their\npresence, and as if no other existed. Give up, once for all, the hope\nof approbation from the people in the street, if you are pursuing great\nends. How can they guess your designs?\n\nAll reference to models, all comparison with neighboring abilities\nand reputations, is the road to mediocrity. The generous soul, on\narriving in a new port, makes instant preparation for a new voyage.\nBy experiment, by original studies, by secret obedience, he has made\na place for himself in the world; stands there a real, substantial,\nunprecedented person, and when the great come by, as always there are\nangels walking in the earth, they know him at sight. Effectual service\nin his own legitimate fashion distinguishes the true man. For he is\nto know that the distinction of a royal nature is a great heart; that\nnot Louis Quatorze, not Chesterfield, nor Byron, nor Bonaparte is the\nmodel of the Century, but, wherever found, the old renown attaches to\nthe virtues of simple faith and staunch endurance and clear perception\nand plain speech, and that there is a master grace and dignity\ncommunicated by exalted sentiments to a human form, to which utility\nand even genius must do homage. And it is the sign and badge of this\nnobility, the drawing his counsel from his own breast. For to every\ngentleman, grave and dangerous duties are proposed. Justice always\nwants champions. The world waits for him as its defender, for he will\nfind in the well-dressed crowd, yes, in the civility of whole nations,\nvulgarity of sentiment. In the best parlors of modern society he\nwill find the laughing devil, the civil sneer; in English palaces the\nLondon twist, derision, coldness, contempt of the masses, contempt of\nIreland, dislike of the Chartist. The English House of Commons is the\nproudest assembly of gentlemen in the world, yet the genius of the\nHouse of Commons, its legitimate expression, is a sneer. In America he\nshall find deprecation of purism on all questions touching the morals\nof trade and of social customs, and the narrowest contraction of ethics\nto the one duty of paying money. Pay that, and you may play the tyrant\nat discretion and never look back to the fatal question,--where had you\nthe money that you paid?\n\nI know the difficulties in the way of the man of honor. The man of\nhonor is a man of taste and humanity. By tendency, like all magnanimous\nmen, he is a democrat. But the revolution comes, and does he join\nthe standard of Chartist and outlaw? No, for these have been dragged\nin their ignorance by furious chiefs to the Red Revolution; they\nare full of murder, and the student recoils,--and joins the rich.\nIf he cannot vote with the poor, he should stay by himself. Let him\naccept the position of armed neutrality, abhorring the crimes of the\nChartist, abhorring the selfishness of the rich, and say, \u2018The time\nwill come when these poor _enfans perdus_ of revolution will have\ninstructed their party, if only by their fate, and wiser counsels will\nprevail; the music and the dance of liberty will come up to bright and\nholy ground and will take me in also. Then I shall not have forfeited\nmy right to speak and act for mankind.\u2019 Meantime shame to the fop of\nlearning and philosophy who suffers a vulgarity of speech and habit\nto blind him to the grosser vulgarity of pitiless selfishness, and to\nhide from him the current of Tendency; who abandons his right position\nof being priest and poet of these impious and unpoetic doers of God\u2019s\nwork. You must, for wisdom, for sanity, have some access to the mind\nand heart of the common humanity. The exclusive excludes himself.\nNo great man has existed who did not rely on the sense and heart of\nmankind as represented by the good sense of the people, as correcting\nthe modes and over-refinements and class-prejudices of the lettered men\nof the world.\n\nThere are certain conditions in the highest degree favorable to the\ntranquillity of spirit and to that magnanimity we so prize. And mainly\nthe habit of considering large interests, and things in masses, and\nnot too much in detail. The habit of directing large affairs generates\na nobility of thought in every mind of average ability. For affairs\nthemselves show the way in which they should be handled; and a good\nhead soon grows wise, and does not govern too much.\n\nNow I believe in the closest affinity between moral and material power.\nVirtue and genius are always on the direct way to the control of the\nsociety in which they are found. It is the interest of society that\ngood men should govern, and there is always a tendency so to place\nthem. But, for the day that now is, a man of generous spirit will not\nneed to administer public offices or to direct large interests of\ntrade, or war, or politics, or manufacture, but he will use a high\nprudence in the conduct of life to guard himself from being dissipated\non many things. There is no need that he should count the pounds of\nproperty or the numbers of agents whom his influence touches; it\nsuffices that his aims are high, that the interest of intellectual and\nmoral beings is paramount with him, that he comes into what is called\nfine society from higher ground, and he has an elevation of habit which\nministers of empires will be forced to see and to remember.\n\nI do not know whether that word Gentleman, although it signifies\na leading idea in recent civilization, is a sufficiently broad\ngeneralization to convey the deep and grave fact of self-reliance. To\nmany the word expresses only the outsides of cultivated men,--only\ngraceful manners, and independence in trifles; but the fountains of\nthat thought are in the deeps of man, a beauty which reaches through\nand through, from the manners to the soul; an honor which is only\na name for sanctity, a self-trust which is a trust in God himself.\nCall it man of honor, or call it Man, the American who would serve\nhis country must learn the beauty and honor of perseverance, he must\nreinforce himself by the power of character, and revisit the margin of\nthat well from which his fathers drew waters of life and enthusiasm,\nthe fountain I mean of the moral sentiments, the parent fountain from\nwhich this goodly Universe flows as a wave.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 4: First read as a lecture--in England--in 1848; here printed\nwith additions from other papers.]\n\n\n\n\n                           PERPETUAL FORCES.\n\n    MORE servants wait on man\n    Than he\u2019ll take notice of.\n\n\n    EVER the Rock of Ages melts\n      Into the mineral air\n    To be the quarry whence is built\n      Thought and its mansions fair.\n\n\n\n\n                         PERPETUAL FORCES.[5]\n\n\nTHE hero in the fairy tales has a servant who can eat granite rocks,\nanother who can hear the grass grow, and a third who can run a hundred\nleagues in half an hour; so man in nature is surrounded by a gang of\nfriendly giants who can accept harder stints than these, and help him\nin every kind. Each by itself has a certain omnipotence, but all, like\ncontending kings and emperors, in the presence of each other, are\nantagonized and kept polite and own the balance of power.\n\nWe cannot afford to miss any advantage. Never was any man too strong\nfor his proper work. Art is long, and life short, and he must supply\nthis disproportion by borrowing and applying to his task the energies\nof Nature. Reinforce his self-respect, show him his means, his arsenal\nof forces, physical, metaphysical, immortal. Show him the riches of\nthe poor, show him what mighty allies and helpers he has. And though\nKing David had no good from making his census out of vain-glory, yet I\nfind it wholesome and invigorating to enumerate the resources we can\ncommand, to look a little into this arsenal, and see how many rounds\nof ammunition, what muskets and how many arms better than Springfield\nmuskets we can bring to bear.\n\nGo out of doors and get the air. Ah, if you knew what was in the air.\nSee what your robust neighbor, who never feared to live in it, has got\nfrom it; strength, cheerfulness, power to convince, heartiness and\nequality to each event.\n\nAll the earths are burnt metals. One half the avoirdupois of the\nrocks which compose the solid crust of the globe consists of oxygen.\nThe adamant is always passing into smoke; the marble column, the\nbrazen statue burn under the daylight, and would soon decompose if\ntheir molecular structure, disturbed by the raging sunlight, were not\nrestored by the darkness of the night. What agencies of electricity,\ngravity, light, affinity combine to make every plant what it is, and in\na manner so quiet that the presence of these tremendous powers is not\nordinarily suspected. Faraday said, \u201cA grain of water is known to have\nelectric relations equivalent to a very powerful flash of lightning.\u201d\nThe ripe fruit is dropped at last without violence, but the lightning\nfell and the storm raged and strata were deposited and uptorn and bent\nback, and Chaos moved from beneath, to create and flavor the fruit on\nyour table to-day. The winds and the rains come back a thousand and a\nthousand times. The coal on your grate gives out in decomposing to-day\nexactly the same amount of light and heat which was taken from the\nsunshine in its formation in the leaves and boughs of the antediluvian\ntree.\n\nTake up a spadeful or a buck-load of loam; who can guess what it holds?\nBut a gardener knows that it is full of peaches, full of oranges,\nand he drops in a few seeds by way of keys to unlock and combine its\nvirtues; lets it lie in sun and rain, and by and by it has lifted into\nthe air its full weight in golden fruit.\n\nThe earliest hymns of the world were hymns to these natural forces.\nThe Vedas of India, which have a date older than Homer, are hymns\nto the winds, to the clouds, and to fire. They all have certain\nproperties which adhere to them, such as conservation, persisting to be\nthemselves, impossibility of being warped. The sun has lost no beams,\nthe earth no elements; gravity is as adhesive, heat as expansive, light\nas joyful, air as virtuous, water as medicinal as on the first day.\nThere is no loss, only transference. When the heat is less here it is\nnot lost, but more heat is there. When the rain exceeds on the coast,\nthere is drought on the prairie. When the continent sinks, the opposite\ncontinent, that is to say, the opposite shore of the ocean, rises.\nWhen life is less here, it spawns there.\n\nThese forces are in an ascending series, but seem to leave no room for\nthe individual; man or atom, he only shares them; he sails the way\nthese irresistible winds blow. But behind all these are finer elements,\nthe sources of them, and much more rapid and strong; a new style and\nseries, the spiritual. Intellect and morals appear only the material\nforces on a higher plane. The laws of material nature run up into the\ninvisible world of the mind, and hereby we acquire a key to those\nsublimities which skulk and hide in the caverns of human consciousness.\nAnd in the impenetrable mystery which hides--and hides through absolute\ntransparency--the mental nature, I await the insight which our\nadvancing knowledge of material laws shall furnish.\n\nBut the laws of force apply to every form of it. The husbandry\nlearned in the economy of heat or light or steam or muscular fibre\napplies precisely to the use of wit. What I have said of the\ninexorable persistence of every elemental force to remain itself,\nthe impossibility of tampering with it or warping it,--the same\nrule applies again strictly to this force of intellect; that it is\nperception, a seeing, not making, thoughts. The man must bend to the\nlaw, never the law to him.\n\nThe brain of man has methods and arrangements corresponding to these\nmaterial powers, by which he can use them. See how trivial is the use\nof the world by any other of its creatures. Whilst these forces act on\nus from the outside and we are not in their counsel, we call them Fate.\nThe animal instincts guide the animal as gravity governs the stone,\nand in man that bias or direction of his constitution is often as\ntyrannical as gravity. We call it temperament, and it seems to be the\nremains of wolf, ape, and rattlesnake in him. While the reason is yet\ndormant, this rules; as the reflective faculties open, this subsides.\nWe come to reason and knowledge; we see the causes of evils and learn\nto parry them and use them as instruments, by knowledge, being inside\nof them and dealing with them as the Creator does. It is curious to\nsee how a creature so feeble and vulnerable as a man, who, unarmed, is\nno match for the wild beasts, tiger, or crocodile, none for the frost,\nnone for the sea, none for a fog, or a damp air, or the feeble fork\nof a poor worm,--each of a thousand petty accidents puts him to death\nevery day,--is yet able to subdue to his will these terrific forces,\nand more than these. His whole frame is responsive to the world, part\nfor part, every sense, every pore to a new element, so that he seems\nto have as many talents as there are qualities in nature. No force but\nis his force. He does not possess them, he is a pipe through which\ntheir currents flow. If a straw be held still in the direction of the\nocean-current, the sea will pour through it as through Gibraltar. If\nhe should measure strength with them, if he should fight the sea and\nthe whirlwind with his ship, he would snap his spars, tear his sails,\nand swamp his bark; but by cunningly dividing the force, tapping the\ntempest for a little side-wind, he uses the monsters, and they carry\nhim where he would go. Look at him; you can give no guess at what\npower is in him. It never appears directly, but follow him and see his\neffects, see his productions. He is a planter, a miner, a shipbuilder,\na machinist, a musician, a steam-engine, a geometer, an astronomer, a\npersuader of men, a lawgiver, a builder of towns;--and each of these by\ndint of a wonderful method or series that resides in him and enables\nhim to work on the material elements.\n\nWe are surrounded by human thought and labor. Where are the farmer\u2019s\ndays gone? See, they are hid in that stone-wall, in that excavated\ntrench, in the harvest grown on what was shingle and pine-barren.\nHe put his days into carting from the distant swamp the mountain\nof muck which has been trundled about until it now makes the cover\nof fruitful soil. Labor hides itself in every mode and form. It is\nmassed and blocked away in that stone house, for five hundred years.\nIt is twisted and screwed into fragrant hay which fills the barn.\nIt surprises in the perfect form and condition of trees clean of\ncaterpillars and borers, rightly pruned, and loaded with grafted fruit.\nIt is under the house in the well; it is over the house in slates and\ncopper and water-spout; it grows in the corn; it delights us in the\nflower-bed; it keeps the cow out of the garden, the rain out of the\nlibrary, the miasma out of the town. It is in dress, in pictures, in\nships, in cannon; in every spectacle, in odors, in flavors, in sweet\nsounds, in works of safety, of delight, of wrath, of science.\n\nThe thoughts, no man ever saw, but disorder becomes order where he\ngoes; weakness becomes power; surprising and admirable effects follow\nhim like a creator. All forces are his; as the wise merchant by truth\nin his dealings finds his credit unlimited,--he can use in turn, as he\nwants it, all the property in the world,--so a man draws on all the\nair for his occasions, as if there were no other breather; on all the\nwater as if there were no other sailor; he is warmed by the sun, and\nso of every element; he walks and works by the aid of gravitation; he\ndraws on all knowledge as his province, on all beauty for his innocent\ndelight, and first or last he exhausts by his use all the harvests, all\nthe powers of the world. For man, the receiver of all, and depositary\nof these volumes of power, I am to say that his ability and performance\nare according to his reception of these various streams of force.\nWe define Genius to be a sensibility to all the impressions of the\nouter world, a sensibility so equal that it receives accurately all\nimpressions, and can truly report them without excess or loss as it\nreceived. It must not only receive all, but it must render all. And the\nhealth of man is an equality of inlet and outlet, gathering and giving.\nAny hoarding is tumor and disease.\n\nIf we were truly to take account of stock before the last Court of\nAppeals,--that were an inventory! What are my resources? \u201cOur stock\nin life, our real estate, is that amount of thought which we have\nhad,\u201d--and which we have applied, and so domesticated. The ground we\nhave thus created is forever a fund for new thoughts. A few moral\nmaxims confirmed by much experience would stand high on the list,\nconstituting a supreme prudence. Then the knowledge unutterable of our\nprivate strength, of where it lies, of its accesses and facilitations,\nand of its obstructions. My conviction of principles, that is great\npart of my possessions. Certain thoughts, certain observations, long\nfamiliar to me in night-watches and daylights, would be my capital\nif I removed to Spain or China, or, by stranger translation, to the\nplanet Jupiter or Mars, or to new spiritual societies. Every valuable\nperson who joins in an enterprise,--is it a piece of industry, or the\nfounding of a colony or a college, the reform of some public abuse, or\nsome effort of patriotism,--what he chiefly brings, all he brings, is\nnot his land or his money or body\u2019s strength, but his thoughts, his way\nof classifying and seeing things, his method. And thus with every one a\nnew power. In proportion to the depth of the insight is the power and\nreach of the kingdom he controls.\n\nIt would be easy to awake wonder by sketching the performance of each\nof these mental forces; as of the diving-bell of the Memory, which\ndescends into the deeps of our past and oldest experience and brings\nup every lost jewel; or of the Fancy, which sends its gay balloon\naloft into the sky to catch every tint and gleam of romance; of the\nImagination, which turns every dull fact into pictures and poetry, by\nmaking it an emblem of thought. What a power, when, combined with the\nanalyzing understanding, it makes Eloquence; the art of compelling\nbelief, the art of making peoples\u2019 hearts dance to his pipe! And not\nless, method, patience, self-trust, perseverance, love, desire of\nknowledge, the passion for truth. These are the angels that take us\nby the hand, these our immortal, invulnerable guardians. By their\nstrength we are strong, and on the signal occasions in our career\ntheir inspirations flow to us and make the selfish and protected and\ntenderly-bred person strong for his duty, wise in counsel, skilful in\naction, competent to rule, willing to obey.\n\nI delight in tracing these wonderful powers, the electricity and\ngravity of the human world. The power of persistence, of enduring\ndefeat and of gaining victory by defeats, is one of these forces\nwhich never loses its charm. The power of a man increases steadily\nby continuance in one direction. He becomes acquainted with the\nresistances, and with his own tools; increases his skill and strength\nand learns the favorable moments and favorable accidents. He is his\nown apprentice, and more time gives a great addition of power, just\nas a falling body acquires momentum with every foot of the fall.\nHow we prize a good continuer! I knew a manufacturer who found his\nproperty invested in chemical works which were depreciating in value.\nHe undertook the charge of them himself, began at the beginning,\nlearned chemistry and acquainted himself with all the conditions of\nthe manufacture. His friends dissuaded him, advised him to give up the\nwork, which was not suited to the country. Why throw good money after\nbad? But he persisted, and after many years succeeded in his production\nof the right article for commerce, brought up the stock of his mills\nto par, and then sold out his interest, having accomplished the reform\nthat was required.\n\nIn each the talent is the perception of an order and series in the\ndepartment he deals with,--of an order and series which pre-existed in\nnature, and which this mind sees and conforms to. The geometer shows us\nthe true order in figures; the painter in laws of color; the dancer in\ngrace. Bonaparte, with his celerity of combination, mute, unfathomable,\nreads the geography of Europe as if his eyes were telescopes; his will\nis an immense battery discharging irresistible volleys of power always\nat the right point in the right time.\n\nThere was a story in the journals of a poor prisoner in a Western\npolice-court who was told he might be released if he would pay his\nfine. He had no money, he had no friends, but he took his flute out of\nhis pocket and began to play, to the surprise, and, as it proved, to\nthe delight of all the company; the jurors waked up, the sheriff forgot\nhis duty, the judge himself beat time, and the prisoner was by general\nconsent of court and officers allowed to go his way without any money.\nAnd I suppose, if he could have played loud enough, we here should have\nbeat time, and the whole population of the globe would beat time, and\nconsent that he should go without his fine.\n\nI knew a stupid young farmer, churlish, living only for his gains, and\nwith whom the only intercourse you could have was to buy what he had\nto sell. One day I found his little boy of four years dragging about\nafter him the prettiest little wooden cart, so neatly built, and with\ndecorations too, and learned that Papa had made it; that hidden deep\nin that thick skull was this gentle art and taste which the little\nfingers and caresses of his son had the power to draw out into day;\nhe was no peasant after all. So near to us is the flowering of Fine\nArt in the rudest population. See in a circle of school-girls one with\nno beauty, no special vivacity,--but she can so recite her adventures\nthat she is never alone, but at night or at morning wherever she sits\nthe inevitable circle gathers around her, willing prisoners of that\nwonderful memory and fancy and spirit of life. Would you know where\nto find her? Listen for the laughter, follow the cheerful hum, see\nwhere is the rapt attention, and a pretty crowd all bright with one\nelectricity; there in the centre of fellowship and joy is Scheherazade\nagain.\n\nSee how rich life is; rich in private talents, each of which charms us\nin turn and seems the best. If we hear music we give up all to that; if\nwe fall in with a cricket-club and see the game masterly played, the\nbest player is the first of men; if we go to the regatta, we forget\nthe bowler for the stroke oar; and when the soldier comes home from\nthe fight, he fills all eyes. But the soldier has the same admiration\nof the great parliamentary debater. And poetry and literature are\ndisdainful of all these claims beside their own. Like the boy who\nthought in turn each one of the four seasons the best, and each of\nthe three hundred and sixty-five days in the year the crowner. The\nsensibility is all.\n\nEvery one knows what are the effects of music to put people in gay or\nmournful or martial mood. But these are the effects on dull subjects,\nand only the hint of its power on a keener sense. It is a stroke on a\nloose or tense cord. The story of Orpheus, of Arion, of the Arabian\nminstrel, are not fables, but experiments on the same iron at white\nheat.\n\nBy this wondrous susceptibility to all the impressions of Nature the\nman finds himself the receptacle of celestial thoughts, of happy\nrelations to all men. The imagination enriches him, as if there were\nno other; the memory opens all her cabinets and archives; Science\nher length and breadth, Poetry her splendor and joy and the august\ncircles of eternal law. These are means and stairs for new ascensions\nof the mind. But they are nowise impoverished for any other mind,\nnot tarnished, not breathed upon; for the mighty Intellect did not\nstoop to him and become property, but he rose to it and followed its\ncircuits. \u201cIt is ours while we use it, it is not ours when we do not\nuse it.\u201d\n\nAnd so, one step higher, when he comes into the realm of sentiment\nand will. He sees the grandeur of justice, the victory of love, the\neternity that belongs to all moral nature. He does not then invent his\nsentiment or his act, but obeys a pre-existing right which he sees. We\narrive at virtue by taking its direction instead of imposing ours.\n\nThe last revelation of intellect and of sentiment is that in a manner\nit severs the man from all other men; makes known to him that the\nspiritual powers are sufficient to him if no other being existed; that\nhe is to deal absolutely in the world, as if he alone were a system and\na state, and though all should perish could make all anew.\n\nThe forces are infinite. Every one has the might of all, for the secret\nof the world is that its energies are _solidaires_; that they work\ntogether on a system of mutual aid, all for each and each for all; that\nthe strain made on one point bears on every arch and foundation of the\nstructure. But if you wish to avail yourself of their might, and in\nlike manner if you wish the force of the intellect, the force of the\nwill, you must take their divine direction, not they yours. Obedience\nalone gives the right to command. It is like the village operator\nwho taps the telegraph-wire and surprises the secrets of empires as\nthey pass to the capital. So this child of the dust throws himself\nby obedience into the circuit of the heavenly wisdom, and shares the\nsecret of God.\n\nThus is the world delivered into your hand, but on two conditions,--not\nfor property, but for use, use according to the noble nature of the\ngifts; and not for toys, not for self-indulgence. Things work to their\nends, not to yours, and will certainly defeat any adventurer who fights\nagainst this ordination.\n\nThe effort of men is to use them for private ends. They wish to\npocket land and water and fire and air and all fruits of these, for\nproperty, and would like to have Aladdin\u2019s lamp to compel darkness,\nand iron-bound doors, and hostile armies, and lions and serpents to\nserve them like footmen. And they wish the same service from the\nspiritual faculties. A man has a rare mathematical talent, inviting\nhim to the beautiful secrets of geometry, and wishes to clap a patent\non it; or has the fancy and invention of a poet, and says, \u2018I will\nwrite a play that shall be repeated in London a hundred nights;\u2019 or a\nmilitary genius, and instead of using that to defend his country, he\nsays, \u2018I will fight the battle so as to give me place and political\nconsideration;\u2019 or Canning or Thurlow has a genius of debate, and\nsays, \u2018I will know how with this weapon to defend the cause that\nwill pay best and make me Chancellor or Foreign Secretary.\u2019 But this\nperversion is punished with instant loss of true wisdom and real power.\n\nI find the survey of these cosmical powers a doctrine of consolation\nin the dark hours of private or public fortune. It shows us the world\nalive, guided, incorruptible; that its cannon cannot be stolen nor its\nvirtues misapplied. It shows us the long Providence, the safeguards\nof rectitude. It animates exertion; it warns us out of that despair\ninto which Saxon men are prone to fall,--out of an idolatry of forms,\ninstead of working to simple ends, in the belief that Heaven always\nsuccors us in working for these. This world belongs to the energetical.\nIt is a fagot of laws, and a true analysis of these laws, showing how\nimmortal and how self-protecting they are, would be a wholesome lesson\nfor every time and for this time. That band which ties them together\nis unity, is universal good, saturating all with one being and aim,\nso that each translates the other, is only the same spirit applied to\nnew departments. Things are saturated with the moral law. There is no\nescape from it. Violets and grass preach it; rain and snow, wind and\ntides, every change, every cause in Nature is nothing but a disguised\nmissionary.\n\nAll our political disasters grow as logically out of our attempts in\nthe past to do without justice, as the sinking of some part of your\nhouse comes of defect in the foundation. One thing is plain; a certain\npersonal virtue is essential to freedom; and it begins to be doubtful\nwhether our corruption in this country has not gone a little over the\nmark of safety, so that when canvassed we shall be found to be made up\nof a majority of reckless self-seekers. The divine knowledge has ebbed\nout of us and we do not know enough to be free.\n\nI hope better of the state. Half a man\u2019s wisdom goes with his courage.\nA boy who knows that a bully lives round the corner which he must\npass on his daily way to school, is apt to take sinister views of\nstreets and of school-education. And a sensitive politician suffers\nhis ideas of the part New York or Pennsylvania or Ohio are to play in\nthe future of the Union, to be fashioned by the election of rogues in\nsome counties. But we must not gratify the rogues so deeply. There is a\nspeedy limit to profligate politics.\n\nFear disenchants life and the world. If I have not my own respect I am\nan impostor, not entitled to other men\u2019s, and had better creep into\nmy grave. I admire the sentiment of Thoreau, who said, \u201cNothing is so\nmuch to be feared as fear; God himself likes atheism better.\u201d For the\nworld is a battle-ground; every principle is a war-note, and the most\nquiet and protected life is at any moment exposed to incidents which\ntest your firmness. The illusion that strikes me as the masterpiece in\nthat ring of illusions which our life is, is the timidity with which\nwe assert our moral sentiment. We are made of it, the world is built\nby it, things endure as they share it; all beauty, all health, all\nintelligence exist by it; yet we shrink to speak of it or to range\nourselves by its side. Nay, we presume strength of him or them who\ndeny it. Cities go against it; the college goes against it, the courts\nsnatch at any precedent, at any vicious form of law to rule it out;\nlegislatures listen with appetite to declamations against it, and vote\nit down. Every new asserter of the right surprises us, like a man\njoining the church, and we hardly dare believe he is in earnest.\n\nWhat we do and suffer is in moments, but the cause of right for which\nwe labor never dies, works in long periods, can afford many checks,\ngains by our defeats, and will know how to compensate our extremest\nsacrifice. Wrath and petulance may have their short success, but they\nquickly reach their brief date and decompose, whilst the massive might\nof ideas is irresistible at last. Whence does the knowledge come?\nWhere is the source of power? The soul of God is poured into the world\nthrough the thoughts of men. The world stands on ideas, and not on\niron or cotton; and the iron of iron, the fire of fire, the ether and\nsource of all the elements is moral force. As cloud on cloud, as snow\non snow, as the bird on the air, and the planet on space in its flight,\nso do nations of men and their institutions rest on thoughts.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 5: Reprinted from the _North American Review_, No. 125,\n1877.]\n\n\n\n\n                              CHARACTER.\n\n      SHUN passion, fold the hands of thrift,\n      Sit still, and Truth is near;\n      Suddenly it will uplift\n      Your eyelids to the sphere:\n    Wait a little, you shall see\n    The portraiture of things to be.\n\n\n    FOR what need I of book or priest\n    Or Sibyl from the mummied East\n    When every star is Bethlehem Star,--\n    I count as many as there are\n    Cinquefoils or violets in the grass,\n      So many saints and saviours,\n      So many high behaviours.\n\n\n\n\n                             CHARACTER.[6]\n\n\nMORALS respects what men call goodness, that which all men agree to\nhonor as justice, truth-speaking, good-will and good works. Morals\nrespects the source or motive of this action. It is the science\nof substances, not of shows. It is the _what_, and not the\n_how_. It is that which all men profess to regard, and by their\nreal respect for which recommend themselves to each other.\n\nThere is this eternal advantage to morals, that, in the question\nbetween truth and goodness, the moral cause of the world lies behind\nall else in the mind. It was for good, it is to good, that all works.\nSurely it is not to prove or show the truth of things,--that sounds a\nlittle cold and scholastic,--no, it is for benefit, that all subsists.\nAs we say in our modern politics, catching at last the language of\nmorals, that the object of the State is the greatest good of the\ngreatest number,--so, the reason we must give for the existence of the\nworld is, that it is for the benefit of all being.\n\nMorals implies freedom and will. The will constitutes the man. He has\nhis life in Nature, like a beast: but choice is born in him; here is he\nthat chooses; here is the Declaration of Independence, the July Fourth\nof zo\u00f6logy and astronomy. He chooses,--as the rest of the creation does\nnot. But will, pure and perceiving, is not wilfulness. When a man,\nthrough stubbornness, insists to do this or that, something absurd or\nwhimsical, only because he will, he is weak; he blows with his lips\nagainst the tempest, he dams the incoming ocean with his cane. It were\nan unspeakable calamity if any one should think he had the right to\nimpose a private will on others. That is the part of a striker, an\nassassin. All violence, all that is dreary and repels, is not power but\nthe absence of power.\n\nMorals is the direction of the will on universal ends. He is immoral\nwho is acting to any private end. He is moral,--we say it with Marcus\nAurelius and with Kant,--whose aim or motive may become a universal\nrule, binding on all intelligent beings; and with Vauvenargues, \u201cthe\nmercenary sacrifice of the public good to a private interest is the\neternal stamp of vice.\u201d\n\nAll the virtues are special directions of this motive; justice is the\napplication of this good of the whole to the affairs of each one;\ncourage is contempt of danger in the determination to see this good of\nthe whole enacted; love is delight in the preference of that benefit\nredounding to another over the securing of our own share; humility is\na sentiment of our insignificance when the benefit of the universe is\nconsidered.\n\nIf from these external statements we seek to come a little nearer\nto the fact, our first experiences in moral as in intellectual\nnature force us to discriminate a universal mind, identical in all\nmen. Certain biases, talents, executive skills, are special to each\nindividual; but the high, contemplative, all-commanding vision,\nthe sense of Right and Wrong, is alike in all. Its attributes are\nself-existence, eternity, intuition and command. It is the mind of the\nmind. We belong to it, not it to us. It is in all men, and constitutes\nthem men. In bad men it is dormant, as health is in men entranced or\ndrunken; but, however inoperative, it exists underneath whatever vices\nand errors. The extreme simplicity of this intuition embarrasses every\nattempt at analysis. We can only mark, one by one, the perfections\nwhich it combines in every act. It admits of no appeal, looks to no\nsuperior essence. It is the reason of things.\n\nThe antagonist nature is the individual, formed into a finite body of\nexact dimensions, with appetites which take from everybody else what\nthey appropriate to themselves, and would enlist the entire spiritual\nfaculty of the individual, if it were possible, in catering for them.\nOn the perpetual conflict between the dictate of this universal mind\nand the wishes and interests of the individual, the moral discipline\nof life is built. The one craves a private benefit, which the other\nrequires him to renounce out of respect to the absolute good. Every\nhour puts the individual in a position where his wishes aim at\nsomething which the sentiment of duty forbids him to seek. He that\nspeaks the truth executes no private function of an individual will,\nbut the world utters a sound by his lips. He who doth a just action\nseeth therein nothing of his own, but an inconceivable nobleness\nattaches to it, because it is a dictate of the general mind. We have\nno idea of power so simple and so entire as this. It is the basis of\nthought, it is the basis of being. Compare all that we call ourselves,\nall our private and personal venture in the world, with this deep\nof moral nature in which we lie, and our private good becomes an\nimpertinence, and we take part with hasty shame against ourselves:--\n\n      \u201cHigh instincts, before which our mortal nature\n    Doth tremble like a guilty thing surprised,--\n    Which, be they what they may,\n    Are yet the fountain-light of all our day,\n    Are yet the master-light of all our seeing,--\n    Uphold us, cherish, and have power to make\n    Our noisy years seem moments in the being\n    Of the eternal silence,--truths that wake\n    To perish never.\u201d\n\nThe moral element invites man to great enlargements, to find his\nsatisfaction, not in particulars or events, but in the purpose and\ntendency; not in bread, but in his right to his bread; not in much corn\nor wool, but in its communication.\n\nNot by adding, then, does the moral sentiment help us; no, but in quite\nanother manner. It puts us in place. It centres, it concentrates us.\nIt puts us at the heart of Nature, where we belong, in the cabinet of\nscience and of causes, there where all the wires terminate which hold\nthe world in magnetic unity, and so converts us into universal beings.\n\nThis wonderful sentiment, which endears itself as it is obeyed, seems\nto be the fountain of intellect; for no talent gives the impression of\nsanity, if wanting this; nay, it absorbs everything into itself. Truth,\nPower, Goodness, Beauty, are its varied names,--faces of one substance,\nthe heart of all. Before it, what are persons, prophets, or seraphim\nbut its passing agents, momentary rays of its light?\n\nThe moral sentiment is alone omnipotent. There is no labor or sacrifice\nto which it will not bring a man, and which it will not make easy. Thus\nthere is no man who will bargain to sell his life, say at the end of a\nyear, for a million or ten millions of gold dollars in hand, or for any\ntemporary pleasures, or for any rank, as of peer or prince; but many a\nman who does not hesitate to lay down his life for the sake of a truth,\nor in the cause of his country, or to save his son or his friend. And\nunder the action of this sentiment of the Right, his heart and mind\nexpand above himself, and above Nature.\n\n    Though Love repine, and Reason chafe,\n      There came a voice without reply,--\n    \u201c\u2019Tis man\u2019s perdition to be safe,\n      When for the truth he ought to die.\u201d\n\nSuch is the difference of the action of the heart within and of the\nsenses without. One is enthusiasm, and the other more or less amounts\nof horsepower.\n\nDevout men, in the endeavor to express their convictions, have used\ndifferent images to suggest this latent force; as, the light, the seed,\nthe Spirit, the Holy Ghost, the Comforter, the D\u00e6mon, the still, small\nvoice, etc.,--all indicating its power and its latency. It is serenely\nabove all mediation. In all ages, to all men, it saith, _I am_;\nand he who hears it feels the impiety of wandering from this revelation\nto any record or to any rival. The poor Jews of the wilderness cried:\n\u201cLet not the Lord speak to us; let Moses speak to us.\u201d But the simple\nand sincere soul makes the contrary prayer: \u2018Let no intruder come\nbetween thee and me; deal THOU with me; let me know it is\nthy will, and I ask no more.\u2019 The excellence of Jesus, and of every\ntrue teacher, is, that he affirms the Divinity in him and in us,--not\nthrusts himself between it and us. It would instantly indispose us to\nany person claiming to speak for the Author of Nature, the setting\nforth any fact or law which we did not find in our consciousness. We\nshould say with Heraclitus: \u201cCome into this smoky cabin; God is here\nalso: approve yourself to him.\u201d\n\nWe affirm that in all men is this majestic perception and command;\nthat it is the presence of the Eternal in each perishing man;\nthat it distances and degrades all statements of whatever saints,\nheroes, poets, as obscure and confused stammerings before its silent\nrevelation. _They_ report the truth. _It_ is the truth.\nWhen I think of Reason, of Truth, of Virtue, I cannot conceive them\nas lodged in your soul and lodged in my soul, but that you and I\nand all souls are lodged in that; and I may easily speak of that\nadorable nature, there where only I behold it in my dim experiences,\nin such terms as shall seem to the frivolous, who dare not fathom\ntheir consciousness, as profane. How is a man a man? How can he exist\nto weave relations of joy and virtue with other souls, but because\nhe is inviolable, anchored at the centre of Truth and Being? In the\never-returning hour of reflection, he says: \u2018I stand here glad at heart\nof all the sympathies I can awaken and share, clothing myself with them\nas with a garment of shelter and beauty, and yet knowing that it is not\nin the power of all who surround me to take from me the smallest thread\nI call mine. If all things are taken away, I have still all things in\nmy relation to the Eternal.\u2019\n\nWe pretend not to define the way of its access to the private heart.\nIt passes understanding. There was a time when Christianity existed in\none child. But if the child had been killed by Herod, would the element\nhave been lost? God sends his message, if not by one, then quite as\nwell by another. When the Master of the Universe has ends to fulfill,\nhe impresses his will on the structure of minds.\n\nThe Divine Mind imparts itself to the single person: his whole duty is\nto this rule and teaching. The aid which others give us is like that\nof the mother to the child,--temporary, gestative, a short period of\nlactation, a nurse\u2019s or a governess\u2019s care; but on his arrival at a\ncertain maturity, it ceases, and would be hurtful and ridiculous if\nprolonged. Slowly the body comes to the use of its organs; slowly the\nsoul unfolds itself in the new man. It is partial at first, and honors\nonly some one or some few truths. In its companions it sees other\ntruths honored, and successively finds their foundation also in itself.\nThen it cuts the cord, and no longer believes \u201cbecause of thy saying,\u201d\nbut because it has recognized them in itself.\n\nThe Divine Mind imparts itself to the single person: but it is also\ntrue that men act powerfully on us. There are men who astonish and\ndelight, men who instruct and guide. Some men\u2019s words I remember so\nwell that I must often use them to express my thought. Yes, because\nI perceive that we have heard the same truth, but they have heard it\nbetter. That is only to say, there is degree and gradation throughout\nNature; and the Deity does not break his firm laws in respect to\nimparting truth, more than in imparting material heat and light. Men\nappear from time to time who receive with more purity and fulness\nthese high communications. But it is only as fast as this hearing from\nanother is authorized by its consent with his own, that it is pure and\nsafe to each; and all receiving from abroad must be controlled by this\nimmense reservation.\n\nIt happens now and then, in the ages, that a soul is born which has\nno weakness of self, which offers no impediment to the Divine Spirit,\nwhich comes down into Nature as if only for the benefit of souls, and\nall its thoughts are perceptions of things as they are, without any\ninfirmity of earth. Such souls are as the apparition of gods among men,\nand simply by their presence pass judgment on them. Men are forced\nby their own self-respect to give them a certain attention. Evil men\nshrink and pay involuntary homage by hiding or apologizing for their\naction.\n\nWhen a man is born with a profound moral sentiment, preferring truth,\njustice and the serving of all men to any honors or any gain, men\nreadily feel the superiority. They who deal with him are elevated\nwith joy and hope; he lights up the house or the landscape in which\nhe stands. His actions are poetic and miraculous in their eyes. In\nhis presence, or within his influence, every one believes in the\nimmortality of the soul. They feel that the invisible world sympathizes\nwith him. The Arabians delight in expressing the sympathy of the unseen\nworld with holy men.\n\n    When Omar prayed and loved,\n      Where Syrian waters roll,\n    Aloft the ninth heaven glowed and moved\n      To the tread of the jubilant soul.\n\nA chief event of life is the day in which we have encountered a\nmind that startled us by its large scope. I am in the habit of\nthinking,--not, I hope, out of a partial experience, but confirmed by\nwhat I notice in many lives,--that to every serious mind Providence\nsends from time to time five or six or seven teachers who are of the\nfirst importance to him in the lessons they have to impart. The highest\nof these not so much give particular knowledge, as they elevate by\nsentiment and by their habitual grandeur of view.\n\nGreat men serve us as insurrections do in bad governments. The world\nwould run into endless routine, and forms incrust forms, till the life\nwas gone. But the perpetual supply of new genius shocks us with thrills\nof life, and recalls us to principles. Lucifer\u2019s wager in the old drama\nwas, \u201cThere is no steadfast man on earth.\u201d He is very rare. \u201cA man\nis already of consequence in the world when it is known that we can\nimplicitly rely on him.\u201d See how one noble person dwarfs a whole nation\nof underlings. This steadfastness we indicate when we praise character.\n\nCharacter denotes habitual self-possession, habitual regard to interior\nand constitutional motives, a balance not to be overset or easily\ndisturbed by outward events and opinion, and by implication points to\nthe source of right motive. We sometimes employ the word to express the\nstrong and consistent will of men of mixed motive, but, when used with\nemphasis, it points to what no events can change, that is, a will built\non the reason of things. Such souls do not come in troops: oftenest\nappear solitary, like a general without his command, because those who\ncan understand and uphold such appear rarely, not many, perhaps not\none, in a generation. And the memory and tradition of such a leader is\npreserved in some strange way by those who only half understand him,\nuntil a true disciple comes, who apprehends and interprets every word.\n\nThe sentiment never stops in pure vision, but will be enacted. It\naffirms not only its truth, but its supremacy. It is not only insight,\nas science, as fancy, as imagination is; or an entertainment, as\nfriendship and poetry are; but it is a sovereign rule: and the acts\nwhich it suggests--as when it impels a man to go forth and impart\nit to other men, or sets him on some asceticism or some practice of\nself-examination to hold him to obedience, or some zeal to unite men\nto abate some nuisance, or establish some reform or charity which it\ncommands--are the homage we render to this sentiment, as compared with\nthe lower regard we pay to other thoughts: and the private or social\npractices we establish in its honor we call religion.\n\nThe sentiment, of course, is the judge and measure of every expression\nof it,--measures Judaism, Stoicism, Christianity, Buddhism, or whatever\nphilanthropy, or politics, or saint, or seer pretends to speak in its\nname. The religions we call false were once true. They also were\naffirmations of the conscience correcting the evil customs of their\ntimes. The populace drag down the gods to their own level, and give\nthem their egotism; whilst in Nature is none at all, God keeping out\nof sight, and known only as pure law, though resistless. Ch\u00e2teaubriand\nsaid, with some irreverence of phrase, If God made man in his image,\nman has paid him well back. \u201c_Si Dieu a fait l\u2019homme \u00e0 son image,\nl\u2019homme l\u2019a bien rendu._\u201d Every nation is degraded by the goblins it\nworships instead of this Deity. The Dionysia and Saturnalia of Greece\nand Rome, the human sacrifice of the Druids, the Sradda of Hindoos,\nthe Purgatory, the Indulgences, and the Inquisition of Popery, the\nvindictive mythology of Calvinism, are examples of this perversion.\n\nEvery particular instruction is speedily embodied in a ritual, is\naccommodated to humble and gross minds, and corrupted. The moral\nsentiment is the perpetual critic on these forms, thundering its\nprotest, sometimes in earnest and lofty rebuke; but sometimes also it\nis the source, in natures less pure, of sneers and flippant jokes of\ncommon people, who feel that the forms and dogmas are not true for\nthem, though they do not see where the error lies.\n\nThe religion of one age is the literary entertainment of the next.\nWe use in our idlest poetry and discourse the words Jove, Neptune,\nMercury, as mere colors, and can hardly believe that they had to the\nlively Greek the anxious meaning which, in our towns, is given and\nreceived in churches when our religious names are used: and we read\nwith surprise the horror of Athens when, one morning, the statues of\nMercury in the temples were found broken, and the like consternation\nwas in the city as if, in Boston, all the Orthodox churches should be\nburned in one night.\n\nThe greatest dominion will be to the deepest thought. The establishment\nof Christianity in the world does not rest on any miracle but the\nmiracle of being the broadest and most humane doctrine. Christianity\nwas once a schism and protest against the impieties of the time, which\nhad originally been protests against earlier impieties, but had lost\ntheir truth. Varnhagen von Ense, writing in Prussia in 1848, says: \u201cThe\nGospels belong to the most aggressive writings. No leaf thereof could\nattain the liberty of being printed (in Berlin) to-day. What Mirabeaus,\nRousseaus, Diderots, Fichtes, Heines, and many another heretic, one can\ndetect therein!\u201d\n\nBut before it was yet a national religion it was alloyed, and, in the\nhands of hot Africans, of luxurious Byzantines, of fierce Gauls, its\ncreeds were tainted with their barbarism. In Holland, in England, in\nScotland, it felt the national narrowness. How unlike our habitual\nturn of thought was that of the last century in this country! Our\nancestors spoke continually of angels and archangels with the same good\nfaith as they would have spoken of their own parents or their late\nminister. Now the words pale, are rhetoric, and all credence is gone.\nOur horizon is not far, say one generation, or thirty years: we all\nsee so much. The older see two generations, or sixty years. But what\nhas been running on through three horizons, or ninety years, looks\nto all the world like a law of Nature, and \u2019tis an impiety to doubt.\nThus, \u2019tis incredible to us, if we look into the religious books of\nour grandfathers, how they held themselves in such a pinfold. But why\nnot? As far as they could see, through two or three horizons, nothing\nbut ministers and ministers. Calvinism was one and the same thing in\nGeneva, in Scotland, in Old and New England. If there was a wedding,\nthey had a sermon; if a funeral, then a sermon; if a war, or small-pox,\nor a comet, or canker-worms, or a deacon died,--still a sermon: Nature\nwas a pulpit; the churchwarden or tithing-man was a petty persecutor;\nthe presbytery, a tyrant; and in many a house in country places the\npoor children found seven sabbaths in a week. Fifty or a hundred years\nago, prayers were said, morning and evening, in all families; grace\nwas said at table; an exact observance of the Sunday was kept in the\nhouses of laymen as of clergymen. And one sees with some pain the\ndisuse of rites so charged with humanity and aspiration. But it by no\nmeans follows, because those offices are much disused, that the men and\nwomen are irreligious; certainly not that they have less integrity or\nsentiment, but only, let us hope, that they see that they can omit the\nform without loss of real ground; perhaps that they find some violence,\nsome cramping of their freedom of thought, in the constant recurrence\nof the form.\n\nSo of the changed position and manners of the clergy. They have\ndropped, with the sacerdotal garb and manners of the last century, many\ndoctrines and practices once esteemed indispensable to their order.\nBut the distinctions of the true clergyman are not less decisive. Men\nask now, \u201cIs he serious? Is he a sincere man, who lives as he teaches?\nIs he a benefactor?\u201d So far the religion is now where it should be.\nPersons are discriminated as honest, as veracious, as illuminated, as\nhelpful, as having public and universal regards, or otherwise;--are\ndiscriminated according to their aims, and not by these ritualities.\n\nThe changes are inevitable; the new age cannot see with the eyes of\nthe last. But the change is in what is superficial; the principles are\nimmortal, and the rally on the principle must arrive as people become\nintellectual. I consider theology to be the rhetoric of morals. The\nmind of this age has fallen away from theology to morals. I conceive\nit an advance. I suspect, that, when the theology was most florid and\ndogmatic, it was the barbarism of the people, and that, in that very\ntime, the best men also fell away from theology, and rested in morals.\nI think that all the dogmas rest on morals, and that it is only a\nquestion of youth or maturity, of more or less fancy in the recipient;\nthat the stern determination to do justly, to speak the truth, to\nbe chaste and humble, was substantially the same, whether under a\nself-respect, or under a vow made on the knees at the shrine of Madonna.\n\nWhen once Selden had said that the priests seemed to him to be\nbaptizing their own fingers, the rite of baptism was getting late in\nthe world. Or when once it is perceived that the English missionaries\nin India put obstacles in the way of schools, (as is alleged,)--do not\nwish to enlighten but to Christianize the Hindoos,--it is seen at once\nhow wide of Christ is English Christianity.\n\nMankind at large always resemble frivolous children: they are impatient\nof thought, and wish to be amused. Truth is too simple for us; we do\nnot like those who unmask our illusions. Fontenelle said: \u201cIf the\nDeity should lay bare to the eyes of men the secret system of Nature,\nthe causes by which all the astronomic results are effected, and they\nfinding no magic, no mystic numbers, no fatalities, but the greatest\nsimplicity, I am persuaded they would not be able to suppress a feeling\nof mortification, and would exclaim, with disappointment, \u2018Is that\nall?\u2019\u201d And so we paint over the bareness of ethics with the quaint\ngrotesques of theology.\n\nWe boast the triumph of Christianity over Paganism, meaning the victory\nof the spirit over the senses; but Paganism hides itself in the uniform\nof the Church. Paganism has only taken the oath of allegiance, taken\nthe cross, but is Paganism still, outvotes the true men by millions\nof majority, carries the bag, spends the treasure, writes the tracts,\nelects the minister, and persecutes the true believer.\n\nThere is a certain secular progress of opinion, which, in civil\ncountries, reaches everybody. One service which this age has rendered\nis, to make the life and wisdom of every past man accessible and\navailable to all. Socrates and Marcus Aurelius are allowed to be\nsaints; Mahomet is no longer accursed; Voltaire is no longer a\nscarecrow; Spinoza has come to be revered. \u201cThe time will come,\u201d\nsays Varnhagen von Ense, \u201cwhen we shall treat the jokes and sallies\nagainst the myths and church-rituals of Christianity--say the sarcasms\nof Voltaire, Frederic the Great, and D\u2019Alembert--good-naturedly and\nwithout offence: since, at bottom, those men mean honestly, their\npolemics proceed out of a religious striving, and what Christ meant\nand willed is in essence more with them than with their opponents, who\nonly wear and misrepresent the _name_ of Christ.... Voltaire was\nan apostle of Christian ideas; only the names were hostile to him, and\nhe never knew it otherwise. He was like the son of the vine-dresser in\nthe Gospel, who said No, and went; the other said Yea, and went not.\nThese men preached the true God,--Him whom men serve by justice and\nuprightness; but they called themselves atheists.\u201d\n\nWhen the highest conceptions, the lessons of religion, are imported,\nthe nation is not culminating, has not genius, but is servile. A true\nnation loves its vernacular tongue. A completed nation will not import\nits religion. Duty grows everywhere, like children, like grass; and we\nneed not go to Europe or to Asia to learn it. I am not sure that the\nEnglish religion is not all quoted. Even the Jeremy Taylors, Fullers,\nGeorge Herberts, steeped, all of them, in Church traditions, are only\nusing their fine fancy to emblazon their memory. \u2019Tis Jud\u00e6a, not\nEngland, which is the ground. So with the mordant Calvinism of Scotland\nand America. But this quoting distances and disables them: since with\nevery repeater something of creative force is lost, as we feel when we\ngo back to each original moralist. Pythagoras, Socrates, the Stoics,\nthe Hindoo, Behmen, George Fox,--these speak originally; and how many\nsentences and books we owe to unknown authors,--to writers who were not\ncareful to set down name or date or titles or cities or postmarks in\nthese illuminations!\n\nWe, in our turn, want power to drive the ponderous State. The\nconstitution and law in America must be written on ethical principles,\nso that the entire power of the spiritual world can be enlisted to\nhold the loyalty of the citizen, and to repel every enemy as by force\nof Nature. The laws of old empires stood on the religious convictions.\nNow that their religions are outgrown, the empires lack strength.\nRomanism in Europe does not represent the real opinion of enlightened\nmen. The Lutheran Church does not represent in Germany the opinions of\nthe universities. In England, the gentlemen, the journals, and now, at\nlast, churchmen and bishops, have fallen away from the Anglican Church.\nAnd in America, where are no legal ties to churches, the looseness\nappears dangerous.\n\nOur religion has got on as far as Unitarianism. But all the forms grow\npale. The walls of the temple are wasted and thin, and, at last, only\na film of whitewash, because the mind of our culture has already left\nour liturgies behind. \u201cEvery age,\u201d says Varnhagen, \u201chas another sieve\nfor the religious tradition, and will sift it out again. Something is\ncontinually lost by this treatment, which posterity cannot recover.\u201d\n\nBut it is a capital truth that Nature, moral as well as material,\nis always equal to herself. Ideas always generate enthusiasm. The\ncreed, the legend, forms of worship, swiftly decay. Morals is the\nincorruptible essence, very heedless in its richness of any past\nteacher or witness, heedless of their lives and fortunes. It does not\nask whether you are wrong or right in your anecdotes of them; but it is\nall in all how you stand to your own tribunal.\n\nThe lines of the religious sects are very shifting; their platforms\nunstable; the whole science of theology of great uncertainty, and\nresting very much on the opinions of who may chance to be the leading\ndoctors of Oxford or Edinburgh, of Princeton or Cambridge, to-day. No\nman can tell what religious revolutions await us in the next years;\nand the education in the divinity colleges may well hesitate and vary.\nBut the science of ethics has no mutation; and whoever feels any love\nor skill for ethical studies may safely lay out all his strength and\ngenius in working in that mine. The pulpit may shake, but this platform\nwill not. All the victories of religion belong to the moral sentiment.\nSome poor soul beheld the Law blazing through such impediments as he\nhad, and yielded himself to humility and joy. What was gained by being\ntold that it was justification by faith?\n\nThe Church, in its ardor for beloved persons, clings to the miraculous,\nin the vulgar sense, which has even an immoral tendency, as one sees\nin Greek, Indian and Catholic legends, which are used to gloze every\ncrime. The soul, penetrated with the beatitude which pours into it\non all sides, asks no interpositions, no new laws,--the old are good\nenough for it,--finds in every cart-path of labor ways to heaven, and\nthe humblest lot exalted. Men will learn to put back the emphasis\nperemptorily on pure morals, always the same, not subject to doubtful\ninterpretation, with no sale of indulgences no massacre of heretics,\nno female slaves, no disfranchisement of woman, no stigma on race; to\nmake morals the absolute test, and so uncover and drive out the false\nreligions. There is no vice that has not skulked behind them. It is\nonly yesterday that our American churches, so long silent on Slavery,\nand notoriously hostile to the Abolitionist, wheeled into line for\nEmancipation.\n\nI am far from accepting the opinion that the revelations of the moral\nsentiment are insufficient, as if it furnished a rule only, and not\nthe spirit by which the rule is animated. For I include in these, of\ncourse, the history of Jesus, as well as those of every divine soul\nwhich in any place or time delivered any grand lesson to humanity;\nand I find in the eminent experiences in all times a substantial\nagreement. The sentiment itself teaches unity of source, and disowns\nevery superiority other than of deeper truth. Jesus has immense claims\non the gratitude of mankind, and knew how to guard the integrity of his\nbrother\u2019s soul from himself also; but, in his disciples, admiration of\nhim runs away with their reverence for the human soul, and they hamper\nus with limitations of person and text. Every exaggeration of these is\na violation of the soul\u2019s right, and inclines the manly reader to lay\ndown the New Testament, to take up the Pagan philosophers. It is not\nthat the Upanishads or the Maxims of Antoninus are better, but that\nthey do not invade his freedom; because they are only suggestions,\nwhilst the other adds the inadmissible claim of positive authority,--of\nan external command, where command cannot be. This is the secret of the\nmischievous result that, in every period of intellectual expansion,\nthe Church ceases to draw into its clergy those who best belong there,\nthe largest and freest minds, and that in its most liberal forms, when\nsuch minds enter it, they are coldly received, and find themselves out\nof place. This charm in the Pagan moralists, of suggestion, the charm\nof poetry, of mere truth, (easily disengaged from their historical\naccidents which nobody wishes to force on us,) the New Testament loses\nby its connection with a church. Mankind cannot long suffer this loss,\nand the office of this age is to put all these writings on the eternal\nfooting of equality of origin in the instincts of the human mind. It is\ncertain that each inspired master will gain instantly by the separation\nfrom the idolatry of ages.\n\nTo their great honor, the simple and free minds among our clergy\nhave not resisted the voice of Nature and the advanced perceptions\nof the mind; and every church divides itself into a liberal and\nexpectant class, on one side, and an unwilling and conservative class\non the other. As it stands with us now, a few clergymen, with a more\ntheological cast of mind, retain the traditions, but they carry\nthem quietly. In general discourse, they are never obtruded. If the\nclergyman should travel in France, in England, in Italy, he might leave\nthem locked up in the same closet with his \u201coccasional sermons\u201d at\nhome, and, if he did not return, would never think to send for them.\nThe orthodox clergymen hold a little firmer to theirs, as Calvinism has\na more tenacious vitality; but that is doomed also, and will only die\nlast; for Calvinism rushes to be Unitarianism, as Unitarianism rushes\nto be pure Theism.\n\nBut the inspirations are never withdrawn. In the worst times, men\nof organic virtue are born,--men and women of native integrity, and\nindifferently in high and low conditions. There will always be a class\nof imaginative youths, whom poetry, whom the love of beauty, lead to\nthe adoration of the moral sentiment, and these will provide it with\nnew historic forms and songs. Religion is as inexpugnable as the use\nof lamps, or of wells, or of chimneys. We must have days and temples\nand teachers. The Sunday is the core of our civilization, dedicated\nto thought and reverence. It invites to the noblest solitude and the\nnoblest society, to whatever means and aids of spiritual refreshment.\nMen may well come together to kindle each other to virtuous living.\nConfucius said, \u201cIf in the morning I hear of the right way, and in the\nevening die, I can be happy.\u201d\n\nThe churches already indicate the new spirit in adding to the perennial\noffice of teaching, beneficent activities,--as in creating hospitals,\nragged schools, offices of employment for the poor, appointing almoners\nto the helpless, guardians of foundlings and orphans. The power that in\nother times inspired crusades, or the colonization of New England, or\nthe modern revivals, flies to the help of the deaf-mute and the blind,\nto the education of the sailor and the vagabond boy, to the reform\nof convicts and harlots,--as the war created the Hilton Head and\nCharleston missions, the Sanitary Commission, the nurses and teachers\nat Washington.\n\n\nIn the present tendency of our society, in the new importance of the\nindividual, when thrones are crumbling and presidents and governors are\nforced every moment to remember their constituencies; when counties\nand towns are resisting centralization, and the individual voter his\nparty,--society is threatened with actual granulation, religious as\nwell as political. How many people are there in Boston? Some two\nhundred thousand. Well, then so many sects. Of course each poor soul\nloses all his old stays; no bishop watches him, no confessor reports\nthat he has neglected the confessional, no class-leader admonishes him\nof absences, no fagot, no penance, no fine, no rebuke. Is not this\nwrong? is not this dangerous? \u2019Tis not wrong, but the law of growth.\nIt is not dangerous, any more than the mother\u2019s withdrawing her hands\nfrom the tottering babe, at his first walk across the nursery-floor:\nthe child fears and cries, but achieves the feat, instantly tries it\nagain, and never wishes to be assisted more. And this infant soul must\nlearn to walk alone. At first he is forlorn, homeless; but this rude\nstripping him of all support drives him inward, and he finds himself\nunhurt; he finds himself face to face with the majestic Presence,\nreads the original of the Ten Commandments, the original of Gospels and\nEpistles; nay, his narrow chapel expands to the blue cathedral of the\nsky, where he\n\n    \u201cLooks in and sees each blissful deity,\n    Where he before the thunderous throne doth lie.\u201d\n\nTo nations or to individuals the progress of opinion is not a loss of\nmoral restraint, but simply a change from coarser to finer checks. No\nevil can come from reform which a deeper thought will not correct. If\nthere is any tendency in national expansion to form character, religion\nwill not be a loser. There is a fear that pure truth, pure morals, will\nnot make a religion for the affections. Whenever the sublimities of\ncharacter shall be incarnated in a man, we may rely that awe and love\nand insatiable curiosity will follow his steps. Character is the habit\nof action from the permanent vision of truth. It carries a superiority\nto all the accidents of life. It compels right relation to every other\nman,--domesticates itself with strangers and enemies. \u201cBut I, father,\u201d\nsays the wise Prahlada, in the Vishnu Purana, \u201cknow neither friends nor\nfoes, for I behold Kesava in all beings as in my own soul.\u201d It confers\nperpetual insight. It sees that a man\u2019s friends and his foes are of his\nown household, of his own person. What would it avail me, if I could\ndestroy my enemies? There would be as many to-morrow. That which I hate\nand fear is really in myself, and no knife is long enough to reach to\nits heart. Confucius said one day to Ke Kang: \u201cSir, in carrying on your\ngovernment, why should you use killing at all? Let your evinced desires\nbe for what is good, and the people will be good. The grass must bend,\nwhen the wind blows across it.\u201d Ke Kang, distressed about the number of\nthieves in the state, inquired of Confucius how to do away with them.\nConfucius said, \u201cIf you, sir, were not covetous, although you should\nreward them to do it, they would not steal.\u201d\n\nIts methods are subtle, it works without means. It indulges no enmity\nagainst any, knowing, with Prahlada that \u201cthe suppression of malignant\nfeeling is itself a reward.\u201d The more reason, the less government. In\na sensible family, nobody ever hears the words \u201cshall\u201d and \u201csha\u2019n\u2019t;\u201d\nnobody commands, and nobody obeys, but all conspire and joyfully\nco-operate. Take off the roofs of hundreds of happy houses, and you\nshall see this order without ruler, and the like in every intelligent\nand moral society. Command is exceptional, and marks some break in\nthe link of reason; as the electricity goes round the world without\na spark or a sound, until there is a break in the wire or the water\nchain. Swedenborg said, that, \u201cin the spiritual world, when one wishes\nto rule, or despises others, he is thrust out of doors.\u201d Goethe, in\ndiscussing the characters in \u201cWilhelm Meister,\u201d maintained his belief\nthat \u201cpure loveliness and right good-will are the highest manly\nprerogatives, before which all energetic heroism, with its lustre and\nrenown, must recede.\u201d In perfect accord with this, Henry James affirms,\nthat \u201cto give the feminine element in life its hard-earned but eternal\nsupremacy over the masculine has been the secret inspiration of all\npast history.\u201d\n\nThere is no end to the sufficiency of character. It can afford to\nwait; it can do without what is called success; it cannot but succeed.\nTo a well-principled man existence is victory. He defends himself\nagainst failure in his main design by making every inch of the road\nto it pleasant. There is no trifle, and no obscurity to him: he feels\nthe immensity of the chain whose last link he holds in his hand, and\nis led by it. Having nothing, this spirit hath all. It asks, with\nMarcus Aurelius, \u201cWhat matter by whom the good is done?\u201d It extols\nhumility,--by every self-abasement lifted higher in the scale of being.\nIt makes no stipulations for earthly felicity,--does not ask, in the\nabsoluteness of its trust, even for the assurance of continued life.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n[Footnote 6: Reprinted from the _North American Review_ of April,\n1866.]\n\n\n\n\n                              EDUCATION.\n\n    WITH the key of the secret he marches faster\n    From strength to strength, and for night brings day,\n    While classes or tribes too weak to master\n    The flowing conditions of life, give way.\n\n\n\n\n                              EDUCATION.\n\n\nA NEW degree of intellectual power seems cheap at any price. The use\nof the world is that man may learn its laws. And the human race have\nwisely signified their sense of this, by calling wealth, means,--Man\nbeing the end. Language is always wise.\n\nTherefore I praise New England because it is the country in the world\nwhere is the freest expenditure for education. We have already taken,\nat the planting of the Colonies, (for aught I know for the first time\nin the world,) the initial step, which for its importance might have\nbeen resisted as the most radical of revolutions, thus deciding at the\nstart the destiny of this country,--this, namely, that the poor man,\nwhom the law does not allow to take an ear of corn when starving, nor\na pair of shoes for his freezing feet, is allowed to put his hand into\nthe pocket of the rich, and say, You shall educate me, not as you will,\nbut as I will: not alone in the elements, but, by further provision,\nin the languages, in sciences, in the useful and in elegant arts. The\nchild shall be taken up by the State, and taught, at the public cost,\nthe rudiments of knowledge, and, at last, the ripest results of art and\nscience.\n\nHumanly speaking, the school, the college, society, make the difference\nbetween men. All the fairy tales of Aladdin or the invisible Gyges\nor the talisman that opens kings\u2019 palaces or the enchanted halls\nunderground or in the sea, are only fictions to indicate the one\nmiracle of intellectual enlargement. When a man stupid becomes a man\ninspired, when one and the same man passes out of the torpid into the\nperceiving state, leaves the din of trifles, the stupor of the senses,\nto enter into the quasi-omniscience of high thought,--up and down,\naround, all limits disappear. No horizon shuts down. He sees things in\ntheir causes, all facts in their connection.\n\nOne of the problems of history is the beginning of civilization. The\nanimals that accompany and serve man make no progress as races. Those\ncalled domestic are capable of learning of man a few tricks of utility\nor amusement, but they cannot communicate the skill to their race. Each\nindividual must be taught anew. The trained dog cannot train another\ndog. And Man himself in many races retains almost the unteachableness\nof the beast. For a thousand years the islands and forests of a great\npart of the world have been filled with savages who made no steps of\nadvance in art or skill beyond the necessity of being fed and warmed.\nCertain nations with a better brain and usually in more temperate\nclimates, have made such progress as to compare with these as these\ncompare with the bear and the wolf.\n\nVictory over things is the office of man. Of course, until it is\naccomplished, it is the war and insult of things over him. His\ncontinual tendency, his great danger, is to overlook the fact that the\nworld is only his teacher, and the nature of sun and moon, plant and\nanimal only means of arousing his interior activity. Enamored of their\nbeauty, comforted by their convenience, he seeks them as ends, and fast\nloses sight of the fact that they have worse than no values, that they\nbecome noxious, when he becomes their slave.\n\nThis apparatus of wants and faculties, this craving body, whose\norgans ask all the elements and all the functions of Nature for their\nsatisfaction, educate the wondrous creature which they satisfy with\nlight, with heat, with water, with wood, with bread, with wool. The\nnecessities imposed by this most irritable and all-related texture have\ntaught Man hunting, pasturage, agriculture, commerce, weaving, joining,\nmasonry, geometry, astronomy. Here is a world pierced and belted\nwith natural laws, and fenced and planted with civil partitions and\nproperties, which all put new restraints on the young inhabitant. He\ntoo must come into this magic circle of relations, and know health and\nsickness, the fear of injury, the desire of external good, the charm\nof riches, the charm of power. The household is a school of power.\nThere, within the door, learn the tragi-comedy of human life. Here is\nthe sincere thing, the wondrous composition for which day and night go\nround. In that routine are the sacred relations, the passions that bind\nand sever. Here is poverty and all the wisdom its hated necessities\ncan teach, here labor drudges, here affections glow, here the secrets\nof character are told, the guards of man, the guards of woman, the\ncompensations which, like angels of justice, pay every debt: the opium\nof custom, whereof all drink and many go mad. Here is Economy, and\nGlee, and Hospitality, and Ceremony, and Frankness, and Calamity, and\nDeath and Hope.\n\nEvery one has a trust of power,--every man, every boy a jurisdiction,\nwhether it be over a cow or a rood of a potato-field, or a fleet of\nships, or the laws of a state. And what activity the desire of power\ninspires! What toils it sustains! How it sharpens the perceptions and\nstores the memory with facts. Thus a man may well spend many years of\nlife in trade. It is a constant teaching of the laws of matter and\nof mind. No dollar of property can be created without some direct\ncommunication with nature, and of course some acquisition of knowledge\nand practical force. It is a constant contest with the active faculties\nof men, a study of the issues of one and another course of action, an\naccumulation of power, and, if the higher faculties of the individual\nbe from time to time quickened, he will gain wisdom and virtue from his\nbusiness.\n\nAs every wind draws music out of the \u00c6olian harp, so doth every object\nin Nature draw music out of his mind. Is it not true that every\nlandscape I behold, every friend I meet, every act I perform, every\npain I suffer, leaves me a different being from that they found me?\nThat poverty, love, authority, anger, sickness, sorrow, success, all\nwork actively upon our being and unlock for us the concealed faculties\nof the mind? Whatever private or petty ends are frustrated, this end is\nalways answered. Whatever the man does, or whatever befalls him, opens\nanother chamber in his soul,--that is, he has got a new feeling, a new\nthought, a new organ. Do we not see how amazingly for this end man is\nfitted to the world?\n\nWhat leads him to science? Why does he track in the midnight heaven a\npure spark, a luminous patch wandering from age to age, but because\nhe acquires thereby a majestic sense of power; learning that in his\nown constitution he can set the shining maze in order, and finding\nand carrying their law in his mind, can, as it were, see his simple\nidea realized up yonder in giddy distances and frightful periods of\nduration. If Newton come and first of men perceive that not alone\ncertain bodies fall to the ground at a certain rate, but that all\nbodies in the Universe, the universe of bodies, fall always, and at one\nrate; that every atom in nature draws to every other atom,--he extends\nthe power of his mind not only over every cubic atom of his native\nplanet, but he reports the condition of millions of worlds which his\neye never saw. And what is the charm which every ore, every new plant,\nevery new fact touching winds, clouds, ocean currents, the secrets of\nchemical composition and decomposition possess for Humboldt? What but\nthat much revolving of similar facts in his mind has shown him that\nalways the mind contains in its transparent chambers the means of\nclassifying the most refractory phenomena, of depriving them of all\ncasual and chaotic aspect, and subordinating them to a bright reason\nof its own, and so giving to man a sort of property,--yea, the very\nhighest property in every district and particle of the globe.\n\nBy the permanence of Nature, minds are trained alike, and made\nintelligible to each other. In our condition are the roots of language\nand communication, and these instructions we never exhaust.\n\nIn some sort the end of life is that the man should take up\nthe universe into himself, or out of that quarry leave nothing\nunrepresented. Yonder mountain must migrate into his mind. Yonder\nmagnificent astronomy he is at last to import, fetching away moon, and\nplanet, solstice, period, comet and binal star, by comprehending their\nrelation and law. Instead of the timid stripling he was, he is to be\nthe stalwart Archimedes, Pythagoras, Columbus, Newton, of the physic,\nmetaphysic and ethics of the design of the world.\n\nFor truly the population of the globe has its origin in the aims which\ntheir existence is to serve; and so with every portion of them. The\ntruth takes flesh in forms that can express it; and thus in history an\nidea always overhangs, like the moon, and rules the tide which rises\nsimultaneously in all the souls of a generation.\n\nWhilst thus the world exists for the mind; whilst thus the man is\never invited inward into shining realms of knowledge and power by the\nshows of the world, which interpret to him the infinitude of his own\nconsciousness,--it becomes the office of a just education to awaken him\nto the knowledge of this fact.\n\nWe learn nothing rightly until we learn the symbolical character of\nlife. Day creeps after day, each full of facts, dull, strange, despised\nthings, that we cannot enough despise,--call heavy, prosaic, and\ndesert. The time we seek to kill: the attention it is elegant to divert\nfrom things around us. And presently the aroused intellect finds gold\nand gems in one of these scorned facts,--then finds that the day of\nfacts is a rock of diamonds; that a fact is an Epiphany of God.\n\nWe have our theory of life, our religion, our philosophy; and the\nevent of each moment, the shower, the steamboat disaster, the passing\nof a beautiful face, the apoplexy of our neighbor, are all tests to\ntry our theory, the approximate result we call truth, and reveal its\ndefects. If I have renounced the search of truth, if I have come into\nthe port of some pretending dogmatism, some new church or old church,\nsome Schelling or Cousin, I have died to all use of these new events\nthat are born out of prolific time into multitude of life every hour.\nI am as a bankrupt to whom brilliant opportunities offer in vain. He\nhas just foreclosed his freedom, tied his hands, locked himself up and\ngiven the key to another to keep.\n\nWhen I see the doors by which God enters into the mind; that there\nis no sot or fop, ruffian or pedant into whom thoughts do not enter\nby passages which the individual never left open, I can expect any\nrevolution in character. \u201cI have hope,\u201d said the great Leibnitz,\n\u201cthat society may be reformed, when I see how much education may be\nreformed.\u201d\n\nIt is ominous, a presumption of crime, that this word Education has\nso cold, so hopeless a sound. A treatise on education, a convention\nfor education, a lecture, a system, affects us with slight paralysis\nand a certain yawning of the jaws. We are not encouraged when the law\ntouches it with its fingers. Education should be as broad as man.\nWhatever elements are in him that should foster and demonstrate. If\nhe be dexterous, his tuition should make it appear; if he be capable\nof dividing men by the trenchant sword of his thought, education\nshould unsheathe and sharpen it; if he is one to cement society by his\nall-reconciling affinities, oh! hasten their action! If he is jovial,\nif he is mercurial, if he is great-hearted, a cunning artificer, a\nstrong commander, a potent ally, ingenious, useful, elegant, witty,\nprophet, diviner,--society has need of all these. The imagination\nmust be addressed. Why always coast on the surface and never open the\ninterior of nature, not by science, which is surface still, but by\npoetry? Is not the Vast an element of the mind? Yet what teaching, what\nbook of this day appeals to the Vast?\n\nOur culture has truckled to the times,--to the senses. It is not\nmanworthy. If the vast and the spiritual are omitted, so are the\npractical and the moral. It does not make us brave or free. We teach\nboys to be such men as we are. We do not teach them to aspire to be all\nthey can. We do not give them a training as if we believed in their\nnoble nature. We scarce educate their bodies. We do not train the eye\nand the hand. We exercise their understandings to the apprehension and\ncomparison of some facts, to a skill in numbers, in words; we aim to\nmake accountants, attorneys, engineers; but not to make able, earnest,\ngreat-hearted men. The great object of Education should be commensurate\nwith the object of life. It should be a moral one; to teach self-trust:\nto inspire the youthful man with an interest in himself; with a\ncuriosity touching his own nature; to acquaint him with the resources\nof his mind, and to teach him that there is all his strength, and to\ninflame him with a piety towards the Grand Mind in which he lives. Thus\nwould education conspire with the Divine Providence. A man is a little\nthing whilst he works by and for himself, but, when he gives voice to\nthe rules of love and justice, is god-like, his word is current in all\ncountries; and all men, though his enemies, are made his friends and\nobey it as their own.\n\nIn affirming that the moral nature of man is the predominant element\nand should therefore be mainly consulted in the arrangements of a\nschool, I am very far from wishing that it should swallow up all the\nother instincts and faculties of man. It should be enthroned in his\nmind, but if it monopolize the man he is not yet sound, he does not\nyet know his wealth. He is in danger of becoming merely devout, and\nwearisome through the monotony of his thought. It is not less necessary\nthat the intellectual and the active faculties should be nourished and\nmatured. Let us apply to this subject the light of the same torch by\nwhich we have looked at all the phenomena of the time; the infinitude,\nnamely, of every man. Everything teaches that.\n\nOne fact constitutes all my satisfaction, inspires all my trust,\nviz., this perpetual youth, which, as long as there is any good in\nus, we cannot get rid of. It is very certain that the coming age\nand the departing age seldom understand each other. The old man\nthinks the young man has no distinct purpose, for he could never get\nanything intelligible and earnest out of him. Perhaps the young man\ndoes not think it worth his while to explain himself to so hard and\ninapprehensive a confessor. Let him be led up with a long-sighted\nforbearance, and let not the sallies of his petulance or folly be\nchecked with disgust or indignation or despair.\n\nI call our system a system of despair, and I find all the correction,\nall the revolution that is needed and that the best spirits of this age\npromise, in one word, in Hope. Nature, when she sends a new mind into\nthe world, fills it beforehand with a desire for that which she wishes\nit to know and do. Let us wait and see what is this new creation, of\nwhat new organ the great Spirit had need when it incarnated this new\nWill. A new Adam in the garden, he is to name all the beasts in the\nfield, all the gods in the sky. And jealous provision seems to have\nbeen made in his constitution that you shall not invade and contaminate\nhim with the worn weeds of your language and opinions. The charm of\nlife is this variety of genius, these contrasts and flavors by which\nHeaven has modulated the identity of truth, and there is a perpetual\nhankering to violate this individuality, to warp his ways of thinking\nand behavior to resemble or reflect their thinking and behavior. A\nlow self-love in the parent desires that his child should repeat his\ncharacter and fortune; an expectation which the child, if justice is\ndone him, will nobly disappoint. By working on the theory that this\nresemblance exists, we shall do what in us lies to defeat his proper\npromise and produce the ordinary and mediocre. I suffer whenever I see\nthat common sight of a parent or senior imposing his opinion and way\nof thinking and being on a young soul to which they are totally unfit.\nCannot we let people be themselves, and enjoy life in their own way?\nYou are trying to make that man another _you_. One\u2019s enough.\n\nOr we sacrifice the genius of the pupil, the unknown possibilities of\nhis nature, to a neat and safe uniformity, as the Turks whitewash the\ncostly mosaics of ancient art which the Greeks left on their temple\nwalls. Rather let us have men whose manhood is only the continuation\nof their boyhood, natural characters still; such are able and fertile\nfor heroic action; and not that sad spectacle with which we are too\nfamiliar, educated eyes in uneducated bodies.\n\nI like boys, the masters of the playground and of the street,--boys,\nwho have the same liberal ticket of admission to all shops, factories,\narmories, town-meetings, caucuses, mobs, target-shootings, as flies\nhave; quite unsuspected, coming in as naturally as the janitor,--known\nto have no money in their pockets, and themselves not suspecting the\nvalue of this poverty; putting nobody on his guard, but seeing the\ninside of the show,--hearing all the asides. There are no secrets from\nthem, they know everything that befalls in the fire-company, the merits\nof every engine and of every man at the brakes, how to work it, and\nare swift to try their hand at every part; so too the merits of every\nlocomotive on the rails, and will coax the engineer to let them ride\nwith him and pull the handles when it goes to the engine-house. They\nare there only for fun, and not knowing that they are at school, in\nthe court-house, or the cattle-show, quite as much and more than they\nwere, an hour ago, in the arithmetic class.\n\nThey know truth from counterfeit as quick as the chemist does. They\ndetect weakness in your eye and behavior a week before you open your\nmouth, and have given you the benefit of their opinion quick as a\nwink. They make no mistakes, have no pedantry, but entire belief on\nexperience. Their elections at base-ball or cricket are founded on\nmerit, and are right. They don\u2019t pass for swimmers until they can swim,\nnor for stroke-oar until they can row: and I desire to be saved from\ntheir contempt. If I can pass with them, I can manage well enough with\ntheir fathers.\n\nEverybody delights in the energy with which boys deal and talk with\neach other; the mixture of fun and earnest, reproach and coaxing, love\nand wrath, with which the game is played;--the good-natured yet defiant\nindependence of a leading boy\u2019s behavior in the school-yard. How we\nenvy in later life the happy youths to whom their boisterous games and\nrough exercise furnish the precise element which frames and sets off\ntheir school and college tasks, and teaches them, when least they think\nit, the use and meaning of these. In their fun and extreme freak they\nhit on the topmost sense of Horace. The young giant, brown from his\nhunting-tramp, tells his story well, interlarded with lucky allusions\nto Homer, to Virgil, to college-songs, to Walter Scott; and Jove and\nAchilles, partridge and trout, opera and binomial theorem, C\u00e6sar in\nGaul, Sherman in Savannah, and hazing in Holworthy, dance through the\nnarrative in merry confusion, yet the logic is good. If he can turn\nhis books to such picturesque account in his fishing and hunting, it\nis easy to see how his reading and experience, as he has more of both,\nwill interpenetrate each other. And every one desires that this pure\nvigor of action and wealth of narrative, cheered with so much humor and\nstreet rhetoric, should be carried into the habit of the young man,\npurged of its uproar and rudeness, but with all its vivacity entire.\nHis hunting and campings-out have given him an indispensable base: I\nwish to add a taste for good company through his impatience of bad.\nThat stormy genius of his needs a little direction to games, charades,\nverses of society, song, and a correspondence year by year with his\nwisest and best friends. Friendship is an order of nobility; from its\nrevelations we come more worthily into nature. Society he must have or\nhe is poor indeed; he gladly enters a school which forbids conceit,\naffectation, emphasis and dulness, and requires of each only the\nflower of his nature and experience; requires good-will, beauty, wit,\nand select information; teaches by practice the law of conversation,\nnamely, to hear as well as to speak.\n\nMeantime, if circumstances do not permit the high social advantages,\nsolitude has also its lessons. The obscure youth learns there the\npractice instead of the literature of his virtues; and, because of the\ndisturbing effect of passion and sense, which by a multitude of trifles\nimpede the mind\u2019s eye from the quiet search of that fine horizon-line\nwhich truth keeps,--the way to knowledge and power has ever been an\nescape from too much engagement with affairs and possessions; a way,\nnot through plenty and superfluity, but by denial and renunciation,\ninto solitude and privation; and, the more is taken away, the more\nreal and inevitable wealth of being is made known to us. The solitary\nknows the essence of the thought, the scholar in society only its fair\nface. There is no want of example of great men, great benefactors, who\nhave been monks and hermits in habit. The bias of mind is sometimes\nirresistible in that direction. The man is as it were born deaf and\ndumb, and dedicated to a narrow and lonely life. Let him study the art\nof solitude, yield as gracefully as he can to his destiny. Why cannot\nhe get the good of his doom, and if it is from eternity a settled fact\nthat he and society shall be nothing to each other, why need he blush\nso, and make wry faces to keep up a freshman\u2019s seat in the fine world?\nHeaven often protects valuable souls charged with great secrets, great\nideas, by long shutting them up with their own thoughts. And the most\ngenial and amiable of men must alternate society with solitude, and\nlearn its severe lessons.\n\n\nThere comes the period of the imagination to each, a later youth; the\npower of beauty, the power of books, of poetry. Culture makes his books\nrealities to him, their characters more brilliant, more effective on\nhis mind, than his actual mates. Do not spare to put novels into the\nhands of young people as an occasional holiday and experiment; but,\nabove all, good poetry in all kinds, epic, tragedy, lyric. If we can\ntouch the imagination, we serve them, they will never forget it. Let\nhim read \u201cTom Brown at Rugby,\u201d read \u201cTom Brown at Oxford,\u201d--better\nyet, read \u201cHodson\u2019s Life\u201d--Hodson who took prisoner the king of Delhi.\nThey teach the same truth,--a trust, against all appearances, against\nall privations, in your own worth, and not in tricks, plotting, or\npatronage.\n\nI believe that our own experience instructs us that the secret of\nEducation lies in respecting the pupil. It is not for you to choose\nwhat he shall know, what he shall do. It is chosen and foreordained,\nand he only holds the key to his own secret. By your tampering and\nthwarting and too much governing he may be hindered from his end and\nkept out of his own. Respect the child. Wait and see the new product of\nNature. Nature loves analogies, but not repetitions. Respect the child.\nBe not too much his parent. Trespass not on his solitude.\n\nBut I hear the outcry which replies to this suggestion:--Would you\nverily throw up the reins of public and private discipline; would\nyou leave the young child to the mad career of his own passions and\nwhimsies, and call this anarchy a respect for the child\u2019s nature?\nI answer,--Respect the child, respect him to the end, but also\nrespect yourself. Be the companion of his thought, the friend of his\nfriendship, the lover of his virtue,--but no kinsman of his sin. Let\nhim find you so true to yourself that you are the irreconcilable hater\nof his vice and the imperturbable slighter of his trifling.\n\nThe two points in a boy\u2019s training are, to keep his _naturel_\nand train off all but that:--to keep his _naturel_, but stop off\nhis uproar, fooling and horse-play;--keep his nature and arm it with\nknowledge in the very direction in which it points. Here are the two\ncapital facts, genius and drill. The first is the inspiration in the\nwell-born healthy child, the new perception he has of nature. Somewhat\nhe sees in forms or hears in music or apprehends in mathematics, or\nbelieves practicable in mechanics or possible in political society,\nwhich no one else sees or hears or believes. This is the perpetual\nromance of new life, the invasion of God into the old dead world, when\nhe sends into quiet houses a young soul with a thought which is not\nmet, looking for something which is not there, but which ought to be\nthere: the thought is dim but it is sure, and he casts about restless\nfor means and masters to verify it; he makes wild attempts to explain\nhimself and invoke the aid and consent of the bystanders. Baffled for\nwant of language and methods to convey his meaning, not yet clear\nto himself, he conceives that though not in this house or town, yet\nin some other house or town is the wise master who can put him in\npossession of the rules and instruments to execute his will. Happy this\nchild with a bias, with a thought which entrances him, leads him, now\ninto deserts now into cities, the fool of an idea. Let him follow it\nin good and in evil report, in good or bad company; it will justify\nitself; it will lead him at last into the illustrious society of the\nlovers of truth.\n\nIn London, in a private company, I became acquainted with a gentleman,\nSir Charles Fellowes, who, being at Xanthus, in the \u00c6gean Sea, had\nseen a Turk point with his staff to some carved work on the corner of\na stone almost buried in the soil. Fellowes scraped away the dirt,\nwas struck with the beauty of the sculptured ornaments, and, looking\nabout him, observed more blocks and fragments like this. He returned\nto the spot, procured laborers and uncovered many blocks. He went back\nto England, bought a Greek grammar and learned the language; he read\nhistory and studied ancient art to explain his stones; he interested\nGibson the sculptor; he invoked the assistance of the English\nGovernment; he called in the succor of Sir Humphry Davy to analyze the\npigments; of experts in coins, of scholars and connoisseurs; and at\nlast in his third visit brought home to England such statues and marble\nreliefs and such careful plans that he was able to reconstruct, in the\nBritish Museum where it now stands, the perfect model of the Ionic\ntrophy-monument, fifty years older than the Parthenon of Athens, and\nwhich had been destroyed by earthquakes, then by iconoclast Christians,\nthen by savage Turks. But mark that in the task he had achieved an\nexcellent education, and become associated with distinguished scholars\nwhom he had interested in his pursuit; in short, had formed a college\nfor himself; the enthusiast had found the master, the masters, whom he\nsought. Always genius seeks genius, desires nothing so much as to be a\npupil and to find those who can lend it aid to perfect itself.\n\nNor are the two elements, enthusiasm and drill, incompatible. Accuracy\nis essential to beauty. The very definition of the intellect is\nAristotle\u2019s: \u201cthat by which we know terms or boundaries.\u201d Give a boy\naccurate perceptions. Teach him the difference between the similar and\nthe same. Make him call things by their right names. Pardon in him\nno blunder. Then he will give you solid satisfaction as long as he\nlives. It is better to teach the child arithmetic and Latin grammar\nthan rhetoric or moral philosophy, because they require exactitude of\nperformance; it is made certain that the lesson is mastered, and that\npower of performance is worth more than the knowledge. He can learn\nanything which is important to him now that the power to learn is\nsecured: as mechanics say, when one has learned the use of tools, it is\neasy to work at a new craft.\n\nLetter by letter, syllable by syllable, the child learns to read,\nand in good time can convey to all the domestic circle the sense of\nShakspeare. By many steps each just as short, the stammering boy and\nthe hesitating collegian, in the school debate, in college clubs, in\nmock court, comes at last to full, secure, triumphant unfolding of his\nthought in the popular assembly, with a fullness of power that makes\nall the steps forgotten.\n\nBut this function of opening and feeding the human mind is not to be\nfulfilled by any mechanical or military method; is not to be trusted\nto any skill less large than Nature itself. You must not neglect the\nform, but you must secure the essentials. It is curious how perverse\nand intermeddling we are, and what vast pains and cost we incur to\ndo wrong. Whilst we all know in our own experience and apply natural\nmethods in our own business,--in education our common sense fails us,\nand we are continually trying costly machinery against nature, in\npatent schools and academies and in great colleges and universities.\n\nThe natural method forever confutes our experiments, and we must still\ncome back to it. The whole theory of the school is on the nurse\u2019s or\nmother\u2019s knee. The child is as hot to learn as the mother is to impart.\nThere is mutual delight. The joy of our childhood in hearing beautiful\nstories from some skilful aunt who loves to tell them, must be repeated\nin youth. The boy wishes to learn to skate, to coast, to catch a fish\nin the brook, to hit a mark with a snowball or a stone; and a boy a\nlittle older is just as well pleased to teach him these sciences.\nNot less delightful is the mutual pleasure of teaching and learning\nthe secret of algebra, or of chemistry, or of good reading and good\nrecitation of poetry or of prose, or of chosen facts in history or in\nbiography.\n\nNature provided for the communication of thought, by planting with\nit in the receiving mind a fury to impart it. \u2019Tis so in every art,\nin every science. One burns to tell the new fact, the other burns to\nhear it. See how far a young doctor will ride or walk to witness a new\nsurgical operation. I have seen a carriage-maker\u2019s shop emptied of all\nits workmen into the street, to scrutinize a new pattern from New York.\nSo in literature, the young man who has taste for poetry, for fine\nimages, for noble thoughts, is insatiable for this nourishment, and\nforgets all the world for the more learned friend,--who finds equal joy\nin dealing out his treasures.\n\nHappy the natural college thus self-instituted around every natural\nteacher; the young men of Athens around Socrates; of Alexandria around\nPlotinus; of Paris around Abelard; of Germany around Fichte, or\nNiebuhr, or Goethe: in short the natural sphere of every leading mind.\nBut the moment this is organized, difficulties begin. The college was\nto be the nurse and home of genius; but, though every young man is born\nwith some determination in his nature, and is a potential genius; is\nat last to be one; it is, in the most, obstructed and delayed, and,\nwhatever they may hereafter be, their senses are now opened in advance\nof their minds. They are more sensual than intellectual. Appetite and\nindolence they have, but no enthusiasm. These come in numbers to the\ncollege: few geniuses: and the teaching comes to be arranged for these\nmany, and not for those few. Hence the instruction seems to require\nskilful tutors, of accurate and systematic mind, rather than ardent and\ninventive masters. Besides, the youth of genius are eccentric, won\u2019t\ndrill, are irritable, uncertain, explosive, solitary, not men of the\nworld, not good for every-day association. You have to work for large\nclasses instead of individuals; you must lower your flag and reef your\nsails to wait for the dull sailors; you grow departmental, routinary,\nmilitary almost with your discipline and college police. But what doth\nsuch a school to form a great and heroic character? What abiding Hope\ncan it inspire? What Reformer will it nurse? What poet will it breed to\nsing to the human race? What discoverer of Nature\u2019s laws will it prompt\nto enrich us by disclosing in the mind the statute which all matter\nmust obey? What fiery soul will it send out to warm a nation with\nhis charity? What tranquil mind will it have fortified to walk with\nmeekness in private and obscure duties, to wait and to suffer? Is it\nnot manifest that our academic institutions should have a wider scope;\nthat they should not be timid and keep the ruts of the last generation,\nbut that wise men thinking for themselves and heartily seeking the good\nof mankind, and counting the cost of innovation, should dare to arouse\nthe young to a just and heroic life; that the moral nature should be\naddressed in the school-room, and children should be treated as the\nhigh-born candidates of truth and virtue?\n\nSo to regard the young child, the young man, requires, no doubt, rare\npatience: a patience that nothing but faith in the remedial forces\nof the soul can give. You see his sensualism; you see his want of\nthose tastes and perceptions which make the power and safety of your\ncharacter. Very likely. But he has something else. If he has his own\nvice, he has its correlative virtue. Every mind should be allowed to\nmake its own statement in action, and its balance will appear. In these\njudgments one needs that foresight which was attributed to an eminent\nreformer, of whom it was said \u201chis patience could see in the bud of the\naloe the blossom at the end of a hundred years.\u201d Alas for the cripple\nPractice when it seeks to come up with the bird Theory, which flies\nbefore it. Try your design on the best school. The scholars are of all\nages and temperaments and capacities. It is difficult to class them,\nsome are too young, some are slow, some perverse. Each requires so\nmuch consideration, that the morning hope of the teacher, of a day of\nlove and progress, is often closed at evening by despair. Each single\ncase, the more it is considered, shows more to be done; and the strict\nconditions of the hours, on one side, and the number of tasks, on the\nother. Whatever becomes of our method, the conditions stand fast,--six\nhours, and thirty, fifty, or a hundred and fifty pupils. Something must\nbe done, and done speedily, and in this distress the wisest are tempted\nto adopt violent means, to proclaim martial law, corporal punishment,\nmechanical arrangement, bribes, spies, wrath, main strength and\nignorance, in lieu of that wise genial providential influence they had\nhoped, and yet hope at some future day to adopt. Of course the devotion\nto details reacts injuriously on the teacher. He cannot indulge his\ngenius, he cannot delight in personal relations with young friends,\nwhen his eye is always on the clock, and twenty classes are to be dealt\nwith before the day is done. Besides, how can he please himself with\ngenius, and foster modest virtue? A sure proportion of rogue and dunce\nfinds its way into every school and requires a cruel share of time, and\nthe gentle teacher, who wished to be a Providence to youth, is grown\na martinet, sore with suspicions; knows as much vice as the judge of\na police court, and his love of learning is lost in the routine of\ngrammars and books of elements.\n\nA rule is so easy that it does not need a man to apply it; an\nautomaton, a machine, can be made to keep a school so. It facilitates\nlabor and thought so much that there is always the temptation in large\nschools to omit the endless task of meeting the wants of each single\nmind, and to govern by steam. But it is at frightful cost. Our modes of\nEducation aim to expedite, to save labor; to do for masses what cannot\nbe done for masses, what must be done reverently, one by one: say\nrather, the whole world is needed for the tuition of each pupil. The\nadvantages of this system of emulation and display are so prompt and\nobvious, it is such a time-saver, it is so energetic on slow and on bad\nnatures, and is of so easy application, needing no sage or poet, but\nany tutor or schoolmaster in his first term can apply it,--that it is\nnot strange that this calomel of culture should be a popular medicine.\nOn the other hand, total abstinence from this drug, and the adoption\nof simple discipline and the following of nature, involves at once\nimmense claims on the time, the thoughts, on the life of the teacher.\nIt requires time, use, insight, event, all the great lessons and\nassistances of God; and only to think of using it implies character and\nprofoundness; to enter on this course of discipline is to be good and\ngreat. It is precisely analogous to the difference between the use of\ncorporal punishment and the methods of love. It is so easy to bestow on\na bad boy a blow, overpower him, and get obedience without words, that\nin this world of hurry and distraction, who can wait for the returns\nof reason and the conquest of self; in the uncertainty too whether\nthat will ever come? And yet the familiar observation of the universal\ncompensations might suggest the fear that so summary a stop of a bad\nhumor was more jeopardous than its continuance.\n\nNow the correction of this quack practice is to import into Education\nthe wisdom of life. Leave this military hurry and adopt the pace of\nNature. Her secret is patience. Do you know how the naturalist learns\nall the secrets of the forest, of plants, of birds, of beasts, of\nreptiles, of fishes, of the rivers and the sea? When he goes into the\nwoods the birds fly before him and he finds none; when he goes to the\nriver bank, the fish and the reptile swim away and leave him alone.\nHis secret is patience; he sits down, and sits still; he is a statue;\nhe is a log. These creatures have no value for their time, and he must\nput as low a rate on his. By dint of obstinate sitting still, reptile,\nfish, bird and beast, which all wish to return to their haunts, begin\nto return. He sits still; if they approach, he remains passive as the\nstone he sits upon. They lose their fear. They have curiosity too about\nhim. By and by the curiosity masters the fear, and they come swimming,\ncreeping and flying towards him; and as he is still immovable, they\nnot only resume their haunts and their ordinary labors and manners,\nshow themselves to him in their work-day trim, but also volunteer\nsome degree of advances towards fellowship and good understanding\nwith a biped who behaves so civilly and well. Can you not baffle the\nimpatience and passion of the child by your tranquillity? Can you not\nwait for him, as Nature and Providence do? Can you not keep for his\nmind and ways, for his secret, the same curiosity you give to the\nsquirrel, snake, rabbit, and the sheldrake and the deer? He has a\nsecret; wonderful methods in him; he is,--every child,--a new style\nof man; give him time and opportunity. Talk of Columbus and Newton!\nI tell you the child just born in yonder hovel is the beginning of a\nrevolution as great as theirs. But you must have the believing and\nprophetic eye. Have the self-command you wish to inspire. Your teaching\nand discipline must have the reserve and taciturnity of Nature. Teach\nthem to hold their tongues by holding your own. Say little; do not\nsnarl; do not chide; but govern by the eye. See what they need, and\nthat the right thing is done.\n\nI confess myself utterly at a loss in suggesting particular reforms\nin our ways of teaching. No discretion that can be lodged with a\nschool-committee, with the overseers or visitors of an academy,\nof a college, can at all avail to reach these difficulties and\nperplexities, but they solve themselves when we leave institutions\nand address individuals. The will, the male power, organizes, imposes\nits own thought and wish on others, and makes that military eye\nwhich controls boys as it controls men; admirable in its results,\na fortune to him who has it, and only dangerous when it leads the\nworkman to overvalue and overuse it and precludes him from finer\nmeans. Sympathy, the female force,--which they must use who have not\nthe first,--deficient in instant control and the breaking down of\nresistance, is more subtle and lasting and creative. I advise teachers\nto cherish mother-wit. I assume that you will keep the grammar,\nreading, writing and arithmetic in order; \u2019tis easy and of course you\nwill. But smuggle in a little contraband wit, fancy, imagination,\nthought. If you have a taste which you have suppressed because it\nis not shared by those about you, tell them that. Set this law up,\nwhatever becomes of the rules of the school: they must not whisper,\nmuch less talk; but if one of the young people says a wise thing, greet\nit, and let all the children clap their hands. They shall have no book\nbut school-books in the room; but if one has brought in a Plutarch or\nShakspeare or Don Quixote or Goldsmith or any other good book, and\nunderstands what he reads, put him at once at the head of the class.\nNobody shall be disorderly, or leave his desk without permission, but\nif a boy runs from his bench, or a girl, because the fire falls, or\nto check some injury that a little dastard is inflicting behind his\ndesk on some helpless sufferer, take away the medal from the head of\nthe class and give it on the instant to the brave rescuer. If a child\nhappens to show that he knows any fact about astronomy, or plants, or\nbirds, or rocks, or history, that interests him and you, hush all the\nclasses and encourage him to tell it so that all may hear. Then you\nhave made your school-room like the world. Of course you will insist\non modesty in the children, and respect to their teachers, but if the\nboy stops you in your speech, cries out that you are wrong and sets you\nright, hug him!\n\nTo whatsoever upright mind, to whatsoever beating heart I speak, to you\nit is committed to educate men. By simple living, by an illimitable\nsoul, you inspire, you correct, you instruct, you raise, you embellish\nall. By your own act you teach the beholder how to do the practicable.\nAccording to the depth from which you draw your life, such is the depth\nnot only of your strenuous effort, but of your manners and presence.\n\nThe beautiful nature of the world has here blended your happiness with\nyour power. Work straight on in absolute duty, and you lend an arm and\nan encouragement to all the youth of the universe. Consent yourself to\nbe an organ of your highest thought, and lo! suddenly you put all men\nin your debt, and are the fountain of an energy that goes pulsing on\nwith waves of benefit to the borders of society, to the circumference\nof things.\n\n\n\n\n                           THE SUPERLATIVE.\n\n    WHEN wrath and terror changed Jove\u2019s regal port\n    And the rash-leaping thunderbolt fell short.\n\n\n    For Art, for Music overthrilled,\n    The wine-cup shakes, the wine is spilled.\n\n\n\n\n                          THE SUPERLATIVE.[7]\n\n\nTHE doctrine of temperance is one of many degrees. It is usually taught\non a low platform, but one of great necessity,--that of meats and\ndrinks, and its importance cannot be denied and hardly exaggerated.\nBut it is a long way from the Maine Law to the heights of absolute\nself-command which respect the conservatism of the entire energies of\nthe body, the mind, and the soul. I wish to point at some of its higher\nfunctions as it enters into mind and character.\n\nThere is a superlative temperament which has no medium range, but\nswiftly oscillates from the freezing to the boiling point, and which\naffects the manners of those who share it with a certain desperation.\nTheir aspect is grimace. They go tearing, convulsed through\nlife,--wailing, praying, exclaiming, swearing. We talk, sometimes, with\npeople whose conversation would lead you to suppose that they had lived\nin a museum, where all the objects were monsters and extremes. Their\ngood people are ph\u0153nixes; their naughty are like the prophet\u2019s figs.\nThey use the superlative of grammar: \u201cmost perfect,\u201d \u201cmost exquisite,\u201d\n\u201cmost horrible.\u201d Like the French, they are enchanted, they are\ndesolate, because you have got or have not got a shoe-string or a wafer\nyou happen to want,--not perceiving that superlatives are diminutives,\nand weaken; that the positive is the sinew of speech, the superlative\nthe fat. If the talker lose a tooth, he thinks the universal thaw and\ndissolution of things has come. Controvert his opinion and he cries\n\u201cPersecution!\u201d and reckons himself with Saint Barnabas, who was sawn in\ntwo.\n\nEspecially we note this tendency to extremes in the pleasant excitement\nof horror-mongers. Is there something so delicious in disasters and\npain? Bad news is always exaggerated, and we may challenge Providence\nto send a fact so tragical that we cannot contrive to make it a little\nworse in our gossip.\n\nAll this comes of poverty. We are unskilful definers. From want of\nskill to convey quality, we hope to move admiration by quantity.\nLanguage should aim to describe the fact. It is not enough to suggest\nit and magnify it. Sharper sight would indicate the true line. \u2019Tis\nvery wearisome, this straining talk, these experiences all exquisite,\nintense and tremendous,--\u201cThe best I ever saw;\u201d \u201cI never in my life!\u201d\nOne wishes these terms gazetted and forbidden. Every favorite is not\na cherub, nor every cat a griffin, nor each unpleasing person a dark,\ndiabolical intriguer; nor agonies, excruciations nor ecstasies our\ndaily bread.\n\nHorace Walpole relates that in the expectation, current in London a\ncentury ago, of a great earthquake, some people provided themselves\nwith dresses for the occasion. But one would not wear earthquake\ndresses or resurrection robes for a working jacket, nor make a codicil\nto his will whenever he goes out to ride; and the secrets of death,\njudgment and eternity are tedious when recurring as minute-guns.\nThousands of people live and die who were never, on a single occasion,\nhungry or thirsty, or furious or terrified. The books say, \u201cIt made\nmy hair stand on end!\u201d Who, in our municipal life, ever had such an\nexperience? Indeed, I believe that much of the rhetoric of terror,--\u201cIt\nfroze my blood,\u201d \u201cIt made my knees knock,\u201d etc.--most men have realized\nonly in dreams and nightmares.\n\nThen there is an inverted superlative, or superlative contrary, which\nshivers, like Demopho\u00f6n, in the sun: wants fan and parasol on the\ncold Friday; is tired by sleep; feeds on drugs and poisons; finds the\nrainbow a discoloration; hates birds and flowers.\n\nThe exaggeration of which I complain makes plain fact the more welcome\nand refreshing. It is curious that a face magnified in a concave\nmirror loses its expression. All this overstatement is needless. A\nlittle fact is worth a whole limbo of dreams, and I can well spare the\nexaggerations which appear to me screens to conceal ignorance. Among\nthese glorifiers, the coldest stickler for names and dates and measures\ncannot lament his criticism and coldness of fancy. Think how much\npains astronomers and opticians have taken to procure an achromatic\nlens. Discovery in the heavens has waited for it; discovery on the\nface of the earth not less. I hear without sympathy the complaint of\nyoung and ardent persons that they find life no region of romance,\nwith no enchanter, no giant, no fairies, nor even muses. I am very\nmuch indebted to my eyes, and am content that they should see the real\nworld, always geometrically finished without blur or halo. The more I\nam engaged with it the more it suffices.\n\nHow impatient we are, in these northern latitudes, of looseness and\nintemperance in speech! Our measure of success is the moderation and\nlow level of an individual\u2019s judgment. Doctor Channing\u2019s piety and\nwisdom had such weight that, in Boston, the popular idea of religion\nwas whatever this eminent divine held. But I remember that his best\nfriend, a man of guarded lips, speaking of him in a circle of his\nadmirers, said: \u201cI have known him long, I have studied his character,\nand I believe him capable of virtue.\u201d An eminent French journalist paid\na high compliment to the Duke of Wellington, when his documents were\npublished: \u201cHere are twelve volumes of military dispatches, and the\nword _glory_ is not found in them.\u201d\n\nThe English mind is arithmetical, values exactness, likes literal\nstatement; stigmatizes any heat or hyperbole as Irish, French, Italian,\nand infers weakness and inconsequence of character in speakers who\nuse it. It does not love the superlative but the positive degree.\nOur customary and mechanical existence is not favorable to flights;\nlong nights and frost hold us pretty fast to realities. The people of\nEnglish stock, in all countries, are a solid people, wearing good hats\nand shoes, and owners of land whose title-deeds are properly recorded.\nTheir houses are of wood, and brick, and stone, not designed to reel\nin earthquakes, nor blow about through the air much in hurricanes, nor\nto be lost under sand-drifts, nor to be made bonfires of by whimsical\nviziers; but to stand as commodious, rentable tenements for a century\nor two. All our manner of life is on a secure and moderate pattern,\nsuch as can last. Violence and extravagance are, once for all,\ndistasteful; competence, quiet, comfort, are the agreed welfare.\n\nEver a low style is best. \u201cI judge by every man\u2019s truth of his degree\nof understanding,\u201d said Chesterfield. And I do not know any advantage\nmore conspicuous which a man owes to his experience in markets and\nthe Exchange, or politics, than the caution and accuracy he acquires\nin his report of facts. \u201cUncle Joel\u2019s news is always true,\u201d said a\nperson to me with obvious satisfaction, and said it justly; for the old\nhead, after deceiving and being deceived many times, thinks, \u201cWhat\u2019s\nthe use of having to unsay to-day what I said yesterday? I will not\nbe responsible; I will not add an epithet. I will be as moderate as\nthe fact, and will use the same expression, without color, which I\nreceived; and rather repeat it several times, word for word, than vary\nit ever so little.\u201d\n\nThe first valuable power in a reasonable mind, one would say, was\nthe power of plain statement, or the power to receive things as they\nbefall, and to transfer the picture of them to another mind unaltered.\n\u2019Tis a good rule of rhetoric which Schlegel gives,--\u201cIn good prose,\nevery word is underscored;\u201d which, I suppose, means, Never italicize.\n\nSpartans, stoics, heroes, saints and gods use a short and positive\nspeech. They are never off their centres. As soon as they swell and\npaint and find truth not enough for them, softening of the brain has\nalready begun. It seems as if inflation were a disease incident to\ntoo much use of words, and the remedy lay in recourse to things. I am\ndaily struck with the forcible understatement of people who have no\nliterary habit. The low expression is strong and agreeable. The citizen\ndwells in delusions. His dress and draperies, house and stables, occupy\nhim. The poor countryman, having no circumstance of carpets, coaches,\ndinners, wine and dancing in his head to confuse him, is able to look\nstraight at you, without refraction or prismatic glories, and he sees\nwhether you see straight also, or whether your head is addled by this\nmixture of wines.\n\nThe common people diminish: \u201ca cold snap;\u201d \u201cit rains easy;\u201d \u201cgood\nhaying weather.\u201d When a farmer means to tell you that he is doing\nwell with his farm, he says, \u201cI don\u2019t work as hard as I did, and I\ndon\u2019t mean to.\u201d When he wishes to condemn any treatment of soils or of\nstock, he says, \u201cIt won\u2019t do any good.\u201d Under the Catskill Mountains\nthe boy in the steamboat said, \u201cCome up here, Tony; it looks pretty\nout-of-doors.\u201d The farmers in the region do not call particular\nsummits, as Killington, Camel\u2019s Hump, Saddle-back, etc., mountains, but\nonly \u201cthem \u2019ere rises,\u201d and reserve the word mountains for the range.\n\nI once attended a dinner given to a great state functionary by\nfunctionaries,--men of law, state, and trade. The guest was a great man\nin his own country and an honored diplomatist in this. His health was\ndrunk with some acknowledgment of his distinguished services to both\ncountries, and followed by nine cold hurrahs. There was the vicious\nsuperlative. Then the great official spoke and beat his breast, and\ndeclared that he should remember this honor to the latest moment of his\nexistence. He was answered again by officials. Pity, thought I, they\nshould lie so about their keen sensibility to the nine cold hurrahs\nand to the commonplace compliment of a dinner. Men of the world value\ntruth, in proportion to their ability; not by its sacredness, but for\nits convenience. Of such, especially of diplomatists, one has a right\nto expect wit and ingenuity to avoid the lie if they must comply with\nthe form. Now, I had been present, a little before, in the country at a\ncattle-show dinner, which followed an agricultural discourse delivered\nby a farmer: the discourse, to say the truth, was bad; and one of our\nvillage fathers gave at the dinner this toast: \u201cThe orator of the\nday: his subject deserves the attention of every farmer.\u201d The caution\nof the toast did honor to our village father. I wish great lords and\ndiplomatists had as much respect for truth.\n\nBut whilst thus everything recommends simplicity and temperance of\naction; the utmost directness, the positive degree, we mean thereby\nthat \u201crightly to be great is not to stir without great argument.\u201d\nWhenever the true objects of action appear, they are to be heartily\nsought. Enthusiasm is the height of man; it is the passing from the\nhuman to the divine.\n\nThe superlative is as good as the positive, if it be alive. If man\nloves the conditioned, he also loves the unconditioned. We don\u2019t\nwish to sin on the other side, and to be purists, nor to check the\ninvention of wit or the sally of humor. \u2019Tis very different, this weak\nand wearisome lie, from the stimulus to the fancy which is given by\na romancing talker who does not mean to be exactly taken,--like the\ngallant skipper who complained to his owners that he had pumped the\nAtlantic Ocean three times through his ship on the passage, and \u2019twas\ncommon to strike seals and porpoises in the hold. Or what was similarly\nasserted of the late Lord Jeffrey, at the Scottish bar,--an attentive\nauditor declaring on one occasion after an argument of three hours,\nthat he had spoken the whole English language three times over in his\nspeech.\n\nThe objection to unmeasured speech is its lie. All men like an\nimpressive fact. The astronomer shows you in his telescope the\nnebula of Orion, that you may look on that which is esteemed the\nfarthest-off land in visible nature. At the Bank of England they put a\nscrap of paper that is worth a million pounds sterling into the hands\nof the visitor to touch. Our travelling is a sort of search for the\nsuperlatives or summits of art,--much more the real wonders of power in\nthe human form. The arithmetic of Newton, the memory of Magliabecchi\nor Mirandola, the versatility of Julius C\u00e6sar, the concentration of\nBonaparte, the inspiration of Shakspeare, are sure of commanding\ninterest and awe in every company of men.\n\nThe superlative is the excess of expression. We are a garrulous,\ndemonstrative kind of creatures, and cannot live without much outlet\nfor all our sense and nonsense. And fit expression is so rare that\nmankind have a superstitious value for it, and it would seem the whole\nhuman race agree to value a man precisely in proportion to his power of\nexpression; and to the most expressive man that has existed, namely,\nShakspeare, they have awarded the highest place.\n\nThe expressors are the gods of the world, but the men whom these\nexpressors revere are the solid, balanced, undemonstrative citizens\nwho make the reserved guard, the central sense, of the world. For the\nluminous object wastes itself by its shining,--is luminous because it\nis burning up; and if the powers are disposed for display, there is\nall the less left for use and creation. The talent sucks the substance\nof the man. Superlatives must be bought by too many positives. Gardens\nof roses must be stripped to make a few drops of otto. And these\nraptures of fire and frost, which indeed cleanse pedantry out of\nconversation and make the speech salt and biting, would cost me the\ndays of well-being which are now so cheap to me, yet so valued. I like\nno deep stakes. I am a coward at gambling. I will bask in the common\nsun a while longer.\n\nChildren and thoughtless people like exaggerated event and activity;\nlike to run to a house on fire, to a fight, to an execution; like to\ntalk of a marriage, of a bankruptcy, of a debt, of a crime. The wise\nman shuns all this. I knew a grave man who, being urged to go to a\nchurch where a clergyman was newly ordained, said \u201che liked him very\nwell, but he would go when the interesting Sundays were over.\u201d\n\nAll rests at last on the simplicity of nature, or real being. Nothing\nis for the most part less esteemed. We are fond of dress, of ornament,\nof accomplishments, of talents, but distrustful of health, of\nsoundness, of pure innocence. Yet nature measures her greatness by what\nshe can spare, by what remains when all superfluity and accessories are\nshorn off.\n\nNor is there in nature itself any swell, any brag, any strain or shock,\nbut a firm common sense through all her elephants and lions, through\nall her ducks and geese; a true proportion between her means and her\nperformance. _Semper sibi similis._ You shall not catch her in\nany anomalies, nor swaggering into any monsters. In all the years\nthat I have sat in town and forest, I never saw a winged dragon, a\nflying man, or a talking fish, but ever the strictest regard to rule,\nand an absence of all surprises. No; nature encourages no looseness,\npardons no errors; freezes punctually at 32\u00b0, boils punctually at 212\u00b0;\ncrystallizes in water at one invariable angle, in diamond at one, in\ngranite at one; and if you omit the smallest condition the experiment\nwill not succeed. Her communication obeys the gospel rule, yea or nay.\nShe never expatiates, never goes into the reasons. Plant beechmast\nand it comes up, or it does not come up. Sow grain, and it does not\ncome up: put lime into the soil and try again, and this time she says\nyea. To every question an abstemious but absolute reply. The like\nstaidness is in her dealings with us. Nature is always serious,--does\nnot jest with us. Where we have begun in folly, we are brought quickly\nto plain dealing. Life could not be carried on except by fidelity and\ngood earnest; and she brings the most heartless trifler to determined\npurpose presently. The men whom she admits to her confidence, the\nsimple and great characters, are uniformly marked by absence of\npretension and by understatement. The old and the modern sages of\nclearest insight are plain men, who have held themselves hard to the\npoverty of nature.\n\nThe firmest and noblest ground on which people can live is truth; the\nreal with the real; a ground on which nothing is assumed, but where\nthey speak and think and do what they must, because they are so and not\notherwise.\n\nBut whilst the basis of character must be simplicity, the expression\nof character, it must be remembered, is, in great degree, a matter\nof climate. In the temperate climates there is a temperate speech,\nin torrid climates an ardent one. Whilst in Western nations the\nsuperlative in conversation is tedious and weak, and in character is a\ncapital defect, nature delights in showing us that in the East it is\nanimated, it is pertinent, pleasing, poetic. Whilst she appoints us\nto keep within the sharp boundaries of form as the condition of our\nstrength, she creates in the East the uncontrollable yearning to escape\nfrom limitation into the vast and boundless; to use a freedom of fancy\nwhich plays with all the works of nature, great or minute, galaxy or\ngrain of dust, as toys and words of the mind; inculcates the tenet\nof a beatitude to be found in escape from all organization and all\npersonality, and makes ecstasy an institution.\n\nReligion and poetry are all the civilization of the Arab. \u201cThe ground\nof Paradise,\u201d said Mohammed, \u201cis extensive, and the plants of it are\nhallelujahs.\u201d Religion and poetry: the religion teaches an inexorable\ndestiny; it distinguishes only two days in each man\u2019s history, the day\nof his lot, and the day of judgment. The religion runs into asceticism\nand fate. The costume, the articles in which wealth is displayed, are\nin the same extremes. Thus the diamond and the pearl, which are only\naccidental and secondary in their use and value to us, are proper to\nthe oriental world. The diver dives a beggar and rises with the price\nof a kingdom in his hand. A bag of sequins, a jewel, a balsam, a single\nhorse, constitute an estate in countries where insecure institutions\nmake every one desirous of concealable and convertible property. Shall\nI say, further, that the orientals excel in costly arts, in the cutting\nof precious stones, in working in gold, in weaving on hand-looms\ncostly stuffs from silk and wool, in spices, in dyes and drugs,\nhenna, otto and camphor, and in the training of slaves, elephants and\ncamels,--things which are the poetry and superlative of commerce.\n\nOn the other hand,--and it is a good illustration of the difference\nof genius,--the European nations, and, in general, all nations in\nproportion to their civilization, understand the manufacture of iron.\nOne of the meters of the height to which any civility rose is the\nskill in the fabric of iron. Universally, the better gold, the worse\nman. The political economist defies us to show any gold-mine country\nthat is traversed by good roads: or a shore where pearls are found\non which good schools are erected. The European civility, or that of\nthe positive degree, is established by coal-mines, by ventilation, by\nirrigation and every skill--in having water cheap and pure, by iron,\nby agriculture for bread-stuffs, and manufacture of coarse and family\ncloths. Our modern improvements have been in the invention of friction\nmatches; of India-rubber shoes; of the famous two parallel bars of\niron; then of the air-chamber of Watt, and of the judicious tubing of\nthe engine, by Stephenson, in order to the construction of locomotives.\n\nMeantime, Nature, who loves crosses and mixtures, makes these two\ntendencies necessary each to the other, and delights to re-enforce each\npeculiarity by imparting the other. The Northern genius finds itself\nsingularly refreshed and stimulated by the breadth and luxuriance of\nEastern imagery and modes of thinking, which go to check the pedantry\nof our inventions and the excess of our detail. There is no writing\nwhich has more electric power to unbind and animate the torpid\nintellect than the bold Eastern muse.\n\nIf it come back however to the question of final superiority, it is too\nplain that there is no question that the star of empire rolls West:\nthat the warm sons of the Southeast have bent the neck under the yoke\nof the cold temperament and the exact understanding of the Northwestern\nraces.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 7: Reprinted from the _Century_ of February, 1882.]\n\n\n\n\n                      THE SOVEREIGNTY OF ETHICS.\n\n    THESE rules were writ in human heart\n      By Him who built the day;\n    The columns of the universe\n      Not firmer based than they.\n\n\n            THOU shalt not try\n    To plant thy shrivelled pedantry\n      On the shoulders of the sky.\n\n\n\n\n                     THE SOVEREIGNTY OF ETHICS.[8]\n\n\nSINCE the discovery of Oersted that galvanism and electricity\nand magnetism are only forms of one and the same force, and\nconvertible each into the other, we have continually suggested to\nus a larger generalization: that each of the great departments of\nNature--chemistry, vegetation, the animal life--exhibits the same\nlaws on a different plane; that the intellectual and moral worlds are\nanalogous to the material. There is a kind of latent omniscience not\nonly in every man but in every particle. That convertibility we so\nadmire in plants and animal structures, whereby the repairs and the\nulterior uses are subserved, when one part is wounded or deficient,\nby another; this self-help and self-creation proceed from the same\noriginal power which works remotely in grandest and meanest structures\nby the same design,--works in a lobster or a mite-worm as a wise man\nwould if imprisoned in that poor form. \u2019Tis the effort of God, of the\nSupreme Intellect, in the extremest frontier of his universe.\n\nAs this unity exists in the organization of insect, beast and bird,\nstill ascending to man, and from lower type of man to the highest\nyet attained, so it does not less declare itself in the spirit or\nintelligence of the brute. In ignorant ages it was common to vaunt the\nhuman superiority by underrating the instinct of other animals; but a\nbetter discernment finds that the difference is only of less and more.\nExperiment shows that the bird and the dog reason as the hunter does,\nthat all the animals show the same good sense in their humble walk that\nthe man who is their enemy or friend does; and, if it be in smaller\nmeasure, yet it is not diminished, as his often is, by freak and folly.\nSt. Pierre says of the animals that a moral sentiment seems to have\ndetermined their physical organization.\n\nI see the unity of thought and of morals running through all animated\nNature; there is no difference of quality, but only of more and less.\nThe animal who is wholly kept down in Nature has no anxieties. By\nyielding, as he must do, to it, he is enlarged and reaches his highest\npoint. The poor grub, in the hole of a tree, by yielding itself to\nNature, goes blameless through its low part and is rewarded at last,\ncasts its filthy hull, expands into a beautiful form with rainbow\nwings, and makes a part of the summer day. The Greeks called it Psyche,\na manifest emblem of the soul. The man down in Nature occupies himself\nin guarding, in feeding, in warming and multiplying his body, and,\nas long as he knows no more, we justify him; but presently a mystic\nchange is wrought, a new perception opens, and he is made a citizen\nof the world of souls: he feels what is called duty; he is aware that\nhe owes a higher allegiance to do and live as a good member of this\nuniverse. In the measure in which he has this sense he is a man, rises\nto the universal life. The high intellect is absolutely at one with\nmoral nature. A thought is imbosomed in a sentiment, and the attempt to\ndetach and blazon the thought is like a show of cut flowers. The moral\nis the measure of health, and in the voice of Genius I hear invariably\nthe moral tone, even when it is disowned in words;--health, melody and\na wider horizon belong to moral sensibility. The finer the sense of\njustice, the better poet. The believer says to the skeptic:--\n\n    \u201cOne avenue was shaded from thine eyes\n    Through which I wandered to eternal truth.\u201d\n\nHumility is the avenue. To be sure, we exaggerate when we represent\nthese two elements as disunited; every man shares them both; but it is\ntrue that men generally are marked by a decided predominance of one or\nof the other element.\n\nIn youth and in age we are moralists, and in mature life the moral\nelement steadily rises in the regard of all reasonable men.\n\n\u2019Tis a sort of proverbial dying speech of scholars (at least it is\nattributed to many) that which Anthony Wood reports of Nathaniel\nCarpenter, an Oxford Fellow. \u201cIt did repent him,\u201d he said, \u201cthat he had\nformerly so much courted the maid instead of the mistress\u201d (meaning\nphilosophy and mathematics to the neglect of divinity). This, in the\nlanguage of our time, would be ethics.\n\nAnd when I say that the world is made up of moral forces, these are not\nseparate. All forces are found in Nature united with that which they\nmove: heat is not separate, light is not massed aloof, nor electricity,\nnor gravity, but they are always in combination. And so moral powers;\nthey are thirsts for action, and the more you accumulate the more they\nmould and form.\n\nIt is in the stomach of plants that development begins, and ends in\nthe circles of the universe. \u2019Tis a long scale from the gorilla to\nthe gentleman--from the gorilla to Plato, Newton, Shakspeare--to the\nsanctities of religion, the refinements of legislation, the summits of\nscience, art and poetry. The beginnings are slow and infirm, but it is\nan always-accelerated march. The geologic world is chronicled by the\ngrowing ripeness of the strata from lower to higher, as it becomes the\nabode of more highly-organized plants and animals. The civil history\nof men might be traced by the successive meliorations as marked in\nhigher moral generalizations;--virtue meaning physical courage, then\nchastity and temperance, then justice and love;--bargains of kings\nwith peoples of certain rights to certain classes, then of rights to\nmasses,--then at last came the day when, as the historians rightly\ntell, the nerves of the world were electrified by the proclamation that\nall men are born free and equal.\n\nEvery truth leads in another. The bud extrudes the old leaf, and every\ntruth brings that which will supplant it. In the court of law the judge\nsits over the culprit, but in the court of life in the same hour the\njudge also stands as culprit before a true tribunal. Every judge is\na culprit, every law an abuse. Montaigne kills off bigots as cowhage\nkills worms; but there is a higher muse there sitting where he durst\nnot soar, of eye so keen that it can report of a realm in which all the\nwit and learning of the Frenchman is no more than the cunning of a fox.\n\nIt is the same fact existing as sentiment and as will in the mind,\nwhich works in Nature as irresistible law, exerting influence over\nnations, intelligent beings, or down in the kingdoms of brute or\nof chemical atoms. Nature is a tropical swamp in sunshine, on\nwhose purlieus we hear the song of summer birds, and see prismatic\ndew-drops--but her interiors are terrific, full of hydras and\ncrocodiles. In the pre-adamite she bred valor only; by-and-by she gets\non to man, and adds tenderness, and thus raises virtue piecemeal.\n\nWhen we trace from the beginning, that ferocity has uses; only so\nare the conditions of the then world met, and these monsters are the\nscavengers, executioners, diggers, pioneers and fertilizers, destroying\nwhat is more destructive than they, and making better life possible. We\nsee the steady aim of Benefit in view from the first. Melioration is\nthe law. The cruelest foe is a masked benefactor. The wars which make\nhistory so dreary, have served the cause of truth and virtue. There is\nalways an instinctive sense of right, an obscure idea which animates\neither party and which in long periods vindicates itself at last. Thus\na sublime confidence is fed at the bottom of the heart that, in spite\nof appearances, in spite of malignity and blind self-interest living\nfor the moment, an eternal, beneficent necessity is always bringing\nthings right; and, though we should fold our arms,--which we cannot\ndo, for our duty requires us to be the very hands of this guiding\nsentiment, and work in the present moment,--the evils we suffer will\nat last end themselves through the incessant opposition of Nature to\neverything hurtful.\n\nThe excellence of men consists in the completeness with which the\nlower system is taken up into the higher--a process of much time\nand delicacy, but in which no point of the lower should be left\nuntranslated; so that the warfare of beasts should be renewed in a\nfiner field, for more excellent victories. Savage war gives place to\nthat of Turenne and Wellington, which has limitations and a code. This\nwar again gives place to the finer quarrel of property, where the\nvictory is wealth and the defeat poverty.\n\nThe inevitabilities are always sapping every seeming prosperity built\non a wrong. No matter how you seem to fatten on a crime, that can\nnever be good for the bee which is bad for the hive. See how these\nthings look in the page of history. Nations come and go, cities rise\nand fall, all the instincts of man, good and bad, work,--and every\nwish, appetite, and passion, rushes into act and embodies itself\nin usages, protects itself with laws. Some of them are useful and\nuniversally acceptable, hinder none, help all, and these are honored\nand perpetuated. Others are noxious. Community of property is tried,\nas when a Tartar horde or an Indian tribe roam over a vast tract for\npasturage or hunting; but it is found at last that some establishment\nof property, allowing each on some distinct terms to fence and\ncultivate a piece of land, is best for all.\n\n\u201cFor my part,\u201d said Napoleon, \u201cit is not the mystery of the incarnation\nwhich I discover in religion, but the mystery of social order, which\nassociates with heaven that idea of equality which prevents the rich\nfrom destroying the poor.\u201d\n\nShall I say then it were truer to see Necessity calm, beautiful,\npassionless, without a smile, covered with ensigns of woe, stretching\nher dark warp across the universe? These threads are Nature\u2019s\npernicious elements, her deluges, miasma, disease, poison; her\ncurdling cold, her hideous reptiles and worse men, cannibals, and the\ndepravities of civilization; the secrets of the prisons of tyranny, the\nslave and his master, the proud man\u2019s scorn, the orphan\u2019s tears, the\nvices of men, lust, cruelty and pitiless avarice. These make the gloomy\nwarp of ages. Humanity sits at the dread loom and throws the shuttle\nand fills it with joyful rainbows, until the sable ground is flowered\nall over with a woof of human industry and wisdom, virtuous examples,\nsymbols of useful and generous arts, with beauty and pure love, courage\nand the victories of the just and wise over malice and wrong.\n\nNature is not so helpless but it can rid itself at last of every crime.\nAn Eastern poet, in describing the golden age, said that God had made\njustice so dear to the heart of Nature that, if any injustice lurked\nanywhere under the sky, the blue vault would shrivel to a snake-skin\nand cast it out by spasms. But the spasms of Nature are years and\ncenturies, and it will tax the faith of man to wait so long.\n\nMan is always throwing his praise or blame on events, and does not see\nthat he only is real, and the world his mirror and echo. He imputes\nthe stroke to fortune, which in reality himself strikes. The student\ndiscovers one day that he lives in enchantment: the house, the works,\nthe persons, the days, the weathers--all that he calls Nature, all that\nhe calls institutions, when once his mind is active are visions merely,\nwonderful allegories, significant pictures of the laws of the mind; and\nthrough this enchanted gallery he is led by unseen guides to read and\nlearn the laws of Heaven. This discovery may come early,--sometimes in\nthe nursery, to a rare child; later in the school, but oftener when\nthe mind is more mature; and to multitudes of men wanting in mental\nactivity it never comes--any more than poetry or art. But it ought to\ncome; it belongs to the human intellect, and is an insight which we\ncannot spare.\n\nThe idea of right exists in the human mind, and lays itself out in the\nequilibrium of Nature, in the equalities and periods of our system, in\nthe level of seas, in the action and reaction of forces. Nothing is\nallowed to exceed or absorb the rest; if it do, it is disease, and\nis quickly destroyed. It was an early discovery of the mind,--this\nbeneficent rule. Strength enters just as much as the moral element\nprevails. The strength of the animal to eat and to be luxurious and to\nusurp is rudeness and imbecility. The law is: To each shall be rendered\nhis own. As thou sowest, thou shalt reap. Smite, and thou shalt smart.\nServe, and thou shalt be served. If you love and serve men, you\ncannot, by any hiding or stratagem, escape the remuneration. Secret\nretributions are always restoring the level, when disturbed, of the\nDivine justice. It is impossible to tilt the beam. All the tyrants and\nproprietors and monopolists of the world in vain set their shoulders to\nheave the bar. Settles for evermore the ponderous equator to its line,\nand man and mote and star and sun must range with it, or be pulverized\nby the recoil.\n\nIt is a doctrine of unspeakable comfort. He that plants his foot here,\npasses at once out of the kingdom of illusions. Others may well suffer\nin the hideous picture of crime with which earth is filled and the life\nof society threatened, but the habit of respecting that great order\nwhich certainly contains and will dispose of our little system, will\ntake all fear from the heart. It did itself create and distribute all\nthat is created and distributed, and, trusting to its power, we cease\nto care for what it will certainly order well. To good men, as we\ncall good men, this doctrine of Trust is an unsounded secret. They use\nthe word, they have accepted the notion of a mechanical supervision\nof human life, by which that certain wonderful being whom they call\nGod does take up their affairs where their intelligence leaves them,\nand somehow knits and co-ordinates the issues of them in all that is\nbeyond the reach of private faculty. They do not see that _He_,\nthat _It_, is there, next and within; the thought of the thought;\nthe affair of affairs; that he is existence, and take him from them and\nthey would not be. They do not see that particulars are sacred to him,\nas well as the scope and outline; that these passages of daily life are\nhis work; that in the moment when they desist from interference, these\nparticulars take sweetness and grandeur, and become the language of\nmighty principles.\n\nA man should be a guest in his own house, and a guest in his own\nthought. He is there to speak for truth; but who is he? Some clod the\ntruth has snatched from the ground, and with fire has fashioned to a\nmomentary man. Without the truth, he is a clod again. Let him find his\nsuperiority in not wishing superiority; find the riches of love which\npossesses that which it adores; the riches of poverty; the height of\nlowliness, the immensity of to-day; and, in the passing hour, the age\nof ages. Wondrous state of man! never so happy as when he has lost all\nprivate interests and regards, and exists only in obedience and love of\nthe Author.\n\nThe fiery soul said: \u201cLet me be a blot on this fair world, the\nobscurest, the loneliest sufferer, with one proviso,--that I know it is\nHis agency. I will love him, though he shed frost and darkness on every\nway of mine.\u201d The emphasis of that blessed doctrine lay in lowliness.\nThe new saint gloried in infirmities. Who or what was he? His rise and\nhis recovery were vicarious. He has fallen in another; he rises in\nanother.\n\nWe perish, and perish gladly, if the law remains. I hope it is\nconceivable that a man may go to ruin gladly, if he see that thereby\nno shade falls on that he loves and adores. We need not always be\nstipulating for our clean shirt and roast joint _per diem_.\nWe do not believe the less in astronomy and vegetation, because we\nare writhing and roaring in our beds with rheumatism. Cripples and\ninvalids, we doubt not there are bounding fawns in the forest, and\nlilies with graceful, springing stem; so neither do we doubt or fail\nto love the eternal law, of which we are such shabby practisers.\nTruth gathers itself spotless and unhurt after all our surrenders and\nconcealments and partisanship--never hurt by the treachery or ruin\nof its best defenders, whether Luther, or William Penn, or St. Paul.\nWe answer, when they tell us of the bad behavior of Luther or Paul:\n\u201cWell, what if he did? Who was more pained than Luther or Paul?\u201d\nShall we attach ourselves violently to our teachers and historical\npersonalities, and think the foundation shaken if any fault is shown in\ntheir record? But how is the truth hurt by their falling from it? The\nlaw of gravity is not hurt by every accident, though our leg be broken.\nNo more is the law of justice by our departure from it.\n\nWe are to know that we are never without a pilot. When we know not how\nto steer, and dare not hoist a sail, we can drift. The current knows\nthe way, though we do not. When the stars and sun appear, when we have\nconversed with navigators who know the coast, we may begin to put out\nan oar and trim a sail. The ship of heaven guides itself, and will not\naccept a wooden rudder.\n\nHave you said to yourself ever: \u2018I abdicate all choice, I see it is not\nfor me to interfere. I see that I have been one of the crowd; that I\nhave been a pitiful person, because I have wished to be my own master,\nand to dress and order my whole way and system of living. I thought I\nmanaged it very well. I see that my neighbors think so. I have heard\nprayers, I have prayed even, but I have never until now dreamed that\nthis undertaking the entire management of my own affairs was not\ncommendable. I have never seen, until now, that it dwarfed me. I have\nnot discovered, until this blessed ray flashed just now through my\nsoul, that there dwelt any power in Nature that would relieve me of my\nload. But now I see.\u2019\n\nWhat is this intoxicating sentiment that allies this scrap of dust to\nthe whole of Nature and the whole of Fate,--that makes this doll a\ndweller in ages, mocker at time, able to spurn all outward advantages,\npeer and master of the elements? I am taught by it that what touches\nany thread in the vast web of being touches me. I am representative of\nthe whole; and the good of the whole, or what I call the right, makes\nme invulnerable.\n\nHow came this creation so magically woven that nothing can do me\nmischief but myself,--that an invisible fence surrounds my being\nwhich screens me from all harm that I will to resist? If I will stand\nupright, the creation cannot bend me. But if I violate myself, if I\ncommit a crime, the lightning loiters by the speed of retribution,\nand every act is not hereafter but instantaneously rewarded according\nto its quality. Virtue is the adopting of this dictate of the\nuniversal mind by the individual will. Character is the habit of this\nobedience, and Religion is the accompanying emotion, the emotion of\nreverence which the presence of the universal mind ever excites in the\nindividual.\n\nWe go to famous books for our examples of character, just as we send\nto England for shrubs which grow as well in our own door-yards and\ncow-pastures. Life is always rich, and spontaneous graces and forces\nelevate it in every domestic circle, which are overlooked while we are\nreading something less excellent in old authors. From the obscurity and\ncasualty of those which I know, I infer the obscurity and casualty of\nthe like balm and consolation and immortality in a thousand homes which\nI do not know, all round the world. And I see not why to these simple\ninstincts, simple yet grand, all the heights and transcendencies of\nvirtue and of enthusiasm are not open. There is power enough in them\nto move the world; and it is not any sterility or defect in ethics,\nbut our negligence of these fine monitors, of these world-embracing\nsentiments, that makes religion cold and life low.\n\nWhile the immense energy of the sentiment of duty and the awe of the\nsupernatural exert incomparable influence on the mind,--yet it is\noften perverted, and the tradition received with awe, but without\ncorrespondent action of the receiver. Then you find so many men\ninfatuated on that topic! Wise on all other, they lose their head the\nmoment they talk of religion. It is the sturdiest prejudice in the\npublic mind that religion is something by itself; a department distinct\nfrom all other experiences, and to which the tests and judgment\nmen are ready enough to show on other things, do not apply. You may\nsometimes talk with the gravest and best citizen, and the moment the\ntopic of religion is broached, he runs into a childish superstition.\nHis face looks infatuated, and his conversation is. When I talked with\nan ardent missionary, and pointed out to him that his creed found no\nsupport in my experience, he replied, \u201cIt is not so in your experience,\nbut is so in the other world.\u201d I answer: Other world! there is no other\nworld. God is one and omnipresent; here or nowhere is the whole fact.\nThe one miracle which God works evermore is in Nature, and imparting\nhimself to the mind. When we ask simply, \u201cWhat is true in thought?\nwhat is just in action?\u201d it is the yielding of the private heart to\nthe Divine mind, and all personal preferences, and all requiring of\nwonders, are profane.\n\nThe word miracle, as it is used, only indicates the ignorance of\nthe devotee, staring with wonder to see water turned into wine, and\nheedless of the stupendous fact of his own personality. Here he stands,\na lonely thought harmoniously organized into correspondence with the\nuniverse of mind and matter. What narrative of wonders coming down from\na thousand years ought to charm his attention like this? Certainly\nit is human to value a general consent, a fraternity of believers,\na crowded church; but as the sentiment purifies and rises, it leaves\ncrowds. It makes churches of two, churches of one. A fatal disservice\ndoes this Swedenborg or other who offers to do my thinking for me. It\nseems as if, when the Spirit of God speaks so plainly to each soul,\nit were an impiety to be listening to one or another saint. Jesus was\nbetter than others, because he refused to listen to others and listened\nat home.\n\nYou are really interested in your thought. You have meditated in silent\nwonder on your existence in this world. You have perceived in the first\nfact of your conscious life here a miracle so astounding,--a miracle\ncomprehending all the universe of miracles to which your intelligent\nlife gives you access,--as to exhaust wonder, and leave you no need of\nhunting here or there for any particular exhibitions of power. Then\nup comes a man with a text of 1 John v. 7, or a knotty sentence from\nSt. Paul, which he considers as the axe at the root of your tree. You\ncannot bring yourself to care for it. You say: \u201cCut away; my tree is\nYgdrasil--the tree of life.\u201d He interrupts for the moment your peaceful\ntrust in the Divine Providence. Let him know by your security that your\nconviction is clear and sufficient, and if he were Paul himself, you\nalso are here, and with your Creator.\n\nWe all give way to superstitions. The house in which we were born\nis not quite mere timber and stone; is still haunted by parents and\nprogenitors. The creeds into which we were initiated in childhood and\nyouth no longer hold their old place in the minds of thoughtful men,\nbut they are not nothing to us, and we hate to have them treated with\ncontempt. There is so much that we do not know, that we give to these\nsuggestions the benefit of the doubt.\n\nIt is a necessity of the human mind that he who looks at one object\nshould look away from all other objects. He may throw himself upon some\nsharp statement of one fact, some verbal creed, with such concentration\nas to hide the universe from him: but the stars roll above; the sun\nwarms him. With patience and fidelity to truth he may work his way\nthrough, if only by coming against somebody who believes more fables\nthan he does; and, in trying to dispel the illusions of his neighbor,\nhe opens his own eyes.\n\nIn the Christianity of this country there is wide difference of opinion\nin regard to inspiration, prophecy, miracles, the future state of the\nsoul; every variety of opinion, and rapid revolution in opinions, in\nthe last half-century. It is simply impossible to read the old history\nof the first century as it was read in the ninth; to do so you must\nabolish in your mind the lessons of all the centuries from the ninth\nto the nineteenth.\n\nShall I make the mistake of baptizing the daylight, and time, and\nspace, by the name of John or Joshua, in whose tent I chance to behold\ndaylight, and space, and time? What anthropomorphists we are in this,\nthat we cannot let moral distinctions be, but must mould them into\nhuman shape! \u201cMere morality\u201d means,--not put into a personal master of\nmorals. Our religion is geographical, belongs to our time and place;\nrespects and mythologizes some one time and place and person and\npeople. So it is occasional. It visits us only on some exceptional and\nceremonial occasion, on a wedding or a baptism, on a sick-bed, or at a\nfuneral, or perhaps on a sublime national victory or a peace. But that\nbe sure is not the religion of the universal unsleeping providence,\nwhich lurks in trifles, in still, small voices, in the secrets of the\nheart and our closest thoughts, as efficiently as in our proclamations\nand successes.\n\nFar be it from me to underrate the men or the churches that have fixed\nthe hearts of men and organized their devout impulses or oracles into\ngood institutions. The Church of Rome had its saints, and inspired the\nconscience of Europe--St. Augustine, and Thomas \u00e0 Kempis, and F\u00e9nelon;\nthe piety of the English Church in Cranmer, and Herbert, and Taylor;\nthe Reformed Church, Scougal; the mystics, Behmen and Swedenborg;\nthe Quakers, Fox and James Naylor. I confess our later generation\nappears ungirt, frivolous, compared with the religions of the last\nor Calvinistic age. There was in the last century a serious habitual\nreference to the spiritual world, running through diaries, letters and\nconversation--yes, and into wills and legal instruments also, compared\nwith which our liberation looks a little foppish and dapper.\n\nThe religion of seventy years ago was an iron belt to the mind, giving\nit concentration and force. A rude people were kept respectable by\nthe determination of thought on the eternal world. Now men fall\nabroad,--want polarity,--suffer in character and intellect. A sleep\ncreeps over the great functions of man. Enthusiasm goes out. In its\nstead a low prudence seeks to hold society staunch, but its arms are\ntoo short, cordage and machinery never supply the place of life.\n\nLuther would cut his hand off sooner than write theses against the\npope if he suspected that he was bringing on with all his might the\npale negations of Boston Unitarianism. I will not now go into the\nmetaphysics of that reaction by which in history a period of belief\nis followed by an age of criticism, in which wit takes the place of\nfaith in the leading spirits, and an excessive respect for forms out\nof which the heart has departed becomes most obvious in the least\nreligious minds. I will not now explore the causes of the result, but\nthe fact must be conceded as of frequent recurrence, and never more\nevident than in our American church. To a self-denying, ardent church,\ndelighting in rites and ordinances, has succeeded a cold, intellectual\nrace, who analyze the prayer and psalm of their forefathers, and the\nmore intellectual reject every yoke of authority and custom with a\npetulance unprecedented. It is a sort of mark of probity and sincerity\nto declare how little you believe, while the mass of the community\nindolently follow the old forms with childish scrupulosity, and we have\npunctuality for faith, and good taste for character.\n\nBut I hope the defect of faith with us is only apparent. We shall find\nthat freedom has its own guards, and, as soon as in the vulgar it runs\nto license, sets all reasonable men on exploring those guards. I do\nnot think the summit of this age truly reached or expressed unless it\nattain the height which religion and philosophy reached in any former\nage. If I miss the inspiration of the saints of Calvinism, or of\nPlatonism, or Buddhism, our times are not up to theirs, or, more truly,\nhave not yet their own legitimate force.\n\nWorship is the regard for what is above us. Men are respectable only\nas they respect. We delight in children because of that religious eye\nwhich belongs to them; because of their reverence for their seniors,\nand for their objects of belief. The poor Irish laborer one sees with\nrespect, because he believes in something, in his church, and in his\nemployers. Superstitious persons we see with respect, because their\nwhole existence is not bounded by their hats and their shoes, but they\nwalk attended by pictures of the imagination, to which they pay homage.\nYou cannot impoverish man by taking away these objects above him\nwithout ruin. It is very sad to see men who think their goodness made\nof themselves; it is very grateful to see those who hold an opinion the\nreverse of this.\n\nAll ages of belief have been great; all of unbelief have been mean.\nThe Orientals believe in Fate. That which shall befall them is written\non the iron leaf; they will not turn on their heel to avoid famine,\nplague, or the sword of the enemy. That is great, and gives a great\nair to the people. We in America are charged with a great deficiency\nin worship; that reverence does not belong to our character; that\nour institutions, our politics, and our trade, have fostered a\nself-reliance which is small, liliputian, full of fuss and bustle;\nwe look at and will bear nothing above us in the state, and do\nexceedingly applaud and admire ourselves, and believe in our senses\nand understandings, while our imagination and our moral sentiment are\ndesolated. In religion too we want objects above; we are fast losing\nor have already lost our old reverence; new views of inspiration, of\nmiracles, of the saints, have supplanted the old opinions, and it\nis vain to bring them again. Revolutions never go backward, and in\nall churches a certain decay of ancient piety is lamented, and all\nthreatens to lapse into apathy and indifferentism. It becomes us to\nconsider whether we cannot have a real faith and real objects in lieu\nof these false ones. The human mind, when it is trusted, is never false\nto itself. If there be sincerity and good meaning--if there be really\nin us the wish to seek for our superiors, for that which is lawfully\nabove us, we shall not long look in vain.\n\nMeantime there is great centrality, a centripetence equal to the\ncentrifugence. The mystic or theist is never scared by any startling\nmaterialism. He knows the laws of gravitation and of repulsion are\ndeaf to French talkers, be they never so witty. If theology shows that\nopinions are fast changing, it is not so with the convictions of men\nwith regard to conduct. These remain. The most daring heroism, the most\naccomplished culture, or rapt holiness, never exhausted the claim of\nthese lowly duties,--never penetrated to their origin, or was able to\nlook behind their source. We cannot disenchant, we cannot impoverish\nourselves, by obedience; but by humility we rise, by obedience we\ncommand, by poverty we are rich, by dying we live.\n\nWe are thrown back on rectitude forever and ever, only rectitude,--to\nmend one; that is all we can do. But _that_ the zealot stigmatizes\nas a sterile chimney-corner philosophy. Now the first position I\nmake is that natural religion supplies still all the facts which are\ndisguised under the dogma of popular creeds. The progress of religion\nis steadily to its identity with morals.\n\nHow is the new generation to be edified? How should it not? The life\nof those once omnipotent traditions was really not in the legend, but\nin the moral sentiment and the metaphysical fact which the legends\nenclosed--and these survive. A new Socrates, or Zeno, or Swedenborg, or\nPascal, or a new crop of geniuses like those of the Elizabethan age,\nmay be born in this age, and, with happy heart and a bias for theism,\nbring asceticism, duty, and magnanimity into vogue again.\n\nIt is true that Stoicism, always attractive to the intellectual and\ncultivated, has now no temples, no academy, no commanding Zeno or\nAntoninus. It accuses us that it has none: that pure ethics is not\nnow formulated and concreted into a _cultus_, a fraternity with\nassemblings and holy-days, with song and book, with brick and stone.\nWhy have not those who believe in it and love it left all for this,\nand dedicated themselves to write out its scientific scriptures to\nbecome its Vulgate for millions? I answer for one that the inspirations\nwe catch of this law are not continuous and technical, but joyful\nsparkles, and are recorded for their beauty, for the delight they give,\nnot for their obligation; and that is their priceless good to men, that\nthey charm and uplift, not that they are imposed. It has not yet its\nfirst hymn. But, that every line and word may be coals of true fire,\nages must roll, ere these casual wide-falling cinders can be gathered\ninto broad and steady altar-flame.\n\nIt does not yet appear what forms the religious feeling will take. It\nprepares to rise out of all forms to an absolute justice and healthy\nperception. Here is now a new feeling of humanity infused into public\naction. Here is contribution of money on a more extended and systematic\nscale than ever before to repair public disasters at a distance, and\nof political support to oppressed parties. Then there are the new\nconventions of social science, before which the questions of the rights\nof women, the laws of trade, the treatment of crime, regulation of\nlabor, come for a hearing. If these are tokens of the steady currents\nof thought and will in these directions, one might well anticipate a\nnew nation.\n\nI know how delicate this principle is,--how difficult of adaptation\nto practical and social arrangements. It cannot be profaned; it cannot\nbe forced; to draw it out of its natural current is to lose at once\nall its power. Such experiments as we recall are those in which some\nsect or dogma made the tie, and that was an artificial element, which\nchilled and checked the union. But is it quite impossible to believe\nthat men should be drawn to each other by the simple respect which\neach man feels for another in whom he discovers absolute honesty;\nthe respect he feels for one who thinks life is quite too coarse and\nfrivolous, and that he should like to lift it a little, should like\nto be the friend of some man\u2019s virtue? for another who, underneath\nhis compliances with artificial society, would dearly like to serve\nsomebody,--to test his own reality by making himself useful and\nindispensable?\n\nMan does not live by bread alone, but by faith, by admiration, by\nsympathy. \u2019Tis very shallow to say that cotton, or iron, or silver and\ngold are kings of the world; there are rulers that will at any moment\nmake these forgotten. Fear will. Love will. Character will. Men live by\ntheir credence. Governments stand by it,--by the faith that the people\nshare,--whether it comes from the religion in which they were bred, or\nfrom an original conscience in themselves, which the popular religion\nechoes. If government could only stand by force, if the instinct of\nthe people was to resist the government, it is plain the government\nmust be two to one in order to be secure, and then it would not be safe\nfrom desperate individuals. But no; the old commandment, \u201cThou shalt\nnot kill,\u201d holds down New York, and London, and Paris, and not a police\nor horse-guards.\n\nThe credence of men it is that moulds them, and creates at will one\nor another surface. The mind as it opens transfers very fast its\nchoice from the circumstance to the cause; from courtesy to love,\nfrom inventions to science, from London or Washington law, or public\nopinion, to the self-revealing idea; from all that talent executes to\nthe sentiment that fills the heart and dictates the future of nations.\nThe commanding fact which I never do not see, is the sufficiency of\nthe moral sentiment. We buttress it up, in shallow hours or ages, with\nlegends, traditions and forms, each good for the one moment in which\nit was a happy type or symbol of the Power, but the Power sends in the\nnext moment a new lesson, which we lose while our eyes are reverted and\nstriving to perpetuate the old.\n\nAmerica shall introduce a pure religion. Ethics are thought not to\nsatisfy affection. But all the religion we have is the ethics of one\nor another holy person; as soon as character appears, be sure love\nwill, and veneration, and anecdotes, and fables about him, and delight\nof good men and women in him. And what deeps of grandeur and beauty\nare known to us in ethical truth, what divination or insight belongs\nto it! For innocence is a wonderful electuary for purging the eyes to\nsearch the nature of those souls that pass before it. What armor it is\nto protect the good from outward or inward harm, and with what power it\nconverts evil accidents into benefits; the power of its countenance;\nthe power of its presence! To it alone comes true friendship; to it\ncome grandeur of situation and poetic perception, enriching all it\ndeals with.\n\nOnce men thought Spirit divine, and Matter diabolic; one Ormuzd, the\nother Ahriman. Now science and philosophy recognize the parallelism,\nthe approximation, the unity of the two: how each reflects the other as\nface answers to face in a glass: nay, how the laws of both are one, or\nhow one is the realization. We are learning not to fear truth.\n\nThe man of this age must be matriculated in the university of sciences\nand tendencies flowing from all past periods. He must not be one\nwho can be surprised and shipwrecked by every bold or subtile word\nwhich malignant and acute men may utter in his hearing, but should be\ntaught all skepticisms and unbeliefs, and made the destroyer of all\ncard-houses and paper walls, and the sifter of all opinions, by being\nput face to face from his infancy with Reality.\n\nA man who has accustomed himself to look at all his circumstances\nas very mutable, to carry his possessions, his relations to persons,\nand even his opinions, in his hand, and in all these to pierce to the\nprinciple and moral law, and everywhere to find that,--has put himself\nout of the reach of all skepticism; and it seems as if whatever is most\naffecting and sublime in our intercourse, in our happiness, and in our\nlosses, tended steadily to uplift us to a life so extraordinary, and,\none might say, superhuman.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 8: Reprinted from the _North American Review_, of May,\n1878.]\n\n\n\n\n                             THE PREACHER.\n\n    ASCENDING thorough just degrees\n    To a consummate holiness,\n    As angel blind to trespass done,\n    And bleaching all souls like the sun.\n\n\n\n\n                           THE PREACHER.[9]\n\n\nIN the history of opinion, the pinch of falsehood shows itself first,\nnot in argument and formal protest, but in insincerity, indifference\nand abandonment of the Church or the scientific or political or\neconomic institution for other better or worse forms.\n\nThe venerable and beautiful traditions in which we were educated are\nlosing their hold on human belief, day by day; a restlessness and\ndissatisfaction in the religious world marks that we are in a moment\nof transition; as when the Roman Church broke into Protestant and\nCatholic, or, earlier, when Paganism broke into Christians and Pagans.\nThe old forms rattle, and the new delay to appear; material and\nindustrial activity have materialized the age, and the mind, haughty\nwith its sciences, disdains the religious forms as childish.\n\nIn consequence of this revolution in opinion, it appears, for the\ntime, as the misfortune of this period that the cultivated mind has\nnot the happiness and dignity of the religious sentiment. We are\nborn too late for the old and too early for the new faith. I see in\nthose classes and those persons in whom I am accustomed to look for\ntendency and progress, for what is most positive and most rich in human\nnature, and who contain the activity of to-day and the assurance of\nto-morrow,--I see in them character, but skepticism; a clear enough\nperception of the inadequacy of the popular religious statement to the\nwants of their heart and intellect, and explicit declarations of this\nfact. They have insight and truthfulness; they will not mask their\nconvictions; they hate cant; but more than this I do not readily find.\nThe gracious motions of the soul,--piety, adoration,--I do not find.\nScorn of hypocrisy, pride of personal character, elegance of taste\nand of manners and pursuit, a boundless ambition of the intellect,\nwillingness to sacrifice personal interests for the integrity of the\ncharacter,--all these they have; but that religious submission and\nabandonment which give man a new element and being, and make him\nsublime,--it is not in churches, it is not in houses. I see movement, I\nhear aspirations, but I see not how the great God prepares to satisfy\nthe heart in the new order of things. No Church, no State emerges; and\nwhen we have extricated ourselves from all the embarrassments of the\nsocial problem, the oracle does not yet emit any light on the mode of\nindividual life. A thousand negatives it utters, clear and strong, on\nall sides; but the sacred affirmative it hides in the deepest abyss.\n\nWe do not see that heroic resolutions will save men from those tides\nwhich a most fatal moon heaps and levels in the moral, emotive\nand intellectual nature. It is certain that many dark hours, many\nimbecilities, periods of inactivity,--solstices when we make no\nprogress, but stand still,--will occur. In those hours, we can find\ncomfort in reverence of the highest power, and only in that. We never\ndo quite nothing, or never need. It looks as if there were much doubt,\nmuch waiting, to be endured by the best. Perhaps there must be austere\nelections and determinations before any clear vision.\n\nNo age and no person is destitute of the sentiment, but in\nactual history its illustrious exhibitions are interrupted and\nperiodical,--the ages of belief, of heroic action, of intellectual\nactivity, of men cast in a higher mould.\n\nBut the sentiment that pervades a nation, the nation must react upon.\nIt is resisted and corrupted by that obstinate tendency to personify\nand bring under the eyesight what should be the contemplation of\nReason alone. The Understanding will write out the vision in a\nConfession of Faith. Art will embody this vanishing Spirit in temples,\npictures, sculptures and hymns. The senses instantly transfer the\nreverence from the vanishing Spirit to this steadfast form. Ignorance\nand passion alloy and degrade. In proportion to a man\u2019s want of\ngoodness, it seems to him another and not himself; that is to say, the\nDeity becomes more objective, until finally flat idolatry prevails.\n\nOf course the virtuous sentiment appears arrayed against the nominal\nreligion, and the true men are hunted as unbelievers, and burned. Then\nthe good sense of the people wakes up so far as to take tacit part with\nthem, to cast off reverence for the Church; and there follows an age of\nunbelief.\n\nThis analysis was inevitable and useful. But the sober eye finds\nsomething ghastly in this empiricism. At first, delighted with the\ntriumph of the intellect, the surprise of the results and the sense\nof power, we are like hunters on the scent and soldiers who rush to\nbattle: but when the game is run down, when the enemy lies cold in his\nblood at our feet, we are alarmed at our solitude; we would gladly\nrecall the life that so offended us; the face seems no longer that of\nan enemy.\n\nI say the effect is withering; for, this examination resulting in the\nconstant detection of errors, the flattered understanding assumes to\njudge all things, and to anticipate the same victories. In the activity\nof the understanding, the sentiments sleep. The understanding presumes\nin things above its sphere, and, because it has exposed errors in a\nchurch, concludes that a church is an error; because it has found\nabsurdities to which the sentiment of veneration is attached, sneers at\nveneration; so that analysis has run to seed in unbelief. There is no\nfaith left. We laugh and hiss, pleased with our power in making heaven\nand earth a howling wilderness.\n\nUnlovely, nay, frightful, is the solitude of the soul which is without\nGod in the world. To wander all day in the sunlight among the tribes\nof animals, unrelated to anything better; to behold the horse, cow and\nbird, and to foresee an equal and speedy end to him and them;--no, the\nbird, as it hurried by with its bold and perfect flight, would disclaim\nhis sympathy and declare him an outcast. To see men pursuing in faith\ntheir varied action, warm-hearted, providing for their children, loving\ntheir friends, performing their promises,--what are they to this\nchill, houseless, fatherless, aimless Cain, the man who hears only the\nsound of his own footsteps in God\u2019s resplendent creation? To him, it\nis no creation; to him, these fair creatures are hapless spectres:\nhe knows not what to make of it. To him, heaven and earth have lost\ntheir beauty. How gloomy is the day, and upon yonder shining pond what\nmelancholy light! I cannot keep the sun in heaven, if you take away the\npurpose that animates him. The ball, indeed, is there, but his power\nto cheer, to illuminate the heart as well as the atmosphere, is gone\nforever. It is a lamp-wick for meanest uses. The words, _great_,\n_venerable_, have lost their meaning; every thought loses all its\ndepth and has become mere surface.\n\nBut religion has an object. It does not grow thin or robust with the\nhealth of the votary. The object of adoration remains forever unhurt\nand identical. We are in transition, from the worship of the fathers\nwhich enshrined the law in a private and personal history, to a worship\nwhich recognizes the true eternity of the law, its presence to you\nand me, its equal energy in what is called brute nature as in what is\ncalled sacred. The next age will behold God in the ethical laws--as\nmankind begins to see them in this age, self-equal, self-executing,\ninstantaneous and self-affirmed; needing no voucher, no prophet and no\nmiracle besides their own irresistibility,--and will regard natural\nhistory, private fortunes and politics, not for themselves, as we have\ndone, but as illustrations of those laws, of that beatitude and love.\nNature is too thin a screen; the glory of the One breaks in everywhere.\n\nEvery movement of religious opinion is of profound importance to\npolitics and social life; and this of to-day has the best omens as\nbeing of the most expansive humanity, since it seeks to find in every\nnation and creed the imperishable doctrines. I find myself always\nstruck and stimulated by a good anecdote, any trait of heroism, of\nfaithful service. I do not find that the age or country makes the least\ndifference; no, nor the language the actors spoke, nor the religion\nwhich they professed, whether Arab in the desert, or Frenchman in the\nAcademy. I see that sensible men and conscientious men all over the\nworld were of one religion,--the religion of well-doing and daring, men\nof sturdy truth, men of integrity and feeling for others. My inference\nis that there is a statement of religion possible which makes all\nskepticism absurd.\n\nThe health and welfare of man consist in ascent from surfaces to\nsolids; from occupation with details to knowledge of the design; from\nself-activity of talents, which lose their way by the lust of display,\nto the controlling and reinforcing of talents by the emanation of\ncharacter. All that we call religion, all that saints and churches and\nBibles from the beginning of the world have aimed at, is to suppress\nthis impertinent surface-action, and animate man to central and entire\naction. The human race are afflicted with a St. Vitus\u2019 dance; their\nfingers and toes, their members, their senses, their talents, are\nsuperfluously active, while the torpid heart gives no oracle. When\nthat wakes, it will revolutionize the world. Let that speak, and all\nthese rebels will fly to their loyalty. Now every man defeats his own\naction,--professes this but practises the reverse; with one hand rows,\nand with the other backs water. A man acts not from one motive, but\nfrom many shifting fears and short motives; it is as if he were ten or\ntwenty less men than himself, acting at discord with one another, so\nthat the result of most lives is zero. But when he shall act from one\nmotive, and all his faculties play true, it is clear mathematically,\nis it not, that this will tell in the result as if twenty men had\nco-operated,--will give new senses, new wisdom of its own kind; that\nis, not more facts, nor new combinations, but divination, or direct\nintuition of the state of men and things?\n\nThe lessons of the moral sentiment are, once for all, an emancipation\nfrom that anxiety which takes the joy out of all life. It teaches\na great peace. It comes itself from the highest place. It is that,\nwhich being in all sound natures, and strongest in the best and most\ngifted men, we know to be implanted by the Creator of Men. It is a\ncommandment at every moment and in every condition of life to do the\nduty of that moment and to abstain from doing the wrong. And it is so\nnear and inward and constitutional to each, that no commandment can\ncompare with it in authority. All wise men regard it as the voice of\nthe Creator himself.\n\nI know there are those to whom the question of what shall be believed\nis the more interesting because they are to proclaim and teach what\nthey believe.\n\nAll positive rules, ceremonial, ecclesiastical, distinctions of race or\nof person, are perishable; only those distinctions hold which are in\nthe nature of things, not matters of positive ordinance. As the earth\nwe stand upon is not imperishable, but is chemically resolvable into\ngases and nebul\u00e6, so is the universe an infinite series of planes, each\nof which is a false bottom; and, when we think our feet are planted now\nat last on adamant, the slide is drawn out from under us.\n\nWe must reconcile ourselves to the new order of things. But is it\na calamity? The poet Wordsworth greeted even the steam-engine and\nrailroads; and when they came into his poetic Westmoreland, bisecting\nevery delightful valley, deforming every consecrated grove, yet manned\nhimself to say:--\n\n    \u201cIn spite of all that Beauty may disown\n    In your harsh features, Nature doth embrace\n    Her lawful offspring in man\u2019s art, and Time,\n    Pleased with your triumphs o\u2019er his brother Space,\n    Accepts from your bold hands the proffered crown\n    Of hope, and smiles on you with cheer sublime.\u201d\n\nAnd we can keep our religion, despite of the violent railroads of\ngeneralization, whether French or German, that block and intersect our\nold parish highways.\n\nIn matters of religion, men eagerly fasten their eyes on the\ndifferences between their creed and yours, whilst the charm of the\nstudy is in finding the agreements and identities in all the religions\nof men. What is essential to the theologian is, that whilst he is\nselect in his opinions, severe in his search for truth, he shall be\nbroad in his sympathies,--not to allow himself to be excluded from any\nchurch. He is to claim for his own whatever eloquence of St. Chrysostom\nor St. Jerome or St. Bernard he has felt. So not less of Bishop Taylor\nor George Herbert or Henry Scougal. He sees that what is most effective\nin the writer is what is dear to his, the reader\u2019s, mind.\n\nBe not betrayed into undervaluing the churches which annoy you by\ntheir bigoted claims. They too were real churches. They answered to\ntheir times the same need as your rejection of them does to ours.\nThe Catholic Church has been immensely rich in men and influences.\nAugustine, \u00e0 Kempis, F\u00e9nelon, breathe the very spirit which now fires\nyou. So with Cudworth, More, Bunyan. I agree with them more than I\ndisagree. I agree with their heart and motive; my discontent is with\ntheir limitations and surface and language. Their statement is grown\nas fabulous as Dante\u2019s Inferno. Their purpose is as real as Dante\u2019s\nsentiment and hatred of vice. Always put the best interpretation on\na tenet. Why not on Christianity, wholesome, sweet and poetic? It is\nthe record of a pure and holy soul, humble, absolutely disinterested,\na truth-speaker and bent on serving, teaching and uplifting men.\nChristianity taught the capacity, the element, to love the All-perfect\nwithout a stingy bargain for personal happiness. It taught that to love\nhim was happiness,--to love him in other\u2019s virtues.\n\nAn era in human history is the life of Jesus; and the immense influence\nfor good leaves all the perversion and superstition almost harmless.\nMankind have been subdued to the acceptance of his doctrine, and cannot\nspare the benefit of so pure a servant of truth and love.\n\nOf course a hero so attractive to the hearts of millions drew the\nhypocrite and the ambitious into his train, and they used his name to\nfalsify his history and undo his work. I fear that what is called\nreligion, but is perhaps pew-holding, not obeys but conceals the moral\nsentiment. I put it to this simple test: Is a rich rogue made to\nfeel his roguery among divines or literary men? No? Then \u2019tis rogue\nagain under the cassock. What sort of respect can these preachers or\nnewspapers inspire by their weekly praises of texts and saints, when we\nknow that they would say just the same things if Beelzebub had written\nthe chapter, provided it stood where it does in the public opinion?\n\nAnything but unbelief, anything but losing hold of the moral\nintuitions, as betrayed in the clinging to a form of devotion or a\ntheological dogma; as if it was the liturgy, or the chapel, that was\nsacred, and not justice and humility and the loving heart and serving\nhand.\n\nBut besides the passion and interest which pervert, is the shallowness\nwhich impoverishes. The opinions of men lose all worth to him who\nperceives that they are accurately predictable from the ground of their\nsect. Nothing is more rare, in any man, than an act of his own. The\nclergy are as like as peas. I cannot tell them apart. It was said: They\nhave bronchitis because they read from their papers sermons with a near\nvoice, and then, looking at the congregation, they try to speak with\ntheir far voice, and the shock is noxious. I think they do this, or\nthe converse of this, with their thought. They look into Plato, or into\nthe mind, and then try to make parish mince-meat of the amplitudes and\neternities, and the shock is noxious. It is the old story again: once\nwe had wooden chalices and golden priests, now we have golden chalices\nand wooden priests.\n\nThe clergy are always in danger of becoming wards and pensioners of\nthe so-called producing classes. Their first duty is self-possession\nfounded on knowledge. The man of practice or worldly force requires\nof the preacher a talent, a force, like his own; the same as his own,\nbut wholly applied to the priest\u2019s things. He does not forgive an\napplication in the preacher to the merchant\u2019s things. He wishes him to\nbe such a one as he himself should have been, had he been priest. He is\nsincere and ardent in his vocation, and plunged in it. Let priest or\npoet be as good in theirs.\n\nThe simple fact that the pulpit exists, that all over this country the\npeople are waiting to hear a sermon on Sunday, assures that opportunity\nwhich is inestimable to young men, students of theology, for those\nlarge liberties. The existence of the Sunday, and the pulpit waiting\nfor a weekly sermon, give him the very conditions, the \u03c0\u03bf\u1f7a \u03c3\u03c4\u1f7c he\nwants. That must be filled, and he is armed to fill it. Let him value\nhis talent as a door into Nature. Let him see his performances only\nas limitations. Then, over all, let him value the sensibility that\nreceives, that loves, that dares, that affirms.\n\nThere are always plenty of young, ignorant people,--though some of them\nare seven, and some of them seventy years old,--wanting peremptorily\ninstruction; but, in the usual averages of parishes, only one person\nthat is qualified to give it. It is only that person who concerns\nme,--him only that I see. The others are very amiable and promising,\nbut they are only neuters in the hive,--every one a possible royal bee,\nbut not now significant. It does not signify what they say or think\nto-day; \u2019tis the cry and the babble of the nursery, and their only\nvirtue, docility. Buckminster, Channing, Dr. Lowell, Edward Taylor,\nParker, Bushnell, Chapin,--it is they who have been necessary, and the\nopinions of the floating crowd of no importance whatever.\n\nI do not love sensation preaching,--the personalities for spite, the\nhurrah for our side, the review of our appearances and what others say\nof us! That you may read in the gazette. We come to church properly\nfor self-examination, for approach to principles to see how it stands\nwith _us_, with the deep and dear facts of right and love. At the\nsame time it is impossible to pay no regard to the day\u2019s events, to\nthe public opinion of the times, to the stirring shouts of parties,\nto the calamities and prosperities of our town and country; to war and\npeace, new events, great personages, to good harvests, new resources,\nto bankruptcies, famines and desolations. We are not stocks or stones,\nwe are not thinking machines, but allied to men around us, as really\nthough not quite so visibly as the Siamese brothers. And it were\ninhuman to affect ignorance or indifference on Sundays to what makes\nour blood beat and our countenance dejected Saturday or Monday. No,\nthese are fair tests to try our doctrines by, and see if they are worth\nanything in life. The value of a principle is the number of things it\nwill explain; and there is no good theory of disease which does not at\nonce suggest a cure.\n\nMan proposes, but God disposes. We shall not very long have any part\nor lot in this earth, in whose affairs we so hotly mix, and where\nwe feel and speak so energetically of our country and our cause. It\nis a comfort to reflect that the gigantic evils which seem to us so\nmischievous and so incurable will at last end themselves and rid the\nworld of their presence, as all crime sooner or later must. But be\nthat event for us soon or late, we are not excused from playing our\nshort part in the best manner we can, no matter how insignificant\nour aid may be. Our children will be here, if we are not; and their\nchildren\u2019s history will be colored by our action. But if we have no\nchildren, or if the events in which we have taken our part shall not\nsee their solution until a distant future, there is yet a deeper fact;\nthat as much justice as we can see and practise is useful to men, and\nimperative, whether we can see it to be useful or not.\n\nThe essential ground of a new book or a new sermon is a new spirit.\nThe author has a new thought, sees the sweep of a more comprehensive\ntendency than others are aware of; falters never, but takes the\nvictorious tone. For power is not so much shown in talent as in tone.\nAnd if I had to counsel a young preacher, I should say: When there is\nany difference felt between the foot-board of the pulpit and the floor\nof the parlor, you have not yet said that which you should say.\n\nInspiration will have advance, affirmation, the forward foot, the\nascending state; it will be an opener of doors; it will invent its own\nmethods: the new wine will make the bottles new. Spirit is motive and\nascending. Only let there be a deep observer, and he will make light\nof new shop and new circumstance that afflict you; new shop, or old\ncathedral, it is all one to him. He will find the circumstance not\naltered, as deep a cloud of mystery on the cause, as dazzling a glory\non the invincible law. Given the insight, and he will find as many\nbeauties and heroes and strokes of genius close by him as Dante or\nShakspeare beheld. A vivid thought brings the power to paint it; and in\nproportion to the depth of its source is the force of its projection.\nWe are happy and enriched; we go away invigorated, assisted each in our\nown work, however different, and shall not forget to come again for new\nimpulses.\n\nThe supposed embarrassments to young clergymen exist only to feeble\nwills. They need not consider them. The differences of opinion, the\nstrength of old sects or timorous literalists, since it is not armed\nwith prisons or fagots as in ruder times or countries, is not worth\nconsidering except as furnishing a needed stimulus. That gray deacon\nor respectable matron with Calvinistic antecedents, you can readily\nsee, could not have presented any obstacle to the march of St. Bernard\nor of George Fox, of Luther or of Theodore Parker. And though I\nobserve the deafness to counsel among men, yet the power of sympathy\nis always great; and affirmative discourse, presuming assent, will\noften obtain it when argument would fail. Such, too, is the active\npower of good temperament. Great sweetness of temper neutralizes such\nvast amounts of acid! As for position, the position is always the\nsame,--insulting the timid, and not taken by storm, but flanked, I may\nsay, by the resolute, simply by minding their own affair. Speak the\naffirmative; emphasize your choice by utter ignoring of all that you\nreject; seeing that opinions are temporary, but convictions uniform\nand eternal,--seeing that a sentiment never loses its pathos or its\npersuasion, but is youthful after a thousand years.\n\nThe inevitable course of remark for us, when we meet each other for\nmeditation on life and duty, is not so much the enjoining of this or\nthat cure or burning out of our errors of practice, as simply the\ncelebration of the power and beneficence amid which and by which we\nlive, not critical, but affirmative.\n\nAll civil mankind have agreed in leaving one day for contemplation\nagainst six for practice. I hope that day will keep its honor and its\nuse. A wise man advises that we should see to it that we read and speak\ntwo or three reasonable words, every day, amid the crowd of affairs and\nthe noise of trifles. I should say boldly that we should astonish every\nday by a beam out of eternity; retire a moment to the grand secret we\ncarry in our bosom, of inspiration from heaven. But certainly on this\nseventh let us be the children of liberty, of reason, of hope; refresh\nthe sentiment; think as spirits think, who belong to the universe,\nwhilst our feet walk in the streets of a little town and our hands work\nin a small knot of affairs. We shall find one result, I am sure,--a\ncertain originality and a certain haughty liberty proceeding out of our\nretirement and self-communion, which streets can never give, infinitely\nremoved from all vaporing and bravado, and which yet is more than a\nmatch for any physical resistance. It is true that which they say of\nour New England \u0153strum, which will never let us stand or sit, but\ndrives us like mad through the world. The calmest and most protected\nlife cannot save us. We want some intercalated days, to bethink us and\nto derive order to our life from the heart. That should be the use of\nthe Sabbath,--to check this headlong racing and put us in possession of\nourselves once more, for love or for shame.\n\nThe Sabbath changes its forms from age to age, but the substantial\nbenefit endures. We no longer recite the old creeds of Athanasius or\nArius, of Calvin or Hopkins. The forms are flexible, but the uses not\nless real. The old heart remains as ever with its old human duties. The\nold intellect still lives, to pierce the shows to the core. Truth is\nsimple, and will not be antique; is ever present, and insists on being\nof this age and of this moment. Here is thought and love and truth and\nduty, new as on the first day of Adam and of angels.\n\n\u201cThere are two pairs of eyes in man; and it is requisite that the pair\nwhich are beneath should be closed when the pair that are above them\nperceive; and that when the pair above are closed, those which are\nbeneath are opened.\u201d The lower eyes see only surfaces and effects, the\nupper eyes behold causes and the connection of things. And when we go\nalone, or come into the house of thought and worship, we come with\npurpose to be disabused of appearances, to see realities, the great\nlines of our destiny, to see that life has no caprice or fortune, is\nno hopping squib, but a growth after immutable laws under beneficent\ninfluences the most immense. The Church is open to great and small in\nall nations; and how rare and lofty, how unattainable, are the aims it\nlabors to set before men! We come to educate, come to isolate, to be\nabstractionists; in fine, to open the upper eyes to the deep mystery of\ncause and effect, to know that though ministers of justice and power\nfail, Justice and Power fail never. The open secret of the world is the\nart of subliming a private soul with inspirations from the great and\npublic and divine Soul from which we live.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 9: Originally written as a parlor lecture to some Divinity\nstudents, in 1867; afterwards enlarged from earlier writings, and read\nin its present form at the Divinity Chapel, Cambridge, May 5th, 1879.\nReprinted from the _Unitarian Review_ for January, 1880.]\n\n\n\n\n                          THE MAN OF LETTERS.\n\n    ON bravely through the sunshine and the showers,\n    Time hath his work to do, and we have ours.\n\n\n    SO nigh is grandeur to our dust,\n      So near is God to man;\n    When Duty whispers low \u2018Thou must,\u2019\n      The youth replies, \u2018I can.\u2019\n\n\n\n\n                          THE MAN OF LETTERS.\n\n   AN ADDRESS DELIVERED BEFORE THE LITERARY SOCIETIES OF WATERVILLE\n                            COLLEGE, 1863.\n\n\nGENTLEMEN OF THE LITERARY SOCIETIES:--\n\nSome of you are to-day saying your farewells to each other, and\nto-morrow will receive the parting honors of the College. You go to\nbe teachers, to become physicians, lawyers, divines; in due course,\nstatesmen, naturalists, philanthropists; I hope, some of you, to be the\nmen of letters, critics, philosophers; perhaps the rare gift of poetry\nalready sparkles, and may yet burn. At all events, before the shadows\nof these times darken over your youthful sensibility and candor, let\nme use the occasion which your kind request gives me, to offer you\nsome counsels which an old scholar may without pretension bring to\nyouth, in regard to the career of letters,--the power and joy that\nbelong to it, and its high office in evil times. I offer perpetual\ncongratulation to the scholar; he has drawn the white lot in life. The\nvery disadvantages of his condition point at superiorities. He is too\ngood for the world; he is in advance of his race; his function is\nprophetic. He belongs to a superior society, and is born one or two\ncenturies too early for the rough and sensual population into which he\nis thrown. But the Heaven which sent him hither knew that well enough,\nand sent him as a leader to lead. Are men perplexed with evil times?\nThe inviolate soul is in perpetual telegraphic communication with the\nsource of events. He has earlier information, a private despatch which\nrelieves him of the terror which presses on the rest of the community.\nHe is a learner of the laws of nature and the experiences of history; a\nprophet surrendered with self-abandoning sincerity to the Heaven which\npours through him its will to mankind. This is the theory, but you know\nhow far this is from the fact, that nothing has been able to resist the\ntide with which the material prosperity of America in years past has\nbeat down the hope of youth, the piety of learning. The country was\nfull of activity, with its wheat, coal, iron, cotton; the wealth of the\nglobe was here, too much work and not men enough to do it. Britain,\nFrance, Germany, Scandinavia sent millions of laborers; still the need\nwas more. Every kind of skill was in demand, and the bribe came to men\nof intellectual culture,--Come, drudge in our mill. America at large\nexhibited such a confusion as California showed in 1849, when the cry\nof gold was first raised. All the distinctions of profession and habit\nended at the mines. All the world took off their coats and worked in\nshirt-sleeves. Lawyers went and came with pick and wheelbarrow; doctors\nof medicine turned teamsters; stray clergymen kept the bar in saloons;\nprofessors of colleges sold cigars, mince-pies, matches, and so on. It\nis the perpetual tendency of wealth to draw on the spiritual class, not\nin this coarse way, but in plausible and covert ways. It is charged\nthat all vigorous nations, except our own, have balanced their labor by\nmental activity, and especially by the imagination,--the cardinal human\npower, the angel of earnest and believing ages. The subtle Hindoo, who\ncarried religion to ecstasy and philosophy to idealism, produced the\nwonderful epics of which, in the present century, the translations have\nadded new regions to thought. The Egyptian built Thebes and Karnak on\na scale which dwarfs our art, and by the paintings on their interior\nwalls invited us into the secret of the religious belief whence he drew\nsuch power. The Greek was so perfect in action and in imagination, his\npoems, from Homer to Euripides, so charming in form and so true to\nthe human mind, that we cannot forget or outgrow their mythology. The\nHebrew nation compensated for the insignificance of its members and\nterritory by its religious genius, its tenacious belief; its poems and\nhistories cling to the soil of this globe like the primitive rocks.\nOn the south and east shores of the Mediterranean Mahomet impressed\nhis fierce genius how deeply into the manners, language and poetry of\nArabia and Persia! See the activity of the imagination in the Crusades:\nthe front of morn was full of fiery shapes; the chasm was bridged over;\nheaven walked on earth, and Earth could see with eyes the Paradise\nand the Inferno. Dramatic \u201cmysteries\u201d were the entertainment of the\npeople. Parliaments of Love and Poesy served them, instead of the\nHouse of Commons, Congress and the newspapers. In Puritanism, how the\nwhole Jewish history became flesh and blood in those men, let Bunyan\nshow. Now it is agreed that we are utilitarian; that we are skeptical,\nfrivolous; that with universal cheap education we have stringent\ntheology, but religion is low. There is much criticism, not on deep\ngrounds, but an affirmative philosophy is wanting. Our profoundest\nphilosophy (if it were not contradiction in terms) is skepticism.\nThe great poem of the age is the disagreeable poem of \u201cFaust,\u201d--of\nwhich the \u201cFestus\u201d of Bailey and the \u201cParacelsus\u201d of Browning are\nEnglish variations. We have superficial sciences, restless, gossiping,\naimless activity. We run to Paris, to London, to Rome, to Mesmerism,\nSpiritualism, to Pusey, to the Catholic Church, as if for the want of\nthought, and those who would check and guide have a dreary feeling\nthat in the change and decay of the old creeds and motives there was no\noffset to supply their place. Our industrial skill, arts ministering to\nconvenience and luxury, have made life expensive, and therefore greedy,\ncareful, anxious; have turned the eyes downward to the earth, not\nupward to thought.\n\nErnest Renan finds that Europe has thrice assembled for exhibitions of\nindustry, and not a poem graced the occasion; and nobody remarked the\ndefect. A French prophet of our age, Fourier, predicted that one day,\ninstead of by battles and \u0152cumenical Councils, the rival portions of\nhumanity would dispute each other\u2019s excellence in the manufacture of\nlittle cakes.\n\n\u201cIn my youth,\u201d said a Scotch mountaineer, \u201ca Highland gentleman\nmeasured his importance by the number of men his domain could support.\nAfter some time the question was, to know how many great cattle it\nwould feed. To-day we are come to count the number of sheep. I suppose\nposterity will ask how many rats and mice it will feed.\u201d\n\nDickens complained that in America, as soon as he arrived in any of the\nWestern towns, a committee waited on him and invited him to deliver a\ntemperance lecture. Bowditch translated Laplace, and when he removed to\nBoston, the Hospital Life Assurance Company insisted that he should\nmake their tables of annuities. Napoleon knows the art of war, but\nshould not be put on picket duty. Linn\u00e6us or Robert Brown must not\nbe set to raise gooseberries and cucumbers, though they be excellent\nbotanists. A shrewd broker out of State Street visited a quiet\ncountryman possessed of all the virtues, and in his glib talk said,\n\u201cWith your character now I could raise all this money at once, and make\nan excellent thing of it.\u201d\n\nThere is an oracle current in the world, that nations die by suicide.\nThe sign of it is the decay of thought. Niebuhr has given striking\nexamples of that fatal portent; as in the loss of power of thought that\nfollowed the disasters of the Athenians in Sicily.\n\nI cannot forgive a scholar his homeless despondency. He represents\nintellectual or spiritual force. I wish him to rely on the spiritual\narm; to live by his strength, not by his weakness. A scholar defending\nthe cause of slavery, of arbitrary government, of monopoly, of the\noppressor, is a traitor to his profession. He has ceased to be a\nscholar. He is not company for clean people. The worst times only show\nhim how independent he is of times; only relieve and bring out the\nsplendor of his privilege. Disease alarms the family, but the physician\nsees in it a temporary mischief, which he can check and expel. The\nfears and agitations of men who watch the markets, the crops, the\nplenty or scarcity of money, or other superficial events, are not\nfor him. He knows that the world is always equal to itself; that the\nforces which uphold and pervade it are eternal. Air, water, fire, iron,\ngold, wheat, electricity, animal fibre, have not lost a particle of\npower, and no decay has crept over the spiritual force which gives\nbias and period to boundless nature. Bad times,--what are bad times?\nNature is rich, exuberant, and mocks at the puny forces of destruction.\nMan makes no more impression on her wealth than the caterpillar or\nthe cankerworm whose petty ravage, though noticed in an orchard or a\nvillage, is insignificant in the vast exuberance of the summer. There\nis no unemployed force in Nature. All decomposition is recomposition.\nWar disorganizes, but it is to reorganize. Weeks, months pass--a new\nharvest; trade springs up, and there stand new cities, new homes, all\nrebuilt and sleepy with permanence. Italy, France--a hundred times\nthose countries have been trampled with armies and burned over: a few\nsummers, and they smile with plenty and yield new men and new revenues.\n\nIf churches are effete, it is because the new Heaven forms. You are\nhere as the carriers of the power of Nature,--as Roger Bacon, with his\nsecret of gunpowder, with his secret of the balloon and of steam; as\nCopernicus, with his secret of the true astronomy; as Columbus, with\nAmerica in his log-book; as Newton, with his gravity; Harvey, with his\ncirculation; Smith, with his law of trade; Franklin, with lightning;\nAdams, with Independence; Kant, with pure reason; Swedenborg, with his\nspiritual world. You are the carriers of ideas which are to fashion the\nmind and so the history of this breathing world, so as they shall be,\nand not otherwise.\n\nEvery man is a scholar potentially, and does not need any one good so\nmuch as this of right thought.\n\n    \u201cCalm pleasures here abide, majestic pains.\u201d\n\nColeridge traces \u201cthree silent revolutions,\u201d of which the first was\n\u201cwhen the clergy fell from the Church.\u201d A scholar was once a priest.\nBut the Church clung to ritual, and the scholar clung to joy, low\nas well as high, and thus the separation was a mutual fault. But I\nthink it is a schism which must be healed. The true scholar is the\nChurch. Only the duties of Intellect must be owned. Down with these\ndapper trimmers and sycophants! let us have masculine and divine men,\nformidable lawgivers, Pythagoras, Plato, Aristotle, who warp the\nchurches of the world from their traditions, and penetrate them through\nand through with original perception. The intellectual man lives in\nperpetual victory. As certainly as water falls in rain on the tops of\nmountains and runs down into valleys, plains and pits, so does thought\nfall first on the best minds, and run down, from class to class, until\nit reaches the masses, and works revolutions.\n\nNature says to the American: \u201cI understand mensuration and numbers;\nI compute the ellipse of the moon, the ebb and flow of waters, the\ncurve and the errors of planets, the balance of attraction and recoil.\nI have measured out to you by weight and tally the powers you need.\nI give you the land and sea, the forest and the mine, the elemental\nforces, nervous energy. When I add difficulty, I add brain. See to it\nthat you hold and administer the continent for mankind. One thing you\nhave rightly done. You have offered a patch of land in the wilderness\nto every son of Adam who will till it. Other things you have begun to\ndo,--to strike off the chains which snuffling hypocrites had bound\non the weaker race.\u201d You are to imperil your lives and fortunes for\na principle. The ambassador is held to maintain the dignity of the\nRepublic which he represents. But what does the scholar represent?\nThe organ of ideas, the subtle force which creates Nature and men and\nstates;--consoler, upholder, imparting pulses of light and shocks of\nelectricity, guidance and courage. So let his habits be formed, and\nall his economies heroic; no spoiled child, no drone, no epicure, but\na stoic, formidable, athletic, knowing how to be poor, loving labor,\nand not flogging his youthful wit with tobacco and wine; treasuring his\nyouth. I wish the youth to be an armed and complete man; no helpless\nangel to be slapped in the face, but a man dipped in the Styx of human\nexperience, and made invulnerable so,--self-helping. A redeeming trait\nof the Sophists of Athens, Hippias and Gorgias, is that they made their\nown clothes and shoes. Learn to harness a horse, to row a boat, to camp\ndown in the woods, to cook your supper. I chanced lately to be at West\nPoint, and, after attending the examination in scientific classes, I\nwent into the barracks. The chamber was in perfect order; the mattress\non the iron camp-bed rolled up, as if ready for removal. I asked the\nfirst Cadet, \u201cWho makes your bed?\u201d \u201cI do.\u201d \u201cWho fetches your water?\u201d \u201cI\ndo.\u201d \u201cWho blacks your shoes?\u201d \u201cI do.\u201d It was so in every room. These\nare first steps to power. Learn of Samuel Johnson or David Hume, that\nit is a primary duty of the man of letters to secure his independence.\n\nStand by your order. \u2019Tis some thirty years since the days of the\nReform Bill in England, when on the walls in London you read everywhere\nplacards, \u201cDown with the Lords.\u201d At that time, Earl Grey, who was\nleader of Reform, was asked, in Parliament, his policy on the measures\nof the Radicals. He replied, \u201cI shall stand by my order.\u201d Where there\nis no vision, the people perish. The fault lies with the educated\nclass, the men of study and thought. There is a very low feeling of\nduty: the merchant is true to the merchant, the noble in England and\nEurope stands by his order, the politician believes in his arts and\ncombinations; but the scholar does not stand by his order, but defers\nto the men of this world.\n\nGentlemen, I am here to commend to you your art and profession as\nthinkers. It is real. It is the secret of power. It is the art of\ncommand. All superiority is this, or related to this. \u201cAll that the\nworld admires comes from within.\u201d Thought makes us men; ranks us;\ndistributes society; distributes the work of the world; is the prolific\nsource of all arts, of all wealth, of all delight, of all grandeur. Men\nare as they believe. Men are as they think, and the man who knows any\ntruth not yet discerned by other men, is master of all other men so far\nas that truth and its wide relations are concerned.\n\nIntellect measures itself by its counteraction to any accumulation of\nmaterial force. There is no mass which it cannot surmount and dispose\nof. The exertions of this force are the eminent experiences,--out of\na long life all that is worth remembering. These are the moments that\nbalance years. Does any one doubt between the strength of a thought\nand that of an institution? Does any one doubt that a good general is\nbetter than a park of artillery? See a political revolution dogging a\nbook. See armies, institutions, literatures, appearing in the train of\nsome wild Arabian\u2019s dream.\n\nThere is a proverb that Napoleon, when the Mameluke cavalry approached\nthe French lines, ordered the grenadiers to the front, and the asses\nand the _savans_ to fall into the hollow square. It made a good\nstory, and circulated in that day. But how stands it now? The military\nexpedition was a failure. Bonaparte himself deserted, and the army got\nhome as it could, all fruitless; not a trace of it remains. All that is\nleft of it is the researches of those _savans_ on the antiquities\nof Egypt, including the great work of Denon, which led the way to all\nthe subsequent studies of the English and German scholars on that\nfoundation. Pytheas of \u00c6gina was victor in the Pancratium of the boys,\nat the Isthmian games. He came to the poet Pindar and wished him to\nwrite an ode in his praise, and inquired what was the price of a poem.\nPindar replied that he should give him one talent, about a thousand\ndollars of our money. \u201cA talent!\u201d cried Pytheas; \u201cwhy, for so much\nmoney I can erect a statue of bronze in the temple.\u201d \u201cVery likely.\u201d\nOn second thoughts, he returned and paid for the poem. And now not\nonly all the statues of bronze in the temples of \u00c6gina are destroyed,\nbut the temples themselves, and the very walls of the city are utterly\ngone, whilst the ode of Pindar, in praise of Pytheas, remains entire.\n\nThe treachery of scholars! They are idealists, and should stand for\nfreedom, justice, and public good. The scholar is bound to stand for\nall the virtues and all the liberties,--liberty of trade, liberty of\nthe press, liberty of religion,--and he should open all the prizes of\nsuccess and all the roads of Nature to free competition.\n\nThe country complains loudly of the inefficiency of the army. It was\nbadly led. But, before this, it was not the army alone, it was the\npopulation that was badly led. The clerisy, the spiritual guides, the\nscholars, the seers have been false to their trust.\n\nRely on yourself. There is respect due to your teachers, but every age\nis new, and has problems to solve, insoluble by the last age. Men over\nforty are no judges of a book written in a new spirit. Neither your\nteachers, nor the universal teachers, the laws, the customs or dogmas\nof nations, neither saint nor sage, can compare with that counsel which\nis open to you. No, it is not nations, no, nor even masters, not at\nlast a few individuals or any heroes, but himself only, the large\nequality to truth of a single mind,--as if, in the narrow walls of a\nhuman heart, the wide realm of truth, the world of morals, the tribunal\nby which the universe is judged, found room to exist.\n\nOur people have this levity and complaisance,--they fear to offend,\ndo not wish to be misunderstood; do not wish, of all things, to be in\nthe minority. God and Nature are altogether sincere, and Art should\nbe as sincere. It is not enough that the work should show a skilful\nhand, ingenious contrivance and admirable polish and finish; it should\nhave a commanding motive in the time and condition in which it was\nmade. We should see in it the great belief of the artist, which caused\nhim to make it so as he did, and not otherwise; nothing frivolous,\nnothing that he might do or not do, as he chose, but somewhat that\nmust be done then and there by him; he could not take his neck out\nof that yoke, and save his soul. And this design must shine through\nthe whole performance. Sincerity is, in dangerous times, discovered\nto be an immeasurable advantage. I distrust all the legends of great\naccomplishments or performance of unprincipled men. Very little\nreliance must be put on the common stories that circulate of this\ngreat senator\u2019s or that great barrister\u2019s learning, their Greek, their\nvaried literature. That ice won\u2019t bear. Reading!--do you mean that\nthis senator or this lawyer, who stood by and allowed the passage of\ninfamous laws, was a reader of Greek books? That is not the question;\nbut to what purpose did they read? I allow them the merit of that\nreading which appears in their opinions, tastes, beliefs, and practice.\nThey read that they might know, did they not? Well, these men did\nnot know. They blundered; they were utterly ignorant of that which\nevery boy or girl of fifteen knows perfectly,--the rights of men and\nwomen. And this big-mouthed talker, among his dictionaries and Leipzic\neditions of Lysias, had lost his knowledge. But the President of the\nBank nods to the President of the Insurance Office, and relates that\nat Virginia Springs this idol of the forum exhausted a trunkful of\nclassic authors. There is always the previous question, How came you on\nthat side? You are a very elegant writer, but you can\u2019t write up what\ngravitates down.\n\nIt is impossible to extricate oneself from the questions in which our\nage is involved. All of us have shared the new enthusiasm of country\nand of liberty which swept like a whirlwind through all souls at the\noutbreak of war, and brought, by ennobling us, an offset for its\ncalamity.\n\nWar, seeking for the roots of strength, comes upon the moral aspects at\nonce. In quiet times, custom stifles this discussion as sentimental,\nand brings in the brazen devil, as by immemorial right. The war\nuplifted us into generous sentiments. War ennobles the age. We do not\noften have a moment of grandeur in these hurried, slipshod lives, but\nthe behavior of the young men has taught us much. We will not again\ndisparage America, now that we have seen what men it will bear. Battle,\nwith the sword, has cut many a Gordian knot in twain which all the wit\nof East and West, of Northern and Border statesmen could not untie.\n\nI learn with joy and with deep respect that this college has sent its\nfull quota to the field. I learn with grief, but with honoring pain,\nthat you have had your sufferers in the battle, and that the noble\nyouth have returned wounded and maimed. The times are dark, but heroic.\nThe times develop the strength they need. Boys are heroes. Women have\nshown a tender patriotism and inexhaustible charity. And on each new\nthreat of faction, the ballot of the people has been unexpectedly\nright. But the issues already appearing overpay the cost. Slavery\nis broken, and, if we use our advantage, irretrievably. For such a\ngain, to end once for all that pest of all our free institutions,\none generation might well be sacrificed; perhaps it will; that this\ncontinent be purged and a new era of equal rights dawn on the universe.\nWho would not, if it could be made certain that the new morning of\nuniversal liberty should rise on our race by the perishing of one\ngeneration,--who would not consent to die?\n\n\n\n\n                             THE SCHOLAR.\n\n    FOR thought, and not praise,\n      Thought is the wages\n    For which I sell days,\n      Will gladly sell ages\n      And willing grow old,\n      Deaf and dumb, blind and cold,\n    Melting matter into dreams,\n    Panoramas which I saw,\n    And whatever glows or seems\n      Into substance, into Law.\n\n\n    THE sun and moon shall fall amain\n    Like sowers\u2019 seeds into his brain,\n      There quickened to be born again.\n\n\n\n\n                             THE SCHOLAR.\n\n AN ORATION DELIVERED BEFORE THE WASHINGTON AND JEFFERSON SOCIETIES AT\n             THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA, 28TH JUNE, 1876.\n\n\nGENTLEMEN:\n\nThe Athenians took an oath, on a certain crisis in their affairs,\nto esteem wheat, the vine and the olive the bounds of Attica. The\nterritory of scholars is yet larger. A stranger but yesterday to every\nperson present, I find myself already at home, for the society of\nlettered men is a university which does not bound itself with the walls\nof one cloister or college, but gathers in the distant and solitary\nstudent into its strictest amity. Literary men gladly acknowledge these\nties which find for the homeless and the stranger a welcome where\nleast looked for. But in proportion as we are conversant with the\nlaws of life, we have seen the like. We are used to these surprises.\nThis is but one operation of a more general law. As in coming among\nstrange faces we find that the love of letters makes us friends, so in\nstrange thoughts, in the worldly habits which harden us, we find with\nsome surprise that learning and truth and beauty have not let us go;\nthat the spiritual nature is too strong for us; that those excellent\ninfluences which men in all ages have called the _Muse_, or by\nsome kindred name, come in to keep us warm and true; that the face\nof Nature remains irresistibly alluring. We have strayed from the\nterritorial monuments of Attica, but here still are wheat and olives\nand the vine.\n\nI do not now refer to that intellectual conscience which forms\nitself in tender natures, and gives us many twinges for our sloth\nand unfaithfulness:--the influence I speak of is of a higher strain.\nStung by this intellectual conscience, we go to measure our tasks\nas scholars, and screw ourselves up to energy and fidelity, and our\nsadness is suddenly overshone by a sympathy of blessing. Beauty, the\ninspirer, the cheerful festal principle, the leader of gods and men,\nwhich draws by being beautiful, and not by considerations of advantage,\ncomes in and puts a new face on the world. I think the peculiar\noffice of scholars in a careful and gloomy generation is to be (as\nthe poets were called in the Middle Ages) Professors of the Joyous\nScience, detectors and delineators of occult symmetries and unpublished\nbeauties; heralds of civility, nobility, learning and wisdom; affirmers\nof the one law, yet as those who should affirm it in music and dancing;\nexpressors themselves of that firm and cheerful temper, infinitely\nremoved from sadness, which reigns through the kingdoms of chemistry,\nvegetation, and animal life. Every natural power exhilarates; a true\ntalent delights the possessor first. A celebrated musician was wont\nto say, that men knew not how much more he delighted himself with\nhis playing than he did others; for if they knew, his hearers would\nrather demand of him than give him a reward. The scholar is here to\nfill others with love and courage by confirming their trust in the\nlove and wisdom which are at the heart of all things; to affirm noble\nsentiments; to hear them wherever spoken, out of the deeps of ages, out\nof the obscurities of barbarous life, and to republish them:--to untune\nnobody, but to draw all men after the truth, and to keep men spiritual\nand sweet.\n\nLanguage can hardly exaggerate the beatitude of the intellect flowing\ninto the faculties. This is the power that makes the world incarnated\nin man, and laying again the beams of heaven and earth, setting the\nnorth and the south, and the stars in their places. Intellect is the\nscience of metes and bounds; yet it sees no bound to the eternal\nproceeding of law forth into nature. All the sciences are only new\napplications, each translatable into the other, of the one law which\nhis mind is.\n\nThis, gentlemen, is the topic on which I shall speak,--the natural\nand permanent function of the Scholar, as he is no permissive or\naccidental appearance, but an organic agent in nature. He is here to\nbe the beholder of the real; self-centred amidst the superficial; here\nto revere the dominion of a serene necessity and be its pupil and\napprentice by tracing everything home to a cause; here to be sobered,\nnot by the cares of life, as men say, no, but by the depth of his\ndraughts of the cup of immortality.\n\nOne is tempted to affirm the office and attributes of the scholar\na little the more eagerly, because of a frequent perversity of the\nclass itself. Men are ashamed of their intellect. The men committed by\nprofession as well as by bias to study, the clergyman, the chemist, the\nastronomer, the metaphysician, the poet, talk hard and worldly, and\nshare the infatuation of cities. The poet and the citizen perfectly\nagree in conversation on the wise life. The poet counsels his own\nson as if he were a merchant. The poet with poets betrays no amiable\nweakness. They all chime in, and are as inexorable as bankers on the\nsubject of real life. They have no toleration for literature; art is\nonly a fine word for appearance in default of matter. And they sit\nwhite over their stoves, and talk themselves hoarse over the mischief\nof books and the effeminacy of book-makers. But at a single strain of\na bugle out of a grove, or at the dashing among the stones of a brook\nfrom the hills; at the sound of some subtle word that falls from the\nlips of an imaginative person, or even at the reading in solitude\nof some moving image of a wise poet, this grave conclusion is blown\nout of memory; the sun shines, and the worlds roll to music, and the\npoet replaces all this cowardly Self-denial and God-denial of the\nliterary class with the conviction that to one poetic success the world\nwill surrender on its knees. Instantly he casts in his lot with the\npearl-diver and the diamond-merchant. Like them he will joyfully lose\ndays and months, and estates and credit, in the profound hope that one\nrestoring, all-rewarding, immense success will arrive at last, which\nwill give him at one bound a universal dominion. And rightly; for if\nhis wild prayers are granted, if he is to succeed, his achievement is\nthe piercing of the brass heavens of use and limitation, and letting\nin a beam of the pure eternity which burns up this limbo of shadows\nand chimeras in which we dwell. Yes, Nature is too strong for us; she\nwill not be denied; she has balsams for our hurts, and hellebores for\nour insanities. She does not bandy words with us, but comes in with a\nnew ravishing experience and makes the old time ridiculous. Every poet\nknows the unspeakable hope, and represents its audacity.\n\nI am not disposed to magnify temporary differences, but for the\nmoment it appears as if in former times learning and intellectual\naccomplishments had secured to the possessor greater rank and\nauthority. If this were only the reaction from excessive expectations\nfrom literature, now disappointed, it were a just censure. It was\nsuperstitious to exact too much from philosophers and the literary\nclass. The Sophists, the Alexandrian grammarians, the wits of Queen\nAnne\u2019s, the philosophers and diffusion-societies have not much helped\nus. Granted, freely granted. Men run out of one superstition into an\nopposite superstition, and practical people in America give themselves\nwonderful airs. The cant of the time inquires superciliously after the\nnew ideas; it believes that ideas do not lead to the owning of stocks;\nthey are perplexing and effeminating.\n\nYoung men, I warn you against the clamors of these self-praising\nfrivolous activities,--against these busybodies; against irrational\nlabor; against chattering, meddlesome, rich and official people. If\ntheir doing came to any good end! Action is legitimate and good;\nforever be it honored! right, original, private, necessary action,\nproceeding new from the heart of man, and going forth to beneficent and\nas yet incalculable ends. Yes; but not a petty fingering and running, a\nsenseless repeating of yesterday\u2019s fingering and running; an acceptance\nof the method and frauds of other men; an overdoing and busy-ness\nwhich pretends to the honors of action, but resembles the twitches\nof St. Vitus. The action of these men I cannot respect, for they do\nnot respect it themselves. They were better and more respectable abed\nand asleep. All the best of this class, all who have any insight or\ngenerosity of spirit are frequently disgusted, and fain to put it\nbehind them.\n\nGentlemen, I do not wish to check your impulses to action: I would\nnot hinder you of one swing of your arm. I do not wish to see you\neffeminate gownsmen, taking hold of the world with the tips of your\nfingers, or that life should be to you as it is to many, optical, not\npractical. Far otherwise: I rather wish you to experiment boldly and\ngive play to your energies, but not, if I could prevail with you,\nin conventional ways. I should wish your energy to run in works and\nemergencies growing out of your personal character. Nature will fast\nenough instruct you in the occasion and the need, and will bring to\neach of you the crowded hour, the great opportunity. Love, Rectitude,\neverlasting Fame, will come to each of you in loneliest places with\ntheir grand alternatives, and Honor watches to see whether you dare\nseize the palms.\n\nI have no quarrel with action, only I prefer no action to misaction,\nand I reject the abusive application of the term _practical_ to\nthose lower activities. Let us hear no more of the practical men, or I\nwill tell you something of them,--this, namely, that the scholar finds\nin them unlooked-for acceptance of his most paradoxical experience.\nThere is confession in their eyes, and if they parade their business\nand public importance, it is by way of apology and palliation for not\nbeing the students and obeyers of those diviner laws. Talk frankly with\nthem and you learn that you have little to tell them; that the Spirit\nof the Age has been before you with influences impossible to parry\nor resist. The dry-goods men, and the brokers, the lawyers and the\nmanufacturers are idealists, and only differ from the philosopher in\nthe intensity of the charge. We are all contemporaries and bones of one\nbody.\n\nThe shallow clamor against theoretic men comes from the weak. Able men\nmay sometimes affect a contempt for thought, which no able man ever\nfeels. For what alone in the history of this world interests all men in\nproportion as they are men? What but truth, and perpetual advance in\nknowledge of it, and brave obedience to it in right action? Every man\nor woman who can voluntarily or involuntarily give them any insight or\nsuggestion on these secrets they will hearken after. The poet writes\nhis verse on a scrap of paper, and instantly the desire and love of all\nmankind take charge of it, as if it were Holy Writ. What need has he\nto cross the sill of his door? Why need he meddle with politics? His\nidlest thought, his yesternight\u2019s dream is told already in the Senate.\nWhat the Genius whispered him at night he reported to the young men at\ndawn. He rides in them, he traverses sea and land. The engineer in the\nlocomotive is waiting for him; the steamboat is hissing at the wharf,\nand the wheels whirling to go. \u2019Tis wonderful, \u2019tis almost scandalous,\nthis extraordinary favoritism shown to poets. I do not mean to excuse\nit. I admit the enormous partiality. It only shows that such is the\ngulf between our perception and our painting, the eye is so wise, and\nthe hand so clumsy, that all the human race have agreed to value a man\naccording to his power of expression. For him arms, art, politics,\ntrade waited like menials, until the lord of the manor should arrive.\nEven the demonstrations of nature for millenniums seem not to have\nattained their end, until this interpreter arrives. \u201cI,\u201d said the\ngreat-hearted Kepler, \u201cmay well wait a hundred years for a reader,\nsince God Almighty has waited six thousand years for an observer like\nmyself.\u201d\n\nGenius is a poor man and has no house, but see, this proud landlord who\nhas built the palace and furnished it so delicately, opens it to him\nand beseeches him to make it honorable by entering there and eating\nbread. Where is the palace in England whose tenants are not too happy\nif it can make a home for Pope or Addison or Swift or Burke or Canning\nor Tennyson? Or if wealth has humors and wishes to shake off the yoke\nand assert itself,--oh, by all means let it try! Will it build its\nfences very high, and make its Almacks too narrow for a wise man to\nenter? Will it be independent? I incline to concede the isolation which\nit asks, that it may learn that it is not independent but parasitical.\n\nThere could always be traced, in the most barbarous tribes, and also in\nthe most character-destroying civilization, some vestiges of a faith\nin genius, as in the exemption of a priesthood or bards or artists\nfrom taxes and tolls levied on other men; or in civic distinction; or\nin enthusiastic homage; or in hospitalities; as if men would signify\ntheir sense that genius and virtue should not pay money for house and\nland and bread, because they have a royal right in these and in all\nthings,--a first mortgage that takes effect before the right of the\npresent proprietor. For they are the First Good, of which Plato affirms\nthat \u201call things are for its sake, and it is the cause of everything\nbeautiful.\u201d\n\nThis reverence is the re-establishment of natural order; for as the\nsolidest rocks are made up of invisible gases, as the world is made\nof thickened light and arrested electricity, so men know that ideas\nare the parents of men and things; there was never anything that did\nnot proceed from a thought. The scholar has a deep ideal interest in\nthe moving show around him. He knew the motley system in its egg.\nWe have--have we not?--a real relation to markets and brokers and\ncurrency and coin. \u201cGold and silver,\u201d says one of the Platonists, \u201cgrow\nin the earth from the celestial gods,--an effluxion from them.\u201d The\nunmentionable dollar itself has at last a high origin in moral and\nmetaphysical nature. Union Pacific stock is not quite private property,\nbut the quality and essence of the universe is in that also. Have we\nless interest in ships or in shops, in manual work or in household\naffairs; in any object of nature, or in any handiwork of man; in any\nrelation of life or custom of society? The scholar is to show, in each,\nidentity and connexion; he is to show its origin in the brain of man,\nand its secret history and issues. He is the attorney of the world, and\ncan never be superfluous where so vast a variety of questions are ever\ncoming up to be solved, and for ages.\n\nI proceed to say that the allusions just now made to the extent of\nhis duties, the manner in which every day\u2019s events will find him in\nwork, may show that his place is no sinecure. The scholar, when he\ncomes, will be known by an energy that will animate all who see him.\nThe labor of ambition and avarice will appear fumbling beside his. In\nthe right hands, literature is not resorted to as a consolation, and\nby the broken and decayed, but as a decalogue. In this country we are\nfond of results and of short ways to them; and most in this department.\nIn our experiences, learning is not learned, nor is genius wise. The\nname of the Scholar is taken in vain. We who should be the channel of\nthat unweariable Power which never sleeps, must give our diligence no\nholidays. Other men are planting and building, baking and tanning,\nrunning and sailing, heaving and carrying, each that he may peacefully\nexecute the fine function by which they all are helped. Shall he play,\nwhilst their eyes follow him from far with reverence, attributing\nto him the delving in great fields of thought, and conversing with\nsupernatural allies? If he is not kindling his torch or collecting oil,\nhe will fear to go by a workshop; he will not dare to hear the music of\na saw or plane; the steam-engine will reprimand, the steam-pipe will\nhiss at him; he cannot look a blacksmith in the eye; in the field he\nwill be shamed by mowers and reapers. The speculative man, the scholar,\nis the right hero. He is brave, because he sees the omnipotence of that\nwhich inspires him. Is there only one courage and one warfare? I cannot\nmanage sword and rifle; can I not therefore be brave? I thought there\nwere as many courages as men. Is an armed man the only hero? Is a man\nonly the breech of a gun or the haft of a bowie-knife? Men of thought\nfail in fighting down malignity, because they wear other armor than\ntheir own. Let them decline henceforward foreign methods and foreign\ncourages. Let them do that which they can do. Let them fight by their\nstrength, not by their weakness. It seems to me that the thoughtful man\nneeds no armor but this--concentration. One thing is for him settled,\nthat he is to come at his ends. He is not there to defend himself,\nbut to deliver his message; if his voice is clear, then clearly; if\nhusky, then huskily; if broken, he can at least scream; gag him, he can\nstill write it; bruise, mutilate him, cut off his hands and feet, he\ncan still crawl towards his object on his stumps. It is the corruption\nof our generation that men value a long life, and do not esteem life\nsimply as a means of expressing a sentiment.\n\nThe great English patriot Algernon Sidney wrote to his father from his\nprison a little before his execution: \u201cI have ever had in my mind that\nwhen God should cast me into such a condition as that I cannot save my\nlife but by doing an indecent thing he shows me the time has come when\nI should resign it.\u201d Beauty belongs to the sentiment, and is always\ndeparting from those who depart out of that. The hero rises out of\nall comparison with contemporaries and with ages of men, because he\ndisesteems old age, and lands, and money, and power, and will oppose\nall mankind at the call of that private and perfect Right and Beauty in\nwhich he lives.\n\nMan is a torch borne in the wind. The ends I have hinted at made the\nscholar or spiritual man indispensable to the Republic or Commonwealth\nof Man. Nature could not leave herself without a seer and expounder.\nBut he could not see or teach without organs. The same necessity\nthen that would create him reappears in his splendid gifts. There is\nno power in the mind but in turn becomes an instrument. The descent\nof genius into talents is part of the natural order and history of\nthe world. The incarnation must be. We cannot eat the granite nor\ndrink hydrogen. They must be decompounded and recompounded into corn\nand water before they can enter our flesh. There is a great deal of\nspiritual energy in the universe, but it is not palpable to us until\nwe can make it up into man. There is plenty of air, but it is worth\nnothing until by gathering it into sails we can get it into shape and\nservice to carry us and our cargo across the sea. Then it is paid\nfor by hundreds of thousands of our money. Plenty of water also, sea\nfull, sky full; who cares for it? But when we can get it where we want\nit, and in measured portions, on a mill-wheel, or boat-paddle, we\nwill buy it with millions. There is plenty of wild azote and carbon\nunappropriated, but it is nought till we have made it up into loaves\nand soup. So we find it in higher relations. There is plenty of wild\nwrath, but it steads not until we can get it racked off, shall I say?\nand bottled into persons; a little pure, and not too much, to every\nhead. How many young geniuses we have known, and none but ourselves\nwill ever hear of them for want in them of a little talent!\n\nAh, gentlemen, I own I love talents and accomplishments; the feet\nand hands of genius. As Burke said, \u201cit is not only our duty to make\nthe right known, but to make it prevalent.\u201d So I delight to see the\nGodhead in distribution; to see men that can come at their ends. These\nshrewd faculties belong to man. I love to see them in play, and to see\nthem trained: this memory carrying in its caves the pictures of all\nthe past, and rendering them in the instant when they can serve the\npossessor;--the craft of mathematical combination, which carries a\nworking-plan of the heavens and of the earth in a formula. I am apt to\nbelieve, with the Emperor Charles V., that \u201cas many languages as a man\nknows, so many times is he a man.\u201d I like to see a man of that virtue\nthat no obscurity or disguise can conceal, who wins all souls to his\nway of thinking. I delight in men adorned and weaponed with manlike\narts, who could alone, or with a few like them, reproduce Europe and\nAmerica, the result of our civilization.\n\nIt is excellent when the individual is ripened to that degree that\nhe touches both the centre and the circumference, so that he is not\nonly widely intelligent, but carries a council in his breast for the\nemergency of to-day; and alternates the contemplation of the fact\nin pure intellect, with the total conversion of the intellect into\nenergy; Jove, and the thunderbolt launched from his hand. Perhaps I\nvalue power of achievement a little more because in America there\nseems to be a certain indigence in this respect. I think there is no\nmore intellectual people than ours. They are very apprehensive and\ncurious. But there is a sterility of talent. These iron personalities,\nsuch as in Greece and Italy and once in England were formed to strike\nfear into kings and draw the eager service of thousands, rarely\nappear. We have general intelligence, but no Cyclop arms. A very\nlittle intellectual force makes a disproportionately great impression,\nand when one observes how eagerly our people entertain and discuss\na new theory, whether home-born or imported, and how little thought\noperates how great an effect, one would draw a favorable inference as\nto their intellectual and spiritual tendencies. It seems as if two\nor three persons coming who should add to a high spiritual aim great\nconstructive energy, would carry the country with them.\n\nIn making this claim of costly accomplishments for the scholar, I\nchiefly wish to infer the dignity of his work by the lustre of his\nappointments. He is not cheaply equipped. The universe was rifled to\nfurnish him. He is to forge out of coarsest ores the sharpest weapons.\nBut if the weapons are valued for themselves, if his talents assume\nan independence, and come to work for ostentation, they cannot serve\nhim. It was said of an eminent Frenchman, that \u201che was drowned in his\ntalents.\u201d The peril of every fine faculty is the delight of playing\nwith it for pride. Talent is commonly developed at the expense of\ncharacter, and the greater it grows, the more is the mischief and\nmisleading; so that presently all is wrong, talent is mistaken for\ngenius, a dogma or system for truth, ambition for greatness, ingenuity\nfor poetry, sensuality for art; and the young, coming up with innocent\nhope, and looking around them at education, at the professions and\nemployments, at religious and literary teachers and teaching,--finding\nthat nothing outside corresponds to the noble order in the soul,\nare confused, and become skeptical and forlorn. Hope is taken from\nyouth unless there be, by the grace of God, sufficient vigor in\ntheir instinct to say, \u201cAll is wrong and human invention. I declare\nanew from Heaven that truth exists new and beautiful and profitable\nforevermore.\u201d Order is heaven\u2019s first law. These gifts, these senses,\nthese facilities are excellent as long as subordinated; all wasted and\nmischievous when they assume to lead and not obey. What is the use of\nstrength or cunning or beauty, or musical voice, or birth, or breeding,\nor money, to a maniac? Yet society, in which we live, is subject to\nfits of frenzy; sometimes is for an age together a maniac, with birth,\nbreeding, beauty, cunning, strength and money. And there is but one\ndefence against this principle of chaos, and that is the principle of\norder, or brave return at all hours to an infinite common-sense, to the\nmother-wit, to the wise instinct, to the pure intellect.\n\nWhen a man begins to dedicate himself to a particular function, as his\nlogical, or his remembering, or his oratorical, or his arithmetical\nskill; the advance of his character and genius pauses; he has run to\nthe end of his line; seal the book; the development of that mind is\narrested. The scholar is lost in the showman. Society is babyish, and\nis dazzled and deceived by the weapon, without inquiring into the cause\nfor which it is drawn; like boys by the drums and colors of the troops.\n\nThe objection of men of the world to what they call the morbid\nintellectual tendency in our young men at present, is not a hostility\nto their truth, but to this, its shortcoming, that the idealistic views\nunfit their children for business in their sense, and do not qualify\nthem for any complete life of a better kind. They threaten the validity\nof contracts, but do not prevail so far as to establish the new kingdom\nwhich shall supersede contracts, oaths, and property. \u201cWe have seen to\nweariness what you cannot do; now show us what you can and will do,\u201d\nasks the practical man, and with perfect reason.\n\nWe are not afraid of new truth,--of truth never, new, or old,--no,\nbut of a counterfeit. Everybody hates imbecility and shortcoming, not\nnew methods. The astronomer is not ridiculous inasmuch as he is an\nastronomer, but inasmuch as he is not an astronomer. Be that you are:\nbe that cheerly and sovereignly. Plotinus makes no apologies, he says\nroundly, \u201cthe knowledge of the senses is truly ludicrous.\u201d \u201cBody and\nits properties belong to the region of nonentity, as if more of body\nwas necessarily produced where a defect of being happens in a greater\ndegree.\u201d \u201cMatter,\u201d says Plutarch, \u201cis privation.\u201d Let the man of ideas\nat this hour be as direct, and as fully committed. Have you a thought\nin your heart? There was never such need of it as now. As we read\nthe newspapers, as we see the effrontery with which money and power\ncarry their ends and ride over honesty and good-meaning, patriotism\nand religion seem to shriek like ghosts. We will not speak for them,\nbecause to speak for them seems so weak and hopeless. We will hold\nfast our opinion and die in silence. But a true orator will make us\nfeel that the states and kingdoms, the senators, lawyers and rich men\nare caterpillars\u2019 webs and caterpillars, when seen in the light of this\ndespised and imbecile truth. Then we feel what cowards we have been.\nTruth alone is great. The orator too becomes a fool and a shadow before\nthis light which lightens through him. It shines backward and forward,\ndiminishes and annihilates everybody, and the prophet so gladly feels\nhis personality lost in this victorious life. The spiritual nature\nexhibits itself so in its counteraction to any accumulation of material\nforce. There is no mass that can be a counterweight for it. This makes\none man good against mankind. This is the secret of eloquence, for\nit is the end of eloquence in a half-hour\u2019s discourse,--perhaps by a\nfew sentences,--to persuade a multitude of persons to renounce their\nopinions, and change the course of life. They go forth not the men they\ncame in, but shriven, convicted, and converted.\n\nWe have many revivals of religion. We have had once what was called\nthe Revival of Letters. I wish to see a revival of the human mind:\nto see men\u2019s sense of duty extend to the cherishing and use of their\nintellectual powers: their religion should go with their thought and\nhallow it. Whosoever looks with heed into his thoughts will find\nthat our science of the mind has not got far. He will find there is\nsomebody within him that knows more than he does, a certain dumb life\nin life; a simple wisdom behind all acquired wisdom; somewhat not\neducated or educable; not altered or alterable; a mother-wit which does\nnot learn by experience or by books, but knew it all already; makes\nno progress, but was wise in youth as in age. More or less clouded it\nyet resides the same in all, saying _Ay, ay_, or _No, no_\nto every proposition. Yet its grand _Ay_ and its grand _No_\nare more musical than all eloquence. Nobody has found the limit of its\nknowledge. Whatever object is brought before it is already well known\nto it. Its justice is perfect; its look is catholic and universal, its\nlight ubiquitous like the sun. It does not put forth organs, it rests\nin presence: yet trusted and obeyed in happy natures it becomes active\nand salient, and makes new means for its great ends.\n\nThe scholar then is unfurnished who has only literary weapons. He\nought to have as many talents as he can; memory, arithmetic, practical\npower, manners, temper, lion-heart, are all good things, and if he has\nnone of them he can still manage, if he have the main-mast,--if he is\nanything. But he must have the resource of resources, and be planted on\nnecessity. For the sure months are bringing him to an examination-day\nin which nothing is remitted or excused, and for which no tutor, no\nbook, no lectures, and almost no preparation can be of the least avail.\nHe will have to answer certain questions, which, I must plainly tell\nyou, cannot be staved off. For all men, all women, Time, your country,\nyour condition, the invisible world, are the interrogators: _Who are\nyou? What do you? Can you obtain what you wish? Is there method in your\nconsciousness? Can you see tendency in your life? Can you help any\nsoul?_\n\nCan he answer these questions? can he dispose of them? Happy if you can\nanswer them mutely in the order and disposition of your life! Happy\nfor more than yourself, a benefactor of men, if you can answer them in\nworks of wisdom, art, or poetry; bestowing on the general mind of men\norganic creations, to be the guidance and delight of all who know them.\nThese questions speak to Genius, to that power which is underneath and\ngreater than all talent, and which proceeds out of the constitution\nof every man: to Genius, which is an emanation of that it tells of;\nwhose private counsels are not tinged with selfishness, but are laws.\nMen of talent fill the eye with their pretension. They go out into\nsome camp of their own, and noisily persuade society that this thing\nwhich they do is the needful cause of all men. They have talents for\ncontention, and they nourish a small difference into a loud quarrel.\nBut the world is wide, nobody will go there after to-morrow. The gun\nthey have pointed can defend nothing but itself, nor itself any longer\nthan the man is by. What is the use of artificial positions? But Genius\nhas no taste for weaving sand, or for any trifling, but flings itself\non real elemental things, which are powers, self-defensive; which first\nsubsist, and then resist unweariably forevermore all that opposes.\nGenius has truth and clings to it, so that what it says and does is\nnot in a by-road, visited only by curiosity, but on the great highways\nof nature, which were before the Appian Way, and which all souls must\ntravel. Genius delights only in statements which are themselves true,\nwhich attack and wound any who opposes them, whether he who brought\nthem here remains here or not;--which are live men, and do daily\ndeclare fresh war against all falsehood and custom, and will not let an\noffender go; which society cannot dispose of or forget, but which abide\nthere and will not down at anybody\u2019s bidding, but stand frowning and\nformidable, and will and must be finally obeyed and done.\n\nThe scholar must be ready for bad weather, poverty, insult, weariness,\nrepute of failure, and many vexations. He must have a great patience,\nand ride at anchor and vanquish every enemy whom his small arms cannot\nreach, by the grand resistance of submission, of ceasing to do. He\nis to know that in the last resort he is not here to work, but to be\nworked upon. He is to eat insult, drink insult, be clothed and shod in\ninsult until he has learned that this bitter bread and shameful dress\nis also wholesome and warm, is in short indifferent; is of the same\nchemistry as praise and fat living; that they also are disgrace and\nsoreness to him who has them. I think much may be said to discourage\nand dissuade the young scholar from his career. Freely be that said.\nDissuade all you can from the lists. Sift the wheat, frighten away the\nlighter souls. Let us keep only the heavy-armed. Let those come who\ncannot but come, and who see that there is no choice here, no advantage\nand no disadvantage compared with other careers. For the great\nNecessity is our patron, who distributes sun and shade after immutable\nlaws.\n\nYes, he has his dark days, he has weakness, he has waitings, he\nhas bad company, he is pelted by storms of cares, untuning cares,\nuntuning company. Well, let him meet them. He has not consented to the\nfrivolity, nor to the dispersion. The practical aim is forever higher\nthan the literary aim. He shall not submit to degradation, but shall\nbear these crosses with what grace he can. He is still to decline how\nmany glittering opportunities, and to retreat, and wait. So shall you\nfind in this penury and absence of thought a purer splendor than ever\nclothed the exhibitions of wit. I invite you not to cheap joys, to\nthe flutter of gratified vanity, to a sleek and rosy comfort; no, but\nto bareness, to power, to enthusiasm, to the mountain of vision, to\ntrue and natural supremacy, to the society of the great, and to love.\nGive me bareness and poverty so that I know them as the sure heralds\nof the Muse. Not in plenty, not in a thriving, well-to-do condition,\nshe delighteth. He that would sacrifice at her altar must not leave a\nfew flowers, an apple, or some symbolic gift. No; he must relinquish\norchards and gardens, prosperity and convenience; he may live on a\nheath without trees; sometimes hungry, and sometimes rheumatic with\ncold. The fire retreats and concentrates within into a pure flame, pure\nas the stars to which it mounts.\n\nBut, gentlemen, there is plainly no end to these expansions. I have\nexhausted your patience, and I have only begun. I had perhaps wiselier\nadhered to my first purpose of confining my illustration to a single\ntopic, but it is so much easier to say many things than to explain one.\nWell, you will see the drift of all my thoughts, this namely--that\nthe scholar must be much more than a scholar, that his ends give\nvalue to every means, but he is to subdue and keep down his methods;\nthat his use of books is occasional, and infinitely subordinate; that\nhe should read a little proudly, as one who knows the original, and\ncannot therefore very highly value the copy. In like manner he is\nto hold lightly every tradition, every opinion, every person, out\nof his piety to that Eternal Spirit which dwells unexpressed with\nhim. He shall think very highly of his destiny. He is here to know\nthe secret of Genius; to become, not a reader of poetry, but Homer,\nDante, Milton, Shakspeare, Swedenborg, in the fountain, through that.\nIf one man could impart his faith to another, if I could prevail to\ncommunicate the incommunicable mysteries, you should see the breadth of\nyour realm;--that ever as you ascend your proper and native path, you\nreceive the keys of Nature and history, and rise on the same stairs to\nscience and to joy.\n\n\n\n\n                               PLUTARCH.\n\n                                The soul\n    Shall have society of its own rank:\n    Be great, be true, and all the Scipios,\n    The Catos, the wise patriots of Rome,\n    Shall flock to you and tarry by your side\n    And comfort you with their high company.\n\n\n\n\n                             PLUTARCH.[10]\n\n\nIT is remarkable that of an author so familiar as Plutarch, not only\nto scholars, but to all reading men, and whose history is so easily\ngathered from his works, no accurate memoir of his life, not even the\ndates of his birth and death, should have come down to us. Strange\nthat the writer of so many illustrious biographies should wait so long\nfor his own. It is agreed that he was born about the year 50 of the\nChristian era. He has been represented as having been the tutor of the\nEmperor Trajan, as dedicating one of his books to him, as living long\nin Rome in great esteem, as having received from Trajan the consular\ndignity, and as having been appointed by him the governor of Greece.\nHe was a man whose real superiority had no need of these flatteries.\nMeantime, the simple truth is, that he was not the tutor of Trajan,\nthat he dedicated no book to him, was not consul in Rome, nor governor\nof Greece; appears never to have been in Rome but on two occasions,\nand then on business of the people of his native city, Ch\u00e6ronea; and\nthough he found or made friends at Rome, and read lectures to some\nfriends or scholars, he did not know or learn the Latin language there;\nwith one or two doubtful exceptions, never quotes a Latin book; and\nthough the contemporary, in his youth or in his old age, of Persius,\nJuvenal, Lucan and Seneca, of Quintilian, Martial, Tacitus, Suetonius,\nPliny the Elder and the Younger, he does not cite them, and, in return,\nhis name is never mentioned by any Roman writer. It would seem that\nthe community of letters and of personal news was even more rare at\nthat day than the want of printing, of railroads and telegraphs, would\nsuggest to us.\n\nBut this neglect by his contemporaries has been compensated by an\nimmense popularity in modern nations. Whilst his books were never known\nto the world in their own Greek tongue, it is curious that the \u201cLives\u201d\nwere translated and printed in Latin, thence into Italian, French,\nand English, more than a century before the original \u201cWorks\u201d were yet\nprinted. For whilst the \u201cLives\u201d were translated in Rome in 1470, and\nthe \u201cMorals,\u201d part by part, soon after, the first printed edition of\nthe Greek \u201cWorks\u201d did not appear until 1572. Hardly current in his own\nGreek, these found learned interpreters in the scholars of Germany,\nSpain and Italy. In France, in the middle of the most turbulent civil\nwars, Amyot\u2019s translation awakened general attention. His genial\nversion of the \u201cLives\u201d in 1559, of the \u201cMorals\u201d in 1572, had signal\nsuccess. King Henry IV. wrote to his wife, Marie de Medicis: \u201c_Vive\nDieu._ As God liveth, you could not have sent me anything which\ncould be more agreeable than the news of the pleasure you have taken\nin this reading. Plutarch always delights me with a fresh novelty. To\nlove him is to love me; for he has been long time the instructor of\nmy youth. My good mother, to whom I owe all, and who would not wish,\nshe said, to see her son an illustrious dunce, put this book into my\nhands almost when I was a child at the breast. It has been like my\nconscience, and has whispered in my ear many good suggestions and\nmaxims for my conduct and the government of my affairs.\u201d Still earlier,\nRabelais cites him with due respect. Montaigne, in 1589, says: \u201cWe\ndunces had been lost, had not this book raised us out of the dirt. By\nthis favor of his we dare now speak and write. The ladies are able\nto read to schoolmasters. \u2019Tis our breviary.\u201d Montesquieu drew from\nhim his definition of law, and, in his _Pens\u00e9es_, declares, \u201cI\nam always charmed with Plutarch; in his writings are circumstances\nattached to persons, which give great pleasure;\u201d and adds examples.\nSaint Evremond read Plutarch to the great Cond\u00e9 under a tent. Rollin,\nso long the historian of antiquity for France, drew unhesitatingly his\nhistory from him. Voltaire honored him, and Rousseau acknowledged him\nas his master. In England, Sir Thomas North translated the \u201cLives\u201d\nin 1579, and Holland the \u201cMorals\u201d in 1603, in time to be used by\nShakspeare in his plays, and read by Bacon, Dryden, and Cudworth.\n\nThen, recently, there has been a remarkable revival, in France, in\nthe taste for Plutarch and his contemporaries; led, we may say, by\nthe eminent critic Sainte-Beuve. M. Octave Gr\u00e9ard, in a critical work\non the \u201cMorals,\u201d has carefully corrected the popular legends and\nconstructed from the works of Plutarch himself his true biography.\nM. Lev\u00e9que has given an exposition of his moral philosophy, under\nthe title of \u201cA Physician of the Soul,\u201d in the _Revue des Deux\nMondes_; and M. C. Martha, chapters on the genius of Marcus\nAurelius, of Persius, and Lucretius, in the same journal; whilst M.\nFustel de Coulanges has explored from its roots in the Aryan race, then\nin their Greek and Roman descendants, the primeval religion of the\nhousehold.\n\nPlutarch occupies a unique place in literature as an encyclop\u00e6dia of\nGreek and Roman antiquity. Whatever is eminent in fact or in fiction,\nin opinion, in character, in institutions, in science--natural, moral,\nor metaphysical, or in memorable sayings, drew his attention and\ncame to his pen with more or less fulness of record. He is, among\nprose-writers, what Chaucer is among English poets, a repertory for\nthose who want the story without searching for it at first hand,--a\ncompend of all accepted traditions. And all this without any supreme\nintellectual gifts. He is not a profound mind; not a master in any\nscience; not a lawgiver, like Lycurgus or Solon; not a metaphysician,\nlike Parmenides, Plato, or Aristotle; not the founder of any sect\nor community, like Pythagoras or Zeno; not a naturalist, like Pliny\nor Linn\u00e6us; not a leader of the mind of a generation, like Plato or\nGoethe. But if he had not the highest powers, he was yet a man of rare\ngifts. He had that universal sympathy with genius which makes all its\nvictories his own; though he never used verse, he had many qualities\nof the poet in the power of his imagination, the speed of his mental\nassociations, and his sharp, objective eyes. But what specially marks\nhim, he is a chief example of the illumination of the intellect by\nthe force of morals. Though the most amiable of boon-companions, this\ngenerous religion gives him _aper\u00e7us_ like Goethe\u2019s.\n\nPlutarch was well-born, well-taught, well-conditioned; a\nself-respecting, amiable man, who knew how to better a good education\nby travels, by devotion to affairs private and public; a master of\nancient culture, he read books with a just criticism; eminently\nsocial, he was a king in his own house, surrounded himself with select\nfriends, and knew the high value of good conversation; and declares in\na letter written to his wife that \u201che finds scarcely an erasure, as in\na book well-written, in the happiness of his life.\u201d\n\nThe range of mind makes the glad writer. The reason of Plutarch\u2019s vast\npopularity is his humanity. A man of society, of affairs; upright,\npractical; a good son, husband, father, and friend,--he has a taste for\ncommon life, and knows the court, the camp and the judgment-hall, but\nalso the forge, farm, kitchen and cellar, and every utensil and use,\nand with a wise man\u2019s or a poet\u2019s eye. Thought defends him from any\ndegradation. He does not lose his way, for the attractions are from\nwithin, not from without. A poet in verse or prose must have a sensuous\neye, but an intellectual co-perception. Plutarch\u2019s memory is full, and\nhis horizon wide. Nothing touches man but he feels to be his; he is\ntolerant even of vice, if he finds it genial; enough a man of the world\nto give even the Devil his due, and would have hugged Robert Burns,\nwhen he cried:--\n\n    \u201cO wad ye tak\u2019 a thought and mend!\u201d\n\nHe is a philosopher with philosophers, a naturalist with naturalists,\nand sufficiently a mathematician to leave some of his readers, now and\nthen, at a long distance behind him, or respectfully skipping to the\nnext chapter. But this scholastic omniscience of our author engages a\nnew respect, since they hope he understands his own diagram.\n\nHe perpetually suggests Montaigne, who was the best reader he has ever\nfound, though Montaigne excelled his master in the point and surprise\nof his sentences. Plutarch had a religion which Montaigne wanted,\nand which defends him from wantonness; and though Plutarch is as\nplain-spoken, his moral sentiment is always pure. What better praise\nhas any writer received than he whom Montaigne finds \u201cfrank in giving\nthings, not words,\u201d dryly adding, \u201cit vexes me that he is so exposed\nto the spoil of those that are conversant with him.\u201d It is one of the\nfelicities of literary history, the tie which inseparably couples\nthese two names across fourteen centuries. Montaigne, whilst he grasps\n\u00c9tienne de la Bo\u00e8ce with one hand, reaches back the other to Plutarch.\nThese distant friendships charm us, and honor all the parties, and make\nthe best example of the universal citizenship and fraternity of the\nhuman mind.\n\nI do not know where to find a book--to borrow a phrase of Ben\nJonson\u2019s--\u201cso rammed with life,\u201d and this in chapters chiefly ethical,\nwhich are so prone to be heavy and sentimental. No poet could\nillustrate his thought with more novel or striking similes or happier\nanecdotes. His style is realistic, picturesque and varied; his sharp\nobjective eyes seeing everything that moves, shines, or threatens in\nnature or art, or thought or dreams. Indeed, twilights, shadows, omens\nand spectres have a charm for him. He believes in witchcraft and the\nevil eye, in demons and ghosts,--but prefers, if you please, to talk\nof these in the morning. His vivacity and abundance never leave him to\nloiter or pound on an incident. I admire his rapid and crowded style,\nas if he had such store of anecdotes of his heroes that he is forced to\nsuppress more than he recounts, in order to keep up with the hasting\nhistory.\n\nHis surprising merit is the genial facility with which he deals with\nhis manifold topics. There is no trace of labor or pain. He gossips\nof heroes, philosophers and poets; of virtues and genius; of love and\nfate and empires. It is for his pleasure that he recites all that is\nbest in his reading: he prattles history. But he is no courtier, and\nno Boswell: he is ever manly, far from fawning, and would be welcome\nto the sages and warriors he reports, as one having a native right\nto admire and recount these stirring deeds and speeches. I find him\na better teacher of rhetoric than any modern. His superstitions are\npoetic, aspiring, affirmative. A poet might rhyme all day with hints\ndrawn from Plutarch, page on page. No doubt, this superior suggestion\nfor the modern reader owes much to the foreign air, the Greek wine,\nthe religion and history of antique heroes. Thebes, Sparta, Athens\nand Rome charm us away from the disgust of the passing hour. But his\nown cheerfulness and rude health are also magnetic. In his immense\nquotation and allusion we quickly cease to discriminate between what\nhe quotes and what he invents. We sail on his memory into the ports\nof every nation, enter into every private property, and do not stop\nto discriminate owners, but give him the praise of all. \u2019Tis all\nPlutarch, by right of eminent domain, and all property vests in this\nemperor. This facility and abundance make the joy of his narrative,\nand he is read to the neglect of more careful historians. Yet he\ninspires a curiosity, sometimes makes a necessity, to read them. He\ndisowns any attempt to rival Thucydides; but I suppose he has a hundred\nreaders where Thucydides finds one, and Thucydides must often thank\nPlutarch for that one. He has preserved for us a multitude of precious\nsentences, in prose or verse, of authors whose books are lost; and\nthese embalmed fragments, through his loving selection alone, have come\nto be proverbs of later mankind. I hope it is only my immense ignorance\nthat makes me believe that they do not survive out of his pages,--not\nonly Thespis, Polemos, Euphorion, Ariston, Evenus, etc., but fragments\nof Menander and Pindar. At all events, it is in reading the fragments\nhe has saved from lost authors that I have hailed another example of\nthe sacred care which has unrolled in our times, and still searches\nand unrolls _papyri_ from ruined libraries and buried cities, and\nhas drawn attention to what an ancient might call the politeness of\nFate,--we will say, more advisedly, the benign Providence which uses\nthe violence of war, of earthquakes and changed water-courses, to save\nunderground through barbarous ages the relics of ancient art, and thus\nallows us to witness the upturning of the alphabets of old races, and\nthe deciphering of forgotten languages, so to complete the annals of\nthe forefathers of Asia, Africa and Europe.\n\nHis delight in poetry makes him cite with joy the speech of Gorgias,\n\u201cthat the tragic poet who deceived was juster than he who deceived not,\nand he that was deceived was wiser than he who was not deceived.\u201d\n\nIt is a consequence of this poetic trait in his mind, that I confess\nthat, in reading him, I embrace the particulars, and carry a faint\nmemory of the argument or general design of the chapter; but he is not\nless welcome, and he leaves the reader with a relish and a necessity\nfor completing his studies. Many examples might be cited of nervous\nexpression and happy allusion, that indicate a poet and an orator,\nthough he is not ambitious of these titles, and cleaves to the security\nof prose narrative, and only shows his intellectual sympathy with\nthese; yet I cannot forbear to cite one or two sentences which none who\nreads them will forget. In treating of the style of the Pythian Oracle,\nhe says:--\n\n\u201cDo you not observe, some one will say, what a grace there is in\nSappho\u2019s measures, and how they delight and tickle the ears and fancies\nof the hearers? Whereas the Sibyl, with her frantic grimaces, uttering\nsentences altogether thoughtful and serious, neither fucused nor\nperfumed, continues her voice a thousand years through the favor of the\nDivinity that speaks within her.\u201d\n\nAnother gives an insight into his mystic tendencies:--\n\n\u201cEarly this morning, asking Epaminondas about the manner of Lysis\u2019s\nburial, I found that Lysis had taught him as far as the incommunicable\nmysteries of our sect, and that the same D\u00e6mon that waited on Lysis,\npresided over him, if I can guess at the pilot from the sailing of\nthe ship. The paths of life are large, but in few are men directed\nby the D\u00e6mons. When Theanor had said this, he looked attentively on\nEpaminondas, as if he designed a fresh search into his nature and\ninclinations.\u201d\n\nAnd here is his sentiment on superstition, somewhat condensed in Lord\nBacon\u2019s citation of it: \u201cI had rather a great deal that men should say,\nThere was no such man at all as Plutarch, than that they should say\nthat there was one Plutarch that would eat up his children as soon as\nthey were born, as the poets speak of Saturn.\u201d\n\nThe chapter \u201cOn Fortune\u201d should be read by poets, and other wise men;\nand the vigor of his pen appears in the chapter \u201cWhether the Athenians\nwere more Warlike or Learned,\u201d and in his attack upon Usurers.\n\nThere is, of course, a wide difference of time in the writing of these\ndiscourses, and so in their merit. Many of them are mere sketches\nor notes for chapters in preparation, which were never digested or\nfinished. Many are notes for disputations in the lecture-room. His poor\nindignation against Herodotus was perhaps a youthful prize essay: it\nappeared to me captious and labored; or perhaps, at a rhetorician\u2019s\nschool, the subject of Herodotus being the lesson of the day, Plutarch\nwas appointed by lot to take the adverse side.\n\nThe plain-speaking of Plutarch, as of the ancient writers generally,\ncoming from the habit of writing for one sex only, has a great gain\nfor brevity, and, in our new tendencies of civilization, may tend to\ncorrect a false delicacy.\n\nWe are always interested in the man who treats the intellect well.\nWe expect it from the philosopher,--from Plato, Aristotle, Spinoza\nand Kant; but we know that metaphysical studies in any but minds of\nlarge horizon and incessant inspiration have their dangers. One asks\nsometimes whether a metaphysician can treat the intellect well. The\ncentral fact is the superhuman intelligence, pouring into us from its\nunknown fountain, to be received with religious awe, and defended\nfrom any mixture of our will. But this high Muse comes and goes; and\nthe danger is that, when the Muse is wanting, the student is prone to\nsupply its place with microscopic subtleties and logomachy. It is fatal\nto spiritual health to lose your admiration. \u201cLet others wrangle,\u201d said\nSt. Augustine; \u201cI will wonder.\u201d Plato and Plotinus are enthusiasts,\nwho honor the race; but the logic of the sophists and materialists,\nwhether Greek or French, fills us with disgust. Whilst we expect this\nawe and reverence of the spiritual power from the philosopher in his\ncloset, we praise it in the man of the world;--the man who lives on\nquiet terms with existing institutions, yet indicates his perception of\nthese high oracles; as do Plutarch, Montaigne, Hume and Goethe. These\nmen lift themselves at once from the vulgar and are not the parasites\nof wealth. Perhaps they sometimes compromise, go out to dine, make and\ntake compliments; but they keep open the source of wisdom and health.\nPlutarch is uniformly true to this centre. He had not lost his wonder.\nHe is a pronounced idealist, who does not hesitate to say, like another\nBerkeley, \u201cMatter is itself privation;\u201d and again, \u201cThe Sun is the\ncause that all men are ignorant of Apollo, by sense withdrawing the\nrational intellect from that which is to that which appears.\u201d He thinks\nthat \u201csouls are naturally endowed with the faculty of prediction;\u201d he\ndelights in memory, with its miraculous power of resisting time. He\nthinks that \u201cAlexander invaded Persia with greater assistance from\nAristotle than from his father Philip.\u201d He thinks that \u201che who has\nideas of his own is a bad judge of another man\u2019s, it being true that\nthe Eleans would be the most proper judges of the Olympic games, were\nno Eleans gamesters.\u201d He says of Socrates, that he endeavored to bring\nreason and things together, and make truth consist with sober sense. He\nwonders with Plato at that nail of pain and pleasure which fastens the\nbody to the mind. The mathematics give him unspeakable pleasure, but he\nchiefly liked that proportion which teaches us to account that which is\njust, equal; and not that which is equal, just.\n\nOf philosophy he is more interested in the results than in the method.\nHe has a just instinct of the presence of a master, and prefers\nto sit as a scholar with Plato, than as a disputant; and, true to\nhis practical character, he wishes the philosopher not to hide in a\ncorner, but to commend himself to men of public regards and ruling\ngenius: \u201cfor, if he once possess such a man with principles of honor\nand religion, he takes a compendious method, by doing good to one, to\noblige a great part of mankind.\u201d \u2019Tis a temperance, not an eclecticism,\nwhich makes him adverse to the severe Stoic, or the Gymnosophist, or\nDiogenes, or any other extremist. That vice of theirs shall not hinder\nhim from citing any good word they chance to drop. He is an eclectic\nin such sense as Montaigne was,--willing to be an expectant, not a\ndogmatist.\n\nIn many of these chapters it is easy to infer the relation between the\nGreek philosophers and those who came to them for instruction. This\nteaching was no play nor routine, but strict, sincere and affectionate.\nThe part of each of the class is as important as that of the master.\nThey are like the base-ball players, to whom the pitcher, the bat, the\ncatcher and the scout are equally important. And Plutarch thought, with\nAriston, \u201cthat neither a bath nor a lecture served any purpose, unless\nthey were purgative.\u201d Plutarch has such a keen pleasure in realities\nthat he has none in verbal disputes; he is impatient of sophistry, and\ndespises the Epicharmian disputations: as, that he who ran in debt\nyesterday owes nothing to-day, as being another man; so, he that was\nyesterday invited to supper, the next night comes an unbidden guest,\nfor that he is quite another person.\n\nExcept as historical curiosities, little can be said in behalf of\nthe scientific value of the \u201cOpinions of the Philosophers,\u201d the\n\u201cQuestions\u201d and the \u201cSymposiacs.\u201d They are, for the most part, very\ncrude opinions; many of them so puerile that one would believe that\nPlutarch in his haste adopted the notes of his younger auditors, some\nof them jocosely misreporting the dogma of the professor, who laid them\naside as _memoranda_ for future revision, which he never gave,\nand they were posthumously published. Now and then there are hints of\nsuperior science. You may cull from this record of barbarous guesses\nof shepherds and travellers, statements that are predictions of facts\nestablished in modern science. Usually, when Thales, Anaximenes or\nAnaximander are quoted, it is really a good judgment. The explanation\nof the rainbow, of the floods of the Nile, and of the _remora_,\netc., are just; and the bad guesses are not worse than many of Lord\nBacon\u2019s.\n\nHis Natural History is that of a lover and poet, and not of a\nphysicist. His humanity stooped affectionately to trace the virtues\nwhich he loved in the animals also. \u201cKnowing and not knowing is the\naffirmative or negative of the dog; knowing you is to be your friend;\nnot knowing you, your enemy.\u201d He quotes Thucydides\u2019 saying that \u201cnot\nthe desire of honor only never grows old, but much less also the\ninclination to society and affection to the State, which continue even\nin ants and bees to the very last.\u201d\n\nBut, though curious in the questions of the schools on the nature and\ngenesis of things, his extreme interest in every trait of character,\nand his broad humanity, lead him constantly to Morals, to the study of\nthe Beautiful and Good. Hence his love of heroes, his rule of life,\nand his clear convictions of the high destiny of the soul. La Harpe\nsaid that \u201cPlutarch is the genius the most naturally moral that ever\nexisted.\u201d\n\n\u2019Tis almost inevitable to compare Plutarch with Seneca, who, born fifty\nyears earlier, was for many years his contemporary, though they never\nmet, and their writings were perhaps unknown to each other. Plutarch\nis genial, with an endless interest in all human and divine things;\nSeneca, a professional philosopher, a writer of sentences, and, though\nhe keep a sublime path, is less interesting, because less humane; and\nwhen we have shut his book, we forget to open it again. There is a\ncertain violence in his opinions, and want of sweetness. He lacks the\nsympathy of Plutarch. He is tiresome through perpetual didactics.\nHe is not happily living. Cannot the simple lover of truth enjoy the\nvirtues of those he meets, and the virtues suggested by them, so to\nfind himself at some time purely contented? Seneca was still more a man\nof the world than Plutarch; and, by his conversation with the Court\nof Nero, and his own skill, like Voltaire\u2019s, of living with men of\nbusiness and emulating their address in affairs by great accumulation\nof his own property, learned to temper his philosophy with facts. He\nventured far,--apparently too far,--for so keen a conscience as he\nonly had. Yet we owe to that wonderful moralist illustrious maxims; as\nif the scarlet vices of the times of Nero had the natural effect of\ndriving virtue to its loftiest antagonisms. \u201cSeneca,\u201d says L\u2019Estrange,\n\u201cwas a pagan Christian, and is very good reading for our Christian\npagans.\u201d He was Buddhist in his cold abstract virtue, with a certain\nimpassibility beyond humanity. He called pity, \u201cthat fault of narrow\nsouls.\u201d Yet what noble words we owe to him: \u201cGod divided man into men,\nthat they might help each other;\u201d and again, \u201cThe good man differs from\nGod in nothing but duration.\u201d His thoughts are excellent, if only he\nhad the right to say them. Plutarch, meantime, with every virtue under\nheaven, thought it the top of wisdom to philosophize yet not appear to\ndo it, and to reach in mirth the same ends which the most serious are\nproposing.\n\nPlutarch thought \u201ctruth to be the greatest good that man can receive,\nand the goodliest blessing that God can give.\u201d \u201cWhen you are persuaded\nin your mind that you cannot either offer or perform anything more\nagreeable to the gods than the entertaining a right notion of them, you\nwill then avoid superstition as a no less evil than atheism.\u201d He cites\nEuripides to affirm, \u201cIf gods do aught dishonest, they are no gods,\u201d\nand the memorable words of Antigone, in Sophocles, concerning the moral\nsentiment:--\n\n    \u201cFor neither now nor yesterday began\n    These thoughts, which have been ever, nor yet can\n    A man be found who their first entrance knew.\u201d\n\nHis faith in the immortality of the soul is another measure of his deep\nhumanity. He reminds his friends that the Delphic oracles have given\nseveral answers the same in substance as that formerly given to Corax\nthe Naxian:--\n\n    \u201cIt sounds profane impiety\n    To teach that human souls e\u2019er die.\u201d\n\nHe believes that the doctrine of the Divine Providence, and that of the\nimmortality of the soul, rest on one and the same basis. He thinks it\nimpossible either that a man beloved of the gods should not be happy,\nor that a wise and just man should not be beloved of the gods. To him\nthe Epicureans are hateful, who held that the soul perishes when it is\nseparated from the body. \u201cThe soul, incapable of death, suffers in the\nsame manner in the body, as birds that are kept in a cage.\u201d He believes\n\u201cthat the souls of infants pass immediately into a better and more\ndivine state.\u201d\n\nI can easily believe that an anxious soul may find in Plutarch\u2019s\nchapter called \u201cPleasure not attainable by Epicurus,\u201d and his \u201cLetter\nto his Wife Timoxena,\u201d a more sweet and reassuring argument on the\nimmortality than in the Ph\u00e6do of Plato; for Plutarch always addresses\nthe question on the human side, and not on the metaphysical; as Walter\nScott took hold of boys and young men, in England and America, and\nthrough them of their fathers. His grand perceptions of duty lead him\nto his stern delight in heroism; a stoic resistance to low indulgence;\nto a fight with fortune; a regard for truth; his love of Sparta,\nand of heroes like Aristides, Phocion and Cato. He insists that the\nhighest good is in action. He thinks that the inhabitants of Asia came\nto be vassals to one, only for not having been able to pronounce one\nsyllable; which is, No. So keen is his sense of allegiance to right\nreason, that he makes a fight against Fortune whenever she is named. At\nRome he thinks her wings were clipped: she stood no longer on a ball,\nbut on a cube as large as Italy. He thinks it was by superior virtue\nthat Alexander won his battles in Asia and Africa, and the Greeks\ntheirs against Persia.\n\nBut this Stoic in his fight with Fortune, with vices, effeminacy and\nindolence, is gentle as a woman when other strings are touched. He is\nthe most amiable of men. \u201cTo erect a trophy in the soul against anger\nis that which none but a great and victorious puissance is able to\nachieve.\u201d--\u201cAnger turns the mind out of doors, and bolts the door.\u201d\nHe has a tenderness almost to tears when he writes on \u201cFriendship,\u201d\non the \u201cTraining of Children,\u201d and on the \u201cLove of Brothers.\u201d \u201cThere\nis no treasure,\u201d he says, \u201cparents can give to their children, like\na brother; \u2019tis a friend given by nature, a gift nothing can supply;\nonce lost, not to be replaced. The Arcadian prophet, of whom Herodotus\nspeaks, was obliged to make a wooden foot in place of that which had\nbeen chopped off. A brother, embroiled with his brother, going to seek\nin the street a stranger who can take his place, resembles him who will\ncut off his foot to give himself one of wood.\u201d\n\nAll his judgments are noble. He thought, with Epicurus, that it is more\ndelightful to do than to receive a kindness. \u201cThis courteous, gentle,\nand benign disposition and behavior is not so acceptable, so obliging\nor delightful to any of those with whom we converse, as it is to those\nwho have it.\u201d There is really no limit to his bounty: \u201cIt would be\ngenerous to lend our eyes and ears, nay, if possible, our reason and\nfortitude to others, whilst we are idle or asleep.\u201d His excessive and\nfanciful humanity reminds one of Charles Lamb, whilst it much exceeds\nhim. When the guests are gone, he \u201cwould leave one lamp burning, only\nas a sign of the respect he bore to fires, for nothing so resembles\nan animal as fire. It is moved and nourished by itself, and by its\nbrightness, like the soul, discovers and makes everything apparent, and\nin its quenching shows some power that seems to proceed from a vital\nprinciple, for it makes a noise and resists, like an animal dying,\nor violently slaughtered;\u201d and he praises the Romans, who, when the\nfeast was over, \u201cdealt well with the lamps, and did not take away the\nnourishment they had given, but permitted them to live and shine by it.\u201d\n\nI can almost regret that the learned editor of the present\nrepublication has not preserved, if only as a piece of history,\nthe preface of Mr. Morgan, the editor and in part writer of this\nTranslation of 1718. In his dedication of the work to the Archbishop\nof Canterbury, Wm. Wake, he tells the Primate that \u201cPlutarch was the\nwisest man of his age, and, if he had been a Christian, one of the\nbest too; _but it was his severe fate to flourish in those days of\nignorance, which, \u2019tis a favorable opinion to hope that the Almighty\nwill sometime wink at; that our souls may be with these philosophers\ntogether in the same state of bliss_.\u201d The puzzle in the worthy\ntranslator\u2019s mind between his theology and his reason well reappears in\nthe puzzle of his sentence.\n\nI know that the chapter of \u201cApothegms of Noble Commanders\u201d is rejected\nby some critics as not a genuine work of Plutarch; but the matter is\ngood, and is so agreeable to his taste and genius, that if he had found\nit, he would have adopted it. If he did not compile the piece, many,\nperhaps most of the anecdotes were already scattered in his works.\nIf I do not lament that a work not his should be ascribed to him, I\nregret that he should have suffered such destruction of his own. What\na trilogy is lost to mankind in his Lives of Scipio, Epaminondas, and\nPindar!\n\nHis delight in magnanimity and self-sacrifice has made his books, like\nHomer\u2019s Iliad, a bible for heroes; and wherever the Cid is relished,\nthe legends of Arthur, Saxon Alfred and Richard the Lion-hearted,\nRobert Bruce, Sydney, Lord Herbert of Cherbury, Cromwell, Nelson,\nBonaparte, and Walter Scott\u2019s Chronicles in prose or verse,--there\nwill Plutarch, who told the story of Leonidas, of Agesilaus, of\nAristides, Phocion, Themistocles, Demosthenes, Epaminondas, C\u00e6sar, Cato\nand the rest, sit as the bestower of the crown of noble knighthood, and\nlaureate of the ancient world.\n\nThe chapters \u201cOn the Fortune of Alexander,\u201d in the \u201cMorals,\u201d are\nan important appendix to the portrait in the \u201cLives.\u201d The union in\nAlexander of sublime courage with the refinement of his pure tastes,\nmaking him the carrier of civilization into the East, are in the\nspirit of the ideal hero, and endeared him to Plutarch. That prince\nkept Homer\u2019s poems not only for himself under his pillow in his tent,\nbut carried these for the delight of the Persian youth, and made them\nacquainted also with the tragedies of Euripides and Sophocles. He\npersuaded the Sogdians not to kill, but to cherish their aged parents;\nthe Persians to reverence, not marry their mothers; the Scythians to\nbury and not eat their dead parents. What a fruit and fitting monument\nof his best days was his city Alexandria, to be the birthplace or home\nof Plotinus, St. Augustine, Synesius, Posidonius, Ammonius, Jamblichus,\nPorphyry, Origen, Aratus, Apollonius and Apuleius.\n\nIf Plutarch delighted in heroes, and held the balance between the\nsevere Stoic and the indulgent Epicurean, his humanity shines not less\nin his intercourse with his personal friends. He was a genial host and\nguest, and delighted in bringing chosen companions to the supper-table.\nHe knew the laws of conversation and the laws of good-fellowship quite\nas well as Horace, and has set them down with such candor and grace as\nto make them good reading to-day. The guests not invited to a private\nboard by the entertainer, but introduced by a guest as his companions,\nthe Greek called _shadows_; and the question is debated whether\nit was civil to bring them, and he treats it candidly, but concludes:\n\u201cTherefore, when I make an invitation, since it is hard to break the\ncustom of the place, I give my guests leave to bring shadows; but when\nI myself am invited as a shadow, I assure you I refuse to go.\u201d He\nhas an objection to the introduction of music at feasts. He thought\nit wonderful that a man having a muse in his own breast, and all the\npleasantness that would fit an entertainment would have pipes and harps\nplay, and by that external noise destroy all the sweetness that was\nproper and his own.\n\nI cannot close these notes without expressing my sense of the valuable\nservice which the Editor has rendered to his Author and to his readers.\nProfessor Goodwin is a silent benefactor to the book, wherever I have\ncompared the editions. I did not know how careless and vicious in\nparts the old book was, until, in recent reading of the old text, on\ncoming on anything absurd or unintelligible, I referred to the new\ntext and found a clear and accurate statement in its place. It is the\nvindication of Plutarch. The correction is not only of names of authors\nand of places grossly altered or misspelled, but of unpardonable\nliberties taken by the translators, whether from negligence or freak.\n\nOne proof of Plutarch\u2019s skill as a writer is that he bears translation\nso well. In spite of its carelessness and manifold faults, which, I\ndoubt not, have tried the patience of its present learned editor and\ncorrector, I yet confess my enjoyment of this old version, for its\nvigorous English style. The work of some forty or fifty University men,\nsome of them imperfect in their Greek, it is a monument of the English\nlanguage at a period of singular vigor and freedom of style. I hope the\nCommission of the Philological Society in London, charged with the duty\nof preparing a Critical Dictionary, will not overlook these volumes,\nwhich show the wealth of their tongue to greater advantage than many\nbooks of more renown as models. It runs through the whole scale of\nconversation in the street, the market, the coffee-house, the law\ncourts, the palace, the college and the church. There are, no doubt,\nmany vulgar phrases, and many blunders of the printer; but it is the\nspeech of business and conversation, and in every tone, from lowest to\nhighest.\n\nWe owe to these translators many sharp perceptions of the wit and humor\nof their author, sometimes even to the adding of the point. I notice\none, which, although the translator has justified his rendering in a\nnote, the severer criticism of the Editor has not retained. \u201cWere there\nnot a sun, we might, for all the other stars, pass our days in the\nReverend Dark, as Heraclitus calls it.\u201d I find a humor in the phrase\nwhich might well excuse its doubtful accuracy.\n\n\nIt is a service to our Republic to publish a book that can force\nambitious young men, before they mount the platform of the county\nconventions, to read the \u201cLaconic Apothegms\u201d and the \u201cApothegms of\nGreat Commanders.\u201d If we could keep the secret, and communicate it\nonly to a few chosen aspirants, we might confide that, by this noble\ninfiltration, they would easily carry the victory over all competitors.\nBut, as it was the desire of these old patriots to fill with their\nmajestic spirit all Sparta or Rome, and not a few leaders only, we\nhasten to offer them to the American people.\n\nPlutarch\u2019s popularity will return in rapid cycles. If over-read in\nthis decade, so that his anecdotes and opinions become commonplace,\nand to-day\u2019s novelties are sought for variety, his sterling values\nwill presently recall the eye and thought of the best minds, and his\nbooks will be reprinted and read anew by coming generations. And thus\nPlutarch will be perpetually rediscovered from time to time as long as\nbooks last.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 10: This paper was printed as an introduction to Plutarch\u2019s\n_Morals_, edited by Professor William W. Goodwin, Boston, 1871.]\n\n\n\n\n          HISTORIC NOTES OF LIFE AND LETTERS IN NEW ENGLAND.\n\n    \u201cOF old things all are over old,\n      Of good things none are good enough;--\n    We\u2019ll show that we can help to frame\n      A world of other stuff.\u201d\n\n\n    FOR Joy and Beauty planted it\n      With faerie gardens cheered,\n    And boding Fancy haunted it\n      With men and women weird.\n\n\n\n\n          HISTORIC NOTES OF LIFE AND LETTERS IN NEW ENGLAND.\n\n\nTHE ancient manners were giving way. There grew a certain tenderness on\nthe people, not before remarked. Children had been repressed and kept\nin the background; now they were considered, cosseted and pampered. I\nrecall the remark of a witty physician who remembered the hardships of\nhis own youth; he said, \u201cIt was a misfortune to have been born when\nchildren were nothing, and to live till men were nothing.\u201d\n\nThere are always two parties, the party of the Past and the party\nof the Future; the Establishment and the Movement. At times the\nresistance is reanimated, the schism runs under the world and appears\nin Literature, Philosophy, Church, State, and social customs. It is\nnot easy to date these eras of activity with any precision, but in\nthis region one made itself remarked, say in 1820 and the twenty years\nfollowing.\n\nIt seemed a war between intellect and affection; a crack in nature,\nwhich split every church in Christendom into Papal and Protestant;\nCalvinism into Old and New schools; Quakerism into Old and New; brought\nnew divisions in politics; as the new conscience touching temperance\nand slavery. The key to the period appeared to be that the mind had\nbecome aware of itself. Men grew reflective and intellectual. There was\na new consciousness. The former generations acted under the belief that\na shining social prosperity was the beatitude of man, and sacrificed\nuniformly the citizen to the State. The modern mind believed that the\nnation existed for the individual, for the guardianship and education\nof every man. This idea, roughly written in revolutions and national\nmovements, in the mind of the philosopher had far more precision; the\nindividual is the world.\n\nThis perception is a sword such as was never drawn before. It\ndivides and detaches bone and marrow, soul and body, yea, almost\nthe man from himself. It is the age of severance, of dissociation,\nof freedom, of analysis, of detachment. Every man for himself. The\npublic speaker disclaims speaking for any other; he answers only for\nhimself. The social sentiments are weak; the sentiment of patriotism\nis weak; veneration is low; the natural affections feebler than they\nwere. People grow philosophical about native land and parents and\nrelations. There is an universal resistance to ties and ligaments\nonce supposed essential to civil society. The new race is stiff, heady\nand rebellious; they are fanatics in freedom; they hate tolls, taxes,\nturnpikes, banks, hierarchies, governors, yea, almost laws. They have a\nneck of unspeakable tenderness; it winces at a hair. They rebel against\ntheological as against political dogmas; against mediation, or saints,\nor any nobility in the unseen.\n\nThe age tends to solitude. The association of the time is accidental\nand momentary and hypocritical, the detachment intrinsic and\nprogressive. The association is for power, merely,--for means; the end\nbeing the enlargement and independency of the individual. Anciently,\nsociety was in the course of things. There was a Sacred Band, a Theban\nPhalanx. There can be none now. College classes, military corps, or\ntrades-unions may fancy themselves indissoluble for a moment, over\ntheir wine; but it is a painted hoop, and has no girth. The age of\narithmetic and of criticism has set in. The structures of old faith in\nevery department of society a few centuries have sufficed to destroy.\nAstrology, magic, palmistry, are long gone. The very last ghost is\nlaid. Demonology is on its last legs. Prerogative, government, goes to\npieces day by day. Europe is strewn with wrecks; a constitution once a\nweek. In social manners and morals the revolution is just as evident.\nIn the law courts, crimes of fraud have taken the place of crimes of\nforce. The stockholder has stepped into the place of the warlike baron.\nThe nobles shall not any longer, as feudal lords, have power of life\nand death over the churls, but now, in another shape, as capitalists,\nshall in all love and peace eat them up as before. Nay, government\nitself becomes the resort of those whom government was invented to\nrestrain. \u201cAre there any brigands on the road?\u201d inquired the traveller\nin France. \u201cOh, no, set your heart at rest on that point,\u201d said the\nlandlord; \u201cwhat should these fellows keep the highway for, when they\ncan rob just as effectually, and much more at their ease, in the\nbureaus of office?\u201d\n\nIn literature the effect appeared in the decided tendency of criticism.\nThe most remarkable literary work of the age has for its hero and\nsubject precisely this introversion: I mean the poem of Faust. In\nphilosophy, Immanuel Kant has made the best catalogue of the human\nfaculties and the best analysis of the mind. Hegel also, especially.\nIn science the French _savant_, exact, pitiless, with barometer,\ncrucible, chemic test and calculus in hand, travels into all nooks and\nislands, to weigh, to analyze and report. And chemistry, which is the\nanalysis of matter, has taught us that we eat gas, drink gas, tread on\ngas, and are gas. The same decomposition has changed the whole face\nof physics; the like in all arts, modes. Authority falls, in Church,\nCollege, Courts of Law, Faculties, Medicine. Experiment is credible;\nantiquity is grown ridiculous.\n\nIt marked itself by a certain predominance of the intellect in the\nbalance of powers. The warm swart Earth-spirit which made the strength\nof past ages, mightier than it knew, with instincts instead of science,\nlike a mother yielding food from her own breast instead of preparing it\nthrough chemic and culinary skill,--warm negro ages of sentiment and\nvegetation,--all gone; another hour had struck and other forms arose.\nInstead of the social existence which all shared, was now separation.\nEvery one for himself; driven to find all his resources, hopes,\nrewards, society and deity within himself.\n\nThe young men were born with knives in their brain, a tendency to\nintroversion, self-dissection, anatomizing of motives. The popular\nreligion of our fathers had received many severe shocks from the\nnew times; from the Arminians, which was the current name of the\nbacksliders from Calvinism, sixty years ago; then from the English\nphilosophic theologians, Hartley and Priestley and Belsham, the\nfollowers of Locke; and then I should say much later from the slow\nbut extraordinary influence of Swedenborg; a man of prodigious mind,\nthough as I think tainted with a certain suspicion of insanity, and\ntherefore generally disowned, but exerting a singular power over an\nimportant intellectual class; then the powerful influence of the genius\nand character of Dr. Channing.\n\nGermany had created criticism in vain for us until 1820, when Edward\nEverett returned from his five years in Europe, and brought to\nCambridge his rich results, which no one was so fitted by natural grace\nand the splendor of his rhetoric to introduce and recommend. He made\nus for the first time acquainted with Wolff\u2019s theory of the Homeric\nwritings, with the criticism of Heyne. The novelty of the learning\nlost nothing in the skill and genius of his relation, and the rudest\nundergraduate found a new morning opened to him in the lecture-room of\nHarvard Hall.\n\nThere was an influence on the young people from the genius of Everett\nwhich was almost comparable to that of Pericles in Athens. He had\nan inspiration which did not go beyond his head, but which made him\nthe master of elegance. If any of my readers were at that period in\nBoston or Cambridge, they will easily remember his radiant beauty of\nperson, of a classic style, his heavy large eye, marble lids, which\ngave the impression of mass which the slightness of his form needed;\nsculptured lips; a voice of such rich tones, such precise and perfect\nutterance, that, although slightly nasal, it was the most mellow and\nbeautiful and correct of all the instruments of the time. The word\nthat he spoke, in the manner in which he spoke it, became current and\nclassical in New England. He had a great talent for collecting facts,\nand for bringing those he had to bear with ingenious felicity on the\ntopic of the moment. Let him rise to speak on what occasion soever, a\nfact had always just transpired which composed, with some other fact\nwell known to the audience, the most pregnant and happy coincidence.\nIt was remarked that for a man who threw out so many facts he was\nseldom convicted of a blunder. He had a good deal of special learning,\nand all his learning was available for purposes of the hour. It was\nall new learning, that wonderfully took and stimulated the young men.\nIt was so coldly and weightily communicated from so commanding a\nplatform, as if in the consciousness and consideration of all history\nand all learning,--adorned with so many simple and austere beauties\nof expression, and enriched with so many excellent digressions and\nsignificant quotations, that, though nothing could be conceived\nbeforehand less attractive or indeed less fit for green boys from\nConnecticut, New Hampshire and Massachusetts, with their unripe Latin\nand Greek reading, than exegetical discourses in the style of Voss and\nWolff and Ruhnken, on the Orphic and Ante-Homeric remains,--yet this\nlearning instantly took the highest place to our imagination in our\nunoccupied American Parnassus. All his auditors felt the extreme beauty\nand dignity of the manner, and even the coarsest were contented to go\npunctually to listen, for the manner, when they had found out that the\nsubject-matter was not for them. In the lecture-room, he abstained\nfrom all ornament, and pleased himself with the play of detailing\nerudition in a style of perfect simplicity. In the pulpit (for he was\nthen a clergyman) he made amends to himself and his auditor for the\nself-denial of the professor\u2019s chair, and, with an infantine simplicity\nstill, of manner, he gave the reins to his florid, quaint and affluent\nfancy.\n\nThen was exhibited all the richness of a rhetoric which we have never\nseen rivalled in this country. Wonderful how memorable were words\nmade which were only pleasing pictures, and covered no new or valid\nthoughts. He abounded in sentences, in wit, in satire, in splendid\nallusion, in quotation impossible to forget, in daring imagery, in\nparable and even in a sort of defying experiment of his own wit\nand skill in giving an oracular weight to Hebrew or Rabbinical\nwords;--feats which no man could better accomplish, such was his\nself-command and the security of his manner. All his speech was\nmusic, and with such variety and invention that the ear was never\ntired. Especially beautiful were his poetic quotations. He delighted\nin quoting Milton, and with such sweet modulation that he seemed to\ngive as much beauty as he borrowed; and whatever he has quoted will\nbe remembered by any who heard him, with inseparable association\nwith his voice and genius. He had nothing in common with vulgarity\nand infirmity, but, speaking, walking, sitting, was as much aloof\nand uncommon as a star. The smallest anecdote of his behavior or\nconversation was eagerly caught and repeated, and every young scholar\ncould recite brilliant sentences from his sermons, with mimicry, good\nor bad, of his voice. This influence went much farther, for he who was\nheard with such throbbing hearts and sparkling eyes in the lighted\nand crowded churches, did not let go his hearers when the church was\ndismissed, but the bright image of that eloquent form followed the boy\nhome to his bed-chamber; and not a sentence was written in academic\nexercises, not a declamation attempted in the college chapel, but\nshowed the omnipresence of his genius to youthful heads. This made\nevery youth his defender, and boys filled their mouths with arguments\nto prove that the orator had a heart. This was a triumph of Rhetoric.\nIt was not the intellectual or the moral principles which he had to\nteach. It was not thoughts. When Massachusetts was full of his fame it\nwas not contended that he had thrown any truths into circulation. But\nhis power lay in the magic of form; it was in the graces of manner; in\na new perception of Grecian beauty, to which he had opened our eyes.\nThere was that finish about this person which is about women, and which\ndistinguishes every piece of genius from the works of talent,--that\nthese last are more or less matured in every degree of completeness\naccording to the time bestowed on them, but works of genius in their\nfirst and slightest form are still wholes. In every public discourse\nthere was nothing left for the indulgence of his hearer, no marks of\nlate hours and anxious, unfinished study, but the goddess of grace had\nbreathed on the work a last fragrancy and glitter.\n\nBy a series of lectures largely and fashionably attended for two\nwinters in Boston he made a beginning of popular literary and\nmiscellaneous lecturing, which in that region at least had important\nresults. It is acquiring greater importance every day, and becoming\na national institution. I am quite certain that this purely literary\ninfluence was of the first importance to the American mind.\n\nIn the pulpit Dr. Frothingham, an excellent classical and German\nscholar, had already made us acquainted, if prudently, with the genius\nof Eichhorn\u2019s theologic criticism. And Professor Norton a little later\ngave form and method to the like studies in the then infant Divinity\nSchool. But I think the paramount source of the religious revolution\nwas Modern Science; beginning with Copernicus, who destroyed the pagan\nfictions of the Church, by showing mankind that the earth on which we\nlive was not the centre of the Universe, around which the sun and stars\nrevolved every day, and thus fitted to be the platform on which the\nDrama of the Divine Judgment was played before the assembled Angels of\nHeaven,--\u201cthe scaffold of the divine vengeance\u201d Saurin called it,--but\na little scrap of a planet, rushing round the sun in our system,\nwhich in turn was too minute to be seen at the distance of many stars\nwhich we behold. Astronomy taught us our insignificance in Nature;\nshowed that our sacred as our profane history had been written in\ngross ignorance of the laws, which were far grander than we knew; and\ncompelled a certain extension and uplifting of our views of the Deity\nand his Providence. This correction of our superstitions was confirmed\nby the new science of Geology, and the whole train of discoveries in\nevery department. But we presently saw also that the religious nature\nin man was not affected by these errors in his understanding. The\nreligious sentiment made nothing of bulk or size, or far or near;\ntriumphed over time as well as space; and every lesson of humility, or\njustice, or charity, which the old ignorant saints had taught him, was\nstill forever true.\n\nWhether from these influences, or whether by a reaction of the general\nmind against the too formal science, religion and social life of the\nearlier period,--there was, in the first quarter of our nineteenth\ncentury, a certain sharpness of criticism, an eagerness for reform,\nwhich showed itself in every quarter. It appeared in the popularity\nof Lavater\u2019s Physiognomy, now almost forgotten. Gall and Spurzheim\u2019s\nPhrenology laid a rough hand on the mysteries of animal and spiritual\nnature, dragging down every sacred secret to a street show. The attempt\nwas coarse and odious to scientific men, but had a certain truth in it;\nit felt connection where the professors denied it, and was a leading\nto a truth which had not yet been announced. On the heels of this\nintruder came Mesmerism, which broke into the inmost shrines, attempted\nthe explanation of miracle and prophecy, as well as of creation. What\ncould be more revolting to the contemplative philosopher! But a certain\nsuccess attended it, against all expectation. It was human, it was\ngenial, it affirmed unity and connection between remote points, and\nas such was excellent criticism on the narrow and dead classification\nof what passed for science; and the joy with which it was greeted\nwas an instinct of the people which no true philosopher would fail to\nprofit by. But while society remained in doubt between the indignation\nof the old school and the audacity of the new, a higher note sounded.\nUnexpected aid from high quarters came to iconoclasts. The German\npoet Goethe revolted against the science of the day, against French\nand English science, declared war against the great name of Newton,\nproposed his own new and simple optics: in Botany, his simple theory\nof metamorphosis;--the eye of a leaf is all; every part of the plant\nfrom root to fruit is only a modified leaf, the branch of a tree is\nnothing but a leaf whose serratures have become twigs. He extended this\ninto anatomy and animal life, and his views were accepted. The revolt\nbecame a revolution. Schelling and Oken introduced their ideal natural\nphilosophy, Hegel his metaphysics, and extended it to Civil History.\n\nThe result in literature and the general mind was a return to law;\nin science, in politics, in social life; as distinguished from the\nprofligate manners and politics of earlier times. The age was moral.\nEvery immorality is a departure from nature, and is punished by natural\nloss and deformity. The popularity of Combe\u2019s Constitution of Man;\nthe humanity which was the aim of all the multitudinous works of\nDickens; the tendency even of Punch\u2019s caricature, was all on the side\nof the people. There was a breath of new air, much vague expectation, a\nconsciousness of power not yet finding its determinate aim.\n\nI attribute much importance to two papers of Dr. Channing, one on\nMilton and one on Napoleon, which were the first specimens in this\ncountry of that large criticism which in England had given power and\nfame to the Edinburgh Review. They were widely read, and of course\nimmediately fruitful in provoking emulation which lifted the style of\nJournalism. Dr. Channing, whilst he lived, was the star of the American\nChurch, and we then thought, if we do not still think, that he left\nno successor in the pulpit. He could never be reported, for his eye\nand voice could not be printed, and his discourses lose their best in\nlosing them. He was made for the public; his cold temperament made him\nthe most unprofitable private companion; but all America would have\nbeen impoverished in wanting him. We could not then spare a single word\nhe uttered in public, not so much as the reading a lesson in Scripture,\nor a hymn, and it is curious that his printed writings are almost a\nhistory of the times; as there was no great public interest, political,\nliterary, or even economical (for he wrote on the Tariff), on which he\ndid not leave some printed record of his brave and thoughtful opinion.\nA poor little invalid all his life, he is yet one of those men who\nvindicate the power of the American race to produce greatness.\n\nDr. Channing took counsel in 1840 with George Ripley, to the point\nwhether it were possible to bring cultivated, thoughtful people\ntogether, and make society that deserved the name. He had earlier\ntalked with Dr. John Collins Warren on the like purpose, who admitted\nthe wisdom of the design and undertook to aid him in making the\nexperiment. Dr. Channing repaired to Dr. Warren\u2019s house on the\nappointed evening, with large thoughts which he wished to open. He\nfound a well-chosen assembly of gentlemen variously distinguished;\nthere was mutual greeting and introduction, and they were chatting\nagreeably on indifferent matters and drawing gently towards their great\nexpectation, when a side-door opened, the whole company streamed in to\nan oyster supper, crowned by excellent wines; and so ended the first\nattempt to establish \u00e6sthetic society in Boston.\n\nSome time afterwards Dr. Channing opened his mind to Mr. and Mrs.\nRipley, and with some care they invited a limited party of ladies\nand gentlemen. I had the honor to be present. Though I recall the\nfact, I do not retain any instant consequence of this attempt, or any\nconnection between it and the new zeal of the friends who at that time\nbegan to be drawn together by sympathy of studies and of aspiration.\nMargaret Fuller, George Ripley, Dr. Convers Francis, Theodore Parker,\nDr. Hedge, Mr. Brownson, James Freeman Clarke, William H. Channing,\nand many others, gradually drew together and from time to time spent\nan afternoon at each other\u2019s houses in a serious conversation. With\nthem was always one well-known form, a pure idealist, not at all a\nman of letters, nor of any practical talent, nor a writer of books; a\nman quite too cold and contemplative for the alliances of friendship,\nwith rare simplicity and grandeur of perception, who read Plato as an\nequal, and inspired his companions only in proportion as they were\nintellectual,--whilst the men of talent complained of the want of point\nand precision in this abstract and religious thinker.\n\nThese fine conversations, of course, were incomprehensible to some\nin the company, and they had their revenge in their little joke.\nOne declared that \u201cIt seemed to him like going to heaven in a\nswing;\u201d another reported that, at a knotty point in the discourse,\na sympathizing Englishman with a squeaking voice interrupted with\nthe question, \u201cMr. Alcott, a lady near me desires to inquire whether\nomnipotence abnegates attribute?\u201d\n\nI think there prevailed at that time a general belief in Boston that\nthere was some concert of _doctrinaires_ to establish certain\nopinions and inaugurate some movement in literature, philosophy,\nand religion, of which design the supposed conspirators were quite\ninnocent; for there was no concert, and only here and there two or\nthree men or women who read and wrote, each alone, with unusual\nvivacity. Perhaps they only agreed in having fallen upon Coleridge and\nWordsworth and Goethe, then on Carlyle, with pleasure and sympathy.\nOtherwise, their education and reading were not marked, but had the\nAmerican superficialness, and their studies were solitary. I suppose\nall of them were surprised at this rumor of a school or sect, and\ncertainly at the name of Transcendentalism, given nobody knows by whom,\nor when it was first applied. As these persons became in the common\nchances of society acquainted with each other, there resulted certainly\nstrong friendships, which of course were exclusive in proportion to\ntheir heat: and perhaps those persons who were mutually the best\nfriends were the most private and had no ambition of publishing their\nletters, diaries, or conversation.\n\nFrom that time meetings were held for conversation, with very little\nform, from house to house, of people engaged in studies, fond of books,\nand watchful of all the intellectual light from whatever quarter\nit flowed. Nothing could be less formal, yet the intelligence and\ncharacter and varied ability of the company gave it some notoriety and\nperhaps waked curiosity as to its aims and results.\n\nNothing more serious came of it than the modest quarterly journal\ncalled \u201cThe Dial\u201d which, under the editorship of Margaret Fuller,\nand later of some other, enjoyed its obscurity for four years. All\nits papers were unpaid contributions, and it was rather a work of\nfriendship among the narrow circle of students than the organ of any\nparty. Perhaps its writers were its chief readers: yet it contained\nsome noble papers by Margaret Fuller, and some numbers had an instant\nexhausting sale, because of papers by Theodore Parker.\n\nTheodore Parker was our Savonarola, an excellent scholar, in frank\nand affectionate communication with the best minds of his day, yet\nthe tribune of the people, and the stout Reformer to urge and defend\nevery cause of humanity with and for the humblest of mankind. He was no\nartist. Highly refined persons might easily miss in him the element of\nbeauty. What he said was mere fact, almost offended you, so bald and\ndetached; little cared he. He stood altogether for practical truth; and\nso to the last. He used every day and hour of his short life, and his\ncharacter appeared in the last moments with the same firm control as\nin the mid-day of strength. I habitually apply to him the words of a\nFrench philosopher who speaks of \u201cthe man of Nature who abominates the\nsteam-engine and the factory. His vast lungs breathe independence with\nthe air of the mountains and the woods.\u201d\n\nThe vulgar politician disposed of this circle cheaply as \u201cthe\nsentimental class.\u201d State Street had an instinct that they invalidated\ncontracts and threatened the stability of stocks; and it did not\nfancy brusque manners. Society always values, even in its teachers,\ninoffensive people, susceptible of conventional polish. The clergyman\nwho would live in the city _may_ have piety, but _must_\nhave taste, whilst there was often coming, among these, some John the\nBaptist, wild from the woods, rude, hairy, careless of dress and quite\nscornful of the etiquette of cities. There was a pilgrim in those days\nwalking in the country who stopped at every door where he hoped to find\nhearing for his doctrine, which was, Never to give or receive money.\nHe was a poor printer, and explained with simple warmth the belief of\nhimself and five or six young men with whom he agreed in opinion, of\nthe vast mischief of our insidious coin. He thought every one should\nlabor at some necessary product, and as soon as he had made more than\nenough for himself, were it corn, or paper, or cloth, or boot-jacks,\nhe should give of the commodity to any applicant, and in turn go to\nhis neighbor for any article which he had to spare. Of course we\nwere curious to know how he sped in his experiments on the neighbor,\nand his anecdotes were interesting, and often highly creditable.\nBut he had the courage which so stern a return to Arcadian manners\nrequired, and had learned to sleep, in cold nights, when the farmer at\nwhose door he knocked declined to give him a bed, on a wagon covered\nwith the buffalo-robe under the shed,--or under the stars, when the\nfarmer denied the shed and the buffalo-robe. I think he persisted for\ntwo years in his brave practice, but did not enlarge his church of\nbelievers.\n\nThese reformers were a new class. Instead of the fiery souls of the\nPuritans, bent on hanging the Quaker, burning the witch and banishing\nthe Romanist, these were gentle souls, with peaceful and even with\ngenial dispositions, casting sheep\u2019s-eyes even on Fourier and his\nhouris. It was a time when the air was full of reform. Robert Owen of\nLanark came hither from England in 1845, and read lectures or held\nconversations wherever he found listeners; the most amiable, sanguine\nand candid of men. He had not the least doubt that he had hit on a\nright and perfect socialism, or that all mankind would adopt it. He\nwas then seventy years old, and being asked, \u201cWell, Mr. Owen, who is\nyour disciple? How many men are there possessed of your views who\nwill remain after you are gone, to put them in practice?\u201d \u201cNot one,\u201d\nwas his reply. Robert Owen knew Fourier in his old age. He said that\nFourier learned of him all the truth he had; the rest of his system\nwas imagination, and the imagination of a banker. Owen made the best\nimpression by his rare benevolence. His love of men made us forget his\n\u201cThree Errors.\u201d His charitable construction of men and their actions\nwas invariable. He was the better Christian in his controversy with\nChristians, and he interpreted with great generosity the acts of the\n\u201cHoly Alliance,\u201d and Prince Metternich, with whom the persevering\n_doctrinaire_ had obtained interviews; \u201cAh,\u201d he said, \u201cyou may\ndepend on it there are as tender hearts and as much good will to serve\nmen, in palaces, as in colleges.\u201d\n\nAnd truly I honor the generous ideas of the Socialists, the\nmagnificence of their theories, and the enthusiasm with which they\nhave been urged. They appeared the inspired men of their time. Mr.\nOwen preached his doctrine of labor and reward, with the fidelity and\ndevotion of a saint, to the slow ears of his generation. Fourier,\nalmost as wonderful an example of the mathematical mind of France as La\nPlace or Napoleon, turned a truly vast arithmetic to the question of\nsocial misery, and has put men under the obligation which a generous\nmind always confers, of conceiving magnificent hopes and making great\ndemands as the right of man. He took his measure of that which all\nshould and might enjoy, from no soup-society or charity-concert, but\nfrom the refinements of palaces, the wealth of universities, and the\ntriumphs of artists. He thought nobly. A man is entitled to pure air,\nand to the air of good conversation in his bringing up, and not, as\nwe or so many of us, to the poor-smell and musty chambers, cats and\nfools. Fourier carried a whole French Revolution in his head, and much\nmore. Here was arithmetic on a huge scale. His ciphering goes where\nciphering never went before, namely, into stars, atmospheres, and\nanimals, and men and women, and classes of every character. It was the\nmost entertaining of French romances, and could not but suggest vast\npossibilities of reform to the coldest and least sanguine.\n\nWe had an opportunity of learning something of these Socialists and\ntheir theory, from the indefatigable apostle of the sect in New York,\nAlbert Brisbane. Mr. Brisbane pushed his doctrine with all the force\nof memory, talent, honest faith and importunacy. As we listened to his\nexposition it appeared to us the sublime of mechanical philosophy; for\nthe system was the perfection of arrangement and contrivance. The force\nof arrangement could no farther go. The merit of the plan was that it\nwas a system; that it had not the partiality and hint-and-fragment\ncharacter of most popular schemes, but was coherent and comprehensive\nof facts to a wonderful degree. It was not daunted by distance, or\nmagnitude, or remoteness of any sort, but strode about nature with\na giant\u2019s step, and skipped no fact, but wove its large Ptolemaic\nweb of cycle and epicycle, of phalanx and phalanstery, with laudable\nassiduity. Mechanics were pushed so far as fairly to meet spiritualism.\nOne could not but be struck with strange coincidences betwixt Fourier\nand Swedenborg. Genius hitherto has been shamefully misapplied, a\nmere trifler. It must now set itself to raise the social condition\nof man and to redress the disorders of the planet he inhabits. The\nDesert of Sahara, the Campagna di Roma, the frozen Polar circles,\nwhich by their pestilential or hot or cold airs poison the temperate\nregions, accuse man. Society, concert, co-operation, is the secret of\nthe coming Paradise. By reason of the isolation of men at the present\nday, all work is drudgery. By concert and the allowing each laborer to\nchoose his own work, it becomes pleasure. \u201cAttractive Industry\u201d would\nspeedily subdue, by adventurous scientific and persistent tillage, the\npestilential tracts; would equalize temperature, give health to the\nglobe and cause the earth to yield \u201chealthy imponderable fluids\u201d to the\nsolar system, as now it yields noxious fluids. The hy\u00e6na, the jackal,\nthe gnat, the bug, the flea, were all beneficent parts of the system;\nthe good Fourier knew what those creatures should have been, had not\nthe mould slipped, through the bad state of the atmosphere; caused\nno doubt by the same vicious imponderable fluids. All these shall be\nredressed by human culture, and the useful goat and dog and innocent\npoetical moth, or the wood-tick to consume decomposing wood, shall take\ntheir place. It takes sixteen hundred and eighty men to make one Man,\ncomplete in all the faculties; that is, to be sure that you have got a\ngood joiner, a good cook, a barber, a poet, a judge, an umbrella-maker,\na mayor and alderman, and so on. Your community should consist of two\nthousand persons, to prevent accidents of omission; and each community\nshould take up six thousand acres of land. Now fancy the earth planted\nwith fifties and hundreds of these phalanxes side by side,--what\ntillage, what architecture, what refectories, what dormitories, what\nreading-rooms, what concerts, what lectures, what gardens, what baths!\nWhat is not in one will be in another, and many will be within easy\ndistance. Then know you one and all, that Constantinople is the natural\ncapital of the globe. There, in the Golden Horn, will the Arch-Phalanx\nbe established; there will the Omniarch reside. Aladdin and his\nmagician, or the beautiful Scheherezade can alone, in these prosaic\ntimes before the sight, describe the material splendors collected\nthere. Poverty shall be abolished; deformity, stupidity and crime\nshall be no more. Genius, grace, art, shall abound, and it is not to\nbe doubted but that in the reign of \u201cAttractive Industry\u201d all men will\nspeak in blank verse.\n\nCertainly we listened with great pleasure to such gay and magnificent\npictures. The ability and earnestness of the advocate and his friends,\nthe comprehensiveness of their theory, its apparent directness of\nproceeding to the end they would secure, the indignation they felt\nand uttered in the presence of so much social misery, commanded our\nattention and respect. It contained so much truth, and promised in the\nattempts that shall be made to realize it so much valuable instruction,\nthat we are engaged to observe every step of its progress. Yet in\nspite of the assurances of its friends that it was new and widely\ndiscriminated from all other plans for the regeneration of society,\nwe could not exempt it from the criticism which we apply to so many\nprojects for reform with which the brain of the age teems. Our feeling\nwas that Fourier had skipped no fact but one, namely Life. He treats\nman as a plastic thing, something that may be put up or down, ripened\nor retarded, moulded, polished, made into solid or fluid or gas, at\nthe will of the leader; or perhaps as a vegetable, from which, though\nnow a poor crab, a very good peach can by manure and exposure be in\ntime produced,--but skips the faculty of life, which spawns and scorns\nsystem and system-makers; which eludes all conditions; which makes or\nsupplants a thousand phalanxes and New Harmonies with each pulsation.\nThere is an order in which in a sound mind the faculties always appear,\nand which, according to the strength of the individual, they seek to\nrealize in the surrounding world. The value of Fourier\u2019s system is\nthat it is a statement of such an order externized, or carried outward\ninto its correspondence in facts. The mistake is that this particular\norder and series is to be imposed, by force or preaching and votes, on\nall men, and carried into rigid execution. But what is true and good\nmust not only be begun by life, but must be conducted to its issues by\nlife. Could not the conceiver of this design have also believed that a\nsimilar model lay in every mind, and that the method of each associate\nmight be trusted, as well as that of his particular Committee and\nGeneral Office, No. 200 Broadway? Nay, that it would be better to say,\nLet us be lovers and servants of that which is just, and straightway\nevery man becomes a centre of a holy and beneficent republic, which he\nsees to include all men in its law, like that of Plato, and of Christ.\nBefore such a man the whole world becomes Fourierized or Christized or\nhumanized, and in obedience to his most private being he finds himself,\naccording to his presentiment, though against all sensuous probability,\nacting in strict concert with all others who followed their private\nlight.\n\nYet, in a day of small, sour and fierce schemes, one is admonished\nand cheered by a project of such friendly aims and of such bold and\ngenerous proportion; there is an intellectual courage and strength in\nit which is superior and commanding; it certifies the presence of so\nmuch truth in the theory, and in so far is destined to be fact.\n\nIt argued singular courage, the adoption of Fourier\u2019s system, to even a\nlimited extent, with his books lying before the world only defended by\nthe thin veil of the French language. The Stoic said, Forbear, Fourier\nsaid, Indulge. Fourier was of the opinion of St. Evremond; abstinence\nfrom pleasure appeared to him a great sin. Fourier was very French\nindeed. He labored under a misapprehension of the nature of women. The\nFourier marriage was a calculation how to secure the greatest amount of\nkissing that the infirmity of human constitution admitted. It was false\nand prurient, full of absurd French superstitions about women; ignorant\nhow serious and how moral their nature always is; how chaste is their\norganization; how lawful a class.\n\nIt is the worst of community that it must inevitably transform into\ncharlatans the leaders, by the endeavor continually to meet the\nexpectation and admiration of this eager crowd of men and women seeking\nthey know not what. Unless he have a Cossack roughness of clearing\nhimself of what belongs not, charlatan he must be.\n\nIt was easy to see what must be the fate of this fine system in any\nserious and comprehensive attempt to set it on foot in this country. As\nsoon as our people got wind of the doctrine of Marriage held by this\nmaster, it would fall at once into the hands of a lawless crew who\nwould flock in troops to so fair a game, and, like the dreams of poetic\npeople on the first outbreak of the old French Revolution, so theirs\nwould disappear in a slime of mire and blood.\n\nThere is of course to every theory a tendency to run to an extreme,\nand to forget the limitations. In our free institutions, where every\nman is at liberty to choose his home and his trade, and all possible\nmodes of working and gaining are open to him, fortunes are easily made\nby thousands, as in no other country. Then property proves too much\nfor the man, and the men of science, art, intellect, are pretty sure\nto degenerate into selfish housekeepers, dependent on wine, coffee,\nfurnace-heat, gas-light and fine furniture. Then instantly things\nswing the other way, and we suddenly find that civilization crowed\ntoo soon; that what we bragged as triumphs were treacheries: that we\nhave opened the wrong door and let the enemy into the castle; that\ncivilization was a mistake; that nothing is so vulgar as a great\nwarehouse of rooms full of furniture and trumpery; that, in the\ncircumstances, the best wisdom were an auction or a fire. Since the\nfoxes and the birds have the right of it, with a warm hole to keep\nout the weather, and no more,--a pent-house to fend the sun and rain\nis the house which lays no tax on the owner\u2019s time and thoughts, and\nwhich he can leave, when the sun is warm, and defy the robber. This\nwas Thoreau\u2019s doctrine, who said that the Fourierists had a sense of\nduty which led them to devote themselves to their second-best. And\nThoreau gave in flesh and blood and pertinacious Saxon belief the\npurest ethics. He was more real and practically believing in them than\nany of his company, and fortified you at all times with an affirmative\nexperience which refused to be set aside. Thoreau was in his own\nperson a practical answer, almost a refutation, to the theories of the\nsocialists. He required no Phalanx, no Government, no society, almost\nno memory. He lived extempore from hour to hour, like the birds and\nthe angels; brought every day a new proposition, as revolutionary as\nthat of yesterday, but different: the only man of leisure in his town;\nand his independence made all others look like slaves. He was a good\nAbbot Sampson, and carried a counsel in his breast. \u201cAgain and again I\ncongratulate myself on my so-called poverty, I could not overstate this\nadvantage.\u201d \u201cWhat you call bareness and poverty, is to me simplicity.\nGod could not be unkind to me if he should try. I love best to have\neach thing in its season only, and enjoy doing without it at all other\ntimes. It is the greatest of all advantages to enjoy no advantage at\nall. I have never got over my surprise that I should have been born\ninto the most estimable place in all the world, and in the very nick of\ntime too.\u201d There\u2019s an optimist for you.\n\nI regard these philanthropists as themselves the effects of the age\nin which we live, and, in common with so many other good facts,\nthe efflorescence of the period, and predicting a good fruit that\nripens. They were not the creators they believed themselves, but they\nwere unconscious prophets of a true state of society; one which the\ntendencies of nature lead unto, one which always establishes itself\nfor the sane soul, though not in that manner in which they paint it;\nbut they were describers of that which is really being done. The large\ncities are phalansteries; and the theorists drew all their argument\nfrom facts already taking place in our experience. The cheap way is\nto make every man do what he was born for. One merchant to whom I\ndescribed the Fourier project, thought it must not only succeed, but\nthat agricultural association must presently fix the price of bread,\nand drive single farmers into association in self-defence, as the great\ncommercial and manufacturing companion had done. Society in England\nand in America is trying the experiment again in small pieces, in\nco-operative associations, in cheap eating-houses, as well as in the\neconomies of club-houses and in cheap reading-rooms.\n\nIt chanced that here in one family were two brothers, one a brilliant\nand fertile inventor, and close by him his own brother, a man of\nbusiness, who knew how to direct his faculty and make it instantly and\npermanently lucrative. Why could not the like partnership be formed\nbetween the inventor and the man of executive talent everywhere? Each\nman of thought is surrounded by wiser men than he, if they cannot\nwrite as well. Cannot he and they combine? Talents supplement each\nother. Beaumont and Fletcher and many French novelists have known how\nto utilize such partnerships. Why not have a larger one, and with more\nvarious members?\n\nHousekeepers say, \u201cThere are a thousand things to everything,\u201d and\nif one must study all the strokes to be laid, all the faults to be\nshunned in a building or work of art, of its keeping, its composition,\nits site, its color, there would be no end. But the architect, acting\nunder a necessity to build the house for its purpose, finds himself\nhelped, he knows not how, into all these merits of detail, and\nsteering clear, though in the dark, of those dangers which might have\nshipwrecked him.\n\n\n                              BROOK FARM.\n\n\nThe West Roxbury association was formed in 1841, by a society of\nmembers, men and women, who bought a farm in West Roxbury, of about two\nhundred acres, and took possession of the place in April. Mr. George\nRipley was the President, and I think Mr. Charles Dana (afterwards\nwell known as one of the editors of the New York Tribune), was the\nsecretary. Many members took shares by paying money, others held\nshares by their labor. An old house on the place was enlarged, and\nthree new houses built. William Allen was at first and for some time\nthe head farmer, and the work was distributed in orderly committees to\nthe men and women. There were many employments more or less lucrative\nfound for, or brought hither by these members,--shoemakers, joiners,\nsempstresses. They had good scholars among them, and so received pupils\nfor their education. The parents of the children in some instances\nwished to live there, and were received as boarders. Many persons\nattracted by the beauty of the place and the culture and ambition of\nthe community, joined them as boarders, and lived there for years. I\nthink the numbers of this mixed community soon reached eighty or ninety\nsouls.\n\nIt was a noble and generous movement in the projectors, to try an\nexperiment of better living. They had the feeling that our ways of\nliving were too conventional and expensive, not allowing each to do\nwhat he had a talent for, and not permitting men to combine cultivation\nof mind and heart with a reasonable amount of daily labor. At the same\ntime, it was an attempt to lift others with themselves, and to share\nthe advantages they should attain, with others now deprived of them.\n\nThere was no doubt great variety of character and purpose in\nthe members of the community. It consisted in the main of young\npeople,--few of middle age, and none old. Those who inspired and\norganized it were of course persons impatient of the routine,\nthe uniformity, perhaps they would say, the squalid contentment\nof society around them; which was so timid and skeptical of any\nprogress. One would say then that impulse was the rule in the society,\nwithout centripetal balance; perhaps it would not be severe to say,\nintellectual sans-culottism, an impatience of the formal, routinary\ncharacter of our educational, religious, social and economical life in\nMassachusetts. Yet there was immense hope in these young people. There\nwas nobleness; there were self-sacrificing victims who compensated for\nthe levity and rashness of their companions. The young people lived\na great deal in a short time, and came forth some of them perhaps\nwith shattered constitutions. And a few grave sanitary influences of\ncharacter were happily there, which, I was assured, were always felt.\n\nGeorge W. Curtis of New York, and his brother, of English Oxford,\nwere members of the family from the first. Theodore Parker, the near\nneighbor of the farm and the most intimate friend of Mr. Ripley, was a\nfrequent visitor. Mr. Ichabod Morton of Plymouth, a plain man formerly\nengaged through many years in the fisheries with success,--eccentric,\nwith a persevering interest in Education, and of a very democratic\nreligion, came and built a house on the farm, and he, or members of\nhis family, continued there to the end. Margaret Fuller, with her\njoyful conversation and large sympathy, was often a guest, and always\nin correspondence with her friends! Many ladies, whom to name were to\npraise, gave character and varied attraction to the place.\n\nIn and around Brook Farm, whether as members, boarders, or\nvisitors, were many remarkable persons, for character, intellect, or\naccomplishments. I recall one youth of the subtlest mind, I believe\nI must say the subtlest observer and diviner of character I ever\nmet, living, reading, writing, talking there, perhaps as long as the\ncolony held together; his mind fed and overfed by whatever is exalted\nin genius, whether in Poetry or Art, in Drama or Music, or in social\naccomplishment and elegancy; a man of no employment or practical aims,\na student and philosopher, who found his daily enjoyment not with the\nelders or his exact contemporaries so much as with the fine boys who\nwere skating and playing ball or bird-hunting; forming the closest\nfriendships with such, and finding his delight in the petulant heroisms\nof boys; yet was he the chosen counsellor to whom the guardians would\nrepair on any hitch or difficulty that occurred, and draw from him a\nwise counsel. A fine, subtle, inward genius, puny in body and habit as\na girl, yet with an _aplomb_ like a general, never disconcerted.\nHe lived and thought, in 1842, such worlds of life; all hinging on\nthe thought of Being or Reality as opposed to consciousness; hating\nintellect with the ferocity of a Swedenborg. He was the Abb\u00e9 or\nspiritual father, from his religious bias. His reading lay in \u00c6schylus,\nPlato, Dante, Calderon, Shakspeare, and in modern novels and romances\nof merit. There too was Hawthorne, with his cold yet gentle genius,\nif he failed to do justice to this temporary home. There was the\naccomplished Doctor of Music, who has presided over its literature ever\nsince in our metropolis. Rev. William Henry Channing, now of London,\nwas from the first a student of Socialism in France and England, and\nin perfect sympathy with this experiment. An English baronet, Sir John\nCaldwell, was a frequent visitor, and more or less directly interested\nin the leaders and the success.\n\nHawthorne drew some sketches, not happily, as I think; I should rather\nsay, quite unworthy of his genius. No friend who knew Margaret Fuller\ncould recognize her rich and brilliant genius under the dismal mask\nwhich the public fancied was meant for her in that disagreeable story.\n\nThe Founders of Brook Farm should have this praise, that they made what\nall people try to make, an agreeable place to live in. All comers, even\nthe most fastidious, found it the pleasantest of residences. It is\ncertain that freedom from household routine, variety of character and\ntalent, variety of work, variety of means of thought and instruction,\nart, music, poetry, reading, masquerade, did not permit sluggishness\nor despondency; broke up routine. There is agreement in the testimony\nthat it was, to most of the associates, education; to many, the most\nimportant period of their life, the birth of valued friendships, their\nfirst acquaintance with the riches of conversation, their training\nin behavior. The art of letter-writing, it is said, was immensely\ncultivated. Letters were always flying not only from house to house,\nbut from room to room. It was a perpetual picnic, a French Revolution\nin small, an Age of Reason in a patty-pan.\n\nIn the American social communities, the gossip found such vent and sway\nas to become despotic. The institutions were whispering-galleries,\nin which the adored Saxon privacy was lost. Married women I believe\nuniformly decided against the community. It was to them like the brassy\nand lacquered life in hotels. The common school was well enough, but to\nthe common nursery they had grave objections. Eggs might be hatched in\novens, but the hen on her own account much preferred the old way. A hen\nwithout her chickens was but half a hen.\n\nIt was a curious experience of the patrons and leaders of this\nnoted community, in which the agreement with many parties was that\nthey should give so many hours of instruction in mathematics, in\nmusic, in moral and intellectual philosophy, and so forth,--that in\nevery instance the new comers showed themselves keenly alive to the\nadvantages of the society, and were sure to avail themselves of every\nmeans of instruction; their knowledge was increased, their manners\nrefined,--but they became in that proportion averse to labor, and were\ncharged by the heads of the departments with a certain indolence and\nselfishness.\n\nIn practice it is always found that virtue is occasional, spotty,\nand not linear or cubic. Good people are as bad as rogues if steady\nperformance is claimed; the conscience of the conscientious runs in\nveins, and the most punctilious in some particulars are latitudinarian\nin others. It was very gently said that people on whom beforehand all\npersons would put the utmost reliance were not responsible. They saw\nthe necessity that the work must be done, and did it not, and it of\ncourse fell to be done by the few religious workers. No doubt there was\nin many a certain strength drawn from the fury of dissent. Thus Mr.\nRipley told Theodore Parker, \u201cThere is your accomplished friend ----,\nhe would hoe corn all Sunday if I would let him, but all Massachusetts\ncould not make him do it on Monday.\u201d\n\nOf course every visitor found that there was a comic side to this\nParadise of shepherds and shepherdesses. There was a stove in every\nchamber, and every one might burn as much wood as he or she would\nsaw. The ladies took cold on washing-day; so it was ordained that the\ngentlemen-shepherds should wring and hang out clothes; which they\npunctually did. And it would sometimes occur that when they danced\nin the evening, clothes-pins dropped plentifully from their pockets.\nThe country members naturally were surprised to observe that one man\nploughed all day and one looked out of the window all day, and perhaps\ndrew his picture, and both received at night the same wages. One would\nmeet also some modest pride in their advanced condition, signified by a\nfrequent phrase, \u201cBefore we came out of civilization.\u201d\n\nThe question which occurs to you had occurred much earlier to Fourier:\n\u201cHow in this charming Elysium is the dirty work to be done?\u201d And long\nago Fourier had exclaimed, \u201cAh! I have it,\u201d and jumped with joy. \u201cDon\u2019t\nyou see,\u201d he cried, \u201cthat nothing so delights the young Caucasian child\nas dirt? See the mud-pies that all children will make if you will let\nthem. See how much more joy they find in pouring their pudding on the\ntable-cloth than into their beautiful mouths. The children from six to\neight, organized into companies with flags and uniforms, shall do this\nlast function of civilization.\u201d\n\nIn Brook Farm was this peculiarity, that there was no head. In every\nfamily is the father; in every factory, a foreman; in a shop, a master;\nin a boat, the skipper; but in this Farm, no authority; each was\nmaster or mistress of his or her actions; happy, hapless anarchists.\nThey expressed, after much perilous experience, the conviction that\nplain dealing was the best defence of manners and moral between the\nsexes. People cannot live together in any but necessary ways. The only\ncandidates who will present themselves will be those who have tried\nthe experiment of independence and ambition, and have failed; and none\nothers will barter for the most comfortable equality the chance of\nsuperiority. Then all communities have quarrelled. Few people can live\ntogether on their merits. There must be kindred, or mutual economy, or\na common interest in their business, or other external tie.\n\nThe society at Brook Farm existed, I think, about six or seven years,\nand then broke up, the Farm was sold, and I believe all the partners\ncame out with pecuniary loss. Some of them had spent on it the\naccumulations of years. I suppose they all, at the moment, regarded it\nas a failure. I do not think they can so regard it now, but probably\nas an important chapter in their experience which has been of lifelong\nvalue. What knowledge of themselves and of each other, what various\npractical wisdom, what personal power, what studies of character, what\naccumulated culture many of the members owed to it! What mutual measure\nthey took of each other! It was a close union, like that in a ship\u2019s\ncabin, of clergymen, young collegians, merchants, mechanics, farmers\u2019\nsons and daughters, with men and women of rare opportunities and\ndelicate culture, yet assembled there by a sentiment which all shared,\nsome of them hotly shared, of the honesty of a life of labor and of\nthe beauty of a life of humanity. The yeoman saw refined manners in\npersons who were his friends; and the lady or the romantic scholar saw\nthe continuous strength and faculty in people who would have disgusted\nthem but that these powers were now spent in the direction of their own\ntheory of life.\n\nI recall these few selected facts, none of them of much independent\ninterest, but symptomatic of the times and country. I please myself\nwith the thought that our American mind is not now eccentric or rude\nin its strength, but is beginning to show a quiet power, drawn from\nwide and abundant sources, proper to a Continent and to an educated\npeople. If I have owed much to the special influences I have indicated,\nI am not less aware of that excellent and increasing circle of masters\nin arts and in song and in science, who cheer the intellect of our\ncities and this country to-day,--whose genius is not a lucky accident,\nbut normal, and with broad foundation of culture, and so inspires the\nhope of steady strength advancing on itself, and a day without night.\n\n\n\n\n                    THE CHARDON STREET CONVENTION.\n\n\n\n\n                  THE CHARDON STREET CONVENTION.[11]\n\n\nIN the month of November, 1840, a Convention of Friends of Universal\nReform assembled in the Chardon Street Chapel in Boston, in obedience\nto a call in the newspapers, signed by a few individuals, inviting all\npersons to a public discussion of the institutions of the Sabbath,\nthe Church and the Ministry. The Convention organized itself by\nthe choice of Edmund Quincy as Moderator, spent three days in the\nconsideration of the Sabbath, and adjourned to a day in March of the\nfollowing year, for the discussion of the second topic. In March,\naccordingly, a three-days\u2019 sessions was holden in the same place, on\nthe subject of the Church, and a third meeting fixed for the following\nNovember, which was accordingly holden; and the Convention debated,\nfor three days again, the remaining subject of the Priesthood. This\nConvention never printed any report of its deliberations, nor pretended\nto arrive at any result by the expression of its sense in formal\nresolutions;--the professed objects of those persons who felt the\ngreatest interest in its meetings being simply the elucidation of\ntruth through free discussion. The daily newspapers reported, at the\ntime, brief sketches of the course of proceedings, and the remarks\nof the principal speakers. These meetings attracted a great deal of\npublic attention, and were spoken of in different circles in every\nnote of hope, of sympathy, of joy, of alarm, of abhorrence and of\nmerriment. The composition of the assembly was rich and various. The\nsingularity and latitude of the summons drew together, from all parts\nof New England and also from the Middle States, men of every shade of\nopinion from the straitest orthodoxy to the wildest heresy, and many\npersons whose church was a church of one member only. A great variety\nof dialect and of costume was noticed; a great deal of confusion,\neccentricity, and freak appeared, as well as of zeal and enthusiasm.\nIf the assembly was disorderly, it was picturesque. Madmen, madwomen,\nmen with beards, Dunkers, Muggletonians, Come-outers, Groaners,\nAgrarians, Seventh-day-Baptists, Quakers, Abolitionists, Calvinists,\nUnitarians and Philosophers,--all came successively to the top, and\nseized their moment, if not their hour, wherein to chide, or pray, or\npreach, or protest. The faces were a study. The most daring innovators\nand the champions-until-death of the old cause sat side by side. The\nstill-living merit of the oldest New England families, glowing yet\nafter several generations, encountered the founders of families,\nfresh merit, emerging, and expanding the brows to a new breadth,\nand lighting a clownish face with sacred fire. The assembly was\ncharacterized by the predominance of a certain plain, sylvan strength\nand earnestness, whilst many of the most intellectual and cultivated\npersons attended its councils. Dr. Channing, Edward Taylor, Bronson\nAlcott, Mr. Garrison, Mr. May, Theodore Parker, H. C. Wright, Dr.\nOsgood, William Adams, Edward Palmer, Jones Very, Maria W. Chapman, and\nmany other persons of a mystical or sectarian or philanthropic renown,\nwere present, and some of them participant. And there was no want of\nfemale speakers; Mrs. Little and Mrs. Lucy Sessions took a pleasing\nand memorable part in the debate, and that flea of Conventions, Mrs.\nAbigail Folsom, was but too ready with her interminable scroll. If\nthere was not parliamentary order, there was life, and the assurance of\nthat constitutional love for religion and religious liberty which, in\nall periods, characterizes the inhabitants of this part of America.\n\nThere was a great deal of wearisome speaking in each of those\nthree-days\u2019 sessions, but relieved by signal passages of pure\neloquence, by much vigor of thought, and especially by the exhibition\nof character, and by the victories of character. These men and women\nwere in search of something better and more satisfying than a vote or\na definition, and they found what they sought, or the pledge of it,\nin the attitude taken by individuals of their number of resistance\nto the insane routine of parliamentary usage; in the lofty reliance\non principles, and the prophetic dignity and transfiguration which\naccompanies, even amidst opposition and ridicule, a man whose mind is\nmade up to obey the great inward Commander, and who does not anticipate\nhis own action, but awaits confidently the new emergency for the new\ncounsel. By no means the least value of this Convention, in our eye,\nwas the scope it gave to the genius of Mr. Alcott, and not its least\ninstructive lesson was the gradual but sure ascendency of his spirit,\nin spite of the incredulity and derision with which he is at first\nreceived, and in spite, we might add, of his own failures. Moreover,\nalthough no decision was had, and no action taken on all the great\npoints mooted in the discussion, yet the Convention brought together\nmany remarkable persons, face to face, and gave occasion to memorable\ninterviews and conversations, in the hall, in the lobbies, or around\nthe doors.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 11: _The Dial_, vol. iii., p. 100.]\n\n\n\n\n                          EZRA RIPLEY, D. D.\n\n    WE love the venerable house\n      Our fathers built to God:\n    In Heaven are kept their grateful vows,\n      Their dust endears the sod.\n\n    From humble tenements around\n      Came up the pensive train\n    And in the church a blessing found\n      That filled their homes again.\n\n\n\n\n                        EZRA RIPLEY, D. D.[12]\n\n\nEZRA RIPLEY was born May 1, 1751 (O. S.), at Woodstock, Connecticut.\nHe was the fifth of the nineteen children of Noah and Lydia (Kent)\nRipley. Seventeen of these nineteen children married, and it is stated\nthat the mother died leaving nineteen children, one hundred and two\ngrandchildren and ninety-six great-grandchildren. The father was born\nat Hingham, on the farm purchased by his ancestor, William Ripley,\nof England, at the first settlement of the town; which farm has been\noccupied by seven or eight generations. Ezra Ripley followed the\nbusiness of farming till sixteen years of age, when his father wished\nhim to be qualified to teach a grammar school, not thinking himself\nable to send one son to college without injury to his other children.\nWith this view, the father agreed with the late Rev. Dr. Forbes of\nGloucester, then minister of North Brookfield, to fit Ezra for college\nby the time he should be twenty-one years of age, and to have him labor\nduring the time sufficiently to pay for his instruction, clothing and\nbooks.\n\nBut, when fitted for college, the son could not be contented with\nteaching, which he had tried the preceding winter. He had early\nmanifested a desire for learning, and could not be satisfied without a\npublic education. Always inclined to notice ministers, and frequently\nattempting, when only five or six years old, to imitate them by\npreaching, now that he had become a professor of religion he had an\nardent desire to be a preacher of the gospel. He had to encounter great\ndifficulties, but, through a kind providence and the patronage of Dr.\nForbes, he entered Harvard University, July, 1772. The commencement of\nthe Revolutionary War greatly interrupted his education at college.\nIn 1775, in his senior year, the college was removed from Cambridge\nto this town. The studies were much broken up. Many of the students\nentered the army, and the class never returned to Cambridge. There were\nan unusually large number of distinguished men in this class of 1776:\nChristopher Gore, Governor of Massachusetts and Senator in Congress;\nSamuel Sewall, Chief Justice of Massachusetts; George Thacher, Judge of\nthe Supreme Court; Royall Tyler, Chief Justice of Vermont; and the late\nlearned Dr. Prince, of Salem.\n\nMr. Ripley was ordained minister of Concord November 7, 1778. He\nmarried, November 16, 1780, Mrs. Phebe (Bliss) Emerson, then a widow of\nthirty-nine, with five children. They had three children: Samuel, born\nMay 11, 1783; Daniel Bliss, born August 1, 1784; Sarah, born April 8,\n1789. He died September 21, 1841.\n\nTo these facts, gathered chiefly from his own diary, and stated nearly\nin his own words, I can only add a few traits from memory.\n\nHe was identified with the ideas and forms of the New England Church,\nwhich expired about the same time with him, so that he and his coevals\nseemed the rear guard of the great camp and army of the Puritans,\nwhich, however in its last days declining into formalism, in the heyday\nof its strength had planted and liberated America. It was a pity that\nhis old meeting-house should have been modernized in his time. I am\nsure all who remember both will associate his form with whatever was\ngrave and droll in the old, cold, unpainted, uncarpeted square-pewed\nmeeting-house, with its four iron-gray deacons in their little box\nunder the pulpit,--with Watts\u2019s hymns, with long prayers, rich with the\ndiction of ages; and not less with the report like musketry from the\nmovable seats. He and his contemporaries, the old New England clergy,\nwere believers in what is called a particular providence,--certainly,\nas they held it, a very particular providence,--following the\nnarrowness of King David and the Jews, who thought the universe existed\nonly or mainly for their church and congregation. Perhaps I cannot\nbetter illustrate this tendency than by citing a record from the\ndiary of the father of his predecessor,[13] the minister of Malden,\nwritten in the blank leaves of the almanac for the year 1735. The\nminister writes against January 31st: \u201cBought a shay for 27 pounds,\n10 shillings. The Lord grant it may be a comfort and blessing to my\nfamily.\u201d In March following he notes: \u201cHad a safe and comfortable\njourney to York.\u201d But April 24th, we find: \u201cShay overturned, with\nmy wife and I in it, yet neither of us much hurt. Blessed be our\ngracious Preserver. Part of the shay, as it lay upon one side, went\nover my wife, and yet she was scarcely anything hurt. How wonderful\nthe preservation.\u201d Then again, May 5th: \u201cWent to the beach with three\nof the children. The beast, being frightened when we were all out\nof the shay, overturned and broke it. I desire (I hope I desire it)\nthat the Lord would teach me suitably to repent this Providence, to\nmake suitable remarks on it, and to be suitably affected with it.\nHave I done well to get me a shay? Have I not been proud or too fond\nof this convenience? Do I exercise the faith in the Divine care and\nprotection which I ought to do? Should I not be more in my study and\nless fond of diversion? Do I not withhold more than is meet from pious\nand charitable uses?\u201d Well, on 15th May we have this: \u201cShay brought\nhome; mending cost thirty shillings. Favored in this respect beyond\nexpectation.\u201d 16th May: \u201cMy wife and I rode together to Rumney Marsh.\nThe beast frighted several times.\u201d And at last we have this record,\nJune 4th: \u201cDisposed of my shay to Rev. Mr. White.\u201d\n\nThe same faith made what was strong and what was weak in Dr. Ripley\nand his associates. He was a perfectly sincere man, punctual, severe,\nbut just and charitable, and if he made his forms a strait-jacket\nto others, he wore the same himself all his years. Trained in this\nchurch, and very well qualified by his natural talent to work in it,\nit was never out of his mind. He looked at every person and thing from\nthe parochial point of view. I remember, when a boy, driving about\nConcord with him, and in passing each house he told the story of the\nfamily that lived in it, and especially he gave me anecdotes of the\nnine church members who had made a division in the church in the time\nof his predecessor, and showed me how every one of the nine had come\nto bad fortune or to a bad end. His prayers for rain and against the\nlightning, \u201cthat it may not lick up our spirits;\u201d and for good weather;\nand against sickness and insanity; \u201cthat we have not been tossed to and\nfro until the dawning of the day, that we have not been a terror to\nourselves and others;\u201d are well remembered, and his own entire faith\nthat these petitions were not to be overlooked, and were entitled to a\nfavorable answer. Some of those around me will remember one occasion of\nsevere drought in this vicinity, when the late Rev. Mr. Goodwin offered\nto relieve the Doctor of the duty of leading in prayer; but the Doctor\nsuddenly remembering the season, rejected his offer with some humor,\nas with an air that said to all the congregation, \u201cThis is no time for\nyou young Cambridge men; the affair, sir, is getting serious. I will\npray myself.\u201d One August afternoon, when I was in his hayfield helping\nhim with his man to rake up his hay, I well remember his pleading,\nalmost reproachful looks at the sky, when the thunder gust was coming\nup to spoil his hay. He raked very fast, then looked at the cloud, and\nsaid, \u201cWe are in the Lord\u2019s hand; mind your rake, George! We are in the\nLord\u2019s hand;\u201d and seemed to say, \u201cYou know me; this field is mine,--Dr.\nRipley\u2019s,--thine own servant!\u201d\n\nHe used to tell the story of one of his old friends, the minister\nof Sudbury, who, being at the Thursday lecture in Boston, heard the\nofficiating clergyman praying for rain. As soon as the service was\nover, he went to the petitioner, and said, \u201cYou Boston ministers, as\nsoon as a tulip wilts under your windows, go to church and pray for\nrain, until all Concord and Sudbury are under water.\u201d I once rode with\nhim to a house at Nine Acre Corner to attend the funeral of the father\nof a family. He mentioned to me on the way his fears that the oldest\nson, who was now to succeed to the farm, was becoming intemperate.\nWe presently arrived, and the Doctor addressed each of the mourners\nseparately: \u201cSir, I condole with you.\u201d \u201cMadam, I condole with you.\u201d\n\u201cSir, I knew your great-grandfather. When I came to this town, your\ngreat-grandfather was a substantial farmer in this very place, a member\nof the church, and an excellent citizen. Your grandfather followed him,\nand was a virtuous man. Now your father is to be carried to his grave,\nfull of labors and virtues. There is none of that large family left but\nyou, and it rests with you to bear up the good name and usefulness of\nyour ancestors. If you fail, Ichabod, the glory is departed. Let us\npray.\u201d Right manly he was, and the manly thing he could always say. I\ncan remember a little speech he made to me, when the last tie of blood\nwhich held me and my brothers to his house was broken by the death of\nhis daughter. He said, on parting, \u201cI wish you and your brothers to\ncome to this house as you have always done. You will not like to be\nexcluded; I shall not like to be neglected.\u201d\n\nWhen \u201cPut\u201d Merriam, after his release from the state prison, had the\neffrontery to call on the doctor as an old acquaintance, in the midst\nof general conversation Mr. Frost came in, and the doctor presently\nsaid, \u201cMr. Merriam, my brother and colleague, Mr. Frost, has come to\ntake tea with me. I regret very much the causes (which you know very\nwell) which make it impossible for me to ask you to stay and break\nbread with us.\u201d With the Doctor\u2019s views it was a matter of religion to\nsay thus much. He had a reverence and love of society, and the patient,\ncontinuing courtesy, carrying out every respectful attention to the\nend, which marks what is called the manners of the old school. His\nhospitality obeyed Charles Lamb\u2019s rule, and \u201cran fine to the last.\u201d His\npartiality for ladies was always strong, and was by no means abated by\ntime. He claimed privilege of years, was much addicted to kissing;\nspared neither maid, wife, nor widow, and, as a lady thus favored\nremarked to me, \u201cseemed as if he was going to make a meal of you.\u201d\n\nHe was very credulous, and as he was no reader of books or journals, he\nknew nothing beyond the columns of his weekly religious newspaper, the\ntracts of his sect, and perhaps the Middlesex Yeoman. He was the easy\ndupe of any tonguey agent, whether colonizationist or anti-papist, or\ncharlatan of iron combs, or tractors, or phrenology, or magnetism, who\nwent by. At the time when Jack Downing\u2019s letters were in every paper,\nhe repeated to me at table some of the particulars of that gentleman\u2019s\nintimacy with General Jackson, in a manner that betrayed to me at once\nthat he took the whole for fact. To undeceive him, I hastened to recall\nsome particulars to show the absurdity of the thing, as the Major and\nthe President going out skating on the Potomac, etc. \u201cWhy,\u201d said the\nDoctor with perfect faith, \u201cit was a bright moonlight night;\u201d and I\nam not sure that he did not die in the belief in the reality of Major\nDowning. Like other credulous men, he was opinionative, and, as I well\nremember, a great browbeater of the poor old fathers who still survived\nfrom the 19th of April, to the end that they should testify to his\nhistory as he had written it.\n\nHe was a man so kind and sympathetic, his character was so transparent,\nand his merits so intelligible to all observers, that he was very\njustly appreciated in this community. He was a natural gentleman, no\ndandy, but courtly, hospitable, manly and public-spirited; his nature\nsocial, his house open to all men. We remember the remark made by the\nold farmer who used to travel hither from Maine, that no horse from\nthe Eastern country would go by the doctor\u2019s gate. Travellers from the\nWest and North and South bear the like testimony. His brow was serene\nand open to his visitor, for he loved men, and he had no studies, no\noccupations, which company could interrupt. His friends were his study,\nand to see them loosened his talents and his tongue. In his house\ndwelt order and prudence and plenty. There was no waste and no stint.\nHe was open-handed and just and generous. Ingratitude and meanness in\nhis beneficiaries did not wear out his compassion; he bore the insult,\nand the next day his basket for the beggar, his horse and chaise for\nthe cripple, were at their door. Though he knew the value of a dollar\nas well as another man, yet he loved to buy dearer and sell cheaper\nthan others. He subscribed to all charities, and it is no reflection\non others to say that he was the most public-spirited man in the town.\nThe late Dr. Gardiner, in a funeral sermon on some parishioner whose\nvirtues did not readily come to mind, honestly said, \u201cHe was good at\nfires.\u201d Dr. Ripley had many virtues, and yet all will remember that\neven in his old age, if the fire-bell was rung, he was instantly on\nhorseback with his buckets and bag.\n\nHe showed even in his fireside discourse traits of that pertinency\nand judgment, softening ever and anon into elegancy, which make the\ndistinction of the scholar, and which, under better discipline, might\nhave ripened into a Bentley or a Porson. He had a foresight, when he\nopened his mouth, of all that he would say, and he marched straight to\nthe conclusion. In debate in the vestry of the Lyceum, the structure of\nhis sentences was admirable; so neat, so natural, so terse, his words\nfell like stones; and often, though quite unconscious of it, his speech\nwas a satire on the loose, voluminous, draggle-tail periods of other\nspeakers. He sat down when he had done. A man of anecdote, his talk in\nthe parlor was chiefly narrative. We remember the remark of a gentleman\nwho listened with much delight to his conversation at the time when the\nDoctor was preparing to go to Baltimore and Washington, that \u201ca man who\ncould tell a story so well was company for kings and John Quincy Adams.\u201d\n\nSage and savage strove harder in him than in any of my acquaintances,\neach getting the mastery by turns, and pretty sudden turns: \u201cSave\nus from the extremity of cold and these violent sudden changes.\u201d\n\u201cThe society will meet after the Lyceum, as it is difficult to bring\npeople together in the evening,--and no moon.\u201d \u201cMr. N. F. is dead, and\nI expect to hear of the death of Mr. B. It is cruel to separate old\npeople from their wives in this cold weather.\u201d\n\nWith a very limited acquaintance with books, his knowledge was an\nexternal experience, an Indian wisdom, the observation of such facts\nas country life for nearly a century could supply. He watched with\ninterest the garden, the field, the orchard, the house and the barn,\nhorse, cow, sheep and dog, and all the common objects that engage\nthe thought of the farmer. He kept his eye on the horizon, and knew\nthe weather like a sea-captain. The usual experiences of men, birth,\nmarriage, sickness, death, burial; the common temptations; the common\nambitions;--he studied them all, and sympathized so well in these that\nhe was excellent company and counsel to all, even the most humble and\nignorant. With extraordinary states of mind, with states of enthusiasm\nor enlarged speculation, he had no sympathy, and pretended to none.\nHe was sincere, and kept to his point, and his mark was never remote.\nHis conversation was strictly personal and apt to the party and the\noccasion. An eminent skill he had in saying difficult and unspeakable\nthings; in delivering to a man or a woman that which all their other\nfriends had abstained from saying, in uncovering the bandage from a\nsore place, and applying the surgeon\u2019s knife with a truly surgical\nspirit. Was a man a sot, or a spendthrift, or too long time a bachelor,\nor suspected of some hidden crime, or had he quarrelled with his\nwife, or collared his father, or was there any cloud or suspicious\ncircumstances in his behavior, the good pastor knew his way straight\nto that point, believing himself entitled to a full explanation, and\nwhatever relief to the conscience of both parties plain speech could\neffect was sure to be procured. In all such passages he justified\nhimself to the conscience, and commonly to the love, of the persons\nconcerned. He was the more competent to these searching discourses\nfrom his knowledge of family history. He knew everybody\u2019s grandfather,\nand seemed to address each person rather as the representative of his\nhouse and name, than as an individual. In him have perished more local\nand personal anecdotes of this village and vicinity than are possessed\nby any survivor. This intimate knowledge of families, and this skill\nof speech, and still more, his sympathy, made him incomparable in his\nparochial visits, and in his exhortations and prayers. He gave himself\nup to his feelings, and said on the instant the best things in the\nworld. Many and many a felicity he had in his prayer, now forever lost,\nwhich defied all the rules of all the rhetoricians. He did not know\nwhen he was good in prayer or sermon, for he had no literature and no\nart; but he believed, and therefore spoke. He was eminently loyal in\nhis nature, and not fond of adventure or innovation. By education, and\nstill more by temperament, he was engaged to the old forms of the New\nEngland Church. Not speculative, but affectionate; devout, but with an\nextreme love of order, he adopted heartily, though in its mildest form,\nthe creed and catechism of the fathers, and appeared a modern Israelite\nin his attachment to the Hebrew history and faith. He was a man very\neasy to read, for his whole life and conversation were consistent. All\nhis opinions and actions might be securely predicted by a good observer\non short acquaintance. My classmate at Cambridge, Frederick King, told\nme from Governor Gore, who was the Doctor\u2019s classmate, that in college\nhe was called Holy Ripley.\n\nAnd now, in his old age, when all the antique Hebraism and its customs\nare passing away, it is fit that he too should depart,--most fit that\nin the fall of laws a loyal man should die.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 12: This sketch was written for the Social Circle, a club\nin Concord, now more than a century old, and said to be the lineal\ndescendant of the Committee of Safety in the Revolution. Mr. Emerson\nwas a member for many years and greatly valued its weekly evening\nmeetings, held, during the winter, at the houses of the members. After\nthe death of Dr. Ripley, an early member and connected with him by\nmarriage, Mr. Emerson was asked to prepare the customary Memoir for the\nClub Book.]\n\n[Footnote 13: Rev. Joseph Emerson.]\n\n\n\n\n                          MARY MOODY EMERSON.\n\n    THE yesterday doth never smile,\n    To-day goes drudging through the while,\n    Yet in the name of Godhead, I\n    The morrow front and can defy;\n    Though I am weak, yet God, when prayed,\n    Cannot withhold his conquering aid.\n    Ah me! it was my childhood\u2019s thought,\n    If He should make my web a blot\n    On life\u2019s fair picture of delight,\n    My heart\u2019s content would find it right.\n    But O, these waves and leaves,--\n    When happy, stoic Nature grieves,--\n    No human speech so beautiful\n    As their murmurs mine to lull.\n    On this altar God hath built\n    I lay my vanity and guilt;\n    Nor me can Hope or Passion urge,\n    Hearing as now the lofty dirge\n    Which blasts of Northern mountains hymn,\n    Nature\u2019s funeral high and dim,--\n    Sable pageantry of clouds,\n    Mourning summer laid in shrouds.\n    Many a day shall dawn and die,\n    Many an angel wander by,\n    And passing, light my sunken turf,\n    Moist perhaps by ocean surf,\n    Forgotten amid splendid tombs,\n    Yet wreathed and hid by summer blooms.\n    On earth I dream;--I die to be:\n    Time! shake not thy bald head at me.\n    I challenge thee to hurry past,\n    Or for my turn to fly too fast.\n\n[LUCY PERCY, Countess of Carlisle, the friend of Strafford and\nof Pym, is thus described by Sir Toby Matthews:]\n\n\u201cShe is of too high a mind and dignity not only to seek, but almost\nto wish, the friendship of any creature. They whom she is pleased to\nchoose are such as are of the most eminent condition both for power and\nemployment,--not with any design towards her own particular, either of\nadvantage or curiosity, but her nature values fortunate persons. She\nprefers the conversation of men to that of women; not but she can talk\non the fashions with her female friends, but she is too soon sensible\nthat she can set them as she wills; that pre-eminence shortens all\nequality. She converses with those who are most distinguished for their\nconversational powers. Of Love freely will she discourse, listen to\nall its faults and mark its power: and will take a deep interest for\npersons of celebrity.\u201d\n\n\n\n\n                        MARY MOODY EMERSON.[14]\n\n\nI WISH to meet the invitation with which the ladies have honored me by\noffering them a portrait of real life. It is a representative life,\nsuch as could hardly have appeared out of New England; of an age now\npast, and of which I think no types survive. Perhaps I deceive myself\nand overestimate its interest. It has to me a value like that which\nmany readers find in Madame Guyon, in Rahel, in Eug\u00e9nie de Gu\u00e9rin, but\nit is purely original and hardly admits of a duplicate. Then it is a\nfruit of Calvinism and New England, and marks the precise time when the\npower of the old creed yielded to the influence of modern science and\nhumanity.\n\nI have found that I could only bring you this portrait by selections\nfrom the diary of my heroine, premising a sketch of her time and\nplace. I report some of the thoughts and soliloquies of a country girl,\npoor, solitary,--\u2018a goody\u2019 as she called herself,--growing from youth\nto age amid slender opportunities and usually very humble company.\n\nMary Moody Emerson was born just before the outbreak of the Revolution.\nWhen introduced to Lafayette at Portland, she told him that she was\n\u201cin arms\u201d at the Concord Fight. Her father, the minister of Concord,\na warm patriot in 1775, went as a chaplain to the American army at\nTiconderoga: he carried his infant daughter, before he went, to his\nmother in Malden and told her to keep the child until he returned.\nHe died at Rutland, Vermont, of army-fever, the next year, and Mary\nremained at Malden with her grandmother, and, after her death, with her\nfather\u2019s sister, in whose house she grew up, rarely seeing her brothers\nand sisters in Concord. This aunt and her husband lived on a farm, were\ngetting old, and the husband a shiftless, easy man. There was plenty of\nwork for the little niece to do day by day, and not always bread enough\nin the house.\n\nOne of her tasks, it appears, was to watch for the approach of the\ndeputy-sheriff, who might come to confiscate the spoons or arrest the\nuncle for debt. Later, another aunt, who had become insane, was brought\nhither to end her days. More and sadder work for this young girl. She\nhad no companions, lived in entire solitude with these old people,\nvery rarely cheered by short visits from her brothers and sisters.\nHer mother had married again,--married the minister who succeeded her\nhusband in the parish at Concord, [Dr. Ezra Ripley,] and had now a\nyoung family growing up around her.\n\nHer aunt became strongly attached to Mary, and persuaded the family to\ngive the child up to her as a daughter, on some terms embracing a care\nof her future interests. She would leave the farm to her by will. This\npromise was kept; she came into possession of the property many years\nafter, and her dealings with it gave her no small trouble, though they\ngive much piquancy to her letters in after years. Finally it was sold,\nand its price invested in a share of a farm in Maine, where she lived\nas a boarder with her sister, for many years. It was in a picturesque\ncountry, within sight of the White Mountains, with a little lake in\nfront at the foot of a high hill called Bear Mountain. Not far from\nthe house was a brook running over a granite floor like the Franconia\nFlume, and noble forests around. Every word she writes about this farm\n(\u201cElm Vale,\u201d Waterford,) her dealings and vexations about it, her joys\nand raptures of religion and Nature, interest like a romance, and to\nthose who may hereafter read her letters, will make its obscure acres\namiable.\n\nIn Malden she lived through all her youth and early womanhood, with\nthe habit of visiting the families of her brothers and sisters on any\nnecessity of theirs. Her good will to serve in time of sickness or of\npressure was known to them, and promptly claimed, and her attachment\nto the youths and maidens growing up in those families was secure for\nany trait of talent or of character. Her sympathy for young people who\npleased her was almost passionate, and was sure to make her arrival in\neach house a holiday.\n\nHer early reading was Milton, Young, Akenside, Samuel Clarke, Jonathan\nEdwards, and always the Bible. Later, Plato, Plotinus, Marcus\nAntoninus, Stewart, Coleridge, Cousin, Herder, Locke, Madame De Sta\u00ebl,\nChanning, Mackintosh, Byron. Nobody can read in her manuscript, or\nrecall the conversation of old-school people, without seeing that\nMilton and Young had a religious authority in their mind, and nowise\nthe slight, merely entertaining quality of modern bards. And Plato,\nAristotle, Plotinus, how venerable and organic as Nature they are in\nher mind! What a subject is her mind and life for the finest novel!\nWhen I read Dante, the other day, and his paraphrases to signify\nwith more adequateness Christ or Jehovah, whom do you think I was\nreminded of? Whom but Mary Emerson and her eloquent theology? She\nhad a deep sympathy with genius. When it was unhallowed, as in Byron,\nshe had none the less, whilst she deplored and affected to denounce\nhim. But she adored it when ennobled by character. She liked to\nnotice that the greatest geniuses have died ignorant of their power\nand influence. She wished you to scorn to shine. \u201cMy opinion,\u201d she\nwrites, (is) \u201cthat a mind like Byron\u2019s would never be satisfied with\nmodern Unitarianism,--that the fiery depths of Calvinism, its high\nand mysterious elections to eternal bliss, beyond angels, and all its\nattendant wonders would have alone been fitted to fix his imagination.\u201d\n\nHer wit was so fertile, and only used to strike, that she never used\nit for display, any more than a wasp would parade his sting. It was\never the will and not the phrase that concerned her. Yet certain\nexpressions, when they marked a memorable state of mind in her\nexperience, recurred to her afterwards, and she would vindicate herself\nas having said to Dr. R---- or Uncle L---- so and so, at such a period\nof her life. But they were intensely true when first spoken. All her\nlanguage was happy, but inimitable, unattainable by talent, as if\ncaught from some dream. She calls herself \u201cthe puny pilgrim, whose sole\ntalent is sympathy.\u201d \u201cI like that kind of apathy that is a triumph to\noverset.\u201d\n\nShe writes to her nephew Charles Emerson, in 1833:--\u201cI could never have\nadorned the garden. If I had been in aught but dreary deserts, I should\nhave idolized my friends, despised the world and been haughty. I never\nexpected connections and matrimony. My taste was formed in romance, and\nI knew I was not destined to please. I love God and his creation as I\nnever else could. I scarcely feel the sympathies of this life enough to\nagitate the pool. This in general, one case or so excepted, and even\nthis is a relation to God through you. \u2019Twas so in my happiest early\ndays, when you were at my side.\u201d\n\nDestitution is the Muse of her genius,--Destitution and Death. I used\nto propose that her epitaph should be: \u201cHere lies the angel of Death.\u201d\nAnd wonderfully as she varies and poetically repeats that image in\nevery page and day, yet not less fondly and sublimely she returns to\nthe other,--the grandeur of humility and privation, as thus; \u201cThe chief\nwitness which I have had of a God-like principle of action and feeling\nis in the disinterested joy felt in others\u2019 superiority. For the love\nof superior virtue is mine own gift from God.\u201d \u201cWhere were thine own\nintellect if others had not lived?\u201d\n\nShe had many acquaintances among the notables of the time; and now and\nthen in her migrations from town to town in Maine and Massachusetts,\nin search of a new boarding-place, discovered some preacher with\nsense or piety, or both. For on her arrival at any new home she was\nlikely to steer first to the minister\u2019s house and pray his wife to\ntake a boarder; and as the minister found quickly that she knew all\nhis books and many more, and made shrewd guesses at his character and\npossibilities, she would easily rouse his curiosity, as a person who\ncould read his secret and tell him his fortune.\n\nShe delighted in success, in youth, in beauty, in genius, in manners.\nWhen she met a young person who interested her, she made herself\nacquainted and intimate with him or her at once, by sympathy, by\nflattery, by raillery, by anecdotes, by wit, by rebuke, and stormed the\ncastle. None but was attracted or piqued by her interest and wit and\nwide acquaintance with books and with eminent names. She said she gave\nherself full swing in these sudden intimacies, for she knew she should\ndisgust them soon, and resolved to have their best hours. \u201cSociety\nis shrewd to detect those who do not belong to her train, and seldom\nwastes her attentions.\u201d She surprised, attracted, chided and denounced\nher companion by turns, and pretty rapid turns. But no intelligent\nyouth or maiden could have once met her without remembering her with\ninterest, and learning something of value. Scorn trifles, lift your\naims: do what you are afraid to do: sublimity of character must come\nfrom sublimity of motive: these were the lessons which were urged with\nvivacity, in ever new language. But if her companion was dull, her\nimpatience knew no bounds. She tired presently of dull conversations,\nand asked to be read to, and so disposed of the visitor. If the voice\nor the reading tired her, she would ask the friend if he or she would\ndo an errand for her, and so dismiss them. If her companion were a\nlittle ambitious, and asked her opinions on books or matters on which\nshe did not wish rude hands laid, she did not hesitate to stop the\nintruder with \u201cHow\u2019s your cat, Mrs. Tenner?\u201d\n\n\u201cI was disappointed,\u201d she writes, \u201cin finding my little Calvinist\nno companion, a cold little thing who lives in society alone, and\nis looked up to as a specimen of genius. I performed a mission in\nsecretly undermining his vanity, or trying to. Alas! never done but by\nmortifying affliction.\u201d From the country she writes to her sister in\ntown, \u201cYou cannot help saying that my epistle is a striking specimen of\negotism. To which I can only answer that, in the country, we converse\nso much more with ourselves, that we are almost led to forget everybody\nelse. The very sound of your bells and the rattling of the carriages\nhave a tendency to divert selfishness.\u201d \u201cThis seems a world rather of\ntrying each others\u2019 dispositions than of enjoying each others\u2019 virtues.\u201d\n\nShe had the misfortune of spinning with a greater velocity than any\nof the other tops. She would tear into the chaise or out of it, into\nthe house or out of it, into the conversation, into the thought, into\nthe character of the stranger,--disdaining all the graduation by which\nher fellows time their steps: and though she might do very happily in\na planet where others moved with the like velocity, she was offended\nhere by the phlegm of all her fellow-creatures, and disgusted them by\nher impatience. She could keep step with no human being. Her nephew\n[R. W. E.] wrote of her: \u201cI am glad the friendship with Aunt Mary is\nripening. As by seeing a high tragedy, reading a true poem, or a novel\nlike \u2018Corinne,\u2019 so, by society with her, one\u2019s mind is electrified\nand purged. She is no statute-book of practical commandments, nor\norderly digest of any system of philosophy, divine or human, but a\nBible, miscellaneous in its parts, but one in its spirit, wherein are\nsentences of condemnation, promises and covenants of love that make\nfoolish the wisdom of the world with the power of God.\u201d\n\nOur Delphian was fantastic enough, Heaven knows, yet could always\nbe tamed by large and sincere conversation. Was there thought and\neloquence, she would listen like a child. Her aspiration and prayer\nwould begin, and the whim and petulance in which by diseased habit she\nhad grown to indulge without suspecting it, was burned up in the glow\nof her pure and poetic spirit, which dearly loved the Infinite.\n\nShe writes: \u201cAugust, 1847: Vale.--My oddities were never\ndesigned--effect of an uncalculating constitution, at first, then\nthrough isolation; and as to dress, from duty. To be singular of\nchoice, without singular talents and virtues, is as ridiculous as\nungrateful.\u201d \u201cIt is so universal with all classes to avoid contact\nwith me that I blame none. The fact has generally increased piety and\nself-love.\u201d \u201cAs a traveller enters some fine palace and finds all\nthe doors closed, and he only allowed the use of some avenues and\npassages, so have I wandered from the cradle over the apartments of\nsocial affections, or the cabinets of natural or moral philosophy,\nthe recesses of ancient and modern love. All say--Forbear to enter\nthe pales of the initiated by birth, wealth, talents and patronage. I\nsubmit with delight, for it is the echo of a decree from above; and\nfrom the highway hedges where I get lodging, and from the rays which\nburst forth when the crowd are entering these noble saloons, whilst I\nstand in the doors, I get a pleasing vision which is an earnest of the\ninterminable skies where the mansions are prepared for the poor.\u201d\n\n\u201cTo live to give pain rather than pleasure (the latter so delicious)\nseems the spider-like necessity of my being on earth, and I have\ngone on my queer way with joy, saying, \u201cShall the clay interrogate?\u201d\nBut in every actual case, \u2019tis hard, and we lose sight of the first\nnecessity,--here too amid works red with default in all great and\ngrand and infinite aims. Yet with intentions disinterested, though\nuncontrolled by proper reverence for others.\u201d\n\nWhen Mrs. Thoreau called on her one day, wearing pink ribbons, she shut\nher eyes, and so conversed with her for a time. By and by she said,\n\u201cMrs. Thoreau, I don\u2019t know whether you have observed that my eyes are\nshut.\u201d \u201cYes, Madam, I have observed it.\u201d \u201cPerhaps you would like to\nknow the reasons?\u201d \u201cYes, I should.\u201d \u201cI don\u2019t like to see a person of\nyour age guilty of such levity in her dress.\u201d\n\nWhen her cherished favorite, E. H., was at the Vale, and had gone out\nto walk in the forest with Hannah, her niece, Aunt Mary feared they\nwere lost, and found a man in the next house and begged him to go and\nlook for them. The man went and returned saying that he could not find\nthem. \u201cGo and cry, \u2018Elizabeth!\u2019\u201d The man rather declined this service,\nas he did not know Miss H. She was highly offended, and exclaimed,\n\u201cGod has given you a voice that you might use it in the service of\nyour fellow-creatures. Go instantly and call \u2018Elizabeth\u2019 till you find\nthem.\u201d The man went immediately, and did as he was bid, and having\nfound them apologized for calling thus, by telling what Miss Emerson\nhad said to him.\n\nWhen some ladies of my acquaintance by an unusual chance found\nthemselves in her neighborhood and visited her, I told them that she\nwas no whistle that every mouth could play on, but a quite clannish\ninstrument, a pibroch, for example, from which none but a native\nHighlander could draw music.\n\nIn her solitude of twenty years, with fewest books and those only\nsermons, and a copy of \u201cParadise Lost,\u201d without covers or title-page,\nso that later, when she heard much of Milton and sought his work, she\nfound it was her very book which she knew so well,--she was driven\nto find Nature her companion and solace. She speaks of \u201cher attempts\nin Malden, to wake up the soul amid the dreary scenes of monotonous\nSabbaths, when Nature looked like a pulpit.\u201d\n\n\u201cMalden, November 15th, 1805.--What a rich day, so fully occupied in\npursuing truth that I scorned to touch a novel which for so many years\nI have wanted. How insipid is fiction to a mind touched with immortal\nviews! November 16th.--I am so small in my expectations, that a week\nof industry delights. Rose before light every morn; visited from\nnecessity once, and again for books; read Butler\u2019s Analogy; commented\non the Scriptures; read in a little book,--Cicero\u2019s Letters,--a few:\ntouched Shakspeare,--washed, carded, cleaned house, and baked. To-day\ncannot recall an error, nor scarcely a sacrifice, but more fulness\nof content in the labors of a day never was felt. There is a sweet\npleasure in bending to circumstances while superior to them.\n\n\u201cMalden, September, 1807.--The rapture of feeling I would part from,\nfor days more devoted to higher discipline. But when Nature beams\nwith such excess of beauty, when the heart thrills with hope in its\nAuthor,--feels that it is related to him more than by any ties of\nCreation,--it exults, too fondly perhaps for a state of trial. But in\ndead of night, nearer morning, when the eastern stars glow or appear\nto glow with more indescribable lustre, a lustre which penetrates the\nspirit with wonder and curiosity,--then, however awed, who can fear?\nSince Sabbath, Aunt B---- [the insane aunt] was brought here. Ah!\nmortifying sight! instinct perhaps triumphs over reason, and every\ndignified respect to herself, in her anxiety about recovery, and the\nsmallest means connected. Not one wish of others detains her, not one\ncare. But it alarms me not, I shall delight to return to God. His name\nmy fullest confidence. His sole presence ineffable pleasure.\n\n\u201cI walked yesterday five or more miles, lost to mental or heart\nexistence, through fatigue,--just fit for the society I went into,\nall mildness and the most commonplace virtue. The lady is celebrated\nfor her cleverness, and she was never so good to me. Met a lady in\nthe morning walk, a foreigner,--conversed on the accomplishments of\nMiss T. My mind expanded with novel and innocent pleasure. Ah! were\nvirtue, and that of dear heavenly meekness attached by any necessity to\na lower rank of genteel people, who would sympathize with the exalted\nwith satisfaction? But that is not the case, I believe. A mediocrity\ndoes seem to me more distant from eminent virtue than the extremes of\nstation; though after all it must depend on the nature of the heart. A\nmediocre mind will be deranged in either extreme of wealth or poverty,\npraise or censure, society or solitude. The feverish lust of notice\nperhaps in all these cases would injure the heart of common refinement\nand virtue.\u201d\n\nLater she writes of her early days in Malden: \u201cWhen I get a glimpse of\nthe revolutions of nations--that retribution which seems forever going\non in this part of creation,--I remember with great satisfaction that\nfrom all the ills suffered, in childhood and since, from others, I felt\nthat it was rather the order of things than their individual fault.\nIt was from being early impressed by my poor unpractical aunt, that\nProvidence and Prayer were all in all. Poor woman! Could her own temper\nin childhood or age have been subdued, how happy for herself, who had\na warm heart; but for me would have prevented those early lessons of\nfortitude, which her caprices taught me to practise. Had I prospered in\nlife, what a proud, excited being, even to feverishness, I might have\nbeen. Loving to shine, flattered and flattering, anxious, and wrapped\nin others, frail and feverish as myself.\u201d\n\nShe alludes to the early days of her solitude, sixty years afterward,\non her own farm in Maine, speaking sadly the thoughts suggested by the\nrich autumn landscape around her: \u201cAh! as I walked out this afternoon,\nso sad was wearied Nature that I felt her whisper to me, \u2018Even these\nleaves you use to think my better emblems have lost their charm on\nme too, and I weary of my pilgrimage,--tired that I must again be\nclothed in the grandeurs of winter, and anon be bedizened in flowers\nand cascades. Oh, if there be a power superior to me,--and that there\nis, my own dread fetters proclaim,--when will He let my lights go\nout, my tides cease to an eternal ebb? Oh for transformation! I am\nnot infinite, nor have I power or will, but bound and imprisoned, the\ntool of mind, even of the beings I feed and adorn. Vital, I feel not:\nnot active, but passive, and cannot aid the creatures which seem my\nprogeny,--myself. But you are ingrate to tire of me, now you want to\nlook beyond. \u2019Twas I who soothed your thorny childhood, though you knew\nme not, and you were placed in my most leafless waste. Yet I comforted\nthee when going on the daily errand, fed thee with my mallows, on the\nfirst young day of bread failing. More, I led thee when thou knewest\nnot a syllable of my active Cause, (any more than if it had been dead\neternal matter,) to that Cause; and from the solitary heart taught thee\nto say, at first womanhood, Alive with God is enough,--\u2019tis rapture.\u2019\u201d\n\n\u201cThis morning rich in existence; the remembrance of past destitution in\nthe deep poverty of my aunt, and her most unhappy temper; of bitterer\ndays of youth and age, when my senses and understanding seemed but\nmeans of labor, or to learn my own unpopular destiny, and that--but no\nmore;--joy, hope and resignation unite me to Him whose mysterious Will\nadjusts everything, and the darkest and lightest are alike welcome.\nOh! could this state of mind continue, death would not be longed for.\u201d\n\u201cI felt, till above twenty years old, as though Christianity were as\nnecessary to the world as existence;--was ignorant that it was lately\npromulged, or partially received.\u201d Later: \u201cCould I have those hours in\nwhich in fresh youth I said, To obey God is joy, though there were no\nhereafter, I should rejoice, though returning to dust.\u201d\n\n\u201cFolly follows me as the shadow does the form. Yet my whole life\ndevoted to find some new truth which will link me closer to God. And\nthe simple principle which made me say, in youth and laborious poverty,\nthat, should He make me a blot on the fair face of his Creation, I\nshould rejoice in His will, has never been equalled, though it returns\nin the long life of destitution like an Angel. I end days of fine\nhealth and cheerfulness without getting upward now. How did I use to\nthink them lost! If more liberal views of the divine government make me\nthink nothing lost which carries me to His now hidden presence, there\nmay be danger of losing and causing others the loss of that awe and\nsobriety so indispensable.\u201d\n\nShe was addressed and offered marriage by a man of talents, education,\nand good social position, whom she respected. The proposal gave her\npause and much to think, but, after consideration she refused it,\nI know not on what grounds: but a few allusions to it in her diary\nsuggest that it was a religious act, and it is easy to see that she\ncould hardly promise herself sympathy in her religious abandonment with\nany but a rarely-found partner.\n\n\u201c1807. Jan. 19, Malden [alluding to the sale of her farm]. Last night\nI spoke two sentences about that foolish place, which I most bitterly\nlament,--not because they were improper, but they arose from anger. It\nis difficult, when we have no kind of barrier, to command our feelings.\nBut this shall teach me. It humbles me beyond anything I have met, to\nfind myself for a moment affected with hope, fear, or especially anger,\nabout interest. But I did overcome and return kindness for the repeated\nprovocations. What is it? My uncle has been the means of lessening my\nproperty. Ridiculous to wound him for that. He was honestly seeking\nhis own. But at last, this very night, the bargain is closed, and I\nam delighted with myself:--my dear self has done well. Never did I so\nexult in a trifle. Happy beginning of my bargain, though the sale of\nthe place appears to me one of the worst things for me at this time.\u201d\n\n\u201cJan. 21. Weary at times of objects so tedious to hear and see. O the\npower of vision, then the delicate power of the nerve which receives\nimpressions from sounds! If ever I am blest with a social life, let the\naccent be grateful. Could I at times be regaled with music, it would\nremind me that there are _sounds_. Shut up in this severe weather\nwith careful, infirm, afflicted age, it is wonderful, my spirits: hopes\nI can have none. Not a prospect but is dark on earth, as to knowledge\nand joy from externals: but the prospect of a dying bed reflects lustre\non all the rest.\n\n\u201cThe evening is fine, but I dare not enjoy it. The moon and stars\nreproach me, because I had to do with mean fools. Should I take so\nmuch care to save a few dollars? Never was I so much ashamed. Did\nI say with what rapture I might dispose of them to the poor? Pho!\nself-preservation, dignity, confidence in the future, contempt of\ntrifles! Alas, I am disgraced. Took a momentary revenge on ---- for\nworrying me.\u201d\n\n\u201cJan. 30. I walked to Captain Dexter\u2019s. Sick. Promised never to put\nthat ring on. Ended miserably the month which began so worldly.\n\n\u201cIt was the choice of the Eternal that gave the glowing seraph his\njoys, and to me my vile imprisonment. I adore Him. It was His will\nthat gives my superiors to shine in wisdom, friendship, and ardent\npursuits, while I pass my youth, its last traces, in the veriest shades\nof ignorance and complete destitution of society. I praise Him, though\nwhen my strength of body falters, it is a trial not easily described.\u201d\n\n\u201cTrue, I must finger the very farthing candle-ends,--the duty assigned\nto my pride; and indeed so poor are some of those allotted to join me\non the weary needy path, that \u2019tis benevolence enjoins self-denial.\nCould I but dare it in the bread-and-water diet! Could I but live free\nfrom calculation, as in the first half of life, when my poor aunt\nlived. I had ten dollars a year for clothes and charity, and I never\nremember to have been needy, though I never had but two or three aids\nin those six years of earning my home. That ten dollars my dear father\nearned, and one hundred dollars remain, and I can\u2019t bear to take it,\nand don\u2019t know what to do. Yet I would not breathe to ---- or ---- my\nwant. \u2019Tis only now that I would not let ---- pay my hotel-bill. They\nhave enough to do. Besides, it would send me packing to depend for\nanything. Better anything than dishonest dependence, which robs the\npoorer, and despoils friendship of equal connection.\u201d\n\nIn 1830, in one of her distant homes, she reproaches herself with some\nsudden passion she has for visiting her old home and friends in the\ncity, where she had lived for a while with her brother [Mr. Emerson\u2019s\nfather] and afterwards with his widow. \u201cDo I yearn to be in Boston?\n\u2019Twould fatigue, disappoint; I, who have so long despised means, who\nhave always found it a sort of rebellion to seek them? Yet the old\ndesire for the worm is not so greedy as [mine] to find myself in my old\nhaunts.\u201d\n\n1833. \u201cThe difficulty of getting places of low board for a lady, is\nobvious. And, at moments, I am tired out. Yet how independent, how\nbetter than to hang on friends! And sometimes I fancy that I am emptied\nand peeled to carry some seed to the ignorant, which no idler wind can\nso well dispense.\u201d \u201cHard to contend for a health which is daily used\nin petition for a final close.\u201d \u201cAm I, poor victim, swept on through\nthe sternest ordinations of nature\u2019s laws which slay? yet I\u2019ll trust.\u201d\n\u201cThere was great truth in what a pious enthusiast said, that, if God\nshould cast him into hell, he would yet clasp his hands around Him.\u201d\n\n\u201cNewburyport, Sept. 1822. High, solemn, entrancing noon, prophetic of\nthe approach of the Presiding Spirit of Autumn. God preserve my reason!\nAlone, feeling strongly, fully, that I have deserved nothing; according\nto Adam Smith\u2019s idea of society, \u2018done nothing;\u2019 doing nothing, never\nexpect to; yet joying in existence, perhaps striving to beautify one\nindividual of God\u2019s creation.\n\n\u201cOur civilization is not always mending our poetry. It is sauced and\nspiced with our complexity of arts and inventions, but lacks somewhat\nof the grandeur that belongs to a Doric and unphilosophical age. In a\nreligious contemplative public it would have less outward variety, but\nsimpler and grander means; a few pulsations of created beings, a few\nsuccessions of acts, a few lamps held out in the firmament enable us to\ntalk of Time, make epochs, write histories,--to do more,--to date the\nrevelations of God to man. But these lamps are held to measure out some\nof the moments of eternity, to divide the history of God\u2019s operations\nin the birth and death of nations, of worlds. It is a goodly name for\nour notions of breathing, suffering, enjoying, acting. We personify it.\nWe call it by every name of fleeting, dreaming, vaporing imagery. Yet\nit is nothing. We exist in eternity. Dissolve the body and the night is\ngone, the stars are extinguished, and we measure duration by the number\nof our thoughts, by the activity of reason, the discovery of truths,\nthe acquirement of virtue, the approach to God. And the gray-headed god\nthrows his shadows all around, and his slaves catch, now at this, now\nat that, one at the halo he throws around poetry, or pebbles, bugs,\nor bubbles. Sometimes they climb, sometimes creep into the meanest\nholes--but they are all alike in vanishing, like the shadow of a cloud.\u201d\n\nTo her nephew Charles: \u201cWar; what do I think of it? Why in your ear I\nthink it so much better than oppression that if it were ravaging the\nwhole geography of despotism it would be an omen of high and glorious\nimport. Channing paints its miseries, but does he know those of a\nworse war,--private animosities, pinching, bitter warfare of the human\nheart, the cruel oppression of the poor by the rich, which corrupts old\nworlds? How much better, more honest, are storming and conflagration\nof towns! They are but letting blood which corrupts into worms and\ndragons. A war-trump would be harmony to the jars of theologians and\nstatesmen such as the papers bring. It was the glory of the Chosen\nPeople, nay, it is said there was war in Heaven. War is among the means\nof discipline, the rough meliorators, and no worse than the strife with\npoverty, malice and ignorance. War devastates the conscience of men,\nyet corrupt peace does not less. And if you tell me of the miseries\nof the battle-field, with the sensitive Channing, (of whose love of\nlife I am ashamed), what of a few days of agony, what of a vulture\nbeing the bier, tomb, and parson of a hero, compared to the long years\nof sticking on a bed and wished away? For the widows and orphans--O,\nI could give facts of the long-drawn years of imprisoned minds and\nhearts, which uneducated orphans endure!\n\n\u201cO Time! Thou loiterer. Thou, whose might has laid low the vastest\nand crushed the worm, restest on thy hoary throne, with like potency\nover thy agitations and thy graves. When will thy routines give way to\nhigher and lasting institutions? When thy trophies and thy name and\nall its wizard forms be lost in the Genius of Eternity? In Eternity, no\ndeceitful promises, no fantastic illusions, no riddles concealed by thy\nshrouds, none of thy Arachnean webs, which decoy and destroy. Hasten to\nfinish thy motley work, on which frightful Gorgons are at play, spite\nof holy ghosts. \u2019Tis already moth-eaten and its shuttles quaver, as the\nbeams of the loom are shaken.\n\n\u201cSat. 25. Hail requiem of departed Time! Never was incumbent\u2019s funeral\nfollowed by expectant heir with more satisfaction. Yet not his hope\nis mine. For in the weary womb are prolific numbers of the same sad\nhour, colored by the memory of defeats in virtue, by the prophecy of\nothers, more dreary, blind and sickly. Yet He who formed thy web, who\nstretched thy warp from long ages, has graciously given man to throw\nhis shuttle, or feel he does, and irradiate the filling woof with many\na flowery rainbow,--labors, rather--evanescent efforts, which will wear\nlike flowerets in brighter soils;--has attuned his mind in such unison\nwith the harp of the universe, that he is never without some chord of\nhope\u2019s music. \u2019Tis not in the nature of existence, while there is a\nGod, to be without the pale of excitement. When the dreamy pages of\nlife seem all turned and folded down to very weariness, even this idea\nof those who fill the hour with crowded virtues, lifts the spectator\nto other worlds, and he adores the eternal purposes of Him who lifteth\nup and casteth down, bringeth to dust, and raiseth to the skies. \u2019Tis a\nstrange deficiency in Brougham\u2019s title of a System of Natural Theology,\nwhen the moral constitution of the being for whom these contrivances\nwere made is not recognized. The wonderful inhabitant of the building\nto which unknown ages were the mechanics, is left out as to that part\nwhere the Creator had put his own lighted candle, placed a vice-gerent.\nNot to complain of the poor old earth\u2019s chaotic state, brought so near\nin its long and gloomy transmutings by the geologist. Yet its youthful\ncharms as decked by the hand of Moses\u2019 Cosmogony, will linger about\nthe heart, while Poetry succumbs to Science. Yet there is a sombre\nmusic in the whirl of times so long gone by. And the bare bones of this\npoor embryo earth may give the idea of the Infinite far, far better\nthan when dignified with arts and industry:--its oceans, when beating\nthe symbols of ceaseless ages, than when covered with cargoes of war\nand oppression. How grand its preparation for souls,--souls who were\nto feel the Divinity, before Science had dissected the emotions, and\napplied its steely analysis to that state of being which recognizes\nneither psychology nor element.\n\n\u201cSeptember, 1836. Vale. The mystic dream which is shed over the season.\nO, to dream more deeply; to lose external objects a little more! Yet\nthe hold on them is so slight, that duty is lost sight of perhaps, at\ntimes. Sadness is better than walking talking acting somnambulism. Yes,\nthis entire solitude with the Being who makes the powers of life! Even\nFame, which lives in other states of Virtue, palls. Usefulness, if it\nrequires action, seems less like existence than the desire of being\nabsorbed in God, retaining consciousness. Number the waste-places of\nthe journey,--the secret martyrdom of youth, heavier than the stake, I\nthought, the narrow limits which know no outlet, the bitter dregs of\nthe cup,--and all are sweetened by the purpose of Him I love. The idea\nof being no mate for those intellectualists I\u2019ve loved to admire, is no\npain. Hereafter the same solitary joy will go with me, were I not to\nlive, as I expect, in the vision of the Infinite. Never do the feelings\nof the Infinite, and the consciousness of finite frailty and ignorance,\nharmonize so well as at this mystic season in the deserts of life.\nContradictions, the modern German says, of the Infinite and finite.\u201d\n\nI sometimes fancy I detect in her writings, a certain--shall I\nsay--polite and courtly homage to the name and dignity of Jesus, not at\nall spontaneous, but growing out of her respect to the Revelation, and\nreally veiling and betraying her organic dislike to any interference,\nany mediation between her and the Author of her being, assurance of\nwhose direct dealing with her she incessantly invokes: for example,\nthe parenthesis \u201cSaving thy presence, Priest and Medium of all this\napproach for a sinful creature!\u201d \u201cWere it possible that the Creator\nwas not virtually present with the spirits and bodies which He has\nmade:--if it were in the nature of things possible He could withdraw\nhimself,--I would hold on to the faith, that, at some moment of His\nexistence, I was present: that, though cast from Him, my sorrows, my\nignorance and meanness were a part of His plan; my death, too, however\nlong and tediously delayed to prayer,--was decreed, was fixed. Oh how\nweary in youth--more so scarcely now, not whenever I can breathe, as\nit seems, the atmosphere of the Omnipresence: then I ask not faith nor\nknowledge; honors, pleasures, labors, I always refuse, compared to this\ndivine partaking of existence;--but how rare, how dependent on the\norgans through which the soul operates!\n\n\u201cThe sickness of the last week was fine medicine; pain disintegrated\nthe spirit, or became spiritual. I rose,--I felt that I had given to\nGod more perhaps than an angel could,--had promised Him in youth that\nto be a blot on this fair world, at His command, would be acceptable.\nConstantly offer myself to continue the obscurest and loneliest thing\never heard of, with one proviso,--His agency. Yes, love Thee, and all\nThou dost, while Thou sheddest frost and darkness on every path of\nmine.\u201d\n\nFor years she had her bed made in the form of a coffin; and delighted\nherself with the discovery of the figure of a coffin made every evening\non their sidewalk, by the shadow of a church tower which adjoined the\nhouse.\n\nSaladin caused his shroud to be made, and carried it to battle as his\nstandard. She made up her shroud, and death still refusing to come, and\nshe thinking it a pity to let it lie idle, wore it as a night-gown, or\na day-gown, nay, went out to ride in it, on horseback, in her mountain\nroads, until it was worn out. Then she had another made up, and as she\nnever travelled without being provided for this dear and indispensable\ncontingency, I believe she wore out a great many.\n\n\u201c1833. I have given up, the last year or two, the hope of dying. In the\nlowest ebb of health nothing is ominous; diet and exercise restore.\nSo it seems best to get that very humbling business of insurance. I\nenter my dear sixty the last of this month.\u201d \u201c1835, June 16. Tedious\nindisposition:--hoped, as it took a new form, it would open the cool,\nsweet grave. Now existence itself in any form is sweet. Away with\nknowledge;--God alone. He communicates this our condition and humble\nwaiting, or I should never perceive Him. Science, Nature,--O, I\u2019ve\nyearned to open some page;--not now, too late. Ill health and nerves.\nO dear worms,--how they will at some sure time take down this tedious\ntabernacle, most valuable companions, instructors in the science of\nmind, by gnawing away the meshes which have chained it. A very Beatrice\nin showing the Paradise. Yes, I irk under contact with forms of\ndepravity, while I am resigned to being nothing, never expect a palm, a\nlaurel, hereafter.\u201d\n\n\u201c1826, July. If one could choose, and without crime be gibbeted,--were\nit not altogether better than the long drooping away by age without\nmentality or devotion? The vulture and crow would _caw caw_,\nand, unconscious of any deformity in the mutilated body, would relish\ntheir meal, make no grimace of affected sympathy, nor suffer any\nreal compassion. I pray to die, though happier myriads and mine own\ncompanions press nearer to the throne. His coldest beam will purify\nand render me forever holy. Had I the highest place of acquisition\nand diffusing virtue here, the principle of human sympathy would be\ntoo strong for that rapt emotion, that severe delight which I crave;\nnay for that kind of obscure virtue which is so rich to lay at the\nfeet of the Author of morality. Those economists (Adam Smith) who say\nnothing is added to the wealth of a nation but what is dug out of the\nearth, and that, whatever disposition of virtue may exist, unless\nsomething is done for society, deserves no fame,--why I am content with\nsuch paradoxical kind of facts; but one secret sentiment of virtue,\ndisinterested (or perhaps not), is worthy, and will tell, in the world\nof spirits, of God\u2019s immediate presence, more than the blood of many a\nmartyr who has it not.\u201d \u201cI have heard that the greatest geniuses have\ndied ignorant of their power and influence on the arts and sciences. I\nbelieve thus much, that their large perception consumed their egotism,\nor made it impossible for them to make small calculations.\u201d\n\n\u201cThat greatest of all gifts, however small my power of receiving,--the\ncapacity, the element to love the All-perfect, without regard to\npersonal happiness:--happiness?--\u2019tis itself.\u201d She checks herself\namid her passionate prayers for immediate communion with God;--\u201cI who\nnever made a sacrifice to record,--I cowering in the nest of quiet\nfor so many years;--I indulge the delight of sympathizing with great\nvirtues,--blessing their Original: Have I this right?\u201d \u201cWhile I am\nsympathizing in the government of God over the world, perhaps I lose\nnearer views. Well, I learned his existence _a priori_. No object\nof science or observation ever was pointed out to me by my poor aunt,\nbut His Being and commands; and oh how much I trusted Him with every\nevent till I learned the order of human events from the pressure of\nwants.\u201d\n\n\u201cWhat a timid, ungrateful creature! Fear the deepest pit-falls of\nage, when pressing on, in imagination at least, to Him with whom a\nday is a thousand years,--with whom all miseries and irregularities\nare conforming to universal good! Shame on me who have learned within\nthree years to sit whole days in peace and enjoyment without the least\napparent benefit to any, or knowledge to myself;--resigned, too, to\nthe memory of long years of slavery passed in labor and ignorance, to\nthe loss of that character which I once thought and felt so sure of,\nwithout ever being conscious of acting from calculation.\u201d\n\nHer friends used to say to her, \u201cI wish you joy of the worm.\u201d And when\nat last her release arrived, the event of her death had really such a\ncomic tinge in the eyes of every one who knew her, that her friends\nfeared they might, at her funeral, not dare to look at each other, lest\nthey should forget the serious proprieties of the hour.\n\nShe gave high counsels. It was the privilege of certain boys to have\nthis immeasurably high standard indicated to their childhood; a\nblessing which nothing else in education could supply. It is frivolous\nto ask,--\u201cAnd was she ever a Christian in practice?\u201d Cassandra uttered,\nto a frivolous, skeptical time, the arcana of the Gods: but it is easy\nto believe that Cassandra domesticated in a lady\u2019s house would have\nproved a troublesome boarder. Is it the less desirable to have the\nlofty abstractions because the abstractionist is nervous and irritable?\nShall we not keep Flamsteed and Herschel in the observatory, though it\nshould even be proved that they neglected to rectify their own kitchen\nclock? It is essential to the safety of every mackerel fisher that\nlatitudes and longitudes should be astronomically ascertained; and so\nevery banker, shopkeeper and wood-sawyer has a stake in the elevation\nof the moral code by saint and prophet. Very rightly, then, the\nChristian ages, proceeding on a grand instinct, have said: Faith alone,\nFaith alone.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 14: Aunt of Mr. Emerson, and a potent influence on the lives\nof him and his brothers. This paper was read before the \u201cWoman\u2019s\nClub,\u201d in Boston, in 1869, under the title \u201cAmita,\u201d which was also the\noriginal superscription of the \u201cNun\u2019s Aspiration,\u201d in his Poems; a\nrendering into verse of a passage in Miss Emerson\u2019s diary. Part of this\npoem forms the motto of this chapter.]\n\n\n\n\n                             SAMUEL HOAR.\n\n    Magno se judice quisque tuetur;\n    Victrix causa deis placuit sed victa Catoni.\n\n\n    A YEAR ago, how often did we meet\n      Beneath these elms, once more in sober bloom,\n    Thy tall, sad figure pacing down the street,\n      And now the robin sings above thy tomb!\n    Thy name on other shores may ne\u2019er be known,\n      Though Rome austere no graver consul knew,\n    But Massachusetts her true son shall own;\n      Out of her soil thy hardy virtues grew.\n\n    She loves the man that chose the conquered cause,\n      With upright soul that bowed to God alone;\n    The clean hands that upheld her equal laws,\n      The old religion ne\u2019er to be outgrown;\n    The cold demeanor, the warm heart beneath,\n    The simple grandeur of thy life and death.\n\n                                      F. B. SANBORN.\n\nApril, 1857.\n\n\n\n\n                             SAMUEL HOAR.\n\n       SPEECH AT CONCORD, MASS., 4TH NOV. [ELECTION DAY], 1856.\n\n\nHERE is a day on which more public good or evil is to be done than\nwas ever done on any day. And this is the pregnant season, when our\nold Roman, Samuel Hoar, has chosen to quit this world. _Ab iniquo\ncertamine indignabundus recessit._\n\nHe was born under a Christian and humane star, full of mansuetude and\nnobleness, honor and charity; and, whilst he was willing to face every\ndisagreeable duty, whilst he dared to do all that might beseem a man,\nhis self-respect restrained him from any foolhardiness. The Homeric\nheroes, when they saw the gods mingling in the fray, sheathed their\nswords. So did not he feel any call to make it a contest of personal\nstrength with mobs or nations; but when he saw the day and the gods\nwent against him, he withdrew, but with an unaltered belief. All was\nconquered _pr\u00e6ter atrocem animum Catonis_.\n\nAt the time when he went to South Carolina as the Commissioner of\nMassachusetts, in 1844, whilst staying in Charleston, pending his\ncorrespondence with the governor and the legal officers, he was\nrepeatedly warned that it was not safe for him to appear in public,\nor to take his daily walk, as he had done, unattended by his friends,\nin the streets of the city. He was advised to withdraw to private\nlodgings, which were eagerly offered him by friends. He rejected the\nadvice, and refused the offers, saying that he was old, and his life\nwas not worth much, but he had rather the boys should troll his old\nhead like a foot-ball in their streets, than that he should hide it.\nAnd he continued the uniform practice of his daily walk into all parts\nof the city. But when the mob of Charleston was assembled in the\nstreets before his hotel, and a deputation of gentlemen waited upon him\nin the hall to say they had come with the unanimous voice of the state\nto remove him by force, and the carriage was at the door, he considered\nhis duty discharged to the last point of possibility. The force was\napparent and irresistible; the legal officer\u2019s part was up; it was\nnow time for the military officer to be sent; and he said, \u201cWell,\ngentlemen, since it is your pleasure to use force, I must go.\u201d But his\nopinion was unchanged.\n\nIn like manner now, when the votes of the Free States, as shown in the\nrecent election in the State of Pennsylvania, had disappointed the\nhopes of mankind and betrayed the cause of freedom, he considered the\nquestion of justice and liberty, for his age, lost, and had no longer\nthe will to drag his days through the dishonors of the long defeat, and\npromptly withdrew, but with unaltered belief.\n\nHe was a very natural, but a very high character; a man of simple\ntastes, plain and true in speech, with a clear perception of\njustice, and a perfect obedience thereto in his action; of a strong\nunderstanding, precise and methodical, which gave him great eminence\nin the legal profession. It was rather his reputation for severe\nmethod in his intellect than any special direction in his studies\nthat caused him to be offered the mathematical chair in Harvard\nUniversity, when vacant in 1806. The severity of his logic might have\ninspired fear, had it not been restrained by his natural reverence,\nwhich made him modest and courteous, though his courtesy had a grave\nand almost military air. He combined a uniform self-respect with a\nnatural reverence for every other man; so that it was perfectly easy\nfor him to associate with farmers, and with plain, uneducated, poor\nmen, and he had a strong, unaffected interest in farms, and crops, and\nweathers, and the common incidents of rural life. It was just as easy\nfor him to meet on the same floor, and with the same plain courtesy,\nmen of distinction and large ability. He was fond of farms and trees,\nfond of birds, and attentive to their manners and habits; addicted to\nlong and retired walks; temperate to asceticism, for no lesson of his\nexperience was lost on him, and his self-command was perfect. Though\nrich, of a plainness and almost poverty of personal expenditure, yet\nliberal of his money to any worthy use, readily lending it to young\nmen, and industrious men, and by no means eager to reclaim of them\neither the interest or the principal. He was open-handed to every\ncharity, and every public claim that had any show of reason in it. When\nI talked with him one day of some inequality of taxes in the town, he\nsaid it was his practice to pay whatever was demanded; for, though he\nmight think the taxation large and very unequally proportioned, yet he\nthought the money might as well go in this way as in any other.\n\nThe strength and the beauty of the man lay in the natural goodness and\njustice of his mind, which, in manhood and in old age, after dealing\nall his life with weighty private and public interests, left an\ninfantile innocence, of which we have no second or third example,--the\nstrength of a chief united to the modesty of a child. He returned from\ncourts or congresses to sit down, with unaltered humility, in the\nchurch or in the town-house, on the plain wooden bench where honor came\nand sat down beside him.\n\nHe was a man in whom so rare a spirit of justice visibly dwelt, that if\none had met him in a cabin or in a forest he must still seem a public\nman, answering as sovereign state to sovereign state; and might easily\nsuggest Milton\u2019s picture of John Bradshaw, that \u201che was a consul from\nwhom the fasces did not depart with the year, but in private seemed\never sitting in judgment on kings.\u201d Everybody knew where to find him.\nWhat he said, that would he do. But he disdained any arts in his\nspeech: he was not adorned with any graces of rhetoric,\n\n    \u201cBut simple truth his utmost skill.\u201d\n\nSo cautious was he, and tender of the truth, that he sometimes\nwearied his audience with the pains he took to qualify and verify\nhis statements, adding clause on clause to do justice to all his\nconviction. He had little or no power of generalization. But a plain\nway he had of putting his statement with all his might, and now and\nthen borrowing the aid of a good story, or a farmer\u2019s phrase, whose\nforce had imprinted it on his memory, and, by the same token, his\nhearers were bound to remember his point.\n\nThe impression he made on juries was honorable to him and them. For\na long term of years, he was at the head of the bar in Middlesex,\npractising, also, in the adjoining counties. He had one side or the\nother of every important case, and his influence was reckoned despotic,\nand sometimes complained of as a bar to public justice. Many good\nstories are still told of the perplexity of jurors who found the law\nand the evidence on one side, and yet Squire Hoar had said that he\nbelieved, on his conscience, his client entitled to a verdict. And what\nMiddlesex jury, containing any God-fearing men in it, would hazard\nan opinion in flat contradiction to what Squire Hoar believed to be\njust? He was entitled to this respect; for he discriminated in the\nbusiness that was brought to him, and would not argue a rotten cause;\nand he refused very large sums offered him to undertake the defense of\ncriminal persons.\n\nHis character made him the conscience of the community in which he\nlived. And in many a town it was asked, \u201cWhat does Squire Hoar think of\nthis?\u201d and in political crises, he was entreated to write a few lines\nto make known to good men in Chelmsford, or Marlborough, or Shirley,\nwhat that opinion was. I used to feel that his conscience was a kind\nof meter of the degree of honesty in the country, by which on each\noccasion it was tried, and sometimes found wanting. I am sorry to say\nhe could not be elected to Congress a second time from Middlesex.\n\nAnd in his own town, if some important end was to be gained,--as,\nfor instance, when the county commissioners refused to rebuild the\nburned court-house, on the belief that the courts would be transferred\nfrom Concord to Lowell,--all parties combined to send Mr. Hoar to the\nLegislature, where his presence and speech, of course, secured the\nrebuilding; and, of course also, having answered our end, we passed him\nby and elected somebody else at the next term.\n\nHis head, with singular grace in its lines, had a resemblance to the\nbust of Dante. He retained to the last the erectness of his tall but\nslender form, and not less the full strength of his mind. Such was,\nin old age, the beauty of his person and carriage, as if the mind\nradiated, and made the same impression of probity on all beholders.\nHis beauty was pathetic and touching in these latest days, and, as now\nappears, it awakened a certain tender fear in all who saw him, that the\ncostly ornament of our homes and halls and streets was speedily to be\nremoved. Yet how solitary he looked, day by day in the world, this man\nso revered, this man of public life, of large acquaintance and wide\nfamily connection! Was it some reserve of constitution, or was it only\nthe lot of excellence, that with aims so pure and single, he seemed to\npass out of life alone, and, as it were, unknown to those who were his\ncontemporaries and familiars?\n\n[The following sketch of Mr. Hoar from a slightly different point of\nview, was prepared by Mr. Emerson, shortly after the above speech\nappeared in \u201cPutnam\u2019s Magazine\u201d (December, 1856), at the request of\nthe Editor of the \u201cMonthly Religious Magazine,\u201d and was printed there,\nJanuary, 1857. It is here appended as giving some additional traits of\na characteristic figure which may serve as a pendant in some respects\nto that of Dr. Ripley.]\n\n Mr. Hoar was distinguished in his profession by the grasp of his\n mind, and by the simplicity of his means. His ability lay in the\n clear apprehension and the powerful statement of the material points\n of his case. He soon possessed it, and he never possessed it better,\n and he was equally ready at any moment to state the facts. He saw\n what was essential and refuted whatever was not, so that no man\n embarrassed himself less with a needless array of books and evidences\n of contingent value.\n\n These tactics of the lawyer were the tactics of his life. He had\n uniformly the air of knowing just what he wanted and of going to that\n in the shortest way. It is singular that his character should make\n so deep an impression, standing and working as he did on so common\n a ground. He was neither spiritualist nor man of genius nor of a\n literary nor an executive talent. In strictness the vigor of his\n understanding was directed on the ordinary domestic and municipal\n well-being. Society had reason to cherish him, for he was a main\n pillar on which it leaned. The useful and practical super-abounded\n in his mind, and to a degree which might be even comic to young and\n poetical persons. If he spoke of the engagement of two lovers, he\n called it a contract. Nobody cared to speak of thoughts or aspirations\n to a black-letter lawyer, who only studied to keep men out of prison,\n and their lands out of attachment. Had you read Swedenborg or Plotinus\n to him, he would have waited till you had done, and answered you out\n of the Revised Statutes. He had an affinity for mathematics, but it\n was a taste rather than a pursuit, and of the modern sciences he liked\n to read popular books on geology. Yet so entirely was this respect to\n the ground plan and substructure of society a natural ability, and\n from the order of his mind, and not for \u201ctickling commodity,\u201d that\n it was admirable, as every work of nature is, and like one of those\n opaque crystals, big beryls weighing tons, which are found in Acworth,\n New Hampshire, not less perfect in their angles and structure, and\n only less beautiful, than the transparent topazes and diamonds.\n Meantime, whilst his talent and his profession led him to guard the\n material wealth of society, a more disinterested person did not exist.\n And if there were regions of knowledge not open to him, he did not\n pretend to them. His modesty was sincere. He had a childlike innocence\n and a native temperance, which left him no temptations, and enabled\n him to meet every comer with a free and disengaged courtesy that had\n no memory in it\n\n    \u201cOf wrong and outrage with which earth is filled.\u201d\n\n No person was more keenly alive to the stabs which the ambition and\n avarice of men inflicted on the commonwealth. Yet when politicians\n or speculators approached him, these memories left no scar; his\n countenance had an unalterable tranquillity and sweetness; he had\n nothing to repent of,--let the cloud rest where it might, he dwelt in\n eternal sunshine.\n\n He had his birth and breeding in a little country town, where the\n old religion existed in strictness, and spent all his energy in\n creating purity of manners and careful education. No art or practice\n of the farm was unknown to him, and the farmers greeted him as one of\n themselves, whilst they paid due homage to his powers of mind and to\n his virtues.\n\n He loved the dogmas and the simple usages of his church; was\n always an honored and sometimes an active member. He never shrunk\n from a disagreeable duty. In the time of the Sunday laws he was a\n tithing-man; under the Maine Law he was a prosecutor of the liquor\n dealers. It seemed as if the New England church had formed him to be\n its friend and defender; the lover and assured friend of its parish\n by-laws, of its ministers, its rites, and its social reforms. He was a\n model of those formal but reverend manners which make what is called\n a gentleman of the old school, so called under an impression that the\n style is passing away, but which, I suppose, is an optical illusion,\n as there are always a few more of the class remaining, and always a\n few young men to whom these manners are native.\n\n I have spoken of his modesty; he had nothing to say about himself;\n and his sincere admiration was commanded by certain heroes of the\n profession, like Judge Parsons and Judge Marshall, Mr. Mason and Mr.\n Webster. When some one said, in his presence, that Chief Justice\n Marshall was failing in his intellect, Mr. Hoar remarked that \u201cJudge\n Marshall could afford to lose brains enough to furnish three or four\n common men, before common men would find it out.\u201d He had a huge\n respect for Mr. Webster\u2019s ability, with whom he had often occasion to\n try his strength at the bar, and a proportionately deep regret at Mr.\n Webster\u2019s political course in his later years.\n\n There was no elegance in his reading or tastes beyond the crystal\n clearness of his mind. He had no love of poetry; and I have heard that\n the only verse that he was ever known to quote was the Indian rule:\n\n    \u201cWhen the oaks are in the gray,\n    Then, farmers, plant away.\u201d\n\n But I find an elegance in his quiet but firm withdrawal from all\n business in the courts which he could drop without manifest detriment\n to the interests involved (and this when in his best strength), and\n his self-dedication thenceforward to unpaid services of the Temperance\n and Peace and other philanthropic societies, the Sunday Schools, the\n cause of Education, and specially of the University, and to such\n political activities as a strong sense of duty and the love of order\n and of freedom urged him to forward.\n\n Perfect in his private life, the husband, father, friend, he was\n severe only with himself. He was as if on terms of honor with those\n nearest him, nor did he think a lifelong familiarity could excuse any\n omission of courtesy from him. He carried ceremony finely to the last.\n But his heart was all gentleness, gratitude and bounty.\n\n    With beams December planets dart,\n    His cold eye truth and conduct scanned;\n    July was in his sunny heart,\n    October in his liberal hand.\n\n\n\n\n                               THOREAU.\n\n    A QUEEN rejoices in her peers,\n    And wary Nature knows her own,\n    By court and city, dale and down,\n    And like a lover volunteers,\n    And to her son will treasures more,\n    And more to purpose, freely pour\n    In one wood walk, than learned men\n    Will find with glass in ten times ten.\n\n\n    IT seemed as if the breezes brought him,\n    It seemed as if the sparrows taught him,\n    As if by secret sign he knew\n    Where in far fields the orchis grew.\n\n\n\n\n                             THOREAU.[15]\n\n\nHENRY DAVID THOREAU was the last male descendant of a French ancestor\nwho came to this country from the Isle of Guernsey. His character\nexhibited occasional traits drawn from this blood, in singular\ncombination with a very strong Saxon genius.\n\nHe was born in Concord, Massachusetts, on the 12th of July, 1817. He\nwas graduated at Harvard College in 1837, but without any literary\ndistinction. An iconoclast in literature, he seldom thanked colleges\nfor their service to him, holding them in small esteem, whilst yet his\ndebt to them was important. After leaving the University, he joined\nhis brother in teaching a private school, which he soon renounced. His\nfather was a manufacturer of lead-pencils, and Henry applied himself\nfor a time to this craft, believing he could make a better pencil\nthan was then in use. After completing his experiments, he exhibited\nhis work to chemists and artists in Boston, and having obtained their\ncertificates to its excellence and to its equality with the best London\nmanufacture, he returned home contented. His friends congratulated him\nthat he had now opened his way to fortune. But he replied, that he\nshould never make another pencil. \u201cWhy should I? I would not do again\nwhat I have done once.\u201d He resumed his endless walks and miscellaneous\nstudies, making every day some new acquaintance with Nature, though as\nyet never speaking of zo\u00f6logy or botany, since, though very studious of\nnatural facts, he was incurious of technical and textual science.\n\nAt this time, a strong, healthy youth, fresh from college, whilst all\nhis companions were choosing their profession, or eager to begin some\nlucrative employment, it was inevitable that his thoughts should be\nexercised on the same question, and it required rare decision to refuse\nall the accustomed paths and keep his solitary freedom at the cost of\ndisappointing the natural expectations of his family and friends: all\nthe more difficult that he had a perfect probity, was exact in securing\nhis own independence, and in holding every man to the like duty. But\nThoreau never faltered. He was a born protestant. He declined to give\nup his large ambition of knowledge and action for any narrow craft\nor profession, aiming at a much more comprehensive calling, the art\nof living well. If he slighted and defied the opinions of others, it\nwas only that he was more intent to reconcile his practice with his\nown belief. Never idle or self-indulgent, he preferred, when he wanted\nmoney, earning it by some piece of manual labor agreeable to him, as\nbuilding a boat or a fence, planting, grafting, surveying, or other\nshort work, to any long engagements. With his hardy habits and few\nwants, his skill in wood-craft, and his powerful arithmetic, he was\nvery competent to live in any part of the world. It would cost him less\ntime to supply his wants than another. He was therefore secure of his\nleisure.\n\nA natural skill for mensuration, growing out of his mathematical\nknowledge and his habit of ascertaining the measures and distances\nof objects which interested him, the size of trees, the depth and\nextent of ponds and rivers, the height of mountains, and the air-line\ndistance of his favorite summits,--this, and his intimate knowledge\nof the territory about Concord, made him drift into the profession of\nland-surveyor. It had the advantage for him that it led him continually\ninto new and secluded grounds, and helped his studies of Nature. His\naccuracy and skill in this work were readily appreciated, and he found\nall the employment he wanted.\n\nHe could easily solve the problems of the surveyor, but he was\ndaily beset with graver questions, which he manfully confronted. He\ninterrogated every custom, and wished to settle all his practice on an\nideal foundation. He was a protestant _\u00e0 outrance_, and few lives\ncontain so many renunciations. He was bred to no profession; he never\nmarried; he lived alone; he never went to church; he never voted; he\nrefused to pay a tax to the State; he ate no flesh, he drank no wine,\nhe never knew the use of tobacco; and, though a naturalist, he used\nneither trap nor gun. He chose, wisely no doubt for himself, to be\nthe bachelor of thought and Nature. He had no talent for wealth, and\nknew how to be poor without the least hint of squalor or inelegance.\nPerhaps he fell into his way of living without forecasting it much,\nbut approved it with later wisdom. \u201cI am often reminded,\u201d he wrote in\nhis journal, \u201cthat if I had bestowed on me the wealth of Cr\u0153sus, my\naims must be still the same, and my means essentially the same.\u201d He\nhad no temptations to fight against,--no appetites, no passions, no\ntaste for elegant trifles. A fine house, dress, the manners and talk of\nhighly cultivated people were all thrown away on him. He much preferred\na good Indian, and considered these refinements as impediments to\nconversation, wishing to meet his companion on the simplest terms.\nHe declined invitations to dinner-parties, because there each was in\nevery one\u2019s way, and he could not meet the individuals to any purpose.\n\u201cThey make their pride,\u201d he said, \u201cin making their dinner cost much;\nI make my pride in making my dinner cost little.\u201d When asked at table\nwhat dish he preferred, he answered, \u201cThe nearest.\u201d He did not like the\ntaste of wine, and never had a vice in his life. He said,--\u201cI have a\nfaint recollection of pleasure derived from smoking dried lily-stems,\nbefore I was a man. I had commonly a supply of these. I have never\nsmoked anything more noxious.\u201d\n\nHe chose to be rich by making his wants few, and supplying them\nhimself. In his travels, he used the railroad only to get over so much\ncountry as was unimportant to the present purpose, walking hundreds of\nmiles, avoiding taverns, buying a lodging in farmers\u2019 and fishermen\u2019s\nhouses, as cheaper, and more agreeable to him, and because there he\ncould better find the men and the information he wanted.\n\nThere was somewhat military in his nature, not to be subdued, always\nmanly and able, but rarely tender, as if he did not feel himself except\nin opposition. He wanted a fallacy to expose, a blunder to pillory, I\nmay say required a little sense of victory, a roll of the drum, to call\nhis powers into full exercise. It cost him nothing to say No; indeed\nhe found it much easier than to say Yes. It seemed as if his first\ninstinct on hearing a proposition was to controvert it, so impatient\nwas he of the limitations of our daily thought. This habit, of course,\nis a little chilling to the social affections; and though the companion\nwould in the end acquit him of any malice or untruth, yet it mars\nconversation. Hence, no equal companion stood in affectionate relations\nwith one so pure and guileless. \u201cI love Henry,\u201d said one of his\nfriends, \u201cbut I cannot like him; and as for taking his arm, I should as\nsoon think of taking the arm of an elm-tree.\u201d\n\nYet, hermit and stoic as he was, he was really fond of sympathy, and\nthrew himself heartily and childlike into the company of young people\nwhom he loved, and whom he delighted to entertain, as he only could,\nwith the varied and endless anecdotes of his experiences by field and\nriver: and he was always ready to lead a huckleberry-party or a search\nfor chestnuts or grapes. Talking, one day, of a public discourse,\nHenry remarked, that whatever succeeded with the audience was bad. I\nsaid, \u201cWho would not like to write something which all can read, like\nRobinson Crusoe? and who does not see with regret that his page is not\nsolid with a right materialistic treatment, which delights everybody?\u201d\nHenry objected, of course, and vaunted the better lectures which\nreached only a few persons. But, at supper, a young girl, understanding\nthat he was to lecture at the Lyceum, sharply asked him, \u201cWhether his\nlecture would be a nice, interesting story, such as she wished to hear,\nor whether it was one of those old philosophical things that she did\nnot care about.\u201d Henry turned to her, and bethought himself, and, I\nsaw, was trying to believe that he had matter that might fit her and\nher brother, who were to sit up and go to the lecture, if it was a good\none for them.\n\nHe was a speaker and actor of the truth, born such, and was ever\nrunning into dramatic situations from this cause. In any circumstance\nit interested all bystanders to know what part Henry would take, and\nwhat he would say; and he did not disappoint expectation, but used\nan original judgment on each emergency. In 1845 he built himself a\nsmall framed house on the shores of Walden Pond, and lived there two\nyears alone, a life of labor and study. This action was quite native\nand fit for him. No one who knew him would tax him with affectation.\nHe was more unlike his neighbors in his thought than in his action.\nAs soon as he had exhausted the advantages of that solitude, he\nabandoned it. In 1847, not approving some uses to which the public\nexpenditure was applied, he refused to pay his town tax, and was put\nin jail. A friend paid the tax for him, and he was released. The like\nannoyance was threatened the next year. But, as his friends paid the\ntax, notwithstanding his protest, I believe he ceased to resist. No\nopposition or ridicule had any weight with him. He coldly and fully\nstated his opinion of the company. It was of no consequence if every\none present held the opposite opinion. On one occasion he went to the\nUniversity Library to procure some books. The librarian refused to\nlend them. Mr. Thoreau repaired to the President, who stated to him\nthe rules and usages, which permitted the loan of books to resident\ngraduates, to clergymen who were alumni, and to some others resident\nwithin a circle of ten miles\u2019 radius from the College. Mr. Thoreau\nexplained to the President that the railroad had destroyed the old\nscale of distances,--that the library was useless, yes, and President\nand College useless, on the terms of his rules,--that the one benefit\nhe owed to the College was its library,--that, at this moment, not\nonly his want of books was imperative but he wanted a large number of\nbooks, and assured him that he, Thoreau, and not the librarian, was the\nproper custodian of these. In short, the President found the petitioner\nso formidable, and the rules getting to look so ridiculous, that he\nended by giving him a privilege which in his hands proved unlimited\nthereafter.\n\nNo truer American existed than Thoreau. His preference of his country\nand condition was genuine, and his aversation from English and European\nmanners and tastes almost reached contempt. He listened impatiently\nto news or bonmots gleaned from London circles; and though he tried\nto be civil, these anecdotes fatigued him. The men were all imitating\neach other, and on a small mould. Why can they not live as far apart\nas possible, and each be a man by himself? What he sought was the most\nenergetic nature; and he wished to go to Oregon, not to London. \u201cIn\nevery part of Great Britain,\u201d he wrote in his diary, \u201care discovered\ntraces of the Romans, their funereal urns, their camps, their roads,\ntheir dwellings. But New England, at least, is not based on any Roman\nruins. We have not to lay the foundations of our houses on the ashes of\na former civilization.\u201d\n\nBut, idealist as he was, standing for abolition of slavery, abolition\nof tariffs, almost for abolition of government, it is needless to say\nhe found himself not only unrepresented in actual politics, but almost\nequally opposed to every class of reformers. Yet he paid the tribute of\nhis uniform respect to the Anti-Slavery party. One man, whose personal\nacquaintance he had formed, he honored with exceptional regard. Before\nthe first friendly word had been spoken for Captain John Brown, he\nsent notices to most houses in Concord that he would speak in a\npublic hall on the condition and character of John Brown, on Sunday\nevening, and invited all people to come. The Republican Committee,\nthe Abolitionist Committee, sent him word that it was premature and\nnot advisable. He replied,--\u201cI did not send to you for advice, but to\nannounce that I am to speak.\u201d The hall was filled at an early hour by\npeople of all parties, and his earnest eulogy of the hero was heard by\nall respectfully, by many with a sympathy that surprised themselves.\n\nIt was said of Plotinus that he was ashamed of his body, and \u2019tis very\nlikely he had good reason for it,--that his body was a bad servant,\nand he had not skill in dealing with the material world, as happens\noften to men of abstract intellect. But Mr. Thoreau was equipped with\na most adapted and serviceable body. He was of short stature, firmly\nbuilt, of light complexion, with strong, serious blue eyes, and a grave\naspect,--his face covered in the late years with a becoming beard. His\nsenses were acute, his frame well-knit and hardy, his hands strong and\nskilful in the use of tools. And there was a wonderful fitness of body\nand mind. He could pace sixteen rods more accurately than another man\ncould measure them with rod and chain. He could find his path in the\nwoods at night, he said, better by his feet than his eyes. He could\nestimate the measure of a tree very well by his eye; he could estimate\nthe weight of a calf or a pig, like a dealer. From a box containing a\nbushel or more of loose pencils, he could take up with his hands fast\nenough just a dozen pencils at every grasp. He was a good swimmer,\nrunner, skater, boatman, and would probably outwalk most countrymen in\na day\u2019s journey. And the relation of body to mind was still finer than\nwe have indicated. He said he wanted every stride his legs made. The\nlength of his walk uniformly made the length of his writing. If shut up\nin the house he did not write at all.\n\nHe had a strong common-sense, like that which Rose Flammock the\nweaver\u2019s daughter in Scott\u2019s romance commends in her father, as\nresembling a yardstick, which, whilst it measures dowlas and diaper,\ncan equally well measure tapestry and cloth of gold. He had always a\nnew resource. When I was planting forest trees, and had procured half\na peck of acorns, he said that only a small portion of them would be\nsound, and proceeded to examine them and select the sound ones. But\nfinding this took time, he said, \u201cI think if you put them all into\nwater the good ones will sink;\u201d which experiment we tried with success.\nHe could plan a garden or a house or a barn; would have been competent\nto lead a \u201cPacific Exploring Expedition;\u201d could give judicious counsel\nin the gravest private or public affairs.\n\nHe lived for the day, not cumbered and mortified by his memory. If he\nbrought you yesterday a new proposition, he would bring you to-day\nanother not less revolutionary. A very industrious man, and setting,\nlike all highly organized men, a high value on his time, he seemed\nthe only man of leisure in town, always ready for any excursion that\npromised well, or for conversation prolonged into late hours. His\ntrenchant sense was never stopped by his rules of daily prudence, but\nwas always up to the new occasion. He liked and used the simplest food,\nyet, when some one urged a vegetable diet, Thoreau thought all diets a\nvery small matter, saying that \u201cthe man who shoots the buffalo lives\nbetter than the man who boards at the Graham House.\u201d He said,--\u201cYou\ncan sleep near the railroad, and never be disturbed: Nature knows very\nwell what sounds are worth attending to, and has made up her mind not\nto hear the railroad-whistle. But things respect the devout mind, and a\nmental ecstasy was never interrupted.\u201d He noted what repeatedly befell\nhim, that, after receiving from a distance a rare plant, he would\npresently find the same in his own haunts. And those pieces of luck\nwhich happen only to good players happened to him. One day, walking\nwith a stranger, who inquired where Indian arrow-heads could be found,\nhe replied, \u201cEverywhere,\u201d and, stooping forward, picked one on the\ninstant from the ground. At Mount Washington, in Tuckerman\u2019s Ravine,\nThoreau had a bad fall, and sprained his foot. As he was in the act of\ngetting up from his fall, he saw for the first time the leaves of the\n_Arnica mollis_.\n\nHis robust common sense, armed with stout hands, keen perceptions and\nstrong will, cannot yet account for the superiority which shone in\nhis simple and hidden life. I must add the cardinal fact, that there\nwas an excellent wisdom in him, proper to a rare class of men, which\nshowed him the material world as a means and symbol. This discovery,\nwhich sometimes yields to poets a certain casual and interrupted light,\nserving for the ornament of their writing, was in him an unsleeping\ninsight; and whatever faults or obstructions of temperament might\ncloud it, he was not disobedient to the heavenly vision. In his youth,\nhe said, one day, \u201cThe other world is all my art; my pencils will\ndraw no other; my jack-knife will cut nothing else; I do not use it\nas a means.\u201d This was the muse and genius that ruled his opinions,\nconversation, studies, work and course of life. This made him a\nsearching judge of men. At first glance he measured his companion,\nand, though insensible to some fine traits of culture, could very well\nreport his weight and calibre. And this made the impression of genius\nwhich his conversation sometimes gave.\n\nHe understood the matter in hand at a glance, and saw the limitations\nand poverty of those he talked with, so that nothing seemed concealed\nfrom such terrible eyes. I have repeatedly known young men of\nsensibility converted in a moment to the belief that this was the\nman they were in search of, the man of men, who could tell them all\nthey should do. His own dealing with them was never affectionate, but\nsuperior, didactic, scorning their petty ways,--very slowly conceding,\nor not conceding at all, the promise of his society at their houses, or\neven at his own. \u201cWould he not walk with them?\u201d \u201cHe did not know. There\nwas nothing so important to him as his walk; he had no walks to throw\naway on company.\u201d Visits were offered him from respectful parties, but\nhe declined them. Admiring friends offered to carry him at their own\ncost to the Yellowstone River,--to the West Indies,--to South America.\nBut though nothing could be more grave or considered than his refusals,\nthey remind one, in quite new relations, of that fop Brummel\u2019s reply to\nthe gentleman who offered him his carriage in a shower, \u201cBut where will\n_you_ ride, then?\u201d--and what accusing silences, and what searching\nand irresistible speeches, battering down all defenses, his companions\ncan remember!\n\nMr. Thoreau dedicated his genius with such entire love to the fields,\nhills and waters of his native town, that he made them known and\ninteresting to all reading Americans, and to people over the sea. The\nriver on whose banks he was born and died he knew from its springs\nto its confluence with the Merrimack. He had made summer and winter\nobservations on it for many years, and at every hour of the day and\nnight. The result of the recent survey of the Water Commissioners\nappointed by the State of Massachusetts he had reached by his private\nexperiments, several years earlier. Every fact which occurs in the bed,\non the banks, or in the air over it; the fishes, and their spawning and\nnests, their manners, their food; the shad-flies which fill the air on\na certain evening once a year, and which are snapped at by the fishes\nso ravenously that many of these die of repletion; the conical heaps\nof small stones on the river-shallows, the huge nests of small fishes,\none of which will sometimes overfill a cart; the birds which frequent\nthe stream, heron, duck, sheldrake, loon, osprey; the snake, muskrat,\notter, woodchuck and fox, on the banks; the turtle, frog, hyla and\ncricket, which make the banks vocal,--were all known to him, and, as it\nwere, townsmen and fellow-creatures; so that he felt an absurdity or\nviolence in any narrative of one of these by itself apart, and still\nmore of its dimensions on an inch-rule, or in the exhibition of its\nskeleton, or the specimen of a squirrel or a bird in brandy. He liked\nto speak of the manners of the river, as itself a lawful creature, yet\nwith exactness, and always to an observed fact. As he knew the river,\nso the ponds in this region.\n\nOne of the weapons he used, more important to him than microscope or\nalcohol-receiver to other investigators, was a whim which grew on him\nby indulgence, yet appeared in gravest statement, namely, of extolling\nhis own town and neighborhood as the most favored centre for natural\nobservation. He remarked that the Flora of Massachusetts embraced\nalmost all the important plants of America,--most of the oaks, most of\nthe willows, the best pines, the ash, the maple, the beech, the nuts.\nHe returned Kane\u2019s \u201cArctic Voyage\u201d to a friend of whom he had borrowed\nit, with the remark, that \u201cMost of the phenomena noted might be\nobserved in Concord.\u201d He seemed a little envious of the Pole, for the\ncoincident sunrise and sunset, or five minutes\u2019 day after six months:\na splendid fact, which Annursnuc had never afforded him. He found red\nsnow in one of his walks, and told me that he expected to find yet the\n_Victoria regia_ in Concord. He was the attorney of the indigenous\nplants, and owned to a preference of the weeds to the imported plants\nas of the Indian to the civilized man, and noticed, with pleasure, that\nthe willow bean-poles of his neighbor had grown more than his beans.\n\u201cSee these weeds,\u201d he said, \u201cwhich have been hoed at by a million\nfarmers all spring and summer, and yet have prevailed, and just now\ncome out triumphant over all lanes, pastures, fields and gardens, such\nis their vigor. We have insulted them with low names, too,--as Pigweed,\nWormwood, Chickweed, Shad-blossom.\u201d He says, \u201cThey have brave names,\ntoo,--Ambrosia, Stellaria, Amelanchier, Amaranth, etc.\u201d\n\nI think his fancy for referring everything to the meridian of Concord\ndid not grow out of any ignorance or depreciation of other longitudes\nor latitudes, but was rather a playful expression of his conviction of\nthe indifferency of all places, and that the best place for each is\nwhere he stands. He expressed it once in this wise:--\u201cI think nothing\nis to be hoped from you, if this bit of mould under your feet is not\nsweeter to you to eat than any other in this world, or in any world.\u201d\n\nThe other weapon with which he conquered all obstacles in science was\npatience. He knew how to sit immovable, a part of the rock he rested\non, until the bird, the reptile, the fish, which had retired from him,\nshould come back and resume its habits, nay, moved by curiosity, should\ncome to him and watch him.\n\nIt was a pleasure and a privilege to walk with him. He knew the country\nlike a fox or a bird, and passed through it as freely by paths of\nhis own. He knew every track in the snow or on the ground, and what\ncreature had taken this path before him. One must submit abjectly to\nsuch a guide, and the reward was great. Under his arm he carried an\nold music-book to press plants; in his pocket, his diary and pencil,\na spy-glass for birds, microscope, jack-knife, and twine. He wore a\nstraw hat, stout shoes, strong gray trousers, to brave scrub-oaks and\nsmilax, and to climb a tree for a hawk\u2019s or a squirrel\u2019s nest. He\nwaded into the pool for the water-plants, and his strong legs were no\ninsignificant part of his armor. On the day I speak of he looked for\nthe Menyanthes, detected it across the wide pool, and, on examination\nof the florets, decided that it had been in flower five days. He drew\nout of his breast-pocket his diary, and read the names of all the\nplants that should bloom on this day, whereof he kept account as a\nbanker when his notes fall due. The Cypripedium not due till to-morrow.\nHe thought that, if waked up from a trance, in this swamp, he could\ntell by the plants what time of the year it was within two days. The\nredstart was flying about, and presently the fine grosbeaks, whose\nbrilliant scarlet \u201cmakes the rash gazer wipe his eye,\u201d and whose fine\nclear note Thoreau compared to that of a tanager which has got rid of\nits hoarseness. Presently he heard a note which he called that of the\nnight-warbler, a bird he had never identified, had been in search of\ntwelve years, which always, when he saw it, was in the act of diving\ndown into a tree or bush, and which it was vain to seek; the only bird\nwhich sings indifferently by night and by day. I told him he must\nbeware of finding and booking it, lest life should have nothing more to\nshow him. He said, \u201cWhat you seek in vain for, half your life, one day\nyou come full upon, all the family at dinner. You seek it like a dream,\nand as soon as you find it you become its prey.\u201d\n\nHis interest in the flower or the bird lay very deep in his mind,\nwas connected with Nature,--and the meaning of Nature was never\nattempted to be defined by him. He would not offer a memoir of his\nobservations to the Natural History Society. \u201cWhy should I? To detach\nthe description from its connections in my mind would make it no longer\ntrue or valuable to me: and they do not wish what belongs to it.\u201d His\npower of observation seemed to indicate additional senses. He saw\nas with microscope, heard as with ear-trumpet, and his memory was a\nphotographic register of all he saw and heard. And yet none knew better\nthan he that it is not the fact that imports, but the impression or\neffect of the fact on your mind. Every fact lay in glory in his mind, a\ntype of the order and beauty of the whole.\n\nHis determination on Natural History was organic. He confessed that he\nsometimes felt like a hound or a panther, and, if born among Indians,\nwould have been a fell hunter. But, restrained by his Massachusetts\nculture, he played out the game in this mild form of botany and\nichthyology. His intimacy with animals suggested what Thomas Fuller\nrecords of Butler the apiologist, that \u201ceither he had told the bees\nthings or the bees had told him.\u201d Snakes coiled round his leg; the\nfishes swam into his hand, and he took them out of the water; he pulled\nthe woodchuck out of its hole by the tail and took the foxes under his\nprotection from the hunters. Our naturalist had perfect magnanimity;\nhe had no secrets: he would carry you to the heron\u2019s haunt, or even to\nhis most prized botanical swamp,--possibly knowing that you could never\nfind it again, yet willing to take his risks.\n\nNo college ever offered him a diploma, or a professor\u2019s chair; no\nacademy made him its corresponding secretary, its discoverer, or even\nits member. Perhaps these learned bodies feared the satire of his\npresence. Yet so much knowledge of Nature\u2019s secret and genius few\nothers possessed, none in a more large and religious synthesis. For not\na particle of respect had he to the opinions of any man or body of men,\nbut homage solely to the truth itself; and as he discovered everywhere\namong doctors some leaning of courtesy, it discredited them. He grew\nto be revered and admired by his townsmen, who had at first known him\nonly as an oddity. The farmers who employed him as a surveyor soon\ndiscovered his rare accuracy and skill, his knowledge of their lands,\nof trees, of birds, of Indian remains and the like, which enabled him\nto tell every farmer more than he knew before of his own farm; so\nthat he began to feel a little as if Mr. Thoreau had better rights in\nhis land than he. They felt, too, the superiority of character which\naddressed all men with a native authority.\n\nIndian relics abound in Concord,--arrow-heads, stone chisels, pestles,\nand fragments of pottery; and on the river-bank, large heaps of\nclam-shells and ashes mark spots which the savages frequented. These,\nand every circumstance touching the Indian, were important in his eyes.\nHis visits to Maine were chiefly for love of the Indian. He had the\nsatisfaction of seeing the manufacture of the bark-canoe, as well as\nof trying his hand in its management on the rapids. He was inquisitive\nabout the making of the stone arrow-head, and in his last days charged\na youth setting out for the Rocky Mountains to find an Indian who could\ntell him that: \u201cIt was well worth a visit to California to learn it.\u201d\nOccasionally, a small party of Penobscot Indians would visit Concord,\nand pitch their tents for a few weeks in summer on the river-bank. He\nfailed not to make acquaintance with the best of them; though he well\nknew that asking questions of Indians is like catechizing beavers and\nrabbits. In his last visit to Maine he had great satisfaction from\nJoseph Polis, an intelligent Indian of Oldtown, who was his guide for\nsome weeks.\n\nHe was equally interested in every natural fact. The depth of his\nperception found likeness of law throughout Nature, and I know not any\ngenius who so swiftly inferred universal law from the single fact. He\nwas no pedant of a department. His eye was open to beauty, and his ear\nto music. He found these, not in rare conditions, but wheresoever he\nwent. He thought the best of music was in single strains; and he found\npoetic suggestion in the humming of the telegraph-wire.\n\nHis poetry might be bad or good; he no doubt wanted a lyric facility\nand technical skill, but he had the source of poetry in his spiritual\nperception. He was a good reader and critic, and his judgment on poetry\nwas to the ground of it. He could not be deceived as to the presence or\nabsence of the poetic element in any composition, and his thirst for\nthis made him negligent and perhaps scornful of superficial graces. He\nwould pass by many delicate rhythms, but he would have detected every\nlive stanza or line in a volume, and knew very well where to find\nan equal poetic charm in prose. He was so enamored of the spiritual\nbeauty that he held all actual written poems in very light esteem in\nthe comparison. He admired \u00c6schylus and Pindar; but, when someone was\ncommending them, he said that \u00c6schylus and the Greeks, in describing\nApollo and Orpheus, had given no song, or no good one. \u201cThey ought not\nto have moved trees, but to have chanted to the gods such a hymn as\nwould have sung all their old ideas out of their heads, and new ones\nin.\u201d His own verses are often rude and defective. The gold does not\nyet run pure, is drossy and crude. The thyme and marjoram are not yet\nhoney. But if he want lyric fineness and technical merits, if he have\nnot the poetic temperament, he never lacks the causal thought, showing\nthat his genius was better than his talent. He knew the worth of the\nImagination for the uplifting and consolation of human life, and liked\nto throw every thought into a symbol. The fact you tell is of no value,\nbut only the impression. For this reason his presence was poetic,\nalways piqued the curiosity to know more deeply the secrets of his\nmind. He had many reserves, an unwillingness to exhibit to profane eyes\nwhat was still sacred in his own, and knew well how to throw a poetic\nveil over his experience. All readers of \u201cWalden\u201d will remember his\nmythical record of his disappointments:--\n\n\u201cI long ago lost a hound, a bay horse and a turtle-dove, and am still\non their trail. Many are the travellers I have spoken concerning them,\ndescribing their tracks, and what calls they answered to. I have met\none or two who have heard the hound, and the tramp of the horse, and\neven seen the dove disappear behind a cloud; and they seemed as anxious\nto recover them as if they had lost them themselves.\u201d[16]\n\nHis riddles were worth the reading, and I confide that if at any time I\ndo not understand the expression, it is yet just. Such was the wealth\nof his truth that it was not worth his while to use words in vain.\nHis poem entitled \u201cSympathy\u201d reveals the tenderness under that triple\nsteel of stoicism, and the intellectual subtility it could animate.\nHis classic poem on \u201cSmoke\u201d suggests Simonides, but is better than any\npoem of Simonides. His biography is in his verses. His habitual thought\nmakes all his poetry a hymn to the Cause of causes, the Spirit which\nvivifies and controls his own:--\n\n    \u201cI hearing get, who had but ears,\n    And sight, who had but eyes before;\n    I moments live, who lived but years,\n    And truth discern, who knew but learning\u2019s lore.\u201d\n\nAnd still more in these religious lines:--\n\n    \u201cNow chiefly is my natal hour,\n    And only now my prime of life;\n    I will not doubt the love untold,\n    Which not my worth nor want have bought,\n    Which wooed me young, and wooes me old,\n    And to this evening hath me brought.\u201d\n\nWhilst he used in his writings a certain petulance of remark in\nreference to churches or churchmen, he was a person of a rare, tender\nand absolute religion, a person incapable of any profanation, by act\nor by thought. Of course, the same isolation which belonged to his\noriginal thinking and living detached him from the social religious\nforms. This is neither to be censured nor regretted. Aristotle long ago\nexplained it when he said, \u201cOne who surpasses his fellow-citizens in\nvirtue is no longer a part of the city. Their law is not for him, since\nhe is a law to himself.\u201d\n\nThoreau was sincerity itself, and might fortify the convictions of\nprophets in the ethical laws by his holy living. It was an affirmative\nexperience which refused to be set aside. A truth-speaker he, capable\nof the most deep and strict conversation; a physician to the wounds\nof any soul; a friend, knowing not only the secret of friendship, but\nalmost worshipped by those few persons who resorted to him as their\nconfessor and prophet, and knew the deep value of his mind and great\nheart. He thought that without religion or devotion of some kind\nnothing great was ever accomplished: and he thought that the bigoted\nsectarian had better bear this in mind.\n\nHis virtues, of course, sometimes ran into extremes. It was easy to\ntrace to the inexorable demand on all for exact truth that austerity\nwhich made this willing hermit more solitary even than he wished.\nHimself of a perfect probity, he required not less of others. He\nhad a disgust at crime, and no worldly success would cover it. He\ndetected paltering as readily in dignified and prosperous persons as\nin beggars, and with equal scorn. Such dangerous frankness was in his\ndealing that his admirers called him \u201cthat terrible Thoreau,\u201d as if\nhe spoke when silent, and was still present when he had departed. I\nthink the severity of his ideal interfered to deprive him of a healthy\nsufficiency of human society.\n\nThe habit of a realist to find things the reverse of their appearance\ninclined him to put every statement in a paradox. A certain habit of\nantagonism defaced his earlier writings,--a trick of rhetoric not quite\noutgrown in his later, of substituting for the obvious word and thought\nits diametrical opposite. He praised wild mountains and winter forests\nfor their domestic air, in snow and ice he would find sultriness, and\ncommended the wilderness for resembling Rome and Paris. \u201cIt was so dry,\nthat you might call it wet.\u201d\n\nThe tendency to magnify the moment, to read all the laws of Nature in\nthe one object or one combination under your eye, is of course comic\nto those who do not share the philosopher\u2019s perception of identity.\nTo him there was no such thing as size. The pond was a small ocean;\nthe Atlantic, a large Walden Pond. He referred every minute fact\nto cosmical laws. Though he meant to be just, he seemed haunted by\na certain chronic assumption that the science of the day pretended\ncompleteness, and he had just found out that the _savans_ had\nneglected to discriminate a particular botanical variety, had failed to\ndescribe the seeds or count the sepals. \u201cThat is to say,\u201d we replied,\n\u201cthe blockheads were not born in Concord; but who said they were? It\nwas their unspeakable misfortune to be born in London, or Paris, or\nRome; but, poor fellows, they did what they could, considering that\nthey never saw Bateman\u2019s Pond, or Nine-Acre Corner, or Becky Stow\u2019s\nSwamp; besides, what were you sent into the world for, but to add this\nobservation?\u201d\n\nHad his genius been only contemplative, he had been fitted to his life,\nbut with his energy and practical ability he seemed born for great\nenterprise and for command; and I so much regret the loss of his rare\npowers of action, that I cannot help counting it a fault in him that he\nhad no ambition. Wanting this, instead of engineering for all America,\nhe was the captain of a huckleberry-party. Pounding beans is good to\nthe end of pounding empires one of these days; but if, at the end of\nyears, it is still only beans!\n\nBut these foibles, real or apparent, were fast vanishing in the\nincessant growth of a spirit so robust and wise, and which effaced its\ndefeats with new triumphs. His study of Nature was a perpetual ornament\nto him, and inspired his friends with curiosity to see the world\nthrough his eyes, and to hear his adventures. They possessed every kind\nof interest.\n\nHe had many elegancies of his own, whilst he scoffed at conventional\nelegance. Thus, he could not bear to hear the sound of his own steps,\nthe grit of gravel; and therefore never willingly walked in the road,\nbut in the grass, on mountains and in woods. His senses were acute,\nand he remarked that by night every dwelling-house gives out bad\nair, like a slaughter-house. He liked the pure fragrance of melilot.\nHe honored certain plants with special regard, and, over all, the\npond-lily,--then, the gentian, and the _Mikania scandens_, and\n\u201clife-everlasting,\u201d and a bass-tree which he visited every year when it\nbloomed, in the middle of July. He thought the scent a more oracular\ninquisition than the sight,--more oracular and trustworthy. The scent,\nof course, reveals what is concealed from the other senses. By it he\ndetected earthiness. He delighted in echoes, and said they were almost\nthe only kind of kindred voices that he heard. He loved Nature so well,\nwas so happy in her solitude, that he became very jealous of cities and\nthe sad work which their refinements and artifices made with man and\nhis dwelling. The axe was always destroying his forest. \u201cThank God,\u201d\nhe said, \u201cthey cannot cut down the clouds!\u201d \u201cAll kinds of figures are\ndrawn on the blue ground with this fibrous white paint.\u201d\n\nI subjoin a few sentences taken from his unpublished manuscripts, not\nonly as records of his thought and feeling, but for their power of\ndescription and literary excellence:--\n\n\u201cSome circumstantial evidence is very strong, as when you find a trout\nin the milk.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe chub is a soft fish, and tastes like boiled brown paper salted.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe youth gets together his materials to build a bridge to the moon,\nor, perchance, a palace or temple on the earth, and, at length the\nmiddle-aged man concludes to build a wood-shed with them.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe locust z-ing.\u201d\n\n\u201cDevil\u2019s-needles zigzagging along the Nut-Meadow brook.\u201d\n\n\u201cSugar is not so sweet to the palate as sound to the healthy ear.\u201d\n\n\u201cI put on some hemlock-boughs, and the rich salt crackling of their\nleaves was like mustard to the ear, the crackling of uncountable\nregiments. Dead trees love the fire.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe bluebird carries the sky on his back.\u201d\n\n\u201cThe tanager flies through the green foliage as if it would ignite the\nleaves.\u201d\n\n\u201cIf I wish for a horse-hair for my compass-sight I must go to the\nstable; but the hair-bird, with her sharp eyes, goes to the road.\u201d\n\n\u201cImmortal water, alive even to the superficies.\u201d\n\n\u201cFire is the most tolerable third party.\u201d\n\n\u201cNature made ferns for pure leaves, to show what she could do in that\nline.\u201d\n\n\u201cNo tree has so fair a bole and so handsome an instep as the beech.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow did these beautiful rainbow-tints get into the shell of the\nfresh-water clam, buried in the mud at the bottom of our dark river?\u201d\n\n\u201cHard are the times when the infant\u2019s shoes are second-foot.\u201d\n\n\u201cWe are strictly confined to our men to whom we give liberty.\u201d\n\n\u201cNothing is so much to be feared as fear. Atheism may comparatively be\npopular with God himself.\u201d\n\n\u201cOf what significance the things you can forget? A little thought is\nsexton to all the world.\u201d\n\n\u201cHow can we expect a harvest of thought who have not had a seed-time of\ncharacter?\u201d\n\n\u201cOnly he can be trusted with gifts who can present a face of bronze to\nexpectations.\u201d\n\n\u201cI ask to be melted. You can only ask of the metals that they be tender\nto the fire that melts them. To nought else can they be tender.\u201d\n\nThere is a flower known to botanists, one of the same genus with our\nsummer plant called \u201cLife-Everlasting,\u201d a _Gnaphalium_ like that,\nwhich grows on the most inaccessible cliffs of the Tyrolese mountains,\nwhere the chamois dare hardly venture, and which the hunter, tempted by\nits beauty, and by his love (for it is immensely valued by the Swiss\nmaidens), climbs the cliffs to gather, and is sometimes found dead at\nthe foot, with the flower in his hand. It is called by botanists the\n_Gnaphalium leontopodium_, but by the Swiss _Edelweisse_,\nwhich signifies _Noble Purity_. Thoreau seemed to me living in the\nhope to gather this plant, which belonged to him of right. The scale\non which his studies proceeded was so large as to require longevity,\nand we were the less prepared for his sudden disappearance. The country\nknows not yet, or in the least part, how great a son it has lost. It\nseems an injury that he should leave in the midst his broken task which\nnone else can finish, a kind of indignity to so noble a soul that he\nshould depart out of Nature before yet he has been really shown to\nhis peers for what he is. But he, at least, is content. His soul was\nmade for the noblest society; he had in a short life exhausted the\ncapabilities of this world; wherever there is knowledge, wherever there\nis virtue, wherever there is beauty, he will find a home.\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 15: Part of this paper was the Address delivered by Mr.\nEmerson at the funeral of Mr. Thoreau, in May, 1862. In the following\nsummer it was enlarged and printed in the \u201cAtlantic Monthly\u201d in its\npresent form.]\n\n[Footnote 16: _Walden_: p. 20.]\n\n\n\n\n                               CARLYLE.\n\n    HOLD with the Maker, not the Made,\n    Sit with the Cause, or grim or glad.\n\n\n\n\n                             CARLYLE.[17]\n\n\nTHOMAS CARLYLE is an immense talker, as extraordinary in his\nconversation as in his writing,--I think even more so.\n\nHe is not mainly a scholar, like the most of my acquaintances, but\na practical Scotchman, such as you would find in any saddler\u2019s or\niron-dealer\u2019s shop, and then only accidentally and by a surprising\naddition, the admirable scholar and writer he is. If you would know\nprecisely how he talks, just suppose Hugh Whelan (the gardener) had\nfound leisure enough in addition to all his daily work to read Plato\nand Shakspeare, Augustine and Calvin, and, remaining Hugh Whelan all\nthe time, should talk scornfully of all this nonsense of books that\nhe had been bothered with, and you shall have just the tone and talk\nand laughter of Carlyle. I called him a trip-hammer with \u201can \u00c6olian\nattachment.\u201d He has, too, the strong religious tinge you sometimes\nfind in burly people. That, and all his qualities, have a certain\nvirulence, coupled though it be in his case with the utmost impatience\nof Christendom and Jewdom and all existing presentments of the good\nold story. He talks like a very unhappy man,--profoundly solitary,\ndispleased and hindered by all men and things about him, and, biding\nhis time, meditating how to undermine and explode the whole world of\nnonsense which torments him. He is obviously greatly respected by all\nsorts of people, understands his own value quite as well as Webster, of\nwhom his behavior sometimes reminds me, and can see society on his own\nterms.\n\nAnd, though no mortal in America could pretend to talk with Carlyle,\nwho is also as remarkable in England as the Tower of London, yet\nneither would he in any manner satisfy us (Americans), or begin to\nanswer the questions which we ask. He is a very national figure, and\nwould by no means bear transplantation. They keep Carlyle as a sort of\nportable cathedral-bell, which they like to produce in companies where\nhe is unknown, and set a-swinging, to the surprise and consternation\nof all persons,--bishops, courtiers, scholars, writers,--and, as in\ncompanies here (in England) no man is named or introduced, great is\nthe effect and great the inquiry. Forster of Rawdon described to me\na dinner at the _table d\u2019h\u00f4te_ of some provincial hotel where\nhe carried Carlyle, and where an Irish canon had uttered something.\nCarlyle began to talk, first to the waiters, and then to the walls, and\nthen, lastly, unmistakably to the priest, in a manner that frightened\nthe whole company.\n\nYoung men, especially those holding liberal opinions, press to see\nhim, but it strikes me like being hot to see the mathematical or\nGreek professor before they have got their lesson. It needs something\nmore than a clean shirt and reading German to visit him. He treats\nthem with contempt; they profess freedom and he stands for slavery;\nthey praise republics and he likes the Russian Czar; they admire\nCobden and free trade and he is a protectionist in political economy;\nthey will eat vegetables and drink water, and he is a Scotchman who\nthinks English national character has a pure enthusiasm for beef\nand mutton,--describes with gusto the crowds of people who gaze at\nthe sirloins in the dealer\u2019s shop-window, and even likes the Scotch\nnight-cap; they praise moral suasion, he goes for murder, money,\ncapital punishment, and other pretty abominations of English law. They\nwish freedom of the press, and he thinks the first thing he would do,\nif he got into Parliament, would be to turn out the reporters, and stop\nall manner of mischievous speaking to Buncombe, and wind-bags. \u201cIn the\nLong Parliament,\u201d he says, \u201cthe only great Parliament, they sat secret\nand silent, grave as an ecumenical council, and I know not what they\nwould have done to anybody that had got in there and attempted to tell\nout of doors what they did.\u201d They go for free institutions, for letting\nthings alone, and only giving opportunity and motive to every man;\nhe for a stringent government, that shows people what they must do,\nand makes them do it. \u201cHere,\u201d he says, \u201cthe Parliament gathers up six\nmillions of pounds every year to give to the poor, and yet the people\nstarve. I think if they would give it to me, to provide the poor with\nlabor, and with authority to make them work or shoot them,--and I to be\nhanged if I did not do it,--I could find them in plenty of Indian meal.\u201d\n\nHe throws himself readily on the other side. If you urge free trade, he\nremembers that every laborer is a monopolist. The navigation laws of\nEngland made its commerce. \u201cSt. John was insulted by the Dutch; he came\nhome, got the law passed that foreign vessels should pay high fees, and\nit cut the throat of the Dutch, and made the English trade.\u201d If you\nboast of the growth of the country, and show him the wonderful results\nof the census, he finds nothing so depressing as the sight of a great\nmob. He saw once, as he told me, three or four miles of human beings,\nand fancied that \u201cthe airth was some great cheese, and these were\nmites.\u201d If a tory takes heart at his hatred of stump-oratory and model\nrepublics, he replies, \u201cYes, the idea of a pig-headed soldier who will\nobey orders, and fire on his own father at the command of his officer,\nis a great comfort to the aristocratic mind.\u201d It is not so much that\nCarlyle cares for this or that dogma, as that he likes genuineness (the\nsource of all strength) in his companions.\n\nIf a scholar goes into a camp of lumbermen or a gang of riggers,\nthose men will quickly detect any fault of character. Nothing will\npass with them but what is real and sound. So this man is a hammer\nthat crushes mediocrity and retention. He detects weakness on the\ninstant, and touches it. He has a vivacious, aggressive temperament,\nand unimpressionable. The literary, the fashionable, the political man,\neach fresh from triumphs in his own sphere, comes eagerly to see this\nman, whose fun they have heartily enjoyed, sure of a welcome, and are\nstruck with despair at the first onset. His firm, victorious, scoffing\nvituperation strikes them with chill and hesitation. His talk often\nreminds you of what was said of Johnson: \u201cIf his pistol missed fire he\nwould knock you down with the butt-end.\u201d\n\nMere intellectual partisanship wearies him; he detects in an instant\nif a man stands for any cause to which he is not born and organically\ncommitted. A natural defender of anything, a lover who will live and\ndie for that which he speaks for, and who does not care for him or for\nanything but his own business, he respects; and the nobler this object,\nof course, the better. He hates a literary trifler, and if, after\nGuizot had been a tool of Louis Philippe for years, he is now to come\nand write essays on the character of Washington, on \u201cThe Beautiful,\u201d\nand on \u201cPhilosophy of History,\u201d he thinks that nothing.\n\nGreat is his reverence for realities,--for all such traits as spring\nfrom the intrinsic nature of the actor. He humors this into the\nidolatry of strength. A strong nature has a charm for him, previous,\nit would seem, to all inquiry whether the force be divine or diabolic.\nHe preaches, as by cannonade, the doctrine that every noble nature\nwas made by God, and contains, if savage passions, also fit checks\nand grand impulses, and, however extravagant, will keep its orbit and\nreturn from far.\n\nNor can that decorum which is the idol of the Englishman, and in\nattaining which the Englishman exceeds all nations, win from him any\nobeisance. He is eaten up with indignation against such as desire to\nmake a fair show in the flesh.\n\nCombined with this warfare on respectabilities, and, indeed, pointing\nall his satire, is the severity of his moral sentiment. In proportion\nto the peals of laughter amid which he strips the plumes of a pretender\nand shows the lean hypocrisy to every vantage of ridicule, does he\nworship whatever enthusiasm, fortitude, love, or other sign of a good\nnature is in a man.\n\nThere is nothing deeper in his constitution than his humor, than the\nconsiderate, condescending good-nature with which he looks at every\nobject in existence, as a man might look at a mouse. He feels that the\nperfection of health is sportiveness, and will not look grave even at\ndullness or tragedy.\n\nHis guiding genius is his moral sense, his perception of the sole\nimportance of truth and justice; but that is a truth of character, not\nof catechisms. He says, \u201cThere is properly no religion in England.\nThese idle nobles at Tattersall\u2019s--there is no work or word of serious\npurpose in them; they have this great lying Church; and life is a\nhumbug.\u201d He prefers Cambridge to Oxford, but he thinks Oxford and\nCambridge education indurates the young men, as the Styx hardened\nAchilles, so that when they come forth of them, they say, \u201cNow we are\nproof; we have gone through all the degrees, and are case-hardened\nagainst the veracities of the Universe; nor man nor God can penetrate\nus.\u201d\n\nWellington he respects as real and honest, and as having made up his\nmind, once for all, that he will not have to do with any kind of a lie.\nEdwin Chadwick is one of his heroes,--who proposes to provide every\nhouse in London with pure water, sixty gallons to every head, at a\npenny a week; and in the decay and downfall of all religions, Carlyle\nthinks that the only religious act which a man nowadays can securely\nperform is to wash himself well.\n\nOf course the new French revolution of 1848 was the best thing he\nhad seen, and the teaching this great swindler, Louis Philippe, that\nthere is a God\u2019s justice in the Universe, after all, was a great\nsatisfaction. Czar Nicholas was his hero; for in the ignominy of\nEurope, when all thrones fell like card-houses, and no man was found\nwith conscience enough to fire a gun for his crown, but every one ran\naway in a _coucou_, with his head shaved, through the Barri\u00e8re de\nPassy, one man remained who believed he was put there by God Almighty\nto govern his empire, and, by the help of God, had resolved to stand\nthere.\n\nHe was very serious about the bad times; he had seen this evil coming,\nbut thought it would not come in his time. But now \u2019tis coming, and\nthe only good he sees in it is the visible appearance of the gods.\nHe thinks it the only question for wise men, instead of art and fine\nfancies and poetry and such things, to address themselves to the\nproblem of society. This confusion is the inevitable end of such\nfalsehoods and nonsense as they have been embroiled with.\n\nCarlyle has, best of all men in England, kept the manly attitude in\nhis time. He has stood for scholars, asking no scholar what he should\nsay. Holding an honored place in the best society, he has stood for the\npeople, for the Chartist, for the pauper, intrepidly and scornfully\nteaching the nobles their peremptory duties.\n\nHis errors of opinion are as nothing in comparison with this merit, in\nmy judgment. This _aplomb_ cannot be mimicked; it is the speaking\nto the heart of the thing. And in England, where the _morgue_ of\naristocracy has very slowly admitted scholars into society,--a very\nfew houses only in the high circles being ever opened to them,--he has\ncarried himself erect, made himself a power confessed by all men, and\ntaught scholars their lofty duty. He never feared the face of man.\n\n\n\nFOOTNOTES:\n\n\n[Footnote 17: From a letter written soon after Mr. Emerson\u2019s visit to\nCarlyle in 1848. Read before the Massachusetts Historical Society at\ntheir meeting after the death of Carlyle, February, 1881. Published in\ntheir Proceedings, and also in \u201cScribner\u2019s Magazine,\u201d May, 1881.]\n\n\n\n\n                         =TRANSCRIBER\u2019S NOTES=\n\nSimple typographical errors have been silently corrected; unbalanced\nquotation marks were remedied when the change was obvious, and\notherwise left unbalanced.\n\nPunctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant\npreference was found in the original book; otherwise they were not\nchanged.\n\nInconsistent hyphens left as printed.","title":"Lectures and biographical sketches","tradition":"philosophy-ethics","translated_text":null,"word_count":98138}