Walt Whitman - The Complete Prose Works of Walt Whitman, Volume II, 1902 by gnosisclassics

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THIS EDITION

ISSUED

UNDER ARRANGEMENT WITH

MESSRS. SMALL, MAYNARD,

CO.,

OF BOSTON

THE PUBLISHERS OF THE AUTHORIZED EDITIONS OF THE WRITINGS OF WALT WHITMAN

PAUMANOK

EDITION

This Edition of the Complete Works of Walt

Whitman

printed on Fulsdael hand'^made

paper, and limited

which

Three Hundred

Sets,

this Is

Number.

if,

vcolMa**^tU^Q-*rHtd

THE

COMPLETE WRITINGS' OF

WALT

WHITMA Issued under the editorial super-

of his Literary Execu-

vision tors,

Richard

Maurice Bucke, Thomas B.Harned, and Horace L. Traubel

With

additional

bibliographical

and

critical

ma-

prepared by Oscar Lovell Triggs, Ph.D. terial

G.P.PUTNAM'3 SeNS

NEWYSRK

LCNDoN

THE KNICKERB9CKER. PRESS

THE COMPLETE PROSE WORKS OF

WALT WHITMAN

VOLUME

G. P.

PUTNAM'S SONS

NEW YORK AND LONDON xrbe iknicFietbocfter

1902

pteee

%^--

WALT WHITMAN

1881, 1888, 1891, BY

THOMAS

HARNED

and

HORACE

SURVIVING LITERARY EXECUTORS OF

Entered at Stationers' Hall

•

'• f

Zbc

«.

Itnfcltetbocfier pteee,

TRAUBEL

WALT WHITMAN

l^ew Cork

Contents SPECIMEN DAYS— Continued. A Couple of Old Friends—A A Week's Visit to Boston

PAGE

Coleridge Bit

4 6

The Boston

To-Day

Tribute to Four Poets

Millet's Pictures

Birds

—and a Caution

Samples of

Items

9 II

Common-Place Book

New

York

—Memories

Common — More

Ossianic Night a

New

Emersor

Emerson

— Dearest Friends

.... .... We .... —

Ferry Boat

Newspapers

The Great Unrest of which By Emerson's Grave At Present Writing

22 25

Death of Longfellow Starting

Other Concord Notations

Only

Visit, at the Last, to R.

Boston

\2 '

Custer's Last Rally"

Some Old Acquaintances A Discovery of Old Age

Native Sand and Salt Once More

Hot Weather '*

—Last

are Par t

26 27

30 33

36 31

Personal

Book

After Trying a Certain V01..V.

[iii]

273533

Contente

SPECIMEN DAYS— Continued, Final Confessions

page

— Literary Tests —Morality

...-4' •

Nature and Democracy

COLLECT. One

Two

Index Items

Democratic Vistas

Origins of Attempted Secession

151

Prefaces to Leaves of Grass. Preface, 1855, to first issue of Leaves

"As

Preface, 1872, to

of Grass

Free"

185

Preface, 1876, to L.

Poetry To-Day in America

A Memorandum

at a

of G. and Two Rivulets

—Shakespeare—The Future

193

205

Venture

230

Death of Abraham Lincoln

Two

161

on Pinions

a Strong Bird

Letters

239 237

Notes Left Over 262

Nationality (and Yet)

Emerson's Books (the Shadows of Them) Ventures, on an Old

Theme

.... .

British Literature

Darwinism **

— (Then Furthermore)

Society"

The Tramp and Strike Questions Democracy in the New World Foundation Stages

— then

General Suffrage, Elections, Etc

Who

Gets the Plunder

Lacks and Wants Yet Rulers Strictly Out of the Masses

Monuments

280 284 286 288

290 .

.291

....

— the Past and Present [iv]

278

289

Friendship (the Real Article)

270 274

.... ....

Others

265

292 293 295

Contend COLLEC T—Continued. Little or

Nothing

New

After All

Lincoln Reminiscence

Freedom Book-Classes

— America's

Our Real Culmination

An American Problem The

297 Literature

Last Collective Compaction

299 299

296

300

301

HUustrations IValt

Whitman

....

From J,

Frontispiece

Owned

the painting by Waters, i8yy. H.Johnston, Esq,, Brooklyn,

Henry IVadsworth Longfellow From

the painting by G. P. A. Healey, Reproduced by permission of Foster Bros., Boston. *

266

Ralph IValdo Emerson From

Reproduced the painting by A. E. Smith. by permission of Foster Bros., Boston.

Charles Darwin

278

From a photograph.

[^i]

Specimen Da^s (Continued)

[X]

Specimen Baigs y^priL—Hawe run down

Latter

Couple of

—A c^k-^^ ridge Bit

country haunt for a couple of days, and am spending them by the pond. had I

already

discover'd

kingfisher

here

one—the mate not here yet). morning, down by the creek, he has

(but only

This fine bright

come out round

for a spree, circling, flirting, chirping at a

rate.

While

writing these lines he

disporting himself in scoots and rings over the wider parts of the

pond, into whose surface he dashes,

once or twice making a loud souse—the spray flying in

the

sun— beautiful!—

see his white and dark-gray

plumage and peculiar shape plainly, as he has deign'd to come very near me. The noble, graceful bird! Now he is sitting on the limb of an old tree, high up, bend-

water— seems to be looking at me while memorandize. almost fancy he knows me. Three ing over the

days later.— My second kingfisher (or her) mate.

whirling around. i

saw the two I

had heard,

here with his

together flying and

the distance,

what

thought was the clear rasping staccato of the birds [3]

•

••

•

Specimen 2)a^0 several times already

— but

couldn't be sure the

came from both until saw them together. To-day at noon they appear'd, but apparently either

notes

on business, or wild

now,

frolic

down

full

an hour.

for

of free fun and motion, up and

Doubtless,

now

they have cares,

The

duties, incubation responsibilities.

deferr'd I

dum

know

can finish to-day's memoran-

better than with Coleridge's lines, curiously

appropriate in All

more ways than one:

Nature seems

The bees

And

work—slugs leave —birds are on the wing,

their

his smiling face a

May Boston

I, '8 1.

pair,

nor build, nor sing.

—Seems as

means of American

if all

travel

t)een settled, not only

women,

children, invalids,

the

ways and

to-day had

with reference to

speed and directness, but of

air.

dream of spring;

the while, the sole unbusy thing,

Nor honey make, nor

Week's

lair,

are stirring

winter, slumbering in the open

Wears on

frolics are

summer-close.

till

don't

for a little limited exercise only.

for the

and old fellows

comfort like

me.

went on by a through train that runs daily from Washington to the Yankee metropolis without change. You get in a sleeping-car soon after dark I

in Philadelphia,

and

after

have your bed made up

and go to sleep

—

ruminating an hour or two,

you

fly

like,

draw the

curtains,

on through Jersey to

[4]

New

Specimen 2)a?0

York— hear

your half-slumbers a dull jolting and bumping sound or two are unconsciously toted in

—

from Jersey City by a midnight steamer around the Battery and under the big bridge to the track of the

New

Haven Road— resume your flight eastward, and early the next morning you wake up in Boston. All of which was my experience. wanted to go to the I

A tall unknown gentleman (a fellowon his way to Newport he told me; had

Revere House. passenger just

chatted

assisted

a hack, put

moments

a few

him)

out through the depot crowd, procured

with

smilingly and quietly,

before with

''Now

ride," paid the

traveling bag, saying 1

driver,

remonstrate bow'd himself

want you to and before

let this I

could

off.

The occasion of my jaunt, suppose had better say here, was for a public reading of the death of Abraham Lincoln " essay, on the sixteenth anniversary of that tragedy; which reading duly came off, night of April 15. Then linger'd a week in Boston I

—felt pretty well (the lull'd)

— went around

mood

propitious,

paralysis

everywhere, and saw

all

that

was to be seen, especially human beings. Boston's immense material growth commerce, finance, com-

—

mission stores, the plethora of goods, the crowded

—

made of course the first surand sidewalks prising show. In my trip out West, last year, I thought the wand of future prosperity, future empire, streets

must soon surely be wielded by [5]

St. Louis,

Chicago,

Specimen ®a?0 San Francisco; but

beautiful Denver, perhaps

the said

wand

stretch'd out just as decidedly in

much

with just as

Boston,

evidences of copious capital

New World

the in

the

West

see

ahead of

certainty of

— indeed

staying;

no centre of

(half the big railroads

are built with

Yankees' money, and

they take the

Old Boston with

dividends).

its

zigzag streets and multitudinous angles (crush up

sheet

of letter-paper

down, stamp Boston

flat,

—new

your

and that

Boston with

its

hand, throw the

map

of old

miles upon miles of

costly houses — Beacon

and Street, Commonwealth Avenue, and a hundred others. But the best new departures and expansions of Boston, and of all the cities of New England, are in another large

direction.

the letters

get from Dr. Schliemann

(interesting but fishy) about his excava-

If xf-dr""

tions there in the far-off I

notice cities, ruins, &c., as he digs

their graves, are certain to

say,

Homeric

area,

them out of

layers—that

upon the foundation of an old concern, very

down

indeed,

always another

still

another

—each

far

city or set of ruins,

and upon that another superadded

upon that

—and

sometimes

representing either a

long or rapid stage of growth and development, different

from

its

predecessor, but unerringly grow-

ing out of and resting on [6]

it.

the moral,

emo-

Specimen 'Ba^B and human growths (the main of a race opinion), something of this kind has certainly

tional, heroic, in

taken place of to-day

thing

may be that

else

New

The

Boston.

England metropolis

described as sunny (there

makes warmth, mastering even

winds and meteorologies, though those be sneez'd

at),

some-

joyous,

receptive,

are not to

full

of ardor,

sparkle, a certain element of yearning, magnificently tolerant, yet not to

fool'd;

fond of good eating

—

and drinking costly in costume as its purse can buy; and all through its best average of houses, streets, people, that subtle something (generally thought to

be climate, but the race,

it is

not

—

it is

something indefinable

its

development) which

the turn of

effuses behind the whirl of animation, study, busi-

ness,

a happy and joyous

public

spirit,

tinguished from a sluggish and saturnine one.

think of the glints

books) of the jolly old Greek a

good

dis-

Makes

get (as in Symonds's

Indeed there

cities.

deal of the Hellenic in B., and the people are

handsomer too motions, and with color

getting

(although this

— padded

in their faces.

not Greek) so

gray-hair' d women.

many

lecture

with

out,

freer

never saw

fine-looking

caught myself

pausing more than once to look at them,

—

plentiful

healthy and everywhere through the audience wifely and motherly, and wonderfully charming and beautiful— think such as no time or land but ours I

could show. [7]

Specimen

2)ai?6

April i6.—k short but pleasant

Tribute

Longfellow.

not one of the calling

but as the author of Evangeline

kind,

PQg^g

visit to

come and see Camden, where was ill,

kindly took the trouble to

three years ago in

felt

not only the impulse of

He was

occasion, but a duty.

eminence

called

forget his lit-up face

esy, in the

soon and glowing warmth and court-

here

feel

the impulse to interpolate

American century with In a late

literature.

who

ought to

know

shall not

called the old school.

who stamp

something about the mighty four first

on that

the only particular

Boston, and

modes of what

And now just

my own pleasure

its

this

birth-marks of poetic

my reviewers, of my ''attitude

magazine one of better,

speaks

of contempt and scorn and intolerance " toward the

leading poets ing their

what

—of my

deriding " them, and preach-

uselessness. "

think

about them,

anybody

know

cares to

—and have long thought and avow'd —

am entirely willing to propound.

imagine any better luck befalling these States poetical beginning

and

initiation

than has

can

for a

come from

Emerson, Longfellow, Bryant, and Whittier.

Emer-

son, to me, stands unmistakably at the head, but for

the others

Each

am at a loss where to give any precedence.

illustrious,

Emerson

each

rounded,

each

for his sweet, vital-tasting

philosophy, and

poems

distinctive.

melody, rhym'd

as amber-clear as the

of the wild bee he loves to sing. [8]

honey

Longfellow

for

Specimen 2)a?0 rich

forms and incidents

color, graceful

makes

life

beautiful

—

all

that

and love refined

— competing

own

ground, and,

with the singers of Europe on their

with one exception, better and finer work than that of any of them. Bryant pulsing the first interior versethrobs of a mighty world bard of the river and the

—

wood, ever conveying a as from

hayfields,

taste of open

with scents

air,

grapes, birch-borders

— always

lurkingly fond of threnodies— beginning and ending

with chants of death, with here and there through all, poems, or passages of poems, touchhis long career

ing the highest universal truths, enthusiasms, duties

—morals as grim and eternal, ful,

as anything in Eschylus.

his special

and war, like in

themes

—

for all his

not as stormy and fate-

While

in Whittier,

with

(his outcropping love of heroism

Quakerdom,

his verses at times

the measur'd step of Cromwell's old vererans)—

Whittier lives the zeal, the moral energy, that

founded

New England—the

splendid rectitude and

ardor of Luther, Milton, George Fox

—

must not, dare not, say the wilfulness and narrowness—though doubtless the world needs now, and always will need, almost above all, just such narrowness and wilfulness.

MiUet's

riute'^s

April /<?.—Went out three or four miles tQ the house of Quincy Shaw, to see a collection of J. F. Millet's pictures.

rapt hours.

Never before have

penetrated by this kind of expression. [9]

Two

been so

stood long

— Specimen Daije and long before The Sower. picture - men designate The

first

what the

Sower,

the

executed a second copy, and a third, and, some

artist

think,

improved

something

—a

believe

But

in each.

doubt

it.

There

that could hardly be caught again

in this

sublime murkiness and original pent fury.

Be-

were many others (I the simple evening scene. Water-

sides this masterpiece, there shall

never forget

ing the Cow),

inimitable,

all

works of mere

art;

and then

all

perfect as pictures,

seem'd to me, with

that last impalpable ethic purpose from the artist

(most

likely

unconscious to himself) which

always looking

for.

To me

all

them

told the

what went

before and necessitated the

great French Revolution

— the long precedent crush-

full

story of

ing of the masses of a heroic people into the earth, in abject

poverty, hunger

— every right denied,

manity attempted to be put back

hu-

for generations

yet Nature's force, titanic here, the stronger and hardier for that repression forth,

—waiting terribly to break

revengeful—the pressure on the dykes, and

—the storming of the Bastile—the king and queen — the tempest of

the bursting at last

execution of the

massacres and blood. Could Could

The

we we

Yet

wish humanity

who

can wonder?

different ?

wish the people made of wood or stone

that there be

justice in destiny or time ?

true France, base of [10]

all

the

rest, is certainly

Specimen ®a?0 comprehend Field -People Reposing, The Diggers, and The Angelus in this Some folks always think of the French as opinion. a small race, five or five and a half feet high, and ever frivolous and smirking. Nothing of the sort. in

these

pictures.

The bulk

of the personnel of France, before the

was

Revolution,

large-sized, serious, industrious as

now, and simple. The Revolution and Napoleon's wars dwarf d the standard of human size, but it will come up again. If for nothing else, should dwell on my brief Boston visit for opening to me the new I

world of such an

Will America ever have

Millet's pictures.

artist

out of her

Sunday, April

17.

own

gestation, body, soul ?

—An hour and

a half, late this

afternoon, in silence and half light, in the great nave

of Memorial

Cambridge, the walls thickly

Hall,

cover'd with mural tablets, bearing the names of

students and graduates of the university

who

fell

the secession war.

April 2).—\\, was well for

killed

had

staid another

got

week

away

in fair order,

should have been

with kindness, and with eating and drinking.

May /^.— Home Birds-and a Caution

^^^ ^^

A.M. a

full

again;

down

temporarily

Between

woods.

and 9

concert of birds, from different

quarters, in keeping with the fresh scent, the peace,

the naturalness

all

around me.

lately noticing

the russet-back, size of the robin or a

trifle

less,

Specimen S)a?0 light

breast

stripes

—

tail

and shoulders, with irregular dark long sits hunch'd up by the hour these

—

days, top of a I

bush, or

tall

often get near

and

some

tree, singing blithely.

seems tame; like bill and throat, the

as he

listen,

watch the working of his quaint sidle of his body, and flex of his long tail. hear the woodpecker, and night and early morning

the shuttle of the whip-poor-will

—noons, the gurgle

of thrush delicious, and meo-o-ow of the cat-bird.

Many

cannot name; but

do not very particularly seek information. (You must not know too much, or be too precise or scientific about birds and trees and flowers and water-craft; a certain free margin, I

and even vagueness— perhaps ignorance, credulity helps your enjoyment of these things, and of the

—

sentiment of feather'd, wooded, ture generally.

repeat

river, or

marine Na-

— don't want to know too

My own notes have been written offhand in the latitude of middle New Jersey. exactly, or the reasons

why.

Though they

what saw

me —

describe

— what appear'd to

dare say the expert ornithologist, botanist or

entomologist will detect more than one

Samples of

ought not to

^j^yg^

interests,

^^^.g^^^^'including

slip in

them.)

offer a record of these

recuperations,

certain

common-place book,*

old,

without

well-thumb'd

filled

with favorite

* Samples of my common-place hook down at the creek: Pindar many swift arrows in my quiver which speak to the wise, though they need an interpreter to the thoughtless. I

have

— says old

—

[12]

^4u,

«r

swords

^?w»*<?c.u*,,

aie n

^^^</^*«^ ^^2$>^«,.c^^

^^-%^^

Ti:?^

Zc^.

tn^.t.

<«^*U.^ U'x>*'^

iZAt*-'

*«**«-«-.

"^ ^rt-fwv ~^^ r^^^^

— W§^

o!^ v^

i-vS^'^^^

(U^iiJ^

......isis^

>^,^

..^^"^

•:^J55»r

.^^^^:r^K:*i^^^

—

Specimen 2)a?6 excerpts,

carried in

my pocket for three summers,and

absorb'd over and over again, w^hen the I

find so

sink into pared

much

having a poem or

(a little then

the noise of the

surf, a

and booming, the milk-w^hite Such a man as

Famous swords

ideal

The form sun hears me.

are

kill

made

him, but

—the

after the apparent.

of oath Shall

crests curling over.

among I

lie ?

let

H. D. Thoreau. him live.—Buddhistic.

of refuse scraps, thought worthless.

the only verity

— and not

mixture of hissing

takes ages to make, and ages to understand.

you hate a man, don't

natural influences.

July 25, '81,—Far Rockaway, L L—k good day here, on a jaunt, amid the sand ^"^ ^^'*' ^ steady breeze setting in from the sea, the sun shining, the sedge-odor,

sS^oE^e more

Poetry

fine suggestion

goes a great ways) pre-

by these vacant-sane and

Native

mood invited.

expression of a sound

mind speaking

after

the

Emerson.

the Shoshone Indians

is,

" The

earth hears me.

The

The true test of civilization is not the census, nor the size of CTops—no, but the kind of a man the country turns out.—Emerson. The whole wide ether is the eagle's sway: The whole earth is a brave man's fatherland.

cities,

nor the

Euripides.

Spices crush'd, their pungence yield,

Trodden scents

Would you have

their its

sweets respire;

strength reveal'd ?

Cast the incense in the

Matthew Arnold speaks of " the huge

fire.

Mississippi of falsehood called History."

The wind blows north, the wind blows The wind blows east and west; No matter how the free wind blows. Some ship will find it best.

south.

Preach not to others what they should eat, but eat as becomes you, and be

siknt.^Epictetus.

[13]

;

—

Specimen Da^a had a leisurely bath and naked ramble as of the warm-gray shore-sands, my companions boat

deeper water

old,

off in a

shouting to them Jupiter's

menaces against the gods, from Pope's Homer), July 28— to Long Branch. 8^ a.m., on the steamer Plymouth Rock, foot of 23d Street, New York, for Long Branch. Another fine day, fine sights, the shores, the shipping and bay— everything comforting to the body and spirit of me. (I find the human and

—

Victor

Hugo makes

a donkey meditate and apostrophize thus;

man, it you would know the truth, by the same dull walls shut in massive and the dungeon strong.

brother,

We both

are

The

gate

But you look through the key-hole out beyond,

And

(

knowledge; yet have not

call this

The key wherein

hand

to turn the fatal lock.

" William CuUen Bryant surprised me once," relates a writer in a New York by saying that prose was the natural language of composition, and he wonder'd how anybody came to write poetry." paper, "

Farewell!

But thou

did not art

know

gone, and

thy worth;

now

So angels walk'd unknown on But

when they

likes

little

of his asperity,

a good hater and refuser almost as well as

—only

likes

him

prized:

flew were recognized.

John Burroughs, writing of Thoreau, says: requires age to take off a

't is

earth,

Hood.

" He improves with and fully ripen him. it

likes a

good

lover

age—in

fact

The world and accepter

farther off."

Louise Michel at the burial of Blanqui (i88i). Blanqui passions,

drill'd his

body

civilization.

to subjection to his grand conscience

and his noble young man, broke with all that is sybaritish in modern Without the power to sacrifice self, great ideas will never bear fruit.

and commencing

Out

as a

of the leaping furnace flame

mass of molten silver came Then, beaten into pieces three, Went forth to meet its destiny.

The

first

Within a

a crucifix was made, soldier's

knapsack [14]

laid;

Specimen ©aije

New York City and Brooklyn me than any other.) An hour

objective atmosphere of

affiliative to

later,— SWW on the steamer,

now

sniffing the

salt

very plainly—the long pulsating swash as our boat

steams seaward

—the

passing vessels—the

of Navesink and

hills

air

the best part of

Branch the bulk of the day, stopt

took

all

all.

at a

many

At Long

good

hotel,

very leisurely, had an excellent dinner, and The second was a locket fair, Where a mother kept her dead child's hair; The third a bangle, bright and warm, Around a faithless woman's arm.

—

mighty pain to love

And

't is

But of It is

it is,

a pain that pain to miss;

pain the greatest pain,

all

to love, but love in vain.

Maurice F. Egan on De Guerin.

pagan

heart, a Christian soul

He followed Till earth

Christ, yet for

had

and heaven met within

Theocritus

he,

dead Pan he sigh'd, his breast:

in Sicily

Had come upon the Figure crucified, And lost his gods in deep, Christ-given

And

rest

pray, the only prayer

That moves my lips for me. Is, leave the mind that now 1 bear. And give me Liberty.—Emily Bronte. I

travel

on not knowing,

would not if I might; would rather walk with God in the dark. Than go alone in the light; would rather walk with Him by faith Than pick my way by sight. I

Trof. Huxley in a late lecture. I

Thomas Hobbes, of Malmesbury, that " the I of some action or thing to be done." performance the

myseir agree with the sentiment of

scope of

all

speculation

have not any very great respect

for, or interest in,

[15]

mere " knowing,"

as such.

specimen 2>a?0 then drove for over

two hours about the

Ocean Avenue, the

especially

finest drive

place,

one can

imagine, seven or eight miles right along the beach. directions costly villas,

In all

among them

(but few

palaces,

opine like

millionaires

friend

George

whose personal integrity, generosity, unaffected simplicity, go beyond all worldly wealth). Childs,

/August,â&#x20AC;&#x201D; In the big

good

think.

money a

deal of fun about

fluster,

someness that folks

and take

fortune, has

all

you

More comfort, too, than most A middle-aged man, with plenty of

that he has been off for

the swell places, has disburs'd a small

been hot and out of

two weeks

ple forget

the buoyant whole-

all

kilter

and has return 'd home and lived the last

New York,

offers.

in his pocket, tells

month

Even

the height of the dog-days, there

-New SS^ only avoid

city awhile.

New

York City

quite contented and happy. Peo-

when it is hot here,

other places.

everywhere,

New

York

it is

generally hotter

still

so situated, with the

Trince Metternich. Napoleon was of all men in the world the one who most profoundly despised He had a marvellous insight into the weaker sides of human nature,

the race.

(and

all

our passions are either foibles themselves, or the cause of foibles).

a very small generally

is:

man

of imposing character.

He was

ignorant, as a sub-lieutenant

a remarkable instinct supplied the lack of knowledge.

From his mean He ventur'd Throwing him-

opinion of men, he never had any anxiety lest he should go wrong. everything, and gain'd thereby an self

upon a prodigious

immense

toward success. and made himself master of

being masters of their

while others cannot even get so

far as

went on and on,

his neck.

until

step

arena, he amaz'd the world,

he broke

[i6]

own

hearth.

it,

Then he

;

Specimen 5)a?0 great ozonic brine on both sides,

comprises the

most favorable health-chances in the world. (If only the suffocating crowding of some of its tenement houses could be broken up !) find never suffiI

how

ciently realized

upper two

beautiful are the

thirds of Manhattan Island.

am stopping at Mott now for ten days

Haven, and have been familiar

with the region above One-hundreth

Street,

and

along the Harlem River and Washington Heights.

dwelling a few days with

Mrs.

and and a merry houseful of young ladies. J. J., putting the last touches on the printer's copy of friends Mr.

—

my new

volume of Leaves of Grass the comWork at it two or three hours, pleted book at last. and then go down and loaf along the Harlem River have just had a good spell of this recreation. The sun sufficiently

veil'd,

a soft south breeze, the river

of small or large shells (light taper boats) darting

full

up and down, some singly, now and then long ones with six or eight young fellows, practicing—very

Two

inspiriting sights.

the shore.

fine yachts lie anchor'd off

linger long, enjoying the

sundown,

the glow, the streaked sky, the heights, distances,

shadows.

Aug, 10.— ks this

haltingly ramble an hour or

two

forenoon by the more secluded parts of the

shore, or

sit

under an old cedar half way up the

the city near

view,

many young

hill,

parties gather to

bathe or swim, squads of boys, generally twos or VOL.

v.—«.

-1

[17]

Specimen 2)a?0 some

threes, off

larger ones, along the sand-bottom, or

an old pier close by.

— at

nival

its

peculiar

and pretty

car-

young men, decent behaving. The

height a hundred lads or

very democratic,

but

all

laughter, voices, calls, responses

—the

springing and

diving of the bathers from the great string-piece of

the decay'd

where climb

pier,

or stand long ranks of

them, naked, rose-color'd, w^ith movements, postures ahead of

To all shadow of

any sculpture.

so bright, the dark-green

this,

the sun,

the

hills

the

other side, the amber-rolling waves, changing as the

comes

tide

in to

— the playful boys, sousing — the

a transparent tea-color

quent splash of the

tering drops sparkling,

freglit-

and the good western breeze

blowing.

Went

this

just-fmish'd

P^i^ting

»'

Indians, for the last it

see

by John Mulvany, who has been out in far Dakota, on the spot, at the and among the frontiersmen, soldiers and

L^t^Raii forts,

to-day

from

reality, or

two

years, on purpose to sketch

the best that could be got of

it.

Sat for over an hour before the picture, completely

absorb'd

the

first

view.

vast canvas,

say twenty or twenty-two feet by twelve,

all

should

crowded,

and yet not crowded, conveying such a vivid play There of color, it takes a little time to get used to it. are

masses;

tricks; it is all

there

no throwing of shades

at first painfully real, [18]

overwhelming,

Specimen

S)ai?0

needs good nerves to look at perhaps more,

Forty or

it.

fifty

and detail in the mid-ground, with three times that number, or more, through the rest swarms upon swarms of savage figures,

in full finish

—

Sioux, in their war-bonnets, frantic, mostly on ponies, driving through the background, through the smoke, like a hurricane of

are wonderful.

frontiers, culminating, typical,

deadly, heroic to the like

it,

of the figures

Altogether a Western, autochthonic

phase of America, the

books

A dozen

demons.

nothing

uttermost in

— nothing

Homer, nothing

the

Shak-

more grim and sublime than either, all native, all our own, and all a fact. A great lot of muscular, tan-faced men, brought to bay under terrible circumstances—death ahold of them, yet every man unspere;

daunted, not one losing his head, wringing out every cent of the pay before they

Custer

sell their lives.

(his hair cut short) stands in the middle, with dilated

eye and extended arm, aiming a huge cavalry Captain

Cook

there, partially

pistol.

wounded, blood on

the white handkerchief around his head, aiming his carbine coolly, half kneeling

wards found close by half-slaughter'd

Custer's).

horses,

for

The

after-

slaughtered or

breastworks,

make

Two

dead Indians, herculean, lie the foreground, clutching their Winchester rifles,

peculiar feature. in

— (his body was

very characteristic.

and

The many

attitudes, the carbines, the

ern hats, the

powder-smoke [19]

soldiers, their faces

broad-brimm'd West-

in puffs,

the dying horses

Specimen ^a^e with their rolling eyes almost

human

agony,

in their

the clouds of war-bonneted Sioux in the background,

Cook

the figures of Custer and

whole scene, beauty that its

pervades

There

all.

work

of the

war

is realistic

The physiognomy and Western. only saw it pictures.

over again.

without

very tonic to me; then

tiring;

it is

below

artist said

at brief intervals all

all,

all

great art

went abroad

they might appreciate

my life has an

must have.

to take it

there

of.

to Paris.

— nay,

advised I

think

they certainly

Then would like to show Monsieur Crapeau some things can be done in America as well as

would. that

the sending of the picture abroad,

probably to London, had been talk'd if it

many

needs to be seen

work

him

all

envelop

clear light

could look on such a

The

With

Greek continence

— needs to be studied over and

ethic purpose

and

an almost entire absence of the stock

an hour or so; but

times

my memory.

A sunny sky and

of European

traits

for

remain

fierce action, a certain

it.

indeed the

dreadful, yet with an attraction

will

and

color

— with

others.

y4ug,

i6.

—

Chalk a big mark

for

to-

SomeOid

day," was one of the sayings of an old

ances—

sportsman-friend of mine, when he had had

Memories

unusually good luck

oughly offish or birds.

tired,

— come

home

thor-

but with satisfactory results

Well, to-day might warrant such a [20]

Specimen ©aija mark

for

me.

Everything propitious from the

start.

coming down ten miles by railroad and 8 o'clock stage.

hour's fresh stimulation,

of Manhattan Island

Then an

excellent breakfast at PfafT's restaurant,

Our host

24th Street.

himself, an old friend of mine,

quickly appear'd on the scene to welcome bring up the news, and,

first

of the best wine in the

lum

times, '59 and

'60,

opening a big

me and fat bottle

cellar,

talk about ante-bel-

and the

jovial suppers at his

then Broadway place, near Bleecker Street. friends

and names and frequenters, those times, that

Most

place!

Ah, the

are

dead

— Ada

Clare, Wilkins, Daisy

Sheppard, O'Brien, Henry Clapp, Stanley, Mullin,

Wood, Brougham, Arnold Pfaff

and

table,

—

sitting opposite

all

gone.

brimming,

there

each other at the

gave a remembrance to them

would have themselves

And

in a style

fully confirm'd,

namely,

little

they big,

champagne-glasses, drain'd

fill'd-up

abstracted silence, very leisurely, to the last drop. (Pfaff

a generous

stout, jolly,

champagne

and in

German

oSaT

silent,

should say the best selecter of

America.)

always cumulative. ^"^'^ ^^*'"S ^"^ drinking one wants fresh, and for the nonce, right off, and Perhaps the best

restaurateur,

— but

would not give a straw for that person or poem, or friend, or city, or work of art, that was not more grateful the second time have done with

[21]

Specimen than the

first

not believe

any grandest

at first.

— and more my own

places, characters), first

still

perhaps

the third.

eligibility

Nay,

ever comes forth

experience (persons, poems,

discover the best hardly ever at

(no absolute rule about

suddenly bursting

2)ai?0

hov/ever), sometimes

it,

forth, or stealthily

after years of

opening to me,

unwitting familiarity, unappre-

ciation, usage.

Concord, Mass,

Visit, at

R.w.Emer-

— Out

here on a visit

—

elastic,

mellow, Indian-summery weather.

Came

to-day from

Boston (a pleasant

by steam, through Somerville, Belmont, Waltham, Stony Brook, and other lively towns), convoy'd by my friend F. B. Sanborn, and to his ample house, and the kindness and hospitality of Mrs. S. and their fine family. Am writing this under the shade of some old hickories

son

ride

and elms, just

of 40 minutes

after

4 p.m., on the porch, within a

throw of the Concord River. Off against me, across stream, on a meadow and side-hill, haymakers are gathering and wagoning-in probably their second stone's

The spread

and brown, the knolls, the score or two of little haycocks dotting the meadow, the loaded-up wagons, the patient horses, the slow-strong action of the men and or third crop.

pitchforks

—

all

of emerald-green

the just-waning afternoon, with

patches of yellow sun-sheen, mottled by long shad-

ows—a

cricket shrilly chirping, herald of the [22]

dusk

Specimen Dai20

— a boat with two figures noiselessly gliding along the

passing under the stone bridge-arch

little river,

— the slight settling haze of

aerial moisture, the

and the peacefulness expanding fill and soothe me. overhead

sky

and

in all directions

—

Same Evening,— ^tv ex had

a better piece of luck

me: a long and blessed evening with Emerson, could n't have wish'd better or different. in a way For nearly two hours he has been placidly sitting where could see his face in the best light, near me.

befall

Mrs. S.'s back-parlor well bors,

many

fresh

young, but some

with people, neigh-

fill'd

and charming faces, women, mostly

old.

and

friend A. B. Alcott

were there early. A good deal of talk, the subject Henry Thoreau some new glints of his life and fortunes, with letters to and from him one of the best by Margaret Fuller, others by Horace Greeley, Channing, &c.— one from Thoreau himself, most quaint and interesting. (No doubt seem'd very stupid to the roomful of company, taking hardly any part in the conversation; but had his daughter Louisa

—

my own pail it.) My seat *'

to milk in," as the Swiss proverb puts

and the

relative

arrangement were

such that, without being rude, or anything of the could just look squarely at

kind,

good

part of the

spoken very

two

briefly

company, then

hours.

and

E.,

which

did a

entering, he

had

politely to several of the

settled himself in his chair, a

trifle

push'd back, and, though a listener and apparently [23]

Specimen Wa^e an

alert one,

remain'd silent through the whole talk

and discussion.

lady friend quietly took a seat

A good

next him, to give special attention. his face, eyes clear, with the

color in

well-known expression

of sweetness, and the old clear-peering aspect quite

the same.

Next Day, ner there.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Several hours

at E.'s

house and din-

old familiar house (he has been in

thirty-five years),

with surroundings, furnishment,

roominess, and plain elegance and fullness, signifying

democratic ease, sufficient opulence, and an admirable old-fashioned simplicity its

mere

sumptuousness

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; modern luxury, with

and

touch'd lightly upon or ignored altogether. the same.

Of course

day, September

either

affectation,

Dinner

the best of the occasion (Sun-

i8, '8i)

was the

sight of E. himself.

just said, a healthy color in the cheeks,

and good

light in the eyes,

cheery expression, and just the

amount of talking

that best suited, namely, a

word

or short phrase only where needed, and almost Besides Emerson himself, always with a smile.

Mrs. E., with their daughter Ellen, the son

and his wife, with others, relatives

and

friend P. S.

intimates.

and Mrs.

Edward S.,

and

Mrs. Emerson, re-

suming the subject of the evening before (I sat next to her), gave me further and fuller information about Thoreau, who, years ago, during Mr. E.'s absence in Europe, had lived for some time in the family, by invitation. [24]

Specimen 2)a?0 Though the evening

Mr.

and Mrs. Sanbom's, and the memorable family dinner at Mr. and Mrs. Emerson's, have

Concord Notations

most pleasantly and permanently fill'd my memory, must not slight other notations of Concord, went to the old Manse, walk'd through the I

ancient garden, enter'd the rooms, noted the quaintness, the

unkempt

grass and bushes, the

little

panes

the vs^indows, the low ceilings, the spicy smell, the creepers embowering the light. Went to the in

Concord battle-ground, which is close by, scanned French's statue, '* The Minute Man," read Emerson's poetic inscription on the base, linger'd a long while on the bridge, and stopp'd by the grave of the un-

named

British soldiers buried there the

fight in April, '75.

friend Miss

Then

M. and her

riding

spirited

day

after

on (thanks to

the

white ponies, she

driving them), a half hour at Hawthorne's and Thoreau's graves. foot, lie

got out and went up of course on

and stood a long while and ponder'd.

close together in a pleasant

the cemetery

hill,

face of the first

wooded

''Sleepy Hollow."

was densely

They

spot well up

The

flat

sur-

cover'd by myrtle, with

a border of arbor-vitas, and the other had a brown headstone, moderately elaborate, with inscriptions.

By Henry's side lies his brother John, of whom much was expected, but he died young. Then to Walden Pond, that beautiful embower'd sheet of water, and spent over an hour there. On the spot in the woods [25]

Specimen 2)a?6 where Thoreau had his solitary house is now quite a cairn of stones, to mark the place; too carried one and deposited on the heap. As we drove back, saw the '' School of Philosophy," but it was shut up, and would not have it open'd for me. Near by stopp'd at the house of W. T. Harris, the Hegelian, who came out, and we had a pleasant chat while sat in the wagon. shall not soon forget those Concord drives, and especially that charming Sunday forenoon one with my friend Miss M., and the white ponies. 1

Oct. lo-i), Boston Comof

^^it

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

spend a good deal of time

Common,

these delicious days

^^^ nights â&#x20AC;&#x201D; every mid-day from 11.30 â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and almost every sunset to about

Emerson

know

another hour.

old elms along

Tremont and Beacon

come

all

the big trees, especially the streets,

and have

to a sociable-silent understanding with

most

of them, in the sunlit air (yet crispy-cool enough), as

saunter along the wide unpaved walks.

down

this breadth

same

old elms,

by Beacon walk'd

for

Street,

two

Up and

between these

hours, of a bright

sharp February mid-day twenty-one years ago, with

Emerson, then

in his

prime, keen, physically and

morally magnetic, arm'd at every point, and

when

he chose, wielding the emotional just as well as the intellectual.

talker

ment,

and

During those two hours he was the the listener.

reconnoitring,

was an argument-state-

review, attack, [26]

and pressing

Specimen Daije

home

(like

an army corps

infantry), of

all

that could be said against that part

(and a main part)

that

the construction of

Adam."

''Children of

in order, artillery, cavalry,

dissertion —

poems,

More precious than gold afforded me, ever

after, this

strange and paradoxical lesson: each point of E.'s

statement was unanswerable, no judge's charge ever

more complete

or convincing,

points better put

— and then

could never hear the felt

down

soul

the clear and unmistakable conviction to disobey

and pursue

my own

way.

then to such things?" said

''Only that while

sion.

What have you pausing

E.,

to say

conclu-

answer them

can't

all,

more settled than ever to adhere to my own theory, and exemplify it," was my candid response. Whereupon we went and had a good dinner at 1

feel

the American

House.

And thenceforward

waver'd or was touch'd with qualms (as

had been two or three times Nov., '8 1, AnOssianic Night

—Dear-

never

confess

before).

— Again back

Camden.

^^^^^ ^^^ Delaware in long ^ trips to-

between 9 and 11, the scene overswift sheets of head is a peculiar one flitting vapor-gauze, follow'd by dense clouds throwing an inky pall on everything. Then a spell of that transparent steel-gray black sky have noticed under similar circumstances, on which the moon would est Friends

night,

—

beam

for a

few moments with calm [27]

lustre,

throwing

Specimen 2)a?^

down

a broad dazzle of

highway on the waters; then

the mists careering again. if

by the

furies

amid the

soul blest,

when

—

friends, the old, the

—while the Gael-

my hall when night! And thou dost come, my often thy light hand on my harp,

that thou wouldst

hear

come

hangs on the distant wall, and the feeble

friends ?

muring

Ossianic night

the midst of thy eddying

Carril! in

sound touches to

dead

tenderly suggested

alone by

friend.

real

themselves from the mists— ['' Be thy

strains chant

winds.

—a

whirl, absent or

somehow

past,

they sweep along, sometinnes quite

sometimes thicker

thin,

yet driven as

All silently,

grief,

Why

ear.

and

tell

dost thou not speak

me when

But thou passest away

blast; the

shall in

behold

thy mur-

wind whistles through the gray

hairs of Ossian."]

But most of

all,

those changes of

moon and

sheets

of hurrying vapor and black clouds, with the sense

of rapid action in weird silence, recall the far-back

Erse belief that such above were the preparations for receiving the wraiths of just-slain warriors sat that night in Selma,

— [''We

round the strength of the

The wind was abroad in the oaks. The spirit The blast came rustling of the mountain roar'd. through the hall, and gently touch'd my harp. The sound was mournful and low, like the song of the tomb. Fingal heard it the first. The crowded sighs Some of my heroes are low, said of his bosom rose. shell.

[28]

Specimen Baija the gray-hair'd king of Morven.

death on the harp. string.

hear the sound of

Ossian, touch the trembling

Bid the sorrow

with joy to Morven's

rise,

may

that their spirits

woody

hills.

fly

touch'd the

harp before the king; the sound was mournful and Bend forward from your clouds, said, ghosts low. I

Lay by the red

fathers! bend.

Receive the

course.

falling chief;

terror of

your

whether he comes

from a distant land, or rises from the rolling sea. Let his robe of mist be near; his spear that is form'd of a cloud. in

Place a half-extinguish'd meteor

the form of a hero's sword.

And

countenance be lovely, that his friends in

his

his side,

oh!

let

may

delight

Bend from your clouds, said, fathers, bend. Such was my song in

presence.

ghosts of

his

Selma, to the lightly trembling harp."]

How or why know I

too

tant

not, just at the

muse and think of my best friends homes of William O'Connor,

—

moment, but in their dis-

Maurice

Bucke, of John Burroughs, and of Mrs. Gilchrist friends of soul,

my soul— stanchest

Fer^-Boar

other

'52.—Such a show as the Del^ware presented an hour before sundown yesterday evening, all along between

Philadelphia and It

poems. Jan,

item.

friends of

—

was

12,

Camden,

full tide,

west, the water of a pale

fair

worth weaving

into an

breeze from the south-

tawny color, and just enough [29]

Specimen S)a?6 motion to make things frolicsome and

Add to

lively.

these an approaching sunset of unusual splendor, a

much golden haze and

broad tumble of clouds, with profusion of of

all,

beaming

shaft

and

dazzle.

the midst

the clear drab of the afternoon light, there

new

The Wenonah, as pretty an object as you could wish to see, lightly and swiftly skimming along, all trim and white, cover'd with flags, transparent red and blue, streaming out in the breeze. Only a new ferry-boat, and yet in its fitness comparable with the prettiest product of Nature's cunning, and rivaling it. High up in the transparent ether gracefully balanced and circled four or five great sea hawks, while here below, amid the pomp and picturesqueness of sky and river, swam this creation of artificial beauty and motion and power, in its way no less perfect. steam'd

up the

river

the

Camden, April Death of Longfellow

large,

'82,â&#x20AC;&#x201D; have just \

turn'd from an old forest haunt, '

love to go occasionally lors,

boat,

re-

where

away from

par-

pavements, and the newspapers and magazines

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and where, of a clear forenoon, deep

the shade

of pines and cedars and a tangle of old laurel-trees

and

vines,

reach'd me. lightly

news of Longfellow's death first For want of anything better, let me

the

twine a sprig of the sweet ground-ivy

ing so plentifully through the dead leaves at

my feet,

with reflections of that half hour alone, there [30]

trail-

the

â&#x20AC;˘pcdmen

Daije

and

Add to

lively.

Vendor, a

and

midst

â&#x20AC;˘

there

The to

and

blue,

terry-boat, prettiest

Henry W. tongfellow^; From

the painting by O.V. A. Hea^ permission of Foster Brothers, BosVii,

High

it.

epaeQ^eailj^ ,

,..e below,

<y and

river,

and motion

have '

just re-

where

(T-

YHiiw:

'CS

^u^f^

Je ..ees first

ivy trail-

myfeet, \h

of thai half hour alone, there in the l30l

Specimen 2)a?0 and lay

silence,

contribution on the dead

bard's grave.

Longfellow

in his

voluminous works seems to me in the style and forms of

not only to be eminent

poetical expression that

mark the present age

(an

idiosyncrasy, almost a sickness, of verbal melody),

but to bring what

always dearest as poetry to the general human heart and taste, and probably must be so

the nature of things.

certainly the

and counteractant most needed for our materialistic, self-assertive, money-worshipping, Anglo-Saxon races, and especially for the present age sort of bard

— an age tyrannically regulated with

America

ref-

erence to the manufacturer, the merchant, the financier,

and among

whom

the past in

Europe

Italy,

— poet

universal

poet of

for

whom

— poet of the mellow twilight of

Germany, Spain, and all

Northern

sympathetic gentleness

women and young

— and

people.

were ask'd to name has done more, and in more valuable

should have to think long

man who

—

he comes as the poet of melody,

courtesy, deference

the

workman

the politician and the day

directions, for America. I

itive

doubt

there ever

was

before such a fine intu-

judge and selecter of poems.

His translations

many German and

Scandinavian pieces are said He does not urge to be better than the vernaculars. of

or lash. is

His influence

good drink

not tepid either, but always [31]

vital,

air.

with

flavor,

Specimen Da^a

motion, grace.

and

strikes a splendid average,

does not sing exceptional passions, or humanity's

jagged escapades.

not revolutionary, brings

nothing offensive or new, does not deal hard blows.

the contrary, his songs soothe and heal, or

they excite,

it is

a healthy and agreeable excitement.

His very anger is gentle, is at second hand (as in the " Quadroon Girl " and the '^Witnesses ").

There

no undue element of pensiveness

Even

Longfellow's strains. ''

the

the early translation,

Manrique," the movement

steady wind or is

tide,

as of strong

and

holding up and buoying. Death

not avoided through his

many

something almost winning

themes, but there

in his original

and renderings on that dread subject **the Happiest

Land"

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

as,

verses closing

dispute.

And then the landlord's daughter Up to heaven rais'd her hand, And said, Ye may no more contend. ' *

There

lies

the happiest land."

the ungracious complaint-charge of his want

of racy nativity and special originality,

say that America and the world ently thankful

may

shall

only

well be rever-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; can never be thankful enough â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

for

any such singing-bird vouchsafed out of the centuries,

without asking that the notes be different from

those of other songsters

;

adding what

Longfellow himself say, that ere the

be worthily

original,

have heard

New World

can

and announce herself and her [32]

Specimen 2)a?0

own

must be well saturated with the of others, and respectfully consider the

heroes, she

originality

heroes that lived before

As News^a

evening

across

sail

^^^ Delaware in the staunch ferry-boat

ers

Bevefly

cZnJ^'c^rier)

jolu'd '' I

uight

two

by two young

have a message

''the C. folks told

;

sat taking

Reminiscences

them

Agamemnon.

ago,

was

reporter friends.

you," said one of

for

to say they

would

by your name, to go in their first number. Can you do it for them ? '' 'M guess so," ''what might it be about?" "Well, anysaid thing on newspapers, or perhaps what you Ve done yourself, starting them." And off the boys went, for we had reach'd the Philadelphia side. The hour was fine and mild, the bright half-moon

a piece sign'd

;

shining

;

Venus, with excess of splendor, just

ting in the west,

length

more than

and

set-

the great Scorpion rearing

half

its

the southeast.

cross'd leisurely for an hour in the pleasant night-

scene,

my young

friend's

words brought up

quite a

string of reminiscences. I

commenced when

was but

twelve writing sentimental

bits

boy of eleven or for the old Long a

Island Patriot, in Brooklyn; this

Soon ris's

New

was about

1832.

had a piece or two in George P. Morthen celebrated and fashionable Mirror, of remember with what half-supYork City. after,

VOL. V.-3.

Specimen 3)a?0 press'd excitement

used to watch

for the big, fat,

slow-moving, very old

red-faced,

who

distributed

when

the

Mirror

English

Brooklyn

carrier ;

and

got one, opening and cutting the leaves with

trembling fingers.

How made my heart double-beat

my piece on

the pretty white paper, in nice type.

to see

My first my own

venture was the Long Islander,

real

town

beautiful

of Huntington, in 1839.

had been teaching was about twenty years old. country school for two or three years in various parts of Suffolk and Queens counties, but liked printI

had been at it while a lad, learn'd the trade of compositor, and was encouraged to start a paper in the region where was born. went to New York, bought a press and types, hired some little help, but ing

;

did most of the

work

myself, including the press-

Everything seem'd turning out well (only

work.

my own

restlessness prevented

gradually estab-

permanent property there). bought a good horse, and every week went all round the country serving my papers, devoting one day and lishing a

night to

it.

never had happier jaunts

down

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; going over

to south

side, to

across to

Smithtown and Comae, and back home.

The experiences ion'd

farmers

Babylon,

come up

south road,

of those jaunts, the dear old-fash-

and

their wives, the

hay-fields, the hospitality, nice

evenings, the

the

girls,

stops by the

dinners, occasional

the rides through the brush,

my memory

to this day.

[34]

Specimen ©ai^a next went to the Aurora daily

City

—a

sort of free lance.

Tattler, an

the

for

and a until

little I

went

two years life

—a

hours. forth

outside

York

Also wrote regularly

evening

work

New

With these

paper.

was occupied

and on, where for

off

to edit the Brooklyn Eagle,

had one of the pleasantest sits of my good owner, good pay, and easy work and 1

The

troubles in the Democratic party broke

about those times (i848-'49) and

split off

with

the radicals, which led to rows with the boss and *'

the party," and

Being (it

now

lost

place.

out of a job,

was

offer'd

happen'd between the acts one night

impromptu

the lobby

Broadway Theatre near Pearl Street, New York City) a good chance to go down to New of the old

Orleans on the

staff of the Crescent, a daily to

started there with plenty of capital behind

of the owners,

who was

me walking

the lobby, and though that

first

One

it.

North buying material, met

was our

acquaintance, after fifteen minutes' talk (and a

drink)

we made

two hundred bear

dollars

down

Orleans.

days afterwards; had a good n't to

journey and

be out

life

weeks.

much.

Brooklyn a year or two afterwards Freeman,

first

weekly,

started

then

enjoy'd

Returning to I

started the

daily.

soon the secession war broke out, and [35]

two

leisurely time, as the

in three

Louisiana

and

to bind the contract

New

expenses to

paper was

a formal bargain, and he paid

Pretty too, got

Specimen Da^a drawn

the current southward, and spent the follow-

ing three years there (as memorandized preceding).

Besides starting

had to

them

as aforementioned,

do, one time or another, during

a long

life,

have with

of papers, at divers places, sometimes

list

under queer circumstances.

During the war, the

among other means of amusement, printed a little sheet among themselves, surrounded by wounds and death, the Armory Square Gaiette, to which contributed. The same long afterward, casually, to a paper think it was hospitals at Washington,

the

call'd

Jimplecute

stopp'd at the time.

Canada,

ince, in

—

— out

When 1880,

Colorado where

was in Quebec Provwent into the queerest I

old French printing-office near Tadousac.

little

and ancient than my Camden friend William Kurtz's place up on Federal Street. I remember, as a youngster, several characteristic

was

far

primitive

old printers of a kind hard to be seen these days.

My The Great which

mystic currents as

my poem has been universe — Fifty

sat to-day in solitude

^"^ half-shade by the creek— returning mainly to two principal centres. One of

are Part

* "

thoughts went floating on vast and

cherish'd

the

themes

for a never-achiev'd

two impetuses

latter, creation's

man and

the

incessant unrest,*

thousand years ago the consteHation of the Great Bear or Dipper was a hundred thousand years hence the imaginary Dipper will be upside

starry cross; a

down, and the

stars

which form the bowl and handle [36]

will

have changed places.

Specimen 2)a?6 exfoliation (Darwin's evolution,

what more

Nature but change,

its

suppose).

Indeed,

in all its visible,

invisible processes ?

Or what

and

still

humanity

heroism, poetry, even morals, but

in its faith, love,

emotion ?

May

"^^-made grave without sadness

fon^^rl've

deed hauteur

'82.— We stand by Emerson's

solemn joy and

in-

almost

— our soul-benison no mere "Warrior,

for

faith,

—

rest,

thy task

done,"

one beyond the warriors of the world

symboll'd here.

A just man,

surely

lies

poised on himself,

all-

and sane and clear as the sun. seem so much Emerson himself we are

loving, all-inclosing,

Nor does here to

honor— it

conscience, simplicity, culture,

humanity's attributes at their best, yet applicable if need be to average affairs, and eligible to all. So

used are

to suppose a heroic death can only

come

from out of battle or storm, or mighty personal con-

amid dramatic incidents or danger (have we not been taught so for ages by all the plays and

test, or

The misty nebulae are moving, and besides are whirling around in great spirals, some one way, some another. Every molecule of matter in the whole universe is swinging to and

fro; every particle of ether which fills space is in jelly-like vibration. one kind of motion, heat another, electricity another, magnetism another, sound another. Every human sense is the result of motion every perception, every thought is but motion of the molecules of the brain translated by that incomprehen-

Light

;

sible

thing

whether

call

mind.

The

processes of growth,

in worlds, or in the minutest organisms, are

[37]

of existence,

but motion."

of decay,

Specimen Da^a poems

that

few even of those

mourn Emerson's

thizingly

who most sympadeparture will fully

late

appreciate the ripen'd grandeur of that event, with its

play of calm and fitness, like evening light on

the sea.

How

when, not long

since,

saw

that benignant face, the

clear eyes, the silently smiling

upright in

much

on the blessed hours

shall henceforth dwell

its

great age

— to

mouth, the form yet

the very

last,

with so

spring and cheeriness, and such an absence of

decrepitude, that even the term venerable hardly

seem'd

fitting.

Perhaps the

life

now rounded and

change or harm more, has not

in its

its

splendid intellectual or esthetic products,

but as forming

how

which nothing can most illustrious halo,

and

mortal development,

its

completed

in its entirety

one of the few

(alas!

few!) perfect and flawless excuses for being, of

the entire literary class.

We It is

can say, as Abraham Lincoln at Gettysburg,

not

we who come

reverently

come

to consecrate the dead

to receive,

consecration to ourselves and daily

May 31, At Present Personal A Letter to a "^"^

ExSict

sluce

may

j^q

seems to have

enter

upon first

ago

has

years

with varying course

settled quietly

[38]

some

paralysis that

nearly ten

remalu'd,

be,

work from him.

'82,—'' From to-day

^^y ^^^[^ y^^j. effected

— we

—

down, and

Specimen Da^e will

probably continue.

clumsy, cannot walk rate.

go around

now and

but

far;

tire,

trips,

—

very

spirits are first-

public almost every

then take long

hundreds of miles

easily

day—

railroad or boat,

—

live largely in the open air sunburnt and stout (weigh 190) keep up my activity and interest in life, people, progress, and the

—

questions of the day. 1

About two

What

quite comfortable.

remains entirely unaffected;

thirds of the time

mentality

ever had

though physically

a half-paralytic; and likely to be so, long as I live. But the principal object of my life seems to have been

accomplish'd—

have the most devoted and ardent of friends, and affectionate relatives and of enemies I really make no account." I

—

and volume on The Theory of Poetry, received by mail this morning from England but gave it up at last for tried to read a beautifully printed

a Certain^^

Book

Scholarly

—

a bad job.

Here are some capricious pencillings that

follow'd, as

find

them

notes

youth and maturity Poems are charged with sunshine and varied pomp of day; but as the soul more and more takes precedence (the sensuous still In

included), the I

Dusk becomes the

poet's atmosphere.

too have sought, and ever seek, the

and make

songs according.

the half-lights of evening are [39]

far

But as

brilliant sun, I

grow

to me.

old,

Specimen l)a?0 The play of Imagination, with the sensuous objects of Nature for symbols and Faith

— with

Love and

moving-power of make up the curious chess-game of a poem.

Pride as the unseen impetus and all,

Common *'

teachers or critics are always asking

What does it mean

? "

Symphony of fine musician,

or sunset, or sea-waves rolling up the beach

do they mean

—what

Undoubtedly in the most subtleelusive sense they mean something as love does, and religion does, and the best poem;— but who shall fathom and define those meanings ? (I do not intend this as a warrant for wildness and frantic ?

—

escapades

— but to justify

what cannot be defined

the soul's frequent joy in

to the intellectual part, or to

calculation.)

its

best, poetic lore

is like

what may be heard

of conversation in the dusk, from speakers far or hid, of

What

which is

get only a few broken murmurs.

not gathered

far

— perhaps

the

main thing. Grandest poetic passages are only to be taken at free

removes, as

we sometimes look for stars at night,

not by gazing directly toward them, but off one side.

—

(To a poetic student and friend.) only seek to put you in rapport. Your own brain, heart, evolution, must not only understand the matter, but largely supply

it.

[40]

Specimen Bapa So draw near Final Con-

There

notes.

some

LTto^"

end these garrulous have doubtless occurr'd

their

repetitions, technical errors in the

consecutiveness of dates,

Tests

the minutise

of botanical, astronomical, &c., exactness,

and perhaps elsewhere;—for

gathering up, writing,

peremptorily dispatching copy, this

hot

weather

and through August, '82), and delaying not the printers, have had to hurry along, no time (last of July

But

to spare.

the deepest veracity of

all

—

in re-

flections of objects, scenes. Nature's outpourings, to

my in

senses and receptivity, as they seem'd to

the work of giving those

who

care for

authentic glints, specimen-days of

the bona fide

reader,

go,

all

feel to

City,

relations,

life

make unmitigated of

and so

Secession war,

early

forth,

tell

— and

far

as they

claims. life,

and the

their

some

from author to

the subjects design'd, and as

The synopsis York

and

spirit

it,

me —

own

Long

Island,

New

diary-jottings in the story.

plan in

what constitutes most of the middle of the book, was originally for hints and data of a Naturestarting

poem

that should carry one's experiences a few

hours,

commencing

at noon-flush,

suppose led to such idea But I soon life-afternoon now arrived.

the after-part of the day

my own

found

could

narrative at

—

and so through

move

first

hand.

more ease by giving the (Then there is a humiliating

lesson one learns, in serene hours, of a fine day or [41]

| i

Specimen Daije night.

and

Nature seems to look on

and

fixed-up poetry

something almost impertinent.)

art as

Thus

all

went

on, years following, various seasons

areas, spinning forth

night and stars (or as half-sickness), or at

thought beneath the

was confined to my room by midday looking out upon the I

steaming over the Saguenay's black

sea, or far north

breast, jotting

down

all

the loosest sort of chrono-

and here printing from

logical order,

impromptu

notes, hardly even the seasons group'd together, or

anything corrected

smack of outdoors the lines,

foil),

afraid

what

of dropping

or sun or starlight

might cling to

dared not try to meddle with or smooth

now and

Every

them.

— so

carried a

book

then (not often, but

for a

my pocket — or perhaps tore

out from some broken or cheap edition a bunch of loose leaves;

most always had something of the

sort

mood

.de-

ready, but only took

manded.

way,

In that

conventions,

re-read

cannot divest

out

many it all

many

all,

laws, tallies and proofs.

any one a book are

how

authors.

my appetite

ises

it,

the

utterly out of reach of literary

myself eventually trying call

when

of literature, yet

by Nature —

first

find

prem-

but really the crowning results of

(Has

never occurr'd

the last deciding tests applicable to

entirely outside of technical

and gram-

matical ones, and that any truly first-class production

has

little

or nothing to do with the rules

bres of ordinary critics ?

and

cali-

— or the bloodless chalk of

[42]

Specimen 2)a?0 Dictionary ?

Allibone's

have fancied the ocean and the daylight, the mountain and the forest, putting their spirit in a

judgment on our books.

have fancied some disembodied human soul giving its

verdict.)

Democracy most of all Nature and

•

Democracy— ^P^" ^^^> Only with MqraUty is.

both

— to

affiliates

•

^^^^V ^"^ ^^^^V ^"^ ^ane

Nature— just

Something

check them,

with the

much

temper

them from

excess,

required

restrain

as Art

have wanted, before departure, to bear special testimony to a very old lesson and requisite. morbidity.

American Democracy, factories,

in its

work-shops, stores,

dense streets and houses of fold sophisticated ized,

myriad

life

personalities, in

offices

cities,

— through

and

all

— must either be

their

the

mani-

fibred, vital-

regular contact with outdoor light and air

and growths, farm-scenes, animals, fields, trees, birds, sun-warmth and free skies, or it will certainly dwindle and pale. We cannot have grand races of mechanics, work people, and commonalty (the only specific purpose of America) on any less terms. conceive of no flourishing and heroic elements of Democracy in the United States, or of Democracy I

maintaining

itself at all,

forming a main part

—

without the Nature-element to be its health-element and

beauty-element— to really underlie the whole politics, sanity, religion and art of the New World. / [43]

Specimen Daija Finally,

the

Aurelius, ''what

morality: is it,

sympathy with Nature

''Virtue,"

said

Marcus

only a living and enthusiastic ? "

Perhaps indeed the

efforts

of the true poets, founders, religions, literatures, ages, have been,

and ever

to come, essentially the

will be,

same

all

our time and times

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to bring people back

from their persistent strayings and sickly abstractions, to the costless average, divine, original concrete.

[44]

Collect

[45]

Though

©ne

or Zvoo

the

ensuing

llnbej:

Htcma

Collect and

preceding

Specimen Days are both largely from memoranda already existing, the hurried peremptory needs of

copy

for

the

already

printers,

referr'd

— (the

musicians' story of a composer up in a garret rushing the middle body and last of his score together, while

the fiddlers are playing the

concert-room)

errors.

down

the

— of this haste, while quite willing to

get the consequent stimulus of sure there

parts

first

must have

life

and motion,

sundry technical

resulted

they are too glaring they

will

be corrected

in a future edition.

special

word about

Pieces in Early

Youth

On jaunts over Long Island, as boy and young fellow, nearly half a century ago, heard of, or came across in my own experience, characters,

the end.

true occurrences, incidents,

which

tried

my 'prentice

—

hand at recording (I was then quite an ''abolitionist" and advocate of the ''temperance" and "anticapital-punishment" causes) and publish'd during A majority of occasional visits to New York City.

—

the sketches appear'd view,

first

the Democratic Re-

others in the Columbian Maga:{ine, [47]

the

Collect

American Review of that period. My serious wish were to have all those crude and boyish pieces quietly dropp'd in oblivion

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but to avoid the annoy-

ance of their surreptitious issue (as lately announced,

from outsiders),

them on in

here.

some qualms, tack'd Dough-Face Song came out first

have, with

the Evening Post

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Blood

Money, and Wounded

House of Friends, in the Tribune. Poetry To-day in America, &c., first appear'd

in the

(under the name of ''The Poetry of the Future/') in The North American Review for February, 1881.

Memorandum

some time

at a Venture, in same periodical,

afterward.

Several of the convalescent outdoor scenes and literary items, preceding, originally appear'd in the

fortnightly Critic, of

New

York.

C48I

Collect Democtattc Dtstaa

As the greatest lessons of Nature through the universe are perhaps the lessons of variety and free-

dom, the same present the greatest lessons also in New World politics and progress. If a man were ask'd, for instance, the distinctive points contrasting

modern European and American life

political

and other

with the old Asiatic cultus, as lingering-bequeath'd

yet in China and Turkey, he might find the amount of

them

John Stuart

erty in the future,

Mill's

profound essay on Lib-

where he demands two main con-

stituents, or sub-strata, for a truly

—I St, for

a large variety of character

human

nature to expand

grand nationality

— and 2d,

itself in

play

numberless and

even conflicting directions— (seems to be

humanity much

full

like the influences that

for general

make

up, in

their limitless field, that perennial health-action of the air

we call the weather— an infinite number of currents

and

forces,

and contributions, and temperatures, and

cross-purposes,

whose

ceaseless play of counterpart

upon counterpart brings constant VOL. V.-4.

[49]

restoration

and

Collect

With

vitality).

this

but

all it

speculations.

thoughtâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and not for and draws

necessitates,

after

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

itself alone,

let

begin

the present with greatest deeds and problems, cheerfully accepting the past, including

America,

feudalism

mate as

filling

(as,

indeed, the present

but the

legifi-

birth of the past, including feudalism), counts,

reckon, for her justification and success (for

who,

as yet, dare claim success?) almost entirely on the

Nor

future.

hope unwarranted.

that

ahead, though dimly yet,

we see,

sane, gigantic offspring.

For our

sider far less important for it is,

what

alities,

in vistas, a copious,

New World

than for results to come.

To-day,

con-

has done, or what

Sole

among

nation-

these States have assumed the task to put

forms of lasting power and

practicality,

on areas of

amplitude rivaling the operations of the physical

kosmos, the moral

speculations of ages,

political

long, long deferr'd, the democratic republican princi-

and the theory of development and perfection by voluntary standards, and self-reliance. Who else, ple,

indeed, except the United States, in history, so

have accepted see,

stand,

act

unwitting

faith,

and, as

upon, and go security

far,

we now

for,

these

things?

But preluding no longer, note of the following strain.

(it is,

First

strike the

key-

premising that, at

widely

in fact, a collection of

memo-

though the passages of different times

let

have been written

[50]

Collect

randa, perhaps for future designers, comprehenders),

and though

contradicting

may

be open to the charge of one part

anotherâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;for there

are opposite sides to

the great question of democracy, as to every great

Question

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

my own them

the parts harmoniously blended

feel

realization

and convictions, and present

to be read only in such oneness, each page and

each claim and assertion modified and temper'd by the others.

Bear in mind, too, that they are not the

studying up

economy, but of the ordinary sense, observing, wandering among men, result of

in political

these States, these stirring years of war and peace. 1

will not gloss

over the appaling dangers of universal

suffrage in the United States.

and face these dangers

whose thought

within

retreating, tions,

In fact,

writing.

it is

to admit

To him

rages the battle, advancing,

between democracy's

convictions, aspira-

and the people's crudeness,

mainly write this essay.

shall

vice, caprices,

the issue.

use the words

America and democracy as convertible terms. an ordinary one

or her

The United

Not

States are

destined either to surmount the gorgeous history^f feudalism, or else prove the most tremendous failure

of time.

Not the

am on any I

prospects

The triumphant

future of

least doubtful

of their material success.

geographic and productive departments, on larger scales and in more varieties than ever, is certain."^ In those respects the republic must soon

their business,

*' From

territorial

area of less than nine hundred thousand square miles, the

[50

— Collect

(if she

does not already) outstrip all examples hitherto

and dominate the world.

afforded,

Admitting our

all

this,

with the priceless value of

political institutions,

acknowledging the doors),

say that,

and only

general suffrage (and fully

widest opening of the

latest,

deeper than these, what

far

finally

make of our Western world a nationality known, and out-topping the

superior to any hither Union has expanded into over four

millions

of Great Britain and France combined

and a half—fifteen times

larger than that

—with a shore-line, including Alaska, equal to

the entire circumference of the earth, and with a domain within these lin€s

than that of the river, lake,

Romans

in their

proudest days of conquest and renown.

and coastwise commerce estimated with a railway

dollars per year;

traffic

at over

of four to

six

two thousand

far

wider

With

millions of

thousand millions per year, and

the annual domestic exchanges of the country running up to nearly ten thousand millions per year; with over ing, mechanical,

two thousand

millions of dollars invested in manufactur-

and mining industry; with over

five

hundred millions of acres of

land in actual occupancy, valued, with their appurtenances, at over seven thousand

and producing annually crops valued

millions of dollars,

millions of dollars; with a realm which,

at over three

thousand

the density of Belgium's population were

would be vast enough to include all the present inhabitants of the world; and with equal rights guaranteed to even the poorest and humblest of our forty we can, with a manly pride akin to that which distinguished the millions of people yice-Tresident Colfax's Speech^ palmiest days of Rome, claim," &c., &c, &c. possible,

—

July 4, 1870.

Later

—London " Times " (Weekly

June 2j,

^82.

" The wonderful wealth-producing power of the United States defies and sets at naught the grave drawbacks of a mischievous protective tariff, and has already What obliterated, almost wholly, the traces of the greatest of modern civil wars. is a«|ecially remarkable in the present development of American energy and success is its wide and equable distribution. North and south, east and west, on the shores of the Atlantic and the Pacific, along the chain of the great lakes, in the valley of the Mississippi,

and on the coasts of the gulf of Mexico, the creation of wealth and the

increase of population are signally exhibited.

It is

quite true, as has been

shown by some

the recent apportionment of population in the House of Representatives, that .

sections of the

Union have advanced, But

unexpected degree.

this

relatively to the rest, in

additional representatives or have actually lost

receded.

overflow'd like

The

fact

an extraordinary and

does not imply that the States which have gain'd no

some have been

stationary or have

that the present tide of prosperity has risen so high that

all barriers,

and has

fill'd

up the back-waters, and

an approach to uniform success." [53]

has

establish'd something

Collect

must be vigorous, yet unsuspected Literatures, perfect personalities and sociologies, original, transcendental, and expressing (what, in highest sense, past,

not yet express'd at

are

democracy and the modern. With these, and out of these, promulge nlw races of Teachers, and of perfect Women, indisall)

pensable to

endow

the birth-stock of a

New

World. For feudalism, caste, the ecclesiastic traditions, though palpably retreating from political institutions, still hold essentially, by their

spirit,. even in this

country,

more important fields, indeed of education, and of social standards

entire possession of the

the very subsoil,

and I

literature.

say that democracy can never prove

cavil, until

forms of all

art,

itself beyond

founds and luxuriantly grows

own

poems, schools, theology, displacing

that exists, or that has been produced

the past, under opposite influences.

its

that while so

many

anywhere

It is

curious

voices, pens, minds, in

the press, lecture-rooms, in our Congress, &c., are discussing legislative

intellectual

topics,

pecuniary

problems, the suffrage,

tariff

dangers,

and labor

questions, and the various business and benevolent

needs of America, with propositions, remedies, often

one need, a hiatus the profoundest, that no eye seems to perceive, no voice to state. Our fundamental want to-day in the United

worth deep

attention, there

with closest, amplest reference to present conditions, and to the future, is of a class, and the States,

[S3]

Collect

clear idea of a class, of native authors, literatuses, far

higher

grade than any yet known,

modern,

fit

to cope with our occasions,

different, far

sacerdotal,

lands, permeating the tality, taste, belief, life,

giving

whole mass of American men-

breathing into

decision,

new

breath

affecting politics far

mo^

than the popular superficial suffrage, with results inside

and underneath the elections of Presidents or

Congresses ers,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; radiating, begetting appropriate teach-

schools, manners, and, as

grandest

its

result,

accomplishing (what neither the schools nor the

churches and their clergy have hitherto accomplish'd,

and without which

this nation will

no more stand,

permanently, soundly, than a house will stand without a substratum) a religious and moral character

beneath the

political

and productive and

bases of the States. For

know you

not, dear, earnest

reader, that the people of our land write,

and may

all

yet the main things this to suggest

intellectual

may

all

voteâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

possess the right to

may be

read and

entirely lacking?

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; (and

them).

View'd, to-day, from a point of view sufficiently over-arching, the problem of humanity civilized finally

departs,

world

social

and

met and treated by the

divine

literatus

religious, literature.

comes.

all

and

over the is

The

modern

great literatus of the modern. [54]

priest

Never was

anything more wanted than, to-day, and here States, the poet of the

to be

the

wanted, or the

all

times, perhaps,

Collect

any nation, and that whence it is sway'd the most, and whence it sways

the central point itself really

others,

national literature, especially

is its

Above

poems.

typal

original literature

and reliance

surely to

some

(in

previous lands,

all

become the

arche-

its

a great

justification

respects the sole reliance) of

American democracy.

Few

aware

are

gives hue to

all,

how

the great literature penetrates

shapes aggregates and individ-

all,

uals, and, after subtle

ways, with

reminiscence, above

two

pressibly

Judah

gigantic,

lives,

Why tower,

the nations of the earth,

all

petty in themselves, yet inex-

lands,

special

power,

irresistible

constructs, sustains, demolishes at will.

beautiful,

columnar?

and Greece immortal

Immortal

lives, in

a couple

of poems.

Nearer than but

this.

not generally realized,

true, as the genius of Greece,

and

all

the

sociology, personality, politics and religion of those

wonderful

resided in their literature or es-

states,

thetics, that

what was afterwards the main support

of European chivalry, the feudal, ecclesiastical, dynastic

world over there

ture, holding

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; forming

its

osseous struc-

together for hundreds, thousands of

years, preserving

its

decision, rounding

flesh

out,

and bloom, giving

and so saturating

conscious and unconscious blood, breed, intuitions

of men, that

still

prevails

form, in

belief,

the

and

powerful

to this day, in defiance of the mighty changes of [55]

Collect

time

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; was

permeating to the very

literature,

its

marrow, especially that major songs, ballads, and poems.*

the ostent of the senses and eyes,

influences

enchanting

part, its

know, the

which stamp the world's history

are wars,

uprisings or downfalls of dynasties, changeful

ments of

trade,

important inventions, navigation,

military or civil governments,

;

yet,

may

advent of powerful

These of course play

personalities, conquerors, &c.

their part

move-

be, a single

new thought,

im-

agination, abstract principle, even literary style, for

the time, put in shape by

and projected among

some

mankind,

fit

great literatus,

may

duly cause

changes, growths, removals, greater than the longest

and bloodiest war, or the most stupendous merely political, dynastic, or commercial overturn. In short, as,

though

strictly true, that

may

not be realized,

it is

a few first-class poets, philosophs,

and authors, have substantially

settled

and given

status to the entire religion, education, law, sociol-

ogy, &c., of the hitherto civilized world, by tinging * See,

for hereditaments, specimens,

collection, Ellis's

Walter Scott's Border Minstrelsy, Percy's

Early English Metrical Romances, the European continental poems

of Walter of Aquitania, and the Nibelungen, of pagan stock, but monkish-feudal re-

cumbrous old which European chivalry was hatch'd; Ticknor's chapters on the Cid, and on the Spanish poems and poets of daction; the history of the Troubadours,

Hindu

epics,

Fauriel; even the far-back

as indicating the Asian eggs out of

Calderon's time.

Then always, and, of course,

as the superbest poetic culmination-

expression of feudalism, the Shaksperean dramas, in the attitudes, dialogue, characters,

&c.,

of the princes, lords and gentlemen, the pervading

implied and express'd standard of manners, the high port and the regal embroidery of style, &c.

[56]

atmosphere, the

proud

stomach,

Collect

and often creating the atmospheres out of which they have arisen, such also must stamp, and more than ever stamp, the interior and real democratic construction of this American continent, to-day, and Remember also this fact of differdays to come. ence, that, while through the antique and through the

mediaeval ages, highest thoughts and ideals realized

themselves, and their expression other

arts,

much

as, or

made

its

way by

even more than by, tech-

open to the mass of persons, or even to the majority of eminent persons), such liter-

nical literature (not

ature in our day and for current purposes

not only

more eligible than all the other arts put together, but has become the only general means of morally influencing the world. dramatic theatre,

Painting,

sculpture,

and the

would seem, no longer play an

indispensable or even important part in the workings

and mediumship of esthetics.

intellect,

utility,

or even high

Architecture remains, doubtless with ca-

and a real future. Then music, the combiner, nothing more spiritual, nothing more sensuous, a god, yet completely human, advances, prevails, holds highest place supplying in certain wants and pacities,

;

what nothing else could supply. Yet in the civilization of to-day it is undeniable that, over all quarters

beyond allshapes the character of church and schoolâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;or, at any rate, is capable of doing so. Including the lit-

the

arts,

literature dominates, serves

erature of science,

its

scope CS7]

indeed unparallel'd.

Collect

Before proceeding further,

were perhaps well

to discriminate on certain points.

crops

Literature

tills its

many fields, and some may flourish, while lag. What say in these Vistas has its main

others

bearing on imaginative literature, especially poetry, the stock of

the department of science, and

all.

the specialty of journalism, there appear,

these

States, promises, perhaps fulfilments, of highest ear-

nestness,

modern.

and

reality,

But

the region of imaginative, spinal

essential attributes,

ation

is,

manded.

new

something equivalent to

our age and lands,

for

For not only

blood,

These, of course, are

life.

new

as as,

not enough that the

political

warm in

goes deeper, gets

means, superclear to

at least as firm

and

suffrage, legislation, &c., but

that, unless

imperatively de-

frame of democracy shall be vivified

and held together merely by ficial

a hold in men's hearts, emotions and belief,

their days, feudalism or ecclesiasticism,

inaugurates

its

own

the centre forever,

its

strength will be defective,

its

main charm wanting.

its

suggest, therefore, the possibility, should really

and

perennial sources, welling from

growth doubtful, and or three

cre-

American

original

artists or lecturers), arise,

poets

some two (perhaps

mounting the horizon

planets, stars of the first magnitude, that, from their

eminence, fusing contributions, races,

far localities,

would give more compaction and more moral identity (the quality to-day most &c., together, they

[58]

Collect

needed), to these States, than

and

legislative cal,

and

judicial ties,

its

Constitutions,

all its

hitherto politi-

all

warlike, or materialistic experiences.

instance, there could hardly

would more serve the

States,

As, for

happen anything that with all their variety of

origins, their diverse climes, cities, standards, &c.,

than possessing an aggregate of heroes, characters, exploits, sufferings, prosperity or misfortune, glory

or disgrace,

common

but even greater would tion of a cluster of

all,

universal,

be to possess the aggrega-

mighty poets,

for us, national expressers,

ing for the

typical of allâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; no less,

artists, teachers, fit

comprehending and

effus-

men and women of the States, what is native, common to all, inland and sea-

board, Northern and Southern.

The

historians say

of ancient Greece, with her ever-jealous autonomies, cities,

and

states, that the

only positive unity she

ever own'd or receiv'd was the sad unity of a com-

mon

subjection, at the

last,

to foreign conquerors.

Subjection, aggregation of that sort,

America interiors, all

;

impossible to

but the fear of conflicting and irreconcilable

and the lack

close, continually

nothing

ot a

common skeleton,

haunts me.

Or,

if it

knitting

does not,

plainer than the need, a long period to

come, of a fusion of the States into the only able identity, the moral

and

For,

artistic one.

reli-

say,

the true nationality of the States, the genuine union,

when we come after

all,

to a moral

crisis, is,

and

neither the written law, nor (as [59]

to be,

generally

;

Collect

supposed), either self-interest, or or material objects

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;but

common

pecuniary

the fervid and tremendous

melting everything else with resistless heat,

Idea,

and solving

all

lesser

indefinite, spiritual,

and

definite distinctions in vast,

emotional power./

may be claim 'd (and admit the weight of the claim) that common and general worldly prosperity, It

and a populace well to do, and with all life's material It may comforts, is the main thing, and is enough. be argued that our republic

is,

enacting to-day the grandest

performance, really

poems, &c., by

arts,

beating up the wilderness into

fertile

And

her railroads, ships, machinery, &c. ask'd.

Are these not

farms, and in it

may be

better, indeed, for America, than

any utterances even of greatest rhapsode,

artist,

literatus ? I

too hail those achievements with pride and joy:

then answer that the soul of

man

will not

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; be only â&#x20AC;&#x201D; nay, not with such at all

finally satisfied

but needs what (standing on these and on as the feet stand on the ground)

with such

all

things,

addressed to the

loftiest, to itself alone.

Out of such treatment character,

considerations, such truths, arises for

these Vistas the important question of

of an

American stock-personality, with

and return-expressions, and, of course, to correspond, within outlines common to all. To these, the main affair, the thinkers of the United States^ in general so acute, have either

literatures

and

arts for outlets

[60]

Collect

given feeblest attention, or have remained, and main, in a state of somnolence.

For

political

part,

re-

would alarm and caution even the

and business

reader,

and to the utmost

extent, against the prevailing delusion that the es-

tablishment of free political institutions, and plentiful intellectual smartness, with general good order, physical plenty, industry, &c. (desirable and precious advantages as they all are), do, of themselves, deter-

mine and yield to our experiment of democracy the

With such advantages at present

fruitage of success. fiilly,

or almost fully, possessed

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

Union just

is-/

sued, victorious, from the struggle with the only foes it

need ever

fear (namely, those within

interior ones),

advancement

and with unprecedented

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; society,

these States,

crude, superstitious, and rotten.

made

society

is,

and

itself,

the

materialistic is

canker'd,

Political,

or law-

private, or voluntary society,

any vigor, the element of the moral conscience, the most important, the verteber to State or man, seems to me either entirely lacking, or seriously enfeebled or ungrown. say we had best look our times and lands searchingly in the face, like a physician diagnosing some deep disease. Never was there, perhaps, more hollowness at heart than at present, and here in the United States. Genuine belief seems to have left us. The also.

underlying principles of the States are not honestly believ'd in (for

all

this hectic glow, [6i]

and these melo-

Collect

humanity itself believ'd in. What penetrating eye does not everywhere see through the mask ? The spectacle is appaling. ^ We dramatic screamings), nor

live in

men

an atmosphere of hypocrisy throughout."'^ The

believe not in the

men.

women, nor the women

the

scornful superciliousness rules in literature.

The aim of all the litterateurs is to find something to make fun of. A lot of churches, sects, &c., the most dismal phantasms know, usurp the name of religion. Conversation is a mass of badinage. From deceit in I

the

spirit,

the mother of

all

false deeds,

the offspring

acute and candid person,

already incalculable.

the revenue department in Washington,

who

led

by the course of his employment to regularly visit the cities. North, South and West, to investigate frauds, has talk'd much with me about his discoveries. The depravity of the business classes of our country

not

than has been supposed, but infinitely greater.

less

The

official

services of America, national, state,

municipal, in

all

their branches

and

and departments, ex-

cept the judiciary, are saturated in corruption, bribery, falsehood, maladministration; and the judiciary

The

tainted.

much In

great cities reek with respectable as

as non-respectable robbery

fashionable

life,

and scoundrelism.

flippancy, tepid amours,

infidelism, small aims, or

time.

no aims

all,

weak

only to

kill

business (this all-devouring modern word,

business), the one sole object

cuniary gain.

The

is,

by any means, pe-

magician's serpent in the fable [62]

Collect

ate

the other serpents; and money-making

all

our magician's serpent, remaining to-day sole master The best class we show is but a mob of the field. of fashionably dress'd speculators

and vulgarians.

True, indeed, behind this fantastic farce, enacted on

the visible stage of society, solid things and stupen-

dous labors are to be discover'd, existing crudely and going on in the background, to advance and tell themselves terrible.

* I

in time.

Yet the truths are none the

less

say that our New World democracy, how-''^

ever great a success in uplifting the masses out of their sloughs, in materialistic development, products,

and

in a certain

intellectuality,

highly-deceptive superficial popular

is,

far,

an almost complete

failure ^

its

social aspects,

and

really

grand

religious,

moral, literary, and esthetic results.

In vain

march with unprecedented

empire so co-

strides to

outvying the antique, beyond Alexander's, beyond the proudest sway of Rome. In vain have

lossal,

annex'd Texas, California, Alaska, and reach north

Canada and south for Cuba. -It is as if we were somehow being endow'd with a vast and more and more thoroughly-appointed body, and then left with little or no soul.

for

Let

illustrate further, as

observations, localities, &c. tant,

and

now

again (September, 1870)

will bear repetition.

write, with current

The

subject

impor-

After an absence, in

New

Brooklyn, on a few weeks' vacation. [63]

York City and

The

splendor,

Collect

picturesqueness, and oceanic amplitude and rush of

these great

the unsurpass'd situation, rivers

cities,

and bay, sparkling

sea-tides, costly

and

new

lofty

of marble and iron, of original

buildings, fafades

grandeur and elegance of design, with the masses of

gay

color, the

preponderance of white and blue, the

flags flying, the endless ships, the

tumultuous

streets,

Broadway, the heavy, low, musical roar, hardly ever intermitted, even at night; the jobbers' houses, the rich shops, the

wharves, the great Central Park, and

the Brooklyn Park of this beautiful

fall

hills (as

wander among them

weather, musing, watching, absorb-

— the assemblages of the citizens their groups, conversations, trades, evening amusements, or along of these, say, and the the by-quarters — tnese, ing)

completely satisfy tion,

senses of power, fulness,

&c., and give me, through

mo-

such senses and

and through my esthetic conscience, a continued exaltation and absolute fulfilment. Always and more and more, as I cross the East and North appetites,

rivers,

the

ferries,

or with the pilots in their pilot-

houses, or pass an hour in Wall Street, or the gold

exchange,

realize (if

we must

isms) that not Nature alone

freedom and the open

air, in

admit such

partial-

great in her fields of

her storms, the shows

of night and day, the mountains, forests, seas in

—

the

artificial,

the

work

in this profusion of

ingenuities,

streets,

man

too

equally great

teeming humanity

goods, [64]

houses,

— but

—

ships

these

— these

Collect

hurrying, feverish, electric crowds of men, their complicated business genius (not least among the gen-

and

mighty, many-threaded wealth and industry concentrated here. iuses)

all

this

But sternly discarding, shutting our eyes to the glow and grandeur of the general superficial effect,

coming down to what is of the only real importance, Personalities, and examining minutely, we question,

ask.

name

Are there, indeed, men here worthy the Are there athletes ? Are there perfect wo-

men, to match the generous material luxuriance? Is there a pervading atmosphere of beautiful manners ? Are there crops of fine youths, and majestic old persons ? rich people ? civilization

one

worthy freedom and a there a great moral and religious

Are there Is

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the only

arts

justification of a great material

Confess that to severe eyes, using the moral

microscope upon humanity, a sort of dry and

flat

crowded with petty grotesques, malformations, phantoms, playing meanSahara appears, these

ingless antics. street,

cities,

Confess that everywhere,

church, theatre, bar-room,

shop,

official chair,

are

pervading flippancy and vulgarity, low cunning, infidelityâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;everywhere the youth puny, impudent, foppish,

prematurely ripe

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; every where

an abnor-

mal libidinousness, unhealthy forms, male, female, painted, padded, dyed, chignon'd, muddy complexions,

bad blood, the capacity

for

good motherhood

deceasing or deceas'd, shallow notions of beauty, VOL. V.-5.

[653

U-

Collect

with a range of manners, or rather lack of manners (considering the advantages enjoy'd), probably the

meanest to be seen

them the breath

breathe into

and heroic

life,

say a

merely to copy and to

what

away

the world.*

and these lamentable conditions, to

this,

all

new founded

literature,

reflect existing surfaces, or

called taste

recuperative of sane

— not

not

pander

only to amuse, pass

time, celebrate the beautiful, the refined, the

grammatical

past, or exhibit technical, rhythmic, or

— but a literature

dexterity

underlying

life,

religious,

consistent with science, handling the elements and

competent power, teaching and training

forces with

men

— and, as perhaps

sults,

the most precious of

achieving the entire redemption of

of these incredible holds and

webs

its

re-

woman

out

silliness, milli-

—

and and every kind of dyspeptic depletion thus insuring to the States a strong and sweet Feis what is male Race, a race of perfect Mothers nery,

—

needed.

And now, *

Of these

the

full

conception of these facts and

rapidly-sketch'd hiatuses, the

for one, the condition,

scientious fibre

all

women

two which seem to me most

serious are,

absence, or perhaps the singular abeyance, of moral con-

through American society; and, for another, the appaling de-

powers of sane atiiletic maternity, their crowning attribute, and ever making the woman, in loftiest spheres, superior to the man. have sometimes thought, indeed, that the sole avenue and means of a recon-

pletion of

in their

structed sociology depended, primarily, on a

vigoration of

woman,

affording, for races to

birth are indispensable), a perfect

than they know, sociology ises,

all

motherhood.

birth, elevation,

expansion, in-

(as the conditions that

antedate

Great, great, indeed, far greater

But doubtless the question of such new many varied and complex influences and premwoman, and the woman as well as the man.

the sphere of

women.

goes together, includes

and the man as well as the

new

come

[66]

Collect

and

points,

that they infer, pro and con

all

yet unshaken

faith in

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; with

the elements of the American

masses, the composites, of both sexes, and even consider'd as individuals

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and ever recognizing

them

the broadest bases of the best literary and esthetic

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;1 proceed with my speculations, Vistas. let us see what we can make out of a brief,

appreciation First,

general, sentimental consideration of political racy,

its

and whence

democ-

has arisen, with regard to some

current features, as an aggregate, and as the

basic structure of our future literature and authorship.

shall,

it is

and continually

true, quickly

origin-idea of the singleness of

asserting

itself,

opposite ideas.

and cropping

find the'

man, individualism,

forth,

even from the

But the mass, or lump character,

imperative reasons,

for

to be ever carefully weigh'd,

Only from it, and from its proper regulation and potency, comes the The two other, comes the chance of individualism. borne

mind, and provided

for.

are contradictory, but our task

The

political history of

to reconcile them.*

the past

may be summ'd

up as having grown out of what underlies the words, order, safety, caste, and especially out of the need of some prompt deciding authority, and of cohesion at Must not the is one which time only can answer. modern Individualism, continually enlarging, usurping all, seriously affect,

* The question hinted here virtue of

perhaps keep

down

entirely, in

America, the

like of

the fervid and absorbing love of general country ?

two

will

the ancient virtue of Patriotism, have no doubt myself that the

merge, and will mutually profit and brace each other, and that from them But feel that at present they and their op-

a greater product, a third, will arise.

positions form a serious problem

and paradox [67]

in the

United States.

Collect

the

memory

some

we come to the period within people now living, when, as from

Leaping time,

cost

all

where they had slumber'd long, accumulating wrath, sprang up and are yet active (1790, and on even to the present, 1870), those noisy eructalair

destructive

tions,

iconoclasms, a

sense of

fierce

wrongs, amid which moves the form, well

modern

much ors

Old World,

history, in the

known

stain'd

with

by savage reactionary clamThese bear, mostly, as on one

blood, and mark'd

and demands.

inclosing point of need.

^ ^For

after the rest is said

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

after the

many

time-

honor'd and really true things for subordination, experience, rights of property, &c.,

to and acquiesced in

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

after

listened

the valuable and well-

settled statement of our duties is

have been

and

relations in society

thoroughly conn'd over and exhausted

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

remains

to bring forward and modify everything else with the

idea of that Something a

man

is (last

precious con-

solation of the drudging poor), standing apart from

and a woman in hers, sole and untouchable by any canons of authority, or any rule derived from precedent, state-safety, the acts of legislatures, or even from what is called else,

all

religion, is

divine in his

modesty, or

own

art.

right,

The

radiation of this truth

the key of the most significant doings of our im-

mediately preceding three centuries, and has been the

political

visibly,

genesis and

it still

life

of America.

more advances [68]

invisibly.

Advancing Underneath

Collect

the fluctuations of the expressions of society, as well as the movements of the politics of the leading na-

tions of the world,

and strengthening

see steadily pressing ahead

even

itself,

the midst of im-

mense tendencies toward aggregation, completeness

this

image of

separatism, of individual personal

dignity, of a single person, either male or female,

characterized in the main, not from extrinsic acquire-

ments or

position, but in the pride of himself or

and, as an eventual conclusion and

herself alone

;

summing up

(or else the entire

scheme of things

aimless, a cheat, a crash), the simple idea that the last,

and

best dependence its

own

to be

upon humanity

inherent, normal, full-grown qualities,

without any superstitious support whatever. idea of perfect individualism est

itself,

This

indeed that deep-

tinges and gives character to the idea of the

aggregate.

For

mainly or altogether to serve

independent separatism that eralization, consolidation. vitality

and freedom to the

favor a strong gen-

to give the best

rights

of the

States

(every bit as important as the right of nationality,

the union), that

Union

at all hazards.

The purpose in

insist

on the identity of the

democracyâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;supplanting old belief

the necessary absoluteness of establish'd dynastic

rulership, temporal, ecclesiastical,

and

scholastic, as

furnishing the only security against chaos, crime, is, througTi many transmigrations, and ignorance

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

[69]

Collect

and amid endless

arguments, and ostensible

ridicules,

failures, to illustrate, at all hazards, this doctrine or

theory that man, properly train'd freedom,

may and must become

in sanest,

highest

a law, and series of

laws, unto himself, surrounding and providing

not only his

own

personal control, but

tions to other individuals,

while other theories, as tions,

his rela-

and to the State; and

that,

the past histories of na-

have proved wise enough, and indispensable

perhaps for their conditions, stand

all

for,

this,

our civilized world,

worth working from, as warranting

as matters

results like those

when once

of Nature's laws, reliable,

now

the only scheme

establish'd, to

carry on themselves.

The argument of the matter is extensive, and, we admit, by no means all on one side. What we shall offer will

much

ing unsaid

the

way

far, far

for the

from

sufficient.

But while leav-

that should properly even prepare

treatment of this many-sided ques-

tion of political liberty, equality, or republicanism

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

leaving the whole history and consideration of the feudal plan its politics

and

its

products,

civilization,

embodying humanity,

through the retrospect of

past time (which plan and products, indeed,

all

make

of the past, and a large part of the present)

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

by any specific and local answer, many a well-wrought argument and instance, and many a conscientious declamatory cry and warn-

leaving unanswer'd, at least

ing

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

as,

very

lately,

from an eminent and venerable [70]

Collect

person abroad*

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; things,

problems,

new

dread, suspense (not

many an anxious hour in city's lence), we still may give a page or Time

fragmentarily,

din, or night's siso,

whose

drift is

alone can finally answer these

But as a substitute

things.

of doubt,

to me, but old occupiers

opportune.

full

throw

in passing, let us,

even,

forth a short direct or indirect

suggestion of the premises of that other plan,

the

new

our

spirit,

under the new forms, started here

America.

to the political section of Democracy,

which

introduces and breaks ground for further and vaster sections,

few probably

are the minds, even in these

republican States, that fully comprehend the aptness

of that phrase, ''the government of the People, by

THE People, for th^ People," which the

lips

shape

Abraham homely wit, but whose scope

the totality and

The People

all

is full

man, viewed a constant puzzle and offence,

essay

Shooting Niagara."

was

from

includes both

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

which, to

of vulgar contradictions and

the lump, displeases, and

affront to the

was

itself,

at first roused to

merely educated

much anger and abuse by

essay from Mr. Carlyle, so insulting to the theory of America

think afterwards

inherit

minutias of the lesson.

Like our huge earth

ordinary scansion,

Lincoln; a formula whose verbal

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;but

this

happening to

had more than once been in the like mood, during which his and seen persons and things in the same light (indeed some have since read it signs of the same feeling in these Vistas),

how

evidently cast,

might say there

are

does certain judgments from the highest feudal point of*view, but have read it with respect as coming from an earnest soul, and as contributing certain sharp-cutting metallic grains, which, if not gold or silver, again, not only as a study, expressing as

may

be good, hard, honest

iron.

[71]

Collect

The

classes.

rare, cosmical, artist

mind,

lit

with the

alone confronts his manifold and oceanic

Infinite,

and culture (so called) have been against the masses, and remain so. There is plenty of glamour about the most damnable crimes and hoggish meannesses, special and general, of the feudal and dynastic world over there, with its personnel of lords and queens and courts, so well-dress'd and so handsome. But the People are ungrammatical, untidy, and their sins gaunt and qualitiesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; but

intelligence,

taste,

ill-bred.

Literature, strictly considered,

the People, and, whatever day.

has never recognized

may be

does not to-

said,

Speaking generally, the tendencies of literature,

as hitherto pursued, have been to

and querulous men.

make mostly

criti-

seems as if, so far, there were some natural repugnance between a literary and professional life and the rude rank spirit of the democracies. There is, in later literature, a treatment of benevolence, a charity business, rife enough it is cal

true;

but

know

country, than a

nothing more

fit

appreciation of the

even

rare,

and reverent

scientific estimate

People â&#x20AC;&#x201D; of

in this

their

measureless

wealth of latent power and capacity, their vast, tic

contrasts of lights and shades

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; with,

artis-

America,

and a

certain

breadth of historic grandeur, of peace or war,

far sur-

their entire reliability in emergencies,

passing

all

haut ton

the vaunted samples of book-heroes, or any

coteries, in

all

the records of the world. [72]

Collect

The movements

of the late secession war, and their results, to any sense that studies well and

comprehends them, show that popular democracy, whatever its faults and dangers, practically justifies itself beyond the proudest claims and wildest hopes of

enthusiasts.

its

but

well

Probably no future age can know,

know, how the

gist of this fiercest

and

most resolute of the world's war-like contentions resided exclusively in the unnamed, unknown rank and file; and how the brunt of its labor of death was, to

all

essential purposes, volunteer'd.

of their

own

its

People,

choice, fighting, dying for their

idea, insolently attack'd

and

The

own

by the secession-slave-power,

very existence imperifd.

Descending to

detail,

entering any of the armies, and mixing with the pri-

vate soldiers,

we see and have seen

have seen the

alacrity

august spectacles.

with which the American-

born populace, the peaceablest and most good-natured race in the world, and the

dent and

intelligent,

most personally indepen-

and the

least fitted to

submit to

the irksomeness and exasperation of regimental discipline, sprang, at the first tap of the

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but life,

for gain, for

drum, to arms

nor even glory, nor to repel invasion

an emblem, a mere abstraction

the safety of the flag.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

for the

have seen the un-

equal'd docility and obedience of these soldiers.

and long by hopelessness, mismanagement, and by defeat; have seen the incredible slaughter toward or through which the have seen them

tried long

[73]

Collect

armies (as at

first

the Wilderness)

advance. '

Fredericksburg, and afterward at

still

unhesitatingly obey'd orders to

have seen them

crouch-

in trench, or

ing behind breastv/ork, or tramping in deep mud, or

amid pouring rain or thick-falling snow, or under forced marches in hottest summer (as on the road to get to Gettysburg) visions, corps,

— vast

suffocating swarms,

with every single

black with sweat and dust, his

man so grimed and own mother would

— his clothes

not have

known him

and

with sour, accumulated sweat

torn,

— many

di-

all

dirty, stain'd for

perfume

a comrade, perhaps a brother, sun-struck,

staggering out, dying, by the roadside, of exhaustion

— yet

the great bulk bearing steadily on, cheery

enough, hollow-bellied from hunger, but sinewy with

unconquerable resolution.

have seen

drearier,

this race

proved by wholesale by

yet more fearful tests

— the

wound, the

amputation, the shatter'd face or limb, the slow hot fever,

long impatient anchorage

forms of maiming, operation

bed, and

all

and disease.

the

Alas!

though only in her early youth, already to hospital brought. There have we watch'd these soldiers, many of them only boys in America have

seen,

— mark'd their

decorum, their religious nature and fortitude, and their sweet affection. Wholesale, truly. For at the front, and through- the camps, in years

countless tents, stood the regimental, brigade, and division hospitals; while

everywhere amid the [74]

land,

Collect

in or

near

cities,

rose clusters of huge, white-wash'd,

crowded, one-story wooden barracks; and there ruled agony with bitter scourge, yet seldom brought a cry;

and there

narrow

by day and night along the between the rows of cots, or by the

stalk'd death

aisles

blankets on the ground, and touch'd lightly

poor

know

not whether

realize that

mixing

finally

shall

night

am now

penning these

the gloomiest period of the

the Patent-office hospital

lay,

learn'd personally

Washington

stood by the bedside of a Pennsylvania

who

be understood, but

from what

such scenes that

One

pages.

war,

it is

many

with blessed, welcome touch.

sufferer, often

city,

soldier,

conscious of quick approaching death, yet

perfectly calm,

and with noble,

veteran surgeon,

spiritual

turning aside,

manner, the

said to

me, that

though he had witness'd many, many deaths of soldiers, and had been a worker at Bull Run, Antietam, Fredericksburg, &c., he had not seen yet the

man

boy that met the approach of My dissolution with cowardly qualms or terror.

first

case of a

own observation fully bears What have we here, if

out the remark. not,

towering above

all

and argument, the plentifully-supplied, needed proof of democracy, in its personalities? Curiously enough, too, the proof on this point last-

talk

should say, every bit as much from the South, as from the North. Although have spoken

comes,

only of the

latter,

yet

[75]

deliberately

include

all.

Collect

Grand,

common

stock

the accomplish'd and

convincing growth, prophetic of the future;

proof

undeniable to sharpest sense, of perfect beauty, tenderness and pluck, that never feudal lord, nor Greek,

nor

Roman

speak

Let no tongue ever

breed, yet rival'd.

disparagement of the American races, North

war

or South, to one v^^ho has been through the

the great army hospitals.

Meantime, general humanity turn, as, for our purposes, in

mind) has always,

what

recovers from clearly

really

so yet.

always

will

such sickly moods.

enough the

strata of the

soon

myself see

crude, defective streaks in

common

full

downcast

be â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but I

re-

to bear

is,

every department, been

of perverse maleficence, and

hours the soul thinks

(for to that

all

the

the specimens and

people;

vast collections of the ignorant, the credulous, the unfit

and uncouth, the incapable, and the very low

The eminent person

and poor. ingly asks

whether

just mention'd sneer-

we expect to elevate and

improve

by absorbing such morbid collections and qualities therein. The point is a formidable one, and there will doubtless always be numbers of a nation's politics

solid it.

and

reflective citizens

Our answer

scope and

letter

who

general,

will

and

of this essay.

ulterior object of political

and

all

never get over involved

the

believe the

other government

(having, of course, provided for the police, the safety of

life,

property, and for the basic statute and [76]

com-

Collect

mon

law, and their administration, always

order) to be

among

the

rest,

first

not merely to

rule, to &c., but to develop, to open up

repress disorder,

to cultivation, to encourage the possibilities of all beneficent and manly outcroppage, and of that aspiration for independence,

respect latent in

exceptions, alone, *

make

all

and the pride and

characters.

(Or,

self-

there be

cannot, fixing our eyes on them

theirs the rule for all.)

say the mission of government, henceforth,

civilized lands, is not repression alone,

and not au-

that favorite

thority alone, not even of law, nor

standard of the eminent writer, the rule of the best

men, the born heroes and captains of the race (as if such ever, or one time out of a hundred, get into the big places, elective or dynastic), but higher than

the highest arbitrary

through

all

rule,

train

communities

their grades, beginning with individuals

and ending there again, to

What

rule themselves.

Christ appear'd for in the moral-spiritual field for

human-kind, namely, that

in respect to

the absolute

the possession of such by each single

soul, there

is in

individual,

something so transcendent, so incapable

of gradations (like all

beings on a

life),

that, to that extent,

common

the distinctions of

level, utterly regardless of

intellect, virtue,

height or lowliness whatever ner,

this other field,

places

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

station,

or any

tallied in like

by democracy's

rule that

men, the nation, as a common aggregate of [77]

manliving

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Collect

each a separate and complete

identities, aflfording in

subject for freedom, worldly thrift and happiness,

and

for a fair

chance

in citizenship,

for protection

&c., must, to the political extent of

the suffrage or vote,

and

growth, and

for

further,

be placed,

each

the whole, on one broad, primary, universal,

common

platform.

The purpose is not altogether direct; perhaps it is more indirect. For it is not that democracy is of exhaustive account, in

Nature) of no account

(like

itself.

see,

Perhaps, indeed, in itself

the best, perhaps only,

means, formulater, general

caller-forth,

fit

that, as

and

trainer,

full

for

the million, not for grand material personalities only,

but for immortal souls. is

not so

have

its

much; and

To be

a voter with the rest

this, like

imperfections.

chised man, and now,

every

institute, will

But to become an enfran-

impediments removed, to

stand and start without humiliation, and equal with

the rest; to commence, or have the road clear'd to

commence, the grand experiment of development, whose end (perhaps requiring several generations)

may be

the forming of a full-grown

that

something.

and

our times

We the

man

woman

To ballast the State is also secured, no other way. do not) put it either on

to be secured, in

do not (at any rate ground that the People, 1

the

masses,

even

the best of them, are, in their latent or exhibited qualities, essentially sensible [78]

and good

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; nor on the

Collect

ground of their rights; but that good or bad, rights or no rights, the democratic formula is the only safe and preservative one for coming times. We endow the masses with the suffrage for their

doubt; then, perhaps

own

sake,

more, from another point Leaving the rest to

still

of view, for community's sake.

the sentimentalists,

in its scientific aspect,

present freedom as sufficient

cold as

ice,

reasoning, deduc-

and passionless as crystal. / Democracy too is law, and of the

tive, clear

Many suppose

plest kind.

ranks the error) that law, and running

(and often

means a throwing But, briefly,

riot.

am-

strictest,

it is

its

own

aside of

the superior

law, not alone that of physical force, the body,

which, adding

Law

spirit.

to,

supersedes with that of the

the unshakable order of the universe

and the law over

forever;

all,

and law of laws,

the

law of successions; that of the superior law, in time, gradually supplanting and overwhelming the inferior one. first

(While, for myself,

would

cheerfully

agree-

covenanting that the formative tendencies

be administer'd

and that until

shall

favor, or at least not against

this reservation

it,

be closely construed

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; that

show due

signs,

the individual or community

or be so minor and fractional as not to endanger

the State, the condition of authoritative tutelage

may

continue, "and self-government must abide

time.)

the esthetic point, always an imporwithout fascination for highest aiming

Nor

tant one,

its

[79]

Collect

The common ambition strains for elevations, become some privileged exclusive. The master

souls.

sees greatness and health in being part of the mass;

nothing will do as well as

common ground.

you have in yourself the divine, Then merge yourself in \t<

Would

vast, general

law?

And, topping democracy, this most alluring record, that

nations,

all

alone can bind, and ever seeks to bind,

all

men, of however various and distant

lands, into a brotherhood, a family.

the old,

yet ever-modern dream of earth, out of her eldest and her youngest, her fond philosophers and poets. that half only, individualism, is

another

half,

which

isolates.

Not There

adhesiveness or love, that

and aggregates, making the races comrades, and fraternizing all. Both are to be vitalized by re-

fuses, ties

worthiest elevator of

(sole

ligion

man

or State),

breathing into the proud, material tissues, the breath of

life.

For

say at the core of democracy,

finally, is

All the religions, old

and new,

the religious element.

Nor may the scheme step forth, clothed resplendent beauty and command, till these, bear-

are there. in

ing the best, the latest

fruit,

the spiritual, shall fully

appear.

portion of our pages

might

indite

with

refer-

ence toward Europe, especially the British part of

it,

more than our own land, perhaps not absolutely needed for the home reader. But the whole question hangs together, and fastens and links all peoples. [80]

Collect

The

of to-day has this advantage over antique or mediaeval times, that his doctrine seeks not liberalist

only to individualize but to universalize.

word

Solidarity has arisen.

tion, as things exist in

all

The

great

dangers to a na-

our day, there can be no greater

one than having certain portions of the people set off from the rest by a line drawn they not privileged

—

as others, but degraded, humiliated,

Much quackery

count.

democracy's

side,

and

(or,

of no ac-

teems, of course, even on

yet does not really affect the orbic

To work

quality of the matter. it,

made

in, if

we may so term

God, his divine aggregate, the People the veritable horn'd and sharp-taiKd Devil, his justify

aggregate,

who

there be

convulsively insist upon

it)— this, say, is what democracy is for; and this is what our America means, and is doing— may not If not, she means nothing more, and say, has done? does nothing more, than any other land. And as, by I

virtue

stomach

its

kosmical,

fully strong

antiseptic

power. Nature's

enough not only

to digest the

morbific matter always presented, not to be turn'd

and perhaps, indeed, intuitively gravitating thither— but even to change such contributions into so American nutriment for highest use and life aside,

—

democracy's.

That

the lesson we, these days, send

over to European lands by every western breeze.

And,

truly,

whatever may be said

the

way

abstract argument, for or against the theory of a wider

democratizing of institutions VOL. V.-6.

[8l]

any

civilized country,

Collect

much

trouble might well be saved to

all

European

lands by recognizing this palpable fact (for a palpable fact

is),

that

some form

about the only resource dissatisfaction

of such democratizing

now

continued,

left.

That, or chronic

which grow due course, and

mutterings

annually louder and louder,

till,

most cases, the inevitable crisis, Anything worthy to be call'd crash, dynastic ruin. statesmanship in the Old World, should say, among the advanced students, adepts, or men of any brains, does not debate to-day whether to hold on, attempting to lean back and monarchize, or to look forward and democratize but how, and in what degree and part, most prudently to democratize. The eager and often inconsiderate appeals of reformers and revolutionists are indispensable, to counterbalance the inertness and fossilism making so pretty swiftly in

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

large a part of

human

institutions.

always take care of themselves

The

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

that they rapidly tend to ossify us.

latter will

danger being

The former

be treated with indulgence, and even with respect. As circulation to air, so is agitation and a plentiful

and moral goodness, virtue, law

degree of speculative license to sanity.

Indirectly, but surely,

political

(of the very best), follow freedom.

mocracy, are what the keel

These, to de-

to the ship, or saltness

to the ocean.

^'The true gravitation-hold of liberalism

the

United States will be a more universal ownership of [8a]

Collect

property, general homesteads, general comfort

intertwining reticulation of wealth.

vast,

human

frame, or, indeed, any object in this manifold

universe,

own

its

best kept together by the simple miracle

cohesion, and the necessity, exercise and

so a great and varied

thereof,

profit

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

As the

nationality,

occupying millions of square miles, were firmest held and knit by the principle of the safety and endurance of the aggregate of its middling property owners. that,

may

from another point of view, ungracious as it sound, and a paradox after what we have been

saying, democracy looks with suspicious, ill-satisfied

eye upon the very poor, the ignorant, and on those

She asks

out of business.

for

men and women

with

occupations, well-off, owners of houses and acres,

and with cash

the

make them.

with some cravings

and must have them,

for literature, too;

bankâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

Luckily, the seed

and: hastens

already well-

sown, and has taken ineradicable root.V

Huge and mighty lands

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

* For

most

fear of mistake,

are our days, our republican their

may

rapid

as well distinctly specify, as cheerfully included in

the model and standard of these Vistas, a practical,

even materialistic character.

their

shiftings,

stirring,

worldly, money-making,

undeniable that our farms,

stores,

offices,

dry-

goods, coal and groceries, enginery, cash-accounts, trades, earnings, markets, &c.,

should be attended to

permanent

existence.

in earnest, I

and

actively pursued, just as

they had a

real

and

perceive clearly that the extreme business energy, and this

almost maniacal appetite for wealth prevalent in the United States, are parts of amelioration and progress, indispensably needed to prepare the very results 1 demand. My theory includes riches, and the getting of riches, and the amplest products, power, activity, inventions,

movements, &c.

Upon them,

edifice design'd in these Vistas.

[83]

upon

substrata,

raise

the

Collect

changes,

the interest of the cause.

all in

this particular passage

(November,

vital

write

1868), the din of

Acrid the temper of

disputation rages around me.

the parties,

Congress

the pending questions.

convenes; the President sends his message; reconstruction

abeyance; the nomination and the

is still in

draw close, Of these, and all the

contest for the twenty-first Presidentiad

with loudest threat and bustle. like of these, the I

know

not; but well

and whatever things remain safe and

that behind them,

tuations, the vital all

eventuations

work goes

the needed

later superciliousness,

on.

their evencertain,

and

Time, with soon or

disposes of Presidents, Con-

Anon,

gressmen, party platforms, and such.

clears

the stage of each and any mortal shred that thinks itself

so potent to

its

day; and at and after which

(with precious, golden exceptions once or twice century),

moulder self

all

that relates to

in a burial-vault,

the least bit about

sir

potency

flung to

and no one bothers him-

afterward.

But the People

ever remain, tendencies continue, and tic transfers in

all

the idiocra-

unbroken chain go on.

few years the dominion-heart of America will be far inland, toward the West. Our future national It is capital may not be where the present one is. In a

possible,

nay

likely, that in

will migrate a

less

than

fifty

thousand or two miles,

founded, and everything belonging to different plan, original, far

more superb.

[84]

years,

will

re-

made on a The main

Collect

social, political, spine-character of the States will prob-

ably run along the Ohio, Missouri and Mississippi

and west and north of them, including Canada. Those regions, with the group of powerful brothers toward the Pacific (destined to the mastership of that rivers,

sea and

its

countless paradises of islands), will com-

pact and settle the traits of America, with r.etain'd,

but

more expanded,

grafted

hardier, purely native stock.

all

the old

newer,

giant growth,

com-

posite from the rest, getting their contribution, absorb-

ing

it,

intellect,

make

From the North, the idea of unsway-

illustrious.

the sun of things, also

amid the last, the wildest temFrom the South the living soul, the animus pests. of good and bad, haughtily admitting no demonstration but its own. While from the West itself comes solid personality, with blood and brawn, and the able justice, anchor

deep quality of all-accepting

/ Political works

democracy, as

America, with

fusion.

all its

exists

and

threatening

practically evils,

sup-

making first-class men. It is life's gymnasium, not of good only, but of all. We A brave detry often, though we fall back often. plies a training-school for

light, fit for

freedom's athletes,

fills

these arenas, and

them, irrespective Whatever we do not attain, we at any of success. rate attain the experiences of the fight, the hardening

fully satisfies,

out of the action

of the strong campaign, and throb with currents of attempt at least. Time is ample. Let the victors [8s]

— Collect

come part

after us.

among

us.

Not

for

nothing does

evil

play

Judging from the main portions of

the history of the world, so

far,

justice

jeopardy, peace walks amid hourly

always

pitfalls,

some

the credulity of the populace, in

and

of their pro-

tean forms, no voice can at any time say.

The clouds break

out

They

courage and prophecy not,

must

Vive, the

Yet

to last forever.

not,

are

and the sun shinej

little,

—but soon and certain the lowering darkness

again, as

and of

slavery, misery, meanness, the craft of tyrants

not.

its

falls

there an immortal

every sane soul that can-

under any circumstances, capitulate.

attack—the perennial assault!

unpopular cause—the the never-abandon'd

audaciously aims

spirit that

efforts,

Five, the

pursued the same amid

opposing proofs and precedents. /

Once, before the war

many

times the

mood

(alas

good man, had impressively putting in form, indeed, travel'd

much

their politicians,

and

has come

with doubt and gloom.

have

how

dare not say !)

too,

was

filled

foreigner, an acute

said to me, that

my own

and

day

observations:

''I

the United States, and watch'd listen'd to the

speeches of the

candidates, and read the journals, and gone into the public houses, and heard the unguarded talk of men.

And

have found your vaunted America honey-

comb'd from top to toe with infidelism, even to itself and its own programme. have mark'd the brazen hell-faces of secession and slavery gazing defiantly I

[86]

Collect

from

all

where

windows and doorways.

the

found,

primarily,

the offices themselves.

filling

just as

and

thieves

arranging the nominations to

scalliwags

and sometimes have found the North

offices, I

of bad stuff as the South.

full

have every-

Of the

hold-

ers of public office in the Nation or the States or

have found that not one in a hundred has been chosen by any spontaneous selec-

their municipalities,

tion of the outsiders, the people, but

all

have been

nominated and put through by little or large caucuses of the politicians, and have got in by corrupt rings and electioneering, not capacity or desert. I

have noticed

how

the millions of sturdy farmers and

mechanics are thus the helpless supple-jacks of comparatively

few

politicians.

And

have noticed more

and more the alarming spectacle of parties usurping the government, and openly and shamelessly wielding

for party

purposes."

Sad, serious, deep truths. still

deeper, amply confronting, dominating truths.

and great and little rings, and their insolence and wiles, and over the powparties, looms a power, too sluggish maybe,

Over those over

Yet are there other,

all

erfulest

politicians

but ever holding decisions and decrees ready, with stern process, to execute as plainly

neededâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

them

at times, indeed,

as soon

summarily

crushing to atoms the mightiest parties, even

hour of their In saner

hand,

the

pride.

hours

far different are [87]

the amounts of

Collect

these things from what, at

first sight,

they appear.

no doubt important who is elected governor, mayor, or legislator (and full of dismay when incompetent or vile ones get elected, as they some-

Though

it is

times do), there are other, quieter contingencies, in-

more important. Shams, &c., will always be the show, like ocean's scum; enough, if waters deep and clear make up the rest. Enough, that while the piled embroider'd shoddy gaud and fraud spreads to the superficial eye, the hidden warp and weft are genuine, and will wear forever. Enough, in short, that the race, the land which could raise such as the late rebellion, could also put it down. finitely

The average man tant.

He,

impor-

these States, remains immortal

owner

of a land at last only

and boss, deriving good sort of servant in office,

versal

requisites,

and

somehow, out of any

uses,

even the basest (certain unitheir

settled

regularity

and

protection, being first secured); a nation like ours, in

a sort of geological formation state, trying continually

new

experiments, choosing

not served by the best

men

new

delegations,

only, but sometimes

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

more by those that provoke it by the combats they arouse. Thus national rage, fury, discussions, &c., better than content.

Thus,

also,

the warning sig-

nals, invaluable for after times.

What

more dramatic than the

spectacle

have seen repeated, and doubtless long shall seethe popular judgment taking the successful candi[88]

Collect

dates on

trial in

the offices— standing

off,

were,

and observing them and their doings for a while, and always giving, finally, the fit, exactly due re-

ward

think, after

ical history,

and

all,

the sublimest part of

culmination,

its

from the American people.

currently issuing

know

nothing grander,

better exercise, better digestion,

positive proof

of the past, the triumphant result of faith in

than

kind,

a well

polit-

contested

American

humannational

election.

Then passage

still

these pages.

the thought returns

(like

overtures), giving the key

When

pass to and

the thread-

and echo to

fro, different lati-

tudes, different seasons, beholding the crowds of the

great nati,

cities.

New

York, Boston, Philadelphia, Cincin-

Chicago, St Louis, San Francisco,

Baltimore — when

swarms

New Orleans,

mix with these interminable

of alert, turbulent, good-natured, independ-

ent citizens, mechanics, clerks,

young persons—at

the idea of this mass of men, so fresh and loving and so proud, a singular

awe

falls

free,

upon me.

with dejection and amazement, that among our geniuses and talented writers or speakers, few I

feel,

none have yet really spoken to this people, created a single image-making work for them, or absorb'd the central spirit and the idiosyncrasies which or

are theirs— and which, thus, in highest ranges, so far

remain entirely uncelebrated, unexpressed. Dominion strong is the body's; dominion stronger [89]

;

Collect

intellect, is

What

the mind's.

has

and

fill'd,

fills

our fancy, furnishing the standards therein,

The

yet foreign.

great poems, Shakspere included,

are poisonous to the idea of the pride

the ^

common

The models

people, the life-blood

of our literature, as

and bask'd and grown of princes' favors.

get

from other

sunshine;

in castle

Of workers

many

learn'd,

touch'd by the national

in courts, all

smells

of a certain sort,

have indeed, plenty, contributing elegant,

and dignity of of democracy.

have had their birth

lands, ultra-marine,

many

to-day our

after their

complacent.

all

test, or tried

kind

But

by the stand-

ards of democratic personality, they wither to ashes. I

say

have not seen a single

writer, artist, lecturer,

or what-not, that has confronted the voiceless but

ever erect and active, pervading, underlying will and typic aspiration of the land, in a spirit kindred to itself.

Do you

American poets tareen,

drama,

call

paste-pot

those genteel

Do you term

taste, verse ?

think

hear,

some mountain-top

laugh of the Genius of these States.

Democracy

afar in the

in silence,

creatures

that perpetual, pis-

American

work,

little

art,

American

echoed as from

West, the scornful

biding

its

time, ponders

own ideals, not of literature and art only â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not The idea of the women of men only, but of women.

its

of America (extricated from this daze, this fossil and

which hangs about the word lady), develop'd, raised to become the robust equals, unhealthy

air

[90]

Collect

may be, even practical and political with the men — greater than man, we may

workers, and, deciders

admit, through their divine maternity, always their

towering, emblematical attribute

man,

rate, as

—but

departments;

in all

of being so, soon as they realize

any

great, at

or, rather,

capable

and can bring themselves to give up toys and fictions, and launch forth, as men do, amid real, independent, stormy life. it,

Then, as towards our thought's that,

finals (and,

overarching the true scholar's lesson),

to say there can be

no complete or

have

epical presentation

of democracy in the aggregate, or anything like at this day,

because

its

any one branch, when, in Far, far, the root and centre.

deed, stretch, in distance, our Vistas is still

to be disentangled, freed

make

the

final

this

authority and reliance

say democracy

on and come to in

How

long

takes

in itself,

is,

politics,

and

for a party

flower and

fruits in

name

may

pass

manners,

the highest forms of interaction between men,

and

their beliefs

schools in

in-

How much

only of use there that its

all,

suppose democracy was

friend,

only for elections, for I

American world see that

Did you, too,

it,

doctrines will only be effec-

tually incarnated in their spirit

the

—

in religion, literature, colleges,

— democracy

in all

army and navy.*

* The whole present system of the navy of these States, and the spirit and

public and private

have intimated

ofificering

life,

and

that, as a

and personnel of the army and and

letter of their trebly-aristocratic rules

[91]

Collect

paramount scheme, it has yet few or no full realizers and believers. do not see, either, that it owes any I

serious thanks to noted propagandists or champions,

or has been essentially help'd,

by them.

has been and

though often harm'd, carried on by all the

moral forces, and by trade, finance, machinery, inter-

by all the developand can no more be stopp'd than

communications, and,

ments of history,

the tides, or the earth in it

crude and

resides,

of the

fair

mainly

fact,

Doubtless, also,

its orbit.

latent, well

down

the hearts

average of the American-born people,

the agricultural regions.

But

it is

not yet,

there or anywhere, the fully-receiv'd, the fervid, the

absolute â&#x20AC;˘'^'

faith.

submit, therefore, that the fruition of democracy,

on aught

like a

grand

As, under

future.

scale, resides altogether in

the

any profound and comprehensive

view of the gorgeous-composite feudal world, we see in it, through the long ages and cycles of ages, the results of a deep, integral, human and divine or

principle, ecclesia,

poems

manners,

institutes,

which

issued

laws,

costumes, personalities,

(hitherto unequall'd), faithfully partaking of

their source, it,

from

fountain,

and indeed only arising either to betoken

or to furnish parts of that varied-flowing display,

whose regulations,

much

centre is

was one and

absolute

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

so,

long ages

a monstrous exotic, a nuisance and revolt, and belong here just as

as orders of nobility, or the Pope's council of cardinals.

theory of our army and navy

sensible

and

mitigated fraud.

[92]

true,

I say if the present

then the rest of America

an un-

Collect

hence, shall the due historian or

make

critic

an equal retrospect, an equal history cratic principle.

with

its

results

at least

for the

demo-

too must be adorn'd, credited

— then, when

it,

with imperial power,

through amplest time, has dominated mankind has been the source and test of social, political,

and

the moral, esthetic,

and

religious expressions

tutes of the civilized world spirit,

all

— has

insti-

begotten them

form, and has carried

unprecedented heights

—

had

them

own

its

possible),

(it

monastics and ascetics, more numerous, more de-

vout than the monks and priests of creeds

— has

rectitude

all

sway'd the ages with a breadth and Nature's

tallying

own — has

fashion'd,

systematized, and triumphantly finish'd and carried

own interest, and with unparallel'd success, a new earth and a new man./ Thus we presume to write, as it were, upon out, in

its

things that exist not, and travel by

and a blank.

and

But

maps yet unmade,

the throes of birth are

may

—

us;

seasons

for

then the

have something of this advantage

of strong formations, doubts, suspense

upon

more or less; and then, hot from surrounding war and revolution, our speech, though without polish'd afflatus of

such themes haply

fall

upon

us,

coherence, and a failure by the standard called cism,

comes

forth, real at least as the lightnings.

And may be we, reward

criti-

(for there are

these days, have, too, our yet some, in [93]

all

lands,

own

worthy

Collect

Though not for us the joy

to be so encouraged).

entering at last the conquer'd city

chance ever to see with our

own

— not

and majesty or

far

dynastic

all

among

eligible

being toss'd

— there

principle,

world with effulgence

beyond those of past

sway

ours the

eyes the peerless

power and splendid edat of the democratic arriv'd at meridian, filling the

history's kings,

yet, to

whoever

us, the prophetic vision, the

joy of

the brave turmoil of these times

the promulgation

—

and the path, obedient, lowly

reverent to the voice, the gesture of the god, or holy ghost,

which others see

not, hear not

— with

the

proud consciousness that amid whatever clouds, seductions, or heart-wearying postponements,

have never deserted, never despair'd, never abandon'd the

faith.

/So much

contributed, to be conn'd well, to help

— we aspects — per-

prepare and brace our edifice, our plann'd Idea still

proceed to give

another of

its

haps the main, the high fafade of all. racy, the

average,

leveler, is

the unyielding principle of the

surely join'd another principle, equally

unyielding, closely tracking the it,

For to democ-

first,

indispensable to

opposite (as the sexes are opposite), and

existence, confronting

whose

and ever modifying the other,

often clashing, paradoxical, yet neither of highest avail

without the other, plainly supplies to these

and to the launch'dmortal dangers of republicanism, to-day or any

grand cosmic forth

politics of ours,

[943

Collect

day, the counterpart and offset whereby Nature restrains the deadly original relentlessness of all her first-class laws. This second principle is individuality,

the pride and centripetal isolation of a

being

himself— identity

ever the name,

— personalism.

human What-

acceptance and thorough infusion

its

through the organizations of

commonalty

political

now

shooting Aurora-like about the world, are of utmost importance, as the principle itself is needed for

very

life 's

sake.

forms, in a sort, or

to form,

the compensating balance-wheel of the successful

working machinery of aggregate America. ^ And, if we think of it, what does civilization itself rest

upon

— and

what

but

religions, arts, schools, &c.,

personalism?

toward such

result

that,

like Nature's scale,

all

object has

its

claims

its

because

on anything

alone,

breaks up the limitless fallows of

humankind, and plants the seed, and gives that

with

rich, luxuriant, varied

bends; and

democracy

it,

now precede

the

rest.

The

fair

play,

literature,

songs, esthetics, &c., of a country are of importance principally because they furnish the materials

suggestions of personality for the

women

of that country, and enforce them effective

ways.*

* After the signally toil'd.

Accordingly

They

and men

a thousand

As the topmost claim of a strong

rest is satiated, all interest

never flags there.

and

too, in

all

culminates in the

in this field

ages,

all

field

of persons, and

have the great poets and

lands,

have been

literatuses

creators, fashioning,

making types of men and women, as Adam and Eve are made in the divine fable. Behold, shaped, bred by orientalism, feudalism, through their long growth and culmination, and breeding back in return (when shall we have an equal series, typi-

—

[95]

Collect

consolidating of the nationality of these States,

is,

by such powerful compaction can the separate States secure that full and free swing within their spheres, which is becoming to them, each after its kind, so will individuality, with unimpeded that only

branchings, flourish best under imperial republican forms.

Assuming Democracy to be

bryo condition, and that the only large and factory justification of

em-

at present in its

satis-

resides in the future, mainly

through the copious production of perfect characters

among

the people, and through the advent of a sane

and pervading religiousness,

atmosphere and spaciousness

fit

with regard to the for

such characters,

and of certain nutriment and cartoon-draftings proper for them, and indicating them for New-World purposes, that

new

exploration, as of cal of in

democracy ? )

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; an

continue the present statement

ground, wherein,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; behold, commencing

what beginning we know,

in the

in primal Asia

other

(apparently formulated,

gods of the mythologies, and coming

down

few samples out of the countless product, bequeath'd to the moderns, bequeath'd to America as studies. For the men, Yudishtura, Rama, Arjuna, Solomon,

thence), a

most of the Old and

New

Testament characters;

Achilles, Ulysses, Theseus, Pro-

metheus, Hercules, y^neas, Plutarch's heroes; the Merlin of Celtic bards;

the Cid,

Arthur and his knights, Siegfried and Hagen in the Nihelungen; Roland and Oliver;

Roustam

in the

Shah-Nemah; and

Shakspere's Hamlet, Richard

These,

II,,

so on to Milton's Satan, Cervantes'

Don

Quixote,

Marc Antony, &c., and the modern Faust.

Lear,

say, are models, combined, adjusted to other standards than America's,

but of priceless value to her and hers.

Among women,

the goddesses of the Egyptian, Indian and Greek mythologies,

certain Bible characters, especially the traits

Holy Mother; Cleopatra, Penelope; the porthe Oriana, Una, &c.

of Brunhelde and Chriemhilde in the Nihelungen;

modern Consuelo, Walter

Scott's Jeanie

and

portray 'd or outlin'd a* her best, or as perfect

seems to me,

fully

appear in literature.)

[96]

Effie

;

Deans, &c., &c.

human mother,

(Yet

woman

does not hitherto,

Collect

must do the best can, leaving it to those w^ho come after me to do much better. (The service, in fact, if any, must be to break a sort of first path or track, no matter how rude and primitive surveyors,

ungeometrical.)

We Yet

have frequently printed the word Democracy.

cannot too often repeat that

real gist of

which

still

unawaken'd,

notwithstanding the resonance and the

tempests out of which

pen or tongue.

It is

syllables

its

word the

sleeps, quite

many angry

have come, from

a great word,

whose

history,

suppose, remains unwritten, because that history has yet to be enacted.

some

sort,

younger

brother of another great and often-used word. Nature,

whose

history also waits unwritten.

perceive,

the tendencies of our day, in the States (and

en-

toward those vast and sweeping movements, influences, moral and physical, respect them),

tirely

now and always

of humanity, planet,

Then

are

over the

current

on the scale of the impulses of the elements.

it is

also

good to reduce the whole matter

the consideration of a single

on permanent grounds.

self,

Even

a man, a

for the

woman,

treatment of

the universal, in politics, metaphysics, or anything,

sooner or

later

we come down

to one single, solitary

soul.

There

is,

thought that else,

sanest hours,

rises,

independent,

a consciousness, a lifted

calm, like the stars, shining eternal.

out from

This

all

the

Collect

thought of identity

mine

are, as

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; yours

me.

for

most

you, whoever you

for

beyond

Miracle of miracles,

and vaguest of earth's dreams, yet hardest basic fact, and only entrance to statement,

all facts.

significant

spiritual

such devout hours,

vision,

the

fall

(significant

the centre), creeds, con-

away and become

simple idea.

this

the midst of the

wonders of heaven and earth

only because of the ventions,

of no account before

Under the luminousness of

alone takes possession, takes value.

shadowy dwarf

looked upon,

real

the fable, once liberated and

expands over the whole earth, and

spreads to the roof of heaven.

J The quality of Being, to

its

own

central idea

the object's

self,

according

and purpose, and of growing

therefrom and thereto â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not criticism by other standthe lesson of ards, and adjustments thereto â&#x20AC;&#x201D; is

Nature.

True, the

absorbs; but

if,

full

man

wisely gathers,

engaged disproportionately

culls,

in that,

he slights or overlays the precious idiocrasy and special nativity self,

and intention that he

the main thing,

general cultivation.

a failure,

Thus,

is,

the man's

however wide

his

our times, refinement

and delicatesse are not only attended to

sufficiently,

but threaten to eat us up,

Already the

like a cancer.

democratic genius watches, ill-pleased, these tendencies.

Provision for a

little

virtue, justification of

whatever

is,

healthy rudeness, savage

what one has

demanded. [98]

in one's

Negative

self,

qualities,

Collect

even deficiencies, would be a

Singleness and

relief.

normal simplicity and separation, amid this more and more complex, more and more artificialized state of society

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;how

pensively

we would welcome In

yearn for them!

their return!

balanceâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; we

what weight we current ones.

any

feel called

enough upon to throw rate

can, not for absolute reasons, but

ever cram and

how

some such direction, then â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

to preserve the

prune, gather, trim, conform, and

and be genteel and proper, the pressure of our days. While aware that much stuff,

can be said even that

what

behalf of

now

have not

demanded

all

this,

to consider the question of

to serve a half-starved

barous nation, or set of nations, but what applicable,

most

perceive

pertinent, for

and is

bar-

most

numerous congeries

of conventional, over-corpulent societies, already be-

coming

stifled

literature,

and

and rotten with polite conformity

to established sciences,

flatulent, infidelistic

and

art.

In addition

suggest a science as

were of healthy average personalism, on original-universal grounds, the object of which should be to raise

up and supply through the States a copious race of superb American men and women, cheerful, religious, ahead of any yet known. America has yet morally and artistically originated nothing. She seems singularly unaware that the models of persons, books, manners, &c., appropriate for former conditions and for European lands, are but [99]

Collect

and exotics here. No current of her life, as shown on the surfaces of what is authoritatively exiles

called her society, accepts

esthetic

against

democracy; but Never,

it.

or runs into social

the currents set squarely

all

the Old World,

was thoroughly

upholster'd exterior appearance and show, mental

and

other, built entirely

on the idea of caste, and on

the sufficiency of mere outside acquisition

were

— never

more the test, the elevated as head and sample

glibness, verbal intellect,

emulation

— than

— more

loftily

they are on the surface of our republican

The writers of a time hint the mottoes of its gods. The word of the modern, say these voices, is the word Culture. States this day.

We find ourselves abruptly in the enemy.

This word Culture, or what

to represent, involves,

contrast, our

and has been, indeed, the ment.

close quarters with

Certain

has come

whole theme,

spur, urging us to engage-

questions

arise.

now

taught,

accepted and carried out, are not the processes of culture rapidly creating a class of supercilious infidels,

who in

believe in nothing?

Shall a

man

lose himself

countless masses of adjustments, and be so shaped

and the other, that the simply good and healthy and brave parts of him are reduced and clipped away, like the bordering of tiox You can cultivate corn and roses and in a garden? but who shall cultivate the mountain orchards

with reference to

this, that,

—

peaks, the ocean, and the tumbling gorgeousness of [100]

Collect

the clouds?

Lastly

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

the readily-given reply that

culture only seeks to help, systematize, and put in

elements of

attitude, the

fertility

and power, a con-

clusive reply?

do not so much object to the name, or word,

but

should certainly

States,

on a

radical

insist, for

change of category,

bution of precedence.

gramme

of culture,

the purposes of these the distri-

should demand a pro-

drawn

out, not for a single class

alone, or for the parlors or lecture-rooms, but with

an eye to practical

life,

the West, the working-men,

the facts of farms and jack-planes and engineers, and of the broad range of the

and working

women

also of the middle

and with reference to the perfect equality of women, and of a grand and powerful motherhood. should demand of this programme or theory a scope generous enough to include the strata,

widest

human

area.

must have

meaning the formation of a

for

its

spinal

typical personality of

character, eligible to the uses of the high average

men

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and not restricted by conditions

to the masses.

The

ineligible

best culture will always be that

manly and courageous instincts, and loving aiming to form, perceptions, and of self-respect

of the

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

over this continent, an idiacrasy of universalism,

which, true child of America, will bring joy to mother, returning to her

myriads of offspring, ant,

devout believers

her

own

spirit,

its

recruiting

able, natural, perceptive, tolerin her, [101]

America, and with some

Collect

why

most

vast,

now and

and

for

what she has

most formidable of

historic births,

definite instinct

with

here,

wonderful

step,

arisen,

and

is,

journeying

through Time.

The problem,

New

World,

is,

seems to me, presented to the under permanent law and order, and it

cohesion (ensemble-Individuality),

after preserving

hazards, to vitalize man's free play of special

all

Personalism, recognizing

something that

calls

ever more to be consider'd, fed, and adopted as the

substratum for the best that belongs to us (govern-

ment indeed

is for it),

including the

new

esthetics of

our future.

formulate beyond this present vagueness

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to

help line and put before us the species, or a speci-

men

of the species, of the democratic ethnology of

the future,

work toward which the genius

of our

land, with peculiar encouragement, invites her well-

Already certain limnings, more or less

wishers.

grotesque,

appear'd.

We,

will try

or less fading and watery,

have

too (repressing doubts and qualms),

our hand.

Attempting, then, however crudely, a basic model or portrait of personality for general use for the

man-

most useful which is most simple and comprehensive for all, and toned low enough), we should prepare the canvas well beforehand. Parentage must consider itself in liness of the States

advance.

(and doubtless that

(Will the time hasten [102]

when

fatherhood

Collect

and motherhood

become

shall

noblest science?)

To our model,

strong- fibred physique, tions of food, drink, tion,

a science

air,

— and

the

a clear-blooded,

indispensable; the ques-

exercise, assimilation, diges-

can never be intermitted. Out of these we descry

a well-begotten selfhood

—

emotional, aspiring,

of adventure; at maturity,

full

youth, fresh, ardent,

brave, perceptive, under control, neither too talkative

nor too reticent, neither flippant nor sombre; of the

movements easy, the complexion showing the best blood, somewhat flush'd, breast expanded, an erect attitude, a voice whose sound

bodily figure, the

outvies music, eyes of calm and steady gaze, yet

capable also of flashing that holds

(For

it is

dows

its

own

— and

the

a general presence

company

of the highest.

native personality, and that alone, that en-

man

to stand before presidents or generals,

or in any distinguish'd collection, with aplomb

— md

not culture, or any knowledge or intellect whatever.)

With regard

to the mental-educational part of our

model, enlargement of the

intellect, stores of cephalic

knowledge, &c., the concentration thitherward of all

the customs of our age, especially

America,

so overweening, and provides so fully for that part, that,

important and necessary as

nothing from us here

warning and

really

— except, indeed, a

restraint.

though important,

it is, it

needs

phrase of

Manners, costumes, too,

we need

not dwell upon here.

Like beauty, grace of motion, &c., they are results. [103]

Collect

Causes, original things, being attended

to,

the right

manners unerringly follow. Much is said, among '' artists, of the grand style," as if it were a thing by itself. When a man, artist or whoever, has health, pride, acuteness, noble aspirations, he has the mo-

The

tive-elements of the grandest style.

manipulation (yet that

Leaving

still

rest is

but

no small matter).

unspecified several sterling parts of

any model fit for the future personality of America, I must not fail, again and ever, to pronounce myself on one, probably the least attended to in modern times

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a

hiatus, indeed, threatening its gloomiest

consequences

after us.

mean the

simple, unso-

phisticated Conscience, the primary moral element.

were asked to specify in what quarter lie the grounds of darkest dread, respecting the America of If

our hopes, I

should

should have to point to this particular.

demand the

viduality, this

day and any day, of that

plumb-rule

true

of persons,

triumphant modern

and

his

invariable application to indi-

wondrous

civilizee,

old, ever-

nations.

eras,

Our

with his all-schooling

appliances, will

still

show

himself

but an amputation while this deficiency remains.

Beyond (assuming a more hopeful tone), the vertebration of the manly and womanly personalism of our Western world, can only be, and is, indeed, to be /

hope)

The

its

all-penetrating Religiousness.

ripeness of Religion

doubtless to be looked

for in this field of individuality, [104]

and

a result that

— Collect

no organization or church can ever achieve. As history is poorly retain'd by what the technists call history, and is not given out from their pages, except the learner has

himself the sense of the well-

wrapt, never yet written, perhaps impossible to be written, history

— so Religion,

although casually

ar-

rested, and, after a fashion, preserv'd in the churches

and creeds, does not depend

at all

upon them, but

when greatest, way, but in new ways

a part of the identified soul, which,

knows not

bibles in the old

the identified soul, which can really confront Religion

when

and not

extricates itself entirely from the churches, before.

Personalism fuses

this,

and favors

it.

should

say, indeed, that only in the perfect uncontamination

and

solitariness of individuality

of religion positively

and on

such

come

terms,

may

forth at

the spirituality

Only

all.

here,

the meditation,

the devout

Only

communion

ecstasy, the soaring flight.

here,

with the mysteries, the eternal problems, whence, and whither ? Alone, and identity, and the mood

—

the

soul

emerges, and

sermons, melt

away

all

statements,

like vapors.

thought and awe, and aspiration

Alone, and silent

— and then the

terior consciousness, like a hitherto tion, in

magic

the sense.

ink,

Bibles

churches,

unseen inscrip-

beams out i^ wondrous

may

in-

lines to

convey, and priests expound,

exclusively for the noiseless operation of one's isolated Self, to enter the pure ether of veneration,

but

it is

•

[105]

Collect

reach the divine levels, and

commune

v^ith the

un-

utterable.

practically enter into politics

an important

To every young man,

part of American personalism.

North and South, earnestly studying these things, should here, as an

now

pages,

offset to

also say, that

largest scope, after

all,

what have I

may

said in former

be to views of very

perhaps the

(perhaps

political

the literary and sociological), America goes best about its

development

porary sight,

its

own way â&#x20AC;&#x201D; sometimes,

appaling enough.

the

to tem-

fashion

and fops (perhaps myself am not guiltless) to decry the whole formulation of the active politics of America, as beyond redemption, and to be carefully kept away from. See you that you do not fall into this error. America, it may be, is doing very well upon the whole, notwithstanding

among

dillettants

these antics of the parties and their leaders, these half-brain'd nominees, the

many

ignorant ballots, and

many

elected failures and blatherers.

tants,

and

all

who

shirk their duty,

you

It is

who are

the

dillet-

not doing

more strongly advise every young man to do so. yet into politics. Always inform yourself; always do the best you can; always vote. Disengage yourself from parties. They have been useful, and to some extent remain so; but the floating, uncommitted electors, farmers, clerks, watching aloof, mechanics, the masters of parties well.

for

you,

advise

to enter

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

inclining victory this side or that side [io6]

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; such are the

Collect

ones most needed, present and future. if

eligible at

all

and

to downfall

not without; for

For America,

ruin, is eligible

within

see clearly that the

com-

bined foreign world could not beat her down.

But

herself,

these savage, wolfish parties alarm me.

law but and

less

their

own

will,

Owning no

more and more combative, ensemble and of

less tolerant of the idea of

equal brotherhood, the perfect equality of the States,

the ever-overarching American ideas, to

convey yourself

implicitly to

behooves you

no party, nor submit

blindly to their dictators, but steadily hold yourself

judge and master over

all

of them./

So much (hastily toss'd together, and leaving far more unsaid), for an ideal, or intimations of an ideal, toward American manhood. But the other sex, in our land, requires at least a basis of suggestion. I

have seen a young American woman, one of a

large family of daughters,

who, some years

since,

home to one of own support. She

migrated from her meagre country the Northern

cities,

to gain her

soon became an expert seamstress, but finding the employment too confining for health and comfort, she went boldly to work for others, to house-keep, After trying several places, she fell cook, clean, &c.

upon one where she was

suited.

She has told

that she finds nothing degrading in her position;

me it is

not inconsistent with personal dignity, self-respect,

and the respect of others. She confers benefits and She has good health; her presence receives them. [107]

Collect

itself is

healthy and bracing; her character

stain'd;

she has

made

herself understood,

un-

and pre-

serves her independence, and has been able to help

her parents, and educate and get places for her sisters;

and her course of

life is

not without opportunities for

mental improvement, and of

much

quiet, uncosting

happiness and love. 1

have seen another v^oman who, from taste and

necessity conjoin'd, has gone into practical

affairs,

on a mechanical business, partly works at it herself, dashes out more and more into real hardy carries

life,

not abash'd by the coarseness of the con-

knows how

tact,

time, holds her

to be firm and silent at the

own

same

with unvarying coolness and de-

corum, and will compare, any day, with superior

and even boatmen and drivers. For all that, she has not lost the charm of the womanly nature, but preserves and bears it fully, though through such rugged presentation. carpenters, farmers,

Then there is the wife of a mechanic, mother of two children, a woman of merely passable English education, but of fine wit, with

and

intuitions,

who

all

her sex's grace

exhibits, indeed,

female personality, that

such a noble

fain to record

here.

Never abrogating her own proper independence, but always genially preserving it, and what belongs to it

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; cooking, washing, child-nursing, house-tending â&#x20AC;&#x201D; she beams sunshine out of

them

illustrious.

all

these duties, and makes

Physiologically sweet and sound, [io8]

Collect

loving work, practical, she yet

knows

that there are

however few, devoted to recreation, music, leisure, hospitality and affords such intervals. Whatever she does, and wherever she is, that charm, intervals,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

that indescribable perfume of genuine

womanhood

attends her, goes with her, exhales from her, which

belongs of right to

all

the sex, and

the invariable atmosphere and

is,

or ought to be,

common

aureola of old

as well as young.

dear mother once described to

a resplen-

down on Long Island, whom she knew days. She was known by the name of the

dent person, in early

She was well toward eighty years old, of happy and sunny temperament, had always lived on a farm, and was very neighborly, sensible and discreet, an invariable and welcomed favorite, espePeacemaker.

cially

with young married women.

She had numer-

ous children and grandchildren. She was uneducated, but possess'd a native dignity.

She had come to be

a tacitly agreed upon domestic regulator, settler of difficulties, shepherdess,

judge,

and reconciler

She was a sight to draw near and look upon, with her large figure, her profuse snow-white hair (uncoiFd by any head-dress or cap), dark eyes, clear complexion, sweet breath, and peculiar personal

the land.

magnetism.

The foregoing out of

line

portraits,

admit, are frightfully

from these imported models of womanly

personalityâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the stock feminine characters of the cur[109]

Collect

rent novelist, or of the foreign court

poems (Ophelias,

Enids, princesses, or ladies of one thing or another)

which fill the envying dreams of so many poor girls, and are accepted by our men, too, as supreme ideals of feminine excellence to be sought after.

But

pre-

sent mine just for a change.

(we will not now stop to heed them here, but they must be heeded) of something more revolutionary. The day is coming when the deep questions of woman's entrance amid

Then

there are mutterings

the arenas of practical will not only

life,

be argued

put to decision, and

real

politics,

all

the suffrage, &c.,

around

us,

but

may

experiment.

Of course, in these States, for both man and woman, we must entirely recast the types of highest personality from what the oriental, feudal, ecclesiastical

worlds bequeath

us,

and which yet possess the

imaginative and esthetic fields of the United States, pictorial

and

melodramatic,

not

without

use as

making sad work, and forming a strange anachronism upon the scenes and exigencies around Of course, the old undying elements remain. us. The task is, to successfully adjust them to new combinations, our own days. Nor is this so incredible. can conceive a community, to-day and here, in which, on a sufficient scale, the perfect personalities, without noise meet say in some pleasant Western settlement or town, where a couple of hundred best men and women, of ordinary worldly status, have by studies, but

;

[no]

Collect

luck been

drawn

together, with nothing extra of

genius or wealth, but virtuous, chaste, industrious,

and devout.

cheerful, resolute, friendly

community organized

ceive such a

powers judiciously delegated

running order,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; farming,

trade, courts, mails, schools, elections,

;

and then the

rest of

bearing golden

and old man,

fruit.

all

attended

each individual, and

every young

every

woman after

can see there,

after his kind,

building,

the main thing, freely

life,

branching and blossoming

can con-

and

hers, a true personality, develop'd, exercised propor-

tionately in body, mind, this case as in

and

spirit.

one not necessarily

can imagine

rare or difficult,

but

buoyant accordance with the municipal and general

requirements of our times.

And

can realize

the culmination of something better than any stereo-

typed eclat of history or poems.

Perhaps^ unsung,

undramatized, unput in essays or biographies

haps even some such community already Ohio,

Illinois,

fulfilling itself, life,

all

Missouri, or somewhere,

and thus outvying,

that has been hitherto

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; per-

exists, in

practically

cheapest vulgar

shown

best ideal

pictures.

and to sum up, America, betaking herself to formative action (as it is about time for more solid achievement, and less windy promise), must,

/In

short,

for her purposes, cease to recognize a

acter

grown

merely

theory of char-

of feudal aristocracies, or form'd

literary standards, or [III]

from any ultramarine,

Collect

full-dress formulas of culture, polish, caste, &c.,

must

sternly promulgate her

own new

and

standard, yet

old enough, and accepting the old, the perennial ^\

elements, and combining them into groups, unities, appropriate to the modern, the democratic, the West,

and to the practical occasions and needs of our own cities, and of the agricultural regions. Ever the most

common. Ever the fresh breeze of lake, is more than any palpitation

precious in the field,

hill,

of fans, though of ivory, and redolent with perfume;

and the

air is

more than the

And now,

costliest perfumes.

mit to beg our absolution from or

goes

along

with,

venerable shade!

all

we have

yours, with

all

not inter-

that genuinely

even Culture.

The whole

of your office.

we know,

we may

for fear of mistake,

Pardon

is,

us,

seem'd to speak lightly civilization of the earth,

the glory and the light

own

and seeking to tally the loftiest teachings of it, that we aim For you, too, mighty ministhese poor utterances. ter! know that there is something greater than you, thereof

It is,

namely, the

indeed, in your

last,

vise

your

needed help, to

the

country and our days.

much

and promulge along with

a deeper, principle.

World

including in

best,

vitalize

too

our

Thus we pronounce not so

against the principle of culture;

it,

From

fresh, eternal qualities of Being.

them, and by them, as you,

evoke the

spirit,

it,

we only super-

as deep, perhaps

As we have shown the itself

New

the all-leveling aggregate

[112]

Collect

of democracy, varied,

we show

all-permitting,

also including the

all-free

theorem of

all-

individ-

and erecting therefor a lofty and hitherto unoccupied framework or platform, broad enough for uality,

all,

eligible to

every farmer and mechanic

— to

the

— a towering selfhood, perfect only — not with the

female equally with the male

not physically

satisfied

mere mind's and

learning's

but religious,

stores,

possessing the idea of the infinite (rudder and compass sure amid this troublous voyage, o'er darkest, wildest wave, through progress)

nation's

or that

—

known humanity,

hesion to

itself,

stormiest wind, of man's realizing,

above the

deepest sense,

purposes beyond

for

rest,

fair

— and

ad-

that,

most important with reference to the immortal, the unknown, the spiritual, the only permanently real, which as the finally,

the personality of mortal

ocean waits each and

for

life is

and receives the

rivers,

waits for us

all.

Much

there, yet,

demanding

line

and outline

our Vistas, not only on these topics, but others quite unwritten.

expand

it,

Indeed,

through

could talk the matter, and

lifetime.

But

return to our original premises.

necessary to

view of them,

have again pointedly to confess that

all

the objec-

tive grandeurs. of the world, for highest purposes,

yield themselves up, and

Here, and here only,

all

depend on mentality balances,

all rests.

mind, which alone builds the permanent VOL. v.—8.

["3]

alone.

For the edifice,

Collect

haughtily builds

lows

it,

with what

the unknown.

endow a fill

known, and a prophecy of

literature

take expression, to incarnate, to

with grand and archetypal models

with pride and love the utmost capacity, and

to achieve spiritual meanings,

and suggest the future

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; these, and these only, satisfy the soul. not say one word against

know

fol-

are convey'd to mortal sense the culminations

of the materialistic, the

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to

itself.

real materials;

must

but the wise

do not become real till touched by Did we call the latter imponemotions, the mind. that they

Ah,

derable ?

let

us rather proclaim that the slight-

ephemera of passions arous'd by orators and tale-tellers, are more dense, more weighty than the engines there in the great est song-tune, the countless

factories, or

the granite blocks

in their

foundations.

Approaching thus the momentous spaces, and considering with reference to a sonalism, the

needs and

new and

greater per-

possibilities of

American

imaginative literature, through the medium-light of

what we have already

broach'd,

will at

once be

appreciated that a vast gulf of difference separates the present accepted condition of these spaces, inclusive of

what

floating in them, from

justed to, or

fit

for,

any condition ad-

the world, the America, there

sought to be indicated, and the copious races of complete

men and women,

outlined.

than

lies

is,

along these Vistas crudely

some

sort,

less a difference

between that long-continued nebular ["4]

state

Collect

and vagueness of the astronomical worlds, compared with

the

subsequent

state,

the

defmitely-form'd

worlds themselves, duly compacted, clustering in sytems, hung up there, chandeliers of the universe, beholding and mutually serving for ground of

gar

uses— yet

fill!

other's

lights, all

vul-

more as an undying chain proofs and shows. A bound-

still

and echelon of spiritual less field to

by each

substantial foothold,

all

serving

lit

A new

creation, with

needed orbic

works launch'd forth, to revolve in free and lawful circuits— to move, self-poised, through the ether, and shine like heaven's own suns! With such, and nothing less, we suggest that New World literature, fit to rise upon, cohere, and signalize in time, these States.

What, however, do we more definitely mean by New World literature ? Are we not doing well enough here already? Are not the United States this day busily using, working, more printer's type, more presses, than any other country ? uttering and absorbing more publications than any other ? Do not our publishers fatten quicker and deeper? (helping themselves, under shelter of a delusive and sneaking law, or rather absence of law, to most of their forage, poetical, pictorial, historical, romantic,

without

money and without

price

sisting the timidest proposal to will is

come under

to dispel

it.

this I

— and

pay

for

delusion— but

say that a nation [IIS]

even comic, fiercely reit.)

may

Many purpose

hold and

Collect

circulate rivers

and oceans of very readable

print,

journals, magazines, novels, library-books, ''poetry,"

— such as the States to-day possess and circulate — of unquestionable aid and value — hundreds of &c.

new volumes here,

annually composed and brought out

respectable

enough, indeed

smartness and erudition

unsurpass'd

further hundreds, or

by thrown into the market

rather millions (as tion'd), also

— with

free forage or theft

aforemen-

— and

yet,

all

the while, the said nation, land, strictly speaking,

may

possess no literature at

all.

Repeating our inquiry, what, then, do

real literature? especially

ture of the future ?

clues are inferential, best,

we mean

the democratic

litera-

Hard questions to meet. The and turn us to the past. At

can only offer suggestions, comparisons,

circuits.

must still be reiterated, as, for the purpose of these memoranda, the deep lesson of history and It

time, that

all

age, through

else in the contributions of a nation or its politics,

ties, military eclat,

materials, heroic personali-

&c., remains crude,

and

defers, in

any close and thorough-going estimate, until vitalized by national, original archetypes in literature.

They only put

the nation in form, finally

tell

any-

complete any thing — perpetuate any-

thing—prove, thing. Without doubt, some of the richest and most powerful and populous communities of the antique world, and some of the grandest personalities and [ii6]

Collect

events, have, to after

unbequeath'd.

entirely

selves

and present times,

than any that have come

left

Doubtless,

down

themgreater

were among those lands, heroisms, persons, that have not come down to us at all, even by name, date, or location. Others have arrived safely, as from voyages over to us,

The

wide, century-stretching seas.

little

miracles that have buoy'd them, and

ships, the

incredible

chances safely convey'd them (or the best of them,

meaning and essence) over long wastes, darkness, lethargy, ignorance, &c., have been a few inscriptionsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;a few immortal compositions, small in size, yet compassing what measureless values of

their

contemporary

reminiscence,

idioms and

beliefs,

thought, to

tie

and the

old,

and touch forever the old, new body, new soul! These! and still these! bearAll

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; dearer than

call

Old and

New

Eschylus, Plato, Juvenal, &c. think,

pride

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; dearer

the best experience of humanity,

folded, saved, freighted to us here.

tiny ships

manners,

with deepest inference, hint and

ing the freight so dear

than love.

portraitures,

we were

Some

of these

Testament, Homer,

Precious minims!

forced to choose, rather than have

you, and the likes of you, and what belongs

has grown of you, blotted out and gone,

to,

and

could

would be, to lose all by wharf, or floating on

better afford, appaling as that actual ships, this

day fasten 'd

wave, and see them, with

all

and sent to the bottom. [117]

their cargoes, scuttled

Collect

Gathered by geniuses of

by them

and put

city, race, or age,

highest of art's forms, namely, the

liter-

ary form, the peculiar combinations and the out-

shows of

that city, age, or race,

its

particular

of the universal attributes and passions,

its

modes faiths,

heroes, lovers and gods, wars, traditions, struggles, crimes,

emotions, joys

selfhood and

its

could

all

make up

experiences

and highest,

ply, indispensable

thing else

the

subtle

spirit

been pass'd on to us to illumine our

these), having

own

(or

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; what they

sup-

taken away, no-

the world's boundless storehouses

to us, or ever again return.

For us, along the great highways of time, those

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; those

monuments stand beauty. nights.

Hindus, epic

;

forms

of majesty and

For us those beacons burn through

all

the

Unknown Egyptians, graving hieroglyphs; with hymn and apothegm and endless

Hebrew

prophet, with spirituality, as in flashes

of lightning, conscience like red-hot iron, plaintive

songs and screams of vengeance

for tyrannies

and

enslavement; Christ, with bent head, brooding love

and peace,

a dove;

Greek,

creating

eternal

shapes of physical and esthetic proportion; Roman, lord

of satire, the sword, and the codex;

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;of

the

figures,

some

visible;

Dante, stalking with lean form, nothing but

fibre,

far off

and

veil'd,

others nearer and

not a grain of superfluous flesh; Angelo, and

the great painters, architects, musicians; rich Shakspere, luxuriant as the sun, artist [Ii8]

and singer of feu-

Collect

sunset, with

dalism

owner

thereof,

its

the gorgeous colors,

all

and using them at will; and so to such as German Kant and Hegel, where they, though near us, leaping over the ages,

sit

again, impassive,

imperturbable, like the Egyptian gods.

and the

like of these, is

these,

too much, indeed, to re-

turn to our favorite figure, and view

and systems of orbs, moving

them

as orbs

paths

free

spaces of that other heaven, the kosmic

intellect,

the the

soul?

Ye powerful and resplendent ones! ye were, in your atmospheres, grown not for America, but rather for her foes, the feudal is

and the old

democratic and modern.

but breathe your breath of nostrils

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;while our genius

Yet could ye, indeed,

life

into our

to enslave us, as

now,

to say

World's

but, for our

own â&#x20AC;&#x201D; perhaps

needs, to breed a spirit like your (dare

New

to dominate, even

destroy,

what you yourselves have left! On your plane, and no less, but even higher and wider, must we mete demand races and measure for to-day and here. of orbic bards, with unconditional uncompromising I

sway.

Come

forth,

sweet democratic despots of the

West! By points like these we, in reflection, token what we mean by any land's or people's genuine literature. And thus compared and tested, judging amid the influence of loftiest products only, what do our current copious fields of print, covering in manifold [119]

Collect

the United States, better, for an analogy,

forms, present,

than,

of the sea,

regions

certain

those spreading, undulating masses of squid, through

which the whale swimming, with head

half out,

feeds ?

Not but that doubtless our current

so-called liter-

ature (like an endless supply of small coin) performs

and may

a certain service, for

be, too, the service

needed

the time (the preparation service, as children

Everybody

learn to spell).

and truly nearly

reads,

everybody writes, either books, or

The matter has magnitude,

or journals. sort.

for a

But

for the

is it

really

long while

advancing

There

has

? or,

magazines too, after a

advanced

something impressive

about the huge editions of the

dailies

and weeklies,

the mountain-stacks of white paper piled in the

and the proud, crashing, ten-cylinder presses, which can stand and watch any time by press-vaults,

the half hour.

Then (though the

States in the field

of imagination present not a single first-class work,

not a single great literatus), the main objects, to

amuse, to

to pass

titillate,

rhyme and read

and on a

scale of infinity.

To-day,

attain'd,

books,

the rivalry of writers, especially

novelists success (so-call'd),

time, to circulate

the news, and rumors of news, to

rhyme, are yet

away

strikes the

mean

flat,

for

him

common

who

average, the sensational appetite

for stimulus, incident, persiflage, &c.,

the

or her

calibre, sensual, exterior [120]

and life.

depicts, to

To such,

Collect

the luckiest of them, as limitless

While

and

profitable;

this day, or

interior or spiritual

and often laggard

see the audiences are

but they cease presently.

any day, to workmen portraying life, the audiences were limited, but they last forever.

—

Compared with the soars,

past,

and our journals serve

— but

Behold the

think, sub-

prolific

science

and even

ideal

ordinary romantic literature, does not, stantially advance.

'^'

our modern

brood of the

contemporary novel, magazine-tale, theatre-play, &c.

The same

endless thread of tangled and superlative

Amadises

love-story, inherited, apparently from the

and Palmerins of the

13th, 14th,

over there in Europe. tions brought

and more

down

The costumes and

should say, has not

the same, nor more, nor is

— advanced — is'^/

and ogres

just as sensational, just as strain'd

What

associa-

to date, the seasoning hotter

varied, the dragons

but the thing,

and

15 th centuries

out

left

— remains

about

less.

the reason our time, our lands, that

see no fresh local courage, sanity, of our Mississippi, stalwart

Western men,

real

physical facts. Southerners, &c., in the literature ? especially the poetic part of

own— the mental and

body of our it.

But

al-

ways, instead, a parcel of dandies and ennuy^es, dapper

little

gentlemen from abroad,

with their thin sentiment of

who

flood us

parlors, parasols, piano-

songs, tinkling rhymes, the five-hundredth importa-

tion—or whimpering and crying about something, [I2X]

»^

Collect

chasing one aborted conceit after another, and ever occupied

women.

for-

dyspeptic amours with dyspeptic

While, current and novel, the grandest

events and revolutions, and stormiest passions of

with unparallel'd rapid-

history, are crossing to-day ity

and magnificence over the stages of our

all

the continents, offering

new

vistas,

new

opening

materials,

with largest needs, inviting the daring

launching forth of conceptions

by them, soaring

in literature, inspired

highest regions, serving art in

highest (which

its

own and

only the other

name

for serv-

where is the man of letters, where is the book, with any nobler aim than to follow in the old track, repeat what has been ing God, and serving humanity),

said before

^and be

—and,

utmost triumph,

its

sell well,

erudite or elegant ?

Mark the

which

processes, through

roads, the

these States have arrived, standing easy, henceforth ever-equal,

ever-compact,

European adventures African ? old history

own

ible,

blazing bright as

unquestion'd

Columbus down

present

— and

range to-day.

the most antique

They hasten, incredFrom the deeds and days

fire.

to the present, and including the

especially the

late

secession

con them,

see

have not made a mistake, and

feel,

splendid figments of

dream.

Rather,

facts.

when if

? Asiatic or

— miracles—romances

our

their

every

leaf, like

some dream.

stand, live,

move, [122]

war

—

stopping to

fall'n

But

on the is

the huge flow of

Collect

—

our age's materialism

had founded

most

for us the

are these terrible duties they have

The but what

—

us ?

left

Their politics the United States all

have

positive of lands.

founders have pass'd to other spheres

opinion, with

in its spirituality.

have,

their faults, already substantially

establish'd, for good,

on their

own

native, sound,

long-vista'd principles, never to be over-turn'd, offer-

ing a sure basis for

all

the

rest.

With

that, their

future religious forms, sociology, literature, teachers,

schools, costumes,

&c., are of course to

compact whole, uniform, on

make

tallying principles.

For

how can we remain, divided, contradicting ourselves, this way?* say we can only attain harmony and 1

by consulting ensemble and the ethic purports, and faithfully building upon them. For the New World, indeed, after two grand stages of prepstability

aration-strata,

perceive that

now

a third stage, be-

ing ready for (and without which the other

were

useless),

with unmistakable signs appears.

two The

was the planning and putting on record the political foundation rights of immense masses of First stage

people

— indeed

all

people

—

the organization of

republican National, State, and municipal govern* Note, to-day, an its fields,

has already burst well glorious

instructive, curious spectacle

and

conflict.

Science (twin, in

— Science, testing absolutely thoughts, works, upon the world — a sun, mounting, most illuminating, most

of Democracy in

all

its)

all

— surely never again to

session, yet remains (not only literature,

But against it, deeply entrench'd, holding posset. through the churches and schools, but by imaginative

and unregenerate poetry) the fossil theology of the mythic-materialistic, untaught and credulous, fable-loving, primitive ages of humanity.

superstitious,

[123]

Collect

t ments,

all

each to

constructed with reference to each, and

This

all.

for classes,

but

the American programme, not

for universal

man, and

embodied

the compacts of the Declaration of Independence, and, as

began and has

ments, the Federal

governments, with

what

with

Constitution â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

all

its

amend-

the State

and with gen-

their interiors,

those having the sense not only of

suffrage;

eral

now grown,

themselves, but that their certain several

things started, planted, hundreds of others in the ^1

same

direction duly arise

and follow.

The Second J

stage relates to material prosperity, wealth, produce,

labor-saving machines, iron, cotton, local. State and continental railways, intercommunication and trade

with

all

lands, steamships, mining, general

ment, organization of great for

comfort,

cities,

employ-

cheap appliances

numberless technical schools, books,

newspapers, a currency for

The Third stage, make them and

money

circulation, &c.

rising out of the previous, ones, to; all

illustrious,

now,

for one, pro-

mulge, announcing a native expression-spirit, getting into form, adult,

and through mentality,

States, self-contain'd, different

pansive, original

rich

and

free,

for these

from others, more exto be evidenced

authors and poets to come, by American

personalities, plenty of

them, male and female, trav-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and by native none excepted superber tableaux and growths of language, songs, and by a operas, orations, lectures, architecture

ersing the

States,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

[124]

Collect

sublime and serious Religious Democracy sternly taking command, dissolving the old, sloughing off surfaces,

and from

own

its

ciples, reconstructing,

interior

and

vital

prin-

democratizing society./

For America, type of progress, and of essential

man, above

faith in

all

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and wickedness deep it really strikes.

his errors

few suspect how deep, how The world evidently supposes, and we have evidently supposed so too, that the States are merely to achieve the equal franchise, an elective govern-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

ment to inaugurate the respectability of labor, and become a nation of practical operatives, law-abiding, orderly and well off. Yes, those are indeed parts of the task of America; but they not only do

not exhaust the progressive conception, but rather arise,

teeming with

it,

as the

mediums

of deeper,

Daughter of a physical revolution

higher progress.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; mother of the true revolutions, which are of the

in-

and of the arts. For so long as the spirit is not changed, any change of appearance is of no avail. The old men, remember as a boy, were always

terior

life,

talking of American independence.

pendence

Freedom from

those of one's ones.

own

inde-

laws or bonds except

by the universal woman, what is there

being, control'd

lands, to

at last to each,

all

What

man, to

but the inherent soul, nativity, idioc-

rasy, free, highest-poised, soaring in its

own

flight,

following out itself?

At present, these States, [125]

in their

theology and

Collect

social standards

importance than their

(of greater

held possession of

political institutions), are entirely

foreign lands.

of the

New

see the sons and daughters

World, ignorant of

its

genius, not yet in-

augurating the native, the universal, and the near, still

importing the distant, the

see London, Paris, Italy

partial,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not

and the dead.

original, superb,

where they belongâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; but second-hand here, where they do not belong. We see the shreds of Hebrews, Romans, Greeks; but where, on her own soil, do we see, in any faithful, highest, proud expression, America herself? sometimes question whether she as

has a corner

her

own

house.

Not but that in one sense, and a very grand one, good theology, good art, or good literature, has certain features shared in common. The combination fraternizes, ties the races

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

is,

many

under laws applicable indifferently to

all,

particulars,

irrespective

of climate or date, and, from whatever source, ap-

Nevertheless, they touch a

common to man closest

(perhaps only actually touch him) even

in these, in

peals to emotions, pride, love, spirituality,

human kind. their

expression through autochthonic lights

and

shades, flavors, fondnesses, aversions, specific incidents, illustrations, out of his

own

nationality, geog-

The more on

raphy, surroundings, antecedents, &c.

spirit

and the form are one, and depend

asso-

ciation, identity

and

place, than

far

supposed.

Subtly

interwoven with the materiality and personality of a [126]

Collect

land, a

race— Teuton, Turk,

Californian, or

what-not

— there always something — can hardly what — history but describes the results of — is

tell

same

the

some human faces. is full of it— but to

as the untellable look of

Nature, too,

most

it is

her stolid forms,

This something

there a secret.

rooted

the invisible roots, the profoundest meanings of

that place, race, or nationality; and to absorb and

again effuse its

it,

uttering

midst, and carrying

words and products

as from

into highest regions,

the

work, or a main part of the work, of any country's true author, poet, historian, lecturer, and perhaps

even

priest

and philosoph.

Here, and here only, are

the foundations for our really valuable and permanent verse, drama, &c.

But at present (judged by any higher scale than that

which ishly

finds the chief ends of existence to be to fever-

make money during

one-half of

''amusement," or perhaps foreign

it,

and by some

travel, flippantly

time, the other half), and consider'd with ref-

kill

erence to purposes of patriotism, health, a noble personality, religion,

these

swarms

and the democratic adjustments,

all

of poems, literary magazines, dramatic

plays, resultant so far from

American

intellect,

and the

formation of our best ideas, are useless and a mockery. They strengthen and nourish no one, express nothing characteristic, give decision

and purpose to no one,

only the lowest level of vacant minds. Of what is called the drama, or dramatic presenta-

and

suffice

["7l

Collect

tion in the United States, as

theatres,

same

the

should say gravity,

now

put forth at the

deserves to be treated with

and on a par with the questions

of ornamental confectionery at public dinners, or the

arrangement of curtains and hangings

in a

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; nor more,

will not insult

nor

less.

Of the

other,

ball-room

the reader's intelligence (once really entering into the atmosphere of these Vistas) by supposing cessary to show, in detail,

ne-

the copious dribble,

well-known rhymesters, does not fulfil, in any respect, the needs and august occasions of this land. America demands a poetry that is bold, modern, and all-surrounding and kosmical, as she is herself. It must in no respect ignore science or the modern, but inspire itself with science and the modern. It must bend its vision toward the future, more than the past. Like America, it must extricate itself from even the greatest models of the past, and, while courteous to them, must have entire faith in itself, and the products of its own democratic spirit only. Like her, it must place in the van, and hold either of our

why

little

at all hazards, the

man

banner of the divine pride of

himself (the radical foundation of the

new

Long enough have the People been listenpoems in which common humanity, deferen-

religion).

ing to tial,

bends low, humiliated, acknowledging superiors.

But America .-.and -V^

fully

America

no such poems. Erect, inflated, self-esteeming be the chant; and then listens to

will listen

with pleased [128]

ears.

Collect

Nor may the genuine brought to

light at last,

gold, the gems, when be probably usher'd forth

from any of the quarters currently counted on.

To-

day, doubtless, the infant genius of American poetic

(eluding those highly-refined imported

expression

and gilt-edged themes, and sentimental and butterfly flights, pleasant to orthodox publishers causing

—

tender spasms in the coteries, and warranted not to chafe the sensitive cuticle of the most exquisitely

gossamer delicacy)

ficial

lies

arti-

sleeping far away, hap-

and uninjur'd by the coteries, the the talkers and critics of the saloon^

pily unrecognized art-writers,

or the lecturers in the colleges

unrecking

itself,

—

lies sleeping, aside,

some Western

idiom, or native

Michigan or Tennessee repartee, or stump-speech

—

or in Kentucky or Georgia, or the Carolinas some slang or local song or allusion of the Manhat-

or in

tan, Boston, Philadelphia or Baltimore

the Maine

woods — or

mechanic

— or

off in the hut of the

California miner, or crossing the

Rocky Mountains,

or along the Pacific railroad — or on the breasts of the

young farmers of the Northwest, or Canada, or boatmen of the lakes. Rude and coarse nursing-beds, these; but only from such beginnings and stocks, in-

sprout, in

and I

fruits truly

say

it VOL. V.

may

be grafted, and time, flowers of genuine American aroma,

digenous here,

and

haply

fully

arrive,

our own.

—

were a standing disgrace to these States were a disgrace to any nation, distinguish'd it

—

[129]

Collect

above others by the variety and vastness of tories,

materials,

its

inventive activity, and the

its

splendid practicality of

art,

and

its

own

original styles in litera-

supply of intellectual and

esthetic masterpieces, archetypal, _^ itself.

know

and

people, not to rise

its

soar above others also in ture and

its terri-

and consistent with

not a land except ours that has not, to

some extent, however small, made its title clear. The Scotch have their born ballads, subtly expressing their past and present, and expressing character.

The

Irish

tj;ieirs.

have

theirs.

England,

Italy,

France, Spain,

What has America? With exhaustless mines

of the richest ore of epic, &c., in the Four-Years'

lyric, tale,

tune, picture,

War; with, indeed,

some-

times think, the richest masses of material ever

af-

forded a nation, more variegated, and on a larger scale

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

first

sign of proportionate, native, imagi-

native Soul, and first-class

cannot too often repeat) so

works to match,

far

wanting.

Long ere the second centennial arrives, there will be some forty to fifty great States, among them Canada and Cuba. When the present century closes, our population will be sixty or seventy millions. The Pacific will be ours, and the Atlantic mainly ours. There

will

be daily

part of the globe. i

electric

communication with every

What

an age

What

a land

Where, elsewhere, one so great? The individuality of one nation must then, as always, lead the world. Can there be any doubt who the leader ought to be?

[130]

Collect

Bear

mind, though, that nothing

less

than the

Soul has ever ever can lead. (This Soul-

mightiest original non-subordinated really, gloriously led, or its

other name, in these Vistas, In

let

Literature.)

fond fancy leaping those hundred years ahead,

us survey America's w^orks, poems, philosophies, prophecies, and giving form and decision to

fulfilling

Much

best ideals.

that

might then perhaps see

now undream 'd

of,

establish'd, luxuriantly crop-

and of artistic expression, in whose products character will be a main requirement, and not merely erudition or elegance; ping forth, richness, vigor of

letters

Intense and loving comradeship, the personal and

passionate attachment of

man

to define, underlies the lessons

man

and

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; which, hard

ideals of the pro-

found saviours of every land and age, and which

seems to promise, when thoroughly develop'd, cultivated and recognized in manners and literature, the most substantial hope and safety of the future of these States, will then

fully express'd.*

â&#x20AC;˘

It is

to the development, identification, and general prevalence of that fervid

comradeship (the adhesive love, at imaginative literature, offset of

Many

will say

confidently expect a time

manly

all

that

amative love hitherto possessing look for the counterbalance and

it is

when

a dream,

and

will not follow

inferences; but

there will be seen, running like a half-hid

warp

the myriad audible and visible worldly interests of America, threads of

friendship, fond

degrees hitherto it

it)

our materialistic and vulgar American democracy, and for the spiritualiza-

tion thereof

through

least rivaling the

not going beyond

and

unknown

loving, pure

and sweet, strong and

life-long, carried to

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not only giving tone to individual character, and making

unprecedently emotional, muscular, heroic, and refined, but having the deepest loving comradeship, as its I say democracy infers such

relations to general politics.

most inevitable twin or counterpart, without which and incapable of perpetuating itself [131]

will

be incomplete,

in vain,

Collect

A strong fibred joyousness and faith, and the sense of health al fresco, may well enter into the preparation of future noble

American authorship.

Part of

the test of a great literatus shall be the absence

him of the idea of the cent, the devil, the

the Puritans,

hell,

covert, the lurid, the malefi-

grim estimates inherited from

natural depravity,

and the

like.

The great literatus will be known, among the rest, by his cheerful simplicity, his adherence to natural standards, his limitless faith in God, his reverence,

him of doubt, ennui, buror any strain'd and temporary

and by the absence lesque,

persiflage,

fashion.

Nor must fail, again and yet again, to clinch, reiterate more plainly still (O that indeed such survey I

fancy,

ever

field,

time this part completed

lofty

aim, surely the proudest and the

whose

service the future literatus, of what-

also!) the

purest, in

may show

may

gladly labor.

we have

intimated,

offsetting the material civilization of our race, our nationality, its wealth, territories, factories, population,

products, trade, and military and naval strength,

and breathing breath of

must be pression,

its

life

into

moral civilization

and aidancy whereof,

height of literature.

these,

and more,

the very highest

The climax of this

of civilization, rising above

and

all

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the formulation, ex-

all

loftiest

range

the gorgeous shows

results of wealth, intellect,

power, and

art,

such â&#x20AC;&#x201D; above even theology and religious fervor â&#x20AC;&#x201D; [132]

Collect

to be

the

its

development, from the eternal bases, and

expression, of absolute Conscience,

fit

soundness. Justice.

Even

a touch of animal heat. ness,

But moral conscientious-

human, awes and enchants

emotional love, even

universe.

But,

clear there

eration,

in religious fervor there is

without flaw, not Godlike only,

crystalline,

entirely

we must make

something greater.

fail,

Power, love, venserenest moods,

somehow become vain. Then

less,

with flowing steps, the

ideal

comes.

By the names

lord,

the sun, the last

it.

wise â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but

to the

solid, lasting

thing of

call

all.

Its

safe.

as in

it,

analogy

al-

together this

dynamics on forever sure and persistent shirking of

But

it.

the proudest,

what holds world, and every object upon it, and

the material universe

the world of

remains a dream, an idea as they

no dream most only

noise-

right, justice, truth,

suggest, but do not describe it

gradations,

products, genius, esthetics, tried by sub-

somewhere

men

Great

forever.

the order of the rational

comparisons, analyses, and

tlest

moral

life,

carries

Its lack,

its

and the

sociology, litera-

and even sermonizing, these times, or any times, still leaves the abysm, the mortal flaw and smutch, mocking civilization to-day, with all its unquestioned triumphs, and all the civilization ture, politics, business,

far *

known.* am

reminded as

write that out of this very conscience, or idea of con-

science, of intense moral right,

and

in its

name and

[133]

strain'd construction, the

worst

Collect

Present literature, while magnificently

demands, with plenteous knowledge

certain popular

and verbal smartness, sane,

and

profoundly sophisticated, in-

very joy

its

morbid.

express Nature, and the

spirit

and obey the standards. ture,

fulfilling

needs

tally

of Nature, and to

and

know

say the question of Na-

largely considered, involves the questions of

the esthetic, the emotional, and the religious— and

involves happiness.

growing up as

in right

born and bred race,

conditions of out-door as

harmony,

in-door

fitly

much

and development,

activity

would probably, from and in those conditions, find it enough merely to live and would, in their rela-

—

tions to the sky,

water, trees, &c., and to the

common shows, and

countless itself,

air,

the fact of

discover and achieve happiness

—with

life

Being

by wholesome extasy, surthe pleasures that wealth, amusement,

suffused night and day

passing

all

and even art,

gratified intellect, erudition, or the sense of

can give.

fanaticisms, wars, persecutions, murders, &c.,

broach'd, and have

come

have

yet, in all lands, in the past,

to their devilish fruition.

Much

to be said

— but

been

may

say here, and in response, that side by side with the unflagging stimulation of the

elements of religion and conscience must henceforth

move with

equal sway, science,

absolute reason, and the general proportionate development of the whole man.

These

scientific facts,

civilization, and,

abstract religion,

deductions, are divine too

perceive,

vouring, remorseless, like

We want,

fire

from the emotional nature, ice.

— precious

with physical health, indispensable to

it,

counted parts of moral

to prevent fanaticism.

easily led astray, ever credulous,

and flame.

may

and

For

capable of de-

Conscience, too, isolated from

all else,

and

but attain the beauty and purity of glacial, snowy

for these States, for the general character, a cheerful, religious fervor,

endued with the ever-present modifications of the human emotions, olence, with a

fair

field for scientific inquiry,

always the cooling influences of material Nature.

[134]

friendship, benev-

the right of individual judgment, and

Collect

fin the prophetic literature of these States (the reader of

stress unless

speculations will miss their principal

he allows well

new

Literature, perhaps a

new

Poetry, are to be, in

for the point that a

new

Metaphysics, certainly a!

opinion, the only sural

and worthy supports and expressions of the American Democracy), Nature, true Nature, and the true idea of Nature, long absent, must, above

all,

become

and must furnish the pervading atmosphere to poems, and the test of all high literary and esthetic compositions, do not mean the smooth walks, trimm'd hedges, poseys and nightingales of the English poets, but the whole orb, fully restored, enlarged,

with

its

geologic history, the kosmos, carrying

and snow, that

rolls

light as a feather,

through the

though weighing

Furthermore, as by what ture

illimitable

we now

intended, at most, only

fire

areas,

billions of tons.

partially call

what

Na-

entertainable

by the physical conscience, the sense of matter, and of good animal healthâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; on these it must be distinctly accumulated, incorporated, that man, comprehending these, has, in towering superaddition, the moral

and

spiritual consciences, indicating his destination

beyond the

ostensible, the mortal.

the heights of such estimate of Nature indeed

ascending,

proceed to make observations

Vistas, breathing rarest

Idealism seems to

air.

What

for

our

believe called

to suggest (guarding against

extravagance, and ever modified even by [135]

its

opposite)

Collect

the course of inquiry and desert of favor for our

New World literature,

metaphysics, their foundation of and

* The culmination and pleasure for the itual

human

world, the soul

fruit

of literary

the

—

unanimous, antique or modern.

—though

its final fields

and the question of the immortal continuation of our mind of man has brought up here and always will.

Here, at least, of whatever race or era, too,

and

artistic expression,

soul, are in metaphysics, including the mysteries of the spir-

itself,

In all ages,

identity.

giving hue to all*

their reward, instead of a

common ground. Those authors who work well stand on

handsome percentage,

or royalty,

simply the laurel-crown of the victors in the great Olympic games

—

Applause, in this field

may be

but

be dearest

will

to humanity, and their works, however esthetically defective, will be treasur'd forever. will be.

—

The altitude of literature and poetry has always been religion and always The Indian Vedas, the Nafkas of Zoroaster, the Talmud of the Jews, the

Old Testament, the Gospel of Christ and his disciples, Plato's works, the Koran of Mohammed, the Edda of Snorro, and so on toward our own day, to Swedenborg, and to the invaluable contributions of Leibnitz, Kant and Hegel these with such poems onl); in which (while singing well of persons and events, of the passions of man, and the shows of the material universe), the religious tone, the consciousness of mystery, the recognition of the future, of the unknown, of Deity over and under all, and of the divine purpose, are never absent, but indirectly give tone to all exhibit literature's real heights and elevations, towering up like the great mountains of

—

the earth.

Standing on this ground sternly criticising, from

it,

—the

all

last,

the highest, only permanent

works, either of the

literary,

peremptorily to dismiss every pretensive production, however lectual points,

which

violates or ignores, or

any

ground—and art,

fine' its esthetic

we have or intel-

even does not celebrate, the central di-

vine idea of All, suffusing universe, of eternal trains of purpose, in the development,

by however slow

and

degrees, of the physical, moral,

has studied, meditated to no

profit,

whatever

not absorb'd this simple consciousness and

may be

faith.

•

spiritual

his

It is

kosmos.

mere erudition,

not entirely

new

say he

who

—but

has it

is,

Democracy to elaborate it, and look to build upon and expand from it, with uncompromising reliance. Above the doors of teaching the inscription is to appear. Though little or nothing can be absolutely known, perceiv'd, except from a point of view which is evanescent, yet we know at least one permanency, that Time and Space, in the will of God, furnish successive chains, completions of material births and beginnings, solve all discrepancies, fears and doubts, and eventually fulfil happiness and that the prophecy of those births, namely spiritual results, throws the true arch over all teaching, all science. The local considerations of sin, disease, deformity, ignorance, death, &c., and their measurement by the superficial mind, and

for

—

met by science, boldly accepting, proand planting the seeds of superber laws of the explication of the physical universe through the spiritual and clearing the way for a religion, sweet and unimpugnable alike to little child or great savan. ordinary legislation and theology, are to be

mulging

this faith,

—

[136]

—

Collect

The elevating and etherealizing ideas of the unknown and of unreality must be brought forward with authority, as they are the legitimate heirs of the

known, and of

and

reality,

at least as great as their

and of the ostent, let us take our stand, our ground, and never desert it, to confront the growing excess and arrogance of reFearless of scoffiing

parents.

alism.

the cry,

victoriousâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the cry of sense,

incomes, farms, merchandise,

science, flesh, intellect,

now

demonstrations, solid perpetuities, buildings

of brick and iron, or even the facts of the earth, rocks, &c., fear not,

trees,

logic,

sisters, to

shows of

my brethren, my

sound out with equally determin'd

voice,

that conviction brooding within the recesses of every

soulâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; illusions! apparitions! figments all! True, we must not condemn the show, neither absolutely deny it, for the indispensability of its meanenvisioned

ings; but

how

clearly

see that, migrate in soul to

what we can already conceive of itual points

present relations, tainly

would,

hail

superior and spir-

seems under and several might, nay cer-

of view, and, palpable as

fall

all

apart and vanish.

with joy the oceanic, variegated, intense

practical energy, the

demand

for facts,

even the busi-

ness materialism of the current age, our States.

But

which these things, movements, stopping at themselves, do not tend to ideas. As fuel to flame, and flame to the heavens, so must wealth, science, materialismâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; even this democracy

to the age or land in

[1371

Collect

of which

we make

much

highest mind, the soul.

—unerringly

feed the

Infinitude the flight: fath-

Man, so diminutive, dilates beyond the sensible universe, competes with, outcopes space and time, meditating even one great idea. Thus, and thus only, does a human being, his spirit, ascend above, and justify, objective Naomless the mystery.

which, probably nothing

ture,

and divinely

And

serviceable, indispensable,

as the purport of objective Nature

hidden,

folded,

here

in itself, is incredibly

what

somewhere here

this globe

and

its

real, is

— as

here.

doubtless

somewhere

manifold forms, and

the light of day, and night's darkness, and

life itself,

for— it is here the great literature, especially verse, must get its inspiration and throbbing blood. Then may we attain to a poetry worthy the immortal soul of man, and which, with

all

its

experiences, are

while absorbing materials, and, the shows of Nature, rectly

and

will,

in their

above

all,

own

sense,

have, both di-

indirectly, a freeing, fluidizing,

expanding,

religious character, exulting with science, fructifying

the moral elements, and stimulating aspirations, and

meditations on the

The though

process, so it

may be

unknown./ far, is

indirect

and

peculiar,

and

suggested, cannot be defined.

Observing, rapport, and with intuition, the shows

and forms presented by Nature, the sensuous luxuriance, the beautiful in living men and women, the actual play of passions, in history and life— and, C138]

Collect

above or

all,

human

from those developments either personality in which

power

Nature

(dearest of

all

to the sense of the artist), transacts itselfâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; out of

and seizing what is in them, the poet, the esthetic worker in any field, by the divine magic of

these,

his genius, projects

them, their analogies, by curious

removes, indirections,

and

(No useless attempt to repeat the material creation, by daguerreotyping the exact likeness by mortal mental means). This is the image-making faculty, coping with material creation, and rivaling, almost triumphing over

when

This alone,

it.

literature

all

art.

the other parts of

a specimen of literature or art are ready and waiting,

can breathe into

the breath of

life,

and endow

with identity. ''The true question to ask," says the

Congress

paper read before the Social Science

in a

Convention

New York,

October, 1869,

question to ask respecting a book,

human soul

librarian of

?''

This

is,

''The true

Has it help'd any

the hint, statement, not only

of the great literatus, his book, but of every great artist.

tried

and

may be

that

all

works of

art are to

first

their art qualities, their image-forming talent,

their dramatic, pictorial, plot-constructing,

eupho-

Then, whenever claiming to be first-class works, they are to be strictly and sternly tried by their foundation in, and radiation, in nious and other talents.

the highest sense, and always indirectly, of the ethic principles,

and

eligibility to free, arouse, dilate. [139]

Collect

As, within the purposes of the kosmos, and vivifying

meteorology, and

all

the congeries of the

—

and animal worlds all the phygrowth and development of man, and all the his-

mineral, vegetable sical

tory of the race in politics, religions, wars, &c., there is

a moral purpose, a visible or invisible intention,

certainly underlying

ing to be faith,

patiently

the

product, or

measure and

its

and proof need-

results for

—needing

realization,

congeries of

This

intuition,

which many,

do not have

intellectual,

the greatest literatus. est

—

waited

idiosyncrasy, to

and especially the in

all

—so

the product,

the

last,

profound-

test of a first-class literary or es-

thetic achievement,

and when understood and put

must fain, say, lead to works, books, nobler than any hitherto known. Lo! Nature (the only force

complete, actual poem), existing calmly

scheme, containing

all,

And

permanent

lo!

the divine

content, careless of the

icisms of a day, or these endless and ers.

wordy

crit-

chatter-

to the consciousness of the soul, the

identity, the thought, the something, be-

which the magnitude even of democracy, art, literature, &c., dwindles, becomes partial, measurable—something that fully satisfies (which those do not). That something is the All, and the idea of All, with the accompanying idea of eternity, and of itself, fore

the soul, buoyant, indestructible, sailing space ever, visiting every region, as a ship at sea.

again

lo!

the pulsations

in all matter, all spirit, [140]

for-

And throb-

Collect

bing forever— the eternal beats, eternal systole and diastole of

life in

that death

things—wherefrom

rather the real

and know

was thought, but

not the ending, as

feel

beginning—and that nothing ever

or can be lost, nor ever die, nor soul, nor matter. In

the future of these States must arise poets im-

menser

poems

far,

and make great poems of death.

life

are great, but there

of the purports of itself.

life,

The must be the poems

not only in

itself,

but beyond

have eulogized Homer, the sacred bards of

Jewry, Eschylus, Juvenal, Shakspere, &c., and ac-

knowledged

But (with per-

their inestimable value.

haps the exception,

second-mention'd,)

some, not

all

respects, of the

say there must, for future and

democractic purposes, appear poets (dare so

of higher class even than any of those

not only possess'd of the religious

fire

to say

— poets

and abandon of

Isaiah, luxuriant in the epic talent of

proud characters as

Homer, or

for

Shakspere, but consistent with

the Hegelian formulas, and consistent with modern

America needs, and the world needs, a class of bards who will, now and ever, so link and tally the rational physical being of man with the ensembles of time and space, and with this vast and science.

multiform show, Nature, surrounding him, ever tantalizing him, equally a part, and yet not a part of him, as to essentially harmonize, satisfy, and put at Faith, very old, now scared away by science, rest.

must be

restored, brought

back by the same power

[141]

Collect

that caused her departure

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; restored with new sway,

deeper, wider, higher than ever. versal ennui,

this

coward

Surely, this unithis

fear,

shuddering at

death, these low, degrading views, are not always to rule the spirit pervading future society, as past, tius

What

and does the present.

sought most nobly, yet

tively to

for his

age and

all

its

the

has the

Roman

Lucre-

too blindly, nega-

successors,

done positively by some great coming

must be

literatus,

espe-

who, while remaining fully poet, will absorb whatever science indicates, with spiritualism, and out of them, and out of his own genius, will compose the great poem of death. Then will man indeed confront Nature, and confront time and space, both with science, and con amove, and take his right place, prepared for life, master of fortune and misfortune. And then that which was long wanted will be supplied, and the ship that had it not before in all her voyages will have an anchor. There are still other standards, suggestions, for products of high literatuses. That which really balances and conserves the social and political world is not so much legislation, police, treaties, and dread

cially poet,

of punishment, as the latent eternal intuitional sense, in

humanity, of

fairness,

manliness, decorum, &c.

Indeed, this perennial regulation, control, and oversight,

self-suppliance,

sine

qua non to democ-

and a highest widest aim of democratic literature may well be to bring forth, cultivate, brace, and

racy;

[142]

Collect

strengthen this sense, in individuals and society.

strong mastership of the general inferior self by the superior self surely,

by the

to be aided, secured, indirectly, but in his

literatus,

works, shaping,

for

individual or aggregate democracy, a great passionate

body,

masterful

And

and along

w^hich goes a great

w^ith

spirit.

still,

providing for contingencies,

front the fact, the

fain

con-

need of powerful native philosophs

and orators and bards, these States, as rallying points to come, in times of danger, and to fend off ruin and defection.

For history

long,

long.

Shift

and turn the combinations of the statement as we may, the problem of the future of America is in certain respects as dark as tition,

vast.

Pride,

segregation, vicious wilfulness,

and

compelicense

beyond example, brood already upon us. Unwieldy and immense, who shall hold in behemoth ? who bridle leviathan ?

Flaunt

choose, athwart

and over the roads of our progress loom huge uncerIt is usetainty, and dreadful, threatening gloom. less to deny it: Democracy grows rankly up the thickest, noxious, deadliest plants and fruits of all

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; brings larger,

worse and worse invaders

stronger,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; needs newer,

keener compensations

and com-

pellers.

Our

lands, embracing

much (embracing

in-

deed the whole, rejecting none), hold in their breast that flame also, capable of consuming themselves, [143]

Collect

consuming us has been,

life

Short as the span of our national

all.

have

already

and downfall

death

crowded close upon us — and will again crowd close, no doubt, even if warded off. Ages to come may never know, but know, how narrowly during the and more than once, and more late secession war than twice or thrice our Nationality (wherein bound up, as in a ship in a storm, depended, and yet depend, 1

— —

all

our best

by a them

life, all

hope,

value), just grazed, just

all

hair escaped destruction. !

Alas

to think of

the agony and bloody sweat of certain of

those hours

those cruel, sharp, suspended crises

Even to-day, amid these whirls, incredible flippancy, and blind fury of parties, infidelity, entire lack of first-class captains and leaders, added to the plentiful meanness and vulgarity of the ostensible masses

— that open

problem, the labor question, beginning to

like a

year — what

yawning

gulf,

prospect have

rapidly widening every

sail

a danger-

ous sea of seething currents, cross and under-currents, vortices

shall

—

turn ?

so dark, untried

all It

seems as

— and

whither

the Almighty had

spread before this nation charts of imperial destinies, dazzling as the sun, yet with difficulty,

fection

many

a deep intestine

and human aggregate of cankerous imper-

— saying,

the roads, the only plans of

development, long and varied with

and

ebullitions.

You

said in

your

empire of empires, overshadowing [144]

all

terrible balks

soul,

all else,

will

past and

Collect

present, putting the history of Old- World dynasties,

conquests behind me, as of no account a

new

democracy, making old

history, a history of

dwarf—

history a

minating time.

— making

alone inaugurating largeness, culthese,

lands of America, are

indeed the prizes, the determinations of your soul,

But behold the

so.

mens

of the cost.

you

ripen for

know

ness,

centuries

that

— must

a pear ?

traitor,

you would have

you must conquer pay

for

For you too, as for

price.

the

and already speciThought you greatness was to cost,

great-

through ages,

with a proportionate

all

lands, the struggle,

the wily person in

office,

wealth, the surfeit of prosperity, the

scrofulous

demonism

gr^ed, the hell of passion, the decay of faith, the

long postponement, the less

fossil-like lethargy,

the cease-

need of revolutions, prophets, thunder-storms,

new

deaths, births, ideas and

Yet

projections and invigorations of

men.

have dream'd, merged

problem of our

fate,

in that

hidden-tangled

whose long unraveling stretches

— dream'd out, portray'd, hinted already — a or a larger band — a band of brave and unprecedented yet — arm'd and equipt every point — the members separated, mysteriously through time little

true,

may

be,

different dates

north, or east, or

west

—

and

States, or south, or

Pacific, Atlantic,

Southern,

— a year, a century here, and other there — but always one, compact

Canadian turies VOL.

v.— lO.

[MS]

censoul,

Collect

conscience

God - inculcating,

conserving,

inspired

achievers, not only in literature, the greatest art, but

achievers in

all

art

from age to age least as

fit

— a new^, undying order, dynasty, transmitted — a band, a at class,

to cope with current years, our dangers,

needs, as those w^ho, for their times, so long, so

armor or

well, in

made world. To

cowl, upheld and

trious, that far-back feudal, priestly

illus-

offset

chivalry, indeed, those vanish'd countless knights,

old altars, abbeys, priests, ages and strings of ages, a

and more sacred cause to-day demands,

knightlier

and

shall supply, in a

New

World, to

work, more than the counterpart and Arrived now, Vistas,

definitely,

larger,

grander

tally of

them.

an apex for these

confess that the promulgation and belief in

such a class or institution atus order

—

its

— a new

possibility

these entire speculations

and greater

liter-

(nay certainty) underlies

— and

that the

other parts, as superstructures, are

all

rest,

the

founded upon

seems to me the condition, not only of our future national and democratic development, but of our perpetuation. In the highly artificial and mait.

really

terialistic

bases of modern civilization, with the cor-

responding arrangements and methods of

living,

the

force-infusion of intellect alone, the depraving influ-

ences of riches just as of

all

high ideals

much

in character

as poverty, the absence

— with the long series

of tendencies, shapings, which few are strong enough to resist,

and which now seem, with steam-engine [146]

Collect

speed, to be everywhere turning out the generations of humanity like uniform iron castings as

compared with the feudal

ages,

—

all

of which,

can yet do

nothing better than accept, make the best

even welcome, upon the whole,

and their restless wholesale knead-

practical grandeur,

ing of the masses

—

say of

dominant play of solely current

life

all

this

tremendous and

materialistic bearings

at least

upon

the United States, with the results as

already seen, accumulating, and reaching future, that

and

of,

for their oceanic

far into

the

they must either be confronted and met

an equally subtle and tremendous force-

infusion for purposes of spiritualization, for the pure

conscience, for genuine esthetics, and for absolute

—

and primal manliness and womanliness or else our modern civilization, with all its improvements, is in vain,

and

equivalent, in

are

on the road to a destiny, a real

its

status,

world, to that of the fabled

damned. Prospecting thus the coming unsped days, and that

new

order in them

— marking the

endless train

of exercise, development, unwind, in nation as

man, which

life is

for

these prospects and hopes,

and written

— we see, fore-indicated, amid new

language — not

law-forces of spoken

merely the pedagogue-

forms, correct, regular, familiar with precedents,

made

for matters of outside propriety, fine words, thoughts

definitely told out

— but

a language fann'd

by the

breath of Nature, which leaps overhead, cares mostly [147]

Collect

for

impetus and

effects,

and

what

for

plants

and

invigorates to

growâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; tallies

seldomer

a thing than suggests or necessitates

it.

tells

In fact, a

Hew

life

theory of literary composition for

imaginative works of the very cially for

highest poems,

these States. plied, is

and character, and

Books

first

and espe-

class,

the sole course open to

and sup-

are to be call'd for,

on the assumption that the process of reading

not a half-sleep, but,

in highest sense,

a gymnast's struggle; that the reader

thing for himself, must be on the

an exercise,

do somemust himself

alert,

or herself construct indeed the poem, argument, history, metaphysical essay

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

hints, the clue, the start or

text furnishing the

Not the

frame-work.

book needs so much to be the complete thing, but the reader of the book does. That were to make a nation of supple and athletic minds, well-train'd, intuitive, used to depend on themselves, and not on a few coteries of writers. Investigating here,

thing

see, not that

have, in having the bequeath'd

countless shelves of volumes, records, &c.

;

little

libraries,

yet

how

serious the danger, depending entirely on them, of

the bloodless vein, the nerveless arm, the false application, at

second or third hand.

real interest of this

people of ours

history, poetry, politics,

past (the British islands,

the past),

We in

see that the

the theology,

and personal models of the for instance, and indeed all

not necessarily to mould ourselves or our [148]

Collect

upon them, but

literature

to attain fuller,

defin-

comparisons, warnings, and the insight to ourselves, our own present, and our own far grander, ite

different, future history, religion, social

customs, &c.

see that almost everything that has been written,

sung, or stated, of old, with reference to humanity

under the feudal and Oriental for other lands,

stated, in

institutes, religions,

needs to be re-written, re-sung,

and re-

terms consistent with the institution of

these States, and to

come

range and obedient

uniformity with them.

see,

kosmos, cycles,

as in

the universes of the

material

and animal born through them, to

after meteorological, vegetable,

man

at last arises,

prove them, concentrate them, to turn upon them

with wonder and love

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to

command them,

adorn

them, and carry them upward into superior realms

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

so,

out of the series of the preceding social and

political universes,

that while

now

arise these States.

many were supposing

see

things establish'd

and completed, really the grandest things always remain; and discover that the work of the New

World

/We ics,

not ended, but only

fairly

begun.

see our land, America, her literature, esthet-

&c., as, substantially, the getting in form, or

effusement and statement, of deepest basic elements

and

loftiest final

meanings, of history and

manâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

the portrayal (under the eternal laws and conditions of beauty) of our

own physiognomy, [149]

the subjective

Collect

and expression of the objective, as from our own combination, continuation, and points of view and the deposit and record of the national mentality, tie

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

character, appeals, heroism, wars,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; where these, and

artistic

and

all,

culminate

and even

liberties

in native literary

formulation, to be perpetuated; and not

having which native,

she will

first-class formulation,

flounder about, and her other, however imposing,

eminent greatness, prove merely a passing gleam; but truly having which, she will understand live nobly,

ing,

herself,

nobly contribute, emanate, and, swing-

poised safely on herself, illumin'd and illuming,

become

a full-form'd world, and divine

only of material but spiritual worlds, succession through time

Mother not in

ceaseless

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the main thing being the

average, the bodily, the concrete, the democratic,

the popular, on which

all

the superstructures of the

future are to permanently rest.

[ISO]

©doins flot tbe

of Httempteb Secession

Mbole

/iDatter, but

Some St^e

jfacts

Mortb

donntng Zo^Wa^ anb Hny Das

'65,

war of attempted secession, 1860a struggle of two distinct and separate

CONSIDER the

not as

peoples, but a conflict (often happening, and very

between the passions and paradoxes of one and the same identity perhaps the only terms on which that identity could really become fused, homogeneous and lasting. The origin and conditions out of which it arose are full of lessons, full of warnings fierce)

—

yet to the

Republic

— and

always

will

The

be.

underlying and principal of those origins are yet sin-

The Northern

gularly ignored.

States were really

just as responsible for that war, (in

its

foundations, instigations,) as the South. to give '60,)

my was

view.

From the age

much

Let

try

of 21 to 40, (1840-

interested in the political

the land, not so

precedents,

movements

as a participant, but as an ob-

think and a regular voter at the elections. 1 was conversant with the springs of action, and their workings, not only in New York City and Brooklyn,

server,

[151]

Collect

but understood them

the whole country, as

had made leisurely tours through all the Middle States, and partially through the Western and Southern, and down to New Orleans, in which city resided for some time. (I was there at the close of the Mexican War saw and talk'd with General Taylor, and the other generals and officers, who were feted and detained several days on their return victorious from in

—

that expedition.)

Of course many and very specialties,

contradictory things,

developments, constitutional views, &c.,

—

went to make up the origin of the war but the most significant general fact can be best indicated and stated as follows: For twenty-five years previous to the outbreak, the controlling

Democratic

nominating conventions of our Republic from their primaries

wards or

expanding to counties, powerful to

— starting

and so States, and

districts,

cities,

the great Presidential nominating conventions

— were

getting to represent and be

composed of

and more putrid and dangerous materials. Let me give a schedule, or list, of one of these representative conventions for a long time before, and

which nominated Buchanan. (Remember they had come to be the fountains and tissues of the American body politic, forming, as it were, the whole blood, legislation, office-holding, inclusive

&c.)

of,

One

that

of these conventions, from 1840 to

'60,

exhibited a spectacle such as could never be seen [152]

Collect

except in our

own

age and

members who composed

The

these States.

were, seven eighths of

them, the meanest kind of bawling and blowing office-holders, office-seekers, pimps, malignants, conspirators, murderers, fancy

contractors,

men, custom-house

kept-editors,

spaniels

clerks,

well-train'd

carry and fetch, jobbers, infidels, disunionists, terrorists,

mail-riflers, slave-catchers,

creatures of the

pushers of slavery,

President, creatures of

would-be

Presidents, spies, bribers, compromisers, lobbyers,

sponges,

expell'd gamblers,

ruin'd sports,

policy-

backers, monte-dealers, duellists, carriers of conceal'd

weapons, deaf men, pimpled men, with

vile

disease,

made from

scarr'd

inside

gaudy outside with gold chains

money and

the people's

harlots'

money

twisted together; crawling, serpentine men, the lousy

combings and born freedom-sellers of the earth. And whence came they? From back-yards and barrooms; from out of the custom-houses, marshals' offices,

post-offices,

and gambling-hells; from the

President's house, the

unnamed

by-places,

jail,

where

the station-house; from devilish

disunion

was

hatch'd at midnight; from political hearses, and from

the coffins inside, and from the shrouds inside of the coffins;

from the tumors and abscesses of the land;

from the skeletons and skulls federal almshouses;

the great

cities.

the vaults of the

and from the running sores of

Such,

say, form'd, or absolutely

controll'd the forming of, the entire personnel, the [X53]

— Collect

atmosphere, nutriment and chyle, of our municipal. State,

and National

politics

ment," &c.

permeat-

and wielding everything

ing, handling, deciding, legislation,

— substantially

nominations,

''public

elections,

senti-

— while the great masses of the people,

mechanics, and traders, were helpless

farmers,

These conditions were mostly prevalent in the North and West, and especially in New York and Philadelphia cities; and the Southern leaders (bad enough, but of a far higher order) struck hands

their gripe.

and used them. Is it strange that a thunder-storm follow'd such morbid and stifling

and

affiliated with,

cloud-strata ? I

say then, that what, as just outlined, heralded,

and made the ground ready ought to be held up, through

for all

secession

revolt,

the future, as the

most instructive lesson in American political history— the most significant warning and beacon-light to coming generations.

say that the sixteenth, seventeenth

and eighteenth terms of the American Presidency have shown that the villainy and shallowness of

by the machinery of great parties) are eligible to these States as to any foreign des-

rulers (back'd

just as

potism, kingdom, or empire difference.

History

— there

not a bit of

to record those three Presi-

and especially the administrations of Fillmore and Buchanan, as so far our topmost warning and shame. Never were publicly displayed more de-

dentiads,

formed, mediocre, snivelling, unreliable, false-hearted [154]

Collect

Never were these States so insulted, and attempted to be betray'd. All the main purposes for which the Government was establish'd were openly men.

denied.

The

perfect equality of slavery with free-

dom was flauntingly

preach'd in the North

superiority of slavery.

The

slave trade

— nay, the

was proposed

Everywhere frowns and misunderstandings—everywhere exasperations and humiliations. (The slavery contest is settled and the war is long over —yet do not those putrid conditions, too to be renew'd.

—

many

of them,

still

exist ?

result in diseases,

still

—

wounds not of war and army hospitals— but the wounds and diseases of peace ?) Out of those generic influences, mainly in New

fevers,

York, Pennsylvania, Ohio, &c., arose the attempt

at disunion.

philosophical examination, the

lignant fever of that

and the

original

the North.

war shows

its

nourishment of

embryonic sources,

its life

and growth,

say secession, below the surface,

nated and was brought to maturity I

now, that

origi-

the free States.

allude to the score of years preceding i860.

deliberate opinion

ma-

at the

opening of

the contest the abstract duality-question of slavery

and

quiet could

have been submitted to a

direct

popular vote, as against their opposite, they would

have triumphantly carried the day

in a

majority of

the Northern States— in the large

cities,

leading off

with

New

majorities.

York and Philadelphia, by tremendous The events of '61 amazed everybody [155]

Collect

North and South, and burst

the North put

prophecies and calcu-

But even then, and during the

lations like bubbles.

whole war, the

all

stern fact remains that (not only did

down, but) the

many

numerically just as

secession cause

had

sympathi;(ers in the free as

in the rebel States,

As to slavery, abstractly and practically (its idea, and the determination to establish and expand it,

new

especially in the

common,

too

it is

with the South.

Territories, the future

repeat, to identify

In fact

down

America)

exclusively

to the opening of the

war, the whote country had about an equal hand

The North had at least been just as guilty, if not more guilty and the East and West had. The former

it.

;

Presidents and Congresses had been guilty

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the gov-

ernors and legislatures of every Northern State had

been

guilty,

Northern all

cities

stain'd.

it is

hard to

New

and the mayors of

had

And tell

all

been guilty

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

York and other their hands were

as the conflict took decided shape,

which

class,

the leading Southern or

Northern disunionists, was more stunn'd and disappointed at the non-action of the free-State secession element, so largely existing and counted on by those leaders,

both sections.

So much

for that point,

and

for the North.

the inception and direct instigation of the war,

South tions.

lute

itself,

shall not

Behind

all,

the

attempt interiors or complica-

the idea that

was from

a reso-

and arrogant determination on the part of the [156]

Collect

extreme slave-holders, the Calhounites, to carry the States-rights portion of the Constitutional

compact and nationalize slavery, or else disrupt the Union, and found a new empire, with

farthest verge,

its

slavery for

its

corner-stone,

the true theory. I

was and

(If successful, this

not sure, but

might

only our American republic, class proportions, in itself

ages at

where

attempt might

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; have in

and

undoubtedly

destroy 'd not

anything its

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and would have been

prestige, but for

the greatest triumph

blow

to political

every other freedom, possible to conceive.

would have inured to the Southen

selves.)

like first-

the cause of Liberty and Equality every-

least,

of reaction, and the severest

result

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and

Its

worst

States

them-

That our national democratic experiment,

and machinery, could triumphantly sustain such a shock, and that the Constitution could weather it, like a ship a storm, and come out of it as sound principle,

and whole as

before,

far

the most signal proof

yet of the stability of that experiment, Democracy,

and that Constitution. Of the war itself, we know in the ostent what has been done. The numbers of the dead and wounded can be told or approximated, the debt posted and and of those

principles,

put on record, the material events narrated, &c.

Meantime, elections go on, laws are pass'd, cal parties struggle,

issue their platforms, &c., just

But immensest results, not only literature, poems, and sociology,

the same as before. in politics,

but

politi-

[157]

Collect

are doubtless waiting yet unform'd

How

long they will wait

cannot

shows

of history's retrospect

the future.

The pageant

tell.

ages

us,

since,

all

Europe marching on the crusades, those arm'd uprisings of the people, stirr'd by a mere idea, to grandest attempt

— and, when once baffled

at intervals, twice, thrice,

it,

and again.

returning,

unsurpass'd

of revolutionary events, influences.

series

took over two hundred years crusades to sprout.

germinate,

Two

before beginning even to lay, sleeping,

dead, but dormant in the ground.

literature,

arts,

freedom, the

seeds of the

for the

hundred years they

them, unerringly,

Yet

travel, spirit

not

Then, out of

navigation, politics,

of adventure, inquiry,

and steadily sped on to what we see Far back there, that huge agitation-

all

arose, grew,

present.

struggle of the crusades stands, as undoubtedly the

embryo, the

start,

of the high preeminence of experi-

and enterprise which the European nations have since sustain'd, and of which these

ment,

civilization

States are the heirs.

Another

illustration

though the war

itself,

— (history

is full

of them,

al-

the victory of the Union, and

the relations of our equal States, present features of

which there are no precedents in the past). The conquest of England eight centuries ago, by the Franco-Normans the obliteration of the old (in many respects so needing obliteration) the Domes-

—

day Book, and the

—

repartition of the [158]

land— the

old

Collect

impedimenta removed, even by blood and ruthless violence, and a new, progressive genesis establish'd,

new

seeds

sown

that, bitter as

— time

has proved plain enough

they were,

all

these were the most

salutary series of revolutions that could possibly have

Out of them, and by them mainly, have

happen'd.

Roman and Saxon England

come, out of Albic,

—

and without them could not have come not only the England of the 500 years down to the present,

and of the present

— but these

for that terrible dislocation

States, as It is

they

certain to

only, are

Nor, except

and overturn, would these

are, exist to-day.

tue of that war and

them

States.

that the United States,

its results,

now

vir-

and through that and

ready to enter, and must cer-

upon their genuine career in history, as no more torn and divided in their spinal requisites, free States all but a great homogeneous Nation moral and political unity in variety, such as Nature shows in her grandest physical works, and as much greater than any mere work of Nature, as the moral and political, the work of man, his mind, his soul,

tainly enter,

—

are, in their loftiest sense, greater

physical.

Out

of that

tionality of the States

—

than the merely

war not only has the

na-

escaped from being strangled,

but more than any of the

rest,

more than the North

the

itself,

and, in

vital

opinion,

heart and breath

of the South have escaped as from the pressure of a general nightmare, and are henceforth to enter on [159]

Collect

life,

development, and active freedom, whose

ties are certain in

the future, notwithstanding

Southern vexations of the

hour â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a

reali-

all

the

development

which could not possibly have been achiev'd on any less terms, or by any other means than that grim And predict lesson, or something equivalent to it. that the South is yet to outstrip the North. I

[i6o]

prefaces to "Xeaves of (Brass America does not repel the Preface, 1855 To

first

p^^^ j^^^ produced under

^j^^

amid other

—

with calmness

that the corpse

sleeping little

life

while

its

lesson

its

literature,

requirements has

new forms

— perceives

slowly borne from the eating and

the door

— perceives that

— that

was

waits

fittest for its

action has descended to the stalwart

and well-shaped heir be

of the

rooms of the house

days — that

— accepts the

manners

which served

life

new

not impatient because the slough

passed into the

shall

forms, or

to opinions and

sticks

while the

what

poHtJcs, or the idea of castes,) f-

or the old religions

its

issue of

Leaves of Grass, Brooklyn, N. Y.

still

past, or

who

fittest for his

The Americans

approaches

— and that he

days. all

nations at any time upon

the earth have probably the fullest poetical nature.

The United greatest

States themselves are essentially the

poem,

in the history of the earth hitherto,

the largest and most stirring appear tame and orderly to their ampler largeness and

something

the doings of

stir.

man

Here

at last

that corresponds

with the broadcast doings of the day and night. VOL.

v.— II.

[161]

Collect

Here

action untied from strings, necessarily blind

and

to particulars

Here

masses.

cates heroes. trivial,

details,

magnificently moving in

the hospitality which forever indi-

Here the performance, disdaining the

unapproach'd

the tremendous audacity of

crowds and groupings, and the push of its perspective, spreads with crampless and flowing breadth, and showers its prolific and splendid extravagance. One sees it must indeed own the riches of the summer and winter, and need never be bankrupt while corn grows from the ground, or the orchards drop apples, or the bays contain fish, or men beget children upon women. Other states indicate themselves in their deputies its

— but the genius of the United States most

in its

executives or legislatures, nor

bassadors or authors, parlors,

not best or

nor even

but always most

the

am-

or churches or

or colleges

in its

newspapers or inventors

common

West, East,

in all its States,

amplitude.

The

—

people, South, North,

through

all

its

mighty

largeness of the nation, however,

were monstrous without a corresponding largeness Not and generosity of the spirit of the citizen. swarming states, nor streets and steamships, nor prosperous business, learning, fice

may

the poet.

live nation

nor

farms,

nor

reminiscences

nor

—

man nor sufmay suffice either.

suffice for the ideal of

capital,

can always cut a deep mark, and can

have the best authority the cheapest [162]

— namely, from

Collect

its

own

soul.

This

the

sum

of the profitable uses

of individuals or states, and of present action and

grandeur, and of the subjects of poets.

were necessary to

trot

back generation

ation to the Eastern records!

sacredness of the demonstrable must

(As

after

if it

gener-

the beauty and

behind that

fall

As if men do not make their mark out of any times! As if the opening of the Western Continent by discovery, and what has transpired in North and South America, were less than the small of the mythical!

theatre of the antique, or the aimless sleep-walking

The

of the Middle Ages!)

pride of the United States

leaves the wealth and finesse of the returns of

commerce and

cities,

and

agriculture,

and all

magnitude of geography or shows of exterior

all

the

victory,

to enjoy the sight and realization of full-sized men, or one full-sized

man unconquerable and

The American poets for

America

to be indirect,

epic.

Its

are to enclose old

the race of races.

the American poet

simple.

The

and new,

expression of

to be transcendent and new.

and not

direct or descriptive or

quality goes through these to

much more.

Let the age and wars of other nations be chanted,

and

their eras

and characters be

illustrated,

and that

Not so the great psalm of the republic. Here the theme is creative, and has vista. Whatever stagnates in the flat of custom or obedience

finish

the verse.

or legislation, the great poet never stagnates.

ence does not master him, he masters C163]

it.

Obedi-

High up

Collect

out of reach he stands, turning a concentrated light

— he turns the pivot with his finger — he baffles the

he stands, and easily overtakes

swiftest runners as

The time

and envelopes them. fidelity

and confections and

by steady it

—

people and preserves them

never give up believing and expecting and

There

trusting.

that indescribable freshness and

unconsciousness about an bles

he withholds

persiflage

the antiseptic of the soul

common

pervades the

— they

Faith

faith.

straying toward in-

illiterate

person, that

hum-

and mocks the power of the noblest expressive

The poet

genius.

may be just

great artist greatest

sees for a certainty as sacred

and

how

one not a

perfect as the

artist.

The power

to destroy or remould

freely

used by

the greatest poet, but seldom the power of attack.

What

past

past.

he does not expose superior

models, and prove himself by every step he takes, he is

not what

wanted.

The presence

of the great

poet conquers — not parleying, or struggling, or any

prepared attempts. see after him!

Now

There

he has passed that way, not

left

any vestige of

despair, or misanthropy, or cunning, or exclusiveness,

or the ignominy of a nativity or color, or delusion of hell or the necessity of hell

forward shall be degraded or sin.

The

triviality.

fore

— and

for

no man thence-

ignorance or weakness

greatest poet hardly

knows

pettiness or

he breathes into anything that was be-

thought small,

dilates [164]

with the grandeur and

Collect

life

of the universe.

— he

complete

as he, only he sees

one of the

a seer

himself it,

— he

individual

— the others are as good

and they do

not.

not

chorus— he does not

stop for any regulation—he-is the president of regulation. What the eyesight does to the rest, he does to the rest. Who knows the curious mystery of the eyesight ? The other senses corroborate themselves, but this

moved from any

proof but

its

mocks

all

single glance of

the investigations of man, and

instruments and books of the earth, and

What

marvellous

what

possible or baseless or

vague

re-

own, and foreruns the

identities of the spiritual world. it

all

the

reasoning.

what is imyou have once

unlikely ?

—

after

and given au-

just open'd the space of a peach-pit,

dience to far and near, and to the sunset, and had all

things enter with electric swiftness, softly and

duly, without confusion or jostling or

The land and

jam

sea, the animals, fishes

and

the sky of heaven and the orbs, the forests, tains

and

rivers, are

not small themes

birds,

moun-

— but

folks

expect of the poet to indicate more than the beauty

and dignity which always attach to dumb real objects expect him to indicate the path between Men and women perceive reality and their souls.

— they

the beauty well enough

The

— probably

passionate tenacity of hunters,

risers, cultivators

as well as he.

woodmen,

early

of gardens and orchards and fields,

the love of healthy

women [i6S]

for the

manly form,

Collect

sea-faring persons, drivers of horses, the passion for

and the open

light

air, all is

failing perception of

an old varied sign of the un-

beauty, and of a residence of the

They can never be assisted to perceive some may, but they never The poetic quality is not marshal'd in rhyme

poetic in out-door people.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

by poets can.

or uniformity, or abstract addresses to things, nor in

melancholy complaints or good precepts, but life of these and much else, and is in the soul.

the

The

rhyme is that it drops seeds of a sweeter and more luxuriant rhyme, and of uniformity that it conprofit of

veys

itself into its

sight.

own

roots in the

The rhyme and uniformity

show

the free growth of metrical

them

as unerringly

ground out of

poems laws, and bud from of perfect

and loosely as lilacs and roses on a bush, and take shapes as compact as the shapes of chestnuts and oranges, and melons and pears, and shed the perfume impalpable to form. The fluency and ornaments of the

finest

poems

or music or ora-

tions or recitations are not independent but dependent.

All

beauty comes from beautiful blood and a

beautiful brain.

the greatnesses are

enough â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

conjunction

in a

man

vail

through the universe; but the gaggery and

woman,

it is

of a million years will not prevail.

fact will pre-

Who

himself about his ornaments or fluency

gilt

troubles

is lost.

This

Love the earth and sun and the animals, despise riches, give alms to every one that asks, stand up for the stupid and crazy, devote is

what you

shall

[166]

Collect

your income and labor to others, hate tyrants, argue not concerning God, have patience and indulgence

toward the people, take

your hat to nothing

off

known or unknown, or to any man or number of men go freely with powerful uneducated persons,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and with the young, and with the mothers of families re-examine all you have been told in school or church or in any book, and dismiss whatever insults

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

your

own

and your very

soul;

poem, and have the words, but

be a great

flesh shall

richest fluency, not only in its

the silent lines of

its lips

and

face,

and

between the lashes of your eyes, and in every motion and joint of your body. The poet shall not spend He shall know that the his time in unneeded work. ground is already plough'd and manured; others may He shall go directly to not know it, but he shall. the creation.

His trust shall master the trust of

everything he touches

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

shall

master

all

attach-

ment.

The known universe has one complete lover, and He consumes an eternal that is the greatest poet. passion, and

indifferent

which chance happens, and

which possible contingency of fortune or misfortune, and persuades daily and hourly his delicious pay.

What

balks or breaks others

fuel for his

progress to contact and amorous joy. portions of the

reception

nothing to his proportions. or from the highest, he

burning

Other pro-

of pleasure dwindle to All

expected from heaven

rapport with in the sight of

[167]

Collect

the daybreak, or the scenes of the winter woods, or the presence of children playing, or with his arm

man

round the neck of a all

woman.

love has leisure and expanse

ahead of himself. lover

— he

ence and the showers and

Nothing can

— death

jar

and

him

— he

room

leaves

irresolute or suspicious

— he scorns

sure

His love above

intervals.

thrills are

His experi-

not for nothing.

— suffering and darkness cannot To him

fear cannot.

complaint and

jealousy and envy are corpses buried and rotten in

the earth

— he

saw them

buried.

The

sea

not

surer of the shore, or the shore of the sea, than he

the fruition of his love, and of

all

perfection

and

beauty.

/ The

—

it is

fruition of

beauty

as inevitable as

gravitation.

life

—

no chance of miss or hit it is exact and plumb as

From the eyesight proceeds another

and from the hearing proceeds another hearing, and from the voice proceeds another voice, eternally curious of the harmony of things with man. These understand the law of perfection in masses and floods that it is profuse and impartial— that eyesight,

—

there

not a minute of the light or dark, nor an acre

of the earth and sea, without

— nor any

direction

of the sky, nor any trade or employment, nor any turn of events.

This

proper expression

the reason that about the

of beauty there

a precision

One part does not need to be thrust above another. The best singer is not the one who

and balance.

[i68]

Collect

has the most of

poems

lithe

not

and powerful organ.

them

The

it is

any or

all

the least

done, the greatest poet brings the

spirit

events and passions and scenes and per-

some more and some less, individual character as you hear

sons,

to bear on your

To do

or read.

compete with the laws that pursue and follow Time. What is the purpose must surely be there, and the clue of it must be there and the

this well

—

and Past and

faintest indication is the indication of the best,

then becomes the clearest indication.

present and future are not disjoin'd but join'd. greatest poet forms the consistence of

from what has been and

is.

what

The to be,

drags the dead out

them again on their feet. Rise and walk before me that

of their coffins and stands

He says

to the past.

lesson — he

places

himself where the future becomes present.

The

may

realize

you.

learns the

his

rays over

passions — he

finally as-

greatest poet does not only dazzle

character and scenes and

cends, and finishes that no

man

beyond

— he

verge.

can

tell

all

— he

exhibits the pinnacles

what they

are for, or

what

glows a moment on the extremest most wonderful in his last half-hidden

smile or frown;

that flash of the

ing the one that sees fied afterward for

shall

many

that take the handsomest

measure and sound. / Without effort, and without exposing

how

pleasure

of part-

be encouraged or

years.

[169]

moment

The

terri-

greatest poet

•

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Collect

does not moralize or make applications of morals he knows the soul. pride

which

The

soul has that measureless

consists in never

lessons or deductions but

pathy as measureless as

its

acknowledging any

own. pride,

its

But

has sym-

and the one

ances the other, and neither can stretch too it

stretches in

company with the

other.

secrets of art sleep with the twain.

poet has

lain close

art of art,

for excess, or for

letters, is simplicity.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; nothing

all

intellectual

nor very uncommon.

Noth-

make up To carry

subjects their articulations, are

common

in literature

can

the lack of defmiteness.

on the heave of impulse and pierce neither

vital

the glory of expression and the

better than simplicity

and give

The inmost The greatest

betwixt both, and they are

sunshine of the light of ing

while

and thoughts.

in his style

/The

far

bal-

depths

powers

But to speak

with the perfect rectitude and insouci-

ance of the movements of animals, and the unimpeachableness of the sentiment of trees

and grass by the roadside, art.

the

woods

the flawless triumph of

you have look'd on him who has achiev'd

you have look'd on one of the masters of the artists of all nations and times. You shall not contemplate the flight of the gray gull over the bay, or the mettle-

some

action of the blood horse, or the

tall

leaning

of sunflowers on their stalk, or the appearance of

the sun journeying through heaven, or the appear-

ance of the

moon afterward, with any more satisfaction [170]

Collect

than you shall contemplate him. has less a mark'd style, and

The

great poet

more the channel of

thoughts and things without increase or diminution, and is the free channel of himself. He swears to his art,

will not

be meddlesome,

writing any elegance, or in I

will not

have

effect, or originality, to

hang

way between me and and the rest like curtains.

the

have nothing hang

will

the way, not the richest

What tell tell for who may exalt or startle or

curtains.

Let

what

precisely

it is.

fascinate or soothe,

have purposes as health or heat or snow has, and be as regardless of observation. What experiI

will

ence or portray out a shred of

The

and look

side

go from

shall

composition. in

composition with-

You

shall stand

the mirror with me. /

old red blood and stainless gentility of great

poets will be proved by their unconstraint.

heroic

person walks at his ease through and out of that

custom or precedent or authority that suits him not. Of the traits of the brotherhood of first-class writers, savans, musicians, inventors and artists, nothing finer

than silent defiance advancing from

forms.

the need of poems, philosophy,

mechanism, science, behavior, the appropriate native grand opera, craft,

itself,

that

which

and makes one. [171]

finds

or any

who contributes

the greatest original practical example. est expression

free

politics,

craft of art,

shipcraft,

greatest for ever and ever

new

The

clean-

no sphere worthy

Collect

The messages

woman

are,

of great

Come

can you understand

what we

to us us.

poems

to each

man and

on equal terms, only then are no better than you,

you inclose, what we enjoy you may enjoy. Did you suppose there could be only one Supreme ? We affirm there can be unnumber'd inclose

Supremes, and that one does not countervail another

—

any more than one eyesight countervails another and that men can be good or grand only of the consciousness of their supremacy within them.

What

do you think is the grandeur of storms and dismemberments, and the deadliest battles and wrecks, and the wildest fury of the elements, and the power of the sea, and the motion of Nature, and the throes of

human

It is

and dignity and hate and love ? that something in the soul which says, Rage on, desires,

whirl on,

tread master here and everywhere

—

Master of the spasms of the sky and of the shatter of the sea. Master of nature and passion and death,

and of all terror and all pain. The American bards shall be mark'd for generosity and affection, and for encouraging competitors. They shall be kosmos, without monopoly or secrecy, glad to pass anything to any one hungry for equals night and day. They shall not be careful of riches and privilege they shall be riches and privilege they shall perceive who the most affluent man is. The most affluent man is he that confronts all the shows he sees by equivalents out of the

—

[172]

Collect

The American bard persons, nor one or two

stronger wealth of himself. shall delineate

class of

out of the strata of interests, nor love most nor truth most, nor the soul most, nor the body most and

—

not be for the Eastern States more than the Western, or the Northern States more than the Southern.

Exact science and

its practical

movements

are

checks on the greatest poet, but always his encour-

The

agement and support.

outset and remembrance

— there the arms that braced him best — there he returns are there

lifted

him

first,

after all his

and

goings

— the anato-

and comings.

The

mist, chemist,

astronomer, geologist, phrenologist,

spiritualist,

sailor

and

traveler

mathematician, historian, and lexicog-

rapher, are not poets, but they are the lawgivers of poets,

and

their construction underlies the structure

of every perfect poem. utter'd,

they sent the seed of the conception of

them and by them stand the

souls.

—

visible proofs of

there shall be love and content between

the father and the son, and is

matter what rises or

the greatness of the son

the exuding of the greatness of the father, there

shall

be love between the poet and the

monstrable science.

henceforth the tuft and

Great

man

of de-

the beauty of poems are

final

applause of science.

the faith of the flush of knowledge, and

of the investigation of the depths of qualities and things.

Cleaving and circling here swells the soul

of the poet, yet

president of [173]

itself

always.

The

Collect

The

depths are fathomless, and therefore calm.

nocence and nakedness are resumed ther modest nor immodest.

the supernatural, and

educed out of happen'd shall

it,

all

that

happen, the

— they are nei-

The whole theory of was twined with it or

What

departs as a dream.

— what

happens, and whatever vital

in-

laws inclose

all.

—

has ever

may

They

or are

any case and for all cases none to be hurried or retarded any special miracle of affairs or persons inadmissible in the vast clear scheme where every motion and every spear of grass, and the frames and spirits of men and women and all that sufficient for

—

concerns them, are unspeakably perfect miracles, referring to It is

all,

and each

and

distinct

all

in its place.

also not consistent with the reality of the soul

known universe more divine than men and women. Men and women, and the earth and all upon it, to admit that there

anything

are to be taken as they are, their past

the

and the investigation of

and present and future

mitted, and shall be this basis

shall

be uninter-

done with perfect candor.

Upon

philosophy speculates, ever looking towards

the poet, ever regarding the eternal tendencies of

toward happiness, never inconsistent with what

all

and to the soul. For the eternal tendencies of all toward happiness make the only Whatever comprehends point of sane philosophy. clear to the senses

less

light

than that

— whatever

less

and of astronomical motion [174]

than the laws of

— or

less

than the

Collect

laws that follow the

thief,

the

the drunkard, through this

ward,—

the glutton and

liar,

life

and doubtless

after-

or less than vast stretches of time, or the

slow formation of density, or the patient upheaving of strata,— is of no account. Whatever would put

God ing

poem or system of philosophy as contendagainst some being or influence, is also of no in

Sanity and ensemble characterize the great

account.

master

— spoilt

one

great master has nothing to do with miracles.

The He

sees health for himself in being one of the mass

— he

principle, all is spoilt.

sees the hiatus in singular eminence.

shape comes

common

general law

great, for that

The master knows and that

that he

for instance, is greater

bring

them up well

the

to correspond with

it.

unspeakably great,

are unspeakably great

all

perfect

To be under

ground. is

To the

— that

nothing,

than to conceive children, and

— that to be

just as great as to

perceive or tell In the

make

of the great masters the idea of

political liberty is indispensable.

adherence of heroes wherever exist

— but

from the

Liberty takes the

man and woman

never takes any adherence or welcome

rest

more than from

They are the They out of ages them it is con-

poets.

voice and exposition of liberty.

—

to worthy the grand idea Nothing has prefided, and they must sustain it. cedence of it, and nothing can warp or degrade it. As the attributes of the poets of the kosmos are

[175]

Collect

concentre in the real body, and

the pleasure of

things, they possess the superiority of genuineness

over all fiction and romance. As they emit themselves, facts are lit

shower'd over

with more volatile light

setting

and

rising

light— the daylight

w^ith

— the deep between the

sun goes deeper

many

fold.

Each

precise object or condition or combination or process

— the multiplication table — old — the carpenter's trade — the grand opera

exhibits a beauty

age its

its

— the

at sea

its

huge-hull'd clean-shap'd

under steam or

beauty

— the

full sail

American

New

York clipper

gleams with unmatch'd

circles

and

of government gleam with theirs

large

harmonies

— and the common-

and actions with theirs. The poets of the kosmos advance through all interpositions and coverings and turmoils and stratagems to first est definite intentions

They

principles.

from

its

are of use

need, and riches from

proprietor,

who

and paid

its

they say, shall not

more than any one not he

— they dissolve poverty

for

holds a legal it.

title

it,

of the library

can read the same through

all

having bought

Any one and every one

the library (indeed he or she alone

large

or perceive

realize

The owner

else.

You

conceit.

owner of

owner),

who

the varieties of tongues

and subjects and styles, and in whom they enter with ease, and make supple and powerful and rich and large.

These American

States, strong

and healthy and

accomplish'd, shall receive no pleasure from violations [176]

Collect

of natural models, and

must not permit them.

paintings or mouldings or carvings in

wood, or

mineral or

the illustrations of books or newspapers,

or in the patterns of woven stuffs, or anything to beau-

rooms or furniture or costumes, or to put upon cornices or monuments, or on the prows or sterns of ships, or to put anywhere before the human eye indoors or out, that which distorts honest shapes, or which creates unearthly beings or places or contintify

gencies,

especially,

ulous.

it is

so great

Of ornaments

be allow'd

Of the human form must never be made ridica work nothing outre can

a nuisance and revolt. it

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; but those ornaments can be allow'd that

conform to the perfect

facts of the

open

air,

and that

flow out of the nature of the work, and come pressibly from

of the work.

ornament. physiology.

irre-

and are necessary to the completion Most works are most beautiful without it,

Exaggerations will be revenged

human

Clean and vigorous children are jetted

and conceiv'd only

those communities where the

models of natural forms are public every day.

Great

genius and the people of these States must never be

demean'd to romances.

As soon as histories are properly told, no more need of romances. The great poets are to be known by the absence in them of tricks, and by the justification of perfect personal candor. All faults may be forgiven of him who has perfect candor. Henceforth let no man of us lie, for we have seen that openness wins the inner VOL. V.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

13. .

[177]

Collect

and outer world, and that there

no single exception,

and that never since our earth gather'd itself in a mass have deceit or subterfuge or prevarication attracted its

smallest particle or the faintest tinge of a shade

—

and that through the enveloping wealth and rank of a state, or the whole republic of States, a sneak or sly person shall

be discover'd and despised

— and

that the soul has never once been fool'd and never

can be fool'd

— and

without the loving nod of

thrift

puff— and

grew up in any of the continents of the globe, nor upon any planet or satellite, nor in that condition which pre-

the soul

only a

foetid

there never

cedes the birth of babes, nor at any time during the

any stretch of abeyance or action of vitality, nor in any process of formation or reformation anywhere, a being whose instinct hated

changes of

life,

nor

the truth.

Extreme caution or prudence, the soundest organic

hope and comparison and fondness for and children, large alimentiveness and de-

health, large

women

structiveness and causality, with a perfect sense of the

oneness of nature, and the propriety of the same spirit

applied to

human

affairs,

float of the brain of the

are called

up of the

world to be parts of the

greatest poet from his birth out of his mother's

womb,

and from her birth out of her mother's. Caution seldom goes far enough. It has been thought that the prudent citizen was the citizen who applied himself to solid gains, and did well for himself and for [178]

Collect

his family,

or crime.

and completed a lawful

life

without debt

The greatest poet sees and admits these

eco-

nomies as he sees the economies of food and sleep, but has higher notions of prudence than to think he gives

much when he gives a few slight attentions at the latch The premises of the prudence of life are of the gate. not the hospitality of it.

for

it,

or the ripeness

and harvest of

Beyond the independence of a little sum laid aside burial-money, and of a few clapboards around

and shingles overhead on a lot of American soil own'd, and the easy dollars that supply the year's plain clothing and meals, the melancholy prudence of the abandonment of such a great being as a man is to the toss and pallor of years of money-making, with all their scorching days and icy nights, and all their stifling deceits and underhand dodgings, or infinitesimals of parlors, or shameless stuffing while

others starve, and

all

the loss of the bloom and odor

of the earth, and of the flowers and atmosphere, and of the sea, and of the true taste of the

men you age,

pass or have to do with in youth or middle

and the issuing sickness and desperate

the close of a if

women and

life

without elevation or naivete, (even

you have achieved a secure 10,000

election to

revolt at

year, or

Congress or the Governorship,) and the

ghastly chatter of a death without serenity or majesty, is

the great fraud upon modern civilization and fore-

thought, blotching the surface and system which civilization

undeniably

drafts, [179]

and moistening with

Collect

tears the

immense

features

spreads and spreads

with such velocity before the reach'd kisses of the soul.

Ever the right explanation remains to be made

The prudence of the mere

about prudence.

and respectability of the most esteem'd too faint for the eye to observe at

all,

large alike drop quietly aside at the

prudence suitable

dom

that

life

when

appears little

and

thought of the

What

for immortality.

v/ealth

the wis-

the thinness of a year, or seventy

fills

or eighty years â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to the wisdom spaced out by ages,

and coming back

at a certain

time with strong rein-

forcements and rich presents, and the clear faces of

wedding-guests as direction,

running gaily

itself

All that a

you can toward you ?

far

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

all

look, in every

else has reference to

person does or thinks

Nor can the push of charity

Only the soul what ensues.

of consequence.

or personal force ever be

anything else than the profoundest reason, whether

brings argument to hand or no.

necessary â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to add or subtract or divide

Little or big,

all

is in

vain.

learn'd or unlearn'd, white or black,

legal or illegal, sick or well,

down

specification

from the

first

inspiration

the windpipe to the last expiration out of

that a male or female does that

much

it,

vigorous and

him or her in the unshakable order of the universe, and through the whole scope of it forever. The prubenevolent and clean

sure profit to

dence of the greatest poet answers [i8o]

at last the crav-

Collect

ing and glut of the soul, puts off nothing, permits

no let-up

for its

own

case or any case, has no par-

sabbath or judgment day, divides not the living from the dead, or the righteous from the un-

ticular

righteous,

satisfied

thought or act by

correlative,

its

and knows no pos-

deputed atonement.

sible forgiveness or

The

with the present, matches every

direct trial of

him who would be the

greatest

he does not flood himself with the immediate age as with vast oceanic tidesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; if he be poet

to-day.

not himself the age transfigur'd, and

him

open'd the eternity which gives similitude to

not all

periods and locations and processes, and animate

and inanimate forms, and which is the bond of time, and rises up from its inconceivable vagueness and infiniteness in the is

swimming shapes

held by the ductile anchors of

present spot the passage from shall be,

this

and commits

wave

life,

of to-day, and and makes the

what was

what

the representation of

itself to

of an hour, and this one of the sixty

beautiful children of the

wave

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

let

him merge

the general run, and wait his development. Still

the final test of poems, or any character or

work, remains.

prescient poet projects himself

centuries ahead, and ^udges performer or performance after

the changes of time.

them? Does style, and the satisfactory

it still

Does

hold on untired?

live

through

Will the same

direction of genius to similar points, be

now ?

Have the marches of tens and [I8i]

Collect

hundreds and thousands of years made willing detours to the right hand and the left hand for his sake? he beloved long and long

Does him? and the young woman think often of him? and do the middle-aged and the old think of him? A great poem is for ages and ages in common, and for all degrees and complexions, and all departments and sects, and for a woman as much as a man, and a man as much as a woman. A great poem is no finish to a man or woman, but rather a beginning. Has any one fancied he could sit at last under some due authority, and rest satisfied with explanations, and realize, and be content and full? To no such terminus does the greatest poet bring he brings neither cessation nor sheltered fatness and ease. The touch of him, like Nature, tells in action. Whom he Is

the

young man think

after

buried?

often of

—

takes he takes with firm sure grasp into live regions

previously unattain'd

— thenceforward

rest

—

they see the space and ineffable sheen that turn the old spots and lights into dead vacuums.

Now

there

be a man cohered out of tumult and chaos — the elder encourages the younger and shows him how —

shall

they two shall launch off fearlessly together till the new world fits an orbit for itself, and looks unabashed

on the

lesser orbits of the stars,

and sweeps through

the ceaseless rings, and shall never be quiet again.

There is

done.

will

soon be no more

A new

priests.

Their work

order shall arise, and they shall be [182]

Collect

the priests of man, and every

man

be his

shall

own

They shall find their inspiration in real obto-day, symptoms of the past and future. They

priest.

jects

shall not

deign to defend immortality or God, or the

perfection of things, or liberty, or the exquisite beauty

and

reality of the soul.

They

shall arise in

America,

and be responded to from the remainder of the

earth.

The English language befriends the grand American expression it is brawny enough, and limber

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and full enough. On the tough stock of a race who through all change of circumstance was never without the idea of political liberty, which of

all

liberty,

the animus

has attracted the terms of daintier and

gayer and subtler and more elegant tongues. the powerful language of resistance â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

common

sense.

melancholy

races,

It is

the dialect

the speech of the proud and

and of

all

who

chosen tongue to express growth, freedom, justice,

it is

equality,

aspire.

the

faith, self-esteem,

friendliness,

prudence, decision, and courage.

amplitude,

medium

the

that shall wellnigh express the inexpressible.

great literature, nor any like style of behavior

or oratory, or social intercourse or household arrange-

ments, or public institutions, or the treatment by bosses of employ'd people, nor executive detail of the

army and navy, nor

spirit

detail, or

of legislation

or courts, or police or tuition or architecture, or songs or amusements, can long elude the jealous and pas-

sionate instinct of American standards. [183]

Whether

Collect

no the sign appears from the mouths of the people, it throbs a live interrogation in every freeman's and free woman's heart, after that which passes by, or this built to remain. Is it uniform with my country ? Are

its

Is it for

disposals without ignominious distinctions ?

the ever-growing

communes

of brothers and

beyond the old models, generous beyond all models? Is it something grown fresh out of the fields, or drawn from the sea know that what anfor use to me to-day here? lovers,

well united, proud,

large,

swers

for

me, an American,

must answer for for it

Texas, Ohio, Canada,

any individual or nation that serves a part of my materials. Does this answer ? Is it the nursing of the young of the republic ? Does for

solve readily with the sweet milk of the nipples of

the breasts of the Mother of

Many

Children ?

America prepares with composure and good-will for the visitors that lect that is to

talented, the

have sent word.

not intel-

It is

be their warrant and welcome. artist,

the ingenious, the editor, the

statesman, the erudite, are not unappreciated fall

in their place

nation also does all.

and do its

their

work.

Only toward the

half-way.

work.

The

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; they

soul of the

rejects none,

like ol itself will

individual

when he has the tion. The soul

The

permits

advance

as superb as a nation

which make a superb naof the largest and wealthiest and proudest nation may well go half-way to meet that of

its

qualities

poets. [184]

Collect

The impetus and To As

sLn,

years past,

^oxxxt

Bird

attempt

Now'^r.MoL,

ideas urging me, for to

an utterance, or

New World

utterance, of

^ougs, and au epic of Democracy, having inVr^frentt^: ^*iÂ°Â°already had their publish'd expression, as well as

can expect to give

it,

Leaves of Grass,

the present and any future pieces from

but the surplusage forming

wake eddying behind rious conviction,

and

total

it.

after that I

fulfill'd in

that an impe-

confess

nature as

those which make the sea

flow, or the globe revolve. i

volume, or the

and the commands of

irresistible as

tary volume,

are really

But of this supplemen-

Having

not so certain.

from early manhood abandoned the business pursuits

and applications usual

time and country, and

obediently yielded myself up ever since to the impetus mention'd, and to the

work

of expressing those

may be that mere habit has got dominion of me, when there is no real need of saying anything ideas,

further.

But what

life

but an experiment? and

mortality but an exercise ? with reference to results

beyond. here, trial

And

so shall

and superfluous

my poems there,

nHmporte

and persistent exploration

and other success

failing shall

be.

incomplete

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;the

shall at least

earnest

be mine,

be success enough.

have been more anxious, anyhow, to suggest the songs of vital endeavor and manly evolution, and furnish something for races of outdoor athletes, than

make

perfect rhymes, or reign in the parlors. [185]

— Collect

my own

ventured from the beginning

way, taking

chances— and would keep on venturing. I

will

known

therefore

not conceal from any persons,

unknown

the matter, that

who

to me,

take an interest in

have the ambition of devoting yet

few years to poetic composition. The mighty present age! To absorb and express in poetry, anything of it— of its world— America— cities and States a

—the years, the events of our Nineteenth century— the rapidity of movement—the violent contrasts, fluctuations of light

the entire revolution

method

new

— these

and shade, of hope and

made by

great

new

fear

science in the poetic

underlying

and

facts

—

and spreading everywhere; truly a mighty age As if in some colossal drama, acted again like those of old under the open sun, the Nations of our time, and all the characteristics of Civilization, seem hurrying, stalking across, flitting from wing to wing, gathering, closing up, toward some long-prepared, most tremendous denouement. Not to conclude the infinite scenas of the race's life and toil and happiness and sorrow, but haply that the ideas rushing !

boards be clear'd from oldest, worst incumbrances, accumulations,

and Man resume the

anew, and under happier,

eternal

freer auspices.

play

To me,

the United States are important because in this colossal

drama they

are unquestionably designated for the

leading parts, for history and

many

a century to come.

humanity seem to seek [i86]

them

to culminate.

Collect

Our broad

now

areas are even

plots, passions,

interests,

the busy theatre of

and suspended problems,

compared to which the intrigues of the past of Europe, the wars of dynasties, the scope of kings and kingdoms, and even the development of peoples, as measurement comparatively narrow and trivial. And on these areas of ours, as on a stage, sooner or later, something like an eclaircissement of all the past civilization of Europe and Asia is probably to be evolved. hitherto,

exhibit scales of

The leading parts. Not to be acted, emulated here, by us again, that role till now foremost in history not to become a conqueror nation, or to achieve

—

the glory of mere military, or diplomatic, or commercial superiority— but to

ducing land of nobler races,

cheerful,

become the grand

men and women— of

pro-

copious

become indeed)—

healthy, tolerant, free—to

the most friendly nation (the United States

the modern composite nation, form'd from

all,

with

room for all, welcoming all immigrants— accepting the work of our own interior development, as the work fitly filling ages and ages to come;—the leading nation of peace, but neither ignorant nor incapable

of being the leading nation of nation

only,

war;— not

the man's

but the woman's nation—a land of

splendid mothers, daughters, sisters, wives.

Our America to-day

consider in

as but indeed a vast seething

many

respects

mass of materials,

ampler, better (worse also), than previously [187]

known

— Collect

—eligible to be used to carry towards stage,

and build

for

body and the

soul,*

limit here to land, help, opportunities, mines,

demands, supplies, &c.;

products,

our

crowning

good, the great ideal nationality

of the future, the nation of the

—no

its

permanently establish'd, as

can calculate

—but, so

far,

think)

Mu-

National, State, and

political organization.

nicipal,

—with

far

ahead as

social, literary, religious,

or esthetic organizations, consistent with our politics,

becoming

come,

to us

in time,

—which

organizations can only

through great democratic ideas,

ligion—through science, which now, rise,

our

ascending, begins to illuminate

own

like a

all

sun-

—and through

begotten poets and literatuses.

book on

new

re-

(The moral

seems to be that the only real foundation-walls and bases and also sine qua non afterward of true and full civilization, is the eligibility and certainty of boundless products for feeding, clothing, sheltering everybody —perennial fountains of physical and domestic comfort, with intercommunication, and with civil and ecclesiastical freedom and that then the esthetic and mental business will take care of itself. Well, of a late well-written

civilization

—

* The problems of the achievements of

this crowning stage through future firstand others of creating in literature an imaginative New World, the correspondent and counterpart of the current Scientific and Political New Worlds, and the perhaps distant, but still delightful prospect

—

class National Singers, Orators, Artists,

—

(for

our children,

not

our

own

day), of delivering America, and, indeed,

all

moribund and watery, but appallingly extensive nuisance of conventional poetry by putting something really alive and substantial in its place— I have undertaken to grapple with, and argue, in the preceding Democratic Vistas. Christian lands everywhere, from the thin

—

[188]

Collect

the United States have establish'd this basis, and

upon

and continuity, rivaling those of Nature; and have now to proceed to build an edifice upon it. say this edifice scales of extent, variety, vitality,

by new literatures, especially the poetic say a modern image-making creation is indispensable to fuse and express the modern political and scientific creations and then the trinity is

only to be

fitly built

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

will

be complete.)

When commenced, years ago, elaborating the plan of my poems, and continued turning over that plan, and shifting it in my mind through many I

years (from the age of twenty-eight to thirty-five),

experimenting much, and writing and abandoning

much, one deep purpose underlay the others, and has underlain it and its execution ever since and Amid many that has been the religious purpose. changes, and a formulation taking far different shape

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

from what

at first

supposed, this basic purpose has

never been departed from

Not of course

verses.

ways, as to

the composition of

to exhibit itself

the old

writing hymns or psalms with an eye

the church-pew, or to express conventional pi-

etism, or the sickly yearnings of devotees, but in

new ways, and aiming

widest sub-bases and

at the

inclusions of humanity, and tallying the fresh air of

sea and land. there

not, for

will see (said

a sound religious

to myself),

purposes as poet, a

germenancy [189]

whether

religion,

the average

and

human

Collect

race, at least in their

United States, and

modern development

common

the hardy

the

fiber

and

native yearnings and elements, deeper and larger,

and affording more profitable sects or churches

returns, than

—as boundless, joyous,

all

and

mere

vital as

Nature itself— a germenancy that has too long been

unencouraged, unsung, almost unknown. ence, the old theology of the East, long in

begins evidently to die and disappear.

With its

sci-

dotage,

But (to

—and maybe such prinprove service — as evidently prepares the way for One indescribably grander — Time's young but peroffspring — the new theology— heir of the West —lusty and loving, and wondrous beautiful. For mind) science

its

v/ill

cipal

fect

America, and for to-day, just the same as any day, the supreme and

final

—what

science being only

call

Democracy

America

and chant

said)

is,

science

or shall be also.

must

God

the science of its

And

minister

—

a poet of

himself with such thoughts,

fill

his best out of

them.

the convictions and aims, for

And

good

as those

were

or bad, of Leaves

of Grass, they are no less the intention of this volume. plete ality, all

no sane and compersonality, nor any grand and electric nationwithout the stock element of religion imbuing

As there can

be,

opinion,

the other elements (like heat in chemistry, invis-

ible itself,

but the

life

all

visible life), so there

can

be no poetry worthy the name without that element

behind

all.

The time has

certainly

[190]

come

to begin to

Collect

discharge the idea of religion, in the United States,

from mere ecclesiasticism, and from Sundays and churches and church-going, and assign it to that general position, chiefest, most indispensable, most

which the others are to be adjusted, human character, and education, and

exhilarating, to

inside of

all

The

affairs.

women

young men and

people, especially the

of America, must begin to learn that religion

(like poetry), is

something

they supposed.

is,

far, far

different

from what

indeed, too important to the

power and perpetuity of the

New World

to be con-

any longer to the churches, old or new. Catholic or Protestant— Saint this, or Saint that. It

sign'd

must be consign 'd henceforth to democracy en masse and to literature. It must enter into the poems of the nation. It must make the nation. The Four Years' War is over and in the peaceful, strong, exciting, fresh occasions of to-day, and of the future, that strange, sad war is hurrying even now to be forgotten. The camp, the drill, the lines

—

of sentries, the prisons, the hospitals pitals

—

all

have passed away

A new

dream.

race, a

—

all

young and

— (ah

the hos-

seem now

like a

lusty generation,

already sweeps in with oceanic currents, obliterating

the war, and all

its

let

its scars, its

mounded

graves, and

reminiscences of hatred, conflict, death.

be obliterated.

the future

and

all

all.

say the

life

of the present and

makes undeniable demands upon us each

South, North, East, West. [191]

help put the

Collect

United States (even hand,

them

only

one unbroken

imagination) hand in

circle in

a chant

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to rouse

to the unprecedented grandeur of the part they

and are even now playing

are to play,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;to the thought

of their great future, and the attitude conform'd to

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; especially

their ^great

moral,

esthetic,

it,

scientific

and

future (of

which

present

but as the preparatory tuning of instru-

their vulgar material

ments by an orchestra), these, as hitherto, for me, among my hopes, ambitions. Leaves of Grass, already publish'd, tions, the

are

still,

in its inten-

is,

song of a great composite democratic indi-

And

vidual, male or female.

fying the

political

same purpose,

following on and ampli-

suppose

to run through the chants of this pleted), the thread- voice,

have

volume

more or

(if

my mind

ever com-

less audible, of

aggregated, inseparable, unprecedented, vast, composite, electric democratic nationality.

Purposing, then, to

still fill

out, from time to time

through years to come, the following volume (unless prevented),

;

conclude this preface to the

first instal-

ment of it, pencil'd in the open air, on my fifty -third birthday, by wafting to you, dear reader, whoever you are (from amid the fresh scent of the grass, the pleasant coolness of the forenoon breeze, the lights and shades of tree-boughs silently dappling and playing around me, and the notes of the cat-bird for undertone and accompaniment), my true good-will and love. W. W. PVashington, D, C, May 31, 1872. [192]

Collect

At the eleventh hour, under grave

^ Preface, 1876 mne centemuai

igft

Edition of Leaves c/ Crass

Qver siuce publlshiug, *^' *^

and Two

illness, ,

gather up the pieces of prose and poetry

To the two-voi-

fwst

Grass

— nearly

—

whjle since,

aud uiaiu

volume, Leaves of pieces, here, some new, some j

them (sombre as many are, making this almost death's book) composed in by-gone atmospheres of perfect health and preceded by the old

all

—

freshest

the

collection,

send them out, embodied partly as

brate, in

some

Two

little

now

Rivulets,

the present melange,

contribution and outpouring to celesort,

centennial of our

the feature of the time, the

New World

nationality

— and

first

then

as chyle and nutriment to that moral, indissoluble

union, equally representing

all,

and the mother of

many coming centennials. And e'en for flush and proof of our America reminder, just as much, or more, in ing pride and joy,

keep

" Passage to

India," is

— As

of tower-

coloring-finish of

some ancient legend-play,

for

special chants of death

and immortality* to stamp the

the hero's career, there

moods

—

all,

to close the plot

and

a farewell gathering on ship's deck and on shore, a loosing

—

a starting out on unknown ties, a spreading of sails to the wind and the curtain falls, up no one knows whither to return no more and there is the end of it have reserv'd that poem, with its cluster, to so finish and explain much that, without them, would not be explain'd, and to take leave, and escape for good, from all that has preceded them. (Then probably Pass-

of hawsers and

—

seas, to fetch

—

and its cluster, are but freer vent and fuller expression to what, from and so on throughout, more or less lurks in my writings, underneath every

age

to India,

the

first,

page, every I

line,

after

everywhere.)

not sure but the

thinks of death.

—

last

inclosing sublimation of race or

After the rest has been

comprehended and

said,

poem

is,

what

even the grandest

those contributions to mightiest nationality, or to sweetest song, or to the

VOL.

v.— 13.

[193]

Collect

present and past.

For terminus and temperer to

all,

they were originally written; and that shall be their the

office at

last.

For some reason

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; not

explainable or definite to

my own

mind, yet secretly pleasing and satisfactory

have not hesitated to embody

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and run

in,

through the volume, two altogether distinct veins, or strata

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

politics for one,

and

for the other,

pensive thought of immortality.

the

Thus, too, the

prose and poetic, the dual forms of the present book. best personalism, male or female, have been glean'd from the rich

of tangible

life,

and have been

visible existence, still

fully

with the duty

devolves,

rounded and apparently completed,

remains to be really completed by suffusing through the whole and several, that

other pervading invisible fact, so large a part

combining the unitary

and furnishing,

rest,

meaning to

universe, in Time.

all,

only a

little

not the largest part

(is it

and

vivify, It

less

than this idea of immortality, above

and give crowning

was originally my body and existence,

here,

me (extend-

democratic purports, the ethereal and

ones, are to concentrate here, and as fixed stars, radiate hence. it is

life

thought, and the cheerful con-

distinctive proofs of the soul, so to

further), the ultimate

consistently with the dignity of the

life,

eligibility to this

first

? )

person or State, the only permanent and

for

even the meanest

As from the

quest of this fact, flash forth the ing

and varied themes

accepted and sung, and the pervading fact of

all

religious stamp, to

For, in

other ideas, that

democracy

to enter into,

New

the

spiritual

opinion,

World.

intention, after chanting in Leaves

of Grass the songs equally needed volume, based

to then compose a further, on those convictions of perpetuity and conservation which, enveloping all precedents, make the unseen soul govern absolutely at last. I meant, while in a sort continuing

of the

the theme of

first

chants, to shift the slides,

and

exhibit the

problem and paradox

of the same ardent and fully appointed personality entering the sphere of the less gravitation

resist-

of spiritual law, and with cheerful face estimating death, not at

as the cessation, but as

somehow what

feel it

must be, the entrance upon by

the greatest part of existence, and something that

life is

at least as

much

for, as

all

far it is

beyond my powers, and must remain for some bard in the future. The physical and the sensuous, in themselves or in their immediate continuations, retain holds upon me which think are never entirely releas'd; and those holds have not only not denied, but hardly wish'd to

for itself.

But the

full

construction of such a

work

weaken. Meanwhile, not entirely to give the go-by to avoid a mark'd hiatus in

it,

than to entirely

fulfil it,

[194]

original plan,

end

and

far

more to

books with thoughts,

Collect

The volume,

therefore,

after

minor episodes,

its

probably divides into these two, at

and treatment.

verse, veins of topic

sight far di-

first

Three points,

have become very dear to me, and

especial,

through

make them

seek to

many forms and

in all

again and again, in

be seen:

repetitions, as will

That

the true growth-characteristics of the democracy of

New World

the

literary,

than

artistic

in its

are henceforth to radiate in superior

and

republican forms, universal and a

or radiations from thoughts, on death, immortality, In those thoughts, in a sort,

world.

spiritual

more suffrage, and

religious expressions, far

make

the

free entrance into

steps or studies

first

the

toward

by my foregoing poems, and them also seek to set the key-stone to my democracy's enduring arch. I recoUate them now, for the press, in order to partially occupy and offset days of strange sickness, and the heaviest affliction and bereavement of my fondly please myself with the notion of leaving that cluster to you, O life; and unknown reader of the future, as " something to remember me by," more especially

the mighty theme, from the point of view necessitated

by modem

science.

than

Written in former days of perfect health,

all else.

little

did

think the pieces

had the purport that now, under present circumstances, opens to me. [As write these lines, May 31, 1875, it is again early summer, again my birthday now my fifty-sixth. Amid the outside beauty and freshness, the sunlight and verdure of the delightful season, O how different the moral atmosphere amid which now revise this Volume, from the jocund influence surrounding the growth and advent of Leaves of Grass. I occupy myself, arranging these pages for

—

publication,

still

envelopt in thoughts of the death

two

years since of

dear

Mother, the most perfect and magnetic character, the rarest combination of practical,

moral and

me O

spiritual,

much

and the

least selfish,

the most deeply loved

all

— and

and any

have ever known

tedious attack of paralysis, obstinately lingering and keeping quite suspending

all

—and by

also under the physical affliction of a its

hold upon me, and

bodily activity and comfort.]

Under these influences, therefore, still feel to keep Passage to India for last words even to this centennial dithyramb. Not as, in antiquity, at highest festival of Egypt, the noisome sKeleton of death was sent on exhibition to the revelers, for zest and shadow to the occasion's joy and light but as the marble statue of the normal Greeks at Elis, suggesting death in the form of a beautiful and perfect young emblem of rest and aspiration man, with closed eyes, leaning on an inverted torch I

—

after action

— of crown and

—

point which

reference to, namely, the justified

it,

all

lives

and poems should

and noble termination of our

and outlet-preparation to another grade. [195]

steadily

have

identity, this grade

— Collect

frequent elections (though these are unspeakably important).

United States

That the

mission of the

vital political

and

to practically solve

is,

problem of two sets of rights

settle the

— the fusion, thorough

compatibility and junction of individual State prerogatives, with the indispensable necessity of centrality

and Oneness

— the national

the sovereign Union, relentless, prising

all,

and over

Do we

an inch: then 3d.

in that

not,

never yielding

amid a general malaria

and vapors, our day, unmistakably see two

of fogs pillars

and

all,

power permanently comidentity

of promise, with grandest, indestructible indi-

— one,

cations

that the morbid facts of American

and society everywhere are but passing incidents and flanges of our unbounded impetus of not growth ? weeds, annuals, of the rank, rich soil politics

—

things?

The

central,

enduring,

that

all

the hitherto experience of the States, their

first

century, has been but preparation, adolescence

— and (/. e.

that this

perennial

Union

only

now and

henceforth

since the secession war), to enter on

democratic career

the whole,

other,

its

full

poems and prose

at all to chronological order,

and passing allusions

and with

(not attending original dates

the heat and impression ot

and undisturb'd), the chants of Leaves of Grass, my former volume, yet serve as the indispensable deep soil, or basis, out of w^hich, and out of which only, could come the roots

the hour,

left

shuffled

in,

[196]

Collect

and stems more definitely indicated by these later pages. (While that volume radiates physiology alone, the present one, though of the like origin in the main,

more palpably doubtless shows the pathology which was pretty sure to come in time from the other.) In that former and main volume, composed in the flush of my health and strength, from the age of 30 to 50 years,

dwelt on birth and

clothing

life,

ideas in pictures, days, transactions of

time, to

give them positive place, identity â&#x20AC;&#x201D; saturating them

with that vehemence of pride and audacity of freedom necessary to loosen the mind of still-to-be-form'd

America from the accumulated folds, the superstitions, and all the long, tenacious and stifling anti-democratic authorities of the Asiatic

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

and European past

enclosing purport being to express, above regulation

artificial

and

aid,

all

the eternal bodily com-

posite, cumulative, natural character of one's self.* * Namely, a character, making most of

common and normal elements, to the which not only the precious accumulations of the learning and experiences of the Old World, and the settled social and municipal necessities and current requirements, so long a-building, shall still faithfully contribute, but which at its foundations and carried up thence, and receiving its impetus from the demosuperstructure of

cratic spirit,

and accepting

shall again directly

and the old

its

gauge

in all

departments from the democratic formulas,

be vitalized by the perennial influences of Nature at

heroic stamina of Nature, the strong air of prairie

dash of the briny

sea, the

primary antiseptics

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; of the

first

hand,

and mountain, the

passions, in

all

their fullest

heat and potency, of courage, rankness, amativeness, and of immense pride. to lose at

occupy

all,

for

therefore, the benefits of artificial progress

Western tenancy the oldest though ever-fresh

and

civilization,

fields,

Not

but to re-

and reap from them

the savage and sane nourishment indispensable to a hardy nation, and the absence of which, threatening to fect

to-day of our

become worse and worse,

New Worid

the most serious lack and de-

literature.

Not but what the brawn of Leaves of Grass

is,

hope, thoroughly spiritual-

ized everywhere, for final estimate, but, from the very subjects, the direct effect

[197]

Collect

Estimating the American Union as so

far,

and

for

some time to come, in its yet formative condition, bequeath poems and essays as nutriment and influI

ences to help truly assimilate and harden, and espelife, as it should be, of flesh and blood, and physical urge, and animalWhile there are other themes, and plenty of abstract thoughts and poems in the volume while have put in it passing and rapid but actual glimpses of the great struggle between the nation and the slave-power, (1861-65,) ^s the fierce and bloody panorama of that contest unroll'd itself: while the whole book, indeed, revolves around that four years' war, which, as was in the midst of it, becomes, in

sense of the ism.

—

Drum-Taps,

pivotal to the rest entire

not a few episodes and speculations

— and

here and there, before and afterward,

— that — namely, to

living, active, worldly, healthy personality,

make

a type-portrait for

objective as well as subjective, joyful

and potent, and modem and free, distinctively for the use of the United States, male and female, through the long future has been, I say, my general object. (Probably, indeed, the whole of these varied songs, and all my writings, both volumes, only ring changes in some sort, on the ejaculation. How vast, how eligible, how

—

how real, is a human being, himself or herself.) Though from no definite plan at the time, see now that have unconsciously sought, by indirections at least as much as directions, to express the whirls and

joyful,

rapid growth and intensity of the United States, the prevailing tendency and events

of the nineteenth century, and largely the

spirit

of the whole current world,

have partaken of that

spirit,

time; for

feel

that

have been deeply interested

and

ages, and, illustrated in the

history of the United States, the opening of larger ones.

(The death of President

in all those events, the closing of long-stretch'd eras

Lincoln, for instance,

old influences

fitly, historically closes, in

— drops

on them, suddenly, a

the civilization of feudalism,

vast,

gloomy, as

many

were, separating

curtain.)

Since

have been

ill,

(i873-'74-'75,) mostly without serious pain,

plenty of time and frequent inclination to judge

eye on the book-market, nor for fame, nor for any pecuniary orary depression

more than once,

not sufllciently pronounc'd.

and with

poems, (never composed with profit,)

have

felt

temp-

Leaves of Grass the moral parts were clearest and calmest moods I have realized

for fear that in

But

way for, and necessitate same as Nature does and is, they are (In a certain what, consistently with my plan, they must and probably should be. sense, while the Moral is the purport and last intelligence of all Nature, there is absoThose only lutely nothing of the moral in the works, or laws, or shows of Nature. lead inevitably to it begin and necessitate it.) Then meant Leaves of Grass, as published, to be the Poem of average Identity (of yours, whoever you are, now reading these lines), A man is not greatest

that as those Leaves,

all

and

several, surely prepare the

morals, and are adjusted to them, just the

—

as victor in war, nor inventor or explorer, nor even in science, or in his intellectual or artistic capacity, or exemplar in

some

vast benevolence.

[198]

the highest demo-

Collect

something toward what the States most need of all, and which seems to me yet quite unsupplied in literature, namely, to show them, or

cially to furnish

show them, themselves

begin to cratic view,

man

most acceptable

upon and from which labors, and his duties

well the practical

in living

happens to him as ordinary farmer,

sea-farer,

and

distinctively,

mechanic,

life

and

which

lot

clerk, laborer, or driver

position as a central basis or pedestal, while performing

— its

and employ'd person, he preserves his physique, ascends, developing, radiating himself in other regions and especially where and when (greatest of all, and nobler than the proudest mere genius or magnate in any field) he fully realizes the conscience, the spiritual, the divine faculty, cultivated well, exemplified in all his deeds and words, through life, uncompromising to the end a flight loftier than any of Homer's or Shakspere's broader than all poems and bibles namely. Nature's own, and in the midst of it, but in the centre Yourself, your own Identity, body and soul. (All serves, helps of all, absorbing all, giving, for your purpose, the only meaning and vitality to all, To sing the Song of that master or mistress of all, under the law, stands Yourself.) law of average Identity, and of Yourself, consistently with the divine law of the universal, is a main intention of those Leaves. Something more may be added for, while I am about it, I would make a full confession. also sent out Leaves of Grass to arouse and set flowing in men's and women's hearts, young and old, endless streams of living, pulsating love and friendTo this terrible, irrepressible ship, directly from them to myself, now and ever. this neveryearning (surely more or less down underneath in most human souls) this unisatisfied appetite for sympathy, and this boundless offering of sympathy this old, eternal, yet ever-new interchange of versal democratic comradeship have given in that book, undisadhesiveness, so fitly emblematic of America as citizen, son, husband, father,

—

— —

—

guisedly, declaredly, the openest expression.

purpose as

Calamus

emotional

expressions

for

Besides, important as they are in

humanity,

the

special

meaning of the

of Grass (and more or less running through the Drum-Taps) mainly resides in its political signifiIn my opinion, it is by a fervent, accepted development of comradeship, cance. the beautiful and sane affection of man for man, latent in all the young fellows, say, and by what goes directly and north and south, east and west it is by this, cluster

Leaves

book, and cropping out

—

indirectly along

with

repeat) are to be

it,

most

that the United States of the future effectually

welded together,

cannot too often

intercalated, anneal'd

into a

living union.

Then,

for enclosing clue

that Leaves of Grass entire effort or

poem

of is

all, it is

imperatively and ever to be borne in

mind

not to be construed as an intellectual or scholastic

mainly, but more as a radical utterance out of the Emotions and the utterance adjusted to, perhaps born of, Democracy and the Modern

Physique

— an

—

very nature regardless of the old conventions, and, under the great laws,

in its

following only

its

own

impulses.

£199]

Collect

what they points of

For though perhaps the main

are for.

all

ages and nations are points of resem-

blance, and, even while granting evolution, are substantially the

same, there are some

vital

things in

which this Republic, as to its individualities, and as a compacted Nation, is to specially stand forth, and And these are the culminate modern humanity. very things it least morally and mentally knows (though, curiously enough, it is at the same time faithfully acting upon them). count with such absolute certainty on the great different from, though future of the United States founded on, the past that have always invoked that future, and surrounded myself with it, before or

—

while singing

lowings

(As ever,

songs.

— America, too,

itself

gives

by the

Of men

alone?

they

alone

or States,

would be

Without

—

it,

justified

few

how much

realize

That, rising like pinnacles,

main significance to

to-day.

fol-

present, or the material ostent

live in the future. its

tends to

What, even

a prophecy.

of the best and most successful,

all

You and

there were

little

are doing

meaning

human

lands or

poems

ages,

Nations and States, have been such prophe-

cies.

all

little

purport in

All

But where any former ones with prophecy so

broad, so clear, as our times, our lands

the

lives.

West

— as those of

Without being a

scientist,

have thoroughly

adopted the conclusions of the great savans and [200]

Collect

experimentalists of our time, and of the last hundred years, all

and they have

interiorly tinged the chyle of

verse, for purposes

modern

spirit,

the real

beyond.

poems

Following the

of the present, ever

and expanding into the future, must vocalize the vastness and splendor and reality with solidifying

which scientism has invested man and the universe, (all that is called creation,) and must henceforth launch humanity into new orbits, consonant with that vastness and splendor and reality, (unknown to the old poems,) like

new systems

upon themselves, revolving subtle than the stars.

and even

present

of orbs, balanced

in limitless space,

Poetry, so largely hitherto

wedded

to children's tales,

and

mere amorousness, upholstery and superficial rhyme, will have to accept, and, while not denying the past, nor the themes of the past, will be revivified by this tremendous innovation, the kosmic spirit, which must henceforth, in my opinion, be the background and underlying impetus, more or less to

visible, of all

Only,

(for

first-class songs.

me,

any

rate,

poetry,) joyfully accepting ally following

all

modern

still

the religiousâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;which

office of scientism, in also, to free

prose and

science,

a higher

the eternal soul of man, (of

spiritual,

and loy-

without the slightest hesitation, there

remains ever recognized fact,

from

it is

my opinion,

all

higher

else too,) the

to be the greatest

and of future poetry

fables, crudities [201]

flight, a

and

superstitions,

— Collect

and launch forth fold.

To me,

renew'd faith and scope a hundred-

the worlds of religiousness, of the con-

ception of the divine, and of the ideal, though mainly latent, are just as absolute in

humanity and the uni-

verse as the world of chemistry, or anything in the

To me

objective worlds.

The prophet and

the bard,

Shall yet maintain themselves Shall mediate to the

—

higher circles yet,

modern, to democracy

—

interpret yet to

them,

God and

To me,

the crown of savantism

surely opens the

and

for

eid6lons.

way

for a

lurking behind the also in the intellect

There

will settle

all for.

There

prospective

far in

last appellate court,

which

parts in these flights, or attempting to

charge of obscurity,

dim escapes and

have not been

in either

human thought, outlets

aerial character, akin to little

nor even

a phase of the real,

which it is of man, in time,

depict or suggest them,

it.

In certain

because

No year,

real,

judgment, a

recesses, a

to be, that

more splendid theology,

ampler and diviner songs.

century, will settle this.

afraid of the

my two

volumes

poetry or melody, must leave

— must possess a certain space

itself,

fluid,

obscure to those

or no imagination, but indispensable to the

highest purposes. the soul,

becomes

vista,

Poetic style,

when

address'd to

less definite form, outline, sculpture,

and

music, half-tints, and even less than [202]

Collect

True,

half-tints.

may

may be

be the forest wildwood, or the best

at twilight, the

in a

;

but again

effect thereof,

waving oaks and cedars

and the impalpable odor. Finally, as I have lived and

architecture

the wind,

in fresh lands, inchoate,

revolutionary age, future-founding,

have

to identify the points of that age, these lands, in

felt

my recitatives, altogether in my own way. Thus my form has strictly grown from my purports and facts, and is the analogy of them. Within my time the United States have emerged from nebulous vagueness

and suspense, to full orbic (though varied) decision have done the deeds and achiev'd the triumphs of

—

half a score of centuries

upon

their real

—and are henceforth to enter

history—the

way

being

now

(/. e.

since the result of the secession war) clear'd of death-

threatening impedimenta, and the free areas around

and ahead of us assured and so before trial

—

certain,

voyages and experiments of the

starting out In

which were not

(the past century being but preparations, ship, before her

upon deep water).

estimating

volumes, the world's current

must be first proOut of the hundred years just

times and deeds, and their

foundly estimated.

spirit,

ending, (1776- 1876,) with their genesis of inevitable

and new experiments and introductions, and many unprecedented things of war and peace (to be realized better, perhaps only realized, at the wilful events,

remove of a century hence [203]

;)

out of that stretch of

Collect

time,

and especially out of the immediately preceding

twenty-five

years,

(i850-'75,) with

changes, innovations, and audacious

and bearing

their

own

the experiments of

inevitable wilful

all

their rapid

movementsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; birth-marksâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;

my poems too have found genesis. W. W.

[204]

poetry

XTo-Ba^

Hmedca Sbaftspctcâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;XTbe jfutute

Strange as race

is its

own

may

seem, the topmost proof of a

or the absence, each tells

ing rose or

The presence of

born poetry. as

lily,

its

the

As the flower-

story.

ripen'd fruit

the apple or the peach, no

that,

matter

a tree,

how

fine

the

trunk, or copious or rich the branches and foliage,

here waits sine qua non at tire

and

finished

last.

has put what

withheld

till

blossom

of original,

any

greatness to

American Republic among the

The stamp

rest, it

first-class

of en-

nation, to the

must be

stands for

sternly in

poems.

the imi-

tations will do.

And though no

esthetik

worthy the present conNew World seems

dition or future certainties of the

to have been outlined in men's minds, or has been

generally called

for,

or thought needed,

clear

that until the United States have just such definite

and native expressers in the highest artistic fields, their mere political, geographical, wealth-forming, [205]

Collect

and even intellectual eminence, however astonishing and predominant, will constitute but a more and more expanded and well-appointed body, and perhaps brain, with little or no soul. Sugar-coat the grim truth as we may, and ward off with outward plausible words, denials, explanations, to the mental

inward perception of the land

this

blank

plain; a

For the meanings and maturer

barren void exists.

purposes of these States are not the constructing of a

new world

of politics merely, and physical

com-

but even more determinedly,

forts for the million,

new world

range with science and the modern, of a

of democratic sociology and imaginative literature. If

the latter were not establish'd for the States, to

form their only permanent

tie

and hold, the

named would be of little avail. With the poems of a first-class weft with warp,

its

man's and woman's,

its

for

manners,

democracy

two

own

all

own physiognomy,

shapes, forms, and

times.

man-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; born

itself in

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; autochthonic

expressers of

alone, to radiate in subtle

all

The hour has come

America to inaugurate

directions specified

personalities

in-

under the eternal laws of

ners, fully justified all

land are twined, as

types of personal character, of

dividuality, peculiar, native, its

forms,

first-

the

poems and

itself,

ways, not only

its

spirit

in art,

but

the practical and familiar, in the transactions between

employers and employ'd persons, wages, and sternly

business and

the army and navy, and revo[206]

Collect

lutionizing them.

nowhere a scope profound

find

enough, and radical and objective enough, either aggregates or individuals.

The thought and

of a poetry in America to

fill,

and worthily

for

identity fill,

the

and enhance these aims, electrifying all and several, involves the essence and integral facts, real and spiritual, of the whole land, the whole body.

great void,

What

the great sympathetic

bones,

heart,

joints,

vitality,

space a relation,

to the congeries of

nervous

fluids,

launching forth

constituting,

and time and

system in

human being— aye, an immortal soul— such and no

less,

holds true poetry to the single

personality, or to the nation.

Here our thirty-eight States stand to-day, the

young as they are, One or two points we

children of past precedents, and, heirs of a very old estate. will consider,

out of the myriads presenting them-

The feudalism of the British Islands, illand by his legitimate ustrated by Shakspere with followers, Walter Scott and Alfred Tennyson selves.

—

had most superb and heroic permeating veins, poems, manners; even It almost seems as if only that its errors fascinating.

all its

tyrannies, superstitions, evils,

feudalism in Europe, like slavery

could outcrop types of

tallest,

own

our

South,

noblest personal char-

— strength and devotion and elsewhere — invincible courage,

acter yet

love better

than

generosity,

aspiration, the spines of

spere and the others

all.

Here

where Shak-

have named perform a service [207]

Collect

incalculably precious to our America.

and everything

ature,

fect personnel, (as

else, centers

democracy

the rest;) and here feudalism rich

and highest-rising lessons

at last in

to find the

is is

Politics, liter-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; here

the

bequeaths us

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a

unrival'd it

per-

same as

mass of foreign nutriment, which we are to work over, and popularize and enlarge, and present again in

our

own

growths.

and anxious drawbacks, jeopardies, fears. Let us give some reflections on the subject, a little fluctuating, but starting from one central thought, and returning there again. Two or three curious results may plow up. As in the astronomical laws, the very power that would seem most deadly and destructive turns out to be latently conservative of longest, vastest future births and lives. We will for once briefly examine the just-named authors solely from a Western point of view. It may Still

there are pretty grave

be, indeed, that erature,

shall use the

and the brightest current

sun of English

stars of his system,

mainly as pegs to hang some cogitations on,

home

lit-

for

inspection.

As depicter and dramatist of the passions at their stormiest outstretch, though ranking high, Shakspere (spanning the arch wide enough) is equal'd by several, and excelled by the best old Greeks (as ytschylus). But in portraying mediaeval European lords and barons, the arrogant port, so dear to the inmost

human

heart, (pride! pride! dearest, perhaps, [208]

Collect

all

— touching us, too, of

— closer than

love,)

the States closest of

he stands alone, and

wonder he so witches the world. From first to last, also, Walter

all

do not

Scott and Tenny-

son, like Shakspere, exhale that principle of caste

which we Americans have come on earth to destroy. Jefferson's verdict on the Waverley novels was that they turn'd and condens'd brilliant but entirely false lights and glamours over the lords, ladies, and aristocratic institutes of Europe, less infamies,

and then

left

with

all

their

measure-

the bulk of the suffering,

down-trodden people contemptuously

the shade.

Without stopping to answer this hornet-stinging criticism, or to repay any part of the debt of thanks owe, in common with every American, to the noblest, healthiest, cheeriest romancer that ever lived, pass on to Tennyson, his works. I

Poetry here of a very high (perhaps the highest) order of verbal melody, exquisitely clean and pure,

and almost always perfumed, like the tuberose, to an extreme of sweetness sometimes not, however, but even then a camellia of the hothouse, never a

—

common

flower

— the verse

of inside elegance and

and yet preserving amid all its super-delicatesse a smack of outdoors and outdoor folk. The high-life;

old

Norman lordhood

that

Saxon

fiber

quality here, too, cross'd with

from which twain the best current

stock of England springs all

— poetry that revels

above

things in traditions of knights and chivalry, and VOL.

v.— 14.

[209]

Collect

deeds of derring-do.

The odor

of English social

life

— a melancholy, affectionate, very manly, but dainty breed — pervading the pages

in its

highest range

an invisible scent; the idleness, the traditions, the

mannerisms, the stately ennui ; the yearning of love,

marrow, inside of

like a spinal

all

;

the costumes,

brocade and satin; the old houses and furniture

—

no mere veneering the moldy secrets everywhere the verdure, the ivy on the walls, the solid

oak,

;

moat, the English landscape outside, the buzzing in

the sun inside the

fly

window pane.

ocratic page; nay, not a line,

Never one demnot a word; never free

and naive poetry, but involv'd, labor'd, quite sophisticated even when the theme is ever so simple or

—

rustic, (a shell, a bit of

sedge, the

passage between a lad and

rhyme

lass,)

commonest

love-

the handling of

showing the scholar and conventional gentleman; showing the laureate, too, the attache of the throne, and most excellent, too; nothing better through the volumes than the dedication ''to the Queen " at the beginning, and the other fine dedthe

all

''These to his

ication,

memory "

(Prince Albert's),

preceding Idylls of the King.

Such

for

an off-hand

three that now,

by the

summary of the mighty women, men, and young

folk of the fifty millions given these States late census,

their

have been and are more read than

all

others put together.

hear

said,

both of Tennyson and another [210]

Collect

current leading literary illustrator of Great Britain,

Carlyle

— as

one of them

of Victor

Hugo

France

— that

not

personally friendly or admirant to-

ward America; indeed, quite the reverse. NHmporte, That they (and more good minds than theirs) cannot span the vast revolutionary arch thrown by the United States over the centuries,

fix'd in

the present,

launch'd to the endless future; that they cannot

stomach the high-life-below-stairs coloring poetic and genteel social status so far less viciousness of

ruffianly

its

nominations

and

agrees with the nominative;

fearful

our

— the measure-

the great radical Republic, with elections;

ill-pitch'd voice, utterly regardless

tations,

all

repulsions,

its

loud,

whether the verb

its fights,

errors, eruc-

dishonesties, audacities;

and varied and long-continu'd

those

storm and

stress stages (so offensive to the well-regulated col-

wherewith Nature, history, and time block out nationalities more powerful than the past, and to upturn it and press on to the future; that they cannot understand and fathom all this, Fortunately, the say, is it to be wonder'd at? gestation of our thirty-eight empires (and plenty more to come) proceeds on its course, on scales of area and velocity immense and absolute as the globe, and, lege-bred mind)

—

the globe

itself,

poets and thinkers.

quite oblivious even of great

But

can by no means afford

to be oblivious of them.

The same

of feudalism, [aii]

its

castles,

courts, eti-

Collect

quettes, personalities.

them hovering

However

they, or the spirits

might scowl and glower at such removes as current Kansas or Kentucky life and forms, the latter may by no means repudiate or of

the

leave out the former. did,

its

air,

Allowing

the evil that

all

and to-day, a balance of good out reminiscence almost beyond price.

get, here

content, then, that the general interior chyle

of our Republic should be supplied and nourish'd

by wholesale from such as these

Years ago

and antagonistic sources Let me answer that question briefly: foreign

thought Americans ought to

highest literature.

than ever.

think so

still,

strike

own

out separate, and have expressions of their

and more decidedly

But those convictions are

now

strongly

temper'd by some additional points (perhaps the results of

ism). all,

advancing age, or the reflection of invalid-

see that this world of the West, as part of

fuses inseparably with the East,

and with

all,

time does â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the ever new yet old, old human race â&#x20AC;&#x201D; *'

the same subject continued," as the novels of our

grandfathers had

for chapter-heads.

are not

to hospitably receive and complete the inaugurations

of the old civilizations, and change their small scale to the largest, broadest scale,

what on

earth are

for ?

The

currents of practical business in America, the

rude, coarse, tussling facts of our lives, and daily experiences,

all

their

need just the precipitation and [ai2]

Collect

tincture of this entirely different fancy

even

ing, contrasting,

etry and romance.

world of

persuading, recherche influences.

and communities

shall

that individuals

comes a time when

not be too

the future these

us,

self-

humanity here, may well fall these grace-

assertion of

shall

po-

the enormous outgrowth

of our unloos'd individualities, and the rank,

surely

lull-

feudalistic, anti-republican

first

free;

then

requisite that they

Although to such

free.

require

results in

look mainly for a great poetry native to

importations

then will have to be

till

accepted, such as they are, and thankful they are no

The inmost

worse.

spiritual currents of the present

time curiously revenge and check their

own com-

tendency to democracy, and absorption in it, by mark'd leanings to the pastâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; by reminiscences pell'd

poems,

plots, operas, novels, to a far-off, contrary,

deceased world, as

they dreaded the great vulgar

Then what has been

gulf-tides

of to-day.

centuries

growing, working

in,

fifty

and accepted as

crowns and apices for our kind, is not going to be pulled down and discarded in a hurry. It is,

perhaps, time

to the honorable

preambles. little

further

were to

party,

the

Not the

still.

real

object of these

reconnaissance a

least part of

our lesson

the curiosity and interest of friendly

realize

few years ago

paid our respects directly

we must make

But

foreign experts,*

and how our situation looks to them. saw

the

question,

[213]

"Has America

produced any great

Collect

" American poetry," says the London Times* apt pupils, but

afflicted

from

first

to last with a fatal

want

Bryant has been long passed as a poet by Professor

of raciness.

in Longfellow,

Longfellow; but

tender feeling, the defect

with

all

his scholarly grace

more apparent than

was

Mr. Lowell can overflow with American humor

muse

inspire his

the poetry of

but

;

in the

when

realm of pure poetry he

American than a Newdigate prize-man. Joaquin

and

in Bryant.

politics

no more

Miller's verse

has

fluency and movement and harmony, but as for the thought, his songs of the sierras might as well have been written in

Holland."

Unless

a certain very slight contingency, the

Times says: " American verse, from

its earliest

its latest

stages,

seems

an exotic, with an exuberance of gorgeous blossom, but no

That

principle of reproduction.

the very note and test of

Great poets are tortured^ and massacred by

inherent want.

having their flowers of fancy gathered and the hortus siccus of an anthology. in

its

gummed down

American poets show better

an anthology than in the collected volumes of their works.

Like their audience they have been unable to resist the attrac-

They may

tion of the vast orbit of English literature.

the primeval forest, but

poem?" announced

Northern Europe.

saw the item

being taken

down with

would generally be very hard from

prize-subject

paralysis,

talk of

for

the competition of some university in

a foreign paper and

and prostrated

for

made

a note of

it;

but

a long season, the matter

have never been able since to get hold of any essay presented of the discussion, nor to learn for certain whether there was It may have been any essay or discussion, nor can I now remember the place. Upsala, or possibly Heidelberg. Perhaps some German or Scandinavian can give slipp'd

away, and

for the prize, or report

particulars.

think

was

in 1872.

* In a long and prominent

editorial, at

the time, on the death of William CuUen

Bryant.

[214]

Collect

were writing on the banks

internal evidence to detect that they

of the

Hudson

In fact, they

only too

rather than

on those of the Thames.

have caught the English tone and

faithfully,

and are accepted by the

English intelligence as readily as

air

and mood

superficially cultivated

they were English born.

Americans themselves confess to a certain disappointment that a literary curiosity and intelligence so diffused [as in the United States]

have not taken up English

America has received it

literature at the point at

and carried

it,

with an independent energy.

Both show the not earned. diction

effects of

But

forward and developed like

reader like

however

racy,

nation of readers has required of

Britain,

would be

which

scholar,

English

also theirs.

tolerated

superficial their culture, read

The

critic,

its

circles

poets a

literature

ruggedness,

which, however

Byron and Tennyson."

though a gentleman and a

and friendly withal,

evidently not alto-

and winds For the English language to have

gether satisfied (perhaps he ''

poet.

having come into an estate they have

and symmetry of form equal to that of an old

hke that of Great

which

jealous),

up by saying: been enriched with a national poetry which was not English but American, would have been a treasure beyond price." With which, as whet and foil, we shall proceed to ventilate more definitely certain no doubt willful opinions. Leaving unnoticed at present the great masterpieces of the antique, or anything from the middle ages, the prevailing flow of poetry for the last fifty

or eighty years, is

(like

and

now

at its height,

has been and

the music) an expression of mere surface [215]

Collect

melody, within narrow

and

limits,

yet, to give

demands of the ear, of wondrous charm, of smooth and easy deAbove all livery, and the triumph of technical art. its

due, perfectly satisfying to the

things

fractional

and

aversion from the sturdy,

select.

shrinks with

the universal, and the

democratic.

The poetry criticism,

and

of the future (a phrase open to sharp

and not

will use

it)

satisfactory to

— the

me, but

significant,

poetry of the future aims at

the free expression of emotion, (which means

far, far

more than appears at first,) and to arouse and initiLike all modern ate, more than to define or finish. tendencies,

has direct or indirect reference con-

tinually to the reader, to

identity of everything,

was

you

or me, to the central

the mighty Ego.

(Byron's

vehement dash, with plenty of impatient democracy, but lurid and introverted amid all its magnetism; not at all the fitting, lasting song of a grand, secure, free, sunny race.) It is more akin, likewise, to outside life and landscape, (returning mainly to the antique feeling,) real sun and gale, and woods and shores to the elements themselves—not sitting at ease in parlor or library listening to a good tale of them, told in good rhyme. a

—

Character, a feature far above style or polish

—

any time, but now first brought gives predominant stamp to advancing

feature not absent at

to the fore poetry.

—

Its

born

sister,

music, already responds to [216]

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; Collect

the same influences.

''The music of the present,

Wagner's, Gounod's, even the

toward

tends

later Verdi's, all

this free expression of poetic emotion,

demands a vocalism

totally

unlike

splendid roulades,

for Rossini's

and

required

that

suave

Bellini's

melodies."

now, indeed, an evolution, a departure from the masters ? Venerable and unsurpassable after their kind as are the old works, and Is

there not even

always unspeakably precious as studies, cans more than any other people,)

(for

much

too

is it

Amerito

say that by the shifted combinations of the modern

mind the whole underlying theory of first-class verse has changed **

Formerly, during the period term'd classic [says Sainte-

when

Beuve],

literature

was govern'd by recognized

who had composed

was

consider'd the best poet

fect

work, the most beautiful poem, the most

most agreeable

to read, the

most complete

wanted.

the

every respect,

For us the greatest poet

most per-

intelligible,

the /Eneid, the Gerusalemme, a fine tragedy.

thing else

the

rules,

To-day, someis

who

in his

works most stimulates the reader's imagination and reflection, who excites him the most himself to poetize. The greatest poet is

who

not he

he, not

all

you much

has done the best;

whose meaning

it is

who suggests the and who

at first obvious,

to desire, to explain, to study,

much

most; leaves

to complete in

your turn."

The

fatal defects

our American singers labor under

are subordination of spirit, an absence of the concrete

and of

real patriotism,

and

[217]

excess that modern es-

Collect

thetic contagion a queer friend of mine calls the beauty '

disease,

The immoderate

men

says Charles Baudelaire, 'Meads excesses.

the beautiful, appear.

which

minds imbued with a all

There

eats

into

frantic

greed for

a lust, a disease of the art faculties,

by our

like a cancer."

plentiful verse-writers there

plenty of service perform'd, of a kind.

monstrous

the balances of truth and justice dis-

up the moral

course,

beauty and art,

taste for

far for a tally.

class of accomplish'd,

see,

Nor need we

every polite

circle,

good-natured persons (''soci-

ety," in fact, could not get eligible for certain

on without them)

problems, times, and duties

fully

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to

mix egg-nog, to mend the broken spectacles, to decide whether the stew'd eels shall precede the sherry or the sherry the stew'd eels, to eke out Mrs. A. B.*s

monk, Jew, lover. Puck, Prospero, Caliban, or what not, and to generally contribute and gracefully adapt their flexibilities and talents, parlor-tableaux with

those ranges, to the world's service.

crises, great

needs and

pulls,

But

for real

moral or physical, they

might as well have never been born.

Or the accepted notion be a

sort of

of a poet

would appear to

male odalisque, singing or piano-playing

a kind of spiced ideas, second-hand reminiscences, or

toying

late

hours at entertainments,

with fashionable scent.

think

rooms

stifling

haven't seen a new-

publish'd, healthy, bracing, simple lyric in ten years.

Not long ago, there were verses [218]

each of three fresh

Collect

monthlies, from leading authors, and in every one the

whole

central motif (perfectly serious)

ancholiness of a marriageable

was the mel-

young woman who

did n't get a rich husband, but a poor one

Besides

its

and alfresco physiology,

tonic

reliev-

ing such as this, the poetry of the future will take on character in a

more important

respect.

Science, hav-

ing extirpated the old stock-fables and superstitions, is

clearing a field for verse, for

for

all

the

arts,

and even

romance, a hundredfold ampler and more won-

derful,

with the

new principles behind.

ism advances over the whole world.

Law by

RepublicanLiberty, with

paramount—will at any rate be the central idea. Then only— for all the splendor and beauty of what has been, or the polish of what is—then only will the true poets appear, her side, will one day be

and the true poems.

Not the

satin

and patchouly of

to-day, not the glorification of the butcheries and wars of the past, nor

any

between Deity on one side on the other— not Milton, not

fight

and somebody else even Shakspere's plays, grand as they are. Entirely different and hitherto unknown classes of men, being authoritatively called for in imaginative literature, will certainly appear.

What

hitherto

most

perhaps most absolutely indicates the future.

lacking,

Dem-

ocracy has been hurried on through time by measure-

and winds, resistless as the revolution of the globe, and as far-reaching and rapid. But in the less tides

highest walks

of art

has not yet had a single

— Collect

representative

Never had

anywhere upon the earth. bard a task more fit for sublime ar-

worthy of real

dor and genius than to sing worthily the songs these States have already indicated. Their origin, ton, '76, the picturesqueness of old times,

Washingthe war of

and the sea-fights; the incredible rapidity of movement and breadth of area to fuse and compact the South and North, the East and West, to express 18 12

—

the native forms, situations, scenes, from

Montauk

and from the Saguenay to the Rio Grande the working out on such gigantic scales, and with such a swift and mighty play of changing light and shade, of the great problems of man and freedom, how far ahead of the stereotyped plots, or gem-cutCalifornia,

—

ting, or tales of love, or

history

—one

full

above

wars of mere ambition

Our

of spinal, modern, germinal subjects

all.

What

the ancient siege of Illium,

and the puissance of Hector's and Agamemnon's warriors proved to Hellenic art and literature, and all art and

literature since,

may

prove the war of attempted

secession of 1861-65 to the future esthetics, drama,

romance, poems of the United States.

Nor could

utility

itself

provide anything more

practically serviceable to the

hundred millions who,

a couple of generations hence, will inhabit within

the limits just named, than the permeation of a sane, sweet, autochthonous national poetry of a kind that does not believe, will in time

now

exist ? but

— must which,

be supplied on scales as [220]

say fully

free as

Collect

acknowledged that we of the States are the most materialistic and moneymaking people ever known. My own theory, while fully accepting this, is that we are the most emotional, spiritualistic, and poetry-loving people also.) Infinite are the new and orbic traits waiting to be launch'd forth in the firmanent that is, and is to be, have wonder'd whether the last America. Lately, Nature's elements.

(It is

meaning of

this cluster of thirty-eight States is not

only practical fraternity real

among themselves —the only

union (much nearer

its

accomplishment, too,

than appears on the surface) — but for fraternity over the whole globe — that dazzling, pensive dream of Indeed, the peculiar glory of our lands,

ages!

come

have

to see, or expect to see, not in their geographi-

cal or republican greatness,

nor wealth or products,

nor military or naval power, nor special, eminent

names

any department, to shine with, or outshine, foreign special names in similar departments, but more and more in a vaster, saner, more surrounding Comradeship, uniting closer and closer not only the American States, but all nations, and all humanity. That, O poets! is not that a theme worth chanting, striving for? Why not fix your in

—

verses henceforth to the gauge of the round globe ?

the whole race ?

Perhaps the most

mination of the modern

may

illustrious cul-

thus prove to be a

growth of joyous, more exalted bards of adhesiveness, identically one in soul, but contributed

signal

[221]

Collect

by every

nation, each after

us, audacious, start

distinctive kind.

Let

Let the diplomats, as ever,

it.

seeking

deeply plan,

still

its

advantages,

proposing

treaties

between governments, and to bind them, on

paper:

what

seek

different, simpler.

inaugurate from America,

this

for

would

purpose,

new

have thought that formulas— international poems. the invisible root out of which the poetry deepest in, and dearest to, humanity grows, is Friendship. 1

have thought that both

(even amid their grandest shows past)

hered too long to petty

come

limits,

and song we have ad-

patriotism

and that the time has

to enfold the world.

human and artificial world we have establish'd in the West a radical departure from anything hitherto known not only men and poliNot only

the

—

tics,

and

all

that goes with

the main sense,

same

its

them

— but Nature

construction,

old font of type, of course, but set

never composed or issued before. sists

is different.

not only

much

spirit,

The

up to a text

For Nature con-

in itself, objectively,

but at least just

in its subjective reflection

from the person,

age, looking at

sorbing

itself,

—

beliefs of the

faithfully

the midst of

it,

and ab-

sends back the characteristic

time or individual

gives again, the

ture—falls

it,

— takes, and readily

physiognomy of any nation

like a great elastic veil

on a

or litera-

face, or like

the molding plaster on a statue.

What

Nature

What were [222]

the elements, the

Collect

invisible

backgrounds and eidolons of

heroes,

voyagers, gods?

What

it,

to Homer's

through the

all

wanderings of Virgil's y^neas ? Then to Shakspere's characters— Hamlet, Lear, the English-Norman kings,

Romans

the

Voltaire, to the

court gardens ?

What was

Nature to Rousseau, to

German Goethe

in his little classical

those presentments

(see the Idylls of the

King— what

Tennyson

sumptuous, per-

fumed, arras-and-gold Nature, inimitably described, better than any, fit for princes and knights and peerless

ladies— wrathful or peaceful, just the same

Vivien and Merlin

in their

strange dalliance, or the

death-float of Elaine, or Geraint

and the long journey

of his disgraced Enid and himself through the

and the wife

all

—

day driving the horses,) as

wood,

in all

the

great imported art-works, treatises, systems, from

Lucretius

down, there

a constantly lurking, often

pervading something, that will have to be elimi-

modern democracy America, but insulting to them, and

nated, as not only unsuited to

and science

disproved by them."^ Still,

the rule and demesne of poetry will always

be not the exterior, but

interior;

not the macrocosm,

but microcosm; not Nature, but Man.

have

n't said

anything about the imperative need of a race of giant

—

* Whatever may be

—

or their best passages said of the few principal poems overwhelming mass of poetic works, as now absorb'd into human character, exerts a certain constipating, repressing, indoor, and artificial inseldom or never that freeing, dilating, joyous one, fluence, impossible to elude with which uncramp'd Nature works on every individual without exception.

it is

certain that the

—

[223]

Collect

bards

the future, to hold up high to eyes of land

and race the eternal antiseptic models, and to dauntlessly confront greed, injustice, and all forms of that wiliness and tyranny

opinion

is,

that after

whose

all

— (my

roots never die

the rest

advanced, that

what first-class poets are for; as, to their days and occasions, the Hebrew lyrists, Roman Juvenal, and doubtless the old singers of India, and the British

Druids)

— to

counteract dangers, immensest ones,

already looming in America

— measureless

corrup-

— what we a mere mask of wax or lace — ensemble, that most cankerous, offensive of earth's shows — a vast and varied

tion in politics

call religion,

for

;

all

community, prosperous and fat with wealth of money and products and business ventures plenty of mere

—

intellectuality too

— and

then

utterly

without the

sound, prevailing, moral and esthetic health-action

beyond Is it

all

the

money and mere

intellect of the

world.

a dream of mine that, in times to come, west,

south, east, north, will silently, surely arise a race of

— nor only poets, and of the best, but newer, larger prophets — larger than Judea's, and more passionate — to meet and such poets, varied, yet one

in soul

penetrate those woes, as shafts of light the darkness?

As is

write, the last fifth of the nineteenth century

enter'd upon,

and

for a

and

will

soon be waning.

Now,

long time to come, what the United States

most need, to give purport, definiteness, reason why, to their unprecedented material wealth, industrial [224]

Collect

products, education

rote merely, great populous-

ness and intellectual activity, ity (or

even the idea of

it)

the central, spinal real-

of such a democratic band

of native-born-and-bred teachers, tolerant

artists, litterateurs,

and receptive of importations, but entirely

adjusted to the West, to ourselves, to our

combinations, differences,

own

days,

Indeed,

superiorities.

fond of thinking that the whole series of concrete

and

political

triumphs of the Republic are mainly as

bases and preparations for half a dozen future poets, ideal personalities, referring not to a special class,

but

to the entire people, four or five millions of square miles.

Long, long are the processes of the development

Only to the

of a nationality.

become the prophecy of the *

rapt vision does the seen

unseen."^

Democracy,

and politics ? Wise men say there are two sets of wills to nations and to persons one set that acts and works from explainable motives from teaching, intelligence, judgment, circumstance, caprice, emulation, greed, &c, and then another set, perhaps deep, hidden, unsuspected, yet often more potent than

And

there not such a thing as the philosophy of American history

so,

what

is it ?

—

the

first,

— —

refusing to be argued with, rising as

were out of abysses,

urging on speakers, doers, communities, unwitting to themselves

resistlessly

— the poet to

his

—

words the race to pursue its loftiest ideal. Indeed, the paradox of a nation's life and career, with all its wondrous contradictions, can probably only be explain'd fi-om these two wills, sometimes conflicting, each operating in its sphere, combining in races or in persons, and producing strangest results. Let us hope there is (indeed, can there be any doubt there is ?) this great unconscious and abysmic second will also running through the average nationality and career of America. Let us hope that, amid all the dangers and defections of the present, and through all the processes of the conscious will, it alone is the permanent and sovereign force, destined to carry on the New World to fulfil its destinies in the future to resolutely pursue those destinies, age upon age; to build, far, far beyond its past vision, present thought; to form and fashion, and for the general type, men and women more noble, more athletic than the world has yet seen to gradually, fieriest

—

;

firmly blend, from VOL. v.— IS.

all

the States, with

all varieties,

[225]

a friendly, happy,

free, religious

Collect

attending only to the

far

modern equal, but to become by On a comprehensive sum-

and not only to

that,

real

— to justify the

only, but the grandest ideal

not for the

real, is

that superior to the past.

ming up of the processes and present and

hitherto

condition of the United States, with reference to their future,

point,

and the indispensable precedents to it, my below all surfaces, and subsoiling them, is,

and prerequisites of a leading national-

that the bases

ity are, first, at all hazards,

and products on the

common

freedom, worldly wealth,

and most varied

largest

scale,

education and intercommunication, and, in

general, the passing through of just the stages nationality

— a nationality not only the

materialistic the

ample and all

and

most inventive, most productive and

richest,

world has yet known, but compacted indissolubly, and out of whose

and giving purpose and

solid bulk,

the spiritual attributes, shall surely

finish to

it,

conscience, morals, and

above some group of

rise, like spires

edifices,

firm-footed on the earth, yet scaling space and heaven.

Great as they

are,

and greater

far to be,

the United States, too, are but a series of

And

steps in the eternal process of creative thought. justification,

and

certain perpetuity.

— and,

There

in that

—

here

is,

my mind,

their final

sublime process, in the laws of

something that would make above all, in the moral law and even vain and contemptible, all the triumphs of war, the gains of peace, and the proudest worldly grandeur of all the nations that have ever existed,

the universe

unsatisfactory,

or that (ours included)

now

exist,

except that

constantly see, through

worldly career, however struggling and blind and lame, attempts, by

all

peoples, according to their development, to reach, to press, to progress on, farther on, to

The

more and more advanced

all

their

ages,

all

and ever

ideals.

glory of the republic of the United States, in

my opinion,

to be that, emer-

ging in the light of the modern and the splendor of science, and solidly based on the past,

it is

to cheerfully range

those universal laws, and as only that individual

itself,

and

its

embody them, and

becomes truly great

politics are henceforth to

carry

who

them

come, under

out, to serve them.

And

understands well that, while com-

is but a part of the divine, eternal scheme, and and laws are adjusted to move in harmonious relations with the general laws of Nature, and especially with the moral law, the deepest and highest of all, and the last vitality of man or state so the United States may only become the greatest and the most continuous, by understanding well their harmonious rela-

plete in himself in a certain sense, he

whose

special

life

—

[226]

Collect

crudities

have passed or are passing through

the United States.

^Then, perhaps, as weightiest factor of the whole business, and of the main outgrowths of the future, it

remains to be definitely avow'd that the native-

born middle-class population of quite States

all

the United

— the average of farmers and mechanics every-

where—the

real,

though

and

latent

bulk of

silent

America, city or country, presents a magnificent mass of material, never before equal'd on earth. material, quite unexpress'd

It is

this

literature or art, that

every respect insures the future of the republic.

During the secession war tions with entire

humanity and

history,

was with

and

all

with the creative thought of Deity, through

their all

the armies, and

laws and progress, sublimed

time, past, present,

expand to the amplitude of their destiny, and become culminating parts of the kosmos, and of civilization.

Thus

will they

and

future.

illustrations

and

No more

considering the States as an incident, or series of incidents, however coming accidentally along the path of time, and shaped by casual emergencies as they happen to arise, and the mere result of modern improvements, vulgar and lucky, ahead of other nations and times, I would finally plant, as seeds, these that it is the deliberate culthoughts or speculations in the growth of our republic mination and result of all the past that here, too, as in all departments of the universe, regular laws (slow and sure in planting, slow and sure in ripening) have and that those laws can controll'd and govern'd, and will yet control and govern no more be baffled or steer'd clear of, or vitiated, by chance, or any fortune or opposition, than the laws of winter and summer, or darkness and light. The summing up of the tremendous moral and military perturbations of i86i-'65, and their results and indeed of the entire hundred years of the past of our national is, experiment, from its inchoate movement down to the present day (i 780-1881) vast,

—

;

—

that they

all

now

—

launch the United States

tirety of civilization

and humanity, and

leading the van, leading the fleet of the

voyages of the

And

fairly forth, consistently

main

sort the representative of

modem and

future.

the real history of the United States

—

all

—

them,

democratic, on the seas and

starting fi-om that great convulsive

struggle for unity, the secession war, triumphantly concluded,

torious after

with the en-

and the South

vic-

only to be written at the remove of hundreds, perhaps a thou-

sand, years hence.

[227]

Collect

saw the rank and file, North and South, and studied have never had the least them for four years. I

doubt about the country Meantime,

in its essential future since.

can (perhaps) do no better than to

saturate ourselves with,

and continue to give imita-

tions, yet awhile, of the esthetic models, supplies, of

that past and of those lands

spring from.

Those

wondrous stores, reminiscences, floods, currents! Let them flow on, flow hither freely. And let the sources be enlarged, to include not only the works of British origin, as now, but stately and devout Spain, courteous France, profound Germany, the manly Scandinavian lands, Italy's art race, and always the mystic Orient. Remembering that at present, and doubtless long ahead, a certain humility would well become us. The course through time of highest civilization,

does

contribution to

its

class structures,

not wait the

kosmic

first

train of

glimpse of our

poems,

perpetuities — Egypt

bibles, first-

and Palestine

and India — Greece and Rome and mediaeval Europe — and so onward? The shadowy procession not is

a meagre one, and the standard not a that

mighty

trod the road.

low one.

All

our kind seems to have already

Ah, never

may America

forget her

thanks and reverence for samples, treasures such as these

—that

hourly

other life-blood, inspiration, sunshine,

use to-day,

all

days, forever, through her

broad demesne! All

serves our

New World [228]

progress, even the

Collect

Through many perturbations and squalls, and much backing and filling, the ship, upon the whole, makes unmistakably for her destination. Shakspere has served, and serves, maybe, the best of any. bafflers,

head-winds, cross -tides.

For conclusion, a passing thought, a contrast, of

him who,

opinion, continues and stands for

the Shaksperean cultus at the present day English-writing I

find

lines, to

peoples— of Tennyson,

impossible, as

taste the

among

all

his poetry.

sweetness of those

escape the flavor, the conviction, the lush-

honey of decay (I dare rottenness) of that feudalism which the

ripening culmination, and last

not

call

mighty English dramatist painted in all the splendors of its noon and afternoon. And how they are chanted both poets! Happy those kings and nobles to be

—

so sung, so told!

deeds and shapes

pomp and

To run in

— to get their pigments — the very

their course

lasting

dazzle of the sunset!

Meanwhile, Democracy waits the coming of its bards in silence and twilight but 't is the twilight

—

of the dawn.

[229]

H ^emoranbum **A11 is

at a IDenture

proper to be express'd, provided our aim

only

does

high enough."—J. F. Millet.

"The candor

of science

not hide and repress; has perfect faith

—

undermine the old

the glory of the modern.

confronts, turns

faith

on the

not in a part only, but

light.

not a law in

itself,

not

— by show-

but a sickness, a perversion

of the good, and the other side of the of humanity, and of everything,

alone it

Yes, in God's truth, by

religious standards ?

excluding the devil from the theory of the universe ing that evil

Does

all.

good

divine

— that in

in fact all

bases,

its

eligibilities."

Shall the mention of such topics as I have briefly but plainly and resolutely broach'd in the Children of

Adam

section of Leaves of Grass be admitted in

poetry and literature ?

be put fail,

down by

by the

Ought not the innovation

opinion and criticism ? and,

District

Attorney?

True,

those

could not

poem which declaredly took, as never the complete human identity, physical, moral,

construct a before,

emotional, and intellectual, (giving precedence and

compass

in a certain

sense to the

first,)

nor

which purpose, without comprehending

that bona fide candor and entirety of treatment

was

a part of

fulfil

[230]

Collect

would entrench myself more deeply and widely than that. And while do not But

this section also.

man

ask any

anxious that what the ground

its

theory,

confess myself

sought to write and express, and

built on, shall

derstood, from

seems to

to indorse

own

be at least partially un-

The

platform.

best

way

to confront the question with entire

frankness.

There

two

are, generally

speaking,

two

points of view,

conditions of the world's attitude toward these

matters; the

and good

first,

the conventional one of good folks

everywhere, repressing any direct

statement of them, and making allusions only at

second or third hand which,

— (as the Greeks did of death,

in Hellenic social culture,

point-blank, but

was not mentioned

by euphemisms).

tion of to-day, this condition

the civiliza-

— without

elaborate the arguments and facts,

stopping to

which

are

many

and varied and perplexing— has led to states of

ig-

norance, repressal, and cover'd over disease and depletion,

forming certainly a main factor

woe.

non-scientific, non-esthetic,

the world's

and eminently

non-religious condition, bequeath'd to us from the

past

(its

origins diverse,

one of them the far-back

lessons of benevolent and wise

men

to restrain the

prevalent coarseness and animality of the tribal ages

—with

Puritanism, or perhaps Protestantism itself

for another,

and

part of this

memorandum)— to

still

another specified

[231]

the latter

probably due

doUcct most of the ill births, inefficient maturity, snickering pruriency, and of that human pathologic evil and morbidity which is, in my opinion, the keel and reason-why of every evil and morbidity. Its scent, as of something sneaking, furtive, mephitic, seems to lingeringly pervade all modern literature, conversation, and manners. The second point of view, and by far the largest as the world in working-day dress vastly exceeds is the one of common the world in parlor toilette life, from the oldest times down, and especially in England (see the earlier chapters of Taine's English Literature, and see Shakspere almost anywhere), and which our age to-day inherits from riant stock,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

the wit, or

circles,

press,

and

what passes

for

and

in erotic stories

wit, of masculine talk, to excite,

ex-

and dwell on, that merely sensual voluptuous-

ness which, according to Victor Hugo, universal trait of

all

ages,

all

lands.

This second

however bad, is at any rate like which comes to the surface, and therefore condition,

the most

a disease less

dan-

gerous than a conceal'd one.

The time seems

America to be the place, third point of view.

to have arrived, and

for a

new

departure

The same freedom and

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

faith

and earnestness which, after centuries of denial, struggle, repression, and martyrdom, the present day brings to the treatment of politics and religion, must

work out

a plan and standard on this subject, not so [232]

Collect

much for what is call'd society, as for thoughtfulest men and women, and thoughtfulest literature. The same

spirit that

marks the physiological author and

demonstrator on these topics

in his

important

have thought necessary to be exemplified, in

another certainly not less important In the present

indicate that plan

memorandum and view

than twenty years ago, for

and formulated tangibly

unless

exemplifying passion in

itself,

for once,

only venture to

— decided

upon more

my own literary action, my printed poems — (as

leads to a deed or

the

field.

Bacon says an abstract thought or theory

moment

field,

concrete) — that

of no

work done, the sexual

while normal and unperverted,

inherently legitimate, creditable, not necessarily an

improper theme

for poet, as confessedly

not for sci-

entist—that, with reference to the whole construcorganism, and intentions of Leaves of Grass, anything short of confronting that theme, and mak-

tion,

ing myself clear upon

it,

as the enclosing basis of

everything, (as the sanity of everything

the atmosphere of the poems,)

to be

should beg the

most momentous

was

and the superstructure that follow'd, pretensive as it might assume to be, would all rest on a poor foundation, question in

its

or no foundation at

all.

aspect,

In short, as

the assumption

of the sanity of birth. Nature and humanity,

the

key to any true theory of life and the universe— at any rate, the only theory out of which I wrote it

—

[233]

Collect

and must inevitably be, the only key to Leaves of That (and not a vain Grass, and every part of it.

is,

consistency or v/eak pride, as a late Springfield Re-

publican charges),

the reason that

have stood

out for these particular verses uncompromisingly for

over twenty years, and maintain them to this day.

That

when

is 1

what

felt

inmost brain and heart,

only answer'd Emerson's vehement argu-

ments with

silence,

under the old elms of Boston

Common. Indeed, might not every physiologist and every

good physician pray ject

from

its

for the

redeeming of

hitherto relegation to the tongues and

pens of blackguards, and boldly putting at least, if

sanity

this sub-

no more,

for

once

the demesne of poetry and

— as something not

in itself

gross or impure,

but entirely consistent with highest

womanhood, and

manhood and

indispensable to both ?

Might not

— not

only every

only every wife and every mother

babe that comes into the world,

were possible not only all marriage, the foundation and sine qua non of the civilized state bless and thank the showing, or taking for granted, that motherhood,

—

that

—

fatherhood, sexuality, and

all

that belongs to them,

comes to question, openly, joyously, proudly, ''without shame or the need of shame," from the highest artistic and human concan be asserted, where

siderations—but, with reverence be

such attempt to justify the base and [234]

written, on start of the

Collect

whole divine scheme in humanity, might not the Creative Power itself deign a smile of approval ? To the movement for the eligibility and entrance of women amid new spheres of business, politics, and the suffrage, the current prurient, conventional treatment of sex is the main formidable obstacle. The rising tide of '* woman's rights," swelling and every year advancing farther and farther, recoils from it with dismay. There will in my opinion be no general progress in such eligibility philosophic, democratic

The

method

whole question â&#x20AC;&#x201D; which

a sensible,

till

substituted.

strikes far, very far

deeper than most people have supposed (and doubt-

something

less, too,

to be said on

one

peculiarly an important

and then

still

more an

in art

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

sides),

all

an ethic,

is first

esthetic one.

condense

from a paper read not long since at Cheltenham, England, before the ''Social Science Congress," to the Art Department, by P. H. Rathbone of Liverpool,

on the ''Undraped Figure

in Art,"

and the discus-

sion that follow'd "

When

coward Europe

suffer'd the unclean

Turk

to soil the

sacred shores of Greece by his polluting presence, civilization

and morality receiv'd a blow from which they have never recover' d,

and the

trail

of the serpent has been over European art

and European society ever

women

as animals

at pleasure,

entirely

since.

The Turk regarded and regards

without soul, toys to be play'd with or broken

and to be hidden, partly from shame, but

the purpose of stimulating exhausted passion. origin of the objection to the

nude [235]

as a

fit

Such

chiefly for

the unholy

subject for art;

it is

Collect

purely Asiatic, and though not introduced for the the fifteenth century,

impurity

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; the

pure-minded and honest,

all

Although the source of the prejudice

East.

thoroughly unhealthy and impure, yet

time in

first

yet to be traced to the source

now

it is

somewhat uneducated,

prepared to maintain that

But

people.

necessary for the future of

many

shared by

English art and of English morality that the right of the nude to a place in our galleries should be boldly asserted;

must,

however, be the nude as represented by thoroughly trained

and with

artists,

a pure

form, male and female,

and noble is

the type and standard of

of form and proportion, and familiar sists

with

The human

ethic purpose.

order safely to judge of

of form and proportion.

beauty

all

necessary to be thoroughly all

To women

beauty which conis

most necessary

become thoroughly imbued with the know-

that they should

ledge of the ideal female form, in order that they should recognize the perfection of

and without

at once,

as possible avoid deviations from the ideal.

case in times past, tortions effected

Had

this

far

been the

should not have had to deplore the dis-

tight-lacing,

ruin'd the health of so

and so

effort,

many

which destroyed the

of the last generation.

figure

and

Nor should

have had the scandalous dresses alike of society and the

stage.

obtained

The extreme development some years ago, when the

into suggestive prominence,

would

of the

low dresses which

stays crush'd

up the breasts

surely have been check'd,

had the eye of the public been properly educated by

familiarity

with the exquisite beauty of line of a well-shaped bust.

might

show how thorough acquaintance with the ideal nude foot would probably have much modified the foot-torturing boots and high heels,

which wring the

foot out of

the body forward into an

It is

all

beauty of

awkward and

line,

and throw

ungainly attitude.

argued that the effect of nude representation of

upon young men

unwholesome, but [236]

women

would not be so

(ToIIect

such works were admitted without question into our

and became thoroughly it

would do much

one of

to clear

their sorest trials

evil,

them.

away from

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; that

of prudish concealment.

suggestion of

familiar

healthy-hearted lads

which

prurient curiosity

Where

there

and to go to a

theatre,

galleries,

the contrary,

mystery there

with

nude nude,

the

and to

more pregnant

is far

imaginings than the most objectionable of totally

evil

undraped

bred

where you have only

to look at the stalls to see one-half of the female form,

the stage to see the other half undraped,

figures.

French

art there

figures exhibited; but the fault

but

they

that

were the

have been questionable

was not

were

that they

portraits of ugly

immodest

women.' '*Some discussion

follow' d.

There was a general concur-

rence in the principle contended for by the reader of the paper. Sir

Walter

Stirling maintain'd that the perfect

was

than the female,

the model of beauty.

male

figure, rather

After a

few remarks

from Rev. Mr. Roberts and Colonel Oldfield, the Chairman regretted that no opponent of nude figures had taken part in the discussion.

He agreed with

figure being the in

most

perfect

Sir

Walter

Stirling as to the

model of proportion.

male

He join'd

defending the exhibition of nude figures, but thought con-

siderable supervision should be exercis'd over such exhibitions."

No,

not the picture or nude statue or text,

with clear aim, that er's

own

indecent;

the behold-

thought, inference, distorted construction.

True modesty

one of the most precious of

butes, even virtues, but in

nothing

there

attri-

more falsity, than the needless assumption of it. Through precept and consciousness, man has long enough realized how bad he is. would not pretense,

[237]

Collect

much

disturb or demolish that conviction, only to

resume and keep unerringly with ing of the Scriptural text,

God

the spinal mean-

overlooked all that

had made, (including the apex of the

manityâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;with behold,

its

whole â&#x20AC;&#x201D; hu-

elements, passions, appetites,)

(^/z^

was very good.

Does not anything short of that third point of view, when you come to think of it profoundly and with amplitude, impugn Creation from the outset In fact,

however

unaware of

overlaid, or

not the conviction involv'd in the centre of

marriage ?

all

Is it

society,

and of the sexes, and of

world

For, old as the

ment

as are the' countless

is,

and splendid

intuitions of the

be develop'd.

[asS]

human

and beyond

human

state-

results of

and evolution, perhaps the best and

and purest

does

perennially exist at

not really an intuition of the

race ?

culture

itself,

its

earliest

race have yet to

—

Death

Hbtabam

Xincoln lecture

l^ew Korft, Hprtl 14, 1879— in *80— in35oston/8l

^cIit>er*^

pbila^elpbta,

How

—that my of

day,

chilly April

now

heart has entertain'd the dream, the wish, to give

Abraham

Lincoln's death,

and memorial. offers,

find

now

Yet

because of

altogether because

itself

feel

idle ?

and the

have

call'd

be dwelt upon. till

my own

April

hold

does the

dream'd

and nearly

a desire, apart from any talk, It is

you together.

For

it,

for this,

Oft as the rolling

however briefly, hope and desire,

again,

my own part,

dying day, whenever the 14th or 15th of

comes, to annually gather a few its

thought

talk here indeed

or anything in

years bring back this hour, let '

why

tribute

fit

to specify the day, the martyrdom. friends,

special

the sought-for opportunity

waits unprepared as ever. less

own

statement so

right phrase never offer ?)

its

notes incompetent, (why, for truly

profound themes,

of,

and dripping Saturday fifteen years bygone

often since that dark

tragic reminiscence. [239]

No narrow

friends,

and

or sectional

— Collect

reminiscence.

belongs to these States

in their

en-

tirety—not the North only, but the South— perhaps belongs most tenderly and devoutly to the South, of all

;

for there, really, this

and thence

There

man's birth-stock.

Why should

his antecedent stamp.

not

say that thence his manliest traits—his universality— his canny, easy

ways and words upon the

his inflexible determination

and courage

surface at heart ?

Have you never realized it, my friends, that Lincoln, though grafted on the West, is essentially, in personnel and character, a Southern contribution ? And though by no means proposing to resume the would briefly remind you of secession war to-night, I

the public conditions preceding that contest.

For

twenty years, and especially during the four or

five

before the

war

actually began, the aspect of affairs in

the United States, though without the flash of military excitement, presents battle, or

any extended campaign, or

Nature's convulsions.

—

^the

dulity,

more than the survey of a series,

The hot passions

even of

of the South

strange mixture at the North of inertia, incre-

and conscious power

abolitionists

—the incendiarism of the

—the rascality and

^r//)

of the politicians,

any age. not omit adding the honesty of the unparallel'd in

any

land,

the people every where— yet with

all

these

must

essential bulk of

the seething fury

and contradiction of their natures more arous'd than

waves in wildest equinox. In politics, what can be more ominous, (though generally unap-

the Atlantic's

[240]

Collect

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;what

more significant than the Presidentiads of Fillmore and Buchanan ? proving conclusively that the weakness and wickedness of predated then)

elected rulers are just as likely to in

afflict

us here, as

the countries of the Old World, under their

mon-

and aristocracies. In that Old World were everywhere heard underground rumemperors,

archies,

blings, that died out, only to again surely return.

While

America the volcano, though

civic yet,

continued to grow more

and more convulsive more and more stormy and threatening.

excitement and chaos,

In the height of all this

hovering on the edge at

first,

and then merged

very midst, and destined to play a leading pears a strange and sily forget It 1

the

first

awkward

time

ever

must have been about the

86 1.

was

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

figure.

in its

part, ap-

shall not ea-

saw Abraham

Lincoln.

i8th or 19th of February,

rather a pleasant afternoon, in

New York

he arrived there from the West, to remain a few hours, and then pass on to Washington, to preCity, as

saw him in Broadway, near the site of thepresent Post-office. He came down,

pare for his inauguration.

think from Canal Street, to stop at the Astor House.

The broad

spaces, sidewalks,

and

street in the neigh-

borhood, and for some distance, were crowded with

masses of people, many thousands. The omnibuses and other vehicles had all been turn'd off, leaving an unusual hush in that busy part of the city.

solid

Presently VOL.

v.â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 16.

two

or three

shabby hack barouches made _

[240

Collect

their

way with some

and drew up

difficulty

through the crowd,

A tall

House entrance.

at the Astor

fig-

ure stepp'd out of the centre of these barouches,

paus'd leisurely on the sidewalk, look'd up at the granite

walls and looming architecture of the grand old

hotel—then, after a relieving stretch of arms and legs, turn'd round for over a minute to slowly and goodhumoredly scan the appearance of the vast and silent crowds. There were no speeches no compliments

—

—no welcome—as Still

much

anxiety

tious persons

had

far as

was

could hear, not a word said.

conceal'd in that quiet.

fear'd

some mark'd

dignity to the President-elect

personal popularity at little political. if

But

all in

—

for

Cau-

insult or in-

he possess'd no

New York City,

and very

was evidently tacitly agreed that

the few political supporters of Mr. Lincoln present

would

entirely abstain

from any demonstration on

immense majority, who were anything but supporters, would abstain on their side also. The result was a sulky, unbroken silence, such as certheir side, the

tainly never before characterized so great a

New York

crowd.

Almost

the

same neighborhood

distinctly re-

member'd seeing Lafayette on his visit to America in had also personally seen and heard, various 1825. I

years afterward,

how Andrew Jackson, Clay, Webster,

Hungarian Kossuth, Filibuster Walker, the Prince of

Wales on his visit, and other ceUhres, native and foreign, had been welcom'd there all that indescrib-

—

[242]

Collect

human

able

sound

and magnetism, unlike any other the universe—the glad exulting thunderroar

shouts of countless unloos'd throats of

men

But on

voice— not a sound. From the top of an omnibus, (driven up one side, close by, and had, block'd by the curbstone and the crowds,) say, a capital view of it all, and especially of Mr. Lincoln, his look and gait— his perfect composure and coolness—his unusual and uncouth height, his dress of complete black, stovepipe hat push'd back on the head, dark-brown complexion, seam'd and wrinkled yet canny-looking face, black, bushy head of hair, disproportionately long neck, and his hands held behind this occasion, not a

as he stood observing the people. curiosity

look'd with

upon that immense sea of faces, and the sea

of faces return'd the look with similar curiosity.

both there was a dash of comedy, almost as Shakspere

crowd

that

farce,

puts in his blackest tragedies.

hemm'd around

consisted

such

The

should think

of thirty to forty thousand men, not a single one his personal friend— while

have no doubt (so frenzied

were the ferments of the time), many an assassin's knife and pistol lurk' d in hip or breast-pocket there, ready, soon as break

and

But no break or

riot

came.

gave another relieving stretch or legs

;

The tall figure two of arms and

then with moderate pace, and accompanied

by a few unknown

looking

persons,

the portico-steps of the Astor House, [243]

ascended disappeared

— Collect

through

its

broad entrance

— and

the

dumb-show

ended.

saw Abraham Lincoln often the four years following that date. He changed rapidly and much during his Presidency but this scene, and him in it, I

—

upon

my recollection.

As sat on the top of my omnibus, and had a good view of him, the thought, dim and inchoate then, has since come out clear enough, that four sorts of genius, four mighty and primal hands, will be needed to the comare indelibly stamp'd

plete limning of this

man's future portrait—the eyes

and brains and fmger-touch of Plutarch and Eschylus

and Michel Angelo, assisted by Rabelais.

And now— (Mr.

Lincoln passing on from this scene

where he was inaugurated, amid armed cavalry, and sharpshooters at every point the first instance of the kind in our history and hope it will be the last) now the rapid succession of well-known events (too well known— believe, these days, we almost hate to hear them mention'd)—the national flag fired on at Sumter—the uprising of the North, in paroxysms of astonishment and rage—

to Washington,

—

the chaos of divided councils

—the

first

Bull

—the

for

troops

Run—the stunning cast-down,

shock,

and dismay of the North—and so secession war.

murderous war. scenes?

— the

feats, plans,

Four years of

call

in full flood the

lurid, bleeding,

murky,

Who paint those years, with all their hard-fought engagements

— the

failures— the gloomy hours, days, [244]

de-

when

Collect

our Nationality seem'd hung

in pall

of doubt, per-

— the Mephistophelean sneers of foreign lands and attaches — the dreaded Scylla of European haps death

interference,

and the Charybdis of the tremendously

dangerous latent strata of secession sympathizers throughout the is

supposed)

free States (far

— the long marches

sweat, and

many

tysburg

'63

more numerous than in

summer

— the hot

a sunstroke, as on the rush to Get-

— the

night battles in the woods, as

— the camps winprisons — the hospitals — (alas!

under Hooker at Chancellorsville

— the

ter

alas

military

the hospitals).

The secession war ? Nay, let me call it the Union war. Though whatever call'd, it is even yet too near too vast and too closely overshadowing— its us

—

branches unform'd yet, (but certain,) shooting too into the future iest

far

— and the most indicative and might-

them yet ungrown.

A great literature

will yet

arise out of the era of those four years, those scenes

— era compressing centuries of native passion, class pictures, tempests of and death — an life

haustible

mine

for the histories,

first-

inex-

drama, romance, and

even philosophy, of peoples to come

— indeed the

verteber of poetry and art (of personal character too)

—

more grand, in my opinion, to the hands capable of it, than Homer's siege of Troy, or the French wars to Shakspere. But must leave these speculations, and come to the theme have assigned and limited myself to. Of

for

all

future America

far

[245]

Collect

the actual murder of President Lincoln, though so

much has been indefinite in

written, probably the facts are yet very

most persons' minds.

read from

memoranda, written at the time, and revised frequently and finally since. The day, April 14, 1865, seems to have been a the moral pleasant one throughout the whole land

—

atmosphere pleasant too so

fratricidal, full

— the

long storm, so dark,

of blood and doubt and gloom, over

by the sunrise of such an absolute National victory, and utter break-down of SecessionLee had ism we almost doubted our own senses and ended

at last

—

capitulated beneath the apple-tree of Appomattox.

The other

armies, the flanges of the revolt, swiftly

follow'd.

And could

the

affairs

really be,

of this world of

was

order,

there really

then

woe and

come the

God

So the day, as

Early herbage, early flowers,

where

was stopping

advanced, there were

failure

and

say,

were

— of

rightful rule

was

propitious.

out.

remember

at the time, the season

many

dis-

confirm'd, unerring

sign of plan, like a shaft of pure light

— of

Out of all

lilacs in full

being

bloom.

one of those caprices that enter and give tinge to events without being at self

all

apart of them,

find

my-

always reminded of the great tragedy of that day

by the

sight

and odor of these blossoms.

never

fails.)

But

hastens.

The deed The popular afternoon paper of Washing-

must not dwell on

[246]

accessories.

Collect

ton, the

little

Evening Star, had spatter'd

third page, divided

its

the advertisements in a

hundred

different places,

The President and his Lady will

be at the Theatre

manner,

sensational ''

among

over

all

..."

this evening.

(Lincoln

was fond

of the theatre.

remember thinking how funny it was that he, in some respects the leading actor in the stormiest drama known I

have myself seen him there several times.

to real history's stage through centuries, should

sit

there and be so completely interested and absorb'd in

those

human

silly little

moving about with

their

gestures, foreign spirit, and flatulent text.)

this occasion the theatre

was crowded, many

and gay costumes,

officers in their uni-

ladies in rich

forms,

jack-straws,

many well-known

young

citizens,

folks,

the

usual clusters of gas-lights, the usual magnetism of

many

violins

people, cheerful, with perfumes, music of

and

flutes

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; (and over

all,

and saturating

all,

that vast, vague wonder. Victory, the nation's victory, the

triumph of the Union,

filling

the

air,

thought, the sense, with exhilaration more than

the all

music and perfumes).

The

President

came betimes, and, with

his wife,

witness'd the play from the large stage-boxes of the

second

tier,

two thrown

drap'd with the national of the piece positions

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; one

flag.

The

acts

profusely

and scenes

of those singularly written

which have

tire relief to

one, and

into

com-

at least the merit of giving en-

an audience engaged [247]

mental action or

Collect

business excitements and cares during the day, as

makes not the emotional,

slightest call

on either the moral, nature

or spiritual

esthetic,

(Our ^American Cousin,)

which,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a

piece,

among

other

characters, so call'd, a Yankee, certainly such a

was never

seen, or the least like

North America,

introduced

one

ever seen, in

England, with a

varied fol-de-rol of talk, plot, scenery, and such phan-

make up

tasmagoria as goes to

drama of

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; had

progressed through perhaps a couple

when

its acts,

the midst of this comedy, or

non-such, or whatever it,

or finish

modern popular

it is

out, as

to be call'd, and to offset

Nature's and the great

Muse's mockery of those poor mimes, came

inter-

polated that scene, not really or exactly to be described at

all (for

on the many hundreds

who were

seems to this hour to have left a passing blur, a dream, a blotch) and yet partially to be described

there

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

now

proceed to give

There

it.

a scene

the

which two unprecedented English ladies are inform'd by the impossible Yankee that he is not a man of fortune, and play representing a

modern

parlor, in

therefore undesirable for marriage-catching purposes;

which, the comments being

after

matic

trio

moment.

ham

make At

Lincoln.

round

it,

exit,

the dra-

leaving the stage clear for a

this period

Great as

finish'd,

came the murder of Abra-

all its

manifold

train,

and stretching into the future

century, in the politics, history, [248]

art,

for

cirding

many

&c., of the

New

Collect

World,

point of fact the main thing, the actual

murder, transpired with the quiet and simplicity of

—

any commonest occurrence the bursting of a bud or pod in the growth of vegetation, for instance.

Through the general hum following the stage pause, with the change of positions, came the muffled sound of a pistol-shot, which not one-hundredth part of the audience heard at the time and yet a moment's hush somehow, surely, a vague startled thrill and then, through the ornamented, draperied, starred and striped spaceway of the President's box, a sudden figure, a man, raises himself with hands and feet, stands a moment on the railing, leaps below to the

—

stage, (a distance of perhaps fourteen or fifteen feet,) falls

out of position, catching his boot-heel

copious drapery, (the American

flag,) falls

the

on one nothing

knee, quickly recovers himself, rises as

had happen'd (he

but unfelt

then) — and

really sprains his ankle,

so the figure. Booth,

the murderer,

dress'd in plain black broadcloth, bareheaded, with full,

glossy, raven hair,

and

animal's, flashing with light

some mad

his eyes like

and

resolution, yet with

a certain strange calmness, holds aloft in one hand a

— walks along not much back from the footlights — turns toward the audience his face large knife

fully

of statuesque beauty, ing with

out

lit

by those

basilisk eyes, flash-

desperation, perhaps insanity

a firm and steady voice the

tfrannis

—

2ind

— launches

words

Sic semper

then walks with neither slow nor [249]

Collect

very rapid pace diagonally across to the back of the

and disappears. (Had not all this scene— making the mimic ones preposterous

terrible

stage,

—had

not all been rehears'd,in blank, by Booth, beforehand?)

A moment's hush— a scream —the cry of murder''

— Mrs.

Lincoln leaning out of the box, with ashy

cheeks and

lips,

with involuntary^ cry, pointing to ''

the retreating figure,

And

still

He has kilVd

the President,''

moment's strange, incredulous suspense

— and then the deluge! — then that mixture of horror, noises, uncertainty — (the sound, somewhere back, of a horse's hoofs clattering with speed) — the people burst through chairs and railings, and break

them up

— there inextricable confusion and terror — women — quite feeble persons and are trampl'd on — many of agony are heard — the broad stage is

faint

fall,

cries

suddenly

crowd,

fills

to suffocation with a dense

some

horrible

rush generally upon

it,

at least the strong

the actors and actresses are

costumes and painted ing through the

confused talk

manage ident's

box

In the

all

rouge — the

audience

men do

—

there in their play-

with mortal

faces,

fright

show-

and

calls,

screams

trebled — two

— redoubled,

to pass

and motley

carnival — the

or three

up water from the stage to the Pres-

— others try to

midst of

all this,

clamber

up— &c.,

&c.

the soldiers of the Presi-

drawn to the (some two hundred altogether)

dent's guard, with others, suddenly

scene, burst — — they storm the house, through in

[250]

all

the

tiers,

espe-

Collect

cially

the upper ones, inflam'd with fury, literally

charging the audience with fix'd bayonets, muskets,

and

pistols,

shouting

c/MM^t^K0 J^ of

Clear out ! clear out ! you sons

Such the wild scene, or a suggestion

rather, inside the

play-house that night.

Outside, too, in the atmosphere of shock and

crowds of people, fill'd with frenzy, ready to seize any outlet for it, come near committing murder One such several times on innocent individuals. craze,

was

case

The

especially exciting.

infuriated crowd,

through some chance, got started against one man,

words he utter'd, or perhaps without any cause at all, and were proceeding at once to actually hang him on a neighboring lamp-post, when he was rescued by a few heroic policemen, who placed him in their midst, and fought their way slowly and amid great peril toward the station-house. It was a fitting episode of the whole affair. The crowd rushing and eddying to and fro the night, the yells, either for

—

the pale faces,

many

frighten 'd people trying in vain

to extricate themselves freed from the

the

silent,

attacked man, not yet

jaws of death, looking

like a

resolute, half-dozen policemen,

weapons but through

— the

all

their

little

clubs, yet stern

those eddying

swarms

gain'd the station-house with

man,

whom

and discharged him

fitting

murder.

the protected

security for the night,

the morning. C251]

with no

— made a

They

—

and steady

side-scene to the grand tragedy of the

they placed

corpse

Collect

And

the midst of that pandemonium, infuriated

soldiers, the all

its

actors

audience and the crowd, the stage, and

and

and gas-lights

actresses, its paint-pots, sp^n^les,

— the life-blood from those veins",*the

best and sweetest of the land, drips slowly

and death's ooze already begins the

its little

down,

bubbles on

lips.

Thus the visible incidents and surroundings of Abraham Lincoln's murder, as they really occurred. Thus ended the attempted secession of these States; thus the four years' war. But the main things come subtly and invisibly afterward, perhaps long after-

ward—neither are)

historical.

military, political, nor (great as those I

say, certain secondary

and

indi-

rect results, out of the

tragedy of this death,

Not the event of the murder

opinion, greatest.

are, in

Not that Mr. Lincoln strings the principal points and personages of the period, like beads, upon the single string of his career. Not that his idiosyncrasy, in its sudden appearance and disappearance, stamps this Republic with a stamp more mark'd and enduring than any yet given by any one man (more even than Washington's;) but, join'd with these, the immeasurable value and meaning of that whole tragedy lies, to me, in senses finally dearest to a nation (and here all our own) the imaginative and artistic senses the literary and dramatic ones. Not in any common or low meaning of those terms, but a meaning precious to the race, and to itself.

—

[252]

—

Collect

every age.

long and varied series of contradictory

events arrives at central, pictorial baffling,

comes

last at

highest poetic, single,

its

denouement.

The whole

involved,

multiform whirl of the secession period

to a head,

and

lightning-illumination

gathered in one brief flash of

— one simple,

sharp culmination, and as

many bloody and angry

fierce deed.

were

Its

solution, of so

problems, illustrates those

climax-moments on the stage of universal Time, where the historic Muse at one entrance, and the tragic

Muse

suddenly ringing

at the other,

curtain, close an

immense

act in

of creative thought, and give stranger than fiction.

the

imagination

all

— how

the

Roman

—

fit

close!

How

loves

these

to have them.

— not

For not

St.

Caesar in the

senate-house, or Napoleon passing

the wild night-storm at falling,

the long drama

student

great deaths, nor far or near

the

radiation, tableau,

Fit radiation

America, too,

things!

down

away

Helena — not Paleologus,

desperately fighting, piled over dozens deep

with Grecian corpses ing the hemlock

— not calm old Socrates, drink-

— outvies

cession war, in one man's

that terminus of the selife,

here in our midst, in

our own time — that seal of the emancipation of three million slaves — that parturition and delivery of our at last really free Republic, born again, henceforth to

commence

its

career of genuine

ous Union, compact, consistent with

Nor

will ever future

homogene-

itself

American Patriots and Union[253]

Collect

ists,

whole

indifferently over the

land, or

The

South, find a better moral to their lesson.

use of the greatest

men

of a nation

is,

North or

after

final

all,

not

with reference to their deeds in themselves, or their The final use direct bearing on their times or lands. of a heroic-eminent

nent death

and the

—

is its

life

indirect filtering into the nation

and to

race,

but unerringly, age

— especially of a heroic-emimany removes,

give, often at

after age, color

and

fibre to

the

personalism of the youth and maturity of that age,

and of mankind. Then there is a cement to the whole people, subtler, more underlying, than any thing in written constitution, or courts or armies

—

namely, the cement of a death identified thoroughly

with that Strange,

people, at

(is it

head, and for

its

sake.

not?) that battles, martyrs, agonies,

—perhaps only lastingly condense — a Nationality. — the grand deaths of the race — the repeat dramatic deaths of every nationality — are most important inheritance-value — some respects be— (as the hero beyond yond and

blood, even assassination, should so condense really, it

its

its literature

his finest portrait,

art

and the

choicest song or epic).

underlying

all

tragedy

Grecian masters

— and

battle itself

beyond

its

not here indeed the point

the famous pieces of the

all

masters?

Why,

the

had had this man, what trilogies of plays what epics would have been made out of him!

old Greeks

—

How

—

the rhapsodes

would have [254]

recited him!

How

Collect

quickly that quaint

tall

the region where

men

vinify

men!

form would have entered into vitalize gods,

and gods

di-

But Lincoln, his times, his death

great as any, any age

— belong

—

altogether to our

own, and our autochthonic. (Sometimes indeed I think our American days, our own stage the actors we know and have shaken hands, or talk'd with more fateful than anything in Eschylus more

—

— afford kings of men our Democracy prouder than Agamemnon — models of character cute and hardy as Ulysses — heroic than the fighters around Troy for

deaths more

When, ion,

pitiful

than Priam's.)

centuries hence, (as

be centuries hence

illustrated,)

the

before

Democracy, can be

States, or of

must,

life

opin-

of these

really written

and

the leading historians and dramatists

seek for some personage, some special event, incisive

enough

mark with deepest

cut,

and mne-

monize, this turbulent nineteenth century of ours, (not only these States, but social

all

world) — something,

over the

political

and

perhaps, to close that

gorgeous procession of European feudalism, with its

pomp and

caste-prejudices (of

whose long

all

train

—

America are yet so inextricably the heirs) something to identify with terrible identification, by far

the greatest revolutionary step

the United States

(perhaps the

the history of

greatest

of the

world, our century)— the absolute extirpation and erasure of slavery from the States [255]

— those historians

— Collect

will

seek

in vain for

any point to serve more thor-

oughly their purpose, than Abraham Lincoln's death. Dear to the Muse thrice dear to Nationality

—

— precious to this Union — unspeakably and forever

whole human race precious to Democracy

to the

precious

— their

first

great Martyr Chief.

[256]

XCwo Xetters I

America , March Yours of Dear Friend: i-jth, 1876. the 28th Feb. receiv'd, and indeed wel-

Camden, N,

'^^

England^

com'd.

J,,

sometimes

—

jogging along

the same in physical condition

worse, and

—

still

about

certainly

still

lately suspect rather better,

more adjusted to the situation. Even begin to think of making some move, some change of base, &c.: the doctors have been advising it for over two years, but have n't felt to do it yet. My cannot walk any distance paralysis does not lift or at any rate

—

have

still

this

baffling,

obstinate,

apparently

chronic affection of the stomachic apparatus and

yet

liver:

get out of doors a

write and read in moderation

— (eat only that) — digestion good

like to

course, VOL.

every day

— appetite

—

sufficiently

very plain food, but always did tolerable

have told you most of

might

little

know

—

spirits

this before, all

again,

unflagging.

but suppose you

date.

and pretty darkly coloring the whole, are

v.— 17.

[257]

Collect

bad

intervals

some

prostrations,

spells,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and

pretty grave

ones,

have resign'd myself to the certainty

of permanent incapacitation from solid work: but

may

things

way

continue at least

this half-and-half

months, even years.

for

books are out, the new edition; a set of which, immediately on receiving your letter of 28th,

have sent you, (by mail, March

suppose you have before

your

dear friend,

other British friends,

the right

think

fully appreciate,

My my

and those of

welcome and acceptive

spirit,

and

them.

this receiv'd

offers of help,

15,)

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; leaving

the matter altogether in your and their hands, and to your and their convenience,

and I

Though poor now, even

nicety.

have not so

thing

shall

discretion,

far

of seven years or

(1865-72)

During

the future.

to penury,

been deprived of any physical

need or wish whatever, and not

leisure,

feel

my employment

Washington

regularly saved part of

confident

after the

war

wages: and,

though the sum has now become about exhausted by my expenses of the last three years, there are already beginning at present

welcome

ward from the

sales of

my new

job and

myself,

(all

sell,

book agents sively,

which

edition,

through this

for three years in

New

just

illness,

York succes-

badly cheated me,) and shall continue to

dispose of the books myself. I

dribbles hither-

should prefer to glean

my [258]

And

that

support.

the

In that

way way

Collect

cheerfully accept

all

the aid

friends find

con-

venient to proffer.

To tails,

that

and without undertaking deunderstand, dear friend, for yourself and all, heartily and most affectionately thank my repeat a

little,

and that accept their sympathetic the same spirit in which believe (nay,

British friends,

generosity

—

know) it is offer'd that though poor am not in maintain good heart and cheer; and want that that by far the most satisfaction to me (and think

—

can be done, and believe

live,

will be)

will

be to

by myself, practicable, by

as long as possible, on the sales,

my own

works, and perhaps,

further writings for the press.

W. W. I

prohibited from writing too much, and

must make serve for

all

this candid

statement of the situation

dear friends over there. 11

Camden, New '*^'

Dresden^ Saxony

nite x?iy

ceived,

\^^f<^ SiR

and

willingly

Jersey, U, S. A,, Dec, 20,

!—Your

letter

asking defi-

endorsement to your translation of

Leaves of Grass into Russian

just re-

Most warmly and consent to the translation, and waft a prayI

hasten to answer

it.

God speed to the enterprise. You Russians and we Americans

erful

so distant, so unlike at first glance [259]

Our

countries

— such a difference

Collect

in social

and

and our respective development the last

political conditions,

methods of moral and practical and yet in hundred years;

—

certain features,

The

vastest ones, so resembling each other.

and

variety

of stock-elements and tongues, to be resolutely fused in

common

idea, perennial

their historic

and union

identity

all

hazards

— the

through the ages, that they both have

and divine mission

— the fervent element

of manly friendship throughout the whole people, sur-

—

the grand expanse of terby no other races ritorial limits and boundaries the unform'd and pass'd

nebulous state of settled,

of an

many

but agreed on

all

—

things, not yet permanently

hands to be the preparations

infinitely greater future

— the

fact that

both

Peoples have their independent and leading positions to hold, keep,

and

necessary, fight

for,

against the

— the deathless aspirations at the most centre of each great community, so vehement, so mysterious, so abysmic — are certainly features

rest of the v/orld

in-

you Russians and we Americans possess in common. As my dearest dream is for an internationality of poems and poets, binding the lands of the earth closer as the purpose than all treaties and diplomacy beneath the rest in my book is such hearty comradeship, for individuals to begin with, and for all the nations of the earth as a result how happy should be to get the hearing and emotional contact of the

—

great Russian peoples.

To whom, now and

here (addressing you for

[260]

Collect

Russia and Russians, and empowering you, should

you

see

fit,

to print the present letter, in your book,

as a preface), shores, in

waft affectionate salutation from these

America's name.

W. W.

[261]

Botes It is Nationality

ÂŠvet

%ctt

more and more

clear to

j^^jp sustenance for highest separate personality, these States,

come from that

general sustenance of the aggregate (as rains,

that the

air,

earth,

give sustenance to a tree) â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and that such per-

by democratic standards, will only be fully coherent, grand and free, through the cohesion, grandeur and freedom of the common aggregate, the Union. Thus the existence of the true American sonality,

continental

solidarity

of the future, depending on

myriads of superb, large-sized, emotional and physically perfect individualities, of

one sex just as much

as the other, the supply of such individualities, in

opinion, wholly depends on a

ensemble. eignties,

As the trifugal

The theory and

compacted imperial

practice of both sover-

contradictory as they are, are

centripetal

law were

fatal alone,

necessary. or the cen-

law deadly and destructive alone, but

to-

gether forming the law of eternal kosmical action, evolution, preservation,

and

life

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

so,

itself alone,

the fullness of individuality, even the sanest, [262]

would

Collect

surely destroy

This

itself.

what makes the im-

portance to the identities of these States of the thor-

oughly fused,

and

relentless,

dominating Union

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; a moral

spiritual idea, subjecting all the parts

with

re-

morseless power, more needed by American democracy than by any of history's hitherto empires or feudalities,

and the sine qua non of carrying out the

republican principle to develop

itself in

the

New

World through hundreds, thousands of years to come. Indeed,

what most needs

hundred years to come,

fostering through the

all

parts of the United

and Atlantic

States, North, South, Mississippi Valley,

and

Pacific coasts,

this fused

and fervent identity

of the individual, whoever he or she

may

be,

and

wherever the place, with the idea and fact of American TOTALITY, and with what is meant by the Flag, the stars and stripes. We need this conviction of nationality as a faith, to be absorb'd in the blood

and

beliefofthe people everywhere, South, North, West, East, to

and

emanate

art.

and in native literature want the germinal idea that America, in their life,

inheritor of the past,

of humanity.

moral and

the custodian of the future

Judging from history,

it is

spiritual ideas appropriate to

some such them, (and

such ideas only,) that have made the profoundest glory and endurance of nations in the past. The races of Judea, the

Rome, and the

classic clusters of

Greece and

feudal and ecclesiastical clusters of [263]

Collect

the Middle Ages, were each and

all

vitalized

by their

separate distinctive ideas, ingrain'd in them, redeem-

many

ing

sins,

reason-why Then,

and indeed,

for their

whole

in a sense,

the principal

career.

the thought of nationality especially for

the United States, and making them original, and different

from

all

other countries, another point ever

There are two

remains to be considered.

principles — aye, paradoxes —

distinct

at the life-fountain

and

life-continuation of the States; one, the sacred prin-

Union, the right of ensemble, at what-

ciple of the

ever sacrifice

— and

yet another, an equally sacred

principle, the right of

each State, consider'd as a sep-

arate sovereign individual, in

go zealously

for

Some

sphere.

and some as must have both; or

one set of these

rights,

zealously for the other set. rather,

own

its

bred out of them, as out of mother and father,

a third set, the perennial result

and combination of

both, and neither jeopardized.

say the loss or ab-

dication of one set, in the future, will be

ruin to

democracy just as much as the loss of the other set. The problem is, to harmoniously adjust the two, and the play of the two.

[Observe the lesson of the

divinity of Nature, ever checking the excess of

law,

by an

opposite, or seemingly opposite

generally the other side of the

theory of this Republic

ernment pensing

is it

is,

law

—

For the

not that the General gov-

the fountain of

forth,

same law.]

one

all

life

and power,

dis-

around, and to the remotest portions [264]

Collect

of our territory, but that the People are, represented in

both, underlying both the General and State gov-

ernments, and consider'd just as well vidualities

and

in their

their indi-

separate aggregates, or States,

as consider'd in one vast aggregate, the Union. w^as the original dual theory

This

and foundation of the

United States, as distinguish'd from the feudal and ecclesiastical single idea of

and the divine

monarchies and papacies,

right of kings.

(Kings have been of

use, hitherto, as representing the idea of the identity

But, to American democracy, both ideas

of nations.

must be

fulfill'd,

of either one

and

w^ill

my opinion the loss of vitality

indeed be the loss of vitality of the

other.)

the regions

Emerson's

beyond

all

Shadows

Spread,

infinite

call

Nature, towering

measurement, with depth

and

infinite

height

—

those regions, including Man, socially and

Them)

historically,

with

influences — how small a

part, (it

to-day,) has literature really

ming up

all

it,

all

his

came

emotional

my mind

depicted — even

Seems

ages.

moral

at its

sumbest some

little fleet

of boats, hugging the shores of a bound-

less

and never venturing, exploring the un-

sea,

mapp'd

— never, Columbus-like, sailing

out for

Worlds, and to complete the orb's rondure. son writes frequently

New

Emer-

the atmosphere of this

thought, and his books report one or [36s]

two

things

Collect

from that very ocean and air, and more legibly address'd to our age and American polity than by any

man

But

yet.

proving that sons.

will

begin by scarifying him

not insensible to his deepest les-

will consider his

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;thus

books from a democratic

will specify the shadand Western point of view. ows on these sunny expanses. Somebody has said I

of heroic character that

wherever the

tallest

peaks

must inevitably be deep chasms and Mine be the ungracious task (for reasons) valleys." of leaving unmention'd both sunny expanses and skyreaching heights, to dwell on the bare spots and darkhave a theory that no artist or work of the nesses. present,

are

very

first class

First,

may be

or can be without them.

then, these pages are perhaps too perfect,

too concentrated.

(How good,

for instance,

good

But to be eating nothing but good sugar. sugar and butter all the time even if ever so good.) And though the author has much to say of freedom and wildness and simplicity and spontaneity, no performance was ever more based on artificial scholarships and decorums at third or fourth removes (he butter,

calls

culture),

and built up from them.

a make, never an unconscious growth.

It is It is

always

the por-

celain figure or statuette of lion, or stag, or Indian

hunter

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; and a very choice statuette too â&#x20AC;&#x201D; appropri-

ate for the library

;

Indeed,

rosewood or marble bracket of parlor or

never the animal

who wants the

itself,

real

or the hunter himself

animal or hunter

[266]

What

— Collect

do amid astral and bric-^-brac and tapestry, and ladies and gentleman talking in subdued tones of Browning and Longfellow and art ? The least sus-

would

that

picion of such actual bull, or Indian, or of Nature car-

rying out

itself,

and

instant terror

Emerson,

would put

all

those good people to

not most eminent as

flight.

opinion,

though valuable in all those. He is best as critic, or diagnoser. Not passion or imagination or warp or weakness, or any pronounced cause or specialty, dominates him. Cold and bloodpoet or

artist or teacher,

dominates him.

less intellectuality

know the

fires,

emotions, love, egotisms, glow deep, perennial, as

New Englanders— but

the fafade hides them well

He does not

they give no sign.)

in all

see or take one side,

one presentation only or mainly (as all the poets, or he sees all sides. most of the fine writers anyhow)

—

His final influence ship anything

make his students cease to wor-

— almost cease to believe

outside of themselves. fill,

certain stretches of

ment—are

(like

These books will life,

anything,

fill,

and well

certain stages of develop-

the tenets or theology the author of

them preach'd when

young man) unspeakably

viceable and precious as a stage.

But

ous or solemnest or dying hours,

ser-

old or nerv-

when one needs

the impalpably soothing and vitalizing influences of

abysmic Nature, or society, lection,

its affinities in literature

human

and the soul resents the keenest mere they will not be sought [267]

for.

intel-

Collect

For a philosopher, Emerson possesses a singularly

He seems to have no notion at all that manners are simply the signs by which the chemist or metallurgist knows his metals. To the profound scientist, all metals are profound, as they really are. The little one, like the conventional world, will make much of gold and silver only. Then to the real artist in humanity, what are called bad dandified theory of manners.

manners are often the most picturesque and significant Suppose these books becoming absorb'd, the of all. permanent chyle of American general and particular character what a well-wash'd and grammatical, but

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

bloodless and helpless, race

should turn out

No,

though the States want scholars, undoubtedly, and perhaps want ladies and gentlemen who use the bath frequently, and never laugh loud, or talk wrong, they don't want scholars, or ladies and no, dear friend;

gentlemen, at the expense of all the

good

rest.

They want

farmers, sailors, mechanics, clerks, citizens

perfect business

and mothers.

and

social relations

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; perfect fathers

could only have these, or their

approximations, plenty of them, fine and large and

sane and generous and patriotic, they might their verbs disagree like volleys of

make

from their nominatives, and laugh

musketeers,

they should please.

America wants, but they are first of all to be provided on a large scale. And, with tremendous errors and escapades, this, substantially, course these are not

what the

States

all

seem

to have an intuition [268]

of,

and

Collect

to be mainly aiming

The

at.

plan of a select class,

superfined (demarcated from the rest), the plan of Old

World lands and itself,

literatures, is

but because

indeed

death to

not so objectionable

chokes the true plan

it.

for us,

and

to such special class, the

United States can never produce any equal to the splendid

show (far, far beyond comparison

tition here) of

compe-

the principal European nations, both in

But an immense and

the past and at the present day.

commonalty over our vast and varied area, in fact, for the first west and east, south and north time in history, agreat, aggregated, real People, worthy the name, and made of develop'd heroic individuals, distinctive

—

both sexes son as

for being.

much

fitting

—

America's principal, perhaps only, reaIf

ever accomplished,

lately think,

and democratic sociologies,

At times really

knows

Homer

at least

result of

democratic

what Poetry

as in the Bible, for instance, or I

literatures

has been doubtful to

or feels

will

doubly as much) the

we ever get them — as of our

and

arts

politics.

Emerson

at its highest,

or Shakspere.

see he covertly or plainly likes best superb verbal

— Waller's Go, lovely or Lovelace's To Lucusta — iht quaint Of conceits of the old French bards, and the power seems to have a gentleman's admiration — polish, or

something old or odd lines

rose,

like.

\\t

but

in his

and Poets

inmost heart the grandest attribute of is

God

always subordinate to the octaves, con-

ceits, polite kinks,

and verbs. [269]

Collect

The reminiscence

that years ago

youngsters to have a touch (though

was only on the that

most came late, and

began

surface) of Emerson-on-the-brain

read his writings reverently, and address'd

in print as

month

Master," and for a

of him as such —

retain not only

but positive satisfaction.

—

him

or so thought

with composure,

have noticed that most

young people of eager minds pass through

this stage

of exercise.

The

best part of Emersonianism

giant that destroys

mere follower

breeds the

Who wants to be any man's

itself.

? lurks

is,

No teacher

behind every page.

ever taught, that has so provided for his pupil's setting

up independently

— no truer evolutionist.

A Dialogue — One an^id^^

^° range our lives

Theme

party says

— We

— even the best and

ar-

bold-

men and women that exist, just as much as the most limited with refest

—

erence to what society conventionally rules

and

makes right. We retire to our rooms for freedom; to undress, bathe, unloose everything in freedom. These, and much else, would not be proper in society.

—

Other party answers Such is the rule of society. Not always so, and considerable exceptions still exist. However, it must be called the general rule, sanction'd

by immemorial usage, and main so.

will

[270]

probably always re-

Collect

First party

poems ? Answer is

— Why

not, then, respect

— One reason,

that the soul of a

compensation

man

your

me a profound one, woman demands, enjoys

and to

the highest directions for this very

restraint of himself or herself, level'd to the average,

or rather mean, low,

however

eternally practical, re-

quirements of society's intercourse.

balance this

indispensable abnegation, the free minds of poets re-

and strengthen and enrich mankind

lieve themselves,

with

free flights in all the directions

not tolerated by

ordinary society. First party

— ^ni must not outrage or give offence

it.

Answer not,

— No,

and cannot.

not

the deepest sense

The

— and do

vast averages of time and the

Only understand that the conventional standards and laws proper enough for ordinary society apply neither to the action of the soul, nor its poets. In fact the latter know no laws but the laws of themselves, planted in them by God, and are themselves the last standards of the law, and its final exponents responsible to Him directly, and not at all to mere etiquette. Often the best service that can be done to the race, is to lift the veil, at least for a time, from these rules and fossil-etiquettes. New Poetry California, Canada, Texas In my opmion the time has arrived to essentially break down the barriers of form between prose and poetry. race en masse settle these things.

—

[271]

Collect

say the

latter is

henceforth to win and maintain

its

character regardless of rhyme, and the measurementrules of iambic, spondee, dactyl, &c.,

and that even

rhyme and those measurements continue to furnish the medium for inferior writers and themes, (especially for persiflage and the comic, as there seems if

henceforward,

to the

evitably comic in

perfect taste,

rhyme, merely

something

in itself,

in-

and any-

how,) the truest and greatest Poetry, (while subtly and necessarily always rhythmic, and distinguishable easily enough,) can never again, in the English

be expressed

language,

arbitrary

and rhyming

more than the greatest eloquence, or the power and passion. While admitting that the venerable and heavenly forms of chiming versification have in their time play'd great and fitting metre, any

truest

— that the pensive complaint, the ballads, wars, legends of Europe, &c., have, many of them, been inimitably render'd rhyming verse — parts

amours,

that there have been very illustrious poets

whose

shapes the mantle of such verse has beautifully and appropriately envelopt fallen,

own

— and though the

mantle has

with perhaps added beauty, on some of our

age

—

it is, notwithstanding, certain to me, day of such conventional rhyme is ended. America, at any rate, and as a medium of highest

that the In

esthetic

or future,

practical it

palpably

The Muse of the

spiritual fails,

Prairies, [272]

expression,

and must

fail,

of California,

present to serve.

Canada,

Collect

Texas, and of the peaks of Colorado, dismissing the literary,

as well as social etiquette of over-sea feu-

dalism and caste, joyfully enlarging, adapting to

comprehend the

itself

whole people, with

size of the

the free play, emotions, pride, passions, experiences,

body and

that belong to them,

globe,

and

all

its

relations

savans portray them to us

soul

— to the general

astronomy, as the

— to

the modern, the

busy nineteenth century, (as grandly poetic as any, only different,) with steamships, railroads, factories, electric telegraphs, cylinder presses

— to the thought

of the solidarity of nations, the brotherhood and

sisterhood of the entire earth

— to

the dignity and

heroism of the practical labor of farms, foundries,

factories,

workshops, mines, or on shipboard, or

on lakes and of expression,

rivers

— resumes

flexible,

to the freer, vast, diviner

that other

eligible

medium

— soars

heaven of prose.

Of poems of the third or fourth class, (perhaps even some of the second,) it makes little or no difference who writes them they are good enough for what they are; nor is it necessary that they should

—

be actual emanations from the personality and

life

The very reverse sometimes gives But poems of the first class, (poems of

of the writers.

piquancy.

the depth, as distinguished from those of the surface,) are to be sternly tallied with the poets themselves,

and tried by them and their fication of VOL.

lives.

Who wants a glori-

courage and manly defiance from a coward

v.— 18.

[273]

Collect

or a sneak ?

— a ballad of benevolence or chastity from

some rhyming hunks, In

these

or lascivious, glib roue?

beyond

States,

all

precedent, poetry

have to do with actual facts, with the concrete for we have not much more than States, and

will

—

begun

— with

the Union.

the definitive getting into shape of

Indeed

sometimes think

alone

Union (namely, to give it artistic character, What American humanity is spirituality, dignity). most in danger of is an overwhelming prosperity, define the

''business" worldliness, materialism: what lacking, East,

West, North, South,

most a fervid and is

glowing Nationality and patriotism, cohering parts into one.

Who may

the

all

fend that danger, and

fill

that lack in the future, but a class of loftiest poets ? If

the United States have n't

scale of grandeur,

grown

poets, on

certain they import,

any

print,

and read more poetry than any equal number of people elsewhere

— probably

more than

all

the rest

of the world combined.

Poetry

(like a

many generations To have great

grand personality)

a growth of

— many rare combinations. poets, there

must be great audi-

ences, too.

To avoid mistake, would say ^"'^ commend the study of this I

^^'

eratture

that

not

literature,

but wish our sources of supply and comparison vastly enlarged.

American students [274]

may well

Collect

derive from

all

former lands

— from forenoon Greece

and Rome, down to the perturb'd mediaeval times, the Crusades, and so to Italy, the German intellect all the older literatures, and all the newer ones from witty and warlike France, and markedly, and

—

— in

many ways, and

many

different periods,

from

the enterprise and soul of the great Spanish race

—

bearing ourselves always courteous, always deferential,

indebted beyond measure to the mother-world,

all its

nations dead, as

offspring, this

all its

nations living

— the

America of ours, the daughter, not by

any means of the British Isles exclusively, but of the continent, and all continents. Indeed, it is time we should realize and fully fructify those germs we also hold from

Italy,

France, Spain, especially in the best

imaginative productions of those lands, which are,

many ways, British,

loftier

and subtler than the English, or

and indispensable to complete our service, pro-

portions, education, reminiscences, &c.

enormously beyond

its fit

already spoken of Shakspere. astral

The

element these States hold, and have always

British

held,

genius,

first

class,

proportions.

He seems

entirely

fit

have

for feudalism.

His contributions, especially to the literature of the passions, are

and

his

name

But there racy.

is is

immense, forever dear to humanity is

always to be reverenced

much

him ever

—

America.

offensive to

democ-

not only the tally of feudalism, but

should say Shakspere

incarnated, [275]

uncompromising

collect

Then one seems

feudalism, in literature.

—

to detect

hardly know how to describe something in him even amid the dazzle of his genius; and, in init ferior manifestations, it is found in nearly all leading I

—

British authors.

(Perhaps

will

have to import

the words Snob, Snobbish, &c., after

While

all.)

poems of Asian antiquity, the Indian the book of Job, the Ionian Iliad, the unsur-

of the great epics,

passedly simple, loving, perfect idyls of the

death of Christ,

Homer and iarly

with

the

New

life

and

Testament, (indeed

the Biblical utterances intertwine famil-

main,) and along down, of most

us, in the

of the characteristic, imaginative or romantic relics

of the continent, as the Cid, Cervantes' &c.,

Don

Quixote,

should say they substantially adjust them-

selves to us, and, far off as they are, accord curiously

with our bed and board to-day,

New

York,

ington, Canada, Ohio, Texas, California

Wash-

— and

with

our notions, both of seriousness and of fun, and our standards of heroism, manliness, and even the democratic

requirements

only not

fulfill'd in

— those

requirements

are

not

the Shaksperean productions, but

on every page. add that while England

are insulted I

—

among

the greatest

of lands in political freedom, or the idea of in stalwart personal

English literature

— and

its

character, &c.

— the

not great, at least

[276]

spirit

and of

not greatest

products are no models for us.

exception of Shakspere, there

it,

With the

first-class

genius

Collect

in that literature

of value, and of classics,) spiritual

not

— which, with a truly vast amount artificial

always material, sensual, not

almost

beauty, (largely from the

— almost always congests, makes plethoric, expands, dilates — cold, anti-democratic,

frees,

loves to be sluggish and stately, and

shows much of

that characteristic of vulgar persons, the dread of

saying or doing something not at but unconventional, and that

itself,

In its best, the

at.

sombre pervades

melancholy, and, to give

its

all

improper

may be

laugh'd

it is

moody,

it;

due, expresses, in

characters and plots, those qualities, in an unrival'd

manner. in

Yet not as the black thunder-storms, and

great normal, crashing passions, of the Greek

dramatists

— clearing

the

air,

refreshing afterward,

bracing with power; but as in Hamlet, moping, sick,

and leaving ever after a secret taste for the blues, the morbid fascination, the luxury of wo. uncertain,

strongly

recommend

eligible, to

the

all

young women of the United

young men and

whom

States to

overhaul the well-freighted

literatures of Italy, Spain, France,

may

fleets,

the

Germany, so

full

of those elements of freedom, self-possession, gay-

heartedness, subtlety, dilation, needed in preparations for the future of the States.

could have really good translations. feeling for Oriental researches it

will

go on. [277]

only wish

rejoice at the

and poetry, and hope

Collect

Running through ^^fTh^^T thermore)

prehistoric ages

sing literature, and so brought (a sort of verteber

and

races

— com-

'"^ ^^^" ^^^^ ^^^^ *"*^ *^^ daybreak of our records, founding theology, suffu-

and marrow to

lands, Egypt,

India,

all

onward

—

the antique

Rome, the

Greece,

and giving cast and compoems, and their politics as well

Chinese, the Jews, &c., plexion to their

art,

as ecclesiasticism,

all

of which

we more

or less in-

herit), appear those venerable claims to origin from

God

himself, or from

gods and goddesses

from divine beings of vaster beauty, than ours. ory of

But

human

size,

— ancestry and power

current and latest times, the the-

origin that

seems to have most made

mark (curiously reversing the antique) is that we have come on, originated, developt, from monkeys, baboons— a theory more significant perhaps in its indirections, or what it necessitates, than it is even in itself. (Of the twain, far apart as they seem, and angrily as their conflicting advocates toits

day oppose each other, are not both theories to be

Can we,

possibly reconcil'd, and even blended? indeed, spare either of

them

Better

still,

out of

not a third theory, the real one, or suggest-

ing the real one, to arise ?)

this old theory, evolution, as broach'd

anew,

by Darwin, it has so much in it, and is so needed as a counterpoise to yet widely prevailing and unspeak-

trebled, with indeed all-devouring claims,

[278]

Collect

ably tenacious, enfeebling superstitions

—

fused,

by the new man, into such grand, modest, truly scientific accompaniments that the world of erudi-

—

tion,

both moral and physical, cannot but be eventu-

ally better'd

and broaden'd

the advent of Darwinism. of origins,

nearer

its

human and

solution.

ory will have to abate

in its speculations,

from

Nevertheless, the problem

other,

not the least whit

due time the evolution theits

vehemence, cannot be

allow'd to dominate every thing else, and will have to take ter

its

— as

place as a segment of the circle, the clus-

but one of

of profoundest value

many

theories,

many

thoughts,

— and re-adjusting and differen-

much, yet leaving the divine se.crets just as inexplicable and unreachable as before maybe more so. Then furthermore What is finally to be done by priest or poet and by priest or poet only amid all the stupendous and dazzling novelties of our century, with the advent of America, and of science and democracy remains just as indispensable, after tiating

—

all

the

work

of the grand astronomers, chemists,

linguists, historians,

and explorers of the

— and the

last

hun-

wondrous German and other and will continue to remain, needed, America and here, just the same as dred years

metaphysicians of that time

—

the world of Europe, or Asia, of a hundred, or

a thousand, or several thousand years ago.

think

indeed more needed, to furnish statements from the [279]

Collect

present points, the added arri^re, and the unspeak-

Only the

ably immense vistas of to-day.

and poets of the modern, in

the past,

manity,

commonalty of

the

time, (the

all

at least as exalted as

any

absorbing and appreciating the

of the past,

results

fully

priests

main

all

hu-

results already, for there

perhaps nothing more, or at any rate not much,

new, only more important modern combinaand new relative adjustments,) must indeed

strictly

tions,

recast the old metal, the already achiev'd material, into

and through

new

moulds, current forms.

Meantime, the highest and subtlest and broadest truths of

modern science wait

ment and waits

for

of light

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; as democracy

first-class

metaphysicians

last vivid flashes its

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; through

and speculative

and foundations

for their true assign-

philosophs â&#x20AC;&#x201D; laying for

those new,

the basements

more expanded,

more harmonious, more melodious,

freer

American

poems.

"Society "

^^^^ myself

American

certain

technically called

cities.

New

spoken so sharply, out of

little

still

Society "

York, of which place

promises something,

our

in I

have

in time,

tremendous and varied materials, with a superiority of intuitions, and the advantage

its

of constant agitation, and ever ings of the cards. social

no hope from what

new and

Boston, with

mummies, swathed

[280]

its

rapid dealcircles

cerements harder than

;

Collect

brass

—

bloodless

its

(Unitarianism,)

religion,

complacent vanity of scientism and

literature,

its

lots

of grammatical correctness, mere knowledge (always

wearisome,

business powers,

intellect,

—

itself )

reforms —

ghosts of its

and no

Society"

abstractions,

should say, (ever admitting

its

almost demoniac,

sharp,

lack, in its

and generosity) — there ing, satisfying sign.

zealous

its

is,

own way,

of courage

at present, little of cheer-

West,

In the

California, &c.,

yet unform'd, puerile, seemingly un-

conscious of anything above a driving business, or to

liberally

spend the money made by

it,

the

usual rounds and shows.

Then American

there

humorous observer of

to the

is,

attempts

according

fashion,

to the

models of foreign courts and saloons, quite a comic side

— particularly

visible

a sort of high-life-below-stairs

—

Washington City business. As if any

farce could be funnier, for instance, than the scenes

of the crowds, winter nights,

our Presidents and

their

meandering around

wives,

cabinet

officers.

Western or other Senators, Representatives, &c. born of good laboring mechanic or farmer stock and antecedents, attempting those full-dress receptions, finesse of parlors, foreign ceremonies, etiquettes, &c.

Indeed, consider'd with any sense of propriety, or any sense at

all,

the whole of this illy-play'd fash-

ionable play and display, with their absorption of

the best part of our wealthier citizens' time, money, [281]

Collect

&c.,

energies,

ridiculously

out of place

the

As if our proper man and woman ''gentleman" and far greater words than (far, '' lady ") could still fail to see, and presently achieve, not this spectral business, but something truly noble, by modes, perfections of active, sane, American United States.

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

character, manners, costumes, social relations, &c.,

adjusted to standards,

far, far different

from those.

Eminent and liberal foreigners, British or continental, must at times have their faith fearfully tried

by what they see of our New World personalities. The shallowest and least American persons seem surest to push abroad, and call without fail on well-

known

foreigners,

who

are doubtless affected with

qualms by these queer ones. Then, more than half of our authors and writers evidently think it a great thing to be ''aristocratic," and sneer indescribable

democracy, revolution, &c.

progress,

international literary snobs' gallery it

her

certain that

were

tinguish'd ones. slanders,

low

some

establish'd,

America could contribute

share of the portraits, and

full

at least

some very

dis-

Observe that the most impudent

insults, &c.,

on the great revolutionary

authors, leaders, poets, &c., of Europe, have their origin

and main circulation

The treatment dead,

are

America, soil'd

here

of Victor

samples.

and both

by unclean

in certain

Hugo

Both

deserving

persistently birds, [282]

living,

circles here.

and Byron so

well of

attempted to be

male and female.

Collect

Meanwhile must still offset the like of the foregoing, and all it infers, by the recognition of the fact, I

that while the surfaces of current society here

much

are,

that

show

dismal, noisome, and vapory, there

beyond question, inexhaustible

supplies, as of

true gold ore, in the mines of America's general hu-

manity.

Let us, not ignoring the dross, give

to these precious immortal values also.

fit

stress

Let

— whatever may be said of

distinctly admitted, that

our fashionable society, and of any foul fractions and episodes

— only

here

America, out of the long

history and manifold presentations of the ages, has at last arisen,

and

now

stands,

what never before

— and

took positive form and sway, the People

that

view'd en masse, and while fully acknowledging deficiencies, dangers, faults, this latent, not yet

come

people, inchoate,

to majority, nor to

its

own

re-

ligious, literary, or esthetic expression, yet affords,

to-day, an exultant justification of

hopes

all

the

faith, all

the

and prayers and prophecies of good men

through the past— the

stablest, solidest-based

gov-

—

ernment of the world the most assured in a future the beaming Pharos to whose perennial light all

—

earnest eyes, the world over, are tending already, in

and from

it,

ing been mortally tried

war and

peace,

now

the democratic principle, hav-

by severest

tests, fatalities

issues from the

trebly-invigorated, perhaps to its finally

— and that

trial,

commence

unharm'd, forthwith

triumphant march around the globe. [283]

Collect

^"^^

gerous

Questions

security,

peace,

progress

dangers— dan-

health,

— long

social

known

World, and there eventuating, more than

once or twice,

months of terror the

spectral

concrete to the governments of the Old

Pr;pote<r(n:vr Deuver'd)

^^^

S^™

The Tramp and Strike

New

— seem of

late

years to be nearing

World, nay, to be gradually establishing

themselves here?

dynastic overturns, bloodshed, days,

among

personify

they are very

What mean

us.

them

real.)

these phantoms

fictitious

shapes, but

the fresh and broad demesne

of America destined also to give

them foothold and

lodgment, permanent domicile?

Beneath the whole

political

world,

what most

presses and perplexes to-day, sending vastest results affecting the future,

not the abstract question of

democracy, but of social and economic organization, the treatment of working-people all

that goes along with

ment

part,

anew

these relations;

but a certain

by employers, and

— not only the wages-pay-

spirit

and

principle, to vivify

the questions of progress,

all

themselves more or less directly out of the Poverty Question (''the Science of Wealth," and a dozen other names are given it, but prefer the severe one just strength,

tariffs,

finance, &c., really evolving

used).

will

to a thought

begin by calling the reader's attention

upon the matter which may not have

— the wealth of the as contrasted with poverty — what does struck

you before

civilized world,

its

[284]

deriva-

Collect

tively stand for,

and represent?

to have a strong stomach.

of to-day mainly

person ought

rich

Europe the wealth

and represents, the

results from,

rapine, murder, outrages, treachery, hoggishness, of

hundreds of years ago, and onward,

later,

so in

the same token — (not yet so bad, America, any rate not so palpable — we have not perhaps, or existed long enough — but we seem to be doing our after

best to

make

Curious as

up.) it

may seem,

what

are caird

the poorest, lowest characters you will sometimes, nay, generally, find glints of the most sublime virtues,

eligibilities,

whether the State

Then

heroisms. is

onous long run, or

doubtful

monotcrises, by

to be saved, either in the in

tremendous

special

good people only. When the storm is deadliest, and the disease most imminent, help often comes (the homoeopathic motto, you from strange quarters remember, cure the bite with a hair of the same dog.) its

—

The American Revolution great strike, successful for

but whether a centuries,

real

of 1776

its

was simply a

immediate object

—

success judged by the scale of the

and the long-striking balance of Time, yet

remains to be settled.

The French Revolution was

absolutely a strike, and a very terrible and relentless

bad pay, unjust division of wealth-products, and the hoggish monopoly of a one, against ages of

few, rolling in superfluity, against the vast bulk of

the work-people, living

in squalor. [28S]

Collect

the United States, like the countries of the Old

World, are also to grow vast crops of poor, desperate, dissatisfied, nomadic, miserably-waged populations,

upon us of late years— steadily, even if slowly, eating into them like a canthen our republican expercer of lungs or stomach

such as

see looming

—

iment, notwithstanding

all its

surface-successes,

heart an unhealthy failure. Feb.

before

'79.—

— and

saw to-day

a sight

amazed, and made

quite good-looking American

sonal presence,

hooks

in their

down, spying

serious; three

men, of respectable per-

two of them young,

ier-bags on their shoulders,

had never seen

carrying chiffon-

and the usual long

iron

hands, plodding along, their eyes cast for scraps, rags, bones,

&c.

estimated and summ'd-up to-day, having

?Z''^''^ New World

thoroughly justified dred years, (as

power

itself

the past hun-

growth,

far as

vitality

and

by severest and most varied trials of peace and war, and having establish'd itself for good, with all its necessities and benefits, for

sult

concerned,)

time to come,

consider'd also in

dangers.

are

its

all

now to

be seriously

pronounced and already developt

While the

suspended,

battle

was

raging,

and the

re-

defections and criticisms were to

be hush'd, and everything bent with vehemence unmitigated toward the urge of victory. victory settled,

new

But that

responsibilities advance. [286]

can

Collect

conceive of no better service

by democrats of thorough and

heart-felt

than boldly exposing the weakness,

liabilities

henceforth, faith,

and

the United States,

infinite corruptions of

By the un-

democracy.

precedented opening-up of humanity en masse

United States, the

last

the

hundred years, under our

in-

not only the good qualities of the race,

stitutions,

but just as

much

the bad ones, are prominently

Man

brought forward.

about the same,

the

whether with despotism, or whether with

main,

freedom. ''

The

ideal

form of human society," Canon Kings-

ley declares, 'Ms democracy. it

even possible, a whole world

free foreheads to

master, for

One

God and

— and were

nation

— of

free

men,

lifting

Nature; calling no

their master,

man

even God; knowing

and doing their duties toward the Maker of the universe, and therefore to each other; not from fear, nor calculation of profit or loss, but because they have seen the beauty of righteousness, and trust, and peace; because the law of

Such a nation

— such

God

a society

ception of moral existence can indeed, be

that,

earth?

their hearts.

— what

nobler con-

Would not God come on

form?

the kingdom of

" this faith,

founded

practically

the ideal,

let

us hold

—

Then what a specexhibited by our American de-

and never abandon or lose tacle

mocracy to-day [287]

it.

Collect

Though Foundation

think

comprehend the

fully

absence of moral tone

our current poli-

almost entire Tbfn others tics and business, and the futility of absolute and simple honor as a counterpoise against the enormous greed for worldly wealth, with the trickeries of gaining

it,

all

through

do not share the depression find possessing and despair on the subject which many good people. The advent of America, the history of the past century, has been the first general aperture and opening-up to the average human comsociety our day,

still

monalty, on the broadest scale, of the

eligibilities

and worldly success and eminence, and has been fully taken advantage of; and the example

to wealth

has spread hence, these

eligibilities

in ripples,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; to

this

all

limitless

nations.

aperture,

the

and rushing and crude, and fiercely, turbidly hasteningâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and we have seen the first stages, and are now in the midst race has tended, en masse, roaring

of the result of

it all,

far.

But there will certainly

ensue other stages, and entirely different ones. nothing mind.

there

Soon,

more evolution than the American will

fully realized that ostensible

wealth and money-making, show, luxury, &c., imperatively necessitate something

beyond

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; namely,

the sane, eternal moral and spiritual-esthetic butes, elements.

(We

cannot have even that

attri-

realiz-

on any less terms than the price we are now paying for it.) Soon, it will be understood clearly,

ation

[288]

Collect

that the State cannot flourish, (nay, cannot exist,)

They

without those elements. into the

will gradually enter

chyle of sociology and literature.

will finally

make the blood and brawn

They

of the best

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;

American individualities of both sexes and thus, with them, to a certainty, (through these very processes of to-day,) dominate the

ftrr

Eie^-^"

still

and

them, the will

Worid.

remains doubtful to

these will ever secure,

wit

tions,'etc.

New

capacity

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; whether,

first-class

ever personally appear

me whether

officially,

the best

through

genius of America the

high

political

stations, the Presidency, Congress, the leading State

Those offices, or the candidacy for them, arranged, won, by caucusing, money, the favoritism offices,

&c.

or pecuniary interest of rings, the superior manipulation of the ins over the outs, or the outs over the ins,

mere business agencies of

are, indeed, at best, the

the people, are useful as formulating, neither the best

and highest, but the average of the public judgment, sense, justice (or sometimes want of judgment, sense, justice).

not so

elect Presidents,

much to have them

Congressmen, &c.,

consider and decide for us,

but as surest practical means of expressing the will of majorities on mooted questions, measures, &c.

As to general suffrage, after all, since we have gone so far, the more general it is, the better. I

favor the VOL.

widest opening of the doors.

v.â&#x20AC;&#x201D; 19.

[289]

Let the

Collect

and area be wide enough, and all is safe. can never have a born penitentiary-bird, or

ventilation

panel-thief,

keeper, for

lowest gambling-hell

President — though

such

groggery

may

not only

emulate, but get, high offices from localities

New

from the proud and wealthy city of

— even

York.

'^The protectionists are fond of flashing to

Who Gets the Plunder?

public eye the glittering delusion of

^j^g

great money-results from manufactures,

mines,

this source,

— so

exports

artificial

and so many from

unanswerable show

tive,

annual

cash from

— an

iron,

many

protection."

all is,

seduc-

immense revenue of woollen,

cotton,

goods, and a hundred other things, ''

millions from

that — such a

all

leather

bolstered up

But the really important point of

into whose pockets does this

plunder really go ?

would be some excuse and satisfaction if even a fair proportion of it went to the masses of laboringmen resulting in homesteads to such, men, women, children myriads of actual homes in fee simple, in every State, (not the false glamour of the It

—

stunning wealth statistics,

reported

the

census, in the

or tables in the newspapers, but a

fair

and generous average to those workmen and workwomen) But that would be something.

division

—

the fact

itself is

nothing of the kind.

The

profits of

''protection" go altogether to a few score select

persons

— who, by favors of Congress, [290]

State legisla-

Collect

tures, the banks,

and other

forming a vulgar aristocracy,

special advantages, are full

bad as anything

the British or European castes, of blood, or the

As Sismondi pointed

dynasties there of the past. out, the

true prosperity of a nation

great wealth of a special class, but really attained in

not be the best show, but

Though Nature Articie)

not

the

only to be

having the bulk of the people pro-

vided with homes or land

fthe^eai^

This

in fee simple. it is

may

the best reality. /

must pre-

maintains, and

vail,

there will always be plenty of peo-

ple,

and good people,

who

cannot, or

think they cannot, see anything in that last,

wisest,

ship

rules

most enveloped of proverbs, '' Friendthe World." Modern society, in its

largest vein,

essentially intellectual, infidelistic

—

and depends most on, pure compulsion or science, its rule and sovereignty is, in

secretly admires,

—

short, in **

cultivated " quarters, deeply Napoleonic.

Friendship," said Bonaparte, in one of his lightning-flashes

of candid garrulity,

one

— not

even

do love him,

it is

Duroc? suits

me; he

affections

Ay, him, is

"Friendship

brothers; Joseph

from

habit,

any one,

but a name.

perhaps a

little.

because he

love no Still,

the eldest of us.

— but why He unfeeling — has no weak

love in a sort

cool, undemonstrative,

— never embraces any one — never weeps."

not sure but the same analogy

to be

applied, in cases, often seen, where, with an extra

Collect

development and acuteness of the ties,

there

tional,

intellectual facul-

a mark'd absence of the spiritual, affec-

more rarely, the and moral elements of cognition.

and sometimes, though

highest esthetic

Of most Wants Yet

foreign countries, small or large,

^^^^ ^^^ remotest times known, our own,

down

each has contributed

after its

kind, directly or indirectly, at least one great

undy-

ing song, to help vitalize and increase the valor,

wisdom, and elegance of humanity, from the points of view attain'd by it up to date. The stupendous of India, the holy Bible

epics

canticles, the Nibelungen, the

Inferno, Shakspere's

itself,

the Homeric

Cid Campeador, the

dramas of the passions and of

the feudal lords, Burns's songs, Goethe's in Germany,

Tennyson's poems France, and

England,

many more,

Victor Hugo's in

are the widely various yet

integral signs or landmarks, (in certain respects the

highest set up

by the human mind and

soul,

beyond

science, invention, political amelioration, &c.,) nar-

rating in subtlest, best

ways, the long, long routes

of history, and giving identity to the stages arrived

by aggregate humanity, and the conclusions assumed in its progressive and varied civilizations. Where is America's art-rendering, in any thing like the spirit worthy of herself and the modat

ern, to these characteristic

immortal monuments?

So far, our Democratic society, (estimating [292]

its

various

Collect

—

strata, in

the mass, as one,) possesses nothing

nor have

contributed any characteristic music,

the finest

tie

of nationality

glowing,

blood-throbbing,

tional,

indefinable,

artistic,

— to

make up

religious,

for that

social,

emo-

indescribably beautiful

charm and hold which fused the separate

parts of

the old feudal societies together, in their wonderful

Europe and Asia, of

interpenetration, in

and

loyalty, running

and picturesque

one

way

responsibility,

ness, running like a

like a living

In coincidence,

weft

—

duty, and blessed-

warp the other way.

Southern States, under slavery,

...

love, belief,

much

(In the

of the same.)

and as things

now

exist in

what is more terrible, more alarming, than the total want of any such fusion and mutuality of love, belief, and rapport of interest, between the comparatively few successful rich, and the great masses of the unsuccessful, the poor ? As a mixed the States,

political

and

social question, is

significance ?

Is it

lem and puzzle ble

want

full

of dark

not worth considering as a prob-

our democracy

— an

indispensa-

to be supplied ?

In strictf out of

the Masses

the talk (which

^^^ "^^^ ^^

^^"

welcome) about

^^ training, thoroughly

school'd and experienced men, for states-

would present the following as an was written by me twenty years ago men,

oflFset.

not this

and has been curiously

—

verified since: [293]

Collect

say no body of

men

are

fit

make

Presidents,

Judges, and Generals, unless they themselves supply

the best specimens of the same; and that supplying

one or two such specimens illuminates the whole

body

for a

when

the like of the present personnel of the govern-

thousand years.

expect to see the day

ments, Federal, State, municipal, military, and naval, will

be look'd upon with derision, and

mechanics and young other

official stations,

fresh from their

men

will reach

when

qualified

Congress and

sent in their working costumes,

benches and

and returning to The young fellows must pretools,

them again with dignity. pare to do credit to this destiny, for the stuff is in them. Nothing gives place, recollect, and never ought to give place, except to its clean superiors. There is more rude and undevelopt bravery, friendship, conscientiousness, clear-sightedness, and practical genius for any scope of action, even the broadest and highest, now among the American mechanics and young men, than in all the official persons in these States, legislative, executive, judicial, military, and naval, and more than among all the literary persons. would be much pleas'd to see some heroic, shrewd, I

fully-inform' d, healthy-bodied, middle-aged, beard-

boatman come down from the West across the Alleghanies, and walk into the Presidency, dress'd in a clean suit of working attire, and with the tan all over his face, breast, and arms; would certainly vote for that sort of faced American blacksmith or

[294]

Collect

man, possessing the due requirements, before any other candidate.

(The ics,

facts of rank-and-file

workingmen, mechan-

Lincoln, Johnson, Grant, Garfield, brought forward

from the masses and placed

the Presidency, and

—

really swaying its mighty powers with firm hand with more sway than any king in history, and with

sway

better capacity in using that

that these facts have bearings

— can we not see

far, far

beyond

their

party ones ?)

political or

you go

Europe

(to say

nothing of

Monu-

^^j^ ^Qj.^ ancient and massive still), the ments cannot stir without meeting venerable Past and

—

mentos

Present

tles,

paintings,

—Cathedrals, ruins of temples, cas-

monuments

(far, far

you me-

of the great, statues and

beyond anything America can ever

expect to produce,) haunts of heroes long dead, saints, poets, divinities, with deepest associations of ages.

But here

the

New

World, while those

we can

never

have more than those to build, and more greatly to build. (I am not sure but the day

emulate,

far

for

conventional monuments, statues, memorials, &c.,

has pass'd

away

— and that they are

perfluous and vulgar.)

henceforth su-

enlarg'd general superior

humanity

(partly indeed resulting

to build.

European, Asiatic greatness are

from those) in

are

the past.

Vaster and subtler, America, combining, justifying the past, yet works for a grander future, in living [295]

Collect

democratic forms. for

(Here too are indicated the paths

Other times, other lands,

our national bards,)

have had their missions

—

Art,

War,

Ecclesiasticism,

Literature, Discovery, Trade, Architecture, &c., &c.

— but

that grand future

the enclosing purport of

the United States.

How small were the best thoughts, poems, Little or

conclusions, except for a certain invariable

^^* "^1 New, after

resemblance and uniform standard

final all

the

thoughts, theology, poems, &c., of

nations,

all

civilizations,

and times.

Those precious

They come

to us from the far-off

centuries

all

— accumulations — from and

legacies

— from Egypt, and

all

eras,

and Greece, and Rome and along through the middle and later ages, in the grand monarchies of Europe born under far different institutes and conditions from ours but out of the insight and inspiration of the same old humanity the same old heart and brain the same old

all

lands

—

India,

—

countenance yearningly, pensively, looking

What we have

do to-day

and to give them ensemble, and a erican and democratic physiognomy. is

Rei^^c^nce^'^'^

well

known,

them cheermodern Am-

to receive

fully,

forth.

story-telling

was

often

weapon which he skill. Very often he

President Lincoln a

employ'd with great

could not give a point-blank reply or [296]

comment

— and

Collect

these indirections (sometimes funny, but not always

were probably the best responses possible. In the gloomiest period of the war, he had a call from a In the talk after large delegation of bank presidents. so)

business Lincoln

was if

one of the big Dons asked Mr. confidence in the permanency of the

settled,

his

—

Union was not beginning to be shaken whereupon the homely President told a little story: *'When I a young

was

man

in Illinois,'' said he,

boarded

for

a time with a deacon of the Presbyterian church.

One

night

door, and

my sleep by a rap at the

was roused from

heard the deacon's voice exclaiming,

'Arise,

sprang Abraham the day of judgment has come from my bed and rushed to the window, and saw the I

stars falling in great

showers

;

but looking back of

saw the grand old constellawas so well acquainted, fixed and

true in their places.

Gentlemen, the world did not

them

tions,

with which

come

the heavens

to an end then, nor will the Union

Freedom

^"'^ ^^^^ *^^^ ^^^* people entirely misunderstand Freedom, but I

have not yet met one person understands it. The whole Universe is

rightly

absolute Law.

and

license

undevelopt

Freedom only opens even to

entire activity

To the degraded or the too many others

under the law.

— and

thought of freedom

law

now."

"^*

sometimes think

who

—

— which, of course,

thought of escaping from

impossible.

[297]

More precious

,5-

Collect

wordly riches is Freedom— freedom from the painful constipation and poor narrowness of ecclesifreedom in manners, habiliments, furniture, asticism enfrom the silliness and tyranny of local fashions

than

all

—

tire

—

freedom from party rings and mere conventions

in politics

— and better than

all,

a general freedom of

One's-Self from the tyrannic domination of vices, habits,

appetites,

man

under which nearly every

(often the greatest brawler for freedom)

of us

enslav'd.

—

the true DemCan we attain such enfranchisement ocracy, and the height of it ? While we are from birth to death the subjects of irresistible law, enclosing

every

movement and minute, we

paradox, into true free

yet escape, by a

Strange as

will.

may seem,

only attain to freedom by a knowledge

implicit

obedience

to.

Law.

Great

of,

and

— unspeakably

great— is the Will the free Soul of man At its greatest, understanding and obeying the laws, it can then, and then only, maintain true liberty. For there is more to the highest, that law as absolute as any absolute than any the Law of Liberty. The shalI

—

low, as intimated, consider liberty a release from

The wise

law, from every constraint. contrary, the potent

Law

see in

it,

all

on the

of Laws, namely, the fusion

and combination of the conscious

will, or partial indi-

vidual law, with those universal, eternal, unconscious

ones,

which run through

all

Time, pervade history,

prove immortality, give moral purpose to the entire objective world,

and the

last dignity to [298]

human

life.

Collect

For certain purposes, literary productions ^Â°^^J^^'^^' through

first

less,

different

The

consisting of only a score or two,

of typical, primal, representative works,

from any before, and embodying

selves their

own main laws and

Then the second able, incessant

them-

reasons for being.

books and writings innumer-

class,

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;to be briefly described as radiations more or

or offshoots, or

The

may be

roughly divided into two classes.

Literature

perhaps

the recorded ages

all

works of the

less imitations of the first.

first class,

as said, have their

own

laws, and may indeed be described as making those laws, and amenable only to them. The sharp warn-

ing of Margaret

unquell'd for thirty years,

Fuller,

yet sounds in the

air:

does not follow that

because the United States print and read more books, magazines, and newspapers than

all

the rest of the

world, that they really have, therefore, a literature."

The

culmination of this vast

final

and

Republic will be the production

Culmination Varied

and perennial establishment of millions of comfortable farms,

city

healthy

homesteads

and

independent,

ownership, fee simple, cheap,

within

and

reach

life

all.

moderate-sized single

separate

them complete but Exceptional wealth,

splendor, countless manufactures, excess of exports,

immense

capital

hotels well

and

capitalists,

fill'd, artificial

the five-dollar-a-day

improvements, even books,

[299]

Collect

and the suffrage— all,

colleges, in

themselves, (hard as

it is

many

respects,

to say so, and sharp as

more or less, a sort of anti-democratic disease and monstrosity, except as they contribute by curious indirections to that culmination seem to me mainly of value, or worth a surgeon's lance,)

form,

—

consideration, only with reference to

There is a subtle something crops, cattle, at first

air,

&c.,

trees,

it.

the

and

common

earth,

having to do

hand with them, that forms the only

purify-

ing and perennial element for individuals and for

must confess want to see the agriculoccupation of America at first hand permanently broaden'd. Its gains are the only ones on which God seems to smile. What others what society.

tural

—

business,

profit,

fortune else

come

wealth,

without a taint?

— what dollar — does not stand more or

from,

less

imposition,

What for,

lying,

and un-

naturalness ?

Problem

One

of the problems presented in America

these times

is,

how

combine one's duty

and policy as a member of associations, brotherhoods or what not, and one's obligations to the State and Nation, with essential freesocieties,

dom

as an

individual

personality,

without which

man cannot grow or expand, or be full, modern, heroic, democratic, American. With all

freedom a

the necessities and benefits of association, (and the [300]

Collect

world cannot get along without ity

and

man

satisfaction of a

it,)

consist in his think-

The problem,

ing and acting for himself.

combine the two, so as not to ignore

^tivf^Compaction

say.

either.

^tamp, and the retention thereof, broad, the tolerating,

every race on earth.

the

All nations British,

navian, Spanish, French, Italian

the

many-sided, here

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;a home

German, Scandi-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; papers

plays acted, speeches made, in

all

published,

languages

our shores the crowning resultant of those tions, decantations,

our polyglot construction-

well

the collective. for

the true nobil-

â&#x20AC;&#x201D; on

distilla-

compactions of humanity, that

have been going on, on

trial,

[301]

over the earth so long.

-^^Y

U DAY

â&#x20AC;¢^