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CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY
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Cornell University Library
PS 1631.G23 Life of
Ralph Waldo Emerson
3 1924 022 015 733
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http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924022015733
"(Breat
Mdters."
EDITED BY
PROFESSOR ERIC
ZIjFI:
S.
ROBERTSON,
of EMERSON
M.A.
LIFE
RALPH WALDO EMERSON
RICHARD GARNETT,
LL.D.
LONDON WALTER
SCOTT,
NEW YORK TORONTO
24
WARWICK LANE
THOMAS WHITTAKER
:
:
W.
J.
GAGE & CO.
1888 {Ali rights reserved^
f
UNIVERSITY:
CONTENTS. CHAPTER
I.
PAGE.
Emerson
Birth of
May 25,
at Boston, Massachusetts,
1803
;
co-
incidence with the birth of Bulwer ; his paternal ancestry; his
mother and maternal grandfather
and
influential
181 1
;
clergyman
family cares and difficulties
Moody Emerson, and
;
as " President's freshman,'' 181 7
tinguished as a collegian
;
;
enters
;
May
12,
;
;
Emerson
Harvard College
hot remarkably dis-
"graduates, 1821
elder brother in school-keeping
an active
Emerson's aunt, Mary
;
her influence upon him
at the Boston Latin School, 1813
love of iiature
his father
;
death of his father,
;
his
first
assists his
;
poetry and his
enters Divinity College, Cambridge, to
Ii
study for the ministry, 1825
CHAPTER
II.
Condition of the times when Emerson entered Cambridge ; his admiration for Channing's discourses
;
want of personal
sympathy; Emerson's studies interrupted by for a time
to
school-keeping
preach,'' October
10,
1826; his
turns
first
Florida for the recovery of his health
1827
;
;
;
to
sermon; goes to
returns
continues his studies at Divinity Hall
insanity of his brother
illness; re-
" approbated
Edward, June, 1828
;
home, June, ;
temporary
elected assis-
tant minister, and shortly afterwards sole minister of the
Second Church, Boston, 1829
;
betrothed to Ellen Tucker
;
CONTENTS.
6
PACJE
December, 1828, and married in September, 1829;
in
Ellen Emerson's beauty, accomplishments, and delicacy of constitution
Emerson as a minister
;
February, 1831
;
;
death of his wife,
his differences with his congregation re-
specting the administration of the Lord's Supper
;
resigns
his discouragement
;
goes on
his pulpit, September, 1832
;
a voyage to Europe, December 25, 1832
February
CHAPTER ;
Europe
III.
Wordsworth
Lan-
his visit to
;
Coleridge, Carlyle, and
Mr. Alexander Ireland's recollections of him
;
Edinburgh
visits
;
Emerson's
at the period of
Emerson's impressions of Italy
dqr ; proceeds to England
in
arrives at Malta,
3^
Intellectual condition of arrival
;
1833
2,
;
he returns to America, September, 1833
and
in request as preacher
himself with a congregation of his brother
Edward
description of
Concord and
;
lecturer ;
his scientific lectures
takes its
up
;
declines to connect
;
his residence at
scenery
;
death
;
Concord;
Emerson's oration
on the bi-centennial anniversary of Concord, and poem on the
monument commemorating
the Battle of Lexington
;
he marries Lidian Jackson, September, 1835 > death of his brother Charles, May, 1836 ; lectures on biography ; on English literature essay on
;
edits Carlyle's " Sartor Resartus "
" Nature," September, 1836
CHAPTER The
.
.
;
his •
.
IV.
years between 1830 and 1840 pregnant vrith intellectual
change
;
American Transcendentalism, 1836
origin of
Emerson's lectures on the philosophy of history gradual estrangement from the pulpit
American Scholar, August, 1837 ting Divinity Class of
excited
by
;
;
;
his
oration on the
discourse to the gradua-
Cambridge, July, 1838
this address
his religious views
;
;
;
opposition
Emerson eschews controversy
his friends at
Fuller, Alcott, Jones Very,
this
time, Margaret
W. H. Channingi Nathaniel of " The Dial," 1840 its cha-
Hawthorne
;
racteristics,
and Emerson's connection with
establishment
;
it
;
its
discon-
57
1
;;;
CONTENTS^
7 PAGE
tinuance,' 1844;
Brook Farm commtinity,
the
Emerson's opinion of the project
Concord neighbours
for plain rustic society sition
;
and
interest in local affairs
;
his
partiality
methods of study and compo-
his
;
1840;
among
his life
;
use of books, and literary predilections
CHAPTER
.81
.
V.
Emerson's excellence as a father; sudden death of his eldest boy, January, 1842
and
his grief
;
and consolation
sacrifices in the circulation
his efforts
;
of Carlyle's writings in
America ; publication of the first series of his Essays, 1841 criticism of the
book ;
Carlyle's opinion of
pecuniary embarrassments
;
"The Method
discourse on
series of his Essays published,
"
>
criticism of the ;
and contrast of the two ; Emerson
intellectual
solstice "
proceeds
;
Britain at the suggestion of
Emerson's
of Nature," .1841; second
1844
Emerson's correspondence with Carlyle ter
it ;
his remuneration as a lecturer
as
a poet
to lecture
;
quarters at Manchester
;
lectures in the provinces
;
proceeds to London
his relations with Carlyle
Carlyle
;
takes
;
1
1
up
his head-
and
in
a lion in London society
trip to Paris
;
.
VI.
visits
Scotland
his
Mr. Alexander Ireland, 1847
CHAPTER Emerson
;
Great
in
England
arrives in
book
Lowell's charac-
;
lectures in
Lon-
don; returns to America, July, 1848; his "Ei^lish Traits"; his " Representative Men " ; the Massachpsetts Quarterly
Review
;
Theodore Parker
Fuller Ossoli
;
;
Thoreau
;
death of Margaret
Emerson's share in her biography
;
sketches
of Emerson by Clough and Frederika Bremer, Carlyle on
1852
" Representative Men "
CHAPTER Emerson's views on American cies corrected
politics
137
VII. ;
their dangerous tenden-
by the anti-slavery agitation
emancipation by purchase of the slaves the truculence of the South
outbreak of the Civil
War
;
;
;
;
he advocates
his resentment at
his Federal sympathies oii the letters to Carlyle
;
temporarily
;
CONTENTS.
8
PAG& impoverished by the war activity as a lecturer
tion
on
;
;
literary style
his long journeys
;
and general
general characteristics of his elocuhis
;
" Conduct
of Life," " Society
and Solitude," and "Letters and Social Aims"; " May Day " ; family incidents and public honours ; ture's
on philosophy before the University of Cambridge,
1870-71
;
visit to
California
;
his house
make good
public subscription to to
his lec-
Europe; reception on
burned down, 1872
his loss
;
his third visit
Concord; respect
his return to
shown him by his fellow-citizens in general ; nominated for the Lord Rectorship of Glasgow University, but defeated by Disraeli ; publishes " Parnassus " and " Letters and Social his
Aims " ;
first
failure of his
marriage
and death,
;
memory ;
Emerson s impersonality American voice
;
his
as
optimism ;
162:
.
VIII.
an author
a characteristically
;
;
his strength
a representative of
peculiarities
his prospect of
INDEX
illness
a link between Channing and Jonathan
;
political thinker
literature
the place of
April, 1882
CHAPTER
Edwards ;
visit to
Walt Whitman's description of;
and beauties of
enduring reputation
.
and weakness
scientific
as a
thought in
his hterary style
;
187
201
NOTE. EMERSON has dealt With written,
full
severely with his biographers.
knowledge that
he thought
fit
to lead a
history
his
life
must be
devoid of incident,
of nearly untroubled happiness, and of absolute conformity to the moral law.
His correspondence
is
seldom
The injured biographer must rely on whatever charm may attach to the not too frequent iigure of one who lived as very interesting, and his diary
he wrote.
is
His main dependence
repose on Mr.
J.
and authorized
historian,
out of reach.
for matters of fact
must
E. Cabot, Emerson's hterary executor
whose consummate knowledge
(unfortunately for the above-mentioned biographer) is only rivalled
by
his
consummate
Cordial acknow-
discretion.
ledgments are also due to preceding writers Dr. Holmes, Mr. Cooke, Mr.
—Mr. Ireland,
Conway—^whose
works, if
superseded as records of circumstance, are yet fresh with
them
to pre-
common
obliga-
the aroma of the admiring love which led
occupy the ground.
Apart from these
tions, the writer is specially
prepared his index,
April 27, 1888.
indebted to the friend
and the friends who
wha
revised his proofs.
LIFE OF EMERSON. CHAPTER
ON May First
25, 1803,
Church
to the Election
I.
William Emerson, minister of the
in Boston,
was among the
Sermon preached " to'
by the Rev. Mr.
Puffer.
listeners
great acceptance,"
Whether he had
left
home
not informed
;
but, if misgivings
in
we
are
he had, they were
in-
spite of inward monitions that he ought to remain,
sufficient to
prevent his presence at the dinner at Governor
Strong's, in
which the observance of the day culminated.
While
sitting at
the Governor's table, his enjoyment of
the repast was enhanced or interrupted by the tidings
of an increase to his family
and
:
Ralph Waldo Emerson,
meanwhile been added to the population of Boston, " within a kiteWilliam's fourth child
third son, having
string of the birthplace of
Benjamin Franklin."
usual hour of dinner was then one.
Ten hours
The
sooner,
allowing for the difference of Greenwich^ and Boston time,
Old England had been enriched by the
birth of
;
:
LIFE OF
12
another child destined to wide
literary
,
renown, but
man
otherwise as dissimilar from the American as one
Edward Ly tton Bulwer
of genius can be from another.
May
was also born on
1803.
25,
Six years later the
same
coincidence was to be renewed by the birth on the day,
on opposite
sides of the Atlantic, of
with infinitely more in
men
two great
—Darwin and Abraham
common
Lincoln.
In one respect, nevertheless, the American and the Britishjinfant agreed, they
were both examples of the per-
sistence 6f family character, exemplifying the saying of
the former that " every
Each of them, early age,
also,
man
is
a bundle of his ancestors."
was destined
to lose his father at
and each, while preserving the paternal
an
type,
was more directly indebted to the care and guidance of a wise and resolute mother.
Goethe
traces the strict
and
sober elements of his character to the paternal, the sunny
and
genial to the maternal parent
" Vom Vater hab' Des Lebens
Vom
Mutterchen die Frohnatur
Und
With Emerson as
it
ich die Statur,
ernstes Fiihren
Lust zu fabuliren."
was the
reverse.
Such animal
he could boast were derived from
spirits
his father:
the
higher and rarer elements of character from a mother
" whose mind had set softness
father
its
stamp upon rnanners of peculiar
and natural grace
and quiet
dignity."
The
was indeed a clergyman, and not too obviously-
deficient in the staidness
but, genial
and
social,
becoming the
more
clerical character;
of a moralist than a divine.
EMERSON. rather a
man
of letters than a
13
man
of learning, he re-
presented a character notably modified since the time that
its
prototypes had crossed the Atlantic.
The name of Emerson, originating in the county Durham or York, and celebrated in England as that an eminent and eccentric mathematician,
mon
in the
several
Northern
States,
is
of of
not uncom-
and has been borne by
persons of note unconnected with the philoso-
pher of Concord, among them a distinguished physician
The first American agriculturist. name was Thomas Emerson, who arrived
and a distinguished settler
of the
in Massachusetts about 1635.
of dispensers of the bread of
pensed
the,
This ancestor of a line life
had himself only
dis-
bread which perisheth to the people of
Ipswich, but from the strong clerical bent evinced by his it may be reasonably concluded that he was among those who forsook their native land for conscience' pake. The next lineal ancestor of Ralph Waldo Emerson
(descendants
T^as
Thomas's son Joseph, " the pioneer minister of Men-
don,
who
barely escaped with his
was destroyed by the Indians."
life
His
when wife,
the village
Elizabeth
Bulkeley, was the niost distinguished by descent of any
^mong Emerson's ancestors, and may well have infused a new spirit into the family. She was great-granddaughter and granddaughter of successive rectors of Odell, in
Bedfordshire^Edward and Peter Bulkeley,
scions of the family of Bulkeley, or Buckley, in Cheshire.
Edward was a staunch letter
volume dedicated
Puritan, 'author of a to
little
Walsingham, upbraiding the
Jesuits for forsaking " the originall fountaine of the
wherein the Spirit of
God
black-
Greek
did indite the Gospell," for
LIFE OF
14
The
a Latin version. opinions
fell
upon
inheritor of his living
evil days, if
and
Edward
a man's steadfastness to his principles.
test
Walsingham
;
earned
the
patronage
Peter's ehcited the wrath of
Compelled
Laud. general,
had
Puritanism
Bulkeley's
acknowledge to
to
his
those days are evil which
.
of
Archbishop
Laud's Vicar-
Nathaniel Brent, that he never used the
Sir
made
surplice in the pulpit or
the sign of the cross in
baptism, he was incontinently suspended, and cited to the
High Commission Court "if he reform not
Whether he made appearance
is
not recorded
before."
but next
;
year (1635), having secretly realised his estate, considerable for those family,
and
day* he crossed the Atlantic with
settled at
England learning.
all
Cambridge, the future seat of
Moving onward,
after
his
New
no long time he
became by honest purchase from the Indians owner of considerable possessions by the
Meadow River, named the town
excel
in,
not
if
days a
lilied
Musketaquit, or
Hampshire, and founded and
is
no people," he said
will strive to excel in
people's bodies his
New
destined to be famous to
" There
Concord. " but
in
holiness?"
in
and
something.
souls,
Protestant
all
ages aa
to his flock^
What can we
Supreme over
his
he spent the remainder. of
Pope, a
rfepublican
monarch,
bequeathing, on his death in 1659, his dignities temporal and spiritual to his son Edward, a sickly scholar, father of the lady
Emerson.
who
and gentle
in 1665 espoused Joseph
" In a certain sense," writes the Rev. John
Brown, the biographer of Bunyan, "Bulkeley
is
the
patron saint as well as the founder of Concord, and traces of
him
are to
be met with on every
side.
Of
— EMERSON. a dozen ministers who since
15
1637 have preached in
the parish church of the place, five were either Bulke-
Emersons."
leys or
Joseph
Emerson's
son
Edward married Rebecca,
whom
daughter of Cornelius Waldo, from loved "
and
certainly
One
the family.
most picturesqiie name came into
likes to think of
the patriarch of the Vaudois, as for
it
beth,
first
it
may
as derived from
well be the case,
appears in England in the reign of Eliza-
doubtless
by foreign
brought
Waldos were among the India Company.
Two
refugees.
original founders of the East
Edward's son Joseph, minister at*
Maiden, who graduated at Harvard Oollege in left
a
name
near occasioning
little
William's death, but the mother's
and the necessity of attending to farm work
He
rescued the lad. his descendants
prayed every night that none of
might ever be
fervent prayer of the righteous
found to
His opinion
ought never to leave his lessons came
his son
intercession
17 17,
as " a heroic scholar," " the greatest student
in the country," says his granddaughter. that
" be-
this
avail.
His
daughter of Samuel
wife,
rich,
man
and the
effectual
has hitherto been
Mary Moody, was
Moody, celebrated
for
his
the elo-
quence, his self-forgetting charity— so forgetful indeed that he. gave
and
away
his wife's shoes instead of his
own,
his relentless pursuit after "graceless sinners
ventured into the alehouse on Saturday night."
who
William
Emerson, son of the scholarly minister of Maiden, seems to have imbibed more of his maternal grandfather's spirit
than of his
father's.
Not only was he
an impassioned and enthusiastic preacher, but when
— LIFE OF
16
War
the
of Independence broke out in his
his patriotic '
ardour hurried him
as
own
parish,
army chaplain
into
the ranks, where he was shortly carried off by a fever.
The Old Manse was
Concord, celebrated by Hawthorne,
at
built for him.
William Emerson, the offspring of his marriage with
Phoebe
Bliss,
evinced,
on the other hand, more
to
aifinity
his grandfather " the heroic scholar," than to his father
the fervent preacher, though by no. means deficient oratorical gifts.
Left an orphan at an early age,
'in
he soon
gained a protector in a step-father, the Rev. Ezra Ripley,
whose
character, curiously
sagacity,
compounded of
credulity
and
was afterwards to be graphically painted by his
step-grandson.
Ere long William Emerson had to dispute
his mother's affection with a rapidly increasing brood of
young
half-brothers
and
sisters.
His own inclinations are
said not to have tended towards the ministry, but his
mother's wishes, reinforced by broad hints in his stepfather's devotional exercises, prevailed with
an
alternate course of college study
he was (1792) ordained settled at Harvard, a
him, and after
and school-keeping,
at the age of twenty-three,
and
town twelve miles from Concord.
The
congregation was small and the income correspbn-
dent
—three hundred and
to which in process of time
hundred and
fifty
more
tion of the currency.
as
thirty-three dollars annually it
became necessary to add two
compensation for the deprecia-
Being too poor to keep a horse, he
was almost debarred from other society than that afforded by the village
and ,
itself,
a restricted circle of plain but friendly
hospitajale people,
more sympathetic with the young
minister's musical tastes than with his literary aspirations.
EMERSON. In the case of a clergyman bass
viol, it excites
no
who
17 ,
and plays on the
sings
surprise, slenderness of
means
not-
withstanding, to hear of " conversations on the subject of
These occurred
matrimoiiy."
in June,
and on
1796,
October 25th of that year William Emerson was united to
Ruth Haskins, of Boston, and brought her from the New England metropolis to dwell in the littie sequestered
among
'hamlet
"We
the woods and rocks.
and
cold," he wrote in his journal, "
and
little
wood, and
little
meat
;
but,
and have
are little
poor' meal,
thank God, courage,
enough."
The
family of Ruth Haskins was
guished as that of her bridegroom uncertain.
It
;
its origin,
indeed, was
had boasted, however, a member of
worth in her
John Haskins
father,
Hannah Upham, sprang from one England
by no means so distin-
:
sterling
and her mother,
of the good old
families, prolific of " selectmen,
New*
moderators of
members of the General
Court, officers in
the militia, and deacons of the church."
John Haskins,.
town-meetings,
differing
from his wife in religious sentiment, was
Episcopalian of an unusually staunch type. stoutly against
tested
He
the changes in the
Liturgy cf^
King's Chapel, by which, as Clbugh subsequently " the
an-.,
had pro-
ex^-
had been cut off,"' and the congregation had become Unitarian. This had ^ pressed
it,
tails
happened in 1785, rector
and the
of the prayers
after
the flight of the old royalist
larger portion of his flock,
who disappeared
along with British supremacy in the year of Independence,
no more than
British
supremacy
to return.
Mr. Haskins
emigrated too, but only to Trinity Church, whither he was
Vccustomed
to repair at the
head of half
his
numerous
LIFE Oh
18
family, his wife leading a procession of the other half
AH
towards the Congregational Church in Park Street.
Churchman would have evening, and treat Sunday in of a pastors the heretical tankard. All was good them with sangaree out of a silver this notwithstanding, the veteran
humour and mutual
toleration,
and an atmosphere was
preparing singularly suitable for the special message of
John Haskins's grandson, who celebrated his death (1814) in
some boyish
He was
lines.
indeed
a,
man of great
firm-
ness of character and sound practical wisdom, whose pithy sayings were current
men going down
among
in preference to the bank.
seem rather
to
and
his neighbours,
to
to the sea in ships entrusted their
whom money
His daughter Ruth would
have resembled her mother, and to have
even surpassed her graciousness of temper and wifely '
and motherly
diligence.
" I do not remember," says Mrs.
Bradford, William Emerson's ward, "ever to have seen
her impatient, or to have heard her express dissatisfaction at any time." spiritual
The
almost anxious, but finely
serious,
countenance prefixed to Mr. D. G. Haskins's
account of the family
is,
but for the dark liquid eyes and
many
the expression as of one troubled about
wonderfully like Emerson's in original of
its
highest
;
from her,
,the musical resonance of his voice.
wife
:
some
plate,
too,
The
though her
he inherited
Mrs. Bradford con-
traits prettily characteristic
how, wheireas she was
munion
"
Ralph Waldo," says Clough, describing her
at the age of eighty-fotir
tributes
things
mood.
of the pastor's
satisfied that the silver
special
charge,
com-
should be
cleaned under her inspection by the sexton, th6 minister's
lawn bands must be ironed by no one but
herself.
" It
EMERSON. tvas the
custom
at that' time for settled ministers to
bands and black of black
silk
wear
gowns, and a plaited broad band
silk
round the
handsome thus •
19
Mr. Emerson looked very
waist.
attired."
Of Ralph Waldo's
infancy
Mrs. Bradford only recollects that he had a surprising
memory
;
that his dress
was
ceeded by dark blue nankeen
at first yellow flannel, suc;
and
that at
an early age
he contracted an evil habit of sucking his thumb, which Mrs. Emerson eradicated by making him wear a mitten. If
the
pecuniary advantages of William Emerson's
marriage were not conspicuous, he had nevertheless enlarged the circle of his acquaintance, and gained friends in the native city of his bride.
It
may have been through
her connections that in 1799 he was invited to preach before the First Church in Boston " on the solemn occasion of choosing officers for the Ancient Artillery
preacher's
The
Company.''
handsome
and Honourable
discourse,
set' off
person, melodious voice,
by the
and agree-
able manner, gave such satisfaction that within a week he
was offered the pastorate of
own inclination could
this
important church.
not be doubtful, but
it
to obtain a dismissal from his rural congregation. this
His
was necessary
To»
end the people of Harvard were apprised by the
•
people of Boston that " the alarming attacks upon our holy religion by the Learned, the Witty, and the Wicked, especially in populous
and seaport towns," rendered
indispensable that the light of
men
like
it
Mr. Emerson
should no longer be concealed under bushels, but that individuals thus luminous should be " invited
ported to convince is
and confound
said of the learned
and the
and sup-
the wicked " (nothing
witty) "
by
their arguments,.
.
LIFE OF
20 1
and allure them by
The people
their amiable behaviour."
of Harvard seem to have had no objection to detach their pastor as a reinforcement to the
metropohs, but were
exercised by the apprehension of having to pay his suc-
As insurance
cessor a better salary.
ItingenCy, they claimed thirteen
against this con-
hundred
The
dollars.
Bostonians showed their real desire to secure Emerson by
meeting
demand
this
considerably
more than
half way.
After a tedious negotiation a thousand dollars were paid,
and the young minister entered upon
He
September 22, 1799. half-brother,
event,
made up
his
his
new
sphere'
had, he afterwards told
mind
to leave
Harvard
in
on his.
any
and had contemplated removal to Washington,
where he would have endeavoured " to plant a church strictly
to
on congregational
principles
be no written confession of
faith,
;
in
which there was
no covenant, and no
subscription whatever to articles as a term of 'communion."
This bold liberalism foreshadows the subsequent conduct of his son, and
own was "
is,
moreover, conclusive as to the writer's
change which
attitude towards the great intellectual silently revolutionizing the theology of
We progress
in
of an orthodox church to a Unitarian
"By
Unitarians progress?"
:
" but
member how do you
own names," was
the
Unitarianism must certainly be allowed to re-
semble the Kingdom of Heaven in one respect not with observation.
a slow and
silent
It
plain.
process,
Protest
:
it
cometh
has always been the result of
begun long ere suspected,
and progressing unchallenged long
become
England.
other churches adopting
our principles while keeping their answer.
New
such and such. ways," said a
is idle,
after its
for^the
tendency has
phenomenon has
;
EMERSON.
21
deep in human nature, being in
fact
bottomed
its
roots
on
the elementary fact that every generation must and
will
look at things
that the only particular
human and
method of
mode
divine in
insuring the
of thought
own
its
way, and
permanency of any
to renounce the exercise of
is
William Emerson, whose ancestors'
thought entirely.
Calvinism had not been extreme, had fallen in easily with the current of the time
but,
:
though there was the
stuff of a vigorous controversialist in him, circumstances
There
did not require him to come prominently forward. seems, indeed, to to stir
up
have been an indisposition on
religious strife
;
until at length
cord was thrown, or rather
in
fell
all
hands
an apple of
dis-
obedience to the laws
of nature, in the shape of a vacant Professorship of
The
Divinity.
question whether a Unitarian could be
appointed on a Calvinist foundation coiild not but lead to contention.
It
was decided
in conformity with the
precedent settled at the English Reformation, and the of the orthodox
irritation
party found
vent
in
the
establishment (1805) of the PanopUst, a journal in which
the
new
porters
views were violently combated, and their supassailed with personal
however, was not
adopted
Buckminster's collection of Vjrhich
animosity.
until
hymns
the
This tone,
publication
of
in 1808, the year in
William Emerson was brought nigh unto death
nor did he ever recover so in ecclesiastical politics.
far as to take
The
an active part
influences, therefore, that
surrounded Ralph Emerson's cradle were troversial
far less con-
than might have been expected, and in the very
year (1821) in which he quitted college, the conflict wore itself out,
leaving as
its
principal literary
monument
the
LIFE OF
22 classic
works of the meekest of controversialists, William
EUery Charming. for the
young
Most
fortunate was
thinker, for
whom
conspired to clear the way
breaking out
its
orthodox and heterodox,
most fortunate also
:
its
sect
what was meant
The
less
for
to-
mankind.
William Emerson
prominent part in controversy, mental
subsi-
up
dence, or he would have run great risk of giving
felt
disposed to take a
the more
likely
The
activity to find vent in literature.
was
his.
Christian
Minister Society, established for the publication of tracts,
was founded and long actively promoted by him.
He
was a merrlber of the Massachusetts Historical Society,
and
also of the Philosophical Society, of
which he seems
to have regarded himself as the founder, since " the child of
my
brain."
But
he
calls it
his chief enterprise
was
the editorship of The Monthly Anthology, a\h& journal of the Anthology Club, of which he was
Busy judges,
vice-president.
rising barristers, influential clergymen, everi
a future President, found time to contribute to this magazine, which represented the best intellectual culture of Boston, in that day conservative in literature as in politics,
and unforeboding of the mystic baptism which
was to receive from the influence which
editor's little boy.
Godwin had
so recently exerted
one contemporary American of
literary
it
The deep
genius
on the
— Charles
Brockden Browne-found no echo among the Bostonian literati;
who had imagination enough to appreciate Scott's
romantic' picturesqueness, but recoiled with instinctive antipathy from a seer Uke Coleridge.
Literary orthodoxy
of this type leaves no permanent intellectual trace, and
only retains an historical interest as indicating the mental
,
EMERSON.
23
of a community at a particular period.
drift
Permanent
however, were produced by William Emerson's
results,
motion
for the formation of a club library,
which eventually
developed into the library of the Boston Athenaeum, one of the best upon the continent.
Thus happily and
usefully occupied,
respected andr
caressed by society notwithstanding the slenderness of his means,
discharging several important public trusts,
recognized by .the civic authorities as a
happy
in a promising
and increasing
man
of mark,
though twice
family,
Emerson
smitten by the loss of young children, William
could write with
all sincerity
of the sphere in which he
found himself, as " an ample and beautiful world in which there has been afforded to
happiness, worthy friends
Nor was
his a
a pleasant lot and
by an
When shortly
is
malady, he could
insidious
To my wife and children,
upon earth
indeed,
a matter of monient
my
as, in
;
my decease, God only knows how they And then the education of the latter !
oppressed with
much
delightful contemplations."
merely fair-weather optimism.
afterwards attacked write, "
me
and
this solicitude.
Our
continuance the event of
would
Subsist.
But
am
family,
I
not
you know,
have so long been in the habit of trusting Providence, that
none of them ever
terrestrial
Very
maintenance
shortly afterwards
seriously thought of providing a for themselves
(May
and households."
12, 1811),
he passed away.
" Three years before, he had been," says his funeral encomiast, Buckminster, " brought
and without any previous warning,
when
busily preparing for a
pubhc
down
in
an
instant,
to the gates of death, service."
This
is
ex-
plained to have been the effect of a profuse haemorrhage
t
LIFE OF
24
from the lungs, from the
effects of
which he never com-
pletely recovered.
But the disease of which he died had
no connection with
this bleeding,
tumour which "
stomach.
The
town," said Buckminster, a
commendation counts observer of
its
being occasioned by a
entirely closed the lower orifice of
for very
much, " has
youth and their education
and Historical Society an associate their flourishing state
The
seer.
;
the
Academy
greatly interested in
clergy throughout the country have lost a
excellent father, husband,
an honourable This
lost a diligent
;
the University an attentive over-
hospitable and liberal brother
and
the
man whose
warm
;
most careful
his family a
and master
and
;
his friends
an.d faithful friend."
eu'logium was delivered as a part of Wil-
liam Emerson's funeral oration, and subsequently added to his
of his able
posthumous and most considerable work, the history
own church from 1630
if
not
brilliant
tions of the
to his
performance,
own time
full
— a respect-
of curious'
metamorphosis of Puritan theology, and itself
come over
a conclusive proof of the change which had
men's minds.
Speaking of the persecutions in which the
old Puritans indulged themselves, he says tists
still
them
:
The most
groaned in prisons.
laws stared
illustra-
in the face;. and the
"
The Bap-
unrighteous
most
villainous
conduct was secretly practised to their mischief."
Buckminster
attests that
veneration almost sors."
Yet Emerson " looked back with
unbounded
at
some of
The book was published by
December
following his death,
something to the
relief
his
his predeces-
widow
in the
and probably contributed
of her narrow circumstances.
William Emerson must indeed have possessed a large
EMERSON. measure of the with a If he
mind
six
walketh not by
faith that
sight, if
he died
at ease respecting the prospects of his family.
depended on
not vain.
25-
his congregation, his confidence
was
The church continued his salary to the widow for
•
months, voted her five hundred dollars yearly for seven
and allowed her the occupancy of the parsonage
years,
'
for a year
and a
three years.
half,
a term subsequently extended to
Boarders were taken
in,
hold drudgery was performed by Mrs. Emerson
herself, _
maiden
personal friends helped occasionally; the
Mary Moody Emerson, did her
.
most of the house-
aunt,
part to the extent of her
scanty means; and so the four boys William (born 1801),
Ralph Waldo (1803), Edward Bliss (1805), Charles Chauncy (1808), were not only fed
lad,
and clothed, but
liberally edu-
Another son, Robert Bulkeley, though an amiable
cated.
proved permanently childish and incapable of instruc-
tion
a
;
death, result
born about the time of her
little girl,
soon disappeared from the scene.
father's
The
great
was not attained without stern self-denial of more
kinds than one, frequent abstinence and occasional privation.
In
after-life
gium on her under " the felt to
Miss Emerson concluded a cordial eulb-
sister
with a special reference to her patience
trials
of boarders,"
be no anticlimax
not be too much."
:
"
which she evidently
The most
I
could say would
A friend coming in one
day, found the
family without food,, and this good aunt, trust,
had
dined, "consoling
endurance."
them with
let
us
Ralph and Edward had but one great-coat
between them, no small matter
New" England.
who,
stories of heroic,
The
in the winter climate of
discomforts of this condition were
sufficiently perceptible at the
time
;
its
blessings were
*
.
LIFE OF
20
•recognized afterwards, when, after a beautiful description of eager, blushing boys
treasures
amassed
comparing the
in hours snatched
from a
intellectual life
duty and unflinching task-work, Emerson adds "
What
the
is
of stern
:
hoop that holds them staunch
It is
?
the iron band of poverty, of necessity, of austerity, which,
excluding them from the sensual enjoyments which
make
other boys too early old, has directed their activity into safe
and
right channels,
and made them, despite themand the good.
selves, reverers of the grand, the beautiful,
Ah, short-sighted students of books, of nature, and of
man
too happy could they
!
know
their advantages, they
pine for freedom from that mild parental yoke; they sigh
for
fine clothes, for riches,
the theatre,
for
and
premature freedom and dis^pation which others possess.
Woe
to
them
if
their wishes
were crowned
and are weaving
that dwell with them,
their youthful brows, are Toil V
Mutual Faith." It
may
The
!
angels
laurels of life for
and Want, and Truth and v
occur to the reader that
if
the young
Emersons
were staunch, the good aunt who fed the hungry with tales of the hungrier
may have had something
imparting this invaluable quality.
Emerson
letters, calls
tonics,
her
all
life
it
was
;
to
do with
she was to
what he, in describing Carlyle's
bark and steel and mellow wine.
she was somewhat
ized her
So
tart
and
Like most
astringent
;
she idol-
nephews in her own way, but by no means
approved of
all their
of angularities proprieties
;
:
doings or thinkings.
She was
full
a perjJetual offender against minor social
orthodox by intellectual conviction, hetero-
EMERSON.
27
dox by native temperament; "no
said her
whistle,"
nephew, "that every mouth could play on, but a pibroch from which only a native Highlander could draw music."
Her
habitual
sibylline
;
would have. oracle;
mode
nor
is it
But
of expressing herself was abrupt clear that she always
came some
at rare intervals
and
knew what she thrilling
some deliverance only needing epigrammatic point
to have
"Scorn
been Emerson's own.
aims," was the burden of
"A
her discourse.
all
your •
hft
trifles,
pulsations of created beings,'' she wrote in 1^22,
few
"a few
successions of acts, a few lamps held out in the firmament,
enable us to talk
of,
Time, make epochs with
date the revelations of for
God
to
man.
It is
histories,
a goodly
name
our notions of breathing, suffering, enjoyihg, acting.
AVe personify fleeting,
We
it.
call
it
by every
Yet
vapouring imagery.
exist in eternity.
name
it
is
of dreaming,
nothing.
We
Dissolve the body and the night
gone, the stars are extinguished, and
is
we measure duration
by the number of our thoughts, by the
activity of reason,
the discovery of truths, the acquirement of virtue, the
approach to God.
shadows
now
all
one
at that
And
the grey-haired god throws his
around, and his slaves catch, ;
at the halo
now
at this,
he throws around poetry, or
Sometimes they climb,
pebbles, or bugs, or bubbles.
sometimes creep into the meanest holes^but they are all
alike
Emerson,
in
vanishing, like the
niuiatis mutandis,
with the third Napoleon, Je
"She has remote
shadow of a cloud."*
might assuredly have said suis- le
deserted," he wrote
neveu de
village to refresh herself awhile with
and defend them from parental
ma
tante.
long afterwards, "her
routine.
young
faces,
Perhaps they
LIFE OF
28
the colleges so real a benefactor.''
will
not find in
The
chronicle of his schooldays, complete as regards his
all
and the routine of
instruction
study, affords but
little
material for constructing a living image of the scholar
Some who have recorded
himself.
in late
life,
their reminiscences
evidently speak less of what they saw than of
what they wish they had seen; others candidly admit that they saw nothing. itself,
and a
most other
among was
clear
One fact, however, is both clear proof how entirely in Emerson's as
his school-mates,
a certain aloofness
him
consider
in
Always
man.
cases, the child fathered the
in
There
he was never of them.
which never allowed them to
quite one of themselves
schoolboy, but a boy at school.
he was not a
;
This peculiar distinc-
tion he preserved through his life; without stiffness or churlishness, affectation' or assumption,
he always put
and kept a distance between himself and
others,
which
rendered his personal influence, apart from his writing
and
his oratory, smaller, than that of almost
great teacher.
any other
noteworthy that his intimates always
It is
call
him Mr. Emerson.
the
hem
Enthusiasm never got beyond
of his garment; and this though the
was as simple, transparent, and unaffected as
had been a great moral science.
naturalist, instead
His
isolation
of a
man he
if
cultivator of
was simply the
effect (5f
an
unlikeness to others not necessarily indicative of mental superiority, it
and so
far
disadvantageous that in later
life
prevented his exercising that moral control over his
congregation which might have been easily exerted by an inferior
man.
The few
definite notices that
we
possess
of him at this early period are mostly indicative of this
EMERSON.
29
He had
involuntary spiritual exclusiveness.
"
an old schoolfellow to Dr. Holmes,
" the
him
since."
"
He
same manner and
you that you have known
courtly hesitation in addressing in
then," said
seemed," says the youth he taught
at college, " to dwell apart, as if in a tower,
from which
he looked upon everything from a loophole of
Taxed on one occasion with assuming an air of he replied with veracious would have seemed the
means a deliver a
it
"
I
own."
did not
know
•
it,
indeed been advanced,
less justifiable, as
brilliant scholar, or
He
class.
task
simplicity,
Such a pretension, had
sir."
his
superiority,
he was by no
remarkably prominent in his
^
was indeed, on one occasion, selected to
poem
of his
own
composition, but only after the
had been declined by seven of
his reputed betters.
" Attended a dissertation of Emerson's in the morning, on the subject of Ethical Philosophy,'' writes Josiah Quincy " I found
it
long and dry."
And
dictory exercise rather poor,
the class." fascinated
It
again, "
and did but
Emerson's little
:
vale-
honour to
was not known that his boyhood had been
by one of the
writers least likely to interest
average youth, Montaigne
;
•
an
and that he habitually carried
a translation of Pascal's Pensdes to church with him. It is
a curious instance of the meeting of extremes that
the most believing of
men
attracted to these two great
should have been thus early
and
in different
ways typical^
sceptics.
Emerson's schooling had commenced before he was three,
and a week ere he attained
seems half disappointed that " well yet."
that ripe age his father
Ralph does not read very
After another spell of learning under
Lyon, "a severe
'
teacher,'' at the
Lawson
age of ten he entered.
•
— LIFE OF
30 •the Boston Latin
then or shortly afterwards
School,
Here
under an excellent master, Mr. Apthorp Gould. he showed a
talent for
speech-making and rhyming which
gained his master's good
any
visit
whole school turning out to
up defences on Noddle Island against an
aid in throwing
expected
but the only incident of
will,
interest recorded is the
from the British
both nations, a hostile
—then,
Emerson
fleet.
shame of
to the
distinctly
remem-
bered the holiday, but could never recollect that the
young engineers had done any work.
In
he
1817
entered Harvard College, under favour of an arrange-
ment resembling a Cambridge
He
sizarship.
linquents
inspred
and announce orders and
him
free lodging
;
and waiter
was made
summon
"President's freshman," or messenger' to
regulations, at
de-
which
Commons, which
saved him three-fourths of his board.
He
also partici-
pated in several minor benefactions for poor scholars,
and
after a while
eked out
means
his
giving supplementary lessons
to a
still
youth
further
less
by
educated
than himself, whose character of him has already been cited,
and who, when a distinguished clergyman
years, gratefully •
acknowledged
in after
his obligation to
rather as Mentor, however, than as instructor.
him Emer-
son's backwardness in mathematics almost brought into disgrace,
and he seems
proficiency except in Greek.
to
him
have evinced no special
The Greek
professor, the
eloquent Edward Everett, inspired him with enthusiastic admiration
;
and the Hellenic bent of
T further disclosed by a successful " to
Why not Locke, Paley, whom
Ctesar and
his
prize essay
mind was
on
Socrates.
or Stewart?" asked the President,
Pompey were
evidently
much
alike.
'
EMERSON.
31
Emerson himself could not have serenely on his
own
ance of the mental food he found his avoidance of that
to his instinct,
but he held
told,
course, resolute alike in his accept-
wholesome and
commend
which did not
itself
Like maiiy another active-minded youth,
in similar circumstances,
he indemnified himself
for the
distastefulness of a large portion of the college course by
a wide ranging over general trace of his study of any
literature.
modern
There seems no
continental language
;
but he was deeply versed in Shakespeare and the early English dramatists
and
;
named among the intellectual among
Addison, and Sterne are
Swift,
authors he introduced to the
Next
his classmates.
and the
faultless propriety of his
poraries
at
Harvard seem
more
to his reserve
conduct, his contem-
chiefly
impressed with his
unusual maturity and such-'an equipoise of intelligence as might
have become a youthful Spinoza, but rarely
accompanies the thing about
There
mystic.
gift
of poetry in verse or prose.
him seemed is
No-
to indicate the future poet or
no trace of the
revolt of a Shelley, the
suicidal tendencies of a Goethe, or Carlyle's warfare with
the Everlasting
No
:
be added, with
less
make
nor did genius ever
in the world with less pa.ssion
and
crudity, or,
By
apparent promise.
Emerson was before most men
so
in the balance
its
debut
it
must
much and
pline of the ordinary faculties of his mind, by so
was he behind most inspired
men
in the
as
disci-
much
development
of the exceptional.
The mind
first
is
indication of deep
thought in Emerson's
found in a reminiscence of
his
not wholly accurate in point of date. ,
own, perhaps It professedly
Missing Page
Missing Page
—
;
LIFE OF
34
Mrs. Emerson had there taken up her abode in Canter,
bury Lane, known also as Light Lane, from the gloom of the overshadowing trees, and Featherbed Lane, in
compliment to the ruggedness of the roadway.
" Poets
While Emerson
succeed better in fiction than ih truth."
disparaged his sylvan retirement in prose, he was by 'no
means backward in the
his claims for
it
in the following lines,
of any importance that he seems to^have com-
first
posed: "
I
am
going to
Burrowed
in
my own hearth-stone,
yon green
hills alone,
A secret nook in a pleasant land, Whose Where
I
Echo
And
groves the frolic
I
am
safe:
Where
in
thought and God.
my
sylvan home,
I
am
Rome
stretched beneath, the pines
the evening star so holy shines,
laugh at the lore and the pride of man,
At
the sophist schools
For what are they
When man These
to
tread on the pride of Greece and
And when I
;
the blackbird's roundelay,
Oh when ,
planned
vulgar feet have never trod
A spot that is sacred
I
fairies
arches green the live-long day
in the
lines, alike in
and
tlie lea!rned
all in their
bush with
clan
;
high conceit.
God may meet ? "
sentiment and cadence, strongly
resemble Pringle's famous " Afar in the Desert," which, however, was not published until 1828; nor can Pringle
have seen them.
The means Lane appear
for
Mrs. Emerson's removal to Canterbury
to have
been supplied by the success
William's school, which allowed
him
to
proceed to
ot
finish
EMERSON. his education in
by
his family
Waldo, as he was now called
Germany.
and
35
intimates,
conducted the school for a
year during his brother's absence, and Edward,
now a
youth of nineteen, established another seminary in Roxbury.
By 1825 Waldo's
had put from two pocket, and he in his
felt
to
three years of school-keeping
three thousand dollars into his
enabled to terminate the parenthesis
own education by
entering the Divinity School at
Cambridge, to prepare himself to follow the profession of all
those
among
American
soil.
his ancestors
who had been born upon
CHAPTER
THE
II.
time when the young schoolmaster thus for a
season retrograded into the pupilar condition was
one of repose and yet of expectation, pregnant with the germs of great things to come..
was
It
for long after-
wards looked back upon with regret as " the era of good feeling."
The
prominent statesman of America's
last
heroic age was President ; two,
more
illustrious
were
still,
descending towards the grave in the sight of
all
;
the
atmosphere seemed suifused with their departing brightness,
and
faction stood for the
solemn euthanasia of an age of issues were silently maturing,
carrion instinct of
new
when he
preparing.
indicated
its
coming man
spoils
An
scrambling and
age was impending of
manoeuvring
The
truly scented the taint
in
personally honest, but author of that
at
selfish
seemed permitted
to
show
;
sham^
an age which might have
to
what a depth a
enlightened people can descend, impressively demonstrated
people can recover
to the victors."
home, of offensive hectoring and
audacious rapacity abroad
^
strifes
watchword of corruption, " The
less
the
Meanwhile new
giants.
Aaron Burr had
of the coming time
Andrew Jackson,
moment abashed by
itself.
if it
free
and
had not even more
from what a depth such a
That America did recover
was.
LIFE OF EMERSON. due
in
37
no small manner to her good fortune
a moral and
descent from the
seventeenth-century
very flower of
England had not been
in preserving
whose hereditary
intellectual aristocracy,
of mis-
lost in the turbid torrent
No
cellaneous immigration.
less
happy was
it
that,
thanks to federal sovereignty and local institutions, this
element was not,
aristocratic
imbecile or public
life,
effete,
but retained
aristocracies,
a healthy interest in
and was neither too timid nor too superfine to and
face a political issue
fight a stiff election.
No man
New
in essen-
was to contribute more to keep tials
many
like so
England
what the Pilgrim Fathers had made
it,
than the
unnoticed student of a system of theology which was ruthlessly dissolving the -
Fathers' creed.
To
lift
mere
externalities of the Pilgrim
Unitarianism out of sectarianism,
to transform an originally rationalistic into a mystic
and bid
it
and transcendental one,
live as literature,
mode
to kill
it
of thought as theology
were tasks reserved
for the
-
young student which would have dismayed him could he have caught' one dimmest glimpse of them as he entered the Cambridge Divinity School.
In choosing the Church as his profession, Emerson followed the path which seemed marked for one in whose veins ran so
obeyed
his
much clerical blood, but at the same time he own conviction of what was best. He had
formed a sound estimate of in the course
He
his powers,
and beUeved that
he was following he should do them
fancied, indeed, that "his abilities were
ambition
;
"
but
this
justice.
below
his
might well be, since his aspiration,
though unambitious of worldly
distinction,
great results in the intellectual world;
contemplated
inmensum infinitum-
^
:
LIFE OF
38
He
que aliquid.
fully
recognized that his logical faculty
compared unfavourably with remarked with
but he
his imagination,
was no reason why he
justice that this
should abstain from theology, " for the highest species of reasoning upon divine subjects
is,
rather the fruit of a sort
of moral imagination than of the reasoning machines, such as
Locke and Clarke and David Hume."
He
proceeds
to instance Channing's Dudleian lecture as his model,
and
his admiration did not misguide him.
There
is
not,
perhaps, in the whole arena of theological literature such
another instance of clear calm sense exalted to the highest
eloquence by devoutness of
spirit
and
rnoral enthusiasm
afforded by the discourses of Channing.
as
is
is
best in the seventeenth
pulpit seems united in this
Whatever
and the eighteenth century ornament of the nineteenth
but out of the pulpit the charm of Channing's eloquence,
if
fervent,
not dispelled, lost
faultless
man
of
much of its fascination. The God whose heroic attitude
and serene eloquence could
mobs seemed
men
fellow
to
have
little
face to face.
environed him;
fire
multitudes and quell
faculty for dealing with his
An
atmosphere of reserve
he gave forth more
light
than heat.
Emerson's personal resort to him ended in disappoint-
ment
;
he was hardly capable, the younger man thought,
of taking another person's point of view, or of com-
municating himself freely in private conversation.
"
He
does not converse," said George Combe, " but delivers
an
essay,
and waits
His pecuhar
patiently to hear
an essay
in return."
secret of exalting morality into religion
by
enthusiasm for the right and good was Emerson's already
by natural endowment
;
so that the latter could not feel
EMERSON. had much
that he
plexities to his
to learn
He
another guide.
wrote
39
from him, nor did he find indeed freely of his per-
aunt Mary, but his interrogations seem than dialogues,
After
rather
soliloquies
culties
were no more than must
every thoughtful
person..
He
make
occur tc
was not blind to the "Presbyte-
strong points of the old Puritan theology.
rianism and Calvinism
his diffi-
all,
naturally
more
Christianity a
and tangible system, and give
some
it
were worth unfolding to the ignorance of men.'' felt
no disposition
God
it
is fickle,
of revelation hath seen cause to repent and
botch up the ordinances of the it
But he
on which
to accept the assumptions
was based. "That the administration of eternity that the
real
which
novelties
God
of Nature, I hold
not irreverent but impious in us to assume."
He
was
not too well satisfied with the average standard of devo-
Church
tional fervour in the Unitarian
transcended in
my
and why not he
it,
erring
adopted the
"I know
?
He
was not, therefore,
that there are
like
from precipitancy, when he clerical profession
:
many had
but
clergymen who are not merely
vicinity
philosophical." ling,
;
literary or
John
Ster-
deliberately
indeed, like almost
all
the acts of his singularly symmetrical and harmonious life,
the step was decidedly the wisest that he could have
taken at the time.
Seldom, however, has neophyte been more buffeted
by accident and' fatality than Emerson. been a month
at the
He
had scarcely r
Cambridge Divinity School ere
his
overtasked eyes failed him, and general debility drove him to the country, " to try the experiment of hard
the benefit of health."
It profited
work
for
him, but more than a
,
LIFE OF
40
interim he
had
at Chelmsford,
time taken charge of a school
for a short
and afterwards of
that established at
bury by his brother Edv^ard, the genius,
deemed, of the
family,
and been driven
In the
Cambridge.
year elapsed ere he returned to
who had overtasked
it
Rox-
was then
his strength,
voyage to the Mediterranean.
to try a
A pupil of Emerson's at the Chelmsford School remembers his grave
and
jection in
which he could keep the boys by a look or a
quiet, yet
engaging demeanour, the sub-
tone, a peculiar expression in his eyes, as if invisible to others.
he saw things
Mr. John Holmes, the brother of
Oliver Wendell Hplmes, records his undoubting calmness
of manner, the sternness of his very infrequent rebukes, his " Every inch a king
kindliness in explaining or advising. in his dominion.
Looking back, he seems
like a captive philosopher set to tending
to
me
flocks.''
rather
"
He
was. not," says another witness, "especially successful as a teacher.
He
was studying
was centred in
his studies.
for the ministry, Still,
with the utmost smoothness."
and his heart
everything went along
While he was
at
Chelms-
ford an incident occurred which must have strengthened his resolution to ing.
be a minister, had
it
needed strengthen-
This was the aberration of his brother William,
who.had gone
to study theology in Germany, and there
imbibed doubts which withheld him from the Church. Foreseeing the pain which this would occasion his mother,
he had sought counsel from Goethe, who received him
own preference for the concrete over the abstract, recommended him rather to conceal sympathetically, and, true to his
his scruples than grieve his kindred. ever,
had the mastery
in William's
Conscience, how-
mind, and he forsook
•
EMERSON.
41
theology for law, rising ultimately to the judicial bench.
Some
congregation lost something,
cousin George, William ever
Upon
heard.
for,
Emerson had he
return
his
according to his
the sweetest voice
Chelmsford to discuss the matter with him. sad," says
for I
did."
it
at
" I was very
knew how it would grieve my The more reason, then, that he
Emerson, "
mother, and
Waldo
visited
himself should adhere to the path she had wished, and
he had chosen.
Though unable Emerson had
to join the regular class at Cambridge,
occasionally attended
lectures,
and the
convinced of his worth and seriousness, and
authorities,
perhaps recognizing his hereditary claim to ordination,
were content to dispense with any considerable acquaint-
ance with technical
If they
divinity.
had examined him,
he said afterwards, his licence would assuredly have been " Approbated to preach " by the Middlesex
refused.
"
Association of Ministers on October lo, 1826, he delivered his
The
first
discourse at Walthain five days afterwards.
with
whom
constitution
he had worked when
by
.
by the remark of a labourer
subject was suggested
in
rustic toil
striving to fortify his
the preceding year
—" a
Methodist, who, though" ignorant and rude, had some deep
He
thoughts.
and that
all
this saying,
said to
me
that
men
prayers were granted.
and wrote
my
which the divisions were
first
(i)
were always praying,' I meditated
Men
are always praying;
(2) All their prayers are granted; (3)
then,
what we ask."
much on
sermon therefrom; of
We
must beware,
Emerson could hardly have begun
his career as a public teacher
more
characteristically
than
by the unfolding of so deep a truth so sheathed in apparent
LIFE OF
42 paradox': nor was
himself to waive at the very-
less like
it
own academical claims in favour of the simple wisdom of one " taught of the Spirit."
outset his
A
month
shortly
later,
brother Edward's
his
after
from Europe, in improved health, but with a
return
burden of debt contracted to defray the expenses of his tour,
which preyed upon
eventually broke
by a recurrence of stay at Charleston,
his chest complaint.
he journeyed on
ancient,
fortified,
population of twelve hundred was
Americans
between
destiny
as
retinues
of blacks.
;
"An
" The
unequally
their
fulfilling
and
ofiSce-holders,
and
States,
sand-bank of a town,"
dilapidated
divided
offices
United
more Spanish than Anglo-American.
far
whose
After a short
to St. Augustine, in
Florida, but recently acquired by the still
and
his sensitive conscience,
him down, Emerson was driven south
manifest
Spanish families
Americans
live
the Spaniards keep bilUard tables
;
on
or,
with their
if
not,
they send their negroes to the mud- to bring oysters, or to the shore to bring
mask, and dance.
a
man was
at
fish,
It
work
and the
in
the public square,
family turned out to see him.
and
rest of the
time fiddle,
was reported in the morning that
I stroll
and
all
drive a green orange over the sand with a stick."
ment was
in the
assisted
mild
by some
system of slavery, and by foreigner
air,
he had known
and
his
He
Health came
could not have been better employed.
back gradually
our
on the sea-beach,
mental develop-
practical insight into the
acquaintance with the
intimately, a
type to any he had yet encountered.
man
first
of a different
This was no other
than Achille Murat, son of King Joachim and nephew
EMERSON.
43 "
of Napoleon, at that time a planter at Tallahassee.
man
philosopher, a scholar, a
of the world
A
very scep-
;
but very candid, and an ardent lover of truth."
tical,
Emerson accompanied him
and they
to his plantation,
were fellow passengers on ship-board back to Charleston.
He
reached
the
way
New
in June, stopping
York.
The
and
interests
duties
aspirations satile
home
;
and preaching on
and
at Charlestcn, Washingtoi), Philadelphia,
he
abstraction from purely professional
had
had become more at times,
felt
His
certainly benefited him.
he
more
varied, his tastes
might become a novelist or a poet
ver-
aunt, as though
tells his
he
he even experienced
;
spasmodic yearnings to be a painter. These growth-pains of genius did not perturb his demeanour; he was
regarded as a
exact in keeping
than his
young man, rather
staid
brilliant
his
diary,
and
less
far
His
brother Edward.
"
tom," he
said, " against
no regard
to
always from
Owe no
promising
originality
mainly manifested in the decision of his
preached independence.
the
your private judgment."
simplest
he apparently
fit,
He
comported himself
felt
But
motive."
no
"
while
Spiritualist
a vegetarian.
His one
deliberately shut
my
Have thus if
he
with them.
young ministers; he
nor a Free Lover, nor even
eccentricity could
without attracting attention.
me,
call to quarrel
like other
was neither a
on
He
conformity to cus-
the influence of your example, but act
saw
in
was
ethics.
asserting his right to disregard social conventions
humour
still
pedantically
" It
is
be indulged
a peculiarity of
my strong propensity for strolling. I up my books in a cloudy July noon, put
old clothes and old hat, and slink away to the
;
LIFE OF
44
whortleberry bushes, and tion into a
little
with the greatest satisfac-
slip
cow-path, where I
am
sure I can defy
This point gained, I solace myself for
observation.
hours with picking blueberries and other trash of the
woods,
far
from fame behind the birch
enjoy hours as I do these.
I
trees.
remember them
I
seldom
in winter
do not know a creature that
I expect
them
I think
has the same humour, or would think
in spring.
The
spectable."
I
impressions thus
be given back in due season.
re-
it
imbibed were to
Emerson's best
writ-
ings are the breathings of a soul saturated with sylvan influences.
For nearly a year Emerson continued a student Divinity Hall, " his health the
same stupid
always had been," "treading on eggs constitution," "lingering
monument and more his
been a model.
ness of the invalid.
a man."
He
less
In what may be things,,
had nothing of the peevish-
" I court laughing persons,
and
a merry or only a gossiping hour, when the talk has
after
been mere soap-bubbles,
mouse book." "
like
moral regimen, he seems, as in most
termed to have
less
The happy consequence was
he reports himself as "looking
that in April, 1828,
it
to strengthen his
on system, writing something
than a sermon a month."
like a
at
riddle that
in
my
He
chest,
am
I
have
at ease,
lost all
sense of the
and can take
my pen
or
adds that he has just refused the third
Church Applicant
"
wanting him to preach as a candi-
date.
The
easy stream of his
life
was soon to be
painful, almost a tragic event.
who
Waldo, the
ruffled
dutiful
followed the career desired by his mother,
by a
youth
who had
"
EMERSON. never been overtaken in a uneasiness to those
who
fault or
45
had given a moment's
loved him, save from the weak-
ness of his health, was in that day regarded rather as the
example than the hope of
He
his family.
had
not, like
William, strayed even beyond the ample limits of Unitarian orthodoxy
nigh akin to
;
nor had he exhibited the
instability,
of his
brilliant
versatility,
brother Edward.
But the family pride and hope were concentrated on the latter.
" Born for success/' writes Waldo,
"
With grace
to win,
He
seemed,
with heart to hold.
With shining gifts that took all eyes. With budding power in college halls.
As pledged in coming days to forge Weapons to guard the State, or scourge Tyrants despite their guards or walls.
This glowing estimate was confirmed by the judgment of " There was no presage," writes Dr.
impartial observers.
Hedge,
seemed
" of Emerson's future greatness. faint in
His promise
comparison with the wondrous brilliancy
of his younger brother,
Edward
Bliss
Emerson, whose
immense expectation was doomed never " Refinement of thought
and
to
be
fulfilled."
selectness in the use of
language," were indeed notable in Waldo, but only so far as "to give promise of an interesting preacher to culti-
vated hearers."
had been
He
But Edward Emerson's college career*
as brilliant as Waldo's
appeared marked
magnetic
spell, still
had been the
for a leader of
reverse.
men, and exerted a
potent after sixty years with the few^
who remember him.
"
Oh
what a teacher Edward Bliss
LIFE OF
46
Emerson was
God to
!
" A gift of A model of manly beauty ofthe
" exclaims Mr. Harrington.
those he taught.
highest type in form
and
Immaculate purity of
feature.
soul, intellectual greatness, exquisite refinement of feeling
and tenderest
sensibility,
were
Had
wonderful attractions.
Charles been spared beyond
all
engaged
in limning its
Edward and
the lives of early
son name would have been
still
manhood, the Emer-
more
often spoken."
This treasure had been confided to an earthen vessel.
Edward's constitution was as delicate as Waldo's, but while the latter was screened by a
ment, inasmuch
mend him
he said
as
his shell with pearl,"
His
him.
health, as has
" he could
strain
was too great
for
been seen, had already broken Returning from Europe, as he
in school-keeping.
fondly
pensive tempera-
himself,
Edward's genius summoned
The
to external activity.
down
'
that,
deemed with renovated
strength,
he had conse-
crated himself with the devotion of a Walter Scott to the task of freeing himself from his pecuniary obligations.
In pursuance of
ment at .
after
this
end he had
tried
another without success, and the
one employfret
of failure
length wore out not only the bodj', but the mind.
In June, 1828, Emerson was hastily brother,
who
" had fainting
been strangely affected in
fits
his
and
mind
summoned delirium,
for
to his
and had
a fortnight."
A
delusive improvement was succeeded by a state of violent
derangement.
" There he lay
learned, eloquent, strong
was temporary.
boy
— Edward,
;
The paroxysm
Edward recovered and
reason, but his health never returned.
broken
the admired,
—a maniac."
retained his
His wing was
he sought the West Indies, and
there, during
EMERSON.
47
the brief respite thus snatched from the grave, the youth
who might have been
the foremost citizen of his state,
Pondering over
lived obscurely as a commercial clerk.
Emerson became almost thankful
this tragedy,
own
which he came
defects,
for his
"
to regard as ballast.
My
manner," he says, with the exaggeration of self-reproach, "
is
sluggish,
my
speech sometimes flippant, sometimes
embarrassed and ragged ;
My
are of a passive kind. preternatural energy."
my
actions
Hence Emerson
say so)
arrived at the
comfortable conclusion that, having so lose,
may
I
(if
brother lived and acted with
little
His
he need not be afraid of losing any.
nificance was to protect him.
"
Do
mind
to
insig-
you think," said the
old Irish retainer to the new-comers, " that the Banshee would wail for the likes of ye 2 " Prosperity depression.
was
clear,
and love joined hands If
he thought
did not.
riieanly
to
lift
him from
of himself,
this
others,
it •
In the autumn of 1828, the pulpit ot
the Second Church, one of the most important in Boston,
seemed
likely to
Emerson was
be vacant by the
invited to
fill
it
illness
Henry Ware.
of
during the pastor's illness
,
:
but a report got abroad that Mr. Ware, upon his recovery,
would
accept a
and Emerson, with
professorship
Cambridge,
at
refined sensitiveness, scrupled at the
j
advantage which occupation of the pulpit would have given
him over other
start
fair.
"If
I
candidates.
am
settled,"
He he
thought
said,
should not be because I have kept a better being heard."
Mr. Ware did not
resign,
all
should
"I choose
it
man from
but accepted
a colleague, and early in 1829 Emerson was elected by' seventy-four
out of seventy-nine votes.
Within a
'.v
,
LIFE OF
48
few weeks Ware found
necessary to seek health in
it
Europe, and Emerson became sole incumbent.
no doubt exceedingly welcome the
to
him
to
was
It
have been spared
usual ordeal of competitive oratory: and another
circumstance had probably weight in determining him to accept a position for
fested but
little
which he had previously mani-
On December
eagerness.
24, 1828,
informed his brother William that he had been
for a
he
week
engaged to Ellen Tucker, a young lady of seventeen,
Boston merchant,
daughter of a deceased
Concord with her mother and
living
He
stepfather.
at
had been
smitten with her a year before, but " thought I had got
over my blushes and my wishes."
he wrote afterwards, " in
me
disappointed as she
became
of
and
life
all
all
" I saw Ellen at once,"
her beauty, and she never
Ellen Emerson,
except in her death.''
in September, 1829, faded so quickly out
memories but her husband's, that
little
seems to be known of her beyond her remarkable beauty, her
fatal delicacy
of constitution, and her buoyant
spirit.
Within a month of her engagement she made Emerson miserable by spitting blood. usual,
much
left
seen that
it
how excellent a piece
tell
with
all
her
talk gravely only
of her
little
We
apparent ground for hope.
have
:
" Ellen
is
mending
'T would take more time than I can spare
day by day.
much
deceptive malady, as
did not prevent their union eight months
In February he wrote
afterwards.
to
The
ails,
and
of work she
loses
no
She trifles so
is.
jot of spirits, that
when asunder." She wrote
verse
;
we
one
poems, preserved in " The Dial," seems to
imply acquaintance with Goethe
:
and
to her,
time, were addressed these charming verses
:
about
this
:
EMERSON. " Thine
eyes
I lonely
As
I
still
shined for me, though far
roved the land or sea
behold yon evening
Which
I
climbed the misty
And roamed
before
the deep-eyed
dew
his side of ilame
I
read thy name."
seems almost needful to the
It
Atlantic, that
rately rejected. oiifice
Emerson was
fit
and knew himself
of teacher by public speech
recognized his incapacity for
it
tensible reason for declining
it.
He
and had the Kirk of Scotland been Church of
pastoral office.
New England
indispensable
To
fit
denounced
his os-
his
willingly
gregation,
always to
as liberal as the
Uni-
he would soon have
Emerson's apprehension, on the other :
he
have spent his life in the service of a con-
them the highest thing he knew, and
form his practice in right
" ;
accompaniments of the
however humble, could he but have had tell
own
and play acting
hand, ministerial duty presented nothing distasteful
would
for
Carlyle must have
even independently of the
lecturing as " a mixture of prophecy
the
:
and confession which formed
restraints of creed
chafed at
he should have
which Carlyle as delibe-
deliberately chosen the calling
tarian
of the
full exhibition
between Emerson and his great compeer and
complement beyond the
the
;
the rosebud ripened to the rose,
In both
contrast
my path,
I
the redbird spread his sable wing,
And showed
When
hill,
the pastures through
How danced thy form When
:
star,
yet beholds not me.
This morn
Amid
49
and duty of
all
respects with his ideal.
free inquiry,
4
liberty
to con-
The
sometimes as passionately
;
LIFE OF
so .asserted as
to
him
•career
though they needed demonstration, appeared
self-evident
but at the outset of his ministerial
:
he could not know that he would be carried beyond
the latitude accorded by the most tolerant of churches
be foresee that
nor, even in this case, could
would refuse new."
He
him " to
to follow
fresh
his flock
woods and pastures
began, therefore, with perfect sincerity, in a
thoroughly hopeful
spirit,
holding out, in thei manifesto
which in compliance with usage he addressed to ;gregation in his
his con-
sermons, no promise of any novelty
first
except the freer use of familiar language and homely tration.,
"I
men would manner Jiar,
in
every
illus-
said to myself," he tells his aunt, "that if
avoid that general language and general
which they
strive
man would be
record of his ministry
lies
to hide all that is pecu-
The
interesting."
written
before his literary executor,
Mr. Gabot, in one hundred and seventy-one manuscript
In deference to
sermons.
his
own wish they
are with-
held from the press, but Mr. Cabot gives a general
account of
According to
their characteristics.
are mainly remarkable originality of
for the
There
thought or phrase.
is
clear,
and
earnest,
Kjuence of thought
is
Mr. Cabot does not
direct.
they
no endeavour
vogue ; and
after the rhetorical effectiveness then in is
this
absence of any special
Whether the
alt
logical se-
better observed than in the Essays, tell us.
As the
preacher's
mind
ripened his individuality became more distinct, but so long as he occupied the pulpit his ideas were presented in Scriptural language, as if they belonged to the
.accepted doctrine.
,new truth out
of,
body of
A specimen of this method of reading
and
into,
an old
text, is
afforded by the
EMERSON.
who heard Emerson preach on
reminiscence of a hearer "
What
lose his
a rnan profited
is
own
51
if
he gain the whole world and
The main emphasis was on
soul ? "
word " own," and the general theme was
man
the great
end of existence was the preservation and
One can
culture of his individual
mind and
understand from
remark of another hearer
this the
looking back on his preaching
character.
politician, he' opened his
the anti-slavery agitation
many
prove what to that there
is
mannei
as to
His
;-
he belonged
;
public bodies and took part in public
no
" In
like a clearer revelation."
not showy, was substantial
if
:
he has impressed
I find
truths to ÂŤ[hi'ch I always assented, in such a
jnake them appear new, popularity,
the
that to every
affairs
church to the
and seemed
first
j
to
though
movers
in
way
to
in a fair
seems doubtful,
so-called liberals
no incompatibility between independent
thought and the public ministrations of
religion.
If his
discourse could not impress the world like Carlyle's, as a
.sudden vent for impassioned feelings, the silent accumulation of
many
years of fierce inward conflict, he could
hold religion up to
men
quil but intense flame
He
as a serene
lamp
which burned
lit
in his
at the tran-
own
bosoih.
could and did avoid the great stumbling-block of the
teacher by the touch of genius which redeems familiar truth from platitude
and commonplace, and, according
to a happy definition, presents religion not merely as morality, but as morality touched with emotion. •duties of pastoral visitation efficient
;
and here indeed
he seems
it is
In the
to have been
less
easy to conceive that nice
refinement and respect for the sacredness of other men's convictions
may sometimes
prove a disqualification, and
LIFE OF
52 that
"
obtrusiveness
Young man,"
may be a
condition
success.
said a spiritual patient, scandalized at not
being treated secundum artem, "
if
you don't know your
you had better go home.''
business,
of
It is characteristic
of his deep humanity, and his aversion to fuss and com-
monplace, that he appeared to least advantage at a funeral.
A professional observer,
a sexton, remarked that on such
To
occasions " he did not seem to be at ease at alL tell
my
the truth, in
Emerson was soon
born to be a minister."
need of such stronger but,
young man was not
opinion, that
to feel the
qualifications as ministers of less refined but
mould bring
though defeat
to bear
upon
for lack of
victory as they could have given
their congregations
them was
bitter,
:
such
would not have been
valued by him.
Ere the coming of that day, however, Emerson had to bear a far heavier calamity.
His marriage, obedient to the
dictates of affection, had set at nought those of physical
Even
prudence.
in
the
flush of triumphant love
first
he had been conscious of the coming shadow. God," he had
written,
comtnon order of I
"make me an
his dealings,
" Will
exception to the
which equalises destinies ?
cannot find in the world any antidote, any bulwark
against this fear like this, the frank
my race,
to
pay a
acknowledgment of
am called, after the way of fatal tax for my good, I may appeal to the
unbounded dependence.
If I
sentiment of collected anticipation with which tide turn
west."
and the winds blow
softly
His forebodings were speedily
winter of their marriage
it
I
saw the
from the favouring fulfilled.
In the
first
was necessary to take Ellen to
the south, and as he was meditating a second journey the
EMERSON.
53
plan was frustrated by her rapid decline, terminating in
death in February,
1831.
She had been
as
him "a
to
bright revelation of the best nature of woman,"
Reserved
he was in the expression of personal emotion,
diary
is
his
long afterwards chequered with cries of sorrow in
prose and verse
and
;
Europe he
until his departure for
daily sought her grave.
The
year following his bereavement (1832) was to see
Emerson widowed It
also of his spiritual bride, his church.
was not a divorce on account of incompatibility.
There
is
nothing to show that he
in the clerical habit, of
himself for
some time
felt
the least uneasiness
which indeed he did not divest
But
afterwards.
it
was a necessary
condition of his ministry that he should be at liberty to follow his
own
highest conceptions
if
;
these clashed with
the requirements of his congregation, their connection
could no longer endure.
The cause
independence
characteristic of his
which nine-tenths of those who have tolerated
as
harmless.
of difference was related to a rite
it
:
felt
with him would
Religious
persons
may
from one point of view be distinguished according as they do or do not feel the need of external ceremonies in
To
worship.
vestments,
some,
painting,
music,
seem the appropriate apparel of
to others, they are an impertinence, almost
Which temper
;
but as a matter of fact
religion;
an offence.
represents the higher conception
be discussed here
gorgeous
it
need not is
certain
that while the ancient religions blazed with ritual splen-
dour, the founders of
more
striven to reduce this to a
spiritual
creeds have always
minimum, and none more so
than the Founder of Christianity.
The
only two rites to
'
;
LIFE OF
54
which he gave
his sanction
might be deemed to represent ;
but a germ'
No
church, pro-
the ne plus ultra of ceremonial simpHcity
remained, prolific in strange growths.
was
bably,
obnoxious
less
than
sacramentalism
to
Emerson's ; but he could not be content so long as the pure simplicity of worship was, in his view, desecrated by
any material contact.
He
easily
persuaded himself that
the Lord's Supper had not been designed as a permanent institution; but let the contrary still
adopt
I
it.
my
it
was
remembrances of him should be
ing, religious.
way of
the free
I should not
should choose other ways which, as more
upon me, he would approve more. For I choose
effectual
that
be conceded, and he was
ready to add, " If I believed that
of respect, as
pleasing, affect-
I will loye
him
friendship,
and not pay him a
men do
to
as a glorified frienVl, after
them whopi they
stiff
sign
fear."
He
went on to protest that he was not " so foolish as to declaim against forms.
Forms
are as essential as bodies
but to exalt particular forms, to adhere to one form a
moment
after
it
is
outgrown,
is
unreasonable, and
Here was
alien to the spirit of Christ."
it
is
the question in
a nut-shell, as respected Emerson's connection with his congregation. had, but
He
had they ?
had outgrown the form, 6r thought he It quickly
were unintelligible to them. that they
no more wished him
appeared that his scruples It
to
was equally apparent
go than he wished to be
Compromises were suggested, but proved imprac-
gone. ticable.
He
would have remained
if
the material ele-
ments could have been dispensed with, and the service
made de,al
purely commemorative.
They would have
let
him
with the symbols as he pleased, provided that they
'
EMERSON. He retreated
were retained.
55-
ponder
into the country to
over the matter, while rumours of his mental derange-
ment went abroad. refute
much
:
These he did not condescend
he replied that
for points of form,
his punctilious-
ness was rather for his people than himself.
go habitually to an
" It
(Sept. gth) " to
my
do nothing which
Having
heart.
have no
said
this,
want of sympathy with
The
Emerson
is
am
please
still
my I
all.
content that
men and
good
it
please-
produces."
it
not exempt from a certaini
was, indeed, pained
and mortified
;;
his people with him,
and
considering himself as a clergyman,
felt
he had hoped to have carried though
said,.
I ain only stating"
;
I shall rejoice in all the
dignity of this farewell
soreness.
if it
he
his resignation.
have said
I
I
it.
stand to the end of the world,
desire,"
cannot do with
I
hostility to this institution
Heaven, and
my
is
which he announced
in the address in
"I cannot
'
which they esteem holiest
institution
with indifference or dislike."
whole
to-
but to his friends, urging him not to stickle pver-
thenceforward something of " a grudge against preaching."
He
could not conceal from himself that the pas-
toral career to
had been a
which everything had seemed to
failure
:
nor could
necessary and invaluable stage
development. letter
the
it it
invite hirre
then be seen what a ha(J
been
in his own.
" I look back," he said in his farewell
of Dec. 22nd, "with a painful sense of weakness
little
service I
expectation on
to-
have been able to render after so much
my
part.''
But the springs of hope and
energy were not destroyed.
" Shall I pester you," he-
wrote to his brother William, "with half the projectsthat sprout
and bloom
in
my
head, of action, literature.
LrpE OF EMERSON.
66 philosopliy ? " health,
and
Actbti, however,
imperatively requires
which cannot well be spared even by
Emenon's
philosophy.
vitality
was
at the
he had never got over hi domestic sorrow himself quite resist a
"
tion.
When
a
Km
;
he could not
of discouragement,
fieling
to those about
seemed
;
literature
time low
and
to
have mistaken his voca-
man wouU be
a reformer he needs to
be strong," wrote his more vugnacious brother Charles. " The disappointment growsupon me as I go Sunday after
Sunday and hear ordinal preachers, and remember
-what a torch of kindling eloq\=nce has
in such an
on a vigorous
step.
and change with " but
real vision of
duce
Emerson determined had tbught of seeking repose
his brother Edvi.rd in the
Naples
dream hanged
and
December
He
Italy.
affectionate farewell to
fortunate hour, brig
He
in a few hours the
letter of
been snuffed out
insignificant fashioi"
25,
1,
West
Indies,
into a purpu-
wrote a
final
people, and in a
183; embarked in
the
yasper, bound with a cargo o-West Indian profor
February.
Malta, where
she
arrivedon
the
2nd of
CHAPTER
EMERSON'S brief
Lehrja'kre
III.
now
were
Wanderjahr was about
over,
to begin.
and
He
his
had
passed through the only episode in his hfe which in the least
savoured of spiritual
so far as
it
belonged at
Even
crisis.
all
was purely accidental and external.
happened but
for others
been arrested or his original line.
his
;
dijverted;
He
this character, in
to his resignation of his charge,
need not have
It
own development had never he had travelled quietly on
had ever followed wisdom
follows an art or science
:
it
him " to adore what he had burned, and he had adored," than
as
was no more a requisite
young
for the
one for
to burn what
artist at a
given
period of his career to burn his pencils, or for the young
astronomer to shatter his telescope.
If he
had been
taxed with the lack of such experience as befell Paul on the road to Damascus, he might have replied with Paul
on another occasion, " like
Shelley,
I
was born
free."
He
had
not,
prematurely taken up ground which he
found hirnself unable to maintain
;
nor had he, like New-
man, surrendered himself to a current whose inevitable direction he long mistook.
only a
mind
new atmosphere as
had
He
ij<ieded
no conversion,
to foster such tendencies of his
failed to receive
J
due nutriment
at
home.
UFE OF 58 ''aves its o'pposite
Yet, as every nature
crk
and cortiplement.
was to seek the one object of the serenLf Paul, Luther, and Wesley, the
modern
optimist's travel
representative cLrred antagonist
victorious but sorely sclj^lyle, lasting writer's first
No "—Thomas name
American to receive
The
i^
as
revelation,
V^yr, generally appears upon
hero, unless also a maVs;urope
the scene at the right time, in
which an
of the "Ever-
early writings, the
CaU,^,n^ Emerson had been the
unknS
as yet
whose
is^
was just in the state
would have
igitiyg visitor
intellectually inqu-^Us
were being tried every-
Experimeni",f standing still. Peace where, including the experiment O.^ye for one local civil
desired to find her.
reigned in every European land, ^i^er was undermined war, but the existing political oAhj Russia, and hostile
everywhere except in England am fiercely in the world tendencies had never clashed more i^„ creed in theory Liberalism was the ruli^g^ j(. jjj practice of thought.
•
,
even among
the statesmen
who
resisKigji^ig
but a formidable re-action was already lectual sphere.
old
Newman
was
^0
striving
1.
Church with Anglicanism, Lamennaia
i^tel-
jjj j-jjg
reconcile the ^j^j^ socialism,
fashion- the
Medieval architecture was coming inta\ century were artistic and literary ideals of the preceding g Romantic falling
into
disrepute.
The Goths
of
tlV
traditional
school had for the time overwhelmed theVj^g^ classicalism of the Latin nations.
European
literatures
;
Byron was
-^^
Scott reigV^g^
still
a great
p!, jq
.
^^
^^
come
seed sown by Shelley and Keats was beginnin4^j.|.jj ^^^ up, though their naiftes, like those of WordswiL^j
^^^
Coleridge, were as yet
America.
Hegel had
only heard in
EnglaN
just repeated the feat
,^
an
^^
EMERSON. failure of Jonathan
59
Edwards in constructing a system which Goethe had done
none could refute and few could receive.
more
for
European thought by impregnating
it
with those
germs of an evolutionary doctrine which afforded a ground to the savants of
battle-
gave the idea
Paris, while Lyell
of geological uniformity scientific shape in England, and
Darwin yet geologized
above the horizon, and
just
On
the whole,
more
till
Steam was
South America.
in
below
electricity just
the leadings of Providence
evident, the intellectual condition of society
have appeared
splendidly anarchical
an
;
it.
became must
impression
which could but be confirmed by the extraordinary mortality which
had
recently taken pla.ce '
sovereigns of thought.
'
Les dieux
among the
s'en vont," said
Heine,
Within a year death had removed Goethe, Scott, Hegel, Chateaubriand had retired from
Bentham, and Cuvier. active
life,
and Coleridge was
A
world.
Hugos and
shortly to retire
made
great void was thus Carlyles of the age,
and
from the
for the Titanic
its
as yet obscure
Comtes and Emersons. In the
first letter
home from Europe, Emer-
he wrote
son described the purpose of his journey as being "to find
new
affinities
between
said
afterwards,
and
nrie
and scenery were subordinate
my
objects.
Art
" I collected," he
nor
cameo,
"neither
fellow men.''
painting,
nor
medallion; but I valued much, as I went on, the growing pictures which the ages
surveyed."
had painted and
When, having
I
reverently
crossed from Malta into
he finds himself at Syracuse,
he
is
Sicily,
disappointed that
"there was scarce anything that speaks of Hiero,
Timoleon, or Dion.
Yet
I
am
or
glad to be where they
LIFE OF
60
have been, and to hear the bees, and pick beautiful wild flowers only three or four miles from the fountain Cyane."
"
How
evanescent and superficial," he exclaims when in
Rome,
"
places,'
which
is
most of that emotion which names and
me
yields in
companion
magnificence, can awaken
or
art
Yet he admired works of
inspires."
though reversing the displaying
more
It
!
which the most ordinary
to the interest
art,
ordinary practice by
traveller's
discrimination- than enthtisiasm.
The
churches struck him particularly, and he was impressed of the esthetic element
with the value
of which hÂŤ had had no
in
religion,
He
previous experience.
was equally surprised that the Americans who had entered European churches should submit to such edifices at
home
be unable
to " devise ceremonies in as
and
;
that Italians
and
taste as their churches
sum
total of his impressions,
same
as
defective
pictures
the eye what dancing
is
their side should
good and manly
The much the
and music."
however, came to
he afterwards delivered Essay on Art:
on
mean
in his
suggestive but
"Painting
seems to
to the limbs.
When
be to
that has
educated the frame to self-possession, to nimbleness, to grace,
the steps
gotten."
of the dancing-master are better for-
The one
thing he really valued abroad was to
be able " to recognize the same masks, and to hear the same
me
in Italian I
want
is
interesting."
whom
was wont to hear
that I never
The
man under in English.
to
My greatest
meet with men who are great or
first
exception he mentions
he sought out with an
many Englishmen
a thousand
commandment spoken
of that day.
is
Landor,
instinct not granted to
Emerson found him
EMERSON.
61
" living in a cloud of pictures at his Villa Gherardesca,"
and though he could not deem Lander's
real conversation
equal to his imaginary ones, he was able to say "
He
has
a wonderful brain, despotic, violent, inexhaustible, meant for a soldier,
by chance converted
He
to letters."
after-
wards, before reaching England, pronounces Landor one
of the two
men
in
Europe
to
say something in earnest.
whom he had been
able to
This was written in Paris,
where he had arrived on June 20th,
after
a flying
visit to
Venice, " a^ityjbr_bgai£rs," and Geneva, where he only visited Voltaire's chateau
under
New
protest.
England
thought had travelled a long way since Franklin brought his
grandson to be blessed by the Patriarch of Ferney.
Paris was pronounced
York
by Emerson " a loud modern
of a place," but, at the
pitable of cities."
He
same
time, " the
New
most hos-
was in London by July
21st,
meeting Mill, whom he does not seem to have appreciated,
and Bowring, who showed him over the house of Jeremy Bentham.
A
more memorable
a spectacle than a conversation
Henry Taylor,
" to
show him
interview, " " (" I
though rather
was glad," says
to Stephen
"),
Sir
was that with
Coleridge, " a short, thick old man, with bright blue eyes « •
and
fine clear complexion, leaning
ridge's conversation
was so
far that
upon
his cane."
of a poet that
obeyed the impulse of any casual incident or
The
sight of a militiaman
him
to the fall of
is
its
Colecourse
allusion.
recorded to have birought
Napoleon by way of the Peninsular
War, and now the aspect of a Unitarian minister led him to declaim against Unitarianism, of
whose
ment he cannot have known much Channing
for a follower of Priestley.
if
One
later develop-
he
really
took
of his remarks,
-
LIFE Of
62
however, was worthy to have " I have
'I'Talk."
for
known
foijind its
way
who
ten persons
one person who loved the true ; but
into " Table-
loved the good
it is
a
far greater
j
j
â&#x20AC;˘I
virtue to love the true for itself alone, than to love the
^ood
for itself alone."
Immediately
deed Emerson was
he alighted
26th)
Carlyle,
was now to meet
at
commanding sense of
for
When
sincerity.''
Craigenputtock and
whose address he had the greatest
discovering,
if in-
he was, in finding the
right, as assuredly
and incessant demand
justice,
an allusion in
complied with Coleridge's standard,
fully
secret'of Carlyle's superiority " in his
{Aug.
as
He
" Nature " shows, by way of York.
one who
Emer-
after his interview with Coleridge
son repaired, to Scotland, passing,
met
difficulty in
he " found him one of the most simple and
frank of men, and became acquainted with him at once.
We walked all
over several miles of
and talked upon
hills,
"That
the great questions that interest us most."
man,"
I don't jiight,
Lord Houghton, " came
Carlyle' said to
know what brought
and then he
didn't go with
him
left us.
him, and I
saw him go up the
it
was
for
them both
hill.
I
I preferred to
watch him mount and vanish hke an angel." nate
me;
we kept him one
him descend.
to see
to see
Most
fortu;
that th^ir meeting lasted so
long and no longer, that there was time to disclose the general unity of spirit and identity of aspiration, and not
time enough for the discovery of the utter antithesis of
temperament, and poipts
of
detail.
other intellectually
the
innumerable discrepancies
They
much
this belief fostered a
parted, each, believing
nearer than he really was
:
in
the
and
sympathy which, by the time that
EMERSON. their differences
63
became undeniably
manifest,
had grown
too strong and habitual to be seriously disturbed by
them.
Carlyle's genius, in fact,
ceived
its
,epic
much under
and dramatic bent
the
is
fully re-
and he was
;
still
bor-
influence of metaphysical ideas
The
rowed from Germany. versation
had not then
report of their
full
not preserved,' but
if
in
con-
comparing notes
they began with their fundamental beliefs, they would travel far before they arrived at their points of disagree-
ment.
Each was a
living organism, not
craftsman.
necessary
Pantheist, seeing in the universe a
something made by an external
Each was a Transcendentalist, indeper^dent
ideas
of
believing in
Each
experience.
Law of Right, independent of utility or expediency. By the time that these points of â&#x20AC;˘contact had been thoroughly established, it may have been in every sense time for Emerson to go., Some passionately asserted a
genuine Carlyleana came out notwithstanding.
Mirabeau
Gibbon was the splendid bridge from
should be a hero.
the old world to the new.
The
great booksellers
had
paid such incredible sums for puffery that they were
on the verge of bankruptcy.
Carlyle
all
had matched
his
An
un-
wits against his pig's, with humiliating results.
finished bit of road was " the grave of the last sixpence.''
Not the
leaist
remarkable feature in the interview was the
perfectly equal footing of
by
ledged
at least
entirely
unknown
him whose genius was acknow-
his visitor,
to fame.
pilgrimage to see Carlyle.
and the thinker as yet ,
Emerson had made a long Carlyle could not have been
expected to go a step out of his way to see Emerson. It
might have seemed inevitable that they should meet
LIFE OF
64 as disciple
and master, but
was not
it
They
so.
on the one
ciated without embarrassment
side,
asso-
or as-
sumption on the other, each feehng the essential point to be not
what a man achieved, but what he was.
Emerson's impressions of Carlyle were
communi-
first
cated to a young Scotchman, destined to eminence as a journalist
and a man of
letters,
but
who
will
even longer remembered as the first European
perhaps be
who
recog-
the age in the American stranger.
nized a light of
Emerson'had come
to
Edinburgh with an introduction
from Bowring to Dr. John Gairdner, a friend of Mr. Alexander Ireland, Ireland,
"was
so
" who,
luckily
much engaged
that he was unable to spare
for
me," says Mr.
in professional duties
a few hours to do the
honours of the Scottish metropolis,'' so his bishopric was taken by another, " and thus
I
became," says Mr.
land, " an entertainer of angels unawares."
had Mr. Ireland " met with any one of so
Ire-
Never before
fine
and varied
A
a culture, and with such frank sincerity of speech. refined
and delicate
so to speak
courtesy, a kind of mental hospitality,
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the like of which, or
anything approaching
to which, I have never encountered
part of his very nature,
walk and conversation."
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;seemed
and inseparable from
The
to
be a
his daily
impression was deepened
when, on August i8th, Mr. Ireland heard him preach
in
the Unitarian church, and remarked the effect produced
notwithstanding the absence of
all
oratorical effort.
" Not
long before this I had listened to a wonderful sermon by Dr. Chalmers, whose force and energy and vehement
eloquence carried for the I
moment
all
before them.
But
must confess that the pregnant thoughts and serene
EMERSON. self-possession of the
charm
for
me
than
65
young Boston minister had a greater
all
the rhetorical splendours of Chal-
In the intervals of sight-seeing Emerson
mers."
coursed of
and
life
Landor and Channing and Montaigne found vent
land's enthusiasm
in
memoranda,
future with which Emerson's discourse
They might
at that
may be
interesting
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; of
Emerson's
had inspired him.
said to have rendered
them almost tame and inadequate."
new
part was so interested in his
premeditation
for
Emerson on
friend as to send
whom
and Wordsworth,
that
:
he accompanied 'me near a mile from
talking vehemently;
imprint his words."
his house,
and ever and anon stopping short to It appears,
report in " English Traits," that
however, from the
fuller
Wordsworth said many
wise things about America, one
among
others
which
long seemed a paradox, that Americans needed a
war to teach the necessity of knitting the stronger.
rating "
Of
he saw on August 25th, he says with
" He was so benevolently anxious to me my social duties as an Americ.in citizen,
gentle sarcasm
impress upon
his
him
from their freshness and un-
his visits to Carlyle
both of w.hom he sought on his way to Liverpool. Wordsworth',
Ire-
what
less of
time have sounded unduly inflated,
but his subsequent career
accountsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; most
and Mr.
;
he had heard than of the anticipations
,"
dis-
Coleridge and Goethe,
literature, of
He
social
civil
ties
solemnized Goethe's birthday by vitupe-
Wilhelm Meister"
:
his criticism is
one of the most
curious examples extant of the inability of the merely ethical
temper to enter into the
observation of
life.
He
had
artist's
relieved his
sympathetic
mind by throw-
ing the book across the room, and, notwithstanding his S
C6
LIFE OF
promise to Emerson,
it
ever picked
it
up
may be doubted whether he The moment was certainly unpro-
again.
pitious for a return to the charge. Wordsworth's eyes
and
grievously inflamed,
was probably merely a second-hand opinion.
this
He
preferred Lucretius to Virgil
whom
almost the only poet to
poetry was
inevitable,
But
;
and yet
and
at first
recollecting that I
self
he was
up
right
and
I
On
to hear."
Emerson
was " near to
had come thus
far to see
the whole Wordsworth "
for his rare elevation
Off his
conformity. value."
But on
own
his beat
made the
mind
;
of one
by general tameness and
beat, his opinions
were of no
he was profound and
told his visitor that " whatever
when he
as
saw
I
was wrong, and gladly gave my-
impression of a narrow and very English
who paid
own
recite his
a poet, and that he was chanting poems to me, that
was
Virgil
he paid the cotnpliment
That Wordsworth should
of translation.
augh.
were
physiognomy was disfigured
Carlyle he thought sometimes insane,
by green goggles. but
his
inspiring,
was didactic
might perish quickly, but whatever combined a truth with
an
affection
was
KnjjKo ie dti,
good to-day and good
for
ever."
At Liverpool, Emerson spent nine days' weather bound, but solaced by the company of Jacob Perkins, the
in-
ventor of the steam gun, who prophesied that the ocean would be navigated by merchant steamers, " but there is
a great deal to be done
first."
Within
five years,
ever, the first steam-ship crossed the Atlahtic.
voyage in a dayยง.
He
sailing
packet occupied one
had time
to
sum up
how-
Emerson's
month and
the results of His
Europe, and question liimself what manner of
five
visit
to
man he
EMERSON.
67
His travel had been of the
was taking back to America.
more than he
highest value to him,
ideas,
Not
quite knew.
mind imbibed new
only had his views expanded and his
but he had profited by detachment from the con-
cerns of a limited community and an isolated church.
Though crude him .
He
before.
committed to paper
in form, his thoughts
on shipboard have a largeness and also
began
liberty not attained
dimly that he might
to feel
have a message to deliver to Europe as well as
The
by
to
America.
wise man, coming to teach, often remains to learn
but sometimes the case
degree
it
is
reversed,
and so
;
in a certain
was with Emerson. "The great men of England,"
he wrote, " are singularly ignorant of
religion.''
This
dictum would have astonished Wordsworth and Coleridge.
Swedenborg met
individuals
who seemed
in the other world with certain
to themselves
to the angels they appeared like
Upon his
arriving in America,
mother
at
dead
comely men, " but horses.''
Emerson went
to live with
Newton, near Boston, and iraniediately
found himself largely in request both as preacher and lecturer.
Disencumbered of every
pendence of of his views
his position
;
special
tie,
the inde-
corresponded to the enlargement
he could speak to
his
former flock like one
emancipated. "
Man
iaegins to hear
the earth, saying that
the celestial host.
a voice that
God
is
I find this
within
fills
the heavens and
him
immediate relation to God, a solution of that oppressed me.
;
that there
amazing revelation of all
is
my
the doubts
I recognize the distinction of the
outer and the inner self; the double consciousness that
'
;
LIFE OF
68
^ithin
it is
me
stronger than I in
any wrong
I repair to takings. â&#x20AC;˘
supreme,
this erring, passionate, mortal self sits a
calm, immortal mind, whose powers I do not
in
it
\
;
my
seems
It
it is
;
wiser than I;
seek counsel of
dangers
it it
I pray to
;
know
but
;
never approved
my doubts in my under-
in it
me
the face which the Creator
this
" increased clearness of the
to
uncovers to his child."
He
concluded that
spiritual sight "
must put an end
to all that
was " tech-
nical, allegorical, parabolical " in religious teaching,
raising
up
These were increased when
groove of his profession. the Quakers of felt
New
Bedford, with whose spirituality he
the deepest sympathy, imbued
merely to
thus
fresh obstacles to his return to the regular
set
him with a
dislike,
not
forms of prayer, but to public prayer of any
kind without prompting from on high.
His views have
been much misrepresented, but he himself well might a child live without
without prayer."
His
said,
"
As
mother's milk as a soul
its
position, however,
was
evidefilly
inconsistent with a stated ministerial charge, and, after
the oifer of a pastorate at this rock,
and, in
New
Emerson, though
fact,
Bedford had struck upon
still
not refusing to preach,
preaching regularly for some years to a small
congregation, seems to have esteemed himself a layman.
He
was now beginning to find
lyceum and
His
lecture-hall.
his proper field in the
first
lectures were scientific.
Without any profound acquaintance with science, he
knew enough raverage
to impart
audience.
elementary information to an
In dealing with higher matters he
showed how immensely
the
man of science
gains by being
— EMERSON. also a
man
the spiritual laws, the
works of nature.
man
nature that
This
all."
"
of thought.
The deeper
more intense
It is
69 a man's insight into
will
be his love of the
the wonaerful charm of external
stands in a central connection with
it
fitted well with the doctrine of evolution,
which, without endeavouring to explain the process, he
assumed
be
to
sufficiently established
Man
is
no upstart
His limbs are only a more exquisite
in the creation.
organization
by the anatomical
"
evidence of gradual development.
— say
rather the finish
— of
the rudimental
forms that have been already sweeping the sea and creeping in the mud./- The brother of his hand
now
even
is
cleaving the Arctic Sea in the fin of the whale,
and
innumerable ages since was pawing the marsh in the flipper of the saurian."
into his
"
Striving to be
view afterwards condensed
man, the worm
Mounts through
But he was
ment
A
memorable couplet
all
the spires of form."
from regarding the progress of develop-
far
as the result of a chance collision of atoms, or a
blind struggle for existence.
With
clear
good sense he
pointed out the iiidications of self-conscious forethought in the universe
— "the preparation
made
for
man
in the
slow and secular changes and melioration of the surface
of the planet
;
his
house
built,
the grounds laid out, the
cellar stocked."
In October, 1834, Edward Emerson, "brother of the brief but blazing star," died in Porto Rico, to the grief of
Waldo and
the intense disappointment of
deep
many
LIFE OF
70
who had regarded
the younger brother as by far the
more
brilliant of the two.
" His from youtH the leader's look
Gave the law which
And
Shamed
that sculptured countenance."
Edward, howeVer, had of Judah fitted
is
him
at
for
others took,
never poor beseeching glance
" Th,e real lion of the tribe
said,
His
home."
gifts
an active than a
appear rather to have
literary life;
only one short
poem, and no written meditation, came of the long decline he
with heroic constancy.
bore
a
Charles,
younger brother of scarcely inferior promise, was engaged to a lady at Concord,
and
perhaps had
this
in leading Mrs. Emerson's uncleâ&#x20AC;&#x17E;the
genarian Dr.
now
its
influence
almost nona-
Ripley, the pastor of the town, to offer
home
Mrs. Emerson and Waldo a
in the
Old Manse,
celebrated by Hawthorne, and which seems to have
had
a genius for growing old, seeing that in Hawthorne's
own day
it
turesque
it
its
late occupant.
Its pic-
given in Mr. Sanborn's paper in
is
They- went there
Monthly.
Scribner's
1834.
was younger than
outline
in October,
Ere long Emerson himself became engaged, and
was necessary to look out for a house of his own.
" dodged the
doom
house in Concord. appear
mean
which justifies
It is
villa that
its
a
mean
place."
in the view published
It
does not
by Mr. Sanborn,
his description of it "as a modest, homelike,
comfortable residence" except for
He
of building, and bought the Coolidge
wooden
may be
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not
unlike,
it
may be added,
material, the half-marine, half-rustic
espied hiding itself in a plantation near
EMERSON.
71
many a quiet English watering-place.
Thffscenery of the
neighbourhood, though not
sufficed a poet of
striking,
Words worthian sympathies who had sat down in the shadow of Etna without
ecstasy,
and mainly sought
he
"to bright eyes a
said,
him what he wanted.
to glean
from
" It might seem,"
Nature " the harvest of a quiet eye."
dull rabbit-warren," .but
gave
it
Hawthorne, coming afterwards to
dwell in the old manse of Dr. Ripley where Emerson had
dwelt before him, has
depicted the landscape
several different points of view,
wrath at the muddiness of the slow
keep
itself clean,"
He
pleasing.
river,
the general impression
his
" too lazy to is
eminently
paints the semicircular sweep of the stream,
looking under certain aspects, for of sky let into the
strip
from
and notwithstanding
meadows, of which
it
earth
impurity, like a
all its ;
the broad,
was the central
line,
peaceful
the bordering
ridges swelling forward or sloping gradually back, with a
white village here and there embowered in lands
Not
its
wood-
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Dutch nature spiritualized by Western influences. away was Walden Pond, the sylvan lake more
far
indissolubly associated with Thoreau's
name than even
with Emerson's,' often as he " Smote the lake
With
And
the beryl
beam
was
eye
flung in pebbles, well to hear
The moment's music which
It
to please hJs
of the broken wave,
natural,
too,
that
they gave."
he should
feel as
a patriot
towards Concord, remembering his descent from founder, ferred
and
that his fellow- townsmen
upon him th6
its,
(who also con-
dignity of hog-reeve) should call
:
LIFE OF
72
upon him
an address on
for
second centennial
their
With simple but
anniversar^^eptember, 1835.
striking
eloquence he discoursed of the heroic passages of the history of Concord, especially the hardships
and renun-
Many were
their wants,
ciations of the original settlers.
The
but more their privileges.
windows of by
light struggled in
oiled paper, but they read the
They were
it.
"
make
fain to
was sweetness and peace amidst
down first
to later times,
he could
of
Their religion
and
toil
audience
his
tell
tears."
Coming
how
organized resistance to the British arms was
about half a mile from
God
use of their knees for a
but their limbs were their own.
table,
Word
through
this spot
;
"
how he
"the.
made
himself had
found within the last few days a narrative of the fight in the handwriting of his grandfather,
then pastor, and
himself a martyr to the cause of independence, and an
an almanack
in that ancestor's handwriting
entry
in
" This
month remarkable
for the greatest
events of the
Speaking of his researches among the
present age."
town records, " which must ever be the fountains of just information respecting your character
he could say
:
"They exhibit
munity almost exclusively
much
a pleasing picture of a com-
agricultural,
where no man has
time for words in his search after things, of a
community of
great simplicity of manners,
manifest love of justice. are luminous
and
These
soiled
electric within.
and of a
and musty books
The
old town-clerks
did not spell very correctly, but they contrive to pretty intelligible the will of a free
On
all
and customs,"
and
just
make
community."
the next anniversary of the Battle of Lexington,
April 19, 1836, the
monument
erected to
commemorate
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
;
EMERSON.
73
the birth of American independence was inaugurated by verses from the pen of Emerson, destined, like the shot
he
be " heard round the world
celebrates, to
" By the rude bridge
"
that arched the flood,
Their flag to April's breeze unfurled.
Here once the embattled farmers
And The
fired the
stood,
shot heard round the world.
foe long since in silence slept
Alike the conqueror silent sleeps
And Time
Down On
this
We
the dark stream which seaward creeps.
green bank, by this soft stream,
set to-day
a votive stone
That memory may
When,
die,
their
;
deed redeem,
Jike our sires, our sons are gone.
Spirit, that
To
;
the ruined bridge has swept
made
those heroes dare
and leave
their children free.
Bid Time and Natilre gently spare
The
Two
shaft
we
raise to
them and
thee.''
days after Emerson's Concord oration, he " drove
over to Plymouth, and was married."
His wife
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Lydia,
or as he chose to call her Lidian, Jackson, sister to Dr.
Charles Jackson, of anaesthetic
nown her
obscurity.
fame^has made
Her modest
figure occasionally
across the background of his public career, letters
from him to her which have found
print reveal both affection
his reflits
and the few
their
way
into
and the assurance of sympathy.
" The soul of failh," was the character he gave her.
had expected to enlarge the house
for the joint
He
occupancy
LIFE OF
74 of Charles
Emerson and
were never needed..
new chambers
his bride, but the
In April, 1836, Emerson went south-
He
ward with Charles, who needed a milder climate.
left
him in New York apparently better, was sharply summoned back, and arrived too late. myself," he exclaims, " for
thought a fond exaggerator. his eyes is
I feel as if
!
my
" I shall have if
I speak of
How much
my own
him I
sorrow to I shall
were very dim."
There
but one opinion as to Charles Emerson's promise,
though he was
less
conspicuously brilliant than Edward.
man
Like Edward, he was rather an orator and a action than a writer
;
" he looked forward,'' says
" to the debates of the senate on great as to his in
be
saw through
first
and native element.
of
Emerson,
political questions,
And
with reason, for
extempore debate his speech was music, and the pre-
cision, the flow,
and
flowers,
and the elegance of
his discourse equally
His memory was a garland of immortal
excellent.
all his
reading
came up
to
him
as he talked."
"After the death of his brothers," says Mr. Cooke,
"Emerson took a much
greater interest in public matters,
feeling that his duties
were increased, and that he must
more
fill
perfectly his place as a citizen."
Emerson's main intellectual occupation during these
two years of domestic enrichment and bereavement was the slow composition of
Nature
He
;
gave
his
epoch-making
tract
on
but he also found time for public discourse. five biographical lectures at
Boston on Michael
Angelo, Luther, Milton, George Fox, and Burke.
on Michael Angelo and Milton a^e extant American Ranav.
in
Those
The North
Emerson himself thought them un-
worthy of pieservation, and he was
right.
They were
EMERSON.
75
no
well adapted for their immediate purpose, but have originality or force.
special
literature delivered in the
Ten
lectures
on English
Masonic Temple, Boston, have
not been printed, but are fully analyzed by Mr. Cabot.
Emerson's connection with the pulpit was resumed time
:
for three years
for
a
he preached regularly to a small
flock at East Lexington
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a
work of necessity on the
showing of one of the sheep, who declared that the simple people laboured under a positive incapacity of understanding any one but Mr. Emerson.
And, in
the
fact,
charge of obscurity so frequently brought against Emerson is
exceedingly unjust as respects individual sentences.
His thought
is
transparent
and almost
casts forth his ice like morsels." is
chillingly clear, "
The obscurity, when
he
there
any, arises from the want of logical sequence in his argu-
ment, and of tone and keeping amid the mass of glittering beauties, not duly subordinate to the general impression.
Emerson was now Prophet.
called
upon
to deal editorially with a
Admiration for Carlyle had made him subscribe
to Fraser as long as " Sartor Resartus " appeared in
it,
and
his critical faculty was thus subjected to the severest test
to
which such
faculty
recognize an entirely failed to respond.
new
It is
tinually verified, that tration
can be exposed in the
summons
order of excellence.
To this he
a remarkable phenomenon, con-
minds of unusual subtlety and pene-
seem to labour under an incapacity for appreciating
the sublime.
The
instrument of such minds often seems
rather the spectroscope which dissects a single
beam
darkened room than the telescope which ranges spac§ from the summit of the mountain.
which
to
finds thoughts too
The
in a
infinite
intellect
deep for tears in the flower
LIFE OF
76
responds with no
agitation to the tempest
of
thrill
j
the perception which detects the microscopic though real beauties of a Clough cannot see the splendour which invests
heaven and earth in the verse of a Shelley.
Emerson's was such a mind
was
upon him
lost
and
;
the sublimity of "Sartor"
:
that other defect in his mental
constitution, which, while allowing
grammatic humour,
left
him
him a vein of
epi-
insensible to the glorious
mirth of an Aristophanes or a Dickens, abolished for greatness in " Sartor,"
him the second element of humour.
Emerson
appreciated, but
"
him.
trials to
and
philosophical truth remained,
Its
O
tlie
Carlyle
" the merit Of glass
!
"
form and
were sore
style
he exclaims
its
this
in his diary,
not to be seen, but to be seen
is
through; but every crystal and lamina of the Carlyle glass
A
shows.''
" Sartor
"
had been
Men
capacity. lyle are
on
they blame
to
criticism,
make
of poetical
Le Baron Russell
atlantic edition,
things plain to the
gifts like
meanest
Emerson and Car-
it is
wands blossom in
only
when
their hands.
deemed by the
superfluously apologetic
own
rule " to
whole heart."
book in
loco parentis
;
but he
and when first
trans-
preface.
enthusiastic timid
felt
do nothing which
His
and
that he was breaking I
cannot do with
my
Soon The North American Review came
to the rescue,
and Emerson could report
have quite
my plume
lost
;
defrayed the cost of the
Emerson contributed the
introduction was
his
purpose of
the importer of the only copy in America, he never-
theless stood towards the
Dr.
the
as with Swedenborg's angels,
they affirm a truth that their
As
if
ground when they admire than when
safer :
sound
to Carlyle, " I
as your harbinger."
EMERSON. Emerson turned
After editing "Sartor"
own
the publication of his
77
gospel.
His
tract
seriously to
on " Nature,"
the most intense and quintessential of his writings, and the in
first
which he came forward teaching as one having
authority,
seems
he took up
^
pleted
till
to
have been commenced even before
his residence at Concord, but
August, 1836.
ing monthj without at
It
attracting
first
was not com-
was published in the follow-
much
attention.
It
proved, however, a seed implanted in a fissure of the
crumbling
New England
theology,
whose unnoticed
pansion had force enough to shatter the whole
By
its
conception
or peculiar to
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;not
him
of course original with Emerson
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;of external
tion of the Divine Mind,
controversies which
and
ex-
fabric.
it
J.
Nature as an incarna-
utterly abolished
had agitated the
most of the
intellect of
America,
up the philosophy of Jonathan
in particular caught
Edwards, that masterpiece of earthly reasoning, into a
The now appeared
heaven of which Edwards had never dreamed. rigid
despotism of an extra-mundane ruler
the free agency of an indwelling power wit'hout infringing a single
moral
rule,
of the Unitarians was transfigured and hardly
knew
itself.
:
the
and stiff
similarly,
morality
glorified until
were by.no means confounded
;
the former was recognized
as the infinite cause, the. latter as the infinite effect
though a cause without an able, the formal duality
substantial unity.
it
At the same time God and Nature
is
Man
:
and
effect is certainly inconceiv-
made
not less clear than the
was represented as the
inter-
mediate phase of being, tending upwards or downwards, according as he inclines to Divine freedom or natural necessity.
To
quote Mr. Cabot's analysis, " regarded as
(
.
LIFE OF
78 part of nature, he
temperament,
is
the victim of his environment
simply a part of nature, not mere
When
shares the cause.
t
inspiration,
disobedient, if he
is,
obedience, the inward ruin us.
When we
When we
man
a
man
persist in dis-
reflected in the World about
is
Evil, then,
seen.''
may be
regarded as
pays for being above Nature
Emerson could not deem
this as
he was necessarily an optimist maintaining that,
much
as
we
should be wiorse off without l)ut
As
is
he
yield to the remedial force of spirit, then
no more
evil is
the price
he
If
in himself,
and incomprehensible.
so he sees aufl so he does.
not
Divine
his will to the
in the finite.
would be something
finds all things hostile
is
effect, but, potentially,
he submits
he becomes a creator
of race,
:
But man
sex, climate, organization.
and as
to the extent, at least, of suffer
it.
;
by any means too high,
evil, we we should be
from moral
Without
a part of the machinery of Nature
;
it
existence
its
is
a
proof of our liberty, which involves the liberty to rise "
As when the summer comes from the
superior to
it.
south, the
snowbanks melt, and the face of the earth
becomes green before create
its
beauty
it,
ornaments along
it visits,
so shall the advancing spirit path,
its
and the song which enchants
draw beautiful faces, and warm
and heroic seen."
and carry with
acts
around
its
hearts,
and wise
way, until evil
it
;
it it
the
shall
discourses,
is
no more
This prophecy was confirmed by cogent though
highly poetical reasoning, an appeal to admitted facts
showing that Nature and
"When
a noble act
is
Man done
actually were in sympathy.
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;perchance
in a scene of
when Leonidas and his three ; great natural hundred martyrs consume one day in dying, and the beauty
;
EMERSOi\ sun and the
moon come
79
each anti look
them once
at
in
the steep defile of Thermopylae; Avhen Arnold Winkelried,
high Alps, under the Shadow of the avalanche,
in the
gathers in his side a sheaf of Austrian spears to break the
comrades
line for his
are not these heroes entitled to
:
add the beauty of the scene
When before
deed
to the beauty of the
the beach lined with savages' fleeing out of
it,
of cane
their huts
sea behind,
the
;
man from among sordid
separate the
the living picture?
places,
objects,
at
sun as
once to draw to
embrace man, only
v/e
In private
an act of truth or heroism the sky as
itself
its
temple, the
thoughts be of equal great-
let his
Willingly does she follow his steps with the rose
ness.
and the to
...
Nature stretcheth out her arms to
candle.
its
all
and the purple
mountains of the Indian Archipelago around, can
seems
?
Columbus nears the shore of America
the bark of
violet,
and bend her
lines of
grandeur and grace
the decoration of her darling child.
Only
let
his
thoughts be of equal scope, and the frame will suit the
A
picture.
virtuous
and makes the
had but
jNIan, then,
with
God and
liberty
man
central
is
in unison with her works,
figure
of the visible sphere.''
to place himself in a right relation
Nature, and the inextricable puzzles of
and necessity would be solved of themselves.
If
the logical connection of the treatise was not always very close,
poet,
it is
and
to be
remembered
that the ideas
part so exquisite credentials.
it
that
was the work of a
embodied were
and ennobling
The most
it
most
for the
as to be their
fascinating part of the
own
was the alluring delineation of natural beauty
best
book
little ;
the
most substantially valuable, the resolute assertion of the
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
80
LIFEm-IFE OF
identity of natural
and ictim of
his
environment of race, :
of natural and spiritual \, organization. the counterpart of an e.fct mere
phrase
of George
'"''
Herbert,
w-'V/^jfe.
" Man
is
not
in the
quoted by the
writer
one world, and hath
Another to attend him."
is
effect, but, potenti^Jlv^
every natural truth a trutt.\subm'>5
pregnant
But man
CHAPTER
A
CERTAIN
IV.
known to The future
boisterous zone of ocean
is
the seaman as "the roaring forties."
historian of this century
as a decade
may
dwell on " the
more pregnant with
political revolution.
still
intellectual
thirties,"
than with
In 1830 occurred the great debate on
of type between Cuvier and Geoffroy Saint Hilaire,
fixity
which
Goethe thought
more important than
infinitely
the Revolution of July.
In 183 1 Darwin departed on his
eventiiil voyage,," Sartor
Resartus
British
"
was
written,
epoch-making works of Strauss and Tocqueville ; first
and the
In 1835 appeared the
Association founded.
statistics
assumed the dignity of a science; and the names
of Copernicus and Galileo vanished from the Index Expurgatorius.
In March of the same year Emerson speaks
to Carlyle of a projected journal to be called the Transcendentalist.
The
christening nevertheless, Hibernically,
perhaps mystically, preceded the
September, 1836
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;the month
birth, for
it
was not
until
which the publication of
" Nature " would alone have sealed as an epoch
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;that
Emerson, Dr. Hedge, George Ripley, and an unnamed companion, meeting on occasion of the sepond centennial anniversary of Harvard College, "chanced to confer on the state of current opinion in theology
6
and philosophy, which
.
LIFE OF
82
we agreed
The upshot
in thinking very unsatisfactory."
was a larger meeting of some dozen "like-minded seekers," at
George Ripley's house
what larger gathering
at
in Boston, followed
by a some-
Emerson's own, to which others
succeeded, and by and by the participants got the Transcendentalists.
How
our witness, does not
know
ground of any
they came by ;
not,
he apprehends, on the
special acquaintance with Kant's transcen-
dental philosophy, seeing that no one it
knew anything about
except himself, ,and he will not affirm that
enough
for a dozen.
heard in
New
worth that
which
he knew
But Kant's name must have been
England, for in 1833 Emerson told Words-
Boston was talking about Victor Cousin,
all
brilliant
name of
Dr. Hedge,
it,
Frenchman had undoubtedly
profited by
his opportunities of studying the philosophy of
when he happened
to
Germany
be imprisoned in that country.
Mr. Freeman Clarke gives another name, and another reason.
"
minded.
I
We
called ourselves the club
suppose because no two of us thought
" Or rather, we
may
" because, in spite of united by a
any to
of the like-
common
say,''
all
adds Mr. Cabot with
differences of opinion, they were
impatience of routine thiriking." In
case, the designation of transcendentalist
be ashamed
of.
"The
was not one
transcendental philosophy,"
says Frothingham, "is the philosophy that
these necessary
alike."
justice,
and universal
is
built
on
principles, the primary
laws of mind, which are the ground of absolute truth."
Since these meetings began and ceased the special
dogma
of Transcendentalism proper, the assertion of knowledge,
independent
of
experience, has
both proved and disproved.
been, one
Observation,
may
say,
more fruitful of
EMERSON.
83
result than speculation, has, by the study of the
phenomena
of heredity, triumphantly vindicated the doctrine of innate ideas as. respects the individual, while overthrowing It is certain that the
as respects the race. at birth
by no means a sheet of blank paper
is
equally certain that the impressions which
it
human mind
it
it
;
is
brings into
the world are the result of the accumulated experiences
of
its
But though the discovery might have
progenitors.
silenced the controversialists on both sides in Emerson's time,
it
utility
The Was
would not have quelled the controversy.
dispute was only one item
among
the measure of right
hended by
Could
intuition ?
?
large issues.
Could
religion
truth be appre-
be identified with
The
the letter of a book, or proved by a miracle ?
afiSr-
mative and negative of any of these propositions seemed
a priori,
equally rational
speedily got a bad
;
their side of the ^question
but because imaginative, tory.
if
Emerson
was
was not that
intrinsically unreasonable,
friend,'' said
all
on Monday."
all
the more
to
Hence no
had been developed Unitarians of
New
careful
accomplished
men
refrac-
a denizen of
Sunday
Massachusetts could not
if
I
would
make him do
it
school of thought was less sym-
pathetic with Emersonianism than that in
scholars,
his followers
and therefore the more impulsive and
"Your accomplished
him, but
it
was naturally congenial
it
Brook Farm, " would hoe corn let
arid
name with sober people,
into a creed
whose bosom
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Unitarian.
"
it
The
England," says Frothingham, " good
reasoners,
of
letters,
clear
and exact
humane
thinkers,
in sentiment, sin-
cere in moral intention, belonged, of course with individual exceptions [such as Channing], to the class which
LIFE OF
84
looked without for knowledge, rather than within for inspiration."
It
was to
this habit of
said, " I
am
Unitarianism, in
of a Unitarian."
little
had worked
itself out, as
done before
it.
fection that, as
mind, and not to any
Channing referred when he
theological differences, that
It
fact,
Romanism and Calvinism had
had brought
Christianity to such per-
an admirer of Paley
written out at examinations."
said, "it
And now the
could be
restless spirit
of man, discontented with even this great result, was protjEsting that here
it
could find no abiding tabernacle.
In the winter of 1836 Emerson followed up his course on Nature by a course of twelve lectures on
dis-
"The
Philosophy of History," a considerable portion of which eventually
became embodied
abstract preserved history
in his Essays.
would seem to have been but remote
the connection of the lectures ^ apparerft.
The most
among
the
;
nor
is
themselves very
important was that on Religion,
which dwelt forcibly on "the great
'
From
by Mr. Cabot, the connection with
the
mind
we
learn from the sense of duty.
in all individual
men."
fact oi the unity
of
This, said Emerson,
"I seek my
satis-
my neighbour's cost, and I find that he has an my own breast, interfering with my private and persuading me to act, not for his advantage
faction at
advocate in action,
or for that of .
all others, for it
but in obedience to the dictate of the general mind. Virtue
is
this obedience,
ing emotion, the
f
has no reference to persons,
soul." this
He
and
thrill at
religion
is
the accompany-
the presence of the universal
went on to say that the attempt to embody
emotion in an outward form made the Church, but as
" the truest state of thought rested in becomes false," the
EMERSON. Church was continually lapsing from
tinually being recovered
in
some obscure
A man
who
into unbelief,
it
by " the
" Only a
heart."
85
and
as con-
light rekindling
new Church
alive."
is
thus taught need not have wondered that
his " one doctrine, the
man," was
infinity of the private
only accepted " as long as
I call the lecture Art,
Politics, or Literature, or the
Household.
I call
Religion people are shocked, though
it
or
The moment be only
it
the application of the same truth which they receive
everywhere
vitality
Every Church
else."
resent being
told that
it
is
to
is sufficiently alive
dead
;
the greater the resentment.
and the
the
less
In June, 1837, he
tried the experiment of preaching in the pulpit of his
his friend, Dr. Farley, " a
Farley, " I found
sermon precisely like one of
Emerson with
his
head bowed
He
hands, which were resting on his knees.
and
said,
'
Now
tell
me
think of that service.'
through
I
'
and
I felt
I
you
he was
half
my mind
that pulpit.
'
You
that
it
was the last time
are right,' he rejoined,
On my part before I of place.' " He did not mean,
thank you.
out
was half through as
Mr. Cabot
marks, that he was out of place in the pulpit
could find a sympathising congregation,
for ten years
the pulpit was no longer to be his platform, the definitely gained
must be added that spiritual
in
what the Church had
lost
had But
Lyceum ;
in this particular aspect the
tendency of the age was for the
Emerson.
re-
when he
yet to pass ere he should preach his last sermon.
had
in his
looked up
honestly, plainly, just what
I replied that before
had made up
he should have
his
"After returning home," says Dr.
lectures in style."
and
it
whole
moment incarnated
Different indeed was the reception which
LIFE OF
86
Literature, as impersonated in the Phi Beta
Kappa Society,
gave him on his next pubhc appearance, the delivery of his oration
on "
Man Thinking,
or the American Scholar,"
"It was," says Mr. Lowell, "an event
August 31, 1837.
without any former parallel-in our literary annals, a scene
memory for its picturesqueWhat crowded and breathless
to be always treasured in the
and
ness
aisles,
inspiration.
its
what windows clustering with eager heads, what
fenthusiasm of approval, what grim silence of foregone dissent
!
"
This great
was no doubt partly due to
effect
the Fourth of July quality pervading the oration, which Dr.
Holmes
"We
pendence."
and
" our intellectual Declaration of Inde-
calls
intellectually
were," says Mr. Lowell, "still socially
moored
to English thought
cut the cable and gave us
flattered
Emerson
by the assurance the discourse breathed
that
felt
need no longer be imitative
and
their literature
that they
;
rise to the level of their opportunities
The
them.
till
dangers and
and
as a free people,
bursting
at the
inspirited
their literature
need but
chance
Americans
of blue water."
glories
a'
and
duties
would rise along with
excellent counsel to the individual student,
forth
in
epigrammatic flashes which seemed
paradoxes until reflection proved them aphorisms, also told for
much. (" Books are
"Action tial."
is
with the scholar subordinate, but
"The
scholar
is
private considerations."
world.")
for the scholar's idle times."
one who "
it
is
essen-
raises himself frdia,
He, and he
only,
knows the
But these things were only subsidiary to the
main purpose of the discourse, the proclamation of the oneness of mankind,
and the omnipresence of God.
"
far.
The near explains
the
The drop
is
a small ocean.
:
EMERSON. .
A man
is
related to
worth of the vulgar every
This perception of the
nature.
in discoveries.
Let
me
bristling with the polarity that ranges
trifle
stantly as
all
is fruitful
87
it
see in-
an eternal law ; and the shop, the plough, and
the ledger referred to the like cause by which light undulates
and poets sing
and the world
;
no longer a dull
lies
miscellany and lumber-room, but has form and order;
no
there
is
and
animates the
trench. shall
is
no puzzle
but one design unites
;
and
pinnacle
farthest
The dread
.
.
.
there
trifle,
man and
of
the
lowest
the love of
man
be a wall of defence and a wreath of joy around
A nation
of
men will
believes himself inspired inspires all
exist,
when
that' this faith
by the Divine Soul which also
in
Emerson spoke
fellow-students,
his
his speech
was directed of
the inspiration
orbi,
all
he proved
men by
Divine Soul was no idle figure of speech with him.
deemed
that
from a subsequent lecture
and
the
He
Idealism might be preached with- good
hope of acceptance even
recalling
all.
because each
men."
In addressing urbi; but
time
for the first
rivalling
to
bankers.
In a passage
entitled "Transcendentalism,"
the
finest
pages of
" Sartor
Resartus," he says
"
How
easy
it is
to
show the
materialist that
he also
is
a phantom walking and working amid phantoms, and that
he need only ask a question or two beyond his
daily questions to find his solid universe proving
and impalpable before
his sense
!
The
dim
sturdy capitaUst,
no matter how deep and square on blocks of Quincy granite he lays his foundations of his banking house
LIFE OF
88 â&#x20AC;˘or
Exchange, must
set
on a cube
at last not
it
corre-
sponding to the angles of his storehouse, but on a mass
of unknown materials and perhaps, at the core perfect sphericity,
solidity, red-hot or white-hot,
which rounds
;
and
off
an almost
to
lies floating in soft air,
spinning away, dragging bank and banker with
it
and goes at the rate
of thousands of miles an hour, he knows not whither,
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a bit of bullet now glimmering now darkling through a small cubic space on the edge of an unimaginable pit of
emptiness.
venture state
is
and
And
which his whole
this wild balloon, in
embarked, faculty.
uniform experience
is
just
an emblem of
Ask him why he will
grounds he founds his
his
whole
believes that an
continue uniform, or on what faith in his figures,
perceive that his mental fabric
is
built
and he
up on
will
just
as
strange and quaking foundations as his proud edifice
of stone."
The
course on
Human Culture
delivered in the follow-
ing winter appears frpm Mr. Cabot's analysis to have been
an expansion of a passage main
in "
"
Thinking."
The
enterprise of the world for splendour, for extent,
the upbuilding of a man."
he showed
that there
is
Thus, inverting the obvious
truth that, the individual exists
be
Man
by and
for the universe,
was also a sense in which
said that the universe existed
by and
it
might
for the individual.
In his next important public appearance he ventured on
no such daring
inversion, but
by merely following out a
tendency of thought already widely diffused, involved himself in what would have proved a sharp controversy for one
controversially given.
The
graduating
EMJSRSON.
89
him
Divinity class of Cambridge invited '
customary discourse upon
On
their entering
to deliver the
on the
ministry.
July 15, 1838, he appeared before them, his breast
a mine of
perilous
stuff.
His lonely meditations had
been much exercised with the questions of the
points he
To
had been more orthodox than he then was.
had alluded
the former he
in "
Man
can
feed
Thinking." us
ever.
enshrined in a person
one
side
It
one' central
is
Jips
infalli-
of Christ and the reality of miracles, and on both
bility
to
significantly in a passage
"The man has never lived that The human mind cannot be who shall set a barrier on any
unbounded,
this
fire,
unboundable
which, flaming
now
empire.
out of the
and now,
of Etna, lightens the capes of Sicily;
out of the throat of Vesuvius, illuminates the towers
and vineyards
of Naples.
out of a thousand nates
all
he had,
in
stars.
Of
men.''
It is
one soul which
light
illumi-
"I
expressed himself doubtfully.
1834,
is
It has not yet
been shown
only the addition of credulous and
This was to be expected
mistaking love."
was ever
one
the miracles attributed to Christ
suppose he wrought them. that the account
which beams
It is
:
no mind
competent than Emerson's to appreciate
less
the weight of historical evidence for or against any alleged
fact,
or
more
impatient of the
the
spiritual,
indifferent to the' test,
ofi&ce.
his opinion
But was
in
his
glad.
No
more
own sphere
sufficiently decided.
should be well "content to lose them.
be
or
Indeed
I
of "I
should
person capable of perceiving the force
of spiritual truth but must see that the doctrines of the teacher lose no more by this than the law of gravity
LIFE OF
90
would
lose if certain facts alleged to
^
become an
ulcer by
have taken place
excrescence of 1834 had
The
did not take place."
"The word
1838.
Miracle," he
told his hearers, " as pronounced by Christian Churches,
Monster.
It is
with the blowing clover and the falling
rain.''
gives a false impression, â&#x20AC;˘
is
it
other point he was equally explicit
the
Let
.
.
.
they
the
and
alive
befell,
who
will
hold up
emulation Wesleys and Oberlins, Saints and
Thank God
am
I also
On
not degrade
and of the cheerful day.
Friends enough you shall find
Prophets.
yield a
a man.'
professional
believed
had,
with unreality
the
;
assent
speaker
and the
to his hearers to professional
these
for
good men, but
The mistake
"
powerful description of
it
as
lie
part of the landscape,
to your
'
them
Do
by insulation and
and dialogues of Christ
life
peculiarity.
^warm,
"
:
not one
to
what was
thought,
not
redeem
really
infected religion
staple of his discourse its
say,
of continuing to
was a
decay and an urgent appeal it
by being
real,
not merely
men; not preachers from whose preaching
could not be inferred whether they were freeholders
or paupers, fathers or childless, but such as " converted life
into
the
Church was
evermore,
truth."
soul.
The remedy first,
It
soul;
did not,
for
and
the deformities of
second,
perhaps,
soul;
and
occur to him
that^such a clerisy as he desiderated would soon have
claimed to govern the country, and would have
no room
for
that task
had been assigned by Providence.
,course
is,
the journalists and politicians to
left
whom
The
dis-
in truth, the cry of a soul thirsting for the
water-springs, the protest of ideal aspiration against the
;
EMERSON. inevitable at a heat,
of humanity
limitations
and
is
was struck off
it
:
well-nigh the only example of sustained
He
passion in his writings.
had been
emphatic
less
he called " a shriek of indignation," a remon-
what
in
91
strance addressed a short time before to President
He
Buren on the wrongs of the Indians.
Van
might have
turned the edge of the attacks tipon his oration but for
what
Miss
gentlemanliness.
justly
A passage
extreme
an
calls
had been omitted
for
of
want
containing a not unneeded warning against
of time,
making the new the
Peabody
head of
truth a fanaticism, "looking
human
all
culture;
Miss Peabody
Jesus Christ every Httle self magnified."
begged him to restore " No," said
it
Emerson,
in the discourse as published.
" these
gentlemen
have
mitted themselves against what I did read, and
not be courteous or
fair
down on
up against
setting
it
com-
would
passage upon
to spring this
them now."
The slight
Divinity School address might have passed with notice
if
it
had been delivered anywhere
else
but the shepherds of Harvard could hardly be expected to allow the wolf to carry off the
lambs
in their very
presence, even at the invitation of the innocents themselves.
one
for
Andrews Norton, a
whom
great scholar
and
divine, but
truth could not be tangible enough, pro-
nounced an emphatic anathema upon Daily Advertiser.
It
was absurd, he
in
The Boston
said,
to suppose
it
that religious truth could be demonstrated or guaranteed
without violations of natural law, or that Christianity
could endure without belief in the miraculous. for us to
It is no.t
determine whether the Professor proved his
"
LIFE OF
92
he
point, but if
entire drift of thought since
did, the
remark that he did Christianity
his time warrants the
a singular disservice
â&#x20AC;˘
:
" Da miei amici mi guarda Dio
Da miei nemici mi
guarder6
As concerned Emerson himself the munication
He
spirit
â&#x20AC;˘the
by the
saintly
not as dramatically
his
Second Church, who feared, that
"I could
stands
;
his doctrine of the
for
I
at,
if
or
why
what
on which any doctrine of mine
do not know what arguments are
of an answer.
my
am
affairs,
you ask
me how I
dare say
so,
I
see that either of t;hese questions admits
So
when
that in the present droll posture of
I see myself
impoitance of a heretic, I
suddenly raised to the
am
very
uneasy when I
advert to the supposed duties of such a personage, is
to
make good
tainly shall
his thesis against all comers.
do no such
and other good men glad
in
I delight in
the most helpless of mortal men.
I think, but if
it is so, I
do not even
challenged.
you one of the arguments
reference to any expression of a thought. telling
To his
characteristically replied
not give an account of myself,
I could not possibly give
you covertly hint
different
former colleague in
merge Deity in humanity.
Emerson
gentle rempnstrance
was an excom-
was handled in a
Henry Ware,
universal soul tended to
:
io.
article
though
crushing,
as
impressive, as Spinoza's.
'
:
thing.
when you speak my
page that has nothing
as
write,
for
I shall read I
what you
have always done,
thoughts,
me."
who
I cer-
and skipping the
EMERSON. These
lines
show
93
Emerson had formed a
that
He
of his strength and his weakness.
could not prove
His
argue.
;
were
sole guide
his
revealed appeared to him self-evident
To
Just idea
see,
but he
he could announce, but he could not
intuitions
by which men
could
what they
;
the ordinary paths
;
arrive at conclusions were closed to him.
those in spiritual sympathy with himself he
only fascinating, but authoritative
;
is
not
his words authenticate
themselves J|||the response they awake in the breast.
But the readeijte reason "
He
him
is
have reasons gets none, save
will
the
belSaHf that
to
not a philosopher," said one
at this time, " he
does,
you
there
is
a seer.
is
him
will recognize
little
is
an imposition.
who
conversed with
oracle
If
you see truth as he
for a gifted teacher
or nothing to be said."
;
if
not,
This inability to
comply with the apostolic precept by rendering a reason for
the faith that was in
him had obvious drawbacks,
balanced by two great advantages. tating controversy, influence,
exempt from the
purest party-chief.
It
spared him
" If
in his diajry, "that the
it
soils
and smirches of the
be true," he wrote
scholar
is
at this
To him no
time
merely an observer, a
dispassionate reporter, no partisan, his position perfect immunity.
irri-
and kept him an almost impersonal
is
one of
disputes can attach, he
is
The vulgar think he would found a sect and and made much of. He knows better, and
invulnerable.
be installed
much
prefers his
melons and
his woods.''
He
was never-
theless always ready to respond to private inquirers,
and
only regretted that with the best intentions he could not
but be to a certain extent insincere, " knowing that there are other words.''
He
laments' having been beguiled
by
i
LIFE OF
94
" friendly youths " into
"a
rambling exculpatory talk
upon Theism," whereas he ought had no language
;
have said that he
to
as he did in effect to an Episcopalian
"
clergyman, his cousin Mr. Haskins.
God
I prefer to
"that
I
was
at first startled
he explained
by
this
answer
his views in the conversation
no
I could discover
commonly accepted
When
When
I speak of
" I confess," says Mr. Haskins,
say It."
difference
;
but as
far as
which followed,
between them and the
doctrine of God's
omnipresence."
asked by Mr. Haskins, on another occasion, " to
define his views," he answered with greater deliberate-
ness and longer pauses between his words than usual, " I
am more
of a Quaker than anything
thestinj_small^voice,
The expansion
and
that voice
else.
is
I believe
i
n
Christ within us."
of Emerson's intellectual horizon, and
the prominent position which, would he would he not,
he was driven to assume as a leader of thought, inevitably
widened the sphere of
his intimacies,
the resort of thinkers
more or
tric,
leiss-
and made Concord
exceptional or eccen-
" wearing their rue with a difference."
Among them
the rnost remarkable was Margaret Fuller, one of those
women who
Sibyls or Alruna
really
and
truly
dp appear,
although for one genuine instance there are a hundred
and
pretenders.
fifty
counterpart to the unlike the
first,
Margaret, however,
intelligible,
its
knew
force
her, her character
and
her latter
its
When Emerson
was in the fulness both of
angularity, qualities greatly
years.
Not one of the
patchwork biography has
\
though oracular; unlike the
second, neither capricious nor insincere. first
was a true
Rahels and Bettinas of Germany
tempered in
contributors to her
succeeded in conveying a
EMERSON. living
resemblance of her;
attempt a
95
even
Emerson does not
Indeed he must have entertained
portrait.
something of the feeling towards her with which Goethe
and Schiller regarded Madame de England meteor " came
bravely admits, " that Margaret
" It
made
impression upon most persons in addition
Stael,
to stay."
;
"
save that the
be
New
said,"
a disagreeable
he
first
and when we learn
"the problems that
that
to
is
chiefly attracted
her were Mythology and Demonology," the thought arise that she
must have been formidable
disagreeable.
Yet, though
Emerson
as well
no
paints
will
as
portrait,
he does contrive to make us understand how much
more Margaret was tures
really interested in
her fellow crea-
than in these mystic fancies, which served
to
exercise a powerful imagination, while the real business
of her
life
sympathy.
was
intellectual
comradeship and
With her imperious disposition
must needs be measured by the degree could charm the recipient into her
own
this
in
spiritual
sympathy
which she
and as
circle,
Emerson's serene star never " Shot madly from
To their mutual
list
this sea-maid's
bond was "
have desired.
He
borrowing Margaret's desert, graceful
less close
its
sphere "
music
than her ambition would her," says Mrs.
own
" the palm-tree, in the
figure,
sheltering
aloft a
literary
reason to regret.
waving crest,
and embracing branches."
Their acquaintance nevertheless became,
an intimate
Howe,
seemed to
and admirable, bearing
but spreading no
:
alliance,
if
not a
spiritual,
which neither had' any
;
LIFE OF
96
Another
of the
ally
sympathized more
well for Alcott
that
whom
of Dickens, to
photographed him his long lean face
for all
and
;
It
hands
irresistible,
who has
Carlyle,
with his grey worn temples
bent on saving the world
all
and the golden age."
an authentic
soul;
universal
Emerson
pure light from, the
involuntary
moods by demonstrating
that
no figment of the imagination.
" I
of depressed
spirituality
was
learned
cloudland had
I not'
that country."
He
proved that
inlet of
rebuked
which
scepticism
to
it
the
treat
known
Platonic world
Alcott,
who
as
a native of
is
was therefore indulgent when
spirituality
describe a fact as
could not write
really was.
He
a
book,
it
or
intends no slur
he goes so far as to speak of Alcott's " victims "
certain that the deluder himself chief.
into the
fell
con-
self-taught, self-sustained, " peacefully irre-
fragable " Alcott,
when
the
reverence.
time as " the good Alcott, with
figure,
to acorns
found in the
might have
repaid
he would have been
and mild radiant eyes
the
he never
nobody worse than
but encountered
by a return
who
Alcott,
him with the fondest
fidence accorded is
was "the innocent char-
heartily,
Amos Bronson
latan,"
whom Emerson
with
period,
was the
and the
first
In the Blake-like Jones Very he found another
piece of pure gold,
needing something of
alloy for general circulation spiritual
among men.
terrestrial
Very's rapt
countenance bears the image and superscrip-
tion of Divine enthusiasm,
and
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;amber without a â&#x20AC;&#x201D;^remain fly
to inspiration
his translucent sonnets
to attest that his claims
were no pretence.
Their form
is
that
of Shakespeare's, under whose spell Very had fallen as
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON.
;
97
he sought to solve the problem, knotty to him, how a
man
can be a genius without being a
notes and
memoranda on Very
of the contact of an
Emerson's
saint.
are an interesting study
but perfectly sane
enthusiastic,
mind, with another too weak to bear the visitations of Divine
Like
light.
but unlike most, reason, as
Mahomet
to expect from
and a
me
a
for
me
as for
my
Seeing
thoughts and
would be as
it
intolerant
to usurp
mine
explanation he conceded
After
?
He
seemed
his mission,
asked him
this, I
my
false
position were
and impossible
occupy
to say his things or try to
him
"
acknowledgment of
full
participation in the same.
constitutional, that
Very was
did to the mountain.
he did not see that
if
prophets,
all
he could accommodate himself to
his
ground
some frank and
full
In dismissing him I seem
this.
to have discharged an arrow into the heart of society."
Society thought so too, and locked Very up as a lunatic.
Though
for a season
Very was no
mentally disturbed and dazzled.
lunatic, only
others said they believed.
one who
After a while the world and
he so adjusted their relations as to allow of
becoming,
his
with some detriment to his poetical faculty, excellent clergyman.
what
really believed
Another
a very
of similar type,
saint
stainless but flighty as the fabled bird of Paradise
which
has forfeited
feet
its
foothold in ridding
William Henry Channing son's circle,
"
I
to
and has
left
do confess myself
me
an
I
also a
a picture of
fascinated.
icy pinnacle only,
came nearer tions
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;was
itself
of
member him
He
its
of Emer-
in his
home.
had been before
uway in the
ether,
but as I
found there was verdure of sweet
affec-
and the beauteous blossoms of lowly thoughts 7
-
LIFE OF
98
and common herbs around the lighted
me;
His family de-
base.
his fondness for his little boy, his tender-
ness towards
his
the unaffected
wife,
politeness
man
courtesy and the merry cheerfulness of the
t more
to win
Among
me
than
all his lofty
moved
if
somedark
at intervals a
silent figure of spiritual nature too, but
gnome than of a
much more
Nathaniel Hawthorne
sylph.
did
contemplations."
these figures, radiant with sincere,
times ill-directed aspiration,
and
of
a
half-
consciously contributed an element of tragedy to the
Concord
society ("I suppose
solitude,"
Emerson
he died of
afterwards wrote), and,
consciously, an element of
comedy.
should be too sacred for a smile, yet
it
his
painful
quite un-
Wifely devotion is
hard to
resist
something broader than a smile in contrasting the cination which Mrs.
fas-
Hawthorne supposes her husband to
have exerted upon Emerson with Emerson's own frank avowal that he talked continually to Hawthorne in the
hope
that, for
very shame's sake, Hawthorne would one
day say something himself, whicH he never did.
Evi-
dently he had been insufficiently impressed by Emerson's
maxim give."
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
" It
They
is
the one base thing to receive and not to
lived
on neighbourly terms, but there could
be no true sympathy between authors who so greatly Emerson, whose
underrated each other's work.
judgments when
not
absurdly wrong, calls work which might
accumulated experience
Hawthorne, on to
his part,
of
lit
be
embody the
several lives, too
young.
had too much imagination not
be sensitive to "the pure
vhich Emerson
literary
absolutely right are apt to
intellectual
gleam" with
up the woodland paths around Walden
; â&#x20AC;˘'
EMERSON.
09
Pond. " Like the garment of a shining one," he says nor did the " austere beauty " of Emerson's poetry repel
But several passages
him.
notebooks reveal im-
in his
patience at Emerson's intellectual aloofness, and in one
suppressed at
first,
but injudiciously restored by his son,
he describes Emerson
as "stretching his
hand out of real."
The
show which of the two men more
firmly
cloudland in the vain search for something
War was
Civil
grasped
to
reality,
but that time of fiery
and meanwhile Hawthorne drew the guests says,
"to
whom
parted as to
sat
in charcoal. just so
make
life all
-"
much
systems, at
framework
first
was not
Young
visionaries,"
a labyrinth around them,
them out of
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;-travelled
in
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; whose
painfully to his door, not to ask
finder of a glittering its
own
People that had lighted on a new thought, or
a thought that they fancied new,
tain
came
an iron
deliverance, but to invite his free spirit into their
thraldom.
he
their self-
Grey-headed theorists
had imprisoned them
air,
yet,
of insight had been im-
to seek the clue that ^hould lead
involved bewilderment.
trial
by Emerson's hearth and
gem
came
to
Emerson, as the
hastens to a lapidary to ascer-
value."
Where Hawthorne saw " Twice Told Tales,"
fit
dramatis persona for his
Emerson discerned the
heirs of all
the ages, the children of the kingdom.
"
No
one can converse much with
society in
New
of a revolution. organization,
not
different classes of
England without remarking the progress
Those who share
no badge, no
vote, or print, or
creed,
in
it
have no external
They do They do not
no name.
even meet together.
v}
LIFE OF
100
know each other's faces or names. They are united only They in a common love of truth and love of its work. are of if
all
some
doubt
conditions and constitutions. are happily born
and
Of these acolytes, many are no with as many scars
well bred,
ill-dressed, ill-placed, ill-made,
Without pomp, without
of hereditary vice as other meh.
trumpet, in lonely and obscure places, in solitude, in servitude,
compunctions
in
and
trudging
privations,
beside the team in the dusty road, or drudging as hire-
men's cornfields, schoolmasters who teach
lings in other
a few children rudiments for a pittance, ministers of small parishes of the obscure sects, lone
condition, matrons beautiful
women
and yourjg maidens,
in
dependent
and poor,
rich
and hard-favoured, without concert or proclama-
tion of any kind, they have silently given in their several
adherence to a new hope, and
in all
companies do signify
man
a greater trust in the nature and resources of
than
the laws or the popular opinions will well allow."
This fixed
fine passage is
from the confession of
faith pre-
by Emerson to "The, Dial," which, under the
editorship of Margaret Fuller, appeared as the organ of
New England reality of the
Transcendentalism, in July, 1840.
universally admitted, but others
cost
of Shinar."
dialect
The
phenomena thus eloquently described was saw
in
them "the Pente-
And, unquestionably, a Babylonish
was not unfrequently heard, and Mrs. Hominy
was no mere creation of the bably she
who
novelist's brain.
inquired at a lecture
omnipotence abnegate attribute?"
:
It
was pro-
" Mr. Alcott, does
Yet, as
loving and hoping spirit went nearer the
ever, the
mark than the
";
EMERSON. and
sceptical
word
own
"
negative.
The
101
Dial " has
become a bye-
Wordsworth became
for crazy mysticism, as
to his
more
generation for namby-pamby, and with hardly
There
reason.
is,
no doubt, a good deal of the Orphic,
a good deal of the oracular
;
and some prose that
really
well-composed rhetoric that
will
of sterling value,
their
lectual changes to
E. Channing's
not a
now for
little
the information they
day welcome harbingers of
come
;
intel-
there are fictions, such as
"Youth of the Poet and
W.
Painter," artless in
but charming as prose poems
structure,
;
too plainly diluted
is
showing perfect sanity and sound
insight; others valuable even
and in
not construe
But there are also many contributions
Emersonianism.
contain,
verse that will not
some
scan,
;
and verses by
the same writer and others, wanting in finish, but wood-
notes wild of genuine poetic passion. translated
Schelling's
"
The
introductory lecture to
Dial
his
last
philosophical course ; published Keats's notes on Milton
saved
his,
brother George from undeserved oblivion; and
showed by some happily rescued fragments what an
Emerson was
lost in Charles.
On
compare most favourably with any ciplined
and unsalaried enthusiasm round a
must of necessity is
the whole
rather that so
attract eccentricity;
much
ability
it
will
similar rally of undisflag
which
and the wonder
should have been mustered
in support of such a venture froni so limited a section
of
New England
not so
much any
culture.
The
real
charm, however,
disinterested, unworldly spirit, warrant of .present
and
is
special literary excellence, as the fresh,
youth in the
large possibilities in the future.
Margaret Fuller bore the burden of " The Dial
"
as
"
LIFE OF
102
long as she could, and in 1842 Emerson assumed " rue
though foreseeing that he should accepting such an intruder on of
my
let
;
my peace, such
there
be rotation
no means belonged enviously admired
to the
by
too
little
He
martyrdom."
in
it,
of
a consumer
But you have played martyr a
time.
long alone
the day
by
"able editor" species so
On
Carlyle.
one occasion he
stood out against a proffered contribution by Theodore Parker, which, being admitted at
"The
into a second edition.
last,
number
carried the
Dial's" pages, notwith-
standing,
owe much of the freshness which
after half
a century, to his love for bright and promising
young persons, and him.
their eagerness to
them
be associated with
His own contributions include the introduction
already quoted, his "
Man
the Reformer " " Transcen-
"Young American,"
dentalist,"
reviews of Landor and
of Carlyle's " Past and Present " Saadi,"
"
The
Snowstorm," "
He
Sphinx," and others. editor,
clings to
but
its
"
;
among
Wood
poems,
his
"
Notes,"
was not only " The
banker, and his connection with
it
The
Dial's
cost
him
not only the worry he had foreseen, but several hundred dollars,^ not easily
replaced by a philosopher or spared by
the father of a family. journals that
took "
The
In April, 1844, the
do not pay
Dial,"
and
it
doom
of
all
their contributors finally over-
expired with the precept in
mouth, "Energise about the Hecatic
sphere.''
its
Years
afterwards a quantity of unsold copies were discovered
and sent to Emerson, who gave of them to
and burned or wasted the remainder.
all
Had
who would, they been
preserved to this day they would have been a small fortune.
Mr. Ireland
is
the envied possessor of a copy
EMERSON. containing a
list
The
writing.
103
of the contributors in Emerson's hand-
infornaation thus imparted
made
is
property in Mr. Cooke's interesting article
Journal of
Philosophy"
Speculative
where biographical
for
public
"
in
The
1885,
July,
particulars respecting the principal
contributors are also to be found. "
We
are a
little
on October
wild here," wrote Emerson to Carlyle,
1840, "with numberless projects
30,
Not a reading man but has
social reform.
a new community in his waistcoat pocket.
mad time,
I
am
gently
Socialism was indeed in the air of the
myself."
and not wholly without
George Combe,
by the
of
his draft of
visiting
difiSculties
Even the
reason.
America
in 1839,
staid
was induced
which he perceived to attach to the
management of American households,
to conjecture that
the richer Americans might in time agree to solve them
by co-operation.
The
outcome of
practical
was the establishment of Alcott's
munity
at Fruitlands,
It
and
this unrest
luckless
com-
and the more famed experiment
Brook Farm, immortalized
Romance."
little
in
at
Hawthorne's " Blithedale
was inevitable that Emerson should be
pressed to cast in
his
lot
with the projectors, and,
conscious of a certain responsibility towards professed followers,
he
felt
compunction
hanging back.
at
he was an individual of individuals ; a infrangible, infusible
;
the last of
in a joint-stock association.
service
must
waiting,
But
crystal isolated,
mankind
to
be merged
He wisely determined that his
consist for the present in standing
and that he must needs
''
dation of owning bank stock and seeing poor
By way of atonement he himself
still
and
submit to the degra-
tried
men suffer."
some experiments
LIFE OF
104
on a small his
Feeling that he would be happier
scale.
if
house sheltered more fellow-creatures, he offered the
Alcotts free hospitality for a year,' a scheme which for-
came
tunately
He
to nothing.
had always been remark-
able for considerateness to his servants, and revive the patriarchal, feudal,
and
society
most seemly
board.
But Louisa the maid would not
institution
now
tried to
in a simple state of
common
of a
sit
family
down without
Lydia the cook, and Lydia held that a cook, unlike her
was never
dishes,
fit
to
come
to table.
He
theorized
upon the advantage of combining manual labour with literary composition, but experience
soon convinced him
that his fine speeches must be unsaid.
he regarded dividual
:
as, at
All these things
most, counsels of perfection for the in-
he perceived that the impossible expectations of
the rank and
file
must force the leaders into charlatanism,
and touched the extravagances of Fourierism with satire.
Âť
whom
it
But he saw more deeply
into
it
than those for
was quite enough that Fourier proposed to turn
the seas into lemonade.
" I regard these philanthropists
as themselves the effects of the age in which
and, in
playful
common
with so
efflorescence of the period, that ripens.
many
other good
we
and predicting a good
They were not
live,-
facts,
the fruit
the creators they believed
themselves, but they were unconscious prophets of a true state of society is really
and the
being done. theorists
:
they were describers of that which
The
drew
all
large cities are phalansteries, their
argumepts from
facts
already taking place in our experierjce."
The Brook Farm adventure has been much misThough inspired by Fourier^s ideas, it
apprehended.
.
.
EMERSON.
105
was hardly a
socialistic experiment. The freedom of the member was jealously guarded by its constiMembers were not required to impoverish
individual tution.
themselves, or resign the
of their earnings.
fruits
especially Fourieristic in the stress laid
and one of the leading
refinement,
excellent school.' in
It
by the opportunity;
remarks, they
came
was
was an
features
hence attracted many considerably
need of such humanizing
largely
It
upon culture and
influences,
as
but,
and such profited
Emerson shrewdly
rather to learn than to wprk, "
and
were charged by the heads of the departments with a
and
certain indolence
came
that others
selfishness."
It
work than
less to
may be added
to play, and,
what
was worse, could not discover that their work, when they performed any, was attended by those ennobling
on the character which
"They
accrued. see,
theoretically
ought to
effects
have
scratched their heads sometimes, to
was the hair turned wool ?
"
On
the other hand,
the art of letter-writing was immensely cultivated, and plain people all
saw with astonishnient that he who ploughed
day earned no more than he who looked out of the
window. The scheme had a reality.
"may
"
What
am
it
am
doing
it
I
must think
with impunity."
that
all
itself
its
wanted
Brook Farm was
existence indefinitely
in industrial competition,
its
if it
the world,
it is,
than a highly intellectual picnic, and though prolonged
it
doing," says Emerson, most wisely,
not be the highest thing to do in
but while I not do
I
but
beautifill side,
it
or I shall
little
more
might have
had not involved
existence could have
demonstrated nothing more than the agreeableness of association
with agreeable company,
and,
which was
LIFE OF
106
more important, the
certainly
among
possibility of frank equality
To
different orders of society.
this,
Emerson, a
may be What knowledge of
sharp observer and no indiscriminate panegyrist,
accepted as a sufficient witness
:
"
themselves and of each other, what various practical
wisdom, what personal power, what studies of character,
what accumulated culture, many of the members owed to it
!
What mutual measure
was a close union,
they took of each other
like that in
!
It
a ship's cabin, of clergy-
men, young coUegianSj merchants, mechanics, farmers'
men and women
sons and daughters, with
and
tunities
sentiment which
all
shared
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;of the honesty of a life
of humanity.
who were
persons
of rare oppor-
delicate culture, yet assembled there
life
of labour, and the beauty of a
The yeoman saw His
by a
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; some of them hotly shared
friends,
manners
refined
in
and the lady or the
romantic scholar saw the continuous strength and faculty
who would have
in people
disgusted
them but
that these
powers were now spent in the direction of their own theory of
Even
life."
Emerson had not been too much of an
if
vidualist to
he had long taken root
my
indi-
be deeply fascinated by co-operative schemes, in
know what
had in the bluebirds, bobolinks, and. were not charged in the
bill.
When
"
Concord.
farm," he says, " I did not
As
little
I bought
a bargain I
thrushes, which
did I guess what
sublime mornings and sunsets I was buying, what reaches of landscape, and what fields and lanes for a tramp. Still less
did I
know what good and
was buying, men of strength and
now known
true neighbours I
virtue,
the country through, but
some
whom
I
of
them
had the
;:
EMERSON.
107
pleasure of knowing long before the country did." Other
neighbours of homelier note had an equal share of his
esteem ;
" not doctors
or a
A short and
stalwart
age, with a face of
fruitful
and sturdy personage, of middle
shrewd and kind expression, and
He
manners of natural courtesy. of talk, and not for,
sandbank into a
Hawthorne shows us the type of such an one
field."
"
of laws, but doctors of land,
swamp
skilled in turning a
with a
little
much
had a very
own
diffidence about his
free flow
opinions
induction from Mr. Emerson, he began
to discourse about the state of the nation, agriculture,
and business to
him
in general, uttering thoughts that
at the plough,
and which had a
of the fresh earth about them."
Such were the men by
whose homely wisdom Emerson loved a thinker," wrote Miss Martineau,
home, "without
who
visited
is
ready at every
call
lectures to the factory people at Lowell
He
preaches
known
when
at every
the opportunity
is
him
and
when
is
in his
unfitted
He
of action.
they ask.
He
presented.
house along the road he
He
"
to profit.
being" solitary, abstracted,
He
for the time.
had come
sort of flavour
travels to
is
and
from home by the words he has dropped, and the deeds
he has done."
He
attended the town-meetings with the
punctuality of a good citizen, though never participating in the proceedings otherwise than
by
his vote.
The
slender,
somewhat stooping
aquiline
mould of countenance, brow not high but
figure,
with
tall,
narrow and finely
modelled, deep-set eyes of such intense blue as has been said to be only found in sea-captains, firm but sensitive
mouth, expression compounded of enthusiasm and kindly shrewdness, as of a
spirit
entrusted with earthly interests,
LIFE OF
108
mingled habitually with the twenty-five \vho
made up
"solid,est
"
the Concord Social Club.
society I have ever
Much
men" best
the'
known," says Emerson; who adds that
he never liked to be away from Concord on Tuesdays,
when
He
the club met.
probably found
it
welcome
a
relief to the strain of lonely thought, for the nature of
condemned him
his intellectual labour it
lasted
was
and meditation,
;
He
his daily habit.
partly in the
woods ; and
Mr. Haskins
recalls the
to solitude while
not actual composition,
if
worked
partly in his study,
account of his method to
his
remark of Wordsworth's servant,
that her master's library was outside, though his books
He
were indoors.
cessful,
went out
early,
boy might hunt a
thought, as a
he
said,
and,
butterfly,
to
hunt a
when
pinned the prize in his cabinet by entering
his " Thought Book."
sucit
in
Down
the capture went, without
any order, but when the need
for essay or lecture arose,
was made, and, by the aid of an
inquisition
thoughts
which
fitted
pplished,
and linked
Emerson
said
times eludes,
;
the
were
subject
together, like beads
the
on a
thread,
but we, whose scrutiny the thread some-
may
agree with Mr. Haskins that com-
parison with a mosaic would have been descriptive.
iridex,
unearthed,
" I write," he
tells
more
accurately
Carlyle, " with very
little
system, and, as far as regards composition, with most
fragmentary result sentence "
an
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;paragraphs
infinitely
Method of Nature
"
incomprehensible,
repellent
was
" written
happiness of a real inspiration " Circles " of " days
:
when he was
"
in
each
Yet
his
the heat
and
particle."
and he speaks in
full
of thoughts, and
could write as he pleased." His peculiar genius rendered
EMERSON.
109
him more independent of books than any Depending so
writer of his age.
other great
on
exclusively
intuitions, his attitude towards other
men was
his
own
necessarily
somewhat that of the Caliph Omar towards the Alexandria
He
Library.
them
felt
of
his
would deeply venerate them only when he
gone beyond himself on some
to have
him was the same
whole, the chief use of books to
the chief use he drew from
neighbours
his
it),
he
inspire,"
comifortable
and keep
his faculties
from
away from them, and
He
"
as
top spin," "
rusting.
"or they are nothing."
said,
the
to provide
:
my
himself with intellectual stimulus (" make
he called
line
On
own, like Swedenborg or Montaigne.
They
was never
Mr. Cabot,
yet," says
" they were pleasing companions, not counsellors, hardly
even
No
intimates.''
author seems at any time to have
He
exercised a controlling influence over him.
have been the same Platonist
He
if
would
Plato had never lived.
pleased himself as well as Carlyle by reading through
the whole of Goethe
at Carlyle's instance,
of his study would have been figured
among
his
faint
if
" Representative
but the traces
Goethe had not
Men."
Next
to
poetry and mystic wisdom his favourite .reading was
biography historian
His
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; "Plutarch," he of heroism â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and
phanes and Cervantes
;
his
books and
aim was
men
to conduce to
the
Doctor and
and Shelley
in
one sense very
as well as Aristo-
in another very catholic, ranging
from the Bhagavat Ghita life,
"is
he delighted in anecdote.
on the whole, was
literary taste,
exclusive, rejecting Scott
in
says,
"
to Martial.
spiritual
In
literature,
as
manhood, and he valued
mainly as he found or deemed them
it.
What he
said of
"The Dial" was
LIFE OF EMERSON.
no true
of himself:
the pens hving, to us."
"Our
resources
are
not so
much
of practised writers as the discourse of the
and the portfoUos which friendship has opened
'
CHAPTER
IT
is
V.
a testimony at once of Heaven's kindness to
Emerson, and of his own kindliness, that the only
misfortunes of his
life
which he
as cruel wounds,
felt
were
He
the untimely deaths of those near and dear to him.
had
lost the first
lous brothers;
choice of his heart and his two marvel-
and now,
was to be more heavily
was
The
If he
still.
exemplary in any one relation of in the father's.
was more
than another
life
It
seemed
as
filled, it is "of
and
though the best of fathers had
been rewarded by the best of markable promise of
it
recollections of his surviving
children depict the ideal of wisdom, thoughtfulness, gentleness.
he
at the beginning of 1842, afflicted
Whether the
re-
would have been
ful-
sons.
his first-born
course impossible to say
reasonably be augured of a boy of
;
but
much might
five so affectionate as
to be his father's constant companion,
and so considerate
as to spend hours in his study without one noisy out-
break.
house,
"
A domesticated sunbeam," says a friend of the
"with
his
father's
voice,
beautiful dark blue eyes with
essay he " sees
softened,
;
and
Emerson
long lashes."
himself names no family likeness
own
but
like the lover in his
no resemblance except
to
summer
â&#x20AC;˘
—
— LIFE OF
112 '
—
evenings and diamond mornings, to rainbows and the
song of birds," " The wondrous
Whose
silver
child,
warble wild
Outvalued every pulsing sound
Within the
cerulean round,
air's
The hyacinthine boy, for whom Morn well might break and April bloom, The gracious boy, who did adorn The world whereinto he was borh,
And by The
his countenance repay
favour of the loving Day."
%
Waldo Emerson was born October January 27, 1842, fever.
from
scarlet
monument,
beautiful in
its
subdued
intensity.
dissembled nothing from himself, not even his
grati-
" The. innocent and beautiful,"
tude for every anodyne. "^
and died
30, 1836, illnessi
Emerson's grief was the grief depicted on a Greek
funeral
He
few days'
after a
he wrote, " should not be sourly and gloomily lamented, but with
music
recollections.
.
fragrant
atid .
.
thovights
Life wears on,
delaying and' grand lessons,
its
and
its
air in the
stern
un-
its
uncontainable endless
dry prose of scepticism
poetry,
of cold
sportive
and ministers
—
veins
like
evening woods, quickly swallowed by
the wide warmth of June
—
its
steady correction of the
rashness and short-sight of youthful judgments, and
pure repairs of in
what
that .
we
to the
it
we
gave
the rents
and seeming ruin
although we love the
;
cling long to the ruin,
new
like a star -
all
if
new
which
shall
rises
will
its
'
light before
so well
be cold
steals
behind our back as we
are borrowing gladly
its
operates
first gift
and think we But the new
come.
it
on us
walk,
and
we know
the
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
;
EMERSON. bea-'fefactor."/
In the
113
'
threnody already quoted,
thrilling
aÂŁiter the stricken heart has long afflicted itself with the
^agonizing pictures traced by
sophy and Religion bring " Fair the
Fancy, Philo-
consolation at last
it
soul's recess
Memory and
and
shrine,
Magic-built to last a season.
Masterpiece of love benign
:
Fairer that expansive Reason
Whose omen
'tis,
and
sign.
Wilt thou not ope thy heart to know
What rainbows
teach,, and sunsets
show?
Revere the Maker, fetch thine eye
Up
to his style,
and manners of the sky.
Not of adamant and gold Built he heaven, stark
and
No, but a nest of bending
cold.
reeds.
Flowering grass, and scented weeds
;
Or like a traveller's fleeing tent, Or bow above the tempest bent Built of tears
And
and sacred flames,
virtue reaching to its aims
Built of furtherance
Not
'
;
and pursuing.
of spent deeds, but of doing.
House and tenant go
to ground.
Lost in God, in Godhead found."
"
A
few weeks ago," wrote Emerson to Carlyle, on
occasion of his
loss,
" I accounted myself a very rich
man, and now the poorest of
all."
"
Your calm tone of
deep, quiet sorrow," returned Carlyle, " coming in on the rear of your trivial worldly businesses, all punctually de-
spatched and recorded too, as
if
had not been busy with you,
tells
the Higher and Highest
me
a sad tale."
The
" businesses " related principally to the publication of
t
"
LIFE OF
114
works
Carlyle's
in America.
none were more
life
Carlyle his due reward.
by unselfishness'than
if
still
On
he had known
August
me very considerable advances, me in the current months very
so liave impoverished
On April 20th of the am now at the bottom
much."
following year
that I
of
printing
'
Chartism,' sent to
me
my
Munroe and
find
he was in
dollars,
Co., in
my
They 1840,
debt between
six
and seven hundred
although some important amounts paid by
relief to
him when,
The French
after
It
me
must have been a
having published
" Sartor,"
Revolution,'' the " Miscellanies," " Chart-
and " Hero Worship," with no man to make him
afraid,
in
?
On May 11,
making out the account of T. C,
were not entered in the account."
isiii,"
booksellers
T. C. fifteen cfents per copy."
"J.
I help
for that express purpose,
and with the encouragement of the will give
" I suppose
:
wheel of debt, and
But how could
shall not hastily venture lower.
"
1839,
3,
in his diary, "Carlyle's accounts have
required what were for
and
was warm,
Carlyle's gratitude
the extent of his indebtedness.
Emerson wrote
itf.
works their due publicity and
would have been warmer
it
difficult to
not disinteresteSv ana
beautifully inspired
his effort to assure Carlyle's
but
would be
It
a single action in Emerson's
upon occasion of the arrival of " Past and Present
1843 he had to report to Carlyle that he had bepirating, inasmuch as " the cheap press has,
come worth
within a few months,
markets.
made a
total
change in our book-
Every English book of any name or credit
is
instantly converted into a newspaper or coarse pamphlet,
and howled by a hundred boys nevertheless printed fifteen
in the streets."
hundred copies
He
at seventy-
EMERSON. ^^e cents, pirates, -
-be
till
and
for
115
a few weeks succeeded in repelling the
a corsair calling himself CoUyer, supposed to
another publisher's domino or dummy, bore down upon
him with an would be
and a
edition at twelve cents
Emerson struck
his flag, rejoiced that at least
Small remittances for
lost.
some time
crossed.the Atlantic for part could send
longer,
and
half,
no money
Carlyle
still
and he on
his
Emerson twenty-four pounds on account
of the EngUsh reprint of his Essajrs, notwithstanding the -competition of
'"'a
scoundrel interloper,
who
prints
on
grey paper."
Even -calamity
so,
year preceding Emerson's great
for the
had made him worth robbing.
Up
of his Essays appeared in 1841.
had been
chiefly
known
The
first series
to this date
he
and although the
as a lecturer,
imputation of heresy had helped his discourse before the Divinity class to a sale of a thousand copies, his reputation was
mainly
still
inner circles even of
New
and confined
local,
England
culture:
to the
But the
Essays went wherever the English language was spoken,
and the
revelation of his
his ripest power.
name was
They were
also the revelation of
not, like " Nature^" too
mystic and dithyrambic for the reader self
on
his
common
sense
;
nor,
public occasions, were they in
and limited had been
application.
originally
who valued him-
hke the addresses on
some measure of
local
A considerable portion, indeed,
deUvered in the shape of
lectures.
"Love,' "Friendship," "Prudence," 'â&#x20AC;˘ The Over-Soul," " Spiritual Laws," for instance, had been largely treated
and much material
of in the courses for 1836 and 1837
;
for a second series existed in these
and in other courses.
LIFE OF
116
But
in this
shape they had been blended with matter
of less value, and lacked the polish of perfect literary expression which, as regarded the finish of individual sentences, they
now
received to a degree rarely surpassed
by intellectual craftsmanship. The
threefold test of lustre,
of durability, and of uniqueness, ranks them definitively
among are
the diamonds of literature.
no material
short
for statues
poems excepted,
Diamonds, however,
and Emerson's
;
prefer
writings,
some
no claim to the yet higher
grace of logical unity and symmetrical completeness.
His usual method of
literary work,
already described,
precluded the composition of an essay in the proper
The thought
sense of the term.
day generally bore
that
slight affinity to the
came
him
to
to-
thought of yester-
In exploring the notebooks where
day or to-morrow.
these casual visitations of the Spirit lay stored
autumnal leaves heaped might find numerous
in
a forest
analogies;,
dingle,
like
Emerson
but to fashion these into
a coherent whole were a task akin to that which Michael Scott
rightly
There
is
just
judged too hard for the
construction
artistic
devil himself.
enough unity of purpose and endeavour in
each several Essay to
after
raise it
from the category of Table-Talks, the desultory record of the wisdom of an Epictetus, a Luther, a Coleridge,
and
to
inscribe the collection
upon the
roll
of great
unsystematic books, along with Marcus Aurelius and
Thomas k Kempis,
Pascal and Montaigne.
It differs
from their monumental writings as the nineteenth century differs
from the
less massive,
Roman
but
rarely sublime like
it
is
period, or the middle age. far
more opulent.
It is
Emerson
is
Marcus Aurelius, but he disposes of a
EMERSON.
117
wealth of variec^ illustration of which Marcus Aurelius
knew nothing and he has turned ;
every page of the
of Nature, which, until these latter ages,
it
book
has been the
fault of ethical writers to neglect.
Were we orchestra,
" The Over-Soul."
It
the others march. else after
Emerson
to look for the conductor of the
we should perhaps
them
It
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; that
find
seems to
in the essay entitled
it
set the
music to which
enforces the ideas which draw
the universe
is'
all
one existence by
by a single divine essence, and mankind. " We see the world
virtue of its interpenetration
that one soul animates
all
piece by piece, as the sun, the moon, the animal, the tree is
but the whole, of which these are the shining parts,
;
the soul.
.
.
From
.
within or from behind, a light
and makes us aware that
shines through us .upon things,
we
are nothing, but the light
man, the
call
What we commonly
is all.
eating, drinking, planting, calculating
man,
does not, as we know him, represent himself, but misrepresents himself.
Him we do not respect,
whose organ he
would he
action,
his will,
intellect, it is
virtue
it is
love.
.
.
.
;
genius
when
it
breathes
breathes through
some one
way through
particular,
Starting
us."
works his way through a
beautiful illustrations to Carlyle's conclusion,
"All history
is
this pantheistic
off
its
When
flows through his affection,
this postulate, the writer
number of
;
when it
All reform aims, in
to let the great soul have
from
it
but th^ soul,
appear through his
let it
would make our knees bend.
through his
it is
is,
sacred."
The
possible exaggeration of
optimism into absolute apathy
is
warded
by a supplementary discourse on Compensation, point-
ing out the " inevitable dualism that bisects nature,"
and
"
:
LIFE OF
118
which
reproduced in every separate existence, and every and intellectual life. " If the good
is
fact of the spiritual is
there, so is the evil
;
if
the
affinity,
so the repulsion
The world
the forces, so the limitation."
a monotonous effluence of Divinity
fore,
effluence nevertheiless
more
clearly than
:
and by nothing
but
;
is
the fact proved
is
by the nice adjustment and absolute
utter fallacy to imagine that the
an
an
it is
balance of compensation throughout the whole of
that justice
if
;
not, there-
is
bad are
It
it.
successful,,
not done now.
is
"Hast not thy share? On winged feet, Lo it rushes thee to meet And all that Nature made thine own, !
Floating in air or pent in stone. Will rive the hills and
And,
The is
like thy
swim the
sea,
shadow, follow thee.
object of the fine essay quaintly entitled " Circles
""
to reconcile this rigidity of unalterable law with the:
fact of
human
property of a
where
self-evolving 'circle,
small, rushes circles,
it is
no
on
all
which,
"
The
relatively perfect,
else."
Hence
"As
limitations,
there
one
is
Hence
become
no
around every of
man
is
a
from a ring imperceptibly
all
new and forms of
larger-
culture,,
For now something
in time obsolete.
the genius that created them creates
gress.
life
sides outwards to
and that without end.
however
less true that
can be drawn.
circle another
illustrates
which always returns to the point
But
began.
it
Compensation
progress. circle,
security but in infinite pro
soon as you once come up with a man's
it is all
over with him.
Infinitely alluring
and
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON.
119
attractive
was he to you yesterday, a great hope, a sea to
swim
now you have found
in
;
and you care not
if
shores, found
its
you never see
Emerson followed a reserve of power.
his
own
it
it
a pond;
again."
counsel
he always keeps
;
His theory of " Circles " reappears
without the least verbal indebtedness to himself, in the splendid essay on Love.
Hfere, having painted as hardly
any other has painted, the beauty of personal relations
and the " mighty ravishment " of the passion of rebukes his
own
raptures by treatingit as after
he
love,
all
some-
thing rudimentary, ancillary and preparatory to the liberal
use and the perfect knowledge of
Nature's lure to a
life.
higher end, "only one scene in our play."
they discover that all which at
first
"At
last
drew them together
these once sacred features, that magical play of charms
was deciduous, had a prospective end, ing by which the house was built
like the scaffold-
and the
;
purification
of the intellect and the heart, from year to year, real marriage, foreseen
and prepared from the
wholly above their consciousness."
is
first,
the
and
Notwithstanding the
assurance that " we need not fear to lose anything by the progress of the soul," this deliverance can hardly act
otherwise than as a drench of cold water to the " fine
madman which he
''
whom the
writer, himself
performing the part
attributes to Nature, has allured to this sober
conclusion by the bait of gorgeous and impassioned speech.
It
is,
therefore, with all its poetry, rather for the
mature than the young. " The gay enchantment
A gentle wife,
is
undone
:
but fairy none."
The austere stoicism of the companion
essay on Friendship
LIFE OF
120
may
even the mature reader with something of a
affect
Here, however,
similar jar.
it
the general drift that
is
"
wounds, and the conclusion that redeems.
These things
may hardly be said without a sort of treachery to the relation. The essence of friendship is entireness, a total magnanimity and
trust.
It
must not surmise or provide
It treats its object as
infirmity.
" Self-Reliance "
both."
a god, that
and " Heroism
pair of essays, the former of
"
may
it
another
are
which must have had
especial
influence in shaping the social type then growing
New
We must pass
England.
by
for
deify
up
in
these, as well as " Pru-
dence," " Intellect," and " Spiritual Laws," to devote a
word
to " History "
an abstract
and " Art."
principle,
just in
if
elucidation of a given subject,
absence of special study. feel that
These itself,
and how
what
illustrate
do
will
far
for the
it fails
in the
In the essay on History we
Emerson's view of human nature as an incarna-
tion of the Divine Spirit binds all the ages together,
makes them
all
equally living
and
day, in so far as his knowledge of
real to the
them
mental picture.
But we also
does not personally get
much beyond
for the
zation,
and
that
research which
is
he
is
feel that
his
and
of
to-
supplies colour
Emerson
grand generali-
indifferent to the archaeological
needed
for
a just realization of the past,
which would have saved him from many travagances.
man
fanciful
ex-
In the essay on Art the fundamental con-
ception of Art as an educational process, elevating the soul to the perception of beauty,
haustive attained,
;
is
valuable
if
not ex-
but in concluding that the perception, once
would supersede the educational process and
render art obsolete, Emerson overlooked the fact that
EMERSON. many men
no other
carve,
and
with physical and mental aptitudes
and which can
to artistic employment,
Man must continue
exercise.
cultivate music, or the finer
become as atrophied
his sense will relish for
bom
them
impelling find
are
121
to paint and
endowments of
as the nattuaUst's
Milton and Shakespeare.
Emerson by a preface
Carlyle repaid his obligations to
to the English edition of the Essays, which secured
immediate recognition in
it
He was evidently
this country.
not entirely in sympathy with Emerson's Uterary manner,
which he
criticizes
with justice as abrupt and
fitful,
nor
does he repeat the verdict of his private correspondence
on its characteristic merits. These he had already defined with inimitable
homely
grace, with such
enough, but
up
as " brevity, simpUcity, softness,
felicity
irresistible,
a penetrating meaning,
going
moralist, the
man
who knows and is still alive,
The
that God's imiverse is
is
were
stiU
!
rnap more
:
"
godlike, that of
He
Once more
far the
had
said
die voice
I feel as if in the wide world there
but this one voice that responded intelligently
my own
:
as
the rest were
if
or umnelodious echoes.
Ralph Waldo first
still
age in this horn."
this
Ah me
!
"One
dreamt o^ by
seen, or
to like effect in a private letter
man
public
mainly reserved for the
is
of sure intuition.
Ages of Miracles ever
of a
soft
and
believes of very certainty th& blah's Soul
most miraculous
to
to the depths
to the heights, as silent electricity goes."
expression of liiÂŤ!^dmiration
all
do#n
!
The
"
slow, but its
never doubtfiil.
My
all
hearsays, melodious
blessing
on you, good
book's sale in England was at
reception in intellectual circles was
Milnes, wrote Carlyle, was warm, and
LIFE OF
122
Martineau
Harriet
John
enthusiastic.
and concluded by asking whether
was,
buy the volume
to
man
one
to the beloved
same
;
but
it
one copy,
began
marked
to lend the other
hopes that she would mark the
in
An anonymous critic vaFraser classed
what she marked.
who
lovers
was never found to make much difference
Emerson among Carlyle,
was possible
and, having
duplicate,
in
their favourite passages in
it
By and by
to obtain the author's likeness.
he
Sterling,
added, scolded and kissed, as the manner of the
heresiarchs
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
judgment of
rightly in the
described the reviewer as "emphatic, ear-
not without a kind of splay-footed thought and
nest,
sincerity,"
and opined that he had enough
in
him
to
warrant his holding his peace for the next five years.
Emerson's generosity in the republication of Carlyle's
works and the conduct of
nanimous
He
Dial" was the more mag-
as the situation of his affairs
was not
brilliant.
had married with a modest competency, but expenses
had by
"The
multiplied,
lecturing.
sion
it
and he could only meet
his
obligations
Lecturing was not then the gainful profes-
has since
become
;
nor had Emerson attained the
popularity which attracts lookers as well as hearers, reinforcing those
who come
to hear
by those who come to
see.
A course' of ten lectures which ithad taken months to prepare might bring
five
hundred
dollars in
Boston
;
the
county lyceum could only afford ten dollars a lecture with travelling expenses.
Even when Emerson got a
windfall
he was admonished of the truth of Goethe's saying that the trees are not permitted to
grow into the
unto myself on the way
home on
three hundred dollars earned in
sky.
"
I
crowed
the strength of
New York and
my
Pro-
EMERSON.
12a
But the Atlas Bank declares no dividend ; so
vidence.
Pure
myself pretty nearly where I was before."
I find
was not then a pursuit eminently conducive to
literature
a livelihood in America or care to
make
;
nor did Emerson understand
the most of
"
it.
The
pains,'' says
Mr.
Cabot, "he gave himself with bargaining and with bookaccounts for Carlyle, and the
sellers'
always showed in practical
affairs,
common
the impression that he was a shrewd
But
in bargaining for himself
value his
own
sense he
have sometimes given
he was
man
of business.
easily led to under-
claims and take an exaggerated view of
those of the other party, and so usually bought dear and sold cheap."
It
must be forgiven
to a poet that
he bought
a piece of land to prevent his view being obstructed, and a field in which he had been accustomed to walk lest
a new proprietor should turn him out, and a pine-grove lest
the
made "to
old proprietor should cut
lecturing doubly necessary that
raise his
own
blackberries."
some of the most important of
it
down.
All this
he might continue
The
consideration of
his discourses at this
period will be best reserved for a review of his relation to
In one of a course on "
national politics.
Present
Age" he put
age into a sentence
:
the
The
religious tendencies of the
" Religion does not seem
to tend to a cultus, but to a heroic life."
now
In another
he dwelt on the narrowness of temperance reformers, and all
such as would regenerate society by special nos-
trums
;
which he exhibited with even more terseness "
You
Mr. Jefts
has
in a passage in hi? diary written about this time.
take away, but what do
you give?
been preached into tipping up
his barrel of
rum
into the
;
:
LIFE OF
124
brook
;
but day after to-morrow, when he wakes up cold
and poor, what
will
he
feel that
If I could
?
lift
he has somewhat
some-
for
him up by happy violence
into a
him
then I
religious beatitude, or imparadise
in ideas,
should have greatly more than indemnified him for what
"The Method
of Nature" (1841) was
composed, he
says, in the heat
and happiness of what
he thought a
real inspiration, as
I
have taken."
certainly was.
it
It is
one of the most eloquent and most pregnant of
his
productions, a glowing rapture of idealistic Pantheism, a
paraphrase of Goethe's pithy text " Natur hat weder Kern noch Schaale
AUes
Sie mit
ist
"The method
like
of Nature cannot be analysed.
" (hear this, ye ultra-Darwinians
new book will give
:
einem Male."
you the key
to Nature,'
The
" says,
!)
and we expect
to
But the thunder
a thunderbolt to the centre.
I
'
go is
a surface phenomenon, makes a skin-deep cut, and so
does the sage.
The
observed
the characteristic of insanity
fast to
:
it
is
rushing stream will not stop- to be to
hold
one thought, and not flow with the course of
Nature.
Nature can only be conceived as existing to
a universal and not a particular end, to a universe of ends,
and not
She knows neither palm nor
to one.
oak, but only vegetable to anything final planet,
system,
like a field of
;
life.
We
constellation,
maize in July."
total
method
of unsurpassed
as a
model
splendour,
nature
all is
hands growing
Possessed for the time by
the divine ecstasy he describes,
Nature's
can point nowhere
but tendency appears on
Emerson recommends
for frail
and with
man
in
language
arguments
and
EMERSON.
125
which might well seem extravagant Notwithstanding some golden sayings place, such as "
Do
inspiration,
a state of
illustrations appropriate to
in
any time and
for
fit
but
colder moods.
what you know, and perception
is
converted into character," the discourse should as a
whole only be read as
One
hour. Baptist
is
not
was spoken,
much
who
minister
it
the
that
surprised
on
presided
choicest
in the
occasion
delivery prayed that the audience might
worthy of
its
be preserved
from ever again hearing such transcendental nonsense.
Emerson asked
his
name, and remarked
:
He
"
seems a
very conscientious, plain-spoken man."
The second series of Emerson's essays appeared in It may be described as generally dealing with
1844.
matters of first
more immediate
had done,
in imagination.
poetry in ' '
it,
Character
as
more
There
practical concern than the
ethical in spirit, is,
any more than of ethic in
" is
a discourse on the
nature in the highest form."
less rich
It
'
forerunner.
its
text, "
Character
is
shows that the recluse
of Concord had a sound knowledge of
life,
and of the
and true on " Experience " seems at first a
conditions
necessary for
greatness.
The
essay
and
notwithstanding, no lack of
enduring
success
singular discourse for a preacher of righteousness.
It
must be regarded as an endeavour to atone for previous over-statements by a frank recognition of the unmoral aspects of the universe. saint.
The
" Nature, as
and Grahamites, she does not
distinguish
She comes eating and drinking and lings,
we know
lights of the church, the ascetics,
her,
is
no
Gentoos,
by any favour.
sinning.
Her
dar-
the great, the strong, the beautiful, are not children
;
LIFE OF
126
of our law, do not come out of the Sunday School, never weigh their food, nor punctually keep the commandments.
If
we would be
strong with
her strength,
The
must not harbour such disconsolate consciences." essay
is
of the apparent contradictions established
full
by experience, but concludes protracted will reconcile self-reliance
and
that experience indefinitely
" Manners " insists on
all.
"
promoting them.
been friendly to
Our American
and
her,
at this
much
woman have
institutions
moment
esteem
I
chief felicity of this cpuntry, that she excels in
Let her be as
good
self-respect as the first requisites of
manners, and eloquently describes the function of in,
we
better placed in the laws
it
a
women.
and
social
forms as the most zealous reformer can ask, but I confide so entirely in her aspiring and musical nature, that I believe only herself
The wonderful
can show us
how
she shall be served.
generosity of her sentiments raises her at
times into heroical and godlike regions, and verifies the pictures of Minerva, Juno, or
Polyhymnia; and by the
firmness with which she treads her
upward
path, she con-
vinces the coarsest calculators that another road exists
than that which their
make good
feet
know.
But besides those who
in our imagination the place of
Delphic Sibyls, are there not
women who
muses and of our vase
fill
with wine and roses to the brim, so that the .wine runs
over and
fills
with courtesy
who
the house with perfume ;
who
who
;
anoint our eyes, and
we
see
?
inspire us
and we speak
loose our tongues,
We
say things
we
never thought to have said; for once our walls of habitual reserve vanish,
and leave us
at large
;
we
are children
playing with children in a wide field of flowers.
'
Keep
;
EMERSON. Tis,'
we
we
shall
127
be sunny'
poets,
and
will
As might be expected from a "Poetry"
are.'
of special beauty and significance.
is
region where the air
and attempt
is
music,
to write
and anon a word, or a
and whenever
we we hear those primal warbcan penetrate into that
them down
verse,
and
;
but we lose ever
substitute something of
The
our own, and thus miswrite the poem." credentials of
no
which
sign
and
the poet are that he announces " that
man
is
Namer, or
the
is
Each word was
Language
things to nature
He
"
foretold."
Language-maker. genius.
The
of the highest.
written before time was,
all
are so finely organized that
lings,
is
on
essay
the
poet,
conception of the poet and his mission " Poetry was
many-
write out in "
coloured words the romance that you
we
weeks, and
cry, 'in these influences, for days, for
at first a stroke of
fossil poetry."
"
He
re-attaches
" Readers of poetry
and the whole."
see the factory-village and the railway, and fancy that the
poetry of the landscape
works of
is
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; for these
broken up by them
art are not yet consecrated in their reading
but the poet sees them
fall
within the great order not less
than the beehive or the spider's geometrical web.
adopts them very
fast into
her
ding train of cars she loves '
"Just then the Swift rush
Grew from
And
train,
and
the
vital circles,
like
^
Hence
with shock on shock,
birtli-scream dire,
bosom of he
passed in noise and
With brazen
her own."
Nature
and the
rock,
fire.
throb, with vital stroke.
It went, far heard, far seen,
Setting a track of shining
smoke
Against the pastoral green."
Coventry Patmore.
gli-
the
LIFE OF
128 true
American
when he
poet,
arrives, will
the most unpromising subjects
stumps and
ism;" no
poetry of
our
their politics, our repudiations, banks,
and
than the northern trade, the southern
less
planting,
Oregon and Texas.
sea-lord
air-lord.
or birds
!
fly,
"Thou
Wherever sun
falls,
true- land-lord
ie
!
or water flows,
wherever day and night m^et in
wherever the blue heaven
twilight,
hung by clouds or sown with
wherever are forms with transparent boundaries,
wherever are outlets into
shed
for thee,
space, wherever
celestial
danger and awe and love, there rain,
make
newspaper and caucus, Methodism and Unitarian-
tariffs,
stars,
— " our
log-rolling,
:
is
is
beauty, plenteous as
and though thou shouldst walk the
world over, thou shalt not be able to find a condition inopportune or ignoble."
Emerson's second
series of essays also
appeared with
a preface from Carlyle, treating this time of the book
merely in
its
aspect of literary property, perhaps because
Emerson had apprehended be "too splendid to
be a very
women
of
my
quiet, plain,
some
that the former preface might I fancy
occasion.
even obscure class
religious culture
and
my
—men and —young,
aspirations
and fashionable army who now read your
him
Carlyle assured
readers
and by no means including the
or else mystical, literary
for
great
books.''
that his public was truly aristocratic
;
being of the bravest inquiring minds that England had.
Among
these
lyle's first
while one
was George
preface
man
:
" This
Eliot, is
who wrote
of Car-
a world worth abiding in
can thus venerate and love another."
Emerson's correspondence with Carlyle had been maintained since their
first
acquaintance, though \Yith occa-
EMERSON.
129
Seldom have two men conceived a
sional fluctuations.
more genuine and abiding regard
for
each other on the betrays that he
Emerson
strength of a single meeting,
has been deeply impressed by Mrs. Carlyle
and
also,
is
unsuspicious of the negative elements in her character.
temper come out
Carlyle's infirmities of
Emerson
tenderness of his nature.
always plotting to
object that he inquires whether Carlyle will burn
wood lyle
is
and thinks himself so near
bring his friend to Concord, his
enough
clearly
the deep' inward
in the correspondence, as also does
But Providence knew
or anthracite.
would not have appeared Transcendentalists
atlantic
to advantage
decent
;
Car-
better.
among was
civility
trans-
all
he
could achieve towards the individuals of the species
despatched to him by Emerson.
occasionally
It
is
doubtful whether the precious substance of his lectures
would have repaid the American ear oratorical fluency
slavery question
:
and
in
any event
for the
want of
his perversity on the
would have estranged him hopelessly and Thanks,
deservedly from the flower of his audience.
however, to Emerson in great measure, Carlyle had be-
come an for
New
The and
intellectual force in Am'erica,
England
and
it
was natural
to pit her seer against her mother's.
contrast between
penetration in
them was exhibited with equal wit Mr. Russell
Lowell's
" Fable for
Critics" (1848).^
" There are
on a likeness
To compare him Carlyle's the
He
make and him and Carlyle
persons, mole-blind to the soul's
Who insist
'twixt
with Plato would be vastly
more
hurly, but E.
is
the rarer
sees fewer objects, but clearlier, truelier
If C's. an original, E's.
more
9
peculiar
;
fairer, ;
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
style,
—— —
;
;
LIFE OF
130
.
That he's more of a man you might say of the one,
Of
the othet he's
more of an Emerson
C"s. the Titan, as
shaggy of mind as of limb
;
Olympian, rapid and slim.
E's. the clear-eyed
The one's two-thirds Norseman, the other's half Greek, Where one's most abounding, the other's-to seek ; C's. generals require to
be seen in the mass,
E's. specialities gain if enlarged
C. gives nature and
And E.
his
by the
own
fits
glass
;~
of the blues,
rims common-sense things with mystical hues
sits
And
in a mystery
calm and intense.
looks coolly around
C. shows you
With
the
While E.
Makes E.
God
is
how
him with sharp common-sense
;
every-day matters unite
dim transdiurnal
recesses of night,
in a plain preternatural
way
mysteries matters of mere every day.
rather like Flaxman, lines straight
and
severe.
And a colourless outline, but full, round, and clear To the men he thinks worthy he frankly accords The
design of a white marble statue in words.
C. labours to get at the centre, and then
Take a reckoning from
there of his actions and men.
E. calmly assumes the said centre as granted.
And, given
himself, has whatever
is
wanted."
may be a suitable place to introduce a notice of Emerson's own poetry, as, although " uncertain whether This
he had one true spark of that he was Dial,"
fire
at this period contributing
which burns
poems
in verse,"
freely to
" The
and even entertaining proposals from publishers for
a collected edition.
The
genius of his verse
is
best
—
it
characterized by a happy phrase of Dr. Holmes's elemental.
It stands in
that of almost
any other poet.
•
of making us participate in the
Nature
herself, not as
is
a closer relation to Nature than
He life
has an unique power of Nature as
Wordsworth gives
it,
it is
in
blended with
;
EMERSON.
131
the feelings or at least coloured by the contemplations of
humanity.
Such intimacy with Nature has sometimes
all
moments and moods
in
the effect of magic; there are
which Emerson seems to have as
Thomson and
worth as he outflew inspiration
and
is
Art. lines,
is
in the highest degree fitful
The poems
and
fragrnentary,
offend continually by lame unscannable
and clumsinesses and
Sometimes the poet seems
bears
But the
Collins.
but seldom found allied with beautiful and dignified
no proportion
obscurities of expression.
to struggle with
how to convey
than he knows
tion.
outflown Words-
far
;
more meaning
at other times the rrieaning
to the laboured intricacy of the dic-
When, however, he
is
fortunate
precise fitting for his idea, the result
is
enough
to find the
a diamond of the
purest water. ' '
Not from a vain or shallow thought His awful Jove young Phidias wrought
Never from
The
lips of
thrilling
" The
silent
The "
No
ray
My And
is
cunning
fell
Delphic oracle."
organ loudest chants
master's requiem."
dimmed, no atom worn,
oldest force
is
good as new
;
the fresh rose on yonder thorn
Gives back the bending heavens in dew."
" There ' '
is
no god dare wrong a worm.''
As the wave breaks to foam on shelves, Then runs irito a wave again ; So
lovers melt their sundered selves,
Vet melted would be
twain.''
;
;
LIFE OF
132
" The musing peasant lowly great Beside the forest water sate
The rope-like pine-roots crosswise grown Composed the network of his throne The wide lake, edged with sand 4md grass,
Was
burnished to a floor of glass',
Painted with shadows green and proud
Of
the tree and of the cloud."
ART. In the vaunted works of Art
The
master-stroke
is
Nature's part.
GIPSIES.
The
wild air bloweth in our lungs.
The keen stars twinkle in our eyes. The birds gave us our wily tongues, The panther in our dances flies.
You doubt we read the stars on high, Nathless we read your fortunes true The stars may hide in the upper sky. But without glass we fathom you.
;
TO EVA. O
FAIR and
stately maid,
Were kindled
in the
At the same torch J*or so I
whose eyes
upper skies
must interpret
that lighted
mine
;
still
Thy sweet dominion o'er'my
will,
A sympathy divine. Ah
let
!
me
blameless gaze' upon
Features that seem at heart
Nor '
Who
my own
;
fear those watchful sentinels,
charm the more
their glance forbids.
Chaste-glowing, underneath their
With
fire
that
draws while
it
lids,
repels.
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
:
EMERSON. On
the whole,
is
Emerson the poet
Emerson the thinker and
contrast to
he
133
potent, epoch-making, the
both literary and
presents a singular
As the latter
orator.
morning
star of
As a poet he
intellectual.
is
a new
era,
the lovely,
wayward child of the American Parnassus, more fascinating
and
captivating than his elders
many
and
and nearer by
betters,
degrees to the central source of inspiration
beautiful rather than strong,
ance and excuse.
and ever
in
;
but
need of allow-
Could he have always written with the
mastery he shows in detached passages, he would have stood in a class by himself.
Some few
of his
poems are
actual models of perfection, as, for instance, the lines in
the dedication of the Dr.
Concord monument
Holmes remarks,
his originality
but here, as
;
of style has for-
saken him, and he writes in the manner of Campbell. "
Another noble poem quoted by Dr. Holmes
would
certainly have
been given
been signed by Emerson.
to
Landor
There
are,
Days
if it
had not
however, pieces
of faultless perfection entirely in the Emersonian Such' a piece
Anthology
the " Rhodora," worthy of the
is
:
" In May, when sea-winds pierced our I
solitudes,
found the fresh Rhodora in the woods,
Spreading
To
its leafless
blooms in a damp nook,
please the desert and the sluggish brook.
The
purple petals, fallen in the ppol,
Made
the black water with their beauty gay
Here might the
And
red-bird
come
his
plumes to
;
cool,
court the flower that cheapens his array.
Rhodora
!
the sages ask thee. why
if
This charm
is
wasted on the earth and sky,
Tell them, dear, that
Then Beauty
is its
if
own
eyes were
made
excuse for being
''
for seeing.
style.
Greek
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
"
;
;
LIFE OF
134
Why thou wert there, O I
rival of the rose
!
never thought to ask, I never knew,
my simple
But
in
The
self-same
ignorance, suppose
Power
Almost equally
finished,
well-spring of feeling, entitled "
Two
that brought
and gushing from a yet deeper
:
voice, Musketaquit,
Repeats the music of the rain
But sweeter
Through
rivers pulsing
;
flit
Concord Plain.
thee, as thou through
Thou in thy narrow banks art pent The stream I love unbounded goes Through
flood
Through I see the
brought you.
the mystic yet transparent allegory
is
Rivers "
" Thy summer
me there
:
and sea and firmament.
light,
through
life, it
forward flows.
inundation sweet,
I hear the spending of the stream
ThroiJgh years, through men, through Nature
fleet,
Through passing thought, through power and dream. Jlusketaquit, a goblin strong,
Of They
shard and
And where So
flint
makes jewels gay
lose their grief
forth
Who
who
he winds
and brighter
drinks
it
is
;
hear his song, the day of day.
fares
my stream,
shall not thirst again
No darkness stains its And ages drop in it
equal gleam, like rain."
Such music and such power of
spiritualizing material
^ Nature would have vindicated a high place for a more faulty poet than Emerson but his claims rest by no :
means Orphic,
solely
even on these high
mystic,
and
gifts.
The Runic,
aphoristic element in his poetry,
:
EMERSON. though there
too
is
He
valuable element.
meaning
is
much
of
inspired
not, like
But
his verse,
:
after all
Better
still,
good or bad,
or
mere
is
literary
his greatest glory as a
it is
been the harbinger of
to have
an original and
greater poets, chequer his
some
commonplace
with
riioods
elegances.
still
always worth trying to penetrate.
he does
;
is
always means something, and his
he always sings something poetry
it,
135
distinctively
poet
American
poetry to America
"He
was the
first
that ever burst
Into that silent sea."
Emerson
hesitated over the publication of his
He
for four years.
had come,
poems
he said himself, "
as
solstice of the stars of his intellectual
to a
firmament," and
though he retained freshness enough to write " Representative
Men
" to
be noticed subsequently,
felt
the need
not only for change, but for a more thorough change than
he could find through
all
American to
in
America.
the fermentations
intellectual life
He
had
pretty well
gone
and combinations of which
was then susceptible, and began
think that he needed the stimulus of an English
audience.
He
was dimly, conscious of something pro-
vincial in his reputation.
The
excited half-frightened him.
my papers days, I
very enthusiasm he had " In the acceptance
that
among my thoughtful countrymen in these cannot help seeing how limited is their reading. find
If they read only the
exaggerate so
books that
wildly."
With
I
his
do, they
would not
usual delicacy,
he
breathed no hint of his inclination to Carlyle, fearing that
an audience might be
artificially collected for
him.
But
LIFE OF EMERSON.
136
when, in 1846, invitations came from various English Mechanics' Institutes, he accepted them with hope and
The prime
pleasure.
rriover
was his old friend Mr. Alex-
ander Ireland, " infinitely well affected towards the
Emerson."
Emerson (name of
man
Feeling himself safe in strong; sure hands,
sailed for Liverpool in the fair
omen
!)
October
s,
Washington Irving
1847.
CHAPTER
VI.
EMERSON, as has been seen, believed in the inward He
light.
self
thought a
man needed but
open to the Divine influences
moulded
for him,
and
his creed
to
to
have his
appeared
keep him-
life
happily-
justified
by
his
experience.
" Early
or late, the falling rain
Arrived in time to swell his grain
;
Stream could not so perversely wind,
â&#x20AC;˘
The Divine
But corn of Guy's there was
to grind."
blessing, indeed, rarely took in his case the
form of money, but intellectual events came as they were wanted, and, unless when in the fulfilment of an obli-
upon himself
gation of courtesy or conscience he took
some extraneous
task like the editorship of
everything happened at the right
moment
"The
for the further-
ance of the inner soul and the external end.
timed brity
visit to
was just
interest,
England was a case
in point.
in the stage to render
without rendering
There was enough
him an
Dial,"
him an
His
well-
His
cele-
'
object of
object of adulation.
curiosity respecting
him
to warrant the
best efforts of his devoted friend Mr. Ireland to gain
him
LIFE OF
138
a hearing, and not enough to tempt vulgarize
him by
and modestly for
contractor to
a-
He came
" running " him.
to proffer his thoughts to those
simply
who
cared
them, and to take in return the impressions derived
from the study of a polished society and a venerable and
social order
yet in process of transformation.
sta:ble,
England, on her part, was in a more congenial humour towards a before,
man
of optimistic faith than she had ever been
or has ever been since.
God
we
forbid that
should be discouraged by anything that has happened since 1847
yet
!
we may admit
nearer then than
it
that the millennium
gravely asking whether
was worth
life
Seemed
People were not then
does now.
The peace
living.
of the world, on the brink of such rude disturbance,
seemed power
had
well-assured.
The
black cloud depicted with such
in Carlyle's " Chartism "
lifted off
Ten Hours
Disraeli's " Sybil,''
and
the English working class.
Bill,
By
passing the
Parliament had just declared that a
man
was not a horse. Free Trade had not only been adopted as a political measure, but
was thought to have been
demonstrated as an economical principle its
and
;
of time.
It
was inconceivable that reasons of State
should prevail over reasons of arithmetic
and the United to
therefore
reception by the whole world seemed but a question
be
four,
States should
merely because
to be five.
Peel was the
Cobden the
second.
rudely shaken;
the
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
that France
go on denying two and two
self-interest first
man
This sanguine
would have them
in the country, faith
demon has rebuked
the exorcist.
But were Free Trade to die out of Manchester fact_
would remain that
its
and
has since been
itself,
the
triumph in 1846 was a great
EMERSON. moral victory
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the
139
triumph of logic and eloquence.
had won with everything against
it,
and
Jt
had
success
its
engendered a conviction of the adequacy of moral force to effect
all
reforms,
penny postage men, enemies of and Poland,
friends of Africa
reformers, philanthropists,
and
capital
some devoted
up
as Shaftesbury
The
very Pope
a reformer, to the dismay of Prince
as
Lecturing and lecturers were rising nearer
Metternich. to the
sanitary
others in various
stages of lunacy, did incredibly prevail. set
punishment,
educationalists,
Southwood Smith,
practical as
had
to cure all
and of moral reforms
Peace men, temperance men, ocean
physical' evils.
American
level
:
the eloquence of
W.
J.
Fox and
George Thompson had won them
seats in Parliament,
and George Dawson was beginning
to
and
be a power
in the
Progress was for the time the national watchword,
land. it
was a
real creed
and no
cant.
Save for the Irish
famine, there seemed scarcely a cloud in the sky
Emerson made his lecturing arrangements
;
when
he arrived on
the eve of a revolution, and in the middle of a panic.
On
landing at Liverpool on October 22nd,
found an invitation from Carlyle, tion,
he
says,
in
its
heartiness
Emerson
irresistible as gravita-
and urgency.
After
spending some hours with Mr. Ireland in Manchester,
he proceeded little
changed
to in
London, and found the Carlyles very appearance from their old selves of
fourteen years before.
Spiritual progress there
had been,
not change, for Carlyle had travelled as steadily on his
own
line as
Emerson had, and
different directions.
their progress
had been
They might be compared
streams which, rising on the same mountain
to
crest,
in
two gush
LIFE OF
140
down
and diverge the more the further
opposite steeps,
wend
they
aUkeâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; the
The central idea of each was Divine Immanence in all 'things; but, to their way.
employ Heine's convenient it
like a
Hebraism
is
was profound, but his
pathies were bitter
" Gymnosophist
of
Emerson;
that
and
is
it
fierce,
talking with
him
did not give us
note of
intellectual anti-
and the serene
sage, the
Emersonianism equalled his love
to
a proof of the sincerity of his love
survived such estrangement.
it
One
on a flowery bank," was among
sitting
His aversion
them.
a Greek.
like
Carlyle's personal tenderness-
intolerance.
to his fellows
one presented
generalization,
Hebrew, the other
here,"
much
to
he
writes,
"
We
had immense
" but find that
chew the cud upon.
He
pure, high-minded man, but I think his talent quite as high as I says, "
Good
friendly looks
of
had
him
and
anticipated."
he is
is
a
not
At another time he
I could 'get none, except
elevated, exotic, polite ways."
from
his-
Emerson
could not be expected to shine in conversation with the first
talker of his age
;
was allowed the chance.
The
even
if,
which
is
improbable,
he
His was not an exuberant mind.
habit of nicely fitting his thought with the one right:
word
in his public utterances
made him
hesitate in ordi-
nary conversation, and grew upon him until " to hear hina talk," says Dr.
Holmes, "was
brook on stepping-stones."
like
watching one crossing a
He
the
more admired the
affluent discourse of the apostle of Silence, which
as one of the four things that
Europe.
he classed
had most impressed him
" You will never discover," he told Mrs.
son, " his real vigour
in
Emer-
and range, or how much more he
might do than he has ever done, without seeing him."
EMERSON. This
visit to
London was
141
short, but
was graced by a
social passport in the shape of a breakfast with Rogers,
who
received
him with
the fatigued politeness of one
for all the lions of the last half-century.
had provided
Returning to Liverpool and Manchester to lecturing engagements, he
felt
development of industrial
life,
"
aspects of the streets.
many size
and
little
street
far-off
but
and
;
and
and
bare-
look curiously into
I
terror, lest
Edie wins from
solidity
it
should resemble
me
the half-pence
and "a
of the people,
and determination
discriminates
me
I shall'see
But he was impressed by the strength,
for this near one."
fixedness
tragic
Edie costs
age, but in coarsest ragged clothes,
and the
his
in rags, with a little creature just of Edie's
footed, stepping beside her
bigness,
and shocked by the
go up the
her Edie's face with some mine,
fulfil
oppressed by the gigantic
My dearest
I cannot
a penny.
some woman
whp
in each person's
them from the sauntering
gait
certain air that
and roving
In America you catch the eye of
eyes of Americans.
every one you meet, here you catch no eye, almost."
Everything in the provinces went well with Emerson.
The Manchester
newspapers, distinguished then as
now
for the excellence of their reports, gave his lectures a
wide
circulation.
care of one of
the king of
Alexander Ireland, though with the
them on
all
his shoulders,
friends
and
active, unweariable, imperturbable."
ture crowded
on Emerson,
"approved himself
helpful agents;
until
he
the most
Invitations to lecfelt
ashamed
to read
yet again " the musty old discourses so often reported."
But managers and audiences would have
Making Manchester
his headquarters,
no
other.
he ranged over
allÂťI,
LIFE OF
142
the northern and midland counties, acquainting himself in the
most agreeable manner possible with the flower of
English middle class culture, and rejoicing in the proof thus afforded that here, as at home, he had beguiled young better hppes than
, people into
The
he could
twice the speed of the American,
Perhaps
him
soul in
prepared him for his
in that
the
;
more
No
many men.
two persons' pursuits could have
lation
and the man of steam.
in the
same
lofty
in a few
But
man
plane of perfect simplicity and sincerity,
moments Stephenson had
marvels of electricity and his
Emerson declared
own
his
The
man of the
party.
hand upon
him of the
engineering experiences,
it
was worth crossing the
great
Duke should have been
that,
Atlantic to see him.
the third
of specu-
minds moved
their
the American's coat-collar, and talked to
until
interesting
brought proof of his doctrine of one
it
been more dissimilar than those of the
and
them.
and half the motion.
this observation the better
meeting with George Stephenson to
realize for
English railways, he remarked, conveyed him with
At Edinburgh, where he went
with a lecture composed for the occasion, he met a
man
as remarkable as Stephenson, but as unlike him as the
imagination can conceive. ception of
De Quincey
his writings,
He
had formed
small old
man
sixty-two), with
thfe
;
saw and heard
face,
expressing the
a very gentle old man, speaking
greatest deliberation
fined in speech
He
of seventy years (De Quincey was
a very handsome
highest refinement
with
con-
and expected a presence and an elocution
" like the organ of York Minster."
"a
his
from the " voluminous music " of
and manners
and
as to
softness,
make
and so
re-
quite indifferent
-
EMERSOJV. his
143
He
extremely plain and poor dress."
dined at
De
afterwards
Quincey's cottage with him and his three
admirable daughters, and laments, as we do, that time failed to record the conversation.
French and rather affected tures to his class
more
strength of
Combe,
George
seemed
to
Mrs.
he found very
Professor Nichol,
notabilities,
and
lec-
to call into exercise
David
Crowe,
his chief friend
Brown, then
him
body than of mind.
Chambers, and other Scotch
ken; but
Jeffrey
and Professor Wilson's
;
Scott,
came
Robert
within his
entertainer was
Samuel
quest of that Sangreal of science, the
in
demonstration of the unity of substance.
Emerson
up
travelled
to
London
in the last days of
February, with the exciting tidings of the French Revolution ringing all
around him.
He
saw Wordsworth and
Harriet Martineau on the road, and on his arrival in
town took up Mr.
his
abode with
his English
publisher,
(now Dr.) John Chapman, whose house was to
harbour George Eliot by and by.
Aided by the
intro-
ductions of the American Minister, he took place at
once as one of the conspicuous figures of the London season.
His
letters
home
are
crowded with the names
of the intellectual leaders he had met, the most remarkable exceptions being Browning, then in Italy, Mill,
who had
at this
and Stuart
time almost given up society.
He
seems to have been especially impressed by Leigh Hunt,
whom, along with De Quincey, he thought the finest mannered man of letters in England ; by Macaulay, in
whom
he
rightly discerned the nearest
among them
all to
approximation
the typical Englishman, incarnating
the differentia of the race
;
and by Owen,
whom
he with
'
LIFE OF
144
equal justice pronounced " one of the best heads in England."
"Richard Owen," he says
in the " Traits," "
adds
sometimes the divination of the old masters to the
unbroken power of labour
in the English mind."
interesting to get a glimpse
of
him from a Nestor
Crabb Robinson, who
observation,
It is
writes
of
" It was with
:
a feeling of predetermined dislike that I had the curiosity to look at Emerson at Lord Northampton's, when, in an instant, all
my
dislike vanished.
He
has one of the most
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a
combination
interesting countenances I ever beheld
of intelligence and sweetness that quite disarmed me."
Mis^ Martineau had told Robinson that Emerson would not be apprehended nobleness
till
" There is a vague
he was seen.
and thorough sweetness about him which
moves people
to their very depths, "without being able
Robinson agreed
to explain why."
lecture left
"
a,
dreamy sense of
analyse, or render
an account
lazy about lecturing,
that
Emerson's
pleasure,
first
not easy to
Emerson had been
of."
and indeed the
political
circum-
stances of the times were unfavourable for the promul-
gation
of abstract thinkings.
threatened to extend to
The
England
;
length, however, a course
Europe
Chartist
and
men "
of the hour.
was arranged
for the begin-
constable were the " representative
At
blaze of
and
ning of June, and in the interim Emerson started for a trip to Paris,
where he arrived
tive revolution of
May
15 th.
were preparing, but in the
just in time for the abor-
The
terrible
meantime
days of June Paris
showed
and men
bravely,
crowded with sashes and
bearded
like goats or lions; full too of living fire, and,
as
helriiets
Emerson thought, of genuine passion
for justice
and
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON. He
humanity.
145
afterwards said that the French
had best
He
discussed what other nations had best done.
had
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
been inspecting a very different place Oxfdrd, where seeds of thought were quietly germinating, des-
just
tined perhaps to produce greater results than the brilliant
The new
demonstrativeness of Paris.
moment
for the
represented for
Liberalism was
Emerson by two young
men whose fellowships even then hung by a hair Clough, whom his writings had deeply impressed, and Froude, " a noble youth, to whom my heart warms.'' Froude was which
^
is
greatly struck
by his resemblance to Newman,
indeed undeniable, and goes deeper than the a curious speculation what would
physical likeness.
It is
have happened
the two could have changed places.
Could
Newman
if
have found his way to
What
sachusetts?
Rome
would Emerson's
tints
from Masspiritualism
have imbibed from the painted windows of Oxford?
Somewhat
Avon
later
he made a pilgrimage to Stratford-on-
among them a
with a party from Coventry,
plain young
woman who told him that
" Confessions " best of
all
He started
books.
" So do I ; " and the plain young that the seen.
very
she liked Rousseau's
woman
;
then said,
wrote next day
American stranger was the one real man she had
He
had had his
first
and
last
meeting with George
Eliot.
Emerson had '
all
but decided not to lecture in London,
but " came to have a feeling that not to do a kind of skulking."
He
seems to have
that, while in the provinces
almost
reverential
regarded as the
it
would be
felt instinctively
he was heard with
interest,
in
last sensation,
lO
serious,
London he was only
and the more so the more
LIFE OF
146
intellectual capital
new
He
audience.
his
aristocratic
"The
discourses on
paid the
nevertheless
the compliment of preparing three
Natural History of the
Intellect,''
which, with two old ones and that composed for Edin-
burgh,
made up
a course under the
title
of "
Duchess of Sutherland downwards, but
came."
The London
at.
Manchester brethren
Emerson day,''
honestly
Carlyle also took a lively interest in the course,
and Emerson was pleased looked
his great pleasure
"Jane Carlyle and Mrs. Bancroft, who
in
had no
and accomplished auditors, from the
lack of dignified
was
Mind and
He
Manners of the Nineteenth Century."
writes,
to observe reporters
in fulness
" Our
little
how much he was far
fell
behind
their
and accuracy, and though
company grows
larger each
the lectures seem to have produced no great effect
beyond the
walls of the
minds,
besides,
exciting
themes
Marylebone
Men's
Institute.
were abundantly occupied with more :
and the net pecuniary produqt was only
;^8o instead of the promised price of the tickets caused
£200
Emerson
while
:
the high
to be taxed with for-
saking the middle class, like the Belgian canons
who not
only had to give up their dinners to the bishops, but
were pelted because they had not thrown them out to
He
the people.
—
old songs "
in
gave three "expiatory lectures
Exeter Hall, and took
his,,
—
dull
leave of the
English platform amid Carlyle's good-humoured laughter at
what he termed the
Robinson thought
it
orator's
moonshine.
the most^ liberal
Exeter Hall had ever heard, and,
he was their
hitting,
heads
at
little
But Crabb
discourse that
suspecting
whom
spoke with disdain of those who " shook
what they could not reduce to propositions
EMERSON. as indisputable as a
somewhat doubtfully
Home,
sum
in
arithmetic."
The
Human
process of thought
is
conceive Carlyle smiling, "
Man
no longer dies
is
on
Life, delivered
not very clear in
the summary, but the conclusion, at which
temporary
Mr. Cabot
identifies this lecture with that
the second of the series on
in 1838.
147
it is
that of the Essay
hard to
on Love.
and
daily in the perishing of local
but finds in the Divine soul the rest
relations,
which in so many types he had sought, and learns to look on them as the movables and furniture of the City
Emerson's
of God."
last
adventure in England was the
expedition to Stonehenge in Carlyle's company, recorded in
On
" English Traits."
Ireland,
his
way from London
to
he spent a night in Manchester with Mr.
Liverpool
and was
full
to England.
He
there was so
much
of pleasant recollections of his
said he
visit
had not been aware " that
kindness in the world."
He
sailed
from Liverpool on July isth, taking a rocking-horse for his girls
own
and a cross-bow
for his son,
and was under
his
roof before the end of the month.
Emerson and again
lectured
on England
in the year of his return,
in 1853, but his full impressions
were not pub-
when they appeared under the title of In this book he has matched himself
lished until 1856,
" English Traits."
with the English people, and both are upon their
Could an
idealist
practical a nation
?
trial.
display true insight in dealing with so
Could so material a
the criticism of an idealist?
civilization stand
England and Emerson both
He
came
well out of the ordeal.
down
the English intelligence as somewhat beefy and
obtuse, for such
is
the
fact.
But
fie
cannot help setting
does not, like
Haw-
LIFE OF
148
phenomenon as an
thorne, resent the
observer
he finds in
:
and boldly
qualities,
affront to the foreign
this stiff soil the
substratum of fine
declares that the intellect of Eng-
The
land owes more to Plato than to Aristotle. of the English
is
no doubt the great primal
" I find the Englishman to be him of firmest
in
shoes."
his
all
Practicality,
solidity
fact with
men who
veracity,
conser-
vatism, all the traits too plain to be missed, are
recognized.
when he comes
B,ut
to literature
nounces that the two nations in England of
him.
stands
fully
he pro-
whom
so
'much has been written are not the Norman and the Saxon, nor the Poor and the Rich, but " the perceptive
and the
class
practical finahty class, ever in counterpoise,
interacting mutually
:
souls,
and
consist only of a dozen
in
"
deplored.
Even what
mechanical in
ceased, as
if
no
millions,
its
is
called philosophy
structure,
vast hope,
no
as
if
religion,
science
is
false
by not being
mollusc
it
science
now
:
and
letters
no song of
poetic.
strives to explain
had joy,
" English
It isolates the ;
whilst reptile
or mollusc only exists in system, in relation." ticular reproach has
and
inspiration
no wisdom, no analogy, existed any more."
reptile of the
by
for ever
power of the
their accord yield the
The preponderance of the practical his own day is indeed admitted and
English state." finality class
is
first
and the second of twenty
their discord
and
these two nations, of genius
of animal force, though the
This
par-,
been well-nigh removed from English
many other departments Emerson would
in
find that his hint of " a retrieving
power in the
English mind, which makes recoil possible," had been fully justified.
He
must
also, if
Darwin ever engaged
his
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON. attention,
149
have had to acknowledge that the recovery of
came
the lost faculty of generalization
in a great
from the very method to which he ascribes
"The absence
of the faculty in England
is
its
measure
extinction.
shown by the
bad
timidity which accumulates mountains of facts, as a
general wants myriads of
men and
miles
of redoubts
compensate the inspirations of courage and conduct"
to
Th^ good his
general often will not
communications
safe,
move
and provided
he has made
till
for his supplies.
Emerson's book sparkles with epigrams such as these
"There should be temperance
A
as in eating.
nation a tent of
man
making
in
:
welU
cloth, as
should not be a silkworm, nor a " The lawyer
caterpillars.''
perdu
lies
under the coronet, and winks to the antiquary to say "
nothing."
The upper
classes
have only
" Loyalty
manners." "
When
to
is
in the English a
the Englishman wishes for
" There
work.''
is
in-
birth, say the
Yes, but they have
people here, and not thoughts.
sub-religion."
amusement he goes
an Englishman's brain a
valve that can be closed at pleasure, as an engineer
The most
shuts off steam.
men
bishop
religious
in
sarcasms there
is
matters.''
and well-informed
and us
injustice
his respect for the
in that
he
felt
Amid
not one sneer
visitor liked us better than
self
sensible
possess the power of thinking just so far
:
it
all is
these kindly
when he
told Margaret Fuller that
Englishman was the more generous
no sympathy with him, only admiration.
books ever written by in
it
our
plain that
he knew, and did both him-
Carlyle said that " English Traits " was worth
and
as the
New England upon
all
the
the
Old;
England assuredly imported from her descen-
â&#x20AC;˘
LIFE OF
150 dants
much
better ware than anything of
its
class that
she had exported to them, except Sir Charles Lyell's.
Emerson
life,
so
is
little
concerned with the fashion of the
and so much with the
day,
that his
solid foundations of English
book should endure as long as these
do.
It
should be a mirror for England to consult from time to time,
and see whether,
more
in gaining the
look
spiritual
which Emerson missed, her countenance has
lost
any
of
" I see
the frankness and resoluteness which he found.
England," he said in a speech at Manchester, in allusion
commercial
to the
labouring
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and
afterwards
he
crisis
under which he found the country
by republishing
signified that
words nine years
his
he had found them true
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;" I
see her not dispirited, not weak, but well remembering that she has seen dark days before; indeed with a kind of instinct that she sees a little better in a cloudy day,
that in storm of battle
and a pulse
like
a cannon.
and
decrepit, but young,
I see her in her old age, not still
daring to believe in her
power of endurance and expansion.
Seeing
All hail, mother of heroes, with strength
time;
still
mind and
it
be
!
and
who
If
it
heart of
truly
a
home
are born in the
be not
capes
so, if the
soil.
to
requires
my
to
So be
it
!
So
crisis,
I will
my own
let
go back Indian
countrymen, the old race are
gone, and the elasticity
the
thoughtful and
courage of England goes
of Massachusetts, and
stream, and say
mankind
the
to
with the chances of a commercial to the
this, I say,
equal to the
and thus only hospitable
in the present hour,
generous
still
wise to entertain and swift to execute the
policy which the
foreigner,
and
and calamity she has a secret vigour
all
and hope of mankind must
EMERSON.
on the Alleghany ranges, or no-
remain
henceforth
151
where.''
Accidental as the coincidence tical
his visit to prac-
England synchronizes with a healthy
son's mind. first
may be,
crisis in
Emer-
His discourses on " Representative Men,"
delivered in 1845, though not published
till
1850,
exhibit a greater tendency to the oracular than anything
The
written before or afterwards.
Uses of Great Men," obscurity
is
justly
is
lecture,
first
"The
obscure in the only sense in which
imputable to Emerson.
It is
a suc-
cession of sayings, for the most part individually compre-
hensible and sometimes of stimulatirig freshness, but so
abrupt and discontinuous that
we
find ourselves landed
at last in Emerson's favourite conclusion with but slight idea
how we have
arrived at
Genius " appears as an
it.
exponent of a vaster mind and
becomes transparent with the is
will.
The opaque
self
Cause."
It
light of a First
the purpose of the remaining lectures to resolve this
pure ray of primal
spectrum of
intellect into the sixfold
philosopher, mystic, sceptic, poet, writer; respectively personified
man of the
by
Plato,
world,
Montaigne, Shakespeare, Napoleon, and Goethe.
we
and
Swedenborg,
Here
find Emerson's success to be proportioned to his hold
on concrete sonality so
and
fact.
little is
indefinite.
"
The
figure of Plato, of
known,
is,
Can you
tell
my
are visible
if
friend, save in
not palpable.
rous than his trampling
God
per-
vague
me," asked an auditor of
his neighbour, " what connection
" None,
whose
as Carlyle complains,
!
has with Plato?"
all this
"
But the other
figures
Nothing can be more gene-
down
of prejudice in recognizing
the true inspiration of Swedenborg, or
more crushing
LIFE OF
152
than his criticism of the merely mechanical element in
"When
that seer.
hear
he mounts into the heaven
walked among the angels
makes me one."
do not
I
A man should not tell riie that he has
language.
its
The
;
his proof is that his eloquence
lecture
on Montaigne teaches that
a wise scepticism leads to the same result as a large f
"
The
faith.
to believe
what the years and the
centuries say against the hours.
Things seem to tend
lesson of
life is
downward, to justify despondency, to promote rogues, to defeat the just
cause
;
and by knaves, as by martyrs, the Let a
carried forward.
is
the permanent in the
man
mutable and
fleeting
;
learn to bear the disappearance, of things he was
reverence without losing his reverence that he
is
here, not to work, but to
opinion,
The
all
;
let
him
let
wont to
him
be worked upon
that though abyss open under abyss,
just
learn to look for
learn ;
and
and opinion displace
are at last contained in the Eternal Cause."
discussion on Napoleon shows
as a connoisseur of
Emerson
at his best
men, and would alone prove that he
did not addict himself to speculation out of incapacity or
contempt judges the the
man
for the affairs
man
brilliantly
sufficiency in all things for
puts
him on
idol of
painted Napoleon's perfect
which virtue
his right footing with, "
common men,
not needful, the
common men."
Goethe and Shakespeare Emerson says many
to be
is
because he had in transcendent
lent things, but the former's activity ,
is
Bonaparte
degree the qualities and the powers of
On
ideologist
of action would have judged the ideologist; and
having niost
after
The
of the world.
of action more shrewedly and justly than
condensed into a
lecture,
is
excel-
too multifarious
though the
man him-
EMERSON. self is got into a sentence
who man
:
"
153
The
old Eternal Genius
more
built the .world has confided himself
than to any
other "
—and Emerson
to this
incapable of
is
contemplating Shakespeare with the eye of the dramatic
His unsatisfied demands ignore the
artist.
fact that
Shakespeare's plays were designed for the stage, and must
The marvel
not be burdened with incongruous wisdom. is it
how he has made them carry may be suspected that in the
not a
of Mr.
little
so
much
and, after
;
of what the student most prizes shared the fate
Queen Elizabeth's
Puff's description of
side-saddle.
Emerson, who afterwards said of Shakespeare, .greatest
all,
original representations
mind
presentative
" the
values him the most," appears in " Re-
Men"
led an obscure
under concern "that the best poet
and profane
ihe public amusement."
using his genius for
life,
His
thus coincides
criticism
with the Englishman's observation to Mr. Fields on his visit to
Stratford-on- Avon
have cared
for
:
— " Shakespeare
Shakespeare
if
he hadn't
who would
!
them
writteil
plays?"
During Emerson's absence
in
Europe a
taking had been initiated in which
it is
literary
to
under-
be regretted
that he did not see his way to participate.
It at that
.time required the collective exertions of the best
in America to support a
first-class
^t the same time be an organ of serious thought.
North American Review
—since
minds
journal which should
greatly
The
modified—was
then cautious, conservative, and quite out of keeping with the aspirations of reformers.
To
provide them with an
organ. The Massachusetts Quarterly was established under
the direction of Theodore Parker.
;
LIFE OF
154
Tennyson, in 1830, inscribed a sonnet to a friend who
was to be " a
later Luther,
and a
soldier-priest,"
to shoot "arrows of lightning into the dark."
and was
Choosing to
war with Giant Pagan rather than Giant Pope, the friend
became a most eminent
The
archaeologist.
poet's
prophecy went wandering homeless about the world until
it
Parker,
found exact fulfilment in the person of Theodore
who lacked nothing
pertaining to the character of
Luther, nor superadded anything material.
seem as much is
less
less
Parker must
than Luther as the abolition of slavery
than the Reformation
yet
:
can scarcely be
it
doubted that in Luther's age he might have played In an age
Luther's part.
however, he must
like ours,
by
inevitably be judged in a great degree
his standing as
author and orator, and this
is
This incontestable fact
an incontestable proof of the
fallacy of Sir
is
also
but in the second rank.
Joshua Reynolds's definition of genius as an
infinite faculty for taking pains.
itself.
may be an
This
pensable accompaniment to the thing
it is
:
indis-
not the thing
Parker's great natural powers were cultivated to
the uttermost
;
and, in truth,
it is
hardly possible to
name
a bookish or oratorical accomplishment that was wanting to him.
Vehement, sonorous, copious,
wrath and moving in his tenderness native yet
severely
ornate yet compact orator, while his
logical ;
;
erudite
exuberantly imagiyet
earnestness delivered
character was finer
Yet
:
in his
perspicuous
he possessed every merit of the
defect of the rhetorician.
hated wrong.
;
terrible
him from every
Fine as his parts were,
his
no man so loved God, no man so it
is
plain that, though his
indelibly inscribed in the civil
and
name
is
religious history of
EMERSON. New
England,
man
of letters
it
;
155
not endure as that of a theologian or
will
and no reason can be given except a
certain
second-rateness in the stuff of the mind, the lack of that
which stamps Emerson, so greatly
inscrutable something
Parker's inferior in whatever can be taught, as a superior in natural endowment.
If
man
Emerson was ever
tempted to identify genius with character, he might have found the correction of
He seems
his error in his friend.
to have even underrated Parker's g ifts, so different to his
"A
own.
little
more feehng of the
'-
poetic significance
of his facts," he said, " would have disqualified
some
function of the great radical preacher
no
him for The main
of his severer offices to his generation."
than eloquence
less truth
as a reformer pulpits that
morals
:
it is
combine
it
that
is this,
:
" His
is
thus defined with
commanding merit jj
he insisted beyond
the essence of Christianity there for use, or
it is
nothing
all
its
is ;
men
in
practical
and
if
you
with sharp trading, or with ordinary city am-
bitions to gloss over municipal corruptions, or private
intemperance, or successful fraud, or immoral politics, or unjust wars, or the cheating of Indians, or the robbery of frontier nations, or leaving
show on the high ance to tyrants,
you
;
your principles at
seas or in
it is
an hypocrisy, and the truth
and no love of
home
to
Europe a supple complais-
religious music, or of
is
not in
dreams of
Swedenborg, or praise of John Wesley or of Jeremy Taylor, can save you from the Satan which you are.'"^
With
this
high and just view of Parker's mission, more
active co-operation
from Emerson
in
The Massachusetts
Quarterly might have been expected.
have been annoyed
at
He
seems to
having been announced as a
LIFE OF
156 joint
and perhaps winced
editor without' his consent,
under the "one fault" which he over-estimated his friends,
"He
finds in Parker.
and sometimes vexed them
with the importunity of his good opinion, whilst they
knew
better the
ebb which follows exaggerated
praise."
His only contribution was. the admirable introductory address (December, 1847), pregnant with unpractical,
but which
common
America has- made
then
ideas
-
deemed
the recent history of
The United "a
property.
States of that day wore in his eyes the aspect of certain
maniacal
immense apparatus of
an
activity,
cunning machinery which turns remberg y
More pungent
toys."
Nu-
out, at last, soine
criticism 'of the
same
kind follows, but Etnerson, unlike Carlyle in similar cases, refuses to despair, will not believe that so stupendous a
phenomenon
as the
American Republic can have been
called into being for nothing.
" Moral
values are always commensurate.
Every material organi-
zation exists to a moral end, which its
Here
existence.
continent with
temperate climates, all
the year,
its
highest energy,
â&#x20AC;˘
are
its
and surrounding
waters,
its
west wind breathing vigour through
confluence of races so favourable to the
and the
without putting
new
pose for which
this
infinite glut
of their production,
questions to Destiny as to the pur-
muster of nations and
enormous values
creation of
makes the reason of
no books, but who can see the
inland
its
and material
is
made
? "
this
The
sudden
questions
with which a jourpal aspiring to leadership must deal are indicated with admirable exactness,
"in some
sort the special
provoked against
it
among them
slaverj',
enigma of the time, as
it
has
a sort of inspiration and enthusiasm
EMERSON. singular in
modern
history
;
"
157
and the adjustment of the
balance between " the exact French school of the genial catholic theorists, Geoffroy
Davy, and Agassiz." gotten the thought,
for
Agassiz
setts
The
did life
to
its
to
belong
not
;
it
to
died of supe-
Among
public within three years.
have be-
of The Massachu-
Quarterly was brief but honourable
riority
Goethe,
St. Hilaire,
(Here the wish seems
Geoffroy St. Hilaire's party.)
Cuvierand
its
many
memorable contributions the only one which concerns us here
is
Parker's general review of Emerson, a creditable-
piece of work, bringing out mOst of Emerson's strong points
and by no means sparing
his
weak
ones, his
want
of logical connection, his occasional inconsistencies extravagances, his deference to Oriental writers fact he misapprehends.
The preponderance
ethical sentiment in Parker's
and
whom of
in
the
mind makes him cold
to
Emerson's mystic absorption in Nature, and the essay is
disfigured
by a gratuitous comparison of Emerson
with a light of the Old World, Milton. whole,
it
was a worthy sentence, the
announcement by an American possessed a
Another
But,
first
on the
authoritative
that his country, at last,
classic.
ally of
those days,
was Henry Thoreau, in nal, half-fraternal
much
nearer than Parker,
whom Emerson
interest, as
took half-pater-
he had every
right to do.
Without him Thoreau might never have existed as the hermit-poet of Walden.
He
had had him
in his
house
two years (1841-1843), and so moulded the young man, not previously deemed over-susceptible to intellectual influences, that
when he found
Mr. Haskins started with amazement his former classmate
" in the tones
and
LIFE OF
158
modes of
inflections of his voice, in his
and pauses of
in the hesitations
part of Mr. Emerson.''
He
expression, even
his speech, the counter-
adds indeed
:
" After conver-
sing with Mr. Emerson for even a brief time,
always
I
found myself able and inclined to adopt his voice and
manner of speaking."
Hawthorne probably had
this
metamorphosis in mind when he drew Thoreau on
one side of Faun.''
nature as Donatello in his "Marble
his
Thoreau adopted more than Emerson's manner
and tones
:
worked out
he
creed
his
of the
suffi-
ciency of the individual, and demonstrated that
it
is
easy to live according to nature in the neighbourhood of a civilized and corrupt society
went to show,
his experiments
tually
presupposed
all
such neighbourhood
;
which
that complicated civilization
theoretically abjured.
land
but, so far at least as
"Thoreau's ex!periment," says Mr. Lowell, "ac-
only.
it
:
in
He
he borrows an axe
;
squatted on another man's his
boards,
his
his
nails,
bricks, his mortar, his books, his lamp, his fish-hooks, his
plough, his hoe,
all
turn state's evidence against
an accomplice in the sin of that which rendered
it
possible that such a person as
D. Thoreau should
may have
exist at all."
infected his
his friends, and, better
the belief that
it
went
still,
of his
is
the boughs of a forest tree
freedom, there too."
"
further.
with him," wrote Hawthorne, "
among
But whatever
method of
There
is
is
him
Henry
affectation
life,
the testimony of
own
writings, forbids
To
hold intercourse
like hearing the ;
as
civilization
artificial
and with
wind
all this
wild
high and classic cultivation in him
even higher testimony to the charm of
his character in the elevating effect
which the remem-
;
EMERSON. brance of
wrought upon Emerson when he penned
it
Hardly any of
Thoreau's funeral tribute.
much
have so plicity,
139
'
down
his writings
natural magic, or such captivating sim-
to the noble peroration, itself simple
seems a kind of indignity to so noble a soul that
it
:
" It
should
depart out of Nature before yet he has been really shown to his peers for
what he
His soul was made in a short
wherever there July
1 6,
for the
he, at least,
is
content.
;
he had
noblest society
exhausted the capabilities of this world
life
wherever there
On
But
is.
is is
knowledge, wherever there
is
virtue,
beauty, he will find a home."
1850, Margaret Fuller Ossoli was drowned,
with her husband and child, on her return from Italy, after
for
sitting
amid driving
on the stranded wreck
twelve hours
rain, in sight of the
coast
and of sundry
came ashore
persons too diligently picking up whatever to
busy themselves in procuring a
To
lifeboat.
find such
another contrast of dying or dead genius in presence of dull, soulless
we must go to memoirs of the Emerson exclaimed,
inhumanity,
"realistic" school of biography.
"
I
have
lost
my
audience
!
He
"
could not honestly say
more, for his nature and Margaret's, though by no means antipathetic,
were hardly congenial.
that of the ardent mistress,
Her
and his the cold
part
had been
beauty's. Fail-
ing in her attempts, to gain his confidence by storm, she cried, "
Why
do
I write thus to
the deepest tones of
my nature
or worldly discontent
home
outside his
affection
:
it
? "
own
one who must ever regard as those of childish fancy
Emerson could never sphere, whether of
was impossible,
feel at
thought or
therefore, that there should
not be something of constraint in his portion of the
LIFE OF
160
biography
two
which,
years
Margaret's death,
after
appeared as the joint production of her most intimate friends.
Yet, having helped himself, by reminiscences of
'conversation and, quotations from correspondence, over
the intellectual region of Margaret's nature, into which
he entered but he comes straight
imperfectly,
he kindles up when
at last
woman, who ,went
the generous helpful
to
from a wedding to attend a
relative
undergoing
a surgical operation, and who, when in after years she
found scope in Italy, "
the exercise of
for
came
to
it
as
if it
her love and devotion
all
had been her habit and her
natural sphere."
Two
from Europe about
visitors
us glimpses of Emerson. at Oxford, his
companion
time have given
this
Arthur
Hugh
at Paris,
and
Clough, his host
in
found (but he cannot have sought very only Englishman
who put Wordsworth
whom
he had
diligently) the
at the top of the
modern English Parnassus, having gone through a spiritual revolution in
England and looked
the face abroad,
came by
in search of a quiet
poral provision shortljf
found
at
political revolution in
his invitation to Massachusetts
haven in which to anchor, and tem-
upon which
to wed.
Better provision was
home, and the translation of Plutarch's
" Morals," on which the exiled scholar had been working- at
The
Harvard, was finished on
iconoclast
who
this side of the Atlantic.
profanely called
with a prettyish pool," " more and son's superiority to
very
common
thing
everybody he had seen. ;
reasonableness
mon, and does ten times the good." guest, less
Walden " a wood
more recognized Emer-
to Emerson's
taste,
is
Energy
much
less
is
a
com-
Another European
was Frederika Bremer,
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON.
IGl
who, carrying the war into Africa, avenged the indiscretions of
There
American
is
little
tourists
by repaying them
exaggeration, however, in her
harm but
magniloquent account of Emerson, who
Hon and an
eagle.
conversation parties,
in kind.
The
picture of
is
alternately a
him
at Alcott's
to which "ladjes were invited with-
out distinction of sex," tolerant of rude interruption and
embanking the flood of talk,
quietly ing.
able.
is
decidedly interest-
Emerson's manner on such occasions wa? admir-
To
a child pf nature who resisted every hint
take his hat off in the drk wing-room, he remarked, will
Miss
continue our conversation in the garden."
Bremer
carried off his " strong, beautiful
head
album, where Crabb Robinson afterwards saw
to,
"We
" in
her
it.
It
should be sought for in Sweden.
Emerson's correspondence wiih Carlyle went on meanwhile with, no diminution of cordiality, rather increase, for Carlyle's heart
brusqueness.
not here
"we
fail
tolerance, often surely tried in this place "
not London.
nounces " a most gravings
impression," he wrote,
admiration' of your pacific virtues, of gentle
:
and noble Chelsea,
smote him when he thought upon his
"Of one
in
" Representative
finished, clear,
the line manner "
compliment sheathing a
and
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a
criticism.
Men" he
pro-
perfect set of en-
neat example of a
CHAPTER
THE
VII.
vein of originality which the
man
of genius
brings into the world must in process of time be
Well
exihausted.
him. if external circumstances or
for
inward resources help him to a new lease of inspiration.
In trying to evolve new ideas from lyle
to
but exaggerated the old
him the
;
mere
his
historical
freshness of his youth.
brain, Car-
themes restored
Emerson
confesses
the infrequency of original thoughts after his return from
Europe
but as invention waned, his intellectual activity
;
found a new stimulus
Banks and
affairs.
involving the most
as other
him
men
for
interest in public
had given place
momentous problems
Emerson was cradled
morality.
to
quickened
in a
tariffs
into poetry.
The
of law
into politics
and
by wrong,
Law was, moment the
Fugitive Slave
a decade what for one brief
oppression of the Indians
to questions
fiery
had been
in
1838.
His
general attitude towards politics, ere political issues had
become
absolutely vital
by himself
and
all-absorbing, is thus defined
in the address prefixed to
The Massachusetts
Quarterlyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; " Lovers of our country, but not always approving of
the public counsels,
we should
certainly
be glad to give
LIFE OF EMERSON. good advice
We
in politics.
163
have not been able to
escape our national and endemic habit, and to be liberated
from
interest in the
and public
elections
We
have we cared to disfranchise ourselves.
make our
than others to
solicitous
healthful, as
and
are
son's thinking in political
is
same laws with
and social questions. The creed
system of property and law
is
is
own
his
the tendency which
is
"
also.
The
the fruit of the same mys,
terious cause as the mineral or animal world."
But so
always undermining this system.
party of Conservatism and the party of Inno-
vation have disputed this world ever since
Their respective claims are
"The
trees,
Emer-
at the root of all
of the Conservative of his dialogue
"The
and
politics clear
acids."
This characteristic aphorism
is
more
believe politics to be nowise accidental
we
or exceptional, but subject to the earths,
Nor
affairs.
set forth
it
was made."
in his discourse,
Conservative" (1841), with such fairness that while
the author's personal leanings are evidently to the Liberal side,
the Conservative case seems advocated with the
more energy and answerable from tants are
Each
point.
its
own
admonished
impossible whole."
case, nevertheless,
point of view
that " each
is
(1841).
The answer
is
all
;
revolutions.
it
",
un-
half,
but an
of these irrecon-
Man_the Reformer"
that of the poetic enthusiast.
things are possible to Love. to our fellows
is
but the dispu-
a good
The combination
cilable moieties is attempted in "
;
All
Let our affection flow out
would operate in a day the greatest of Let us begin by habitual imparting.
Let us understand that the equitable rule
is
that
no one
â&#x20AC;˘
LIFE OF
164
should take more than his share,
Let
me
feel that I
that the world
am
be a
to
the better
is
for'
am
I
face
on
rich.
to see to it
me, and to find
Love would put a new
in the act.
him be ever so
let
lover.
my
this
reward
weary old
world in which we dwell as pagans and as enemies too long,
and
it
would warm the heart to see how
fast
the vain
diplomacy of statesmen, the impotence of armies and navies,
and
unarmed dangers
;
lines of defence, shall
These
child."
be superseded by
generous
views
combined with Emerson's
had
this
their
faith in the indivi-
make him an The Young American " "Government in our times is
they at one period went near to
dual,
Anarchist,
In his oration on "
(1844) he observed that
beginning to wear a clumsy and cumbrous appearance."
In the essay on
Politics,
published in the same year, he
expressed surprise that no one had steadily denied the authority of the laws on the ground of his
nature that
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a hint taken by Thoreau.
he should
It
ridicule " the terror
own moral
was but consistent of old and vicious
people, lest the union of these States be destroyed.
wise and just o\frn feet;
man
that
will
he imparts strength
receives security from
it
;
and
and such as he, would quite better constitution."
The
always feel that he stands on his
that
to the State, not
if all
went down, he,
easily coinbine into a
new and
This excessive individualism, partly
founded on a hasty assumption of the decay of the State from the extent to which
done by private
associations,
its
work was getting
to
be
was sharply checked by the
emergence of the slavery question.
Emerson could not
help discovering that the wise and just were impotent in this
matter as individuals
;
and
that the solution
which
;
EMERSON. he
rightly
deemed most
could only be obtained by
fit
He
the action of the State.
165
wished America to follow
the example of England by combining copipensation with
emancipation.
" Here," he
men must
We
do.
will
"
said,
man
public function which one
a right social or
is
cannot do, which
all
We
will
have a chimney-tax.
give
up our coaches and wine and watches. The churches
will
melt their plate.
Franklin for his patient
to dig
father of his country shall
the Pilgrim Fathers for theirs, and the
The merchants
for his.
the
;
man
will give
away
in the land
a week's
accursed mountain of sorrow once
this
This was justice and
Unfortunately,' not only was
therefore statesmanship. little
will give
the children will have cent
for ever out of the world."
there
inonument
longer for his
little
will give;
Every
societies.
work
;
Columbus
needle-women
and
The
well pleased, a
wait,
on the part of the North
disposition
to give,
but there was none on the part of the South to receive. It
is
a shrewd remark of Arbuthnot's, that die at last of swallowing their
parties
all
own
political
lies.
The
slaveholders had gone on asserting the divinity of slavery until they
believed
suffrage in Kansas,
Sumner desk,
Their growing insolence and
it.
brutality, culminating
attempt to strangle free
in the
and the
in the Senate
ruffianly assault
House
made Emersorian
he
as
sat writing at his
Abolitionist.
to conservatism as long as possible.
on Charles
He
had clung
The annexation
Texas (1845) had not perturbed him; he saw inevitable, integrity.
and was content
Even
in
(1850) he had said, "
if
resisting
his
own
it'
of
be
State held fast her
the Fugitive Slave
We will never
to
Law
intermeddle with your
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; LIFE OF
166
but you can in no wise be suffered to bring
slavery,
Cape Cod attitude
of his
but
impossible,
Emerson pardonable
it
The South had now made
or Berkshire."
her
to
this
seemed to
truculence
comparison with the moral torpor
in
He
own beloved Massachusetts.
was himself
twice hissed at public meetings by descendants of the
Smarting with grief and shame, he,
'Pilgrim Fathers. for a time,
accustomed moderation, lauded
forgot his
John Brown's incendiarism, and appeared to blame the judges for not assuming the functions of last,
however, the attack on Fort Sumter
right.
to
measure
had
;
the logic of events converted every loyal
emancipation as at least a sound military
Emerson
and, as
;
legs long
now."
everything
Upholders and antagonists of slavery shook hands
over the Union citizen
At
legislators.
made
He
" The wish that never
said,
enough to cross the Potomac can do so
now
himself,
as
good a
civic patriot
anybody, was ever ready with speech and song. taries," pieces written to
encourage the young to
as
" Volunenlist for
the war, contain this noble stanza
" So nigh
is
So near
grandeur to our dust.
God
is
When Duty
to nian,
whispers low,
The youth
replies,
Thoii.
Emerson's earnest feeling on the in his letters to Carlyle.
the midst
Nobody can
civil
:
"
We
help us.
and France may do."
war comes
-out
Writing in December, 1862, in
deepest discouragement
of
stoically says
must.
I can."
all
around, he
must get ourselves morally 'Tis of
right.
no account what England
But sympathy was ever precious
EMERSON. to
him
;
and even when the fortune of war had so
changed as had come implores enlist
167
to pass
as fervently as ever
it
greatly
by September, 1864, he " How^ gladly I would :
How
you with your thunderbolt on our part!
gladly enlist
thoughtful,
the wise,
voices of England
We
!
pens and
efficient
want England and Europe
Are
to hold our people staunch to their best tendency.
English of this day incapable of a great sentiment
Can they not
leave caviUing at petty failures,
?
and bad
manners, and the dunce part (always the largest part in
human
affairs),
and leap
and
to the suggestions
finger-
pointings of the gods, which, above the understanding,
men ? "
feed the hopes and guide the wills of
Alas
!
to
form a correct opinion on any subject, a nation must
know something about
it
:
and the English people, mean-
ing well as they always do, were disgracefully ignorant
of foreign
politics, as
Emerson himself
they always are.
had learned much, and found himself more
in
sympathy
than he had ever expected to be with the stern philosophy
"I
of Carlyle.
waste of
life,
shall always respect
war
overpaid by the vistas
it
opens of Eternal
The
hereafter.
the dreary havoc of comfort
and
time, are
Life, Eternal
reconstructing and upholding Society."
On
Law,
Carlyle's
wild sally against the American cause,
Emerson observes
the silence of disdain or compassion.
He may have been
more
lenient from a confession
strained to make. guess, except
Right."
If,
" Everybody has been wrong in his
good women, who never despair of an ideal
however, the
partly caught
he himself had been con-
it
women had
from Emerson.
this faith, they
Making a
had
poet's use of
the laying of the submarine cable, he had grandly written in 1857
:
;
LIFE OF
168 " Be
just at home ; then write your Of honour o'er the sea
And
bid the broad Atlantic
scroll
roll
A ferry of the free. And
henceforth there, shall be no chain,
Save underneath the
The
sea,
murmur through
wires shall
the
main
Sweet songs of Liberty.
The conscious stars accord above, The waters wild below,
And
under, through the cable wove,
Her
fiety errands go.
He
For
that
worketh high and wise.
Nor pauseth
in
His plan.
Will take the sun out of the skies
Ere freedom out of man."
Was he
conscious of the echo of Campbell in the
last
stanza?
The
just, necessary,
and glorious war
for the
had, nevertheless, like cathartic? in general, noxious accompaniments
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;among
impoverishment of Emerson. literature,
none
for lectures,
Union,
many
ob-
them the temporary
There was no demand
no dividend on
for
his invest-
ments, no return from his wife's property, no purchaser for the spirits
wood-lot wjiich, though he declared that his
rose whenever he entered
sacrificed if
and
he could.
he would now have
In time things righted themselves
in justice to his son,
cal profession,
it,
who waÂŤ intended
he allowed
his old friend
for the
to defray the cost of Edward's college course.
winters lecturing
medi-
Adams For many
Mr. Abel
had been a main dependence, and he
EMERSON. had gone
further afield in quest of audiences, extending
Most of the
his tours as far as St. Louis.
on these expeditions appear with
livered
" The Conduct of
Life,''
and the
:
and others of
was sometimes
fee
his later collec-
represents the public as betting
weeks that he
Emerson humorously
him
fifty
dollars a
not go through
will
kindly to
in proportion to the
hardship and discomfort involved.
for three
lectures de-
alterations in
The Western people took
tions of addresses.
him
169
all
day
manner
of indignities every day, and stand up reading in a hall every night
;
''
and
I answer,
and win the nine hundred
bet I
I'll
dispense with food " from are
full
nights passed on
I
do
it
was a happy
morn
till
navigation over fixed
came
to
dewy
eve."
His
and short commons,
the floor of canal boats, bottomless
often, in watchings often."
Ellen
will.'
of reports, too good-humoured to be
called complaints, of long journeys
mud and
It
of his physical constitution that he could
peculiarity
letters
'
dollars."
ice.
" In journeyings
As he grew older his daughter
accompany him, a Mignon of hQtel and between him and the more trying
car, gently interposing
incidents of travel.
Emerson's elocution'has been frequently described, and
most hearers
attest its
the purest natural art, it
was the ars
magical
effect.
endowment
celare.
It
;
if it
It was, or
all
oratorical strategem.
strative as .slight
any
listener,
to
gave the impression of utter
absorption in the theme, and indifference to .and
seemed,
owed anything
all
rhetoric
Composed and undemon-
almost motionless, except for a
vibration of the body, seldom even adapting his
voice to his matter, he
seemed
to confide entirely in the
LIFE OF
170
justness of his thought, the felicity of his language,
the singular music of his voice.
Lowell
says, "
managed
to
He
"
and
somehow," Mr.
combine the charm of unpre-
meditated discourse with the visible existence of carefully
him on the desk ; and
written manuscript lying before
while reciting an oration strictly committed to memory,
he had the If these
from the clouds."
air of fetching inspiration
were
artifices,
they did not seem
We
so.
have already heard Mr. Haskins's testimony that he could not be even a short time in Emersoti's company without unconsciously copying his manner.
This be-
speaks the strong personal magnetism needed to hold large audiences
by ideas so
deficient continuity,
A
and
unfamiliar, stated with such
set off
by so few
artificial graces.
shrewd judge, Anthony TroUope, was particularly
struck with the note of sincerity in
Emerson when he
heard him address a large meeting during the Civil
War.
and
Not only was the speaker practical to
terse,
perspicuous,
a degree amazing to Mr. TroUope's
preconceived notions, but he
commanded
his hearers'
respect by the frankness of his dealing with them.
make much well.
of the American eagle," he said,
But beware of the American peacock.''
shortly aifterwards Mr. rhetorician,
Edward
a means.
He
You
When
TroUope heard the consummate
Everett,
he discerned
oratory was an end with him, instead
"
"
"you do
of,
at
as with
once that
Emerson,
was neither bold nor honest, as Emerson
had been," and the people knew
that while pretending to
lead them he was led by them.
Emerson was a Connoisseur
in style,
and
said there
never had been a time when he would have refused the
EMERSON
171
Ahna
of a professorship of rhetoric at his
offer
The
secret of his
own method
incommunicable
is
Mater. for
;
even truer in his case than in Carlyle's that the style
is
it is
the
man. To write as Emerson, one must be an Emerson. His
may be
precepts, nevertheless,
studied by
They seem
manners.
literary
artists in all
aimed
especially
crying sin of nineteenth-century authorship, ness.
He
insisted
on the importance of "the science
of omitting, which exalts every syllable."
must convey the
is
feeling of
to read aloud
One
you
will find
fraction of
inserted
meaning,
it
If
must
to discover
It
Blot out the
in a mosaic.
and romantic
art,
is
what
like a
for a
pebble
superlatives,
and
see that you have not omitted the
piece was written to state." classic
as well
counsel
you use a word
drag.
negatives, the dismals, the adjectives, finally,
writer
" Blot them out and read again, and
what words drag.
its
good
practical
what you have written
sentences drag.
A
"chemic selection"
of "flamboyant richness.''
as
at the diffuse-
its
very.
the
And,
word which the
In the controversy between
he took the side of the former,
which seemed to him organic, while romanticism appeared But he did not regard
capricious.
between ancients and moderns
;
this as
a question
the antique was always
with us.
The discourses "Conduct
of these later years form three volumes,
of Life"
(i86o)j
(1870); "Letters and Social collection
"Society and Solitude"
Aims" (1875);
the latter
pieced together in Emerson's old age with
Mr. Cabot's
aid,
by combining passages selected from
different lectures, so slight
of Emerson's thought.
was the
logical connection
These writings indicate a period
LIFE OF
172
of diminished mental
activity,
may be compared in this Wordsworth. The author
is
not mechanically repeating
the inspirations of happier hours, to simulate originality
finding his voice less
still
less
endeavouring
by extravagance ; he has simply, dominant from the summit than
of old, compensated for closer approach to
They
but not of decay.
respect to the later works of
its
diminished resonance by a
He
his audience.
has not, as he
says Shakespeare or Franklin would have done (and Lincoln' did), given his
wisdom a comic form
to attract
Western audiences, but he has descended from the
his
shining heights, and discourses from an ordinary platform
with even more calmness and self-possession, less of
mystic rapture and oracular depth.
of
message
his
ever the same, the all-pervading Deity,
is
human
the one
with
if
The burden
soul in every breast, the universality of
spirituaj laws, the exact
correspondence of the moral and
material worlds, the inexorable impartiaUty of Nature,
the impossibility of stealing a march on eternal justice, -the
duty of
Soul,
man
to yield
up
his egotism to the universal
and walk by the inward
discovery
is
over
;
light.
instead of the seer,
of practical experience vouching old beholds the work of it
very good.
the
test.
If
for him.
Emerson
Not a precept Emerson had
But the joy of
we have
man
the
Emerson the
the young,
and
finds
of the latter but has stood written
nothing else than
these discourses, his reputation would never have existed; if
he had not written them,
pledge of
The
Roman
it
would have lacked one
stability.
father of the Samnite general
legions in a trap, advised
him
who had taken either to kill
the
them
EMERSON. all
or to dismiss
them without
17S
method
the world's alternative, the former
But
if
This seems
conditions.
choice.
for
the genius will not be killed he suddenly finds
himself adored for work often far inferior to that of
As
his neglected prime.
so
Mill,
it
it
Emerson.
befell
Browning,
Carlyle,
befell
had taken years to
It
exhaust a small edition of " Nature
"
"
;
The
Dial " had
been given away or destroyed; he had written
"I have not now one
copy of the " Conduct of Life
''
in 1859,
but in i860 not a
disciple";
could be had within two
So rapid a
days after the publication of the book.
precluded any deliberate verdict on
merits,
its
sale
and was
who
in fact not a tribute to the book, but to the author,
might in a sense be said to have lived and written only
Fame had
for these forty-eight hours.
desert, later
of
and even outrun her
works
still
at last overtaken
excellent as Emerson's
for,
The
they want inspiration.
are,
shows
writers
;
some symptoms of
tersest
and
garrulity,
unconsciously evades the trouble of original composition
by a
free recourse to anecdote.
It
is
also significant
that, with great occasional exceptions, like
reignty of Ethics," to say
upon the
and "The
is
When,
as
is
;
neighbour.
begins to care
Then
all
Soveleast
writes better'
on
sometimes the case, grandeur
"^Every
it
that
goes well.
not the sublime
is
man
neighbour shall not cheat him.
when he
"The he has
than on poetry, imagination,
attained in these later writings,
of poetry, but of ethic. his
He
themes.
loftiest
wealth, culture, eloquence
immortality.
Preachej:,."
takes care that
But a day comes
he do not cheat
He
market-cart into a chariot of th& sun."
his
has changed his
A thought
still
;
:
LIFE OF
174
more
pithily
waggon
embodied
the precept
in
" Hitch your
:
to a star."
In 1867 Emerson published " elaborate of his longer poems.
May
Day,'' the
In essentials
it
most
resembles
" Wood Notes," "Monadnoc," and the other earlier pieces in
which he had striven to merge his own individuality
and
in Nature's,
to identify himself with the
life
that
" sleeps in the stone, dreams in the plant, wakes in the animal." effusions,
It exhibits a
being
nearly
decided advance on these
from
free
harshnesses
and
obscurities, while the poet's absorption into the general life
of Nature
more
even more complete.
is
perfectly express
Nothing can
the intoxication of fine spring
weather hurrying the minstrel, sometimes dropping a
rhyme
in
his
along
speed,
the general frolic of
in
dithyrambic joy " Where
And For
shall
we keep
the holiday
duly greet the entering strait
;
May ?
and Jow our cottage doors,
And
all
Nor
spacious court nor monarch's hall
unmeet our carpet
floors
;
Suffice to hold the festival.
Up
and away
!
where haughty woods
Front the liberated floods
:
We will climb the broad-backed hills, Hear
the uproar of their joy
We will mark the leaps and gleams Of the
And
new-delivered streams,
the murmuring rivers of sap
Mount
in the pipes of the treen,
Giddy with day,
Which
to the
topmost spire
for a spike of tender green
Bartered
its
powdery cap
;
'
;
;
'
EMERSON. And And
175
the colours of joy in the bird, the love in
Frog and
And
:
its
carol heard
;
lizard in holiday coats,
turtle
brave in his golden spots.
We will hear the tiny roar Of the
insects evermore,
While
cheerful cries of crag
and plain
Reply to the thunder of river and main.
From
the sensuous revel of teeming
energy the poet ascends by
many
life
and
reckless
passages of beautiful
natural description to the spiritual conception of Spring as the earthly type of the renovation of the soul
" Under gentle
types,
Masks the might
An
my
Spring
of Nature's King,
energy that searches thorough,
From Chaos to the dawning morrow. Into all our human plight. The soul's pilgrimage and flight In
city or in solitude,
Step by step,
Without
lifts
bad to good
;
halting, without rest.
up
Lifting Better
to Best
Planting seeds of knowledge pure.
Through earth
The
to ripen, through
chief defect of this rapturous
poem,
heaven endure."
and most melodious
after its occasional looseness of metrical
matical construction,
is
Emerson's usual
and gram-
fault
of want
of symmetry and coherence, obscuring the development of the thought, which, without this abruptness, would
appear apt and natural.
We
must
travel
far
back to record the decease of
Emerson's venerable mother, who, beautiful in her death
176
LIFE OF
,
as in her
1853.
faded out of the world in November,
softly
life,
We
have ourselves spoken with those who lovingly
remember her
and gentlewomanliness, her
gentleness
No
sweetness of manner and of voice.
event
recorded until
is
the
other domestic
marriage
Emerson's
of
youngest daughter, Edith, in 1865, to Colonel William
N. Forbes
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;an
auspicious union, which in time placed
Emerson above pecuniary
management of while,
were
falling
fast
appointed one of the
West
anxiety, through the prudent
son-in-law.
his
Public honours, mean-
upon him.
In 1863 he was
visitors to the Military
Point, where he attracted attention
curiosity.
from his
by
at
eager
his
In i856 he received the degree of LL.D. university,
and
in
1867 he was chosen orator on
" as he had
Phi Beta Kappa day,
been
before," Mr. Cabot reminds us, " but not
mising young beginner, from
whom
a
He
England."
thirty years
now
as a pro-
speech
fair poetical
might be expected, but as the foremost
New
Academy
man
of letters of
served from 1867 to 1879 on the
Board of Overseers of the University, basking contentedly in the grateful academical environment, but taking
Once he
active part in ,the administration.
little
is re-
corded to have interfered decidedly, when his casting vote defeated
a.
proposal for exempting the students from
compulsory attendance
he
not,
said,
at
morning
prayers.
assuming once a day the noblest attitude of,
that of prayer.
him
it
would
another.
man
is
capable
It does not seem to have occurred to
that to favour this attitude
force
He
deny the young men the bpportunity of
was one
thing,
and
to en-
In 1870 he delivered a course of
teen lectures at the University on
"The
six-
Natural History
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
;
Vn
EMERSON. of the Intellect," "which I
phy
will
not praise
but
;
know
the experts in philoso-
have the fancy that a
I
a good corrector of formalism." bable,
had always been too unsystematic
and he was by
for
realist is is
pro-
such a
task,
His mind,
it
time incapable of any sustained
this
He
fell back on old material, the most recent being the lectures on " Philosophy for the
intellectual
effort.
'
People," delivered in
and summarized
1866,
These seem
Cabot's biography.
to have
in
Mr.
teemed with
acute and penetrating remarks, but to have been at
most
a very modest contribution to so great a theme as the
Young
natural history of the intellect.
Emerson perceived
in heart as ever,.
he had grown old in
that
faculty,
and
yielded a cheerful submission to the inevitable dispensation in his swan-song, "
"
It is
To
Terminus
time to be old,
take in
The god
sail
:
^
:
V of bounds
Who sets to
sea
a shore,
Came to me in his fatal And said No more :
No
"
'
rounds.
!
farther spread
Thy broad
ambitious branches, and thy root.
Fancy departs
:
no more invent.
Contract thy firmament
To compass
of a tent.
There's not enough for this and that,
Make
thy option which of two
Economise the
Not the
;
failing river,
less revere the Giver,
Leave the many and hold the few. Timely
virise
Soften the
accept the terms,
fall
with wary foot
12
";
'
LIFE OF
178
A little while Still
plan and smile,
And,
fault of novel
germs,
Mature the unfallen
As a
fruit.
bird trims her to the gale,
I trim myself to the storm of time,
man
I
Obey '
the rudder, reef the
sail,
the voice at eve obeyed at prime
Lowly,
faithful,
:
banish fear.
Right onward drive imharmed
The
port, well
And
every wave
Emerson might now
worth the is
cruise, is near,
charmed.'
say, "
Good-bye, proud world, I'm
rgoing home," in another sense than
when
in his youth
he
played hide-and-seek with the world in the whortle-
A repetition of the
berry bushes. in
1
87 1 had greatly tried him.
1870 course of lectures Sixty-four miles travel
weekly, with intellectual mischief, as he nervously fancied, at the •of
end of
" I have," he
it.
tells
Carlyle, "
abundance
good reading, and some honest writing on the leading
topics,
but in haste and confusion they are misplaced
.and spoiled. will
here
wasted friend,
or
I
hope the ruin of no young man's soul
hereafter
his time or
John M. Forbes, the
his
•one of a party of twelve
Mr. Thayer, one of the of the
bound on a travellers,
excursion,
Emerson's conversation.
him the manuscript
as
reason."
having
A
kind
father of his son-in-law,
•came to the rescue by carrying him
-incidents
me
be charged to
confounded
April,
off,
187 1, as
trip to California.
recorded the
has
and preserved morsels of
Emerson had brought with
of " Parnassus,"
a
poetry he was then preparing for the press
;
selection
and the
of cir-
EMERSON. cumstance made
much upon
his talk run
" 'Faust' was a destructive poem,
did not like
He
fectly.
The second
it."
had observed the
tion of Shakespeare's "
more
for
light
of the language, but nature, physical
knew but imper-
part he
Henry the
by
poets.
peculiarity of the versifica-
and wished
Eighth,''
on the problem of
tolerable, not
the
lacked afiSrmation, he
it
coarseness, as he severely called
was made
179
it,
The
authorship.
its
Decameron
of the
only by the grace and purity
being steeped
its
and moral.
Italian
in
Machiavelli, he said, wrote
like the Devil, uttering his infernal sentiments with as
much
sweetness and coolness as
praise
they were
summer
he admired the quality of Wilham Morris's verse,
:
but deplored
an
if
Wordsworth and Tennyson were quoted with high
.air.
its
quantity.
efficient poet,
and
He
spoke highly of Byron as
observing "there
general luck about him."
a sort of scenic
is
Imagination was the
solemn act of the soul in believing that things have a spiritual
He
share.
People had been to
significance.
scruples about the
name
was as willing to be called Christian as
Platonist or Republican.
he did not
like.
and
up a
setting
him with
of Christian, which he did not
" It did not bind
What was flag
the use ? "
of negation
him
to
of going
what
about
There was never,
deposes Mr. Thayer, a more agreeable travelling companion
;
he was always
considerate, tolerant
;
accessible, cheerful, sympathetic,
and there was always
respectful interest in those with
whom
the humblest, which raised them in their tion.
trying
The to
incidents of the
the
temper.
trip,
The
that
same
he talked, even
own
estima-
indeed, were
nowise
almanac,
Emerson
told
LIFE OF
180
day said June
Carlyle, said April, but the '
was covered with greenhouse
England bird had a gayer counterpart.
Emerson
lions roared for
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;the
the country
;
and every
flowers,
New
All California's
Yosemite
cataract, the
Sequoia grove, the sea-lions of San Francisco, and Brig-
ham Young, now
not again to roar for any one.
But the
crown of the journey was perhaps the " Alta Califdrnias " character of Emerson's
discourse on immortality, re-
peated in San Francisco
:
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; " All
left
the church feeling
an elegant tribute had been paid to the creative
that
genius of the Great First Cause, and that a masterly use of the English language had contributed to that end."
On the morning of by the crackling of
July 24, 1872,
Emerson was waked
and saw a
light in the closet,
fire,
Unable
which was next the chimney. he ran down for help.
to reach the
partly dressed to the front gate,
His
running from
cries
fire,
and called
were heard, the neighbours came
all sides,
but the wooden tenement could
Books, manuscripts, and furniture were
not be saved.
almost entirely rescued by the clever promptitude of the
They were removed
townsmen.
where a study was family found
fitted
up
some days from an
tion
to the Court
Emerson
;
He
had taken
cold, suffered
attack of low fever, and, atten-
being naturally drawn to the failure of
from which he had already begun to
commonly
House,
the houseless
a refuge at the Manse, where he had
lived before his marriage. for'
for
attributed to
the
shock,
suffer,
memory this
was
incorrectly in Mr.
Cabot's opinion.
Excudent
alii spirantia mollius aera.
United States
is
public spirit
:
The
glory of the
a feeling as finely displayed
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON. men
towards
of
whom
181
the country
is
proud as in the
case 'of municipal improvements or charitable founda-
Americans
tions.
work
set to
to repair Emerson's mis-
fortune as they would have addressed themselves
Mr. Francis Cabot Lowell
restore the Capitol.
and went away, leaving behind him a
chatted,
which was found
to enclose a
cheque
and a few
dollar?, the gift of himself
to
called, letter
for five
thousand
others.
Between
eleven and twelve thousand dollars more were subscribed,
conveyed
to
Emerson with
perfect delicacy,
and acknow-
"The
ledged by him with perfect grace.
list
of
my
benefactors," he said, " cannot be read with dry eyes or
pronounced with
articulate voice.
I
ought to be in high
on heart and mind, and not
health to meet such a call
the thoughtless invalid I happen to be at present."
was indeed
shaken
terribly
his friends deerried a
:
He
thorough
change to the Old World desirable, and in October a thousand and twenty dollars more were presented to him
"but
this recent
ness surprises." .sailed
am
" I
for that purpose.
a lover of men,'' said Emerson,
wonderful experience of their tender-
Accompanied by his daughter
Ellen,
he
on October 28th " To
see, before
The palms and temples
Egypt was
his goal, but
France, and Italy.
opened
his
he died
of the South."
he passed through England,
In London he saw Carlyle, " who
arms and embraced me.
We
had a steady
outpouring for two hours and more on persons, events,
and
opinions.''
"
It's
more," said Carlyle.
a happiness to see Emerson once "
But
there's
a great contrast
LIFE OF
182
He
between him and me.
and takes much striking
seems very content with Hfe,
satisfaction in the world.
and curious spectacle
to
behold a
It's
man
very-
Though
Emerson."
days so confidently cheerful as
a
in these
Emerson came from the land of Rip Van Winkle, he eulogized the good,
and
strong sleep he got in England,
in general took things
tour,
enjoying
all
most
easily
throughout his
came
the fine scenery that
in
his
way, and not going a step out of his way for anything.
Egypt he found " good and
These
gentle, if a
colossal temples, scattered over
Greek and
little soporific.
hundreds of miles,
Gothic
say,
like the
men
of the nineteenth century, here
like the
is
something you
On his return he
cannot do, and must respect.' "
'O ye
piles,
spent a
pleasant fortnight with Mr. Russell Lowell in Paris
the hst of
new acquaintances he made
in
;
and
England includes
He
Mr. Gladstone, Mr. Browning, and Mr. Ruskin.
thought Mr. Ruskin the model lecturer, but his pessim-
ism worse than the
air.
He
many come
Carlyle's, for there
was no laugh to clear
went to Milton's grave, and inquired, " Do here
? "
" Yes,
sir,
Americans
visiting friends at Oxford, Stratford-on-Avon,
ham, he
fitly
!
"
After
and Dur-
concluded his travel by two days spent
under the roof of the oldest and staunchest of
his
English intimates, Mr. Alexander Ireland.
Returning
As
the engine
to
Concord, a surprise awaited him.
approached the station
it
sent forth a note of triumph,
peals of bells responded from the town,
escorted with children,
music between
found his house
every picture in
its
wonted
files
rebuilt,
place.
and Emerson,
of smiling school-
and every book and
,
EMERSON.
183-
Emerson had long been a queened pawn; he had advanced from a humble pulpit to a rostrum whence he could speak urbi
He
et orbi.
ever he went in his
was now something more,,
All took a pride in
a public institution.
own part
by an invisible body-guard,
him
and wher-
;
of the country he was tended
vigilant lest the forgetful old
He
was deeply
touched by the kindness of apparent strangers.
" Perhaps
man
should take hurt in boat or
there should not be the
he
said.
word stranger
Englishmen had wished to
his house, but
he declined,
men had done
enough.
for the
car.
in
any language,"'
assist in rebuilding
feeling that his
own
country-
Scotch admirers nominated him.
Lord Rectorate of the University of Glasgow, where-
he was opposed by no
and succumbed
competitor than
less a
to the purer Caucasian.
Disraeli,,
Carlyle
had
beaten Disraeli on a like occasion, but Carlyle was at
hand
to deliver a speech.
gave a public reading
:
in
He
still
occasionally wrote, or
1876 he went as
far as
Rich-
mond to speak before the University of Virginia, unwilling to refuse
an
invitation
which seemed
reconciliation to the North.
His
like
an overture of
books were " Par-
last
nassus," an extensive selection of poems, published in including,
1874,
it
was thought, many pieces better
adapted for recitation than
for perusal
;
and the compila-
tion from his later writings entitled " Letters
had been promised
and Social
London
Aims."
It
when
powers were more equal to the tasks of
his
tion, excision,
and combination
to a
;
appeared as originally delivered. his
engagement was
for
selec-
hardly any lecture
His
inability to fulfil
for long a sore trouble, of
was relieved by the assistance of
publisher
which he
his future biographer,.
"
a
LIFE OF
184
Mr*
J.
whose self-denying
Elliot Cabot,
" Hast thou
Loved
named
all
:
the birds without a gun ?
the wood-rose, and
on
left it
its stalk ?
At rich men's tables eaten bread and pulse ? Unarmed, faced danger with a heart of trust .
he had
spirit
â&#x20AC;˘celebrated in the lines entitled " Forbearance "
And loved so well a high behaviour In man or maid, that, thou from speech
?
refrained,
Nobility more nobly to repay ?
O
be
my friend,
and teach me
to
be
!
thirie
After the completion of his task, Mr. Cabot would go !up at intervals, so long as
Emerson continued
" for the purpose of getting ready
lectures,
new
to read
selections
from his manuscripts, excerpting and compounding them as
he had been
no danger of .already
There was
in the habit of doing himself.
disturbing the original order, for this was
On
gone past recovery."
the whole, therefore,
Mr. Cabot seems disinclined
to print
.and probably his resolution
wise.
is
-Emerson would take him out iring him into
his
bright ghost, the
shadow of
any more
lectures,
When thus
engaged,
for afternoon
study for
a
walks, or
nocturnal
his former self,
chat
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
but sound
in body, and retaining perfect clearness of ideas, only afflicted with failure of
to
fit
memory and a
his speech to his thought.
on happy
frequent inability
His conversation ran
themes, the' progress and wonderful discoveries
of the age, the admirable persons he had
known from
'Channing downwards, the surprising virtue of the people â&#x20AC;˘of
Concord, great and small.
to Carlyle he says
:
"
In one of his
latest letters
A number of young men are growing
up here of high promise,
a,nd I
compare gladly the
social
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; EMERSON.
185
poverty of
my
As
late as
1878 he traversed the western part of the State
of
New York
youth with the power on which these draw."
in a fruitless search for a
who had written him His
his optimism.
was
a grateful
last public
young mechanic,
but had questioned
appearance of importance
at the fiftieth anniversary of the Unitarian
New
Concord,
He
church.
American
â&#x201A;Źmblem
first
marriage
at
fashion,
been moved
it.
No
his bride
wonder;
bodily, but existed
of the speaker's faculty.
He
very
at- that
went to see the house in which
but could not find
lived,
Church
Hampshire, which was'within pne day of
the same anniversary of his
had
letter,
had,
it
still,
shared in the com-
memoration proceedings by reading a hymn, undisturbed
by the
difficulty
Even
in
1
he found
in following the printed text.
88 1 Emerson spoke on Carlyle's death before
the Massachusetts Historical Society, and on " Aristo-
cracy " before the Concord School of Philosophy. this last year of his life
Walt Whitman, who, on a afterwards at Emerson's
visit
to
Mr. Sanborn, and
own house, noted him
as a silent
but apparently attentive listener to conversation,
good colour
In
we obtain a glimpse of him from
"a
in his face, eyes clear, with the well-known
expression of sweetness, and the old, clear-peering aspect
A
quite the same.
word or short phrase only when
needed, and then almost always with a
smile.''
In February, 1882, Longfellow died, and Emerson, a friend of
fifty years'
gentleman who
"but
I
lies
"
The
here was a beautiful soul," he said,
have forgotten his name."
he had said to a it is
standing, went to the funeral
visitor
:
"
When
A few months
before
one's wits begin to
fail,
time for the heavens to open and take him away.''
LIFE OF EMERSON.
180
This aspiration was
fulfilled
on April
days' illness
27, 1882, after
a few
" In these last days in his
from pneumonia.
study his thoughts often lost their connection, and he
But when
puzzled over familiar objects.
his eyes
fell
on
a portrait' of Carlyle that was hanging on the wall, he
a smile of affection, " That
is the man, my When confined to his bed, "he desired to see all who came. To his wife he spoke tenderly of their life
said, with
man."
together and her loving care of to
him they must now ;
meet again and part no more.
said,
" Oh. that beautiful boy
Seldom had
Then he
part,
smiled and
" !
"the reaper whose name
is
Death"
gathered such illustrious harvest as betweeii December, 1880, and April, 1882.
In the
George Eliot passed away, Carlyle followed
;
in April
first
month of this period
the
in
ensuing February
Lord Beaconsfield
died, de-
plored by his party, nor unregretted by his country
;
in
February of the following year Longfellow was carried to the
tomb
;
in April Rossetti
was laid to
rest
by the
sea,
and the pavement of Westminster Abbey was disturbed to receive the dust of Darwin.
down in death beside
And now Emerson lay man and the searcher
the painter of
of Nature, the English-Oriental statesman, the poet of the plain
man and
whose name these
men
is
the poet of the
artist,
and the prophet
indissolubly linked with his own.
All
passed into Eternity laden with the spoils of
Time, but of none of them could son, that the
most shining
it
be
said, as
intellectual glory
of Emer-
and the most
potent intellectual force of a continent had departed along with him.
CHAPTER
THE man
Emerson
in
easily pourtrayed, not so
is
Other thinkers on his
the author.
more or
usually been
y
VIII.
level
They
less systematic.
have
have, in
their waggons," not to a
Emersonian phrase, "hitched
star, but to a formula, to which their thoughts converge,
and around which these may be grouped. But Emerson's want of system
poets,
we
are
anomalies.
the despair of the natural historian of
is
philosophy, and
upon the
roll
of
unable to remove him from the
roll
of
if
still
we
place him rather
Nor can
A
applied to him.
the
chronological
literary activity
method be
extending over the
third of a century usually implies development, modification, restatement later
manner.
and
recantation,
an
Emerson never sang a
earlier
and a
palinode, never
made a new departure, took no old ideas back, and put no new ideas forward. He did indeed apply his principles more freely to politics and ordinary affairs " chemic selec;
tion," moreover, gains
more and more the upper hand of
" flamboyant richness " in his later
style.
But with these
abatements, and apart from the evidence of date occasionally afforded
that
by
historical allusions,
he might not have written
at
he has
any time of
left little
his
life.
LIFE OF
.188
Renouncing, therefore, the endeavour to give a connected view of Emerson's writings,
we
will briefly
merate some of the respects in which he
is
most
enu-
original
and remarkable.
More than any
He
a Voice.
is
of the other great writers of the age, he is
He
taint of sect, clique, or party.
announces
he speaks when the
;
Spirit
He
the might of the spoken word.
enigma
stand the
in
effects
moves
hiiri,
and
an age of
print,
an accident
most
oral
part,
and labour under
Our
utterance.
seem happily born
singular obligations
With Emerson the printing press seems he uses
:
helps us to under-
should have produced
still
by mere
instructors, for the
to Dr. Faustus.
it
because
way, but he does not need z.
pure from the
how Confucius and Buddha and
and greater teachers
such marvellous
modern
is
does not argue, but
Better than any contemporary, he exhibits
not longer.
.Socrates
He
almost impersonal.
he. finds
He
it.
it
his
in
would have been
age of Buddha or of Solon, as well as of
light of the
ours.
He
is
a characteristically American voice.
realizes the idea
American
before him. imitative.
literature
precisely
Englishmen across the Atlantic,
who
literature
stay at
if
a million cultivated
they think and speak
home.
be conceited and
But neither must defiant,
a rebel
against rules founded in the eternal fitness of things. .and two
make
Kosmos,"
if
on bdth
four
you
will,
Emerson's attitude
is
sides of the Atlantic.
but not perfect,
set
must not be feeble and
It is vain to transplant
exactly like those
American
He
which the American scholar ought to
Two "
A
" one of the roughs."
manly and independent,
"
EMERSON. becomes the spokesman
slightly assertive, as
on
ture
"
its trial.
18»'
a
of.
Meek young men grow up in
litera-
libraries,,
their duty to accepf the views
which Cicero,
which Locke, which Bacon, have given;
forgetful that
believing
it
and Bacon, were only yourig men
Cicero, Locke,
when they wrote
libraries
ness to that
its
is full
affinity,
minds
have made
little
will
lived.
great difference to this
He
it
:
But
Emerson
!
"
cried
blazing ubiquities
Emerson
two of the principal
Emerson
is
if
Washington had never
when some one
;
"
— "Glittering " they
indignantly,
are
supplementing, and combining,
among American
thinkers, parted but
abyss.
rests
have
It will
upon two sure
— God, " re-appearing with
and cobweb
";
suffi-
from the citations already made that
Emerson's thought
Man's soul "
all his
—God
pillars
and'
parts in every moss-
calling the hght its own,,
feeling that the grass grows
a law inferior to first is
a
an important figure in American
him by an immeasurable
ciently appeared
and
and
!
literature, as continuing,
man
Plato
was thoroughly possessed with the ideas of
sneered at them as " glittering generalities
for
if
would have made
it
American
and
would nevertheless
the Declaration of Independence, and
generalities
Poetical
not of appropriation. think alike
real difference to
Goethe had never
Further,
Old
puts the
of verbal indebted-
but every competent reader perceives that
;
a case of
lived.
he
His thoughts continually repeat Plato
he can repay.
religious
;
philosophers and poets; but what he borrows,,
and Goethe it is
He
those books."
World under contribution
in
and the stone
and dependent on
its
falls
nature."
by
The
the idea of the greatest of New England reasoners,..
:
LIFE OF
190
Jonathan Edwards, the Spinoza of Calvinism.
and "
existence,"
real
God
and there
is,
retained
said is
none
else."
*
God
As, however, he
the tenets of Calvinism, " he
all
"
Edwards, "are the same."
is,"
says
Mr.
Leslie Stephen, " in the singular position pf a Pantheist
who
yet regards
all
nature as alienated from God. Clear-
ing away the crust of ancient superstition, we find in bling,
Edwards
may
and a theory of the universe
discovered in any theology."
as elevating, as can be
This "clearing away " was
the very operation which Emerson, whos,e study
have been but virtually
little
He
his
system it,
lived the purer with the other half."
His connection with Channing on the side of humanity
of Divinity, and his obligation sonal. siastic
The
is
more
far
special distinction of
direct
Channing
assertion of the dignity of
we
is
and
per-
his enthu-
man, a mean animal
in the estimation of most theologians.
have seen, thought that
is
Edwards on the side
as intimate as his connection with
t
may
Jonathan Edwards, did nevertheless
threw away the worser part of
And
^,
in
perform on "
still
writings a system of morality as enno-
he owed
Emerson, as
little
to Channing's
conversation, but he imbibed the speaker's spirit at every pore.
His magnificent claims
for
man
as the organ of
the Universal Soul are but Channing's humanitarianism
f
quickened
and sublimed by
Pantheism.
When Channing
" he did not think 1
!
cover truth it ;
;
seek for
all it,
much
that was
and
it
alliance
told
intellect
with Edwards's
George
Combe
was necessary to
that dis-
wanted was an earnest love of
comes of
itself
somehow," he gave
EMERSON. Emerson a
191
"
text to " write large."
and
native realm,
it is
The
soul
wider than hope', rich as love.
Pusillanimity
she refuses with a beautiful scorn
;
who
on her coronation
putteth
is
in her
wider than space, older than time,
and
fear
they are not for her robes,
and goes out *
through universal love to universal power."
Next
in
character of
him
live in
Aurelius, to
Matthew Arnold's
the
as
"The
spirit."
whom
Emerson
is
man
is
to
equally applic-
is
right in observing
"
and something more. possessed.
Marcus
Emerson
Marcus
Add to this that is
Emerson's
Aurelius
is
not an optimist
all,
or at
fire."
most
and resignation ; while
morning
stars singing together,
is
that of the
optimism
for joy.
His
faith (for,
a pl^in inference from the existence
is
of God) has brought upon him more objurgation than
all
Theologians are distressed at his imperfect
his heresies.
realization of evil
Henry James, .as
his
that of acquiescence
and the sons of God shouting after
:
His
was.
morals are not merely morals, they are morals on
optimism
are
exquisite
and aider of those who
friend
the same character
Aurelius
Aurelius was not a
and
brief
Arnold compares him
Mr. Thayer, nevertheless,
able.
that
The most important
are manifold.
summed up would
Here Emerson's
morals.
to religion,
-characteristics
special
and
senior,
sin
:
that uncomfortable personage,
doubts
if
he can have had so
much
a conscience, seeing that, unlike James himself, he
attained
age
the
of
fourteen
temptation to commit a murder
gymnosophist
whom
death
sitting
is
:
without
the slightest
Carlyle saw in
on a flowery bank."
"a terrifying phantom" and
him " a
Mr. Morley, to life
"a piteous
part in a vast drama," naturally finds " his eyes sealed
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
:
LIFE OF
192
one half of the
to at least
gruesome
own
As
possibilities of things."
regards the "pos-
Emerson would perhaps have
sibilities,"
and the
actualities of nature
replied by
his.
stanza " Some of your
And
ills
you have cured,
the sharpest you
still
have survived
;
But what torments of pain you endured
From
As
respects the "actualities," the case
Emerson never
!
but
stronger,
is
said that all Existing things were the
best, but that they all
"
the evils that never arrived
were
things gravitate towards the good,
which,
gression
is infinite
the time
when the worm
;
He
for the best.
if
first
and
that this pro-
we look back only
of Oriental type,
justly chargeable
Emerson
as far as
essayed "to mount the spires
From
of form," seems an irrefragable conclusion.
moral indifference often
insists that
is
upon
the-
optimists
protected by the Marcus-
He
Aurelius elenlent in his constitution.
cannot be
accused of making the ways of virtue too easy.
His.
writings are full of the loftiest lessons of renunciation.
He
it
was who wrote
:
" Though love repine and reason chafe,
There came a voice without reply 'Tis
man's perdition to be
When " It
is
be
"When
he ought to die."
in vain," he says, " to
good men. will
for the truth
The
you
shall
make
a paradise, but for
and
resources of America
immense only
to
say,"
others do, so will I
;
I
:
safe,
wise
and
he warns the renounce, I
its
virtuous
am
scholar,
future-
men." "as-
sorry for
it,.
EMERSON. my
early visions
let
learning
I
;
must
once more
then dies the
:
perish
The man," he
himself,
comes
you ; then
in
and
art,
and
a more
poetry,
and
says elsewhere, "
who renounces
to himself."'
come next under
being but applied morals,
and here too Emerson was
Like Carlyle, he was in
cant.
man
land,
until
done already in a thousand thousand
men."
:
buds of
the
science, as they have
Politics,
good of the
and romantic expectations go
convenient season
review
eat the
193
as well as very strong
:
signifi-
department very weak
this
and even
and
original
his strength
was chiefly
as a protest against certain evil tendencies of his day. Carlyle's paradoxical glorification of despotism
had the
merit of forcing into strong relief the most pernicious features of the time, the cowardice of rulers, the
ness of authority, the general disposition, to
weak-
make words
Emerson's extreme assertion of
do duty for deeds.
indi-
vidual right, which would have logically resulted in the dissolution of the State,
active of one of the politics,
was
still
valuable as a counter-
most mischievous features of American
the tendency to
swamp
all
individuality in party
organization, controlled in the last resort
and the
base.
by the cunning
Those Republicans who on occasion of
the late Presidential election broke the " Machine " by preferring their country to their party, were probably not
unacquainted with Emerson's writings, and were at events such
Like '
men
Carlyle's,
An
as his writings were
meant
all
to produce.
Emerson's extravagance eventually corrects
excellent analysis of Emerson's ethics,
and indeed of all his " The Religion
essential characteristics as a thinker, will be found in
of the Future," by Mr.
J.
B. Crozier.
13
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; LIFE OF
194 itself
by
:
no nation could
either of
Emerson him-
recall.
to see that " easy good-nature
came
self
on the road prescribed
travel long
them without a sharp
dangerous foible of the Repubhc."
had been the
This admission
from his oration on the death of President Lincoln peroration of which
is
:
is
the
one of the best instances of the
grandeur he attains when, rising above the local and temporary in eternal
"
politics,
he deals with the
The ancients believed in
which ruled in the but stern
and
justice, carried
and securing
families,
favourites of heaven.
Nemesis.
eteriial
forward the fortunes of certain sinful offenders or offending
at last the firm prosperity of the
was too narrow a view of the
It
There
rules the fate of nations, little
a serene and beautiful Genius
of nations, which, with a slow
affairs
chosen houses, weeding out
time,
essential
:
is
a serene providence which
which makes
little
account of
of one generation or race, makes no account
of disasters, conquers alike by what
what is called
victory, thrusts aside
is
called defeat or
enemy and obstruction,
crushes everything immoral as inhuman, and obtains the ultimate triumph of the best race by the sacrifice of every-
thing which resists the moral laws of the world, its
own
instruments, creates the
man
him in
poverty, inspires his genius,
task.
It
has given every race
that only that race
its
It
and arms him
own
makes
of the time, trains
talent,
for his
and ordains
which combines perfectly with the
virtues of all shall endure."
This
maxim
of the one special faculty of each race
and
EMERSON.
195
"
each man was a favourite one with Emerson. he
" is like a
says,
lustre as
you turn
bit of
particular angle, then
The
illustration
-the very strongest. left
hand
it
is
spar,
until
you come to a
shows deep and beautiful colours."
conducts us to the
Emerson's position
death had
Labrador
in your
it
A man,"
which has no
where
field of science,
again exceptional, and this time of
He
the place which Goethe's
fills
the secrets of
void, of a poet divining
The
nature by his instincts of beauty and religion. gates of the temple of
modern
/main hinges of his thought plicity
science turn
â&#x20AC;&#x201D;
real unity in
immanent, not external power.
;
T
upon the two
seeming multi-
Of unity he
says,
" Each animal or vegetable form remembers the next in-
and
ferior
one
plant,
nence
:
There is one animal,
predicts the next higher.
one matter, and one force."
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; " There
is
That
in every man, but in every particle.
we
Of Divine imma-
a kind of latent omniscience not only
so admire in plants and animal
convertibility
structures,
the repairs and the ulterior uses are subserved, part
is
wounded, or
deficient,
by another
whereby
when one
this self-help
;
-and self-creation proceed from the same original power
which works remotely in grandest or meanest structures by the same design, works wise
man would
if
in lobster or mite,
even as a
imprisoned in that poor form.
'Tis
the effort of God, of the Supreme Intellect, in the extre5ie 'frontier
writings istry is
of his universe.'' :
in the earliest
of Nature
This
is
from one of his
he had said
:
"The
to stand as the apparition of
is
latest
noblest min-
God.
It
the organ through which the universal Spirit speaks to
the individual, and strives to lead back the individual to it."
No wonder
that a natural philosopher
who
is
also
a
,
:
LIFE OF
196
poet
â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Professor Tyndallâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;should have written in
copy
his
of " Nature,'' " Purchased by inspiration."
Nature glides into
which
by the pathway of beauty, by
art
back to
art travels
stands in this middle ground
an
beautiful than
Emerson, as a
her. ;
he
is
From
artist.
writer,
rather a votary of the
his preference for the
romantic school, one would have ex-
classical over the
pected to have found the sentiment of form strongly
On
developed in him.
the contrary, few have been so
He
incapable of fashioning a symmetrical whole.
achieve
it
now and then
in a short
mental miracle.
sort of casual inspiration or
does,
poem, but only by a
His
single
thoughts are commonly beautifully moulded and exquisitely polished,
but they are miniature wholes, not
He
bers of a great whole. faculty
by the delineation of a character or the narrative
What
of a sequence of events.
ample recompense
is
peculiar to him,
for all his defects, is the
glimmer with a magical
light, like
waters of the Concord river in his
it
:
"
As the
bathed.
They or the
own
beautiful descrip-^
flowing silver reached the clump of trees
through the shade by one fluctuating beauty,
makes amends
it
lie
darkened, and yet every wave celebrated
thought.
An
chiefly charming, ;
for
This
its
passage
fluid, living,
entire composition,
the want of linked continuity of is like
a piece of lustrous
silk,
in a flat
now one piece mind the whole
mood one would
say to Emerson,,
light
upon
falls
now another
in a genial
with Emerson
sparkle.''
by enveloping the
essay of his
changes as the
disappoints
and
atmosphere
twilight air,
of diffused beauty in which his works
tion
mem-
rarely tests his constructive
;
it;
;;
EMERSON.
197
" Thou can'st not wave thy staff in Or dip thy paddle in the lake
air,
;
But
it
carves the
And ripples
in
bow
of beauty there,
rhymes the oar
forsake.''
This general investiture of loveliness sustained eloquence.
passages they are apt to
a lower
look up to see
gems
:
unfavourable to
dife
away, or rather to melt into
by such gentle gradations that you must
strain
isolated fine
is
When Emerson essays high-wrought
how
His far you have come down. may be counted and rated like
sayings
but the pervading beauty of his work has the
character which he too absolutely attributes to it
is
" like
opaline
â&#x20AC;˘evanescent," " ticular
doves'-neck
There
is
lustres,
beauty
nothing so wonderful in any par-
landscape as the necessity of being beautiful
under which every landscape
makes
all
hovering and
it
difficult to
lies."
assay and appraise
This
peculiarity-
him by quotation
the water in the vase never seems quite the same as the
water in the spring.
communicable,
So
far as the
charm of
his
style is
seems to reside in his
instinct for select-
ing the words which wear the most
witching aspect,
call
up the
it
fairest
associations,
and most adorn the
matter in hand. There could not be a happier instance of " proper words in proper places," than the first two sentences of the address at the
School, delivered, be fulgent
summer
The
of
life.
is
spotted with
Any
it
it
Cambridge Divinity
observed, in June
:
"In
this re-
has been a luxury to draw the breath
buds
grass grows, the fire
and gold
burst, the
meadow
in the tint of flowers."
other epithet than refulgent would have been a
misfit.
What
effect,
too,
is
conferred upon a simple
—
!
LIFE OF
198 catalogue of natural
word
diction, every
" It seems as
perfect propriety
and every word
beautiful,
snowflakes in a perfect form
right
The
still
air,
fall
plains
the waving ryefield
;
;
mimic
the
waving of acres of houstonia, whose innumerable whiten and ripple before the eye
;
and
the musical,
flowers
in
glassy lakes
;
;
flames
and
;
wind-
or of pine logs, which yield glory to the walls,
faces in the sitting
—has
—
this
room
most ancient
subjective writer
to his reader
son
steaming,,
trees to
all
the crackling and spurting of hemlock in the
pictures of the
The
florets
the reflections of trees
odorous south wind, which converts harps
of
preserving to each crystal its
the blowing of sleet over a wide sheet of
;
and over
water,
of
the day was not wholly profane in which
if
have given heed to some natural object.
wfe
'
phenomena by
like
who
— these
are the music
and
religion."
imparts his
own being
freely
Burns, or Shelley, or Carlyle, or Emer-
advantage over even
greater writers
— whose themes
Homer, Shakespeare, Milton
lie
outside
themselves, that he can arouse personal affection, and
says
Emerson, "
prays.
makes
It
covenants
Eternal Power in behalf of this dear mate."
out Emerson's writings there
is
an
themselves.
which
One
his lovers
and
friends
reflection occurs
Through-
it is
must take upon
immediately
never get beyond the English language. excellently translated into
with
not a hint of his sub-
jection to " the last infirmity .of noble minds," but infirmity
a.
" Love,"
fond concern for the perpetuity of his fame.
German, and even
He
:
he can
has been
into Italian
:
EMERSON. it is,
199
perhaps, within the resources of French prose to
provide a better translation
still.
But no merely French,
or German, or Italian reader will have the least notion of the magic of his diction
hardly even will the foreigner
:
well versed in English enjoy
him
to the
As regards
full.
EngUsh
the durability of his reputation with the
Emerson, hke most of the great moderns who
much and
lived long, stands in his
own
race,
have written
No more
light.
than Goethe, than Wordsworth, than Hugo, has he given
The
us only of his best.
Mr. John Morley and of Matthew
in the persons of
"
Arnold.
tribunal of letters looks grave,
There are pages," says the former quite
truly,
" which remain mere abracadabra, incomprehensible and
And even
worthless."
the good
requisite wholeness of
accusing
angels
good
Yet even these
tissue."
and
dismiss
Another kind of
to posterity.
perhaps the only kind which he greatly
immortality, is
observes
faulty,
became compurgators,
Emerson with a passport valued,
is
Emerson's diction wants " the
Arnold, with equal truth.
already.
his
He
moral consciousness of his
is
incorporated with the
"His
nation.
essential
teaching," says Professor Norton, in a letter to the writer,
" has become part of the unconsciously acquired creed of every If
more
young American of good and gracious nature." is
to
be claimed
for
Emerson, as
time,
and
science,
his
we
literary worth,
on his
rebuke of another.
This
and science has found no such
preter as Emerson.
well may,
one of the main tendencies of
should rest the claim, apart from his his impersonation of
it
Not
is
an age of
literary inter-
only, says Professor Tyndall, is
Emerson's religious sense entirely undadnted by the
dis-
-
LIFE OF EMERSON.
200
coveries of science
and
prehends
;
but
such discoveries he com-
all
"By Emerson
assimilates.
scientific
conceptions are continually transmuted into the finer
forms and warmer hues of an ideal world." in
sympathy with his age where
it
where
it
is
wrong.
right,
it is
It has,
as
While thus
he
a whole,
is
against
made
the
capital mistake of putting happiness before righteousness.
Utilitarianism has begotten effeminacy,
discontent, in
and discontent
Emerson one man
A
age.
story
is
lesser
despair.
valiant
man might
and effeminacy
Posterity will see
and manly
in
a repining
earn greatness thus.
told of shipwrecked mariners
from fear when the lightning-flash revealed a humble of samphire, for the samphire
is
The End.
tuft
never covered by sea-
Welcome in such a plight much more the brilliant flower.
water.
The
on a rock relieved
the obscure weed,
;;
INDEX. Browning, Mr., 182 Alcott,
Amos
Bronson, g6, 103
"American, The Young," Oration
of
W.
Emerson, 23 Bulkeley,
on, 164
" Aristocracy," speech on, 185 Arnold, Matthew, on Emerson,
eulogium
Buckminster,
Elizabeth, ancestor of
Emerson, 13 Bulwer, E. Lytton,
bom same day
as Emerson, 12
191
Byron, Emerson on, 179 B.
Boston Athenasum, origin of
C.
the,
Cabot, Mr.
23 Boston, Emerson's school
J.
son's sermons,
Church
his analysis of
Bowring,
at,
47
Emerson visits, 61 Emerson to A. Ire-
introduces land, 64
Bradford,
50
;
quoted, 84,
on Emerson's
;
essays, 75 "Nature," 77; ;
on Transcendentalists, 82 on Emerson's business faculty, 123 assists Emerson to prepare "Letters and Social Aims," ;
;
Mrs.,
on
Emerson's
mother, 18
Bremer, Frederika, her account of
Emerson, 160
Brook Farm experiment, 103-106 Brown, Rev. J., on Peter Bulkeley, 14
Brown, Samuel, entertains Enlerson, 143
171
on Emer-
Elliot,
30 Emerson minister of Second at,
184
Emerson's
trip to,
178
Cambridge, Divinity School
of,
California,
36
;
class, lecture to,
89 lectures
before the University
;
of,
176.
compared with Emerson, visit of Emerson to, 62-64
Carlyle
49
;
critique
'â&#x20AC;˘
on
his
"Sartor Re-
;
INDEX.
202 sartus," 97
on death of Emer-
;
son's son, 113
114
;
Emerson pub-
;
works in America,
his
lishes
Emer-
writes prefaces to
son's Essays, 121, 128
Emer-
;
son proposes he should America,- 129
second
;
visit
Civil
visit to,
181
War, 166
;
Emerson
studies,
38
E., 22
conversation, 38
ism, 84
on, 129
;
on Unitarian-
his influence
;
Emerson
;
character of his
;
on Emer-
W.
H.,his description,
of Emerson, 97
Chapman,
Emerson's
J.,
Emerson
visits,
61
Combe, George, on Channing, Concord, town
of,
Bulkeley,
14
home
of,
45
West
loi
40 brilbecomes
25,
;
;
temporarily Insane, 46
48
wife,
;
Emerson, second
;
goes as
Indies, 46
his
;
Emerson's
Lidian,
73
Emerson, Mary Moody, aunt,
son's
first
early death of, 33
wife,
70
in,
founded by ;
Emerson's
influence
Emeron
of,
Emerson's ora-
;
Emerson, Ralph Waldo, birth II
;
childhood
character
Cooke, Mr., on Emerson's interest
enters
;
in politics,
"The
74
;
Dial," 103
Crozier's analysis ethics, 193
Cuvier, 81
on contributors of Emerson's
of,
25-27
fluence of his aunt, 26
tion at, 72 Social Club, 108 " Conduct of Life," 169
to
"The Dial,"
Emerson, Edward, promise
74; remains
of,
him, 26
38
P.
engagement
Charles,
70; death
of,
Emerson, Ellen, Emerson's visits,
14s ; his estimate of Emerson, 160
Coleridge,
Emerson,
early death, 69
Circles," 108, 118
Clough, A. H., Emerson
.
77. 189
Emancipation, Emerson on, 165
clerk to
Character, Essay on, 125
Emerson
spiritualized the philosophy of,
liant
Dr.
English publisher, 143
"
E.
Jonathan,
of published in
son, 190
Channing,
edits.
Disraeli, 183
Edwards,
W.
Channing,
Emerson
;
third
words on, 186 Carlyle, Mrs.,
100
Fuller,
Emerson's dying
;
186
12, 59, 81,
"Days," a poem, 133 De Quincey, Thomas, 142 " Dial, The " edited by Margaret
visit to,
139; on "English Traits," 147;
on the
Darwin,
29-32
;
;
of,
in-
reserved
education
of,
a school teacher, 32 ; Cambridge Divinity
School, 3S seeks
28
of,
;
;
;
in
bad
health in
ethics of,
43
School, 44
;
;
health, 39
Florida,
;
42
back at Divinity
becomes minister
of Second Church, Boston, 47
;
;
INDEX. marries, 48
his sermons, 50
;
his wife dies, 53
congregation, 53
Si
from Europe, 59
Lander,
60
Coleridge,
62
his farewell,
;
Europe 56
goes' to
;
letters
;
61
his
;
;
visits
interview
with
with
;
Carlyle,
with Mr. Ireland, 64
;
;
parts from his
;
with
;
Wordsworth, 65 returns to America, 66 on evolution, 69 ;
;
engagement, 70
his
in Concord, riage, 73
77 76
;
;
founds society
;
ora-
;
Kappa to Cam-
tion before the Phi Beta Society, 86
cles,
controversy,
90
Fuller,
a
;
:,his :
95
93
;
;
on
on mira-
;
compared with Haw-
:
thorne, 98
102
Class, 89
not a philosopher, 93
declines
102
address
;
Divinity
Margaret
;
edits
poems
his
"The
Dial,"
"
Dial,"
in
The
method of work, 108
;
death of his child, 112 publishes ;
Carlyle's
works in America, 114
;
his essays published in England,
ris
;
his
narrow means, 123
poems,
his
to
visit
130-135
139
with Rogers, 141 ;
lectures
139
141
London, 145 ;
;
re-
;
;
style,
171
173 - 17s
later writings^
his
;
of
marriage
;
daughter, 176
Point Academy, 176
his
West
visitor at
;
on Board
;
of Overseers, 176 lectures on "^ " Natural History of Intellect, ;
176
course on "Philosophy for
;
;
;
;
180
178
house
his
his house burnt,
;
third visit to Europe, 181
;
years,
death,
;
optimism, 191 with
ligion style,
196
;
182
rebuilt,
185
last
;
186
his
;
harmonises re-
;
science,
195
his
;
general character
of,
199 Enjerson, Ruth, R.
mother, 12, of.
W. Emerson's 25
18,
17,
death
;
17s
Emerson, Thomas, the
name
first settles
by
in America, 13
Emerson, Waldo, death
of,
Emerson, William, 11
settles at
Concord, 16
moval
work
;
;
marriage, 17
to Boston, 19 of,
22
112
death
;
;
re-
literary
;
of,
23
abandons theology, 40 " English Traits," 147
impres-
on Nature, 77 Art, Michael Angelo, 74 Milton, 74 English literature, 75 " Philosophy of History," 84
lectures
"
to Paris,
Manchester
at
sions of Oxford, 14s
America, 147
;
second
breakfasts
;
visit
;
and Liverpool, in
;
England,
visits Carlyle,
144
;
fornia,
on "Philosophy
of Transcendentalists, 82
seer,
;
his on the civil war, 166 Western lectures, 169 as a on public speaker, 169-170
" Sartor Resartus,"
of History, " 84
bridge
;
;
the People," 177; trip to Cali-
his lectures
:
home
his
;
second mar-
;
on Thoreau, 159 his views on 163 on abolition, 165
politics,
essay on " Nature,"
edits
;
70
20S
returns
to
funeral oration
Essays,
60
;
;
;
;
;
;
Man
Thinking
;
American Scholar," 86 Culture,
88; in
or, ;
"The
the
Human Dial,''
;
INDEY..
204
Method of Nature, io8 on the OverSoul, 117 on Friendship, 119 on Self-reliance and Heroism, 120 on History and Art, 120 on Method of Nature, 124 102
on â&#x20AC;˘
;
;
Circles, 108
;
;
Gladstone, Mr., 182
Goethe on inheritance, 12
Emerson
;
;
125
of,
writings
;
40
W.
;
on
;
fixity
lecture on, 152
;
his
had but slight influence
on Emerson, 190
first
;
H.
England,
published in
series
consults,
of type, 81
;
second series
on Character, 124 on Experience, 125 on Manners, 12 r
;
.
Harvard College, Emerson
enters,
;
;
30
;
126
;
Haskins,
on Poetry, 127
Emerson's
on Emerson's habits
;
of literary work, 108
compared with Emerson's, 170 Emerson's views
Evolution, S9
on
Mr.,
views, 94
Everett, E., his public speaking
on Tho-
;
reau, 156^
;
on, 69
Exeter Hall, Lectures
in,
Hawthorne, Nathaniel,
descrip-
tion of Concord, 71
his rela-
146
tions with
Experience, Essay on, 125
;
Emerson, 98
Hedge, Dr., on Transcendentalists,
Farley, Dr.,
on Emerson's preach-
Emerson
42
vLsits,
Emerson
of,"
84
Holmes, Mr.
Emerson
on, 104
J.,
on Emerson, 40
Holmes, Dr. on Phi Beta Kappa ,
Foxy George, Essay on, 74 Free Trade, Effect of, 138
son's poetry, 130
"Friendship," Essay on, 119
versation, 140
Frothingham on Transcendentalism,
82
on
!
New
Society lecture, 86
on Emer-
;
on
his con-
Fuller,
9S
"
Froude, J. A., Emerson on, 145 Fuller, Margaret, 94 edits " The
;
Howe, Mrs., on Margaret
England
Unitarianism, 83 .
sophy
to
California, 178
Fourierism,
58
"History," Lectures on "Philo-
"Forbeai'ance," Lines on, 184 Forbes, J. M., takes
of,
Heine, 59 Herbert, George, quoted, 80
ing, 8s
Florida,
82
Hegel, System
Human
Culture,'' 88
\.
;
Dial, "
100
;
death
of,
Independence, Emerson on De-
159 claration of, 189
G. Geoffroy St. Hilaire, 81
Ireland, Mr., entertains â&#x20AC;˘
George Eliot on Emerson and Carlyle, 128
Gipsies, Lines on, 132
in Edinburgh,
" The
Dial,"
Emerson's
Emerson's
64
;
102
copy of arranges
;
lectures, visit to,
Emerson
his
137,
182
141
;;
INDEX.
205
Manners, Essay on, 126 Jackson, Andrew, 36
Martineau, Miss, Emerson, 107 character
K.
144
of,
Massachusetts
Kant, 82
Quarterly,
153
Emerson's only contribution to
Keats, 58
the, 156
Landor, Emerson
visits,
"May
60
Leigh Hunt, Emerson impressed by, 143 ' '
Letters
and
Social
Aims,"
Michael Angelo, Essay on, 74 Mill, J. S. Emerson visits, 61 ,
171,
Milnes on Emerson's Essays, 121
183 Lexington, of,
73
;
Poem on the Battle Emerson preaches at,
Milton, Essay on, 74
Mind and Manners, London
lec-
tures on, 146
75 Lincoln, Abraham, 12 oration
Emerson's
;
on the death
of,
EngUsh, 75 London, Lectures
Emerson
Miracles,
on
29
;
lecture on, 152
Morley, Mr. in,
on, 90
Montaigne studied by Emerson,
194
Literature, Emerson's lectures
on Emerson, 199
J.,
Morris, William, 179
145
Longfellow, Emerson at funeral of,
Day," 173 " Method of Nature," 108, 124
Murat,
Emerson's ac-
Achille,
quaintance with, 42
i8s
Lord's Supper, Emerson's views
on the, S4 Lowell, James Russell, on influence of Emerson, 86 at Phi Beta .
his poem,
and 158
Kappa
on lecture ;
comparing Emerson
Carlyle, 129 ;
;
Society, 86
;
on Thoreau,
on Emerson's
elocution,
170
C,
his gift to
Emer-
son, i8i
Lyell, Influence of,
S9
M.
89
Intel-
176
Nature, Essay on, 77-80
Newman,
J. H.,
sonal likeness
Emerson's per-
to,
145
son's essays in the, 74
Professor Andrews,
on
Emerson's Divinity address, 91 Norton, Professor Charles E., on Emerson's teaching, 199
the Reformer," Essay on,
102, 163
"Man
lect,"
Norton,
Luther, Essay on, 74
Man
" Natural History of the
North American Review, Emer-
Lowell, F.
"
N. Napoleon, Lecture on, 152
Thinking," Essay on, 86,
O. "Over-Soul,'' Essay on the, 117
Owen, Richard, Emerson on, 144
1
INDEX.
ao6
Robinson, Henry Crabb, his impressions
Panoplist journal established, 21
Pantheism of Emerson,
63,
77,
124
141
Parker, Theodore, 102, 153 ture
on,
iss
lec-
review
his
;
;
of
Emerson, 157 "Parnassus," 178
review
of,
at,
35
Russell, Dr.
Le Baron, 76
Emerson's S.
102
Patmore, Coventry, quoted, 127
Phi Beta Kappa
" Philosophy
Society, 86
for the People," 177
Plato, Lecture on, 151
Poetry, Essay on,
" Saadi," a poem, 102
Sanborn, Mr.,onEmerson'shome,
Perkins, Jacob, 66j
127
;
analysis
Essay on, izr
;
70 " Sartor Resartus," 75, 81 son edits, 76
Emer-
;
Science of Emerson, 199 Scott, Walter, 58
of Emerson's, 130^35 Politics,
Rome, Emerson visits, 61 Roxbury, Emerson keeps school Ruskin, Emerson on, 182
Pascal's Pens&s, 29 '" Past and Present,"
Emerson
Shakespeare, Emerson's study 31
on, 162, 193 Prayer, Emerson's views on, 68
;
of,
lecture on, 153
Slavery,
Emerson's
attitude to-
wards, 165
" Preacher, The,'' 173 Puffer,
and
Emerson,
of
opinion of his lectures, 144 Rogers, Emerson breakfasts with,
Socialism,
Rev. Mr., 11
leaning of Transcen-
dentalists to, 104 ' '
Quakers, influenpe
of^
Josiah,
on
and
Solitude, '' 171
on EmerEmerson's
" Sovereignty of Ethics," 173 " Sphinx," Poem on the, 102
son, 68
Quincy,
Society
Socrates, Emerson's essay on, 31
Stephenson, G., Emerson's inter-
college oration, 29
view with, 142 Sterling,
R. Religion,
Emerson's lecture on,
on
Emerson's
Stonehenge, Expedition
84
" Representative Men,"
135, 15
" Rhodora," Lines on, 133
Emerson, 16
;
Emerson
;
147
lecture
on, 151
lives
with, 70
George, meetings at his
house, 81
to,
Swedenborg quoted, 67
Ripley, Rev. E., stepfather of W.
Ripley,
John,
Essays, 122
T.
Temperance, Emerson's views on, 123
Tennyson, 179 " Terminus," 177
INDEX. Thayer, Mr., on Californian
trip,
178
'
207
Uses of Great Men, " Lectiure on, 151
Thoreau, Henry, 157
;
Emerson's
funeral oration on, 159
"Thought Book," Emerson's, 108 "
To Eva,"
a poem, 132 Transcendentalism, Lecture on, 87 ^'
;
Van
Buren, President, address to
on wrongs of Indians, 91 Very, Jones, poetical enthusiast,
96
disciples of, 100
TranscendentaUst," Journal, 81
Transcendentalists,
Emerson's
discourse on, 102
TroUope, Anthony, on Emerson's
W. Walden Pond, Waldo family,
lines on, 71
15
Ware, Henry, Emerson
oratory, 170
" Two
league, Rivers," allegory of the,
47
;
on
his col-
Emerson's
Divinity address, 92
134
Tyndall on
''
Nature,'' 195
;
on
science of Emerson, 199
Whitman, Walt, on Emerson, 185 Wordsworth,
58,
Emerson
65
to,
179
;
visit
of
U. Unitarians, Influence of, 20
Unitarianism, service rendered
Emerson
to,
37
by
" Young American," disdourseon, 102
BIBLIOGRAPHY. BY
JOHN
P.
ANDERSON
(British Museum).
L WOEKS.
VI. Appendix
n. Smaller Collectionb
HL
Magazine
Sinole Works.
IV, MiSOELLANBOnS.
WORKS.
op
E. Cabot.] 11 vols. London, 1883-84, 8vo. Works of R. W. E. London, 1883, J.
essays, lectures, poems, and orations. {Bohn's Standard
8vo.
The Works of R. W. E. [Edited by John Morley.] 6 vols. London, Edinburgh [printed],
lAbrary.) 2 vols. London, 1866, 8vo. Prose Works The of R. W. E. New and revised edition. 2 vols. Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1870, 8vo. Works of R. W. E. 5 vols. Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1882, 8vo.
Complete
Riverside edition.
List
Works.
The Complete Works of Ralph Waldo Emerson, comprising his
Emerson's
etc.
Articles.
VII. Chbonoloqioal
V. Selections.
I.
—
Biography, Criticism,
Works.
[Edited by
1883, 8vo.
The introduction by John Morley was printed separately in New York,
XL
1884.
SMALLER COLLECTIONS.
Lectures, and Orations. London, 1848, 16mo. Another edition. London,
—
1851, 8vo.
—
;
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Orations, Lectures, and Addresses. London, 1844, i6mo.
The
London,
Another edition.
1849, 16mo. Essays and Orations. ( Universal Library. Essays, vol. i.) London, 1853, 8vo. Orations, Lectures, and Essays.
London,
Glasgow
in.
^Anotber 1861, 8vo.
SINGLE WORKS.
8vo.
An Address
delivered in the Court Concord, Massain chusetts, 1st Aug. 1844, on the anniversary of the emancipation of the negroes in the British West Indies. Boston, 1844, 8vo. Boston, Another edition. 1844, 8vo.
House
The Eman-
cipation of the Negroes in the etc. West Indies, British (Gaiholic Series.) London, 1844,
12mo.
[From "The ConBehavior. duct of Life"] Books. [From " Society Solitude "] and Boston, Prose). (American 1880, 8vo.
Books, Art,
Eloquence.
[From
" Society and Solitude.!'] Boston, Cambridge [Mass. , printed], 1877, 16mo. (Prose MasterCompensation. pieces, from, Modeim Essayis(s, London, 1886, ed. by G. H. P.) 8vo. Eeprinted from " Essays." Series.
edition.
London,
edition.-
London,
Another
Another edition. Cambridge [Mass., 1876, 16mo. Another edition.
Senior Class in Divinity College, Cambridge, etc. Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1838,
First
Boston,
1860, 8vo.
[printed],
Address delivered before the
Another edition.
Life.
lUusiong.
1866, 8vb.
An
Conduct of
1860, 8vo. Contents .—Wate; Power; Wealth: Culture; Behnvior; Worship; Connderatiom iy the Way; Becmty;
Boston, printed],
London,
1883, 8vo. Part of " Bohn's Cheap Series of Standard Works." Culture, Behavior, Beauty. [From " The Conduct of Life."] Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1876, 24mo. Part ol the " Vest-Poofcet Series of Standard and Popular Authors," Boston, 1856, English Traits. 8vo. Contents : First Visit to jE^land; Voyage to Englamd; Land; Race; AbUUy; Manners; Truth; Cockayne; Wealth Character ; '
Aristocracy; Universities; Iteliffion; Literature; The "Times;" Stonelienge; Personal; Bevi^. Speech at Mamchester. London, -Another edition.
1856, 8vo.
Another
edition.
Boston,
1857, 8vo.
Another
edition.
London,
1882, 8vo. First
Boston
Series.
1841, 12mo. History ; Self - ReContents : Spiritual liance; Compensation; La/ws ; Love; Friendship ; Prudence ; Heroism; The Over-SoiU; Circles;
—
Intelleet; Art.
—
^Another edition.
face
by Thomas
With
Carlyle.
pre-
Lon-
don, 1841, 12mo.
—Another
1843], Svo.
edition.
[London,
—
;;
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Lon-
Essays. Anothei edition. don, 1849, 16mo.
Another
edition.
London
Essays.
Twelve 16mo.
[1852],
Another edition. With preface by Thomas Carlyle. {plw/pmcun's Library for the People^ No. 7.) London, 1863, 12mo. Revised copyright Boston, 1885, 8vo.
edition.
Second Series. Boston, Essays. 1844, 12mo. Contents i—The Poet ; Experiinee ; Character
;
MannerB;
Gifts
I^atwe; Politics; Jfomindlist and Realist; New England JSfiformers. {CatJiolic Another edition. London, 1844, 12mo. Boston, Another edition.
Series.)
1845, 8vo. Fart of the, " Boston Library of American and' Foreign Literature." edition. Eight Another London, 1850, 16mo.
•
Essays.
.^^Another •
—
[1852],
edition.
London
16mo.
New —First (second) Series. and revised edition. 2 parts. Cambridge [Mass., Bostcn, printed], 1876, 16mo. Fortune of the Republic. Lecture, Boston, Cambridge etc. [Mass., minted], 1879, 8vo. Historical Discourse delivered before the Citizens of Concord, 12th September 1835, on the Second Centennial Anniversary of the Incorporation of the Town. Concord, 1835, 8vo. Boston Letters and Social Aims. 1876, 8vo. Contents :—Poetry and ImaginMoguenM. ation. Social Aims. Mesources. The Comic Quotations and Originality, Progress of Culture. Persian Poetry. IjispiraUon. Greatness. Immortality.
——Another
edition.
London,
Ill
Cambridge
printed],
[Mass.,
1876, 8vo. Love, Friendship, Domestic Life.
Friendship from [Love and "Essays," First Series ; Somestic Life from " Society and SoliCambridge Boston, tude."] [Mass., printed], 1877, 16mo.
Man
the Reformer.
A
Lecture.
London, Bolton printed [1844 J], 16mo. May - Day and other Pieces. Boston, Cambridge [Poems.] [Mass., printed], 1867, 8vo.
London,
Another edition. 1867, 8vo.
An of Nature: delivered before the Society of the Adelphi, in Waterville College, in Maine, Boston, August 11, 1841. 1841, 8vo.
The Method oration
Another
London,
edition.
1844, 12mo. Miscellanies ; embracing Nature, Addresses, and Lectures. Boston, 1849, 16mo. New and revised edition. Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1876, 16mo. Nature. Boston, 1836, 16mo. Contents : InirodMA^affn; Nature i Commodity; Beauty; La/nguagei Disdipline; Idealism; Spirit; Prospects.
Nature, an Essay
;
tures on the Times. 1844, 16mo.
and I.eoLondon,
Another edition. Nature, an Essay. To which are added Lectures, and AdLondon, 1852, 8vo. Another edition. Boston, Cambridge [Mass.], printed, 1876, 16mo.
Orations, dresses.
An
Oration
delivered
[Literary Ethics] before the literary
—
;
BIBLIOGRAPHY. societies of
Daitmoutb
College,
Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1838, 8to. An Oration delivered before the
etc
Phi Beta Eappa Society, Cambridge, August 31,1837. Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1838, 8vo.
Man
Thinking.
An
Oration.
London, 1844, 12mo. Bepiinted from the preceding. This oration is also entitled " The
American Scholar."
8to.
Parnassus. Selections from various Poets. Edited by E. W. E. Boston, 1875, 8vo. Poems. Boston, 1847, 8vo.
Another
edition.
London,
Another edition. Cambridge [Mass., 1865, 16mo. Another edition.
Boston, printed],
Boston, 1876, 8vo. This edition, besides most of the
poems previously puhllshed, contains some never before printed. Another edition, (America)? Poems.) London [1881], 8vo. —^Household edition. Edited Boston, Camby J. E. Cabot. bridge [Mass., printed], 1884, 8vo.
Another edition. With prefaby W. Lewin. notice London ; Newcastle - on - Tyne printed, 1886, 16mo. Part of " The Canterbury Poets." Power, "Wealth, Illusions. [From "The Conduct of Life."] Boston, Cambridge [Mass., printed], 1876, 24mo. One of a series, entitled " VestPocket Series of Standard and tory
Popular Authors." The Preacher. Reprinted from XTnita/riom
1880, 8vo.
Another
edition.
Review. Boston,
London,
1850, 8vo.
Another edition. {Chapma/n's lAhrary for the People, No. Z.) London, 1851, 12mo,
New and
1847, 12mo.
Tht
Bepresentative Men. Boston, 1850, 12mo. Contents:— ZTtw <tf Great Ken. Plato; or. The PUhsopTier-Plato New Reaamge. SwedenAorgioTfThe Styatie. Montaigne; or, TheSeeptie. SJiakespeare; or. The Poet. Napoleon; or. The Man of the World. Goethe; or, The Writer. {Catholic ^Another edition. London, 1850, 12mo. Series.) Another edition. {Bohn's Shilling Series.) London, 1850,
revised
edition.
Boston, 1876, 16mo.
Another
edition.
London,
1882, 8vo.
Men and EngWard, Lock, <t
Bepresentative lish
Traits.
(
Popular Library of Literary Treasures.) London, 1886, Co.'s
8vo.
Bight Hand of Fellowship to Reverend H. B. Goodwin. Con-
^
cord, 1830. Society and Solitude. Boston, 1870, 16mo. Contents : Society and Solitude. Civilieation. Art. Mlgquenee. Domeetie Life. PamUng. Books. Days. Clmos. Success.
Work and Courage.
Old Age,
London, Another edition. [printed], Edinburgh 1870, 16mo. " One of IiaVs Copyright cheap editions of
American Books." Boston,
Another edition. Cambridge [Mass., 1876, 16mo. Another edition.
printed],
London,
1883, 8vo. Success, Greatness, Immortality.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. [Mass., Boston, Cambridge printed], 1877, 16nio. Success appeared on^inally in "Society and SoUtnde, Oreatnae and Iimrwrtality in "Letteis and Social Aims."
The Young American
:
a Lecture.
London, 1844, 8to.
The Massachusetts Quarterly Beview. [Edited by B. W. Emerson, Theodore Parker, and J. Boston, E. Cabot] 3 vols. 1847-50, 8vo.
Emerson only wrote the
Editors'
Address.
Memoirs of Margaret Fuller Ossoli, IV.
MISCELLANEOUS.
Biographical Sketch [of Henry D. Thoreau]. {Excursions, etc., by S. Thoreau.) Boston, D. 1863, 8vo. The Correspondence of T. Carlyle and E. W. Emerson, 1834-1872. [Edited by C. E. Norton.] 2 vols. London, 1883, 870. ^Revised edition. 2 vols. Boston, 1886, 8to. The Dial. [Edited by S. M. Fuller, R. W. Emerson, and G. 1-4. Boston Kipley.] Vol. [printed], London, 1841-1844. Vols, ill and iv, were edited by Emerson. By Echoes of Harper's Ferry. James Bedpath. Boston, 1860, 8vo. Speech delivered at Tremont Temple by E. W. Emetaon, pp. 6771 ; Speech delivered at Salem, pp.^ 119-122.
The
or Bose Garden. F. Gladwin. With an Essay on Saadi's Life and Genius, by J. Boss, and a Preface by B. W. Emerson. Boston, 1865, 8vo. The Hundred Greatest Men. Portraits of the one hundred greatest men of history, reproduced from steel engravings. [With a general introduction to the
Gulistan,
Translated
by
work by B. W. Emerson, etc.] London, 1879, 4to. London, Another edition. 1885, 8vo.
[Consistingofherautobiography, and notices of her life by J. F. Clarke, B. W. Emerson, and W. H. Channing.] 3 vols. Boaton, 1852, 8vo. Emerson wrote the chapters on Concord and on Boston in voL i. Morals. Translated the Greek by several hands. Corrected and revised
Plutarch's
from
by William W. Goodwin, with an introduction by Balph Waldo Emerson.
5
vols.
London,
1870, 8vo. Sartor Besartos, by Thomas Cailyle. (Preface by B. W. Emer. son.) Boston, 1836, 12mo.
the Lakes, By Sarah Margaret Fuller. With autobiography and memoir by B. W. Emerson, W. H. Channing, and others, London, 1861, 8vo.
Summer on
yr:'horeau
:
the
poet-natoralist.
With memorial
verses.
By
William Ellery Channing, Boston [1873], 8vo. Contains verses at pp. 161, 167,
and 183, which were never printed by Emerson,
Wanderer, A colloquial poem, by William Ellery Chan-
The
[Edited by E,
ning, i.t.,
B.
W.
Emerson.]
W. E.â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Boston
1871, 12mo.
War.
(Elizabeth P. Peabody's .Esthetic Papers, pp. 36-50.) Boston, 1849, 8vo.
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
VI
V. SELECTIONS.
Bremer, Frederika.
The
Emerson Birthday Book. [Oontaining selections from the writings of K. W. E. Arranged for every day of the year.] Boston, 1881, 8to.
Essay Gems of Emerson. With an introduction by H. K. Haweis.
World
Lihrary, London, 1886, 16mo.
(Rowtlect^ge' a
TSo. 27.)
Select Writings of Ealph Waldo Emerson, With an introduction by PercivalChnbb. (Camelot Series.) London, 1888, 8vo.
Thoughts from Emerson. burgh, 1883, 32mo.
Edin-
BioeBAFHY, Ckitioism, etc. A.
Bronson.
— Emerson.
Cambridge [Mass.], 1866, 8vo. Fiivatel^ printed.
Concord Days. Boston, 1872, 8vo. Emerson, pp. 26-40. E. W. Emerson : an estimate of his character and genius in prose and verse. Boston, 1882, 8vo. Arnold, Matthew. Discourses on America. London, 1885, 8vo. Emerson, pp. 138-207.
—
American of distinguished Boston, 1852, Statesmen, etc. 8vo.
Balph Waldo Emerson, pp. 24-28. Off-hand takings ; or, Crayon Sketches of the noticeable men of our age. New York [1860], 8vo. Kalph' Waldo Emerson, pp. 119126.
^Traits of
Aloott,
Homes,
George W. Crayon Sketches and Oft-hand Takings
Bungay,
New York
VL APPENDIX.
—^The
of the New World ; impressions Translated by of America. Mary Howitt. 3 vols. London, 1853, 8vo. Numerous references to Emerson.
Representative Men. [1883], 8vo.
Balph Waldo Emerson, pp.
164-
172.
Burroughs, John; ^-Emerson and the Superlative. (Essays from
"The Critic," pp. 81-87). Boston, 1882, 8vo. Birds and Poets, with other papers. Edinburgh, 1884,
—
Bush, George.
Bartlett, George
Eeply to R. W. Emerson on Swedenborg. A lecture delivered at the Odeon, Boston. New York, 1846, 8vo. Cabot, James Elliot. A memoir of Ralph Waldo Emerson. 2 vols.
—
B.—-The Concord
Guide Book.
Edited by G. B. Boston, 1881, 8vo. Contains an account of Emerson's House. Bartol, C. A. ^Radical Problems. Boston, 1872, 8vo. Transcendentalism, pp. 61-97. Birrell, Augustine. Obiter Dicta. B.
—
—
Second
series.
London, 1887,
8vo. Emerson, pp. 236-263.
12mo. Emerson, pp.
211-242.
—Professor
Bush's
—
Boston, 1887, 8vo. rAuother edition. London, 1887, 8vo.
2
vols.
—
Conway, Moneure Daniel. Emerson at home and abroad, Boston, 1882, 8vo.
Another edition. {English and Foreign Philosophical Library, vol. xix) London, 1883, 8to,
'
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Cook, Joseph.
—Twelve
Monday
Lectures in Tremont Temple, Boston, U.S., etc. London, 1877, 8to. Kmeison's Tieva of Immortality, pp. 1-10.
Cooke,
Waldo ,
^X
—
Willis. Ralph Emerson : hia life, writ-
GeoTge
and philosophy. 1882, 8vo.
ingSj
Fourth
London, Boston,
edition.
1882, 8to. Crozier, John Beattie. ligion of the Future. 1880, 8to. Emerson, pp. 105-156.
—The
^
^ ,
-
Re-
London,
Dana, William F.— The Optimisni of Ralph Waldo Emerson. Boston, 1886, 12mo.
—
Duyckinck, Evert. Cyclopsedia of American Literature, etc. 2 vols.
Philadelphia,
1877,
8vo.
B. W. Emeraon,
vol.
ii.,
192.
pp. 182-
—
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Ralph Waldo Emerson, Man and Teacher. (TAe Bmund Table Series.) Edinburgh, 1884, 8vo.
—
/
Friswell, J. Hain. Modern Men of Letters honestly criticised. London, 1870, 8vo.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, pp.
333-
342.
—
Frothingham, 0. B. Theodore Parker : a biography. Boston, references to Emeraon.
^—Transcendentalism England.
2 vols. ,
London, 1867, 8vo.
Bepresentative Men, vol,
New
8vo. Emerson, pp.
in
New
York, 1876,
213-249.
^Memoir of William Henry Channing. London, 1887, 8vo. Numerous referencea to Emeraon,
ii,,
pp.
280-254.
Thomas
Carlyle, a history of the first forty years of his life, 1795-1835. 2 vols. London,
1882, 8vo. Beferences to Emerson, Thomas Carlyle, a history of his life in London, 1834-1881. 2 vols. London, 1884, 8vo. Numerous references to Emerson. Fuller, Margaret. Life without and life within ; or, reviews, narratives, etc. Boston, 1874, 8vo. Emerson's Essays, pp. 191-198. Gamett, Richard. Life of Thomas
—
—
Carlyle. Series.)
("Great Writers" London, 1887, 8vo,
Numerous
references to Emeraon. George. A Gallery of Literary Portraits. Edinburgh, 1845, 8vo. Balph Waldo Emerson, pp. 288-
—
GilfiUan,
X
306.
A Second Gallery Portraits.
of Literary
Edinburgh,
1850,
8vo. B.
W, Emerson, pp. 174-196, A Third Gallery of Portraits. Edinburgh, 1854, 8vo. Emerson, pp.
328-336.
—
Poets' Homes. Pen and Pencil Sketches of American poets and their
Gilman, Arthur.
homes. Second
1874, 8vo.
Numerous
—
Froude, James Anthony. Short Studies on Great Subjects.
series.
Boston,
1880, 4to.
Balph Waldo Emeraon, pp.
140-
171.
Grimm, Herman. —Ralph Waldo Emerson tiber Goethe und Shakespeare. Aus dem Englischeu nebst einer Critik der Schriften Emerson's von H. G. Hannover, 1857, 8vo.
—
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
VIU
—
Grimm, Herman. Neue Essays iiber Kunst nnd Literatur. Berlin, 1865, 8vo. E. W. Emerson, pp. Literature. 870.
1-23.
Boston,
.
1886,
—
^
1887, 8vo,
Ealph Waldo Emerson, pp. 141.
133-
—
Alfred H. E. W. philosopher and : poet. New York, 1881, 8vo. Hague, William. Ealph W. Emerson (Life and Philosophy). A paper read Dec. 14, 1883, etc.
Guernsey,
Emerson
J,
—
/
New
York, 1884, 8vo. Baskins, David Greene. Ealph Waldo Emerson, his maternal ancestors, with some reminiscences of him. [Illustrated.]
London
—
[1887], 8vo. Hawthorne, Julian. Confessions and Criticisms. Boston, 1887, 8vo. Emerson aa an American, pp.
—
186-217.
" Manchester Examiner."] London, 1882, 8vo. ^Ealph Waldo Emerson, his genius, and writings a biographical sketch. Second edition, largely augmented, etc. London, 1882, 8vo. life,
Ralph Emerson, pp. 1-43. Griswold, Hattie Tyng. Home Life of Great Authors. Chicago,
/
:
—
Hawthorne, Nathaniel. Passages from the American Note-Books. Boston, 1868, 8vo. Keferencea to Emerson. Oliver Wendell. Holmes, American Men of Letters. Ealph Waldo Emerson. Boston, 1885, 8vo.
Eemains of
Ealph Waldo Emerson.
[A
London, 1885, biography.] 8vo. In MemorIreland, Alexander. E. W. Emerson ; recoliam.
—
lections of his visits to England in 1833, 1847-8, 1872-3, and unpublished extracts from letters.
siderable
[Reprinted, with conadditions, from the
the
Literary
H.
late
J.
Boston, 1885, 8vo. Mr. Emerson, pp. 293-302. Landor, Walter Savage. Letter from W. S. Landor to E. W. Emerson [occasioned by the publication of his " English
—
Traits."]
Bath [1860], 12mo.
—
Landreth, Studies P. and Sketches in Modern Literature. Edinburgh, 1861, 8vo. JEtalph Waldo Emeraon, pp. 298323.
—
Lemoinne,
John. Nonvelles feudes critiques et biographParis, 1863, 8vo. du Garact^re Anglais,
iques.
EscLuisaes
par B. W. Emerson, pp. Lowell, James Russell.
144-176.
—My Study
Windows. Second
edition.
Lon-
don, 1871, 8vo. Emeraon, the Lecturer, pp. 274281.
The Poetical Works of J. E. L.
2 vols.
/
— The
Henry.
James,
New
revised
edition.
Boston,
1882, 8vo.
Emerson and Garlyle in for Critics." J. M.
Manning, the
"A Fable
—Half Truths and
Truth.
Lectures,
etc.
London, 1872, 8vo. Lecture vii., pp. 268-316, on Emerson. Massachusetts Historical Society. Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society, 18811882. Boston, 1882, 8vo. Tribute to Ralph W. Emerson, Addresses by vol. xix., pp. 298-312.
—
Dr.
Ellis, Dr. ^tc.
Holmea,
Oliver
WendeU
;
BIBLIOGRAPHY.
—
1/
.Nichol, John. American Literature, an histoiical sketch, 16201880. Edinburgh, 1882, 8vo. The Transcendental Movement, pp. 264-2S6 ; Emerson and Thoreau, pp. 287-321.
Parton,
James.
Searle,
— Some
noted
Princes, Authors, and Statesmen of our time. Edited by J. P. New York [1886], Svo. Reminiscences of RaU)h Waldo Emerson, by Louisa M. Alcott, pp. 284-288.
—
January,
Phillips.
i.e.,
— Emerson,
and Writings. 12mo.
his
Life
London, 1S55,
—
Shepard, William. Pen Pictures of Modern Authors. New York,
Leon Auguste. II e La Yita TTmana. Saggi di Filosofia Americana di Prima verRalph Emerson.
Welsh, Alfred H. Development and of English Literature Chicago, Language. 2 vols.
—
Carattere
sione Italiana con Introduzione
suUa Vita Autore a
e
suUe Opere
cura di Milano, 1886, Svo.
dell'
L. A. P.
—
—
Literature,
1607-1885.
York, 1887, Svo. Ralph Waldo Emerson, pp. 330-370.
New vol.
i.,
—
Robinson, William S. "Warrington " Pen-Portraits, etc. Boston, 1877, 8vo. References to Emerson.
—
Sanborn, Frank B. Henry D. (American Men of Thoreau. Boston, 1882, Svo. Numerous references to Emerson. The Genius and Character of Emerson, Lectures [by several authors] at the Concord School of Philosophy, edited by F. B. S, Boston, 1885, Svo. Zetters.)
—
—A
Boston, 1884, Svo.
—
1882, Svo. Emerson,
vol.
ii.,
Whipple, Edwin lections of
Thomas. The Living First Authors of America. ^ New York, 1850, Svo. series. R. W. Emerson, pp. 49-77. Richardson, Charles F. American Powell,
y
'^
1882, 12mo.
364-67, 371-74, 877-81, 393, 402, 407, 435, 436.
Perussia,
^'
George S.
Ralph Waldo Emerson, pp. 86-97. Stedman, Edmund C. Poets of America. Boston, 1885, Svo. Ralph Waldo Emerson, pp. 133-179. WestThayer, James Bradley. ern Journey with Mr. Emerson.
Reminiscences of Rev. Wm. Ellery Channing. Boston, 1880, 8vo. R. W. Emerson, pp. 273, 360,
Peabody, Elizabeth Palmer.
/'
—
Horace E. Men and Letters ; essays in characterizaBoston, tion and criticism. 1887, Svo. Emerson's Self, pp. 147-170.
Scudder,
pp. 523-642.
Percy.
—Recol-
Eminent Men,
etc,
Boston, 1887, Svo. Some Recollections of Ralph Waldo Emerson, pp. 119-154.
American otherPapers.
and Literature Boston, 1887, Svo.
Emerson and Carlyle, pp. 234-268 Emerson as a Poet, pp. 259-298. HurryWillis, N. Parker. Graphs ; or, sketches of scenery, London; 1S51, celebrities, etc.
—
8vo.
Emerson, pp. 107-111 ; Second look at Emerson, pp. 111-113.
Wilson, John.
James G.,
—Appleton's
and Fiske, Cyclopaedia
American Biography. York, 1887, Svo.
of
New
Emerson, vol. ii., pp. 343-348. H. Profeten van den Wolff, Nieuweren Tijd. 'S-Hertogenbosch, 1871, Svo. Ralph Waldo Emerson door H.
—
Wolff, pp. 326-365.
-'
;
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Maoazinb Articles. Emerson,
Ralph Waldo.
minster Review,
Emerson, Ralph Waldo,
— West-
33, 1840,
vol.
pp. 345-372.— La
Revue Ind^pendante, by Daniel Stern, (Countess D'Agonlt), torn. 4, 1846, pp. 195-209.—Revue des Deux Mondes, by R. TurnbuU, by Emile Mont^-
vol. 122, 1882,
gut, torn. 19, 1847, pp. 462-493 torn. 7, 1850, pp. 722-737.—
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine,
vol.
643-657 Living 97-107.
;
62,
same Age,
—
1847,
pp.
article, {littell's
vol.
Tait's
16,
pp.
Edinburgh
Magazine, by George GilfiUan, 15 N.S., 1848, pp. 17-23 ; same article, Littell'a Living Age, vol. 17, pp. 97:103.— Dublin Review, vol. 26, 184?, pp. 152-179.— Littell's Living Age, by N. P. Willis, vol. 24, 1850, pp. 457-458.— Continental vol.
Monthly, by D. M. Colton, vol. North 1, 1862, pp. 49-62.
—
British Review, vol. 47, 1867,
319-358.- Broadway, by Robert Buchanan, vol. 2 W.S., 1869, pp. 223-226.— Methodist Quarterly Review, by G. pp.
Prentice,
vol.
56,
1874,
357-374.— Galaxy, ,by
J.
pp.
Bur-
roughs, vol. 21, 1875, pp. 254, Harper's New 543, etc.
—
etc.,
Monthly Magazine, by Whipple,
vol.
52,
E. P. 1875, pp.
417-419.— Catholic World,
by
pp.
238-252.
— Harper's
New
Monthly Magazine, by Julian Hawthorne, 278-281.'
—
vol.
65, 1882, pp.
Modern
Review Channing, 850-854.— Monthly Magazine, by W.
(Letter), by W. H. vol. 3, 1882, pp.
New
R. TurnbuU, December 1882,
— —
Dial, (Chicago,) by pp. 1-25. B. Herford, vol. 2, 1882, pp. 114-115. Fortnightly Review,
by Henry Norman, vol. 34 N.S., 1883, pp. 422-432.— Progress, by J. M. Wheeler vol. 1, 1883, Century Magapp. 117-120. zine, by E. C. Stedman, vol. 25, 1883, pp. 872-886.— Macmillan's Magazine, by Matthew Arnold, vol. 50, 1884, pp. 1-13.—Temple Bar, by C. A. Ward, vol. 72, 1884, pp. 236-248.— Fortnightly Review, by W. L. Courtney,
—
38 N.S.,1885,pp. 319-331. Words, by Augustine Birrell, 1885, pp. 359-363.— Revue des Deux Mondes, by Th. Bentzon, tom. 75, 1886, pp. 95-98. Westminster Review, vol.
— Good
—
Nov. 1887, pp. 985-997.— Good Words, by F.H.XJnderwood, Dec. 1887, pp. 807-816.— Quarterly 130-159.
Review, Jan. 1888, pp. — ^New Princeton Review, by G. Bradford, 145-163.
vol.
5,
1888,
Address, July 1838. Quarterly Review, vol. pp. 500-514.
pp.
Boston 1,
1838,
O'Connor, vol. 27, 1878, pp. 90-97. North American Review, by Francis H. Underwood, vol. 130. 1880, pp. 479-498.—
1870.
Fortnightly Review, by Moncure D. Conway, vol. 31 N.S., 1882, Atlantic Monthly, pp. 747-770.
and Cmrlyle. Revue des Deux Mondes, by Emile Mont^gut,
by W. T.
tom. 7, 1850, pp. 722-737.
J.
—
—
Harris, vol. 50, It 82,
Address on Forefathers' Day,
NewEnglander, by L N.
Tarbox, voL 30, 1871, pp. 175202.
BIBLIOGRAPHY. EmeisoD, Ralph Waldo. amd Carlyle, Matthew Arnold on. Century Magazine, by John
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Literary and the "Dial." World (Boston), by George W.
May
22, 1880, p. 178.
Burroughs, vol. 27, 1884, pp.
Curtis,
925-932.
Kew and the Pantheists. Dominion Monthly, by H. Hemming, vol. 8, 1871, p. 65,
cmd CarlyU, Corre^ondence Modern Review, vol. 4, 1883, pp. 318-340.— Harper's Kew Monthly Magazine, vol. 1883, pp. 956, 957.— 66,
of.
Atlantic Monthly, vol. 51, 1883, Progress, by Norpp. 560-564. man Britton, vol. 1, 1883, pp.
—
277-287.—Athenseum,
18ti3, pp. (Chicago), vol.
335, 336.— Dial 3, 1883, pp. 265-270.— Century
Magazine,
by Henry James,
Jun., vol. 26, 1883, pp. 265272. Westminster Review, vol. 63 N.S., 1883, pp. 451-493. Literary and his Friends. World (Boston) by F, B. Sanborn, May 22, 1880, p. 179.
etc.
amd
and Ms
Visit
to
Scotland, Shilling
Jerrold's
Magazine,
by George Cupples,
vol, 7, 1848, pp. 322-331.
and his Writings, Hewitt's Journal, by G. Barmby, vol. 2, 1847, pp. 315, 316.— Christian Review, vol. 26, 1861, pp. 640663.
wnd History. Southern Literary Messenger, vol. 18, 1852, p. 249, etc. amd Landor. Littell's Living Age (from the Athenseum), vpl. 52, 1857, pp. 371-374. and Occultism. Lucifer, by 0. Johnston, 15th Dec. 1887, pp. 252-257.
and Spencer and Martvneau, Christian Examiner, by W. R. Alger, vol. 84, 1868, pp. 257287.
Solu-
Princeton Review, by E. D. Mead, 1884, pp. 233-256. Critic and the Superlative. (New York), by John Burroughs, vol. 2, 1882, p. 34.
and Transcendentalism. American Review, vol. 1, 1845, pp. 233-243.
—
Douglas
the Philosophy of
tion.
As a Poet.
North American
Review, by E. P. Whipple, vol. 135, 1882, pp, 1-26.
as a Writer and Teacher. Month, by Thomas Slater, vol. 63, 1885, pp. 374-386. as the Fovmder of a Literature.
Literary
W.
(Boston), by T. May 22, 1880,
World
Higginson,
pp. 175, 176.
Boyhoodof. Atlantic Monthly, J. E. Cabot, May 1887, pp.
by
660-667.
Burial Bay.
Critic
(New
York), by John Burroughs, vol. 2,
1882, p. 123.
Cabots Life Magazine, by
of.
Macmillan's
Henry James,
1887, pp. 86-98.— Saturday Review, Nov. 19, 1887, p.
Dec. 203.
— Congrep;ational
Review,
March 1888, pp. 221-227. College Days of. Literary World (Boston), by W. B. Hill,
May
22, 1880, pp. 180-181.
Conduct of Life. Christian Examiner, by F. H. Hedge, vol. 70,
1861,, pp.
149-156.
,
New
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Englander, by N. Porter, voL 19, 1861, pp. 496-508.— Littell's Living Age (from the Saturday Review),
vol.
68,
1861.
pp.
240-242.—Eoleotie Review, vol. 3, N.S., 1862, pp. 365-40&.—
pp. 666-670.
8,
N.S., 1841,
—Monthly Review,
vol. 3, N.S., 1841, pp. 274-279. Boston Quarterly Review, vol.
— 4,
1841, pp. 291-308.— Christian
Examiner, by C. C. Felton, vol.
Eraser's Magazine,
same
30, 1841, pp. 253-262.—Eclectic Review, vol. 76, 1842, pp. 667687. Democratic Review, vol,
Age,
16, N.S., 1845, pp.
vol.
vol. 78, 1868, pp. 1-19; Littell s Living article, vol. 98, pp. 368-373.
Dial (Chieago), by NorPerkins, vol. 1, 1880, pp. 9-11. Journal of Speculative Philosophy, by George Willis Cooke, vol. 19, 1885, pp. 225265, and 322, 323. Ma/rly Letters of, edited ly Mary S. WUJiington, Century Magazine, vol. 26, 1883, pp. 454-458. An English Ancestor ()f (Rev. E. Bulkeley). Congregational Dial.
man C.
—
Review, by Rev. John Brown, Oct. 1887, pp. 916-926.
English Traits. WestminsterEeview, vol. 10, N.S., 1856, 494-514 ; same article. pp. Eclectic Magazine, vol. 39, pp. 503-515.— New Quarterly Review, vol. 5, 1856, pp. 449-455. Dublin University Magazine, vol. 48, 1856, pp. 569, 570.— West of Scotland Magazine, Oct. 1856, pp. 75-80.— New Englander, by N. Porter, vol. 14, 1856, pp. 573-592.— London Quarterly Review, vol. 7, 1856, North American pp. 381-406. Review, by A. P. Peabody, vol. 83, 1856, pp. 503-510.— Putnam's Monthly Magazine, vol. 8, 1856, pp. 407-415.— Quarterly Review, vol. 115, 1864,
—
—
pp. 42-68.
Magazine, vol.
115,
Quarterly Review, 1864, pp. 42-68. Cultv/re.
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Tait's Edinbnrgh Essays.
—
589-602.—
Living Age (from the Spectator), vol. 4, 1845, pp. 139-141 ; vol 23 (from the English Review), pp. 344-350.— Prospective Review, vol. 1, Littell's
1845,
252-262.—Biblical
pp.
Review, vol. 153. —
1846, pp. 148-
1,
Magazine (from
^Eclectic
the English Review), vol. 18, 1849, pp. 546-553. Oenius of. Atlantic Monthly, October 1887, pp. 566-572.
Glimpse
his
of
Boyhood.
Atlantic Monthly, by J. Elliot Cabot, May 1887, pp. 650-667.
Glimpses
of.
Harper's
Monthly Magazine, by Annie Fields, vol. 68, 1884, pp. 457-468.
The Grave
of.
Critic
(New
York), by Walt Whitman, voL 2,
1882, p. 123. Gv£imse'jfs
(Chicago), 2,
Life
of.
Dial
by B. Herford, voL
1881, pp. 114, 115. Literary
His Books.
World
(Boston), by Walt Whitman, 22, 1880, pp. 177, 178. Holme^ Dial Life of. (Chicago), by Geo. P. Upton, vol. 5, 1885, pp. 267-260.—Time, vol. 12, 1885, pp. 246-249. Some of. Literary World (Boston), by G. B. Bartlett, May 22, 1880, pp. 181, 182.—
May
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Emerson, Balph Waldo. Art Journal, vol. 19,
j
N.S.,
1880, p. 55.
—
'-Homes amd Baunis of. (IlScribner's Monthiyi
lustrated.) by F. B.
Sanborn, vol. 17, 1879, pp. 496-511. ——inEnglomd. Harper's 'Weekly,
by M. D. Conway,
vol.
26,
1882, pp. 358, 359. Infmiyx of. Dial (Chicago), by "Walter K. Barnes, vol. 3, 1882, pp. 25-27.
in the Lecture Boom. Atlantic vol. 51, 1883, pp. 818-832. Mcmchester. at IJedmres Hewitt's Journal, vol. 2, 1847,
Monthly,
pp. 370, 371. Lectwres and Writings of. Christian Review, vol.. 15, 1850, pp.
249-254.—Every Saturday,
vol, 3, 1866, p. 680, etc., and ^Fraser's vol. 4, p. 381, etc. Magazine, vol. 75, 1867, pp. 586-600 ; same article, Littell's
—
Living Age, vol. 93, pp. 581-592.
L
etters amd Social Aims. International Review, vol. 3, 1876, p. 249, etc. Litera/ry Methods of. Literary World (Boston), by 6. W. Cooke, May 22, 1880, p. 181. Literary World the Man. (Boston), by C. A. Bartol, May 22, 1880, pp. 174, 175. Mission of. Century, by 6. Merriam, May 1888, pp. S. 154-157.
Personality of. Century, by Lazarus, vol. 24, 1882, pp. 454-456. Fhilosopher wnd the Poet. Literary World (Boston), by F. H. Hedge, May 22, 1880, pp. 176, 177.
Emma
—the
Emerson, Ralph Waldo. Philosophy
of.
Nation,
by
H. W. Holland, vol. 33, 1881, pp. 396, 397.— Time, by W. L. Courtney, vol.
3,
N.S., 1886,
pp. 653-661.
Democratic Review,
Poems.
1838, pp. 319-329.— Southern Literary Messenger, vol. 13, 1847, pp. 292-297.— Brownson's Quarterly Review, vol. 4, 1847, pp. 262-276.— American Review, vol. 6, 1847, Christian Expp. 197-207. aminer, by 0. A. Bartol, voL 42, 1847, pp. 255-262.— Christvol. ian Remembrancer, 15, 1848, pp. 300-352.—Nation, by C. E. Norton, vol. 4, 1867, pp. 430, 431. Catholic Prose Works. World, vol. 11, 1870, pp, 202211. SecoUections of. Harper's New Monthly Magazine, by E. P. Whipple, vol. 65, 1882, pp. 576-587. Reminiscences Critic of. (New York), by F. B. Sanborn, vol. 2, 1882, pp. 123, 124. British Sepresentative Men. Quarterly Review, vol. 11, 1850, pp. 281-315 ; same article, Littell's Living Age, voL 26, pp. 1-16. Christian Examiner, by C. A. Bartol, vol. 48, 1850, pp. 314-318. PaUadium, vol. 1, 1850, pp. 44-55.— North American, by C. E. Norton, vol. 70, 1850, pp. 520-524.—New Engvol.
1,
—
—
—
lander,
1850,
by D. March, 186-196.
pp.
Review, vol.
vol.
8,
— Eclectic
3, il.S., 1852, pp.
568-582. Society
and
Solitude.
Magazine, vol. pp. 1-18,
—
Eraser's
2, N.S., 1870, Littell's Living Age
BIBLIOGRAPHY. Emerson, Balph Waldo. from the Spectator),
Emerson, Ralph Waldo.
Scottish ReThmker. view, by George Stewart, April
Writings of. Christian Examiner, by F. H. Hedge, vol. 38, 1845, pp. 87-106.-,Princeton Review, vol. 13, 1841. p.
1888.
87, etc.
yol, lOS,
1870, pp. 161-163. -i
The,
VII.
Nature
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