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UC-NRLF
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LIBRARY UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, PAVIS
altw
Cforat/s Jttttms
AT THE
assmar* (Ktoarbs Institute,
JUNE
i5TH, 1903.
HARRISON & SONS, PRINTERS IN ORDINARY TO HIS MAJESTY, ST.
MARTIN'S LANE.
LIBRARY OF CALIFORNJI& DAVIS
|E
come
to-day, in these con
genial surroundings of the
Passmore Edwards Settle ment, to unveil the bust of a great
American, certainly one of the greatest
Ralph Waldo Emerson, the centenary of whose birth, on the of
them
25th of
all,
May
last,
was celebrated with
reverence and enthusiasm throughout his
own
Hundreds
lands.
new
been
have
writers merits,
country and in
and
I
to offer
familiar.
I
distant
of speakers and his
discussing
have absolutely nothing on a subject so freshly
would much rather
before you in his
any of
many
own words
set
him
than in
my own. A
2
His claims
to
distinction as poet,
philosopher and prophet, have
been
warmly advanced by his disciples, and as freely contested by the critics, but
whatever
him
about
seems
of definitions.
was
he
tellectual
century years
It is generally
to
be
of
that, as
of wide
the
nineteenth
and almost universal
writing,
course, he
in
a result of his forty
profound
reading,
agreed
one of the great
lights
;
brilliant
me
to
is
war of words and a contest
really a
that
there
controversy
came
contemplation,
and to
enlarged
dis
be recognised as
one of the wisest of men, a great and efficient teacher of his
and of far in
that
own
which came
generation, after
it,
and
advance of his age on many
important questions.
He
certainly
a
imagination,
had a
vivid
and
wonderful power
with
all
of
and the
idealizing the facts of nature
events of
fertile
and a quick sympathy concerned and interested
life,
that
which
humanity,
him
enabled
to
produce some poems which still live after half a century, and which are likely to find
many
readers in
coming
generations.
His Concord
assembled
neighbours
Bridge
to
celebrate
at
the
completion of the
monument which
marked the
where
spot
New
farmers
of
the
armed
first
troops.
sides
the
England
resistance to
There bloodshed on
began the long
conflict
plain offered British
both
which
divided the British Empire into two
independent
nations,
nations
which
now in
at last
happily vie with each other
words and
and
in
of mankind.
he told the
stanza
words that a trumpet By
advance the
to
efforts
interests
"
acts of mutual friendship,
In a single
thrilling story
echo
still
best
like the
sound of
:
the rude bridge that arched the flood,
Their
flag to April's breeze unfurled,
Here once
And
the embattled farmers stood,
fired the shot
Recalling his
what he had Michael
heard round the World."
visit
seen
to
of
Angelo, as
Rome, and the
work of
an Architect,
upon the great Cathedral with he
dome,
soaring
architecture
as
the
directly illuminated
God,
in
words
in
immortal
:
apostrophized
Divine
by the
that
its
Art,
Spirit of
ought
to
be
"
The hand that rounded Peter's Dome, And groined the aisles of Christian Rome, Wrought
in a sad sincerity
God he
Himself from
He
could not free
builded better than he
The
He
;
knew
;
:
conscious stone to beauty grew."
had absolute
faith in the close
between the living
relation
God and
the spirit of the individual man,
and
the boundless possibilities of
human
nature as
its
in
direct result.
Listen to another single verse which
ought to lasts,
live as
long as the language
expressing this idea.
He
was
showing how noble youth of America and of England, brought up, it may be,
in luxury
and
ease, in sport
and
prove to be heroes when the
idling,
trumpet sounds and their names are and turning their backs on called ;
all
they have prized before, on
home
and love
itself,
risk
and limb and
life
happiness to save or serve the cause of their country or their king "
So nigh is grandeur to our So near is God to man,
When Duty The
Nor and
:
dust,
whispers low Thou must/ " youth replies, I can/ '
'
are
isolated
these utterances in
exceptional
their
Much
character.
of
breathes the same lofty
style
his
spirit,
and
poetry
the
same
living imagery.
And
was master of a
lighter vein, full
sometimes he of
sparkling wit and genial fun.
Witness
his
fable
of
the
quarrel
between the squirrel and the moun tain "
:
The Mountain and the Squirrel had a quarrel, And the former called the latter 'little Prig/ Bun '
replied
You
:
are doubtless very big, 8
But
all
sorts of things
Must be taken
in
and weather
together
To make up a year And a sphere, And I think it no disgrace To occupy my place. If I'm not so large as you,
You
are not so small as
And
not half so spry.
I'll
I,
make
not deny you
A
very pretty squirrel track. Talents differ all is well and wisely put, If I cannot carry forests on my back :
Neither can you crack a
Whether he great poet or
is
is
'
nut.'
justly to
be called a
destined to an
immor
tality
of centuries or not, he gave us
much
delightful poetry,
of poetry,
who form
and the lovers
but a small part
of the readers of the English language, will
always find
what he has
You
all
much
to cherish
in
written.
know
the
main
simple and uneventful
life.
facts of his
He
was
a Puritan of the Puritans, or
there
if
be such a thing as a Puritan of the Puritans of the Puritans, he was
He was descended
exactly that.
from
a long line of dissenting clergymen,
beginning with the original immigrant
who had
from persecution at the hands of Archbishop Laud. Being silenced for Non-conformity he had fled
escaped to
New
England, and founded
a church at Concord, the
from
little
village
Boston,
which
fifteen
miles
was
be Emerson's home
to
at
Graduating the
of
age
and,
theology,
of
Dr.
himself
under
the
he a
Minister,
Protestants,
the
life.
Harvard College at Emerson studied
Channing,
Unitarian of the
18,
for
pastor 10
influence
became
a
Protestant
and soon found of
a church
in
Boston
;
of that
long
but even the gentle trammels
mild communion could not
contain
his
souL
independent
He
gave up the sacred office, and the difficulties which it involved his
gentle
ancestral
and
spirit,
village
to
retired
all
for
his
where
of Concord,
he devoted himself to
for forty years
and high thinking, to deep reading and writing and lecturing, by which he obtained his livelihood, for plain living
he had been born and bred
in
poverty
and received nothing by inheritance. To two successive generations of his countrymen, in his lectures, addresses
and published
writings, he gave,
time to
time, the
reading,
study,
He
read
rich
and
everything
fruits
from
of his
contemplation.
good,
but
Shakespeare, Plato, Plutarch, Goethe,
Bacon, Swedenborg and Montaigne seem to have been his favourite authors.
He
remembered what he read
people do, and
made
as few
notes of whatever
impressed him, which furnished the material
those
for
illustrations
and
copious
of which
his
apt
works are
full.
Though he
severed his connection
with the churches he certainly had a religion of his
own which
spiritualized him.
knew him
well
and
exalted
and
Dr. Holmes,
who
is
one of
most
his
"
appreciative biographers, says
:
His
creed was a brief one, but he carried
everywhere with him. in all he said, and, so signs could show, in
the indwelling
guide
:
spirit
through
all 12
In
all
far as all all
was
he
it
did,
outward
his thoughts, his light
and
nature he looked
up
Nature's
to
not worship the the
God man
;
and
if
he did
Christ Jesus as
Churches of Christendom have
done, he
followed
His
footsteps
so
nearly that our
good Methodist, Father Taylor, spoke of him as more like Christ than any man he had known."
The
great influence which,
wisdom and
spotless
life,
by
his
he rapidly
acquired and maintained to the end, certainly
had
a
marked
effect
in
mitigating the rigid tone of dogmatism
from
he
which
revolted.
Dean
Stanley, on his return from America, " is said to have reported that religion
had there passed through an evolution from Edwards to Emerson, and that the genial atmosphere which
had
done
shared by
so all
much
to
Emerson
promote
the churches equally/'
is
The same by
pressed
that
spirit,
im
Methodism, was so
of
apostle
Father Taylor, a great
his
and
pure
when
some
exalted
of
his
Methodist friends took him to task for
his
maintaining
with
friendship
Emerson, on the ground that, being a Unitarian, he must go to a place not to
be mentioned
in
"It does look
replied,
sure of one thing
go
;
society,
so,
but
he
am
I
Emerson does
if
he
that place
to
good
will
change the
climate there, and emigration will set that way."
Of
his
possible
prose writings,
to
say
how
more than was
is
it
said
by Matthew Arnold, who judged him very critically, and cannot be said to have favour
exaggerated
anything
What
is
?
he says
this
in :
his
6
my
As
Wordsworth's poetry is in judgment the most important
work done
in verse in
during the present
our language
"so Emer
nineteenth, of course), son's Essays are,
I
(the
century,"
most
think, the
important work done in prose."
His busy brain was never driving pen was never idle, quent
courses,
his
and
his elo
dis
and
entertaining
was heard by
his country
with ever increasing delight and
satisfaction.
trust
in
these
absolute
Self-reliance,
his
convictions,
of
lectures,
profound,
instructive,
men
in
voice,
still,
own
and a in
and
conscience fearless
conduct
following
and
action,
wherever they might lead, were the constant guides of his
he
never
failed
to
own
urge
life
;
upon
and his
and
hearers
same
to
appealed always to the higher, motives,
highest,
our
of
sions
never
content
peat what
to
was re
men had
said
and
in
subject
own
which
conclusions,
The wide
hand,
thoughts
he evolved
from his own inner
which alone he looked
tion.
and and
except to illustrate his
fearlessly
in
discover
to
the
pas
moral,
spiritual,
other
on
thought
instincts,
nature,
and
tellectual
and
pursue the
path.
He the
readers
light,
for inspira
scope of subjects
which he treated embraced the whole range of pirations.
to
human
conduct and as
His mission was
stimulate
and
life,
private
and life
elevate
of
the
America
higher and nobler plane. 16
to arouse,
public to
a
He
answer
to
began
"
Smith's
question
cynical
four quarters of the globe
book
American
an the
Sydney
in
way
?."
In
the
who
reads
and
led
American
rescuing
from the sluggish and torpid been in which it had long
literature
stream
confined. in a
He
lived to see
and
refreshed
whole of our national peculiar gift
inspire those
letters,
question
animated
life.
and function
him or followed of
flowing
broad and ever widening current,
which
and
it
who
after
It
was
to
laboured with
him
be
quarters of the globe,
his
to stimulate
in the field
and before he died the
came
the
"
real
In the four
who does
not
read American books and recognize
American
As
"
ideas
?
time went on his books found
and
admiring
thoughtful
men and
many
sympathetic
readers
among
women
in
England, and
in
foreign
whose many languages they were translated, and the Emerson cult became very widely spread. countries into
Herman Grimm Berlin
" :
America
wrote to him from
Whenever think
I
of
you,"
and
many
serious
have no doubt that
to
and earnest souls
many
name first
of our
I
lands, the
young Republic suggests
the image of this profound thinker
and stimulating I
in
of
think
I
teacher.
confess that of
whom
I
always
first
and
find
;
the authors with
have become
familiar, I
him
and
to
for light
him more
instructive,
other
all
turn
leading,
suggestive,
more
more awakening than any
there
but
are iS
few subjects
dealing with the conduct of
life,
or the
man, or the study of nature, of which he has not treated more or duties of
less directly
;
and anyone who has
up such a
take
the
subject for
time, cannot begin better than
to
first
by turn
ing to his pages to see what he has said about
it.
President Eliot, of Harvard, in a carefully prepared essay, quite
of
Emerson
himself,
read in
on the centennial of
his
worthy Boston
birth,
has
demonstrated that Mr. Emerson was
advance of his time on many moral, social, and political questions,
far in
and
that
sagacity
he indicated, with singular
and
their future
actually
the course of
foresight,
development
occurred
so
as the
that
same
although
the ranks of the prophets are closed
against him,
we may well
American thought.
as the forerunner of
He in the
but
took part in any con
rarely
troversies,
describe him
many were
although
raised
path of his advancing progress,
left
them
others, while
to
be fought out by
he kept the even tenor
of his way, thinking and teaching
He
cherished with
unfaltering
still.
hope
and confidence the noblest aspirations ifor his country, and uniformly predicted its
ultimate success
and triumph
in
those better things that constitute true civilization
but he never hesitated to
;
his
countrymen shortcomings, which stood scourge
for
their
in the
way
of their reaching the final goal of his
high
ideal.
with effect
This he could always do and authority, because he
stood aside from
politics, 20
and because
commanded
courage and virtue
his
universal reverence.
He
generous and telling
lent the
and opinion the cause of reform, but sometimes
influence of his character to
turned
a
rather
cold
practical reformers,
methods
tumble with
In
his
great
was like
crises,
stirred,
and
to
whose rough and were at variance
and
gentle
shoulder
retiring
however,
spirit.
soul
his
voice rang out
his
a megaphone across the land.
In his address
at
Concord
in
memoration of Emancipation
West
com
in the
Indies he concluded with these
prophetic words "
The
is
the
:
sentiment of Right, once very low and indistinct, but ever more articulate because it
Freedom. things
of the
Universe, pronounces
The Power
that built this fabric of
voice
affirms
it
in
the 21
heart
;
and
the
in C
history of the First of to the ages, of
His
August has made a sign
will."
Within twenty years from that utter ance, Lincoln had signed the pro clamation which freed all the slaves America, and the vast Empire of Russia had no longer a slave within
in
its
borders.
When Sumner
was struck down
in
the Senate for words spoken in debate,
he declared "
The
:
events of the
last
few years and
months and days have taught us the lessons I think we must get rid of of centuries. slavery or
When
we must
attempt was
the
force slavery
I
wish
is
to
we
:
man who is Send home every
could stop every
about to leave the country.
one who
made
upon Kansas by armed
might, he said "
get rid of freedom."
abroad
lest 22
they should find no
country to return to. at home while there
When
it
is
lost,
it
Come home and
stay a country to save. will be time enough for is
any who are luckless enough to remain alive, to gather up their clothes and depart to some land where
When cipation
Freedom
exists."
was
"The
actually signed, he said
first
condition of success
is
We have
putting ourselves right.
in
Eman
the Proclamation of
:
secured
recovered
ourselves from our false position and planted ourselves on a law of Nature.''
"If that
The And "
pillared
firmament
is
fail,
rottenness,
Earth's base built on stubble."
The Government
has assured
best constituency in the world.
of intellect, every ligious heart, every
virtuous
man
itself
of the
Every spark
feeling,
every re
of honor, every poet,
every philosopher, the generosity of the
cities,
the health of the country, the strong arms of
mechanic, the endurance of farmers, the passionate conscience of women, the sympathy the
of distant nations,
all rally 23
to
its
support."
When said of "
Lincoln was struck
him
:
his
By
down he
his
courage,
justice,
his
even
humanity, he stood a heroic figure in the centre of a heroic temper,
his
epoch.
He
fertile
is
his
counsel,
the true history of the American
Step by step he walked people in his time. before them slow with their slowness quicken ;
;
ing his march by theirs
;
the true representative
of this continent, an entirely public man, father of his country
;
the pulse of twenty millions
throbbing in his heart, the thought of their
minds articulated by
his tongue.
Only Wash
ington can compare with him in fortune."
Scouted
at first as a mystic
dreamer, Ralph
long
enough
Waldo Emerson
to
receive
homage
of the confidence
of
countrymen.
his
him
for
his
and a lived
the general
and
affection
They honored
dauntless
courage,
his
sublime devotion to what he believed to
be the truth and the
right, his clear
and controlling conscience, his wisdom of which they garnered the ripe fruits, and
his life-long
the
standard
of
and
morals,
endeavour to elevate their
literature,
manners.
ad
They
mired his unfaltering patriotism, and
sympathy with human which no time could limit and
ardent
his
nature,
no
could
continent
loved
him
nature and
for his life,
bound.
They
sweet and simple
his serene
and
spotless
modest and unassuming manners, and, most of all, because he
character, his
loved
them, and
spent
his
life
in
thinking and working for their highest welfare.
Heart and soul he was
of sunshine
;
he shed
its
beams
full all
about him and saw and revealed only the bright side. I
rejoice
that this
striking
image
him has found an abiding-place this noble building, the home and
of in
and good work. I congratulate Mr. Passmore Edwards and Mrs. Humphry Ward on ac centre of a great
quiring this bust as a fitting ornament
of this
whose Library I
am
books
and know
on
influence.
If
depends on what you
you read only
for
light
inspiration, faith
for ideas
and for
in
But
and information,
leading,
love
God
dis
or for oblivious
don't touch Emerson.
you seek
and
many
minds nothing but a elevating and inspiring
It all
for.
languor,
for
be found.
that they will exer
sipation of thought,
if
will
their
wholesome,
read
his
sure that they will reach
readers, cise
on the shelves of
Institute,
of
and
for
real
country, faith
in
man,
them
find
will
you
in
all
him.
Three years of
Fame
when
ago,
"
The '
for
Great Americans
Hall
was
established in the University of
New
York by
of a
citizen,
the
the
lavish
name
generosity
Emerson came
of
out from the public election, confirmed
by the votes of the council, as the eighth among famous native-born Americans of all the
past.
The seven
who preceded him were Washington, Lincoln,
Webster,
Marshall, Jefferson, of the greatest as a pure
the
man
hearts
there to the
Franklin, all
affairs.
of
of
we may be
letters,
his
men
Grant,
of affairs,
But Emerson, stood
first
in
countrymen, and
content to leave
judgment of posterity.
him
V:
THIS
BOOK
IS DUE ON THE LAST DATE STAMPED BELOW
RENEWED BOOKS ARE SUBJECT TO IMMEDIATE RECALL
12 JUL
'62 HMD
I
6
LIBRARY, UNIVERSITY
OF CALIFORNIA, DAVIS
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Y
'
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