ESSAYS

 BY

 RALPH WALDO EMERSON

 Merrill's English Texts

 SELECTED AND EDITED, WITH INTRODUCTION AND NOTES, BY EDNA H. L. TURPIN, AUTHOR OF "STORIES FROM AMERICAN HISTORY, " "CLASSIC FABLES, " "FAMOUS PAINTERS, " ETC. 

 NEW YORK

 CHARLES E. MERRILL CO. 

 1907

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION LIFE OF EMERSON CRITICAL OPINIONS CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF PRINCIPAL WORKS

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR

COMPENSATION

SELF RELIANCE

FRIENDSHIP

HEROISM

MANNERS

GIFTS

NATURE

SHAKESPEARE; OR, THE POET

PRUDENCE

CIRCLES

NOTES

PUBLISHERS' NOTE

Merrill's English Texts

This series of books will include in complete editions thosemasterpieces of English Literature that are best adapted for the useof schools and colleges. The editors of the several volumes will bechosen for their special qualifications in connection with the textsto be issued under their individual supervision, but familiarity withthe practical needs of the classroom, no less than sound scholarship, will characterize the editing of every book in the series. 

In connection with each text, a critical and historical introduction, including a sketch of the life of the author and his relation to thethought of his time, critical opinions of the work in question chosenfrom the great body of English criticism, and, where possible, aportrait of the author, will be given. Ample explanatory notes of suchpassages in the text as call for special attention will be supplied, but irrelevant annotation and explanations of the obvious will berigidly excluded. 

CHARLES E. MERRILL CO. 

LIFE OF EMERSON

Ralph Waldo Emerson was born in Boston, May 25, 1803. He was descendedfrom a long line of New England ministers, men of refinement andeducation. As a school-boy he was quiet and retiring, reading a greatdeal, but not paying much attention to his lessons. He entered Harvardat the early age of fourteen, but never attained a high rank there, although he took a prize for an essay on Socrates, and was made classpoet after several others had declined. Next to his reserve and thefaultless propriety of his conduct, his contemporaries at collegeseemed most impressed by the great maturity of his mind. Emersonappears never to have been really a boy. He was always serene andthoughtful, impressing all who knew him with that spirituality whichwas his most distinguishing characteristic. 

After graduating from college he taught school for a time, and thenentered the Harvard Divinity School under Dr. Channing, the greatUnitarian preacher. Although he was not strong enough to attend allthe lectures of the divinity course, the college authorities deemedthe name Emerson sufficient passport to the ministry. He wasaccordingly "approbated to preach" by the Middlesex Association ofMinisters on October 10, 1826. As a preacher, Emerson was interesting, though not particularly original. His talent seems to have been ingiving new meaning to the old truths of religion. One of his hearershas said: "In looking back on his preaching I find he has impressedtruths to which I always assented in such a manner as to make themappear new, like a clearer revelation. " Although his sermons werealways couched in scriptural language, they were touched with thelight of that genius which avoids the conventional and commonplace. Inhis other pastoral duties Emerson was not quite so successful. It ischaracteristic of his deep humanity and his dislike for all fuss andcommonplace that he appeared to least advantage at a funeral. Aconnoisseur in such matters, an old sexton, once remarked that on suchoccasions "he did not appear at ease at all. To tell the truth, in myopinion, that young man was not born to be a minister. "

Emerson did not long remain a minister. In 1832 he preached a sermonin which he announced certain views in regard to the communion servicewhich were disapproved by a large part of his congregation. He foundit impossible to continue preaching, and, with the most friendlyfeelings on both sides, he parted from his congregation. 

A few months later (1833) he went to Europe for a short year oftravel. While abroad, he visited Walter Savage Landor, Coleridge andWordsworth, and Thomas Carlyle. This visit to Carlyle was to both mena most interesting experience. They parted feeling that they had muchintellectually in common. This belief fostered a sympathy which, bythe time they had discovered how different they really were, had grownso strong a habit that they always kept up their intimacy. This yearof travel opened Emerson's eyes to many things of which he hadpreviously been ignorant; he had profited by detachment from theconcerns of a limited community and an isolated church. 

After his return he began to find his true field of activity in thelecture-hall, and delivered a number of addresses in Boston and itsvicinity. While thus coming before the open public on the lectureplatform, he was all the time preparing the treatise which was toembody all the quintessential elements of his philosophical doctrine. This was the essay _Nature_, which was published in 1836. By itsconception of external Nature as an incarnation of the Divine Mind itstruck the fundamental principle of Emerson's religious belief. Theessay had a very small circulation at first, though later it becamewidely known. 

In the winter of 1836 Emerson followed up his discourse on Nature by acourse of twelve lectures on the "Philosophy of History, " aconsiderable portion of which eventually became embodied in hisessays. The next year (1837) was the year of the delivery of the _ManThinking, or the American Scholar_ address before the Phi Beta KappaSociety at Cambridge. 

This society, composed of the first twenty-five men in each classgraduating from college, has annual meetings which have called forththe best efforts of many distinguished scholars and thinkers. Emerson's address was listened to with the most profound interest. Itdeclared a sort of intellectual independence for America. Henceforthwe were to be emancipated from clogging foreign influences, and anational literature was to expand under the fostering care of theRepublic. 

These two discourses, _Nature_ and _The American Scholar_, strike thekeynote of Emerson's philosophical, poetical, and moral teachings. Infact he had, as every great teacher has, only a limited number ofprinciples and theories to teach. These principles of life can all beenumerated in twenty words--self-reliance, culture, intellectual andmoral independence, the divinity of nature and man, the necessity oflabor, and high ideals. 

Emerson spent the latter part of his life in lecturing and in literarywork. His son, Dr. Edward Emerson, gave an interesting account of howthese lectures were constructed. "All through his life he kept ajournal. This book, he said, was his 'Savings Bank. ' The thoughts thusreceived and garnered in his journals were indexed, and a great manyof them appeared in his published works. They were religiously setdown just as they came, in no order except chronological, but laterthey were grouped, enlarged or pruned, illustrated, worked into alecture or discourse, and, after having in this capacity undergonerepeated testing and rearranging, were finally carefully sifted andmore rigidly pruned, and were printed as essays. "

Besides his essays and lectures Emerson left some poetry in which isembodied those thoughts which were to him too deep for proseexpression. Oliver Wendell Holmes in speaking of this says: "Emersonwrote occasionally in verse from his school-days until he had reachedthe age which used to be known as the grand climacteric, sixty-three. . . . His poems are not and hardly can become popular; theyare not meant to be liked by the many, but to be dearly loved andcherished by the few. . . . His occasional lawlessness in technicalconstruction, his somewhat fantastic expressions, his enigmaticobscurities hardly detract from the pleasant surprise his verses sooften bring with them. . . . The poetic license which we allow in theverse of Emerson is more than excused by the noble spirit which makesus forget its occasional blemishes, sometimes to be pleased with themas characteristic of the writer. "

Emerson was always a striking figure in the intellectual life ofAmerica. His discourses were above all things inspiring. Through themmany were induced to strive for a higher self-culture. His influencecan be discerned in all the literary movements of the time. He was thecentral figure of the so-called transcendental school which was soprominent fifty years ago, although he always rather held aloof fromany enthusiastic participation in the movement. 

Emerson lived a quiet life in Concord, Massachusetts. "He was afirst-rate neighbor and one who always kept his fences up. " Hetraveled extensively on his lecturing tours, even going as far asEngland. In _English Traits_ he has recorded his impressions of whathe saw of English life and manners. 

Oliver Wendell Holmes has described him in this wise: "His personalappearance was that of the typical New Englander of college-bredancestry. Tall, spare, slender, with sloping shoulders, slightlystooping in his later years, with light hair and eyes, the scholar'scomplexion, the prominent, somewhat arched nose which belongs to manyof the New England sub-species, thin lips, suggestive of delicacy, buthaving nothing like primness, still less of the rigidity which isoften noticeable in the generation succeeding next to that of the menin their shirt-sleeves, he would have been noticed anywhere as oneevidently a scholarly thinker astray from the alcove or the study, which were his natural habitats. His voice was very sweet, andpenetrating without any loudness or mark of effort. His enunciationwas beautifully clear, but he often hesitated as if waiting for theright word to present itself. His manner was very quiet, his smile waspleasant, but he did not like explosive laughter any better thanHawthorne did. None who met him can fail to recall that serene andkindly presence, in which there was mingled a certain spiritualremoteness with the most benignant human welcome to all who wereprivileged to enjoy his companionship. "

Emerson died April 27, 1882, after a few days' illness from pneumonia. Dr. Garnett in his excellent biography says: "Seldom had 'the reaperwhose name is Death' gathered such illustrious harvest as betweenDecember 1880 and April 1882. In the first month of this period GeorgeEliot passed away, in the ensuing February Carlyle followed; in AprilLord Beaconsfield died, deplored by his party, nor unregretted by hiscountry; in February of the following year Longfellow was carried tothe tomb; in April Rossetti was laid to rest by the sea, and thepavement of Westminster Abbey was disturbed to receive the dust ofDarwin. And now Emerson lay down in death beside the painter of manand the searcher of nature, the English-Oriental statesman, the poetof the plain man and the poet of the artist, and the prophet whosename is indissolubly linked with his own. All these men passed intoeternity laden with the spoils of Time, but of none of them could itbe said, as of Emerson, that the most shining intellectual glory andthe most potent intellectual force of a continent had departed alongwith him. "

CRITICAL OPINIONS OF EMERSON AND HIS WRITINGS. 

Matthew Arnold, in an address on Emerson delivered in Boston, gavean excellent estimate of the rank we should accord to him in the greathierarchy of letters. Some, perhaps, will think that Arnold wasunappreciative and cold, but dispassionate readers will be inclined toagree with his judgment of our great American. 

After a review of the poetical works of Emerson the English criticdraws his conclusions as follows:

"I do not then place Emerson among the great poets. But I go farther, and say that I do not place him among the great writers, the great menof letters. Who are the great men of letters? They are men likeCicero, Plato, Bacon, Pascal, Swift, Voltaire--writers with, in thefirst place, a genius and instinct for style. . . . Brilliant andpowerful passages in a man's writings do not prove his possession ofit. Emerson has passages of noble and pathetic eloquence; he haspassages of shrewd and felicitous wit; he has crisp epigram; he haspassages of exquisitely touched observation of nature. Yet he is not agreat writer. . . . Carlyle formulates perfectly the defects of hisfriend's poetic and literary productions when he says: 'For me it istoo ethereal, speculative, theoretic; I will have all things condensethemselves, take shape and body, if they are to have my sympathy. ' . . . 

". . . . Not with the Miltons and Grays, not with the Platos and Spinozas, not with the Swifts and Voltaires, not with the Montaignes andAddisons, can we rank Emerson. No man could see this clearer thanEmerson himself. 'Alas, my friend, ' he writes in reply to Carlyle, whohad exhorted him to creative work, --'Alas, my friend, I can do no suchgay thing as you say. I do not belong to the poets, but only to a lowdepartment of literature, --the reporters; suburban men. ' He deprecatedhis friend's praise; praise 'generous to a fault' he calls it; praise'generous to the shaming of me, --cold, fastidious, ebbing person thatI am. '"

After all this unfavorable criticism Arnold begins to praise. Quotingpassages from the Essays, he adds:

"This is tonic indeed! And let no one object that it is too general;that more practical, positive direction is what we want. . . . Yes, truly, his insight is admirable; his truth is precious. Yet the secretof his effect is not even in these; it is in his temper. It is in thehopeful, serene, beautiful temper wherewith these, in Emerson, areindissolubly united; in which they work and have their being. . . . Onecan scarcely overrate the importance of holding fast to happiness andhope. It gives to Emerson's work an invaluable virtue. As Wordsworth'spoetry is, in my judgment, the most important done in verse, in ourlanguage, during the present century, so Emerson's Essays are, Ithink, the most important work done in prose. . . . But by his convictionthat in the life of the spirit is happiness, and by his hope that thislife of the spirit will come more and more to be sanely understood, and to prevail, and to work for happiness, --by this conviction andhope Emerson was great, and he will surely prove in the end to havebeen right in them. . . . You cannot prize him too much, nor heed him toodiligently. "

Herman Grimm, a German critic of great influence in his own country, did much to obtain a hearing for Emerson's works in Germany. At firstthe Germans could not understand the unusual English, the unaccustomedturns of phrase which are so characteristic of Emerson's style. 

"Macaulay gives them no difficulty; even Carlyle is comprehended. Butin Emerson's writings the broad turnpike is suddenly changed into ahazardous sandy foot-path. His thoughts and his style are American. Heis not writing for Berlin, but for the people of Massachusetts. . . . Itis an art to rise above what we have been taught. . . . All great men areseen to possess this freedom. They derive their standard from theirown natures, and their observations on life are so natural andspontaneous that it would seem as if the most illiterate person with ascrap of common-sense would have made the same. . . . We become wiserwith them, and know not how the difficult appears easy and theinvolved plain. 

"Emerson possesses this noble manner of communicating himself. Heinspires me with courage and confidence. He has read and seen butconceals the labor. I meet in his works plenty of familiar facts, buthe does not employ them to figure up anew the old worn-out problems:each stands on a new spot and serves for new combinations. Fromeverything he sees the direct line issuing which connects it with thefocus of life. . . . 

". . . . Emerson's theory is that of the 'sovereignty of the individual. 'To discover what a young man is good for, and to equip him for thepath he is to strike out in life, regardless of any otherconsideration, is the great duty to which he calls attention. He makesmen self-reliant. He reveals to the eyes of the idealist themagnificent results of practical activity, and unfolds before therealist the grandeur of the ideal world of thought. No man is to allowhimself, through prejudice, to make a mistake in choosing the task towhich he will devote his life. Emerson's essays are, as it were, printed sermons--all having this same text. . . . The wealth and harmonyof his language overpowered and entranced me anew. But even now Icannot say wherein the secret of his influence lies. What he haswritten is like life itself--the unbroken thread ever lengthenedthrough the addition of the small events which make up each day'sexperience. "

Froude in his famous "Life of Carlyle" gives an interesting descriptionof Emerson's visit to the Carlyles in Scotland:

"The Carlyles were sitting alone at dinner on a Sunday afternoon atthe end of August when a Dumfries carriage drove to the door, andthere stepped out of it a young American then unknown to fame, butwhose influence in his own country equals that of Carlyle in ours, andwhose name stands connected with his wherever the English language isspoken. Emerson, the younger of the two, had just broken his Unitarianfetters, and was looking out around him like a young eagle longing forlight. He had read Carlyle's articles and had discerned with theinstinct of genius that here was a voice speaking real and fieryconvictions, and no longer echoes and conventionalisms. He had come toEurope to study its social and spiritual phenomena; and to the youngEmerson as to the old Goethe, the most important of them appeared tobe Carlyle. . . . The acquaintance then begun to their mutual pleasureripened into a deep friendship, which has remained unclouded in spiteof wide divergences of opinion throughout their working lives. "

Carlyle wrote to his mother after Emerson had left:

"Our third happiness was the arrival of a certain young unknown friendnamed Emerson, from Boston, in the United States, who turned aside sofar from his British, French, and Italian travels to see me here! Hehad an introduction from Mill and a Frenchman (Baron d'Eichthal'snephew) whom John knew at Rome. Of course, we could do no other thanwelcome him; the rather as he seemed to be one of the most lovablecreatures in himself we had ever looked on. He stayed till next daywith us, and talked and heard to his heart's content, and left us allreally sad to part with him. "

In 1841 Carlyle wrote to John Sterling a few words apropos of therecent publication of Emerson's essays in England:

"I love Emerson's book, not for its detached opinions, not even forthe scheme of the general world he has framed for himself, or anyeminence of talent he has expressed that with, but simply because itis his own book; because there is a tone of veracity, an unmistakableair of its being _his_, and a real utterance of a human soul, not amere echo of such. I consider it, in that sense, highly remarkable, rare, very rare, in these days of ours. Ach Gott! It is frightful tolive among echoes. The few that read the book, I imagine, will getbenefit of it. To America, I sometimes say that Emerson, such as heis, seems to me like a kind of New Era. "

John Morley, the acute English critic, has made an analytic study ofEmerson's style, which may reconcile the reader to some of itsexasperating peculiarities. 

"One of the traits that every critic notes in Emerson's writing isthat it is so abrupt, so sudden in its transitions, so discontinuous, so inconsecutive. Dislike of a sentence that drags made himunconscious of the quality that French critics name _coulant_. Everything is thrown in just as it comes, and sometimes the pell-mellis enough to persuade us that Pope did not exaggerate when he saidthat no one qualification is so likely to make a good writer as thepower of rejecting his own thoughts. . . . Apart from his difficultstaccato, Emerson is not free from secondary faults. He uses wordsthat are not only odd, but vicious in construction; he is sometimesoblique and he is often clumsy; and there is a visible feeling afterepigrams that do not always come. When people say that Emerson's stylemust be good and admirable because it fits his thought, they forgetthat though it is well that a robe should fit, there is stillsomething to be said about its cut and fashion. . . . Yet, as happens toall fine minds, there came to Emerson ways of expression deeply markedwith character. On every page there is set the strong stamp ofsincerity, and the attraction of a certain artlessness; the mostawkward sentence rings true; and there is often a pure and simple notethat touches us more than if it were the perfection of elaboratedmelody. The uncouth procession of the periods discloses the travail ofthe thought, and that, too, is a kind of eloquence. An honest readereasily forgives the rude jolt or unexpected start when it shows athinker faithfully working his way along arduous and unworn tracks. Even at the roughest, Emerson often interjects a delightful cadence. As he says of Landor, his sentences are cubes which will stand firm, place them how or where you will. He criticised Swedenborg for beingsuperfluously explanatory, and having an exaggerated feeling of theignorance of men. 'Men take truths of this nature, ' said Emerson, 'very fast;' and his own style does no doubt very boldly take thiscapacity for granted in us. In 'choice and pith of diction, ' again, ofwhich Mr. Lowell speaks, he hits the mark with a felicity that isalmost his own in this generation. He is terse, concentrated, and freefrom the important blunder of mistaking intellectual dawdling formeditation. Nor in fine does his abruptness ever impede a trueurbanity. The accent is homely and the apparel plain, but his bearinghas a friendliness, a courtesy, a hospitable humanity, which goesnearer to our hearts than either literary decoration or rhetoricalunction. That modest and lenient fellow-feeling which gave such charmto his companionship breathes in his gravest writing, and prevents usfrom finding any page of it cold or hard or dry. "

E. P. Whipple, the well-known American critic, wrote soon after Emerson'sdeath:

"But 'sweetness and light' are precious and inspiring only so far asthey express the essential sweetness of the disposition of thethinker, and the essential illuminating power of his intelligence. Emerson's greatness came from his character. Sweetness and lightstreamed from him because they were _in_ him. In everything hethought, wrote, and did, we feel the presence of a personality asvigorous and brave as it was sweet, and the particular radical thoughthe at any time expressed derived its power to animate and illuminateother minds from the might of the manhood, which was felt to be withinand behind it. To 'sweetness and light' he therefore added the primequality of fearless manliness. 

"If the force of Emerson's character was thus inextricably blendedwith the force of all his faculties of intellect and imagination, andthe refinement of all his sentiments, we have still to account for thepeculiarities of his genius, and to answer the question, why do weinstinctively apply the epithet 'Emersonian' to every characteristicpassage in his writings? We are told that he was the last in a longline of clergymen, his ancestors, and that the modern doctrine ofheredity accounts for the impressive emphasis he laid on the moralsentiment; but that does not solve the puzzle why he unmistakablydiffered in his nature and genius from all other Emersons. Animaginary genealogical chart of descent connecting him with Confuciusor Gautama would be more satisfactory. 

"What distinguishes _the_ Emerson was his exceptional genius andcharacter, that something in him which separated him from all otherEmersons, as it separated him from all other eminent men of letters, and impressed every intelligent reader with the feeling that he wasnot only 'original but aboriginal. ' Some traits of his mind andcharacter may be traced back to his ancestors, but what doctrine ofheredity can give us the genesis of his genius? Indeed, the safestcourse to pursue is to quote his own words, and despairingly confessthat it is the nature of genius 'to spring, like the rainbow daughterof Wonder, from the invisible, to abolish the past, and refuse allhistory. '"

CHRONOLOGICAL LIST OF EMERSON'S PRINCIPAL WORKS. 

Nature 1836Essays (First Series) 1841Essays (Second Series) 1844Poems 1847Miscellanies 1849Representative Men 1850English Traits 1856Conduct of Life 1860Society and Solitude 1870Correspondence of ThomasCarlyle and R. W. Emerson 1883

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR. 

 This address was delivered at Cambridge in 1837, before the Harvard Chapter of the Phi Beta Kappa Society, a college fraternity composed of the first twenty-five men in each graduating class. The society has annual meetings, which have been the occasion for addresses from the most distinguished scholars and thinkers of the day. 

MR. PRESIDENT AND GENTLEMEN, I greet you on the recommencement of our literary year. Ouranniversary is one of hope, and, perhaps, not enough of labor. We donot meet for games of strength[1] or skill, for the recitation ofhistories, tragedies, and odes, like the ancient Greeks; forparliaments of love and poesy, like the Troubadours;[2] nor for theadvancement of science, like our co-temporaries in the British andEuropean capitals. Thus far, our holiday has been simply a friendlysign of the survival of the love of letters amongst a people too busyto give to letters any more. As such it is precious as the sign of anindestructible instinct. Perhaps the time is already come when itought to be, and will be, something else; when the sluggard intellectof this continent will look from under its iron lids and fill thepostponed expectation of the world with something better than theexertions of mechanical skill. Our day of dependence, our longapprenticeship to the learning of other lands, draws to a close. Themillions that around us are rushing into life cannot always be fed onthe sere remains of foreign harvests. [3] Events, actions arise thatmust be sung, that will sing themselves. Who can doubt that poetrywill revive and lead in a new age, as the star in the constellationHarp, which now flames in our zenith, astronomers announce, shall oneday be the pole-star[4] for a thousand years?

In the light of this hope I accept the topic which not only usage butthe nature of our association seem to prescribe to this day, --theAMERICAN SCHOLAR. Year by year we come up hither to read onemore chapter of his biography. Let us inquire what new lights, newevents, and more days have thrown on his character, his duties, andhis hopes. 

It is one of those fables which out of an unknown antiquity convey anunlooked-for wisdom, that the gods, in the beginning, divided Man intomen, that he might be more helpful to himself; just as the hand wasdivided into fingers, the better to answer its end. [5]

The old fable covers a doctrine ever new and sublime; that there isOne Man, --present to all particular men only partially, or through onefaculty; and that you must take the whole society to find the wholeman. Man is not a farmer, or a professor, or an engineer, but he isall. Man is priest, and scholar, and statesman, and producer, andsoldier. In the _divided_ or social state these functions are parceledout to individuals, each of whom aims to do his stint[6] of the jointwork, whilst each other performs his. The fable implies that theindividual, to possess himself, must sometimes return from his ownlabor to embrace all the other laborers. But, unfortunately, thisoriginal unit, this fountain of power, has been so distributed tomultitudes, has been so minutely subdivided and peddled out, that itis spilled into drops, and cannot be gathered. The state of society isone in which the members have suffered amputation from the trunk andstrut about so many walking monsters, --a good finger, a neck, astomach, an elbow, but never a man. 

Man is thus metamorphosed into a thing, into many things. The planter, who is Man sent out into the field to gather food, is seldom cheeredby any idea of the true dignity of his ministry. He sees his busheland his cart, and nothing beyond, and sinks into the farmer, insteadof Man on the farm. The tradesman scarcely ever gives an ideal worthto his work, but is ridden[7] by the routine of his craft, and thesoul is subject to dollars. The priest becomes a form; the attorney astatute-book; the mechanic a machine; the sailor a rope of the ship. 

In this distribution of functions the scholar is the delegatedintellect. In the right state he is _Man Thinking_. In the degeneratestate, when the victim of society, he tends to become a mere thinker, or, still worse, the parrot of other men's thinking. 

In this view of him, as Man Thinking, the whole theory of his officeis contained. Him Nature solicits with all her placid, all hermonitory pictures. [8] Him the past instructs. Him the future invites. Is not indeed every man a student, and do not all things exist for thestudent's behoof? And, finally, is not the true scholar the only truemaster? But as the old oracle said, "All things have two handles:Beware of the wrong one. "[9] In life, too often, the scholar errs withmankind and forfeits his privilege. Let us see him in his school, andconsider him in reference to the main influences he receives. 

 * * * * *

I. The first in time and the first in importance of the influences uponthe mind is that of nature. Every day, the sun;[10] and, after sunset, Night and her stars. Ever the winds blow; ever the grass grows. Everyday, men and women, conversing, beholding and beholden. [11] The scholarmust needs stand wistful and admiring before this great spectacle. Hemust settle its value in his mind. What is nature to him? There is nevera beginning, there is never an end, to the inexplicable continuity ofthis web of God, but always circular power returning into itself. [12]Therein it resembles his own spirit, whose beginning, whose ending, henever can find, --so entire, so boundless. Far too as her splendorsshine, system on system shooting like rays, upward, downward, withoutcenter, without circumference, --in the mass and in the particle, Naturehastens to render account of herself to the mind. Classification begins. To the young mind everything is individual, stands by itself. By and byit finds how to join two things and see in them one nature; then three, then three thousand; and so, tyrannized over by its own unifyinginstinct, it goes on tying things together, diminishing anomalies, discovering roots running under ground whereby contrary and remotethings cohere and flower out from one stem. It presently learns thatsince the dawn of history there has been a constant accumulation andclassifying of facts. But what is classification but the perceiving thatthese objects are not chaotic, and are not foreign, but have a law whichis also a law of the human mind? The astronomer discovers that geometry, a pure abstraction of the human mind, is the measure of planetarymotion. The chemist finds proportions and intelligible method throughoutmatter; and science is nothing but the finding of analogy, identity, inthe most remote parts. The ambitious soul sits down before eachrefractory fact; one after another reduces all strange constitutions, all new powers, to their class and their law, and goes on forever toanimate the last fiber of organization, the outskirts of nature, byinsight. 

Thus to him, to this school-boy under the bending dome of day, issuggested that he and it proceed from one Root; one is leaf and one isflower; relation, sympathy, stirring in every vein. And what is thatroot? Is not that the soul of his soul?--A thought too bold?--A dreamtoo wild? Yet when this spiritual light shall have revealed the law ofmore earthly natures, --when he has learned to worship the soul, and tosee that the natural philosophy that now is, is only the firstgropings of its gigantic hand, --he shall look forward to anever-expanding knowledge as to a becoming creator. [13] He shall seethat nature is the opposite of the soul, answering to it part forpart. One is seal and one is print. Its beauty is the beauty of hisown mind. Its laws are the laws of his own mind. Nature then becomesto him the measure of his attainments. So much of nature as he isignorant of, so much of his own mind does he not yet possess. And, infine, the ancient precept, "Know thyself, "[14] and the modern precept, "Study nature, " become at last one maxim. 

 * * * * *

II. The next great influence into the spirit of the scholar is themind of the Past, --in whatever form, whether of literature, of art, ofinstitutions, that mind is inscribed. Books are the best type of theinfluence of the past, and perhaps we shall get at the truth, --learnthe amount of this influence more conveniently, --by considering theirvalue alone. 

The theory of books is noble. The scholar of the first age receivedinto him the world around; brooded thereon; gave it the newarrangement of his own mind, and uttered it again. It came into himlife; it went out from him truth. It came to him short-lived actions;it went out from him immortal thoughts. It came to him business; itwent from him poetry. It was dead fact; now, it is quick thought. Itcan stand, and it can go. It now endures, it now flies, it nowinspires. [15] Precisely in proportion to the depth of mind from whichit issued, so high does it soar, so long does it sing. 

Or, I might say, it depends on how far the process had gone, oftransmuting life into truth. In proportion to the completeness of thedistillation, so will the purity and imperishableness of the productbe. But none is quite perfect. As no air-pump can by any means make aperfect vacuum, [16] so neither can any artist entirely exclude theconventional, the local, the perishable from his book, or write a bookof pure thought, that shall be as efficient, in all respects, to aremote posterity, as to contemporaries, or rather to the second age. Each age, it is found, must write its own books; or rather, eachgeneration for the next succeeding. The books of an older period willnot fit this. 

Yet hence arises a grave mischief. The sacredness which attaches tothe act of creation, the act of thought, is instantly transferred tothe record. The poet chanting was felt to be a divine man. Henceforththe chant is divine also. The writer was a just and wise spirit. Henceforward it is settled the book is perfect; as love of the herocorrupts into worship of his statue. Instantly the book becomesnoxious. [17] The guide is a tyrant. We sought a brother, and lo, agovernor. The sluggish and perverted mind of the multitude, alwaysslow to open to the incursions of Reason, having once so opened, having once received this book, stands upon it, and makes an outcry ifit is disparaged. Colleges are built on it. Books are written on it bythinkers, not by Man Thinking, by men of talent, that is, who startwrong, who set out from accepted dogmas, not from their own sight ofprinciples. Meek young men grow up in libraries, believing it theirduty to accept the views which Cicero, which Locke, [18] whichBacon, [19] have given; forgetful that Cicero, Locke and Bacon wereonly young men in libraries when they wrote these books. 

Hence, instead of Man Thinking, we have the bookworm. Hence thebook-learned class, who value books, as such; not as related to natureand the human constitution, but as making a sort of Third Estate[20]with the world and soul. Hence the restorers of readings, [21] theemendators, [22] the bibliomaniacs[23] of all degrees. This is bad;this is worse than it seems. 

Books are the best of things, well used; abused, among the worst. Whatis the right use? What is the one end which all means go to effect?They are for nothing but to inspire. [24] I had better never see a bookthan to be warped by its attraction clean out of my own orbit, andmade a satellite instead of a system. The one thing in the world ofvalue is the active soul, --the soul, free, sovereign, active. Thisevery man is entitled to; this every man contains within him, althoughin almost all men obstructed, and as yet unborn. The soul active seesabsolute truth and utters truth, or creates. In this action it isgenius; not the privilege of here and there a favorite, but the soundestate of every man. [25] In its essence it is progressive. The book, the college, the school of art, the institution of any kind, stop withsome past utterance of genius. This is good, say they, --let us hold bythis. They pin me down. [26] They look backward and not forward. Butgenius always looks forward. The eyes of man are set in his forehead, not in his hindhead. Man hopes. Genius creates. To create, --tocreate, --is the proof of a divine presence. Whatever talents may be, if the man create not, the pure efflux of the Deity is nothis;[27]--cinders and smoke there may be, but not yet flame. There arecreative manners, there are creative actions, and creative words;manners, actions, words, that is, indicative of no custom orauthority, but springing spontaneous from the mind's own sense of goodand fair. 

On the other part, instead of being its own seer, let it receivealways from another mind its truth, though it were in torrents oflight, without periods of solitude, inquest, and self-recovery; and afatal disservice[28] is done. Genius is always sufficiently the enemyof genius by over-influence. [29] The literature of every nation bearme witness. The English dramatic poets have Shakespearized now for twohundred years. [30]

Undoubtedly there is a right way of reading, so it be sternlysubordinated. Man Thinking must not be subdued by his instruments. Books are for the scholar's idle times. When he can read God directly, the hour is too precious to be wasted in other men's transcripts oftheir readings. [31] But when the intervals of darkness come, as comethey must, --when the soul seeth not, when the sun is hid and the starswithdraw their shining, --we repair to the lamps which were kindled bytheir ray, to guide our steps to the East again, where the dawnis. [32] We hear, that we may speak. The Arabian proverb says, "Afig-tree, looking on a fig-tree, becometh fruitful. "

It is remarkable, the character of the pleasure we derive from thebest books. They impress us ever with the conviction that one naturewrote and the same reads. We read the verses of one of the greatEnglish poets, of Chaucer, [33] of Marvell, [34] of Dryden, [35] with themost modern joy, --with a pleasure, I mean, which is in great partcaused by the abstraction of all _time_ from their verses. There issome awe mixed with the joy of our surprise, when this poet, who livedin some past world, two or three hundred years ago, says that whichlies close to my own soul, that which I also had well-nigh thought andsaid. But for the evidence thence afforded to the philosophicaldoctrine of the identity of all minds, we should suppose somepre-established harmony, some foresight of souls that were to be, andsome preparation of stores for their future wants, like the factobserved in insects, who lay up food before death for the young grubthey shall never see. 

I would not be hurried by any love of system, by any exaggeration ofinstincts, to underrate the Book. We all know that as the human bodycan be nourished on any food, though it were boiled grass and thebroth of shoes, so the human mind can be fed by any knowledge. Andgreat and heroic men have existed who had almost no other informationthan by the printed page. I only would say that it needs a strong headto bear that diet. One must be an inventor to read well. As theproverb says, "He that would bring home the wealth of the Indies mustcarry out the wealth of the Indies. " There is then creative reading aswell as creative writing. When the mind is braced by labor andinvention, the page of whatever book we read becomes luminous withmanifold allusion. Every sentence is doubly significant, and the senseof our author is as broad as the world. We then see, what is alwaystrue, that as the seer's hour of vision is short and rare among heavydays and months, so is its record, perchance, the least part of hisvolume. The discerning will read, in his Plato[36] or Shakespeare, only that least part, --only the authentic utterances of theoracle;--all the rest he rejects, were it never so many times Plato'sand Shakespeare's. 

Of course there is a portion of reading quite indispensable to a wiseman. History and exact science he must learn by laborious reading. Colleges, in like manner, have their indispensable office, --to teachelements. But they can only highly serve us when they aim not todrill, but to create; when they gather from far every ray of variousgenius to their hospitable halls, and by the concentrated fires setthe hearts of their youth on flame. Thought and knowledge are naturesin which apparatus and pretension avail nothing. Gowns[37] andpecuniary foundations, [38] though of towns of gold, can nevercountervail the least sentence or syllable of wit. [39] Forget this, and our American colleges will recede in their public importance, whilst they grow richer every year. 

 * * * * *

III. There goes in the world a notion that the scholar should be arecluse, a valetudinarian, [40]--as unfit for any handiwork or publiclabor as a penknife for an axe. The so-called "practical men" sneer atspeculative men, as if, because they speculate or _see_, they could donothing. I have heard it said that the clergy--who are always, moreuniversally than any other class, the scholars of their day--areaddressed as women; that the rough, spontaneous conversation of menthey do not hear, but only a mincing[41] and diluted speech. They areoften virtually disfranchised; and indeed there are advocates fortheir celibacy. As far as this is true of the studious classes, it isnot just and wise. Action is with the scholar subordinate, but it isessential. Without it he is not yet man. Without it thought can neverripen into truth. Whilst the world hangs before the eye as a cloud ofbeauty, we cannot even see its beauty. Inaction is cowardice, butthere can be no scholar without the heroic mind. The preamble[42] ofthought, the transition through which it passes from the unconsciousto the conscious, is action. Only so much do I know, as I have lived. Instantly we know whose words are loaded with life, and whose not. 

The world--this shadow of the soul, or _other me_, lies wide around. Its attractions are the keys which unlock my thoughts and make meacquainted with myself. I launch eagerly into this resounding tumult. I grasp the hands of those next me, and take my place in the ring tosuffer and to work, taught by an instinct that so shall the dumbabyss[43] be vocal with speech. I pierce its order; I dissipate itsfear;[44] I dispose of it within the circuit of my expanding life. Somuch only of life as I know by experience, so much of the wildernesshave I vanquished and planted, or so far have I extended my being, mydominion. I do not see how any man can afford, for the sake of hisnerves and his nap, to spare any action in which he can partake. It ispearls and rubies to his discourse. Drudgery, calamity, exasperation, want, are instructors in eloquence and wisdom. The true scholargrudges every opportunity of action passed by, as a loss of power. 

It is the raw material out of which the intellect molds her splendidproducts. A strange process too, this by which experience is convertedinto thought, as a mulberry-leaf is converted into satin. [45] Themanufacture goes forward at all hours. 

The actions and events of our childhood and youth are now matters ofcalmest observation. They lie like fair pictures in the air. Not sowith our recent actions, --with the business which we now have in hand. On this we are quite unable to speculate. Our affections as yetcirculate through it. We no more feel or know it than we feel thefeet, or the hand, or the brain of our body. The new deed is yet apart of life, --remains for a time immersed in our unconscious life. Insome contemplative hour it detaches itself from the life like a ripefruit, [46] to become a thought of the mind. Instantly it is raised, transfigured; the corruptible has put on incorruption. [47] Henceforthit is an object of beauty, however base its origin and neighborhood. Observe, too, the impossibility of antedating this act. In its grubstate it cannot fly, it cannot shine, it is a dull grub. But suddenly, without observation, the selfsame thing unfurls beautiful wings, andis an angel of wisdom. So is there no fact, no event, in our privatehistory, which shall not, sooner or later, lose its adhesive, inertform, and astonish us by soaring from our body into the empyrean. [48]Cradle and infancy, school and playground, the fear of boys, and dogs, and ferules, [49] the love of little maids and berries, and manyanother fact that once filled the whole sky, are gone already; friendand relative, profession and party, town and country, nation andworld, must also soar and sing. [50]

Of course, he who has put forth his total strength in fit actions hasthe richest return of wisdom. I will not shut myself out of this globeof action, and transplant an oak into a flower-pot, there to hungerand pine; nor trust the revenue of some single faculty, and exhaustone vein of thought, much like those Savoyards, [51] who, getting theirlivelihood by carving shepherds, shepherdesses, and smoking Dutchmen, for all Europe, went out one day to the mountain to find stock, anddiscovered that they had whittled up the last of their pine-trees. Authors we have, in numbers, who have written out their vein, and who, moved by a commendable prudence, sail for Greece or Palestine, followthe trapper into the prairie, or ramble round Algiers, to replenishtheir merchantable stock. 

If it were only for a vocabulary, the scholar would be covetous ofaction. Life is our dictionary. [52] Years are well spent in countrylabors; in town; in the insight into trades and manufactures; in frankintercourse with many men and women; in science; in art; to the oneend of mastering in all their facts a language by which to illustrateand embody our perceptions. I learn immediately from any speaker howmuch he has already lived, through the poverty or the splendor of hisspeech. Life lies behind us as the quarry from whence we get tiles andcopestones for the masonry of to-day. This is the way to learngrammar. Colleges and books only copy the language which the field andthe work-yard made. 

But the final value of action, like that of books, and better thanbooks, is that it is a resource. That great principle of Undulation innature, that shows itself in the inspiring and expiring of the breath;in desire and satiety; in the ebb and flow of the sea; in day and night;in heat and cold; and, as yet more deeply ingrained in every atom andevery fluid, is known to us under the name of Polarity, --these "fits ofeasy transmission and reflection, " as Newton[53] called them, are thelaw of nature because they are the law of spirit. 

The mind now thinks, now acts, and each fit reproduces the other. Whenthe artist has exhausted his materials, when the fancy no longerpaints, when thoughts are no longer apprehended and books are aweariness, --he has always the resource _to live_. Character is higherthan intellect. Thinking is the function. Living is the functionary. The stream retreats to its source. A great soul will be strong tolive, as well as strong to think. Does he lack organ or medium toimpart his truth? He can still fall back on this elemental force ofliving them. This is a total act. Thinking is a partial act. Let thegrandeur of justice shine in his affairs. Let the beauty of affectioncheer his lowly roof. Those "far from fame, " who dwell and act withhim, will feel the force of his constitution in the doings andpassages of the day better than it can be measured by any public anddesigned display. Time shall teach him that the scholar loses no hourwhich the man lives. Herein he unfolds the sacred germ of hisinstinct, screened from influence. What is lost in seemliness isgained in strength. Not out of those on whom systems of education haveexhausted their culture comes the helpful giant to destroy the old orto build the new, but out of unhandselled[54] savage nature; out ofterrible Druids[55] and Berserkers[56] come at last Alfred[57] andShakespeare. I hear therefore with joy whatever is beginning to besaid of the dignity and necessity of labor to every citizen. There isvirtue yet in the hoe and the spade, [58] for learned as well as forunlearned hands. And labor is everywhere welcome; always we areinvited to work; only be this limitation observed, that a man shallnot for the sake of wider activity sacrifice any opinion to thepopular judgments and modes of action. 

 * * * * *

I have now spoken of the education of the scholar by nature, by books, and by action. It remains to say somewhat of his duties. 

They are such as become Man Thinking. They may all be comprised inself-trust. The office of the scholar is to cheer, to raise, and toguide men by showing them facts amidst appearances. He plies the slow, unhonored, and unpaid task of observation. Flamsteed[59] andHerschel, [60] in their glazed observatories, may catalogue the starswith the praise of all men, and, the results being splendid anduseful, honor is sure. But he, in his private observatory, cataloguingobscure and nebulous[61] stars of the human mind, which as yet no manhas thought of as such, --watching days and months sometimes for a fewfacts; correcting still his old records, --must relinquish display andimmediate fame. In the long period of his preparation he must betrayoften an ignorance and shiftlessness in popular arts, incurring thedisdain of the able who shoulder him aside. Long he must stammer inhis speech; often forego the living for the dead. Worse yet, he mustaccept--how often!--poverty and solitude. For the ease and pleasure oftreading the old road, accepting the fashions, the education, thereligion of society, he takes the cross of making his own, and, ofcourse, the self-accusation, the faint heart, the frequent uncertaintyand loss of time, which are the nettles and tangling vines in the wayof the self-relying and self-directed; and the state of virtualhostility in which he seems to stand to society, and especially toeducated society. For all this loss and scorn, what offset? He is tofind consolation in exercising the highest functions of human nature. He is one who raises himself from private considerations and breathesand lives on public and illustrious thoughts. He is the world's eye. He is the world's heart. He is to resist the vulgar prosperity thatretrogrades ever to barbarism, by preserving and communicating heroicsentiments, noble biographies, melodious verse, and the conclusions ofhistory. Whatsoever oracles the human heart, in all emergencies, inall solemn hours, has uttered as its commentary on the world ofactions, --these he shall receive and impart. And whatsoever newverdict Reason from her inviolable seat pronounces on the passing menand events of to-day, --this he shall hear and promulgate. 

These being his functions, it becomes him to feel all confidence inhimself, and to defer never to the popular cry. He and he only knowsthe world. The world of any moment is the merest appearance. Somegreat decorum, some fetich[62] of a government, some ephemeral trade, or war, or man, is cried up[63] by half mankind and cried down by theother half, as if all depended on this particular up or down. The oddsare that the whole question is not worth the poorest thought which thescholar has lost in listening to the controversy. Let him not quit hisbelief that a popgun is a popgun, though the ancient and honorable[64]of the earth affirm it to be the crack of doom. In silence, insteadiness, in severe abstraction, let him hold by himself; addobservation to observation, patient of neglect, patient of reproach, and bide his own time, --happy enough if he can satisfy himself alonethat this day he has seen something truly. Success treads on everyright step. For the instinct is sure that prompts him to tell hisbrother what he thinks. He then learns that in going down into thesecrets of his own mind he has descended into the secrets of allminds. He learns that he who has mastered any law in his privatethoughts is master to that extent of all men whose language he speaks, and of all into whose language his own can be translated. The poet, inutter solitude remembering his spontaneous thoughts and recordingthem, is found to have recorded that which men in cities vast findtrue for them also. The orator distrusts at first the fitness of hisfrank confessions, his want of knowledge of the persons he addresses, until he finds that he is the complement[65] of his hearers;--thatthey drink his words because he fulfills for them their own nature;the deeper he dives into his privatest, secretest presentiment, to hiswonder he finds this is the most acceptable, most public anduniversally true. The people delight in it; the better part of everyman feels--This is my music; this is myself. 

In self-trust all the virtues are comprehended. Free should thescholar be, --free and brave. Free even to the definition of freedom, "without any hindrance that does not arise out of his ownconstitution. " Brave; for fear is a thing which a scholar by his veryfunction puts behind him. Fear always springs from ignorance. It is ashame to him if his tranquility, amid dangerous times, arise from thepresumption that like children and women his is a protected class; orif he seek a temporary peace by the diversion of his thoughts frompolitics or vexed questions, hiding his head like an ostrich in theflowering bushes, peeping into microscopes, and turning rhymes, as aboy whistles to keep his courage up. So is the danger a danger still;so is the fear worse. Manlike let him turn and face it. Let him lookinto its eye and search its nature, inspect its origin, --see thewhelping of this lion, --which lies no great way back; he will thenfind in himself a perfect comprehension of its nature and extent; hewill have made his hands meet on the other side, and can henceforthdefy it and pass on superior. The world is his who can see through itspretension. What deafness, what stone-blind custom, what overgrownerror you behold is there only by sufferance, --by your sufferance. Seeit to be a lie, and you have already dealt it its mortal blow. 

Yes, we are the cowed, --we the trustless. It is a mischievous notionthat we are come late into nature; that the world was finished a longtime ago. As the world was plastic and fluid in the hands of God, soit is ever to so much of his attributes as we bring to it. Toignorance and sin it is flint. They adapt themselves to it as theymay; but in proportion as a man has any thing in him divine, thefirmament flows before him and takes his signet[66] and form. Not heis great who can alter matter, but he who can alter my state of mind. They are the kings of the world who give the color of their presentthought to all nature and all art, and persuade men, by the cheerfulserenity of their carrying the matter, that this thing which they dois the apple which the ages have desired to pluck, now at last ripe, and inviting nations to the harvest. The great man makes the greatthing. Wherever Macdonald[67] sits, there is the head of the table. Linnæus[68] makes botany the most alluring of studies, and wins itfrom the farmer and the herb-woman: Davy, [69] chemistry; andCuvier, [70] fossils. The day is always his who works in it withserenity and great aims. The unstable estimates of men crowd to himwhose mind is filled with a truth, as the heaped waves of the Atlanticfollow the moon. [71]

For this self-trust, the reason is deeper than can be fathomed, --darkerthan can be enlightened. I might not carry with me the feeling of myaudience in stating my own belief. But I have already shown the groundof my hope, in adverting to the doctrine that man is one. I believe manhas been wronged; he has wronged himself. He has almost lost the lightthat can lead him back to his prerogatives. Men are become of noaccount. Men in history, men in the world of to-day, are bugs, arespawn, and are called "the mass" and "the herd. " In a century, in amillennium, one or two men;[72] that is to say, one or twoapproximations to the right state of every man. All the rest behold inthe hero or the poet their own green and crude being, --ripened; yes, andare content to be less, so _that_ may attain to its full stature. What atestimony, full of grandeur, full of pity, is borne to the demands ofhis own nature, by the poor clansman, the poor partisan, who rejoices inthe glory of his chief! The poor and the low find some amends to theirimmense moral capacity, for their acquiescence in a political and socialinferiority. [73] They are content to be brushed like flies from the pathof a great person, so that justice shall be done by him to that commonnature which it is the dearest desire of all to see enlarged andglorified. They sun themselves in the great man's light, and feel it tobe their own element. They cast the dignity of man from their downtrodselves upon the shoulders of a hero, and will perish to add one drop ofblood to make that great heart beat, those giant sinews combat andconquer. He lives for us, and we live in him. 

Men such as they[74] are very naturally seek money or power; and powerbecause it is as good as money, --the "spoils, " so called, "of office. "And why not? For they aspire to the highest, and this, in theirsleep-walking, they dream is highest. Wake them and they shall quitthe false good and leap to the true, and leave governments to clerksand desks. This revolution is to be wrought by the gradualdomestication of the idea of Culture. The main enterprise of the worldfor splendor, for extent, is the upbuilding of a man. Here are thematerials strewn along the ground. The private life of one man shallbe a more illustrious monarchy, more formidable to its enemy, moresweet and serene in its influence to its friend, than any kingdom inhistory. For a man, rightly viewed, comprehendeth[75] the particularnatures of all men. Each philosopher, each bard, each actor has onlydone for me, as by a delegate, what one day I can do for myself. Thebooks which once we valued more than the apple of the eye, we havequite exhausted. What is that but saying that we have come up with thepoint of view which the universal mind took through the eyes of onescribe; we have been that man, and have passed on. First, one, thenanother, we drain all cisterns, and waxing greater by all thesesupplies, we crave a better and a more abundant food. The man hasnever lived that can feed us ever. The human mind cannot be enshrinedin a person who shall set a barrier on any one side to this unbounded, unboundable empire. It is one central fire, which, flaming now out ofthe lips of Etna, lightens the capes of Sicily, and now out of thethroat of Vesuvius, illuminates the towers and vineyards of Naples. Itis one light which beams out of a thousand stars. It is one soul whichanimates all men. 

 * * * * *

But I have dwelt perhaps tediously upon this abstraction of theScholar. I ought not to delay longer to add what I have to say ofnearer reference to the time and to this country. 

Historically, there is thought to be a difference in the ideas whichpredominate over successive epochs, and there are data for marking thegenius of the Classic, of the Romantic, and now of the Reflective orPhilosophical age. [76] With the views I have intimated of the onenessor the identity of the mind through all individuals, I do not muchdwell on these differences. In fact, I believe each individual passesthrough all three. The boy is a Greek; the youth, romantic; theadult, reflective. I deny not, however, that a revolution in theleading idea may be distinctly enough traced. 

Our age is bewailed as the age of Introversion. [77] Must that needs beevil? We, it seems, are critical. We are embarrassed with secondthoughts. [78] We cannot enjoy anything for hankering to know whereofthe pleasure consists. We are lined with eyes. We see with our feet. The time is infected with Hamlet's unhappiness, --

 "Sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. "[79]

Is it so bad then? Sight is the last thing to be pitied. Would we beblind? Do we fear lest we should outsee nature and God, and drinktruth dry? I look upon the discontent of the literary class as a mereannouncement of the fact that they find themselves not in the state ofmind of their fathers, and regret the coming state as untried; as aboy dreads the water before he has learned that he can swim. If thereis any period one would desire to be born in, is it not the age ofRevolution; when the old and the new stand side by side and admit ofbeing compared; when the energies of all men are searched by fear andby hope; when the historic glories of the old can be compensated bythe rich possibilities of the new era? This time, like all times, is avery good one, if we but know what to do with it. 

I read with some joy of the auspicious signs of the coming days, asthey glimmer already through poetry and art, through philosophy andscience, through church and state. 

One of these signs is the fact that the same movement[80] whicheffected the elevation of what was called the lowest class in thestate assumed in literature a very marked and as benign an aspect. Instead of the sublime and beautiful, the near, the low, the common, was explored and poetized. That which had been negligently troddenunder foot by those who were harnessing and provisioning themselvesfor long journeys into far countries, is suddenly found to be richerthan all foreign parts. The literature of the poor, the feelings ofthe child, the philosophy of the street, the meaning of householdlife, are the topics of the time. It is a great stride. It is asign--is it not?--of new vigor when the extremities are made active, when currents of warm life run into the hands and the feet. I ask notfor the great, the remote, the romantic; what is doing in Italy orArabia; what is Greek art, or Provençal minstrelsy; I embrace thecommon, I explore and sit at the feet of the familiar, the low. Giveme insight into to-day, and you may have the antique and futureworlds. What would we really know the meaning of? The meal in thefirkin; the milk in the pan; the ballad in the street; the news of theboat; the glance of the eye; the form and the gait of the body;--showme the ultimate reason of these matters; show me the sublime presenceof the highest spiritual cause lurking, as always it does lurk, inthese suburbs and extremities of nature; let me see every triflebristling with the polarity that ranges it instantly on an eternallaw;[81] and the shop, the plow, and the ledger referred to the likecause by which light undulates and poets sing;--and the world lies nolonger a dull miscellany and lumber-room, but has form and order:there is no trifle, there is no puzzle, but one design unites andanimates the farthest pinnacle and the lowest trench. 

This idea has inspired the genius of Goldsmith, [82] Burns, [83]Cowper, [84] and, in a newer time, of Goethe, [85] Wordsworth, [86] andCarlyle. [87] This idea they have differently followed and with varioussuccess. In contrast with their writing, the style of Pope, [88] ofJohnson, [89] of Gibbon, [90] looks cold and pedantic. This writing isblood-warm. Man is surprised to find that things near are not lessbeautiful and wondrous than things remote. The near explains the far. The drop is a small ocean. A man is related to all nature. Thisperception of the worth of the vulgar is fruitful in discoveries. Goethe, in this very thing the most modern of the moderns, has shownus, as none ever did, the genius of the ancients. 

There is one man of genius who has done much for this philosophy oflife, whose literary value has never yet been rightly estimated:--Imean Emanuel Swedenborg. [91] The most imaginative of men, yet writingwith the precision of a mathematician, he endeavored to engraft apurely philosophical Ethics on the popular Christianity of his time. Such an attempt of course must have difficulty which no genius couldsurmount. But he saw and showed the connexion between nature and theaffections of the soul. He pierced the emblematic or spiritualcharacter of the visible, audible, tangible world. Especially did hisshade-loving muse hover over and interpret the lower parts of nature;he showed the mysterious bond that allies moral evil to the foulmaterial forms, and has given in epical parables a theory of insanity, of beasts, of unclean and fearful things. 

Another sign of our times, also marked by an analogous politicalmovement, is the new importance given to the single person. Everythingthat tends to insulate the individual--to surround him with barriersof natural respect, so that each man shall feel the world is his, andman shall treat with man as a sovereign state with a sovereignstate--tends to true union as well as greatness. "I learned, " said themelancholy Pestalozzi, [92] "that no man in God's wide earth is eitherwilling or able to help any other man. " Help must come from the bosomalone. The scholar is that man who must take up into himself all theability of the time, all the contributions of the past, all the hopesof the future. He must be an university of knowledges. If there be onelesson more than another that should pierce his ear, it is--The worldis nothing, the man is all; in yourself is the law of all nature, andyou know not yet how a globule of sap ascends; in yourself slumbersthe whole of Reason; it is for you to know all; it is for you to dareall. Mr. President and Gentlemen, this confidence in the unsearchedmight of man belongs, by all motives, by all prophecy, by allpreparation, to the American Scholar. We have listened too long to thecourtly muses of Europe. The spirit of the American freeman is alreadysuspected to be timid, imitative, tame. Public and private avaricemake the air we breathe thick and fat. The scholar is decent, indolent, complaisant. See already the tragic consequence. The mind ofthis country, taught to aim at low objects, eats upon itself. There isno work for any one but the decorous and the complaisant. Young men ofthe fairest promise, who begin life upon our shores, inflated by themountain winds, shined upon by all the stars of God, find the earthbelow not in unison with these, but are hindered from action by thedisgust which the principles on which business is managed inspire, andturn drudges, or die of disgust, some of them suicides. What is theremedy? They did not yet see, and thousands of young men as hopefulnow crowding to the barriers for the career do not yet see, that ifthe single man plant himself indomitably on his instincts, and thereabide, the huge world will come round to him. Patience, --patience;with the shades of all the good and great for company; and for solacethe perspective of your own infinite life; and for work the study andthe communication of principles, the making those instincts prevalent, the conversion of the world. Is it not the chief disgrace in theworld, not to be an unit; not to be reckoned one character; not toyield that peculiar fruit which each man was created to bear, but tobe reckoned in the gross, in the hundred, or the thousand, of theparty, the section, to which we belong; and our opinion predictedgeographically, as the north, or the south? Not so, brothers andfriends, --please God, ours shall not be so. We will walk on our ownfeet; we will work with our own hands; we will speak our own minds. Then shall man be no longer a name for pity, for doubt, and forsensual indulgence. The dread of man and the love of man shall be awall of defense and a wreath of joy around all. A nation of men willfor the first time exist, because each believes himself inspired bythe Divine Soul which also inspires all men. 

COMPENSATION. [93]

 The wings of Time are black and white, Pied with morning and with night. Mountain tall and ocean deep Trembling balance duly keep. In changing moon, in tidal wave, Glows the feud of Want and Have. Gauge of more and less through space Electric star and pencil plays. The lonely Earth amid the balls That hurry through the eternal halls, A makeweight flying to the void, Supplemental asteroid, Or compensatory spark, Shoots across the neutral Dark. 

 Man's the elm, and Wealth the vine, Stanch and strong the tendrils twine; Through the frail ringlets thee deceive, None from its stock that vine can reave. Fear not, then, thou child infirm, There's no god dare wrong a worm. Laurel crowns cleave to deserts, And power to him who power exerts; Hast not thy share? On winged feet, Lo! it rushes thee to meet; And all that Nature made thy own, Floating in air or pent in stone, Will rive the hills and swim the sea, And, like thy shadow, follow thee. 

Ever since I was a boy, I have wished to write a discourse onCompensation: for it seemed to me when very young, that on thissubject life was ahead of theology, and the people knew more than thepreachers taught. The documents, [94] too, from which the doctrine isto be drawn, charmed my fancy by their endless variety, and lay alwaysbefore me, even in sleep; for they are the tools in our hands, thebread in our basket, the transactions of the street, the farm, and thedwelling-house, greetings, relations, debts and credits, the influenceof character, the nature and endowment of all men. It seemed to me, also, that in it might be shown men a ray of divinity, the presentaction of the soul of this world, clean from all vestige of tradition, and so the heart of man might be bathed by an inundation of eternallove, conversing with that which he knows was always and always mustbe, because it really is now. It appeared, moreover, that if thisdoctrine could be stated in terms with any resemblance to those brightintuitions in which this truth is sometimes revealed to us, it wouldbe a star in many dark hours and crooked passages in our journey thatwould not suffer us to lose our way. 

I was lately confirmed in these desires by hearing a sermon at church. The preacher, a man esteemed for his orthodoxy, unfolded in theordinary manner the doctrine of the Last Judgment. He assumed thatjudgment is not executed in this world; that the wicked aresuccessful; that the good are miserable;[95] and then urged fromreason and from Scripture a compensation to be made to both parties inthe next life. No offense appeared to be taken by the congregation atthis doctrine. As far as I could observe, when the meeting broke up, they separated without remark on the sermon. 

Yet what was the import of this teaching? What did the preacher meanby saying that the good are miserable in the present life? Was it thathouses and lands, offices, wine, horses, dress, luxury, are had byunprincipled men, whilst the saints are poor and despised; and that acompensation is to be made to these last hereafter, by giving them thelike gratifications another day, --bank stock and doubloons, [96]venison and champagne? This must be the compensation intended; forwhat else? Is it that they are to have leave to pray and praise? tolove and serve men? Why, that they can do now. The legitimateinference the disciple would draw was: "We are to have _such_ a goodtime as the sinners have now"; or, to push it to its extreme import:"You sin now; we shall sin by and by; we would sin now, if we could;not being successful, we expect our revenue to-morrow. "

The fallacy lay in the immense concession that the bad are successful;that justice is not done now. The blindness of the preacher consistedin deferring to the base estimate of the market of what constitutes amanly success, instead of confronting and convicting the world fromthe truth; announcing the presence of the soul; the omnipotence of thewill: and so establishing the standard of good and ill, of success andfalsehood. 

I find a similar base tone in the popular religious works of the day, and the same doctrines assumed by the literary men when occasionallythey treat the related topics. I think that our popular theology hasgained in decorum, and not in principle, over the superstitions it hasdisplaced. But men are better than this theology. Their daily lifegives it the lie. Every ingenuous and aspiring soul leaves thedoctrine behind him in his own experience; and all men feel sometimesthe falsehood which they cannot demonstrate. Few men are wiser thanthey know. That which they hear in schools and pulpits withoutafterthought, if said in conversation, would probably be questioned insilence. If a man dogmatize in a mixed company on Providence and thedivine laws, he is answered by a silence which conveys well enough toan observer the dissatisfaction of the hearer, but his incapacity tomake his own statement. 

I shall attempt in this and the following chapter to record some factsthat indicate the path of the law of Compensation; happy beyond myexpectation, if I shall truly draw the smallest arc of this circle. 

POLARITY, [97] or action and reaction, we meet in every part of nature;in darkness and light; in heat and cold; in the ebb and flow of waters;in male and female; in the inspiration and expiration of plants andanimals; in the equation of quantity and quality in the fluids of theanimal body; in the systole and diastole[98] of the heart; in theundulations of fluids, and of sound; in the centrifugal and centripetalgravity; in electricity, galvanism, and chemical affinity. Superinducemagnetism at one end of a needle; the opposite magnetism takes place atthe other end. If the south attracts, the north repels. To empty here, you must condense there. An inevitable dualism bisects nature, so thateach thing is a half, and suggests another thing to make it whole; as, spirit, matter; man, woman; odd, even; subjective, objective; in, out;upper, under; motion, rest; yea, nay. 

Whilst the world is thus dual, so is every one of its parts. Theentire system of things gets represented in every particle. There issomewhat that resembles the ebb and flow of the sea, day and night, man and woman, in a single needle of the pine, in a kernel of corn, ineach individual of every animal tribe. The reaction, so grand in theelements, is repeated within these small boundaries. For example, inthe animal kingdom the physiologist has observed that no creaturesare favorites, but a certain compensation balances every gift andevery defect. A surplusage given to one part is paid out of areduction from another part of the same creature. If the head and neckare enlarged, the trunk and extremities are cut short. 

The theory of the mechanic forces is another example. What we gain inpower is lost in time; and the converse. The periodic or compensatingerrors of the planets is another instance. The influences of climateand soil in political history is another. The cold climateinvigorates. The barren soil does not breed fevers, crocodiles, tigers, or scorpions. 

The same dualism underlies the nature and condition of man. Everyexcess causes a defect; every defect an excess. Every sweet hath itssour; every evil its good. Every faculty which is a receiver ofpleasure has an equal penalty put on its abuse. It is to answer forits moderation with its life. For every grain of wit there is a grainof folly. For everything you have missed, you have gained somethingelse; and for everything you gain, you lose something. If richesincrease, they are increased[99] that use them. If the gatherergathers too much, nature takes out of the man what she puts into hischest, swells the estate, but kills the owner. Nature hates monopoliesand exceptions. The waves of the sea do not more speedily seek a levelfrom their loftiest tossing, than the varieties of condition tend toequalize themselves. There is always some leveling circumstance thatputs down the overbearing, the strong, the rich, the fortunate, substantially on the same ground with all others. Is a man too strongand fierce for society, and by temper and position a bad citizen, --amorose ruffian, with a dash of the pirate in him;--nature sends him atroop of pretty sons and daughters, who are getting along in thedame's classes at the village school, and love and fear for themsmooths his grim scowl to courtesy. Thus she contrives tointenerate[100] the granite and felspar, takes the boar out and putsthe lamb in, and keeps her balance true. 

The farmer imagines power and place are fine things. But the Presidenthas paid dear for his White House. [101] It has commonly cost him allhis peace, and the best of his many attributes. To preserve for ashort time so conspicuous an appearance before the world, he iscontent to eat dust[102] before the real masters who stand erectbehind the throne. Or, do men desire the more substantial andpermanent grandeur of genius? Neither has this an immunity. He who byforce of will or of thought, is great, and overlooks[103] thousands, has the charges of that eminence. With every influx of light comes newdanger. Has he light? he must bear witness to the light, and alwaysoutrun that sympathy which gives him such keen satisfaction, by hisfidelity to new revelations of the incessant soul. He must hate fatherand mother, wife and child. Has he all that the world loves andadmires and covets?--he must cast behind him their admiration, andafflict them by faithfulness to his truth, and become a by-word and ahissing. 

This law writes the laws of cities and nations. It is in vain to buildor plot or combine against it. Things refuse to be mismanaged long. _Res nolunt diu male administrari. _[104] Though no checks to a newevil appear, the checks exist, and will appear. If the government iscruel, the governor's life is not safe. If you tax too high, therevenue will yield nothing. If you make the criminal code sanguinary, juries will not convict. If the law is too mild, private vengeancecomes in. If the government is a terrific democracy, the pressure isresisted by an overcharge of energy in the citizen, and life glowswith a fiercer flame. The true life and satisfactions of man seem toelude the utmost rigors or felicities of condition, and to establishthemselves with great indifferency under all varieties ofcircumstances. Under all governments the influence of characterremains the same, --in Turkey and in New England about alike. Under theprimeval despots of Egypt, history honestly confesses that man musthave been as free as culture could make him. 

These appearances indicate the fact that the universe is representedin every one of its particles. Everything in nature contains all thepowers of nature. Everything is made of one hidden stuff; as thenaturalist sees one type under every metamorphosis, and regards ahorse as a running man, a fish as a swimming man, a bird as a flyingman, a tree as a rooted man. Each new form repeats not only the maincharacter of the type, but part for part all the details, all theaims, furtherances, hindrances, energies, and whole system of everyother. Every occupation, trade, art, transaction, is a compend of theworld and a correlative of every other. Each one is an entire emblemof human life; of its good and ill, its trials, its enemies, itscourse and its end. And each one must somehow accommodate the wholeman, and recite all his destiny. 

The world globes itself in a drop of dew. [105] The microscope cannotfind the animalcule which is less perfect for being little. [106] Eyes, ears, taste, smell, motion, resistance, appetite, and organs ofreproduction that take hold on eternity, --all find room to consist inthe small creature. So do we put our life into every act. The truedoctrine of omnipresence is, that God reappears with all his parts inevery moss and cobweb. [107] The value of the universe contrives tothrow itself into every point. If the good is there, so is the evil;if the affinity, so the repulsion; if the force, so the limitation. 

Thus is the universe alive. All things are moral. That soul, whichwithin us is a sentiment, outside of us is a law. We feel itsinspiration; out there in history we can see its fatal strength. "Itis in the world, and the world was made by it. " Justice is notpostponed. A perfect equity adjusts its balance in all parts of life. [Greek: Hoi kyboi Dios aei eupiptousi], [108]--the dice of God arealways loaded. The world looks like a multiplication table, or amathematical equation, which, turn it how you will, balances itself. Take what figure you will, its exact value, nor more nor less, stillreturns to you. Every secret is told, every crime is punished, everyvirtue rewarded, every wrong redressed, in silence and certainty. Whatwe call retribution is the universal necessity by which the wholeappears wherever a part appears. If you see smoke, there must be fire. If you see a hand or limb, you know that the trunk to which it belongsis there behind. 

Every act rewards itself, or, in other words, integrates itself, in atwofold manner; first, in the thing, or in real nature; and secondly, in the circumstance, or in apparent nature. Men call the circumstancethe retribution. The causal retribution is in the thing, and is seenby the soul. The retribution in the circumstance is seen by theunderstanding; it is inseparable from the thing, but is often spreadover a long time, and so does not become distinct until after manyyears. The specific stripes may follow late after the offense, butthey follow because they accompany it. Crime and punishment grow outof one stem. Punishment is a fruit that unsuspected ripens within theflower of the pleasure which concealed it. Cause and effect, means andends, seed and fruit, cannot be severed; for the effect already bloomsin the cause, the end preëxists in the means, the fruit in the seed. 

Whilst thus the world will be whole, and refuses to be disparted, weseek to act partially, to sunder, to appropriate; for example, --togratify the senses, we sever the pleasure of the senses from the needsof the character. The ingenuity of man has always been dedicated tothe solution of one problem, --how to detach the sensual sweet, thesensual strong, the sensual bright, etc. , from the moral sweet, themoral deep, the moral fair; that is, again, to contrive to cut cleanoff this upper surface so thin as to leave it bottomless; to get a_one end_, without an _other end_. The soul says, Eat; the body wouldfeast. The soul says, The man and woman shall be one flesh and onesoul; the body would join the flesh only. The soul says, Have dominionover all things to the ends of virtue; the body would have the powerover things to its own ends. 

The soul strives amain[109] to live and work through all things. Itwould be the only fact. All things shall be added unto it, --power, pleasure, knowledge, beauty. The particular man aims to be somebody;to set up for himself; to truck and higgle for a private good; and, inparticulars, to ride, that he may ride; to dress, that he may bedressed; to eat, that he may eat; and to govern, that he may be seen. Men seek to be great; they would have offices, wealth, power, andfame. They think that to be great is to possess one side ofnature, --the sweet, without the other side, --the bitter. 

This dividing and detaching is steadily counteracted. Up to this day, it must be owned, no projector has had the smallest success. Theparted water reunites behind our hand. Pleasure is taken out ofpleasant things, profit out of profitable things, power out of strongthings, as soon as we seek to separate them from the whole. We can nomore have things and get the sensual good, by itself, than we can getan inside that shall have no outside, or a light without a shadow. "Drive out nature with a fork, she comes running back. "[110]

Life invests itself with inevitable conditions, which the unwise seekto dodge, which one and another brags that he does not know; that theydo not touch him;--but the brag is on his lips, the conditions are inhis soul. If he escapes them in one part, they attack him in anothermore vital part. If he has escaped them in form, and in theappearance, it is because he has resisted his life, and fled fromhimself, and the retribution is so much death. So signal is thefailure of all attempts to make this separation of the good from thetax, that the experiment would not be tried, --since to try it is to bemad, --but for the circumstance, that when the disease began in thewill, of rebellion and separation, the intellect is at once infected, so that the man ceases to see God whole in each object, but is able tosee the sensual allurement of an object, and not see the sensual hurt;he sees the mermaid's head, but not the dragon's tail; and thinks hecan cut off that which he would have, from that which he would nothave. "How secret art thou who dwellest in the highest heavens insilence, O thou only great God, sprinkling with an unweariedProvidence certain penal blindnesses upon such as have unbridleddesires!"[111]

The human soul is true to these facts in the painting of fable, ofhistory, of law, of proverbs, of conversation. It finds a tongue inliterature unawares. Thus the Greeks called Jupiter, [112] SupremeMind; but having traditionally ascribed to him many base actions, theyinvoluntarily made amends to reason, by tying up the hands[113] of sobad a god. He is made as helpless as a king of England. [114]Prometheus[115] knows one secret which Jove must bargain for;Minerva, [116] another. He cannot get his own thunders; Minerva keepsthe key of them. 

 "Of all the gods, I only know the keys That ope the solid doors within whose vaults His thunders sleep. "

A plain confession of the in-working of the All, and of its moral aim. The Indian mythology ends in the same ethics; and it would seemimpossible for any fable to be invented to get any currency which wasnot moral. Aurora[117] forgot to ask youth for her lover, and thoughTithonus is immortal, he is old, Achilles[118] is not quiteinvulnerable; the sacred waters did not wash the heel by which Thetisheld him. Siegfried, [119] in the Niebelungen, is not quite immortal, for a leaf fell on his back whilst he was bathing in the dragon'sblood, and that spot which it covered is mortal. And so it must be. There is a crack in everything God has made. It would seem, there isalways this vindictive circumstance stealing in at unawares, even intothe wild poesy in which the human fancy attempted to make boldholiday, and to shake itself free of the old laws, --this back-stroke, this kick of the gun, certifying that the law is fatal; that in naturenothing can be given, all things are sold. 

This is that ancient doctrine of Nemesis, [120] who keeps watch in theuniverse, and lets no offense go unchastised. The Furies, [121] theysaid, are attendants on justice, and if the sun in heaven shouldtransgress his path, they would punish him. The poets related thatstone walls, and iron swords, and leathern thongs had an occultsympathy with the wrongs of their owners; that the belt which Ajaxgave Hector[122] dragged the Trojan hero over the field at the wheelsof the car of Achilles, and the sword which Hector gave Ajax was thaton whose point Ajax fell. They recorded, that when the Thasians[123]erected a statue to Theagenes, a victor in the games, one of hisrivals went to it by night, and endeavored to throw it down byrepeated blows, until at last he moved it from its pedestal, and wascrushed to death beneath its fall. 

This voice of fable has in it somewhat divine. It came from thoughtabove the will of the writer. That is the best part of each writer, which has nothing private in it;[124] that which he does not know, that which flowed out of his constitution, and not from his tooactive invention; that which in the study of a single artist you mightnot easily find, but in the study of many, you would abstract as thespirit of them all. Phidias it is not, but the work of man in thatearly Hellenic[125] world, that I would know. The name andcircumstance of Phidias, however convenient for history, embarrasswhen we come to the highest criticism. We are to see that which manwas tending to do in a given period, and was hindered, or, if youwill, modified in doing, by the interfering volitions of Phidias, ofDante, of Shakespeare, the organ whereby man at the moment wrought. 

Still more striking is the expression of this fact in the proverbs ofall nations, which are always the literature of reason, or thestatements of an absolute truth, without qualification. Proverbs, likethe sacred books of each nation, are the sanctuary of the intuitions. That which the droning world, chained to appearances, will not allowthe realist to say in his own words, it will suffer him to say inproverbs without contradiction. And this law of laws which the pulpit, the senate, and the college deny, is hourly preached in all marketsand workshops by flights of proverbs, whose teaching is as true and asomnipresent as that of birds and flies. 

All things are double, one against another. --Tit for tat;[126] an eyefor an eye; a tooth for a tooth; blood for blood; measure for measure;love for love. --Give and it shall be given you. --- He that waterethshall be watered himself. --What will you have? quoth God; pay for itand take it. --Nothing venture, nothing have. --Thou shalt be paidexactly for what thou hast done, no more, no less. --Who doth not workshall not eat. --Harm watch, harm catch. --Curses always recoil on thehead of him who imprecates them. --If you put a chain around the neckof a slave, the other end fastens itself around your own. --Bad counselconfounds the adviser. --The Devil is an ass. 

It is thus written, because it is thus in life. Our action isovermastered and characterized above our will by the law of nature. Weaim at a petty end quite aside from the public good, but our actarranges itself by irresistible magnetism in a line with the poles ofthe world. 

A man cannot speak but he judges himself. With his will, or againsthis will, he draws his portrait to the eye of his companions by everyword. Every opinion reacts on him who utters it. It is a thread-ballthrown at a mark, but the other end remains in the thrower's bag. Or, rather, it is a harpoon hurled at the whale, unwinding, as it flies, acoil of cord in the boat, and if the harpoon is not good, or not wellthrown, it will go nigh to cut the steersman in twain, or to sink theboat. 

You cannot do wrong without suffering wrong. "No man had ever a pointof pride that was not injurious to him, " said Burke. [127] Theexclusive in fashionable life does not see that he excludes himselffrom enjoyment in the attempt to appropriate it. The exclusionist inreligion does not see that he shuts the door of heaven on himself, instriving to shut out others. Treat men as pawns[128] and ninepins, andyou shall suffer as well as they. If you leave out their heart, youshall lose your own. The senses would make things of all persons; ofwomen, of children, of the poor. The vulgar proverb, "I will get itfrom his purse or get it from his skin, " is sound philosophy. 

All infractions of love and equity in our social relations arespeedily punished. They are punished by fear. Whilst I stand in simplerelations to my fellow-man, I have no displeasure in meeting him. Wemeet as water meets water, or as two currents of air mix, with perfectdiffusion and interpenetration of nature. But as soon as there is anydeparture from simplicity, and attempt at halfness, or good for methat is not good for him, my neighbor feels the wrong; he shrinks fromme as far as I have shrunk from him; his eyes no longer seek mine;there is war between us; there is hate in him and fear in me. 

All the old abuses in society, universal and particular, all unjustaccumulations of property and power, are avenged in the same manner. Fear is an instructor of great sagacity, and the herald of allrevolutions. One thing he teaches, that there is rottenness where heappears. He is a carrion crow, and though you see not well what hehovers for, there is death somewhere. Our property is timid, our lawsare timid, our cultivated classes are timid. Fear for ages has bodedand mowed and gibbered over government and property. That obscene[129]bird is not there for nothing. He indicates great wrongs which must berevised. 

Of the like nature is that expectation of change which instantlyfollows the suspension of our voluntary activity. The terror ofcloudless noon, the emerald of Polycrates, [130] the awe of prosperity, the instinct which leads every generous soul to impose on itself tasksof a noble asceticism and vicarious virtue, are the tremblings of thebalance of justice through the heart and mind of man. 

Experienced men of the world know very well that it is best to payscot and lot[131] as they go along, and that a man often pays dear fora small frugality. The borrower runs in his own debt. Has a man gainedanything who has received a hundred favors and rendered none? Has hegained by borrowing, through indolence or cunning, his neighbor'swares, or horses, or money? There arises on the deed the instantacknowledgment of benefit on the one part, and of debt on the other;that is, of superiority and inferiority. The transaction remains inthe memory of himself and his neighbor; and every new transactionalters, according to its nature, their relation to each other. He maysoon come to see that he had better have broken his own bones than tohave ridden in his neighbor's coach, and that "the highest price hecan pay for a thing is to ask for it. "

A wise man will extend this lesson to all parts of life, and know thatit is the part of prudence to face every claimant, and pay every justdemand on your time, your talents, or your heart. Always pay; for, first or last, you must pay your entire debt. Persons and events maystand for a time between you and justice, but it is only apostponement. You must pay at last your own debt. If you are wise, youwill dread a prosperity which only loads you with more. Benefit is theend of nature. But for every benefit which you receive, a tax islevied. He is great who confers the most benefits. He is base--andthat is the one base thing in the universe--to receive favors andrender none. In the order of nature we cannot render benefits to thosefrom whom we receive them, or only seldom. [132] But the benefit wereceive must be rendered again, line for line, deed for deed, cent forcent, to somebody. Beware of too much good staying in your hand. Itwill fast corrupt and worm worms. [133] Pay it away quickly in somesort. 

Labor is watched over by the same pitiless laws. Cheapest, say theprudent, is the dearest labor. What we buy in a broom, a mat, a wagon, a knife, is some application of good sense to a common want. It isbest to pay in your land a skillful gardener, or to buy good senseapplied to gardening; in your sailor, good sense applied tonavigation; in the house, good sense applied to cooking, sewing, serving; in your agent, good sense applied to accounts and affairs. So do you multiply your presence, or spread yourself throughout yourestate. But because of the dual constitution of things, in labor as inlife there can be no cheating. The thief steals from himself. Theswindler swindles himself. For the real price of labor is knowledgeand virtue, whereof wealth and credit are signs. These signs, likepaper money, may be counterfeited or stolen, but that which theyrepresent, namely, knowledge and virtue, cannot be counterfeited orstolen. These ends of labor cannot be answered but by real exertionsof the mind, and in obedience to pure motives. The cheat, thedefaulter, the gambler, cannot extort the knowledge of material andmoral nature which his honest care and pains yield to the operative. The law of nature is, Do the thing, and you shall have the power: butthey who do not the thing have not the power. 

Human labor, through all its forms, from the sharpening of a stake tothe construction of a city or an epic, is one immense illustration ofthe perfect compensation of the universe. The absolute balance of Giveand Take, the doctrine that everything has its price, --and if thatprice is not paid, not that thing but something else is obtained, andthat it is impossible to get anything without its price, --is not lesssublime in the columns of a ledger than in the budgets of states, inthe laws of light and darkness, in all the action and reaction ofnature. I cannot doubt that the high laws which each man seesimplicated in those processes with which he is conversant, the sternethics which sparkle on his chisel edge, which are measured out by hisplumb and foot rule, which stand as manifest in the footing of theshop bill as in the history of a state, --do recommend to him histrade, and though seldom named, exalt his business to his imagination. 

The league between virtue and nature engages all things to assume ahostile front to vice. The beautiful laws and substances of the worldpersecute and whip the traitor. He finds that things are arranged fortruth and benefit, but there is no den in the wide world to hide arogue. Commit a crime, [134] and the earth is made of glass. Commit acrime, and it seems as if a coat of snow fell on the ground, such asreveals in the woods the track of every partridge and fox and squirreland mole. You cannot recall the spoken word, [135] you cannot wipe outthe foot-track, you cannot draw up the ladder, so as to leave no inletor clew. Some damning circumstance always transpires. The laws andsubstances of nature--water, snow, wind, gravitation--become penaltiesto the thief. 

On the other hand, the law holds with equal sureness for all rightaction. Love, and you shall be loved. All love is mathematically just, as much as the two sides of an algebraic equation. The good man hasabsolute good, which like fire turns everything to its own nature, sothat you cannot do him any harm; but as the royal armies sent againstNapoleon, when he approached, cast down their colors and from enemiesbecame friends, so disasters of all kinds, as sickness, offense, poverty, prove benefactors:--

 "Winds blow and waters roll Strength to the brave, and power and deity, Yet in themselves are nothing. "

The good are befriended even by weakness and defect. As no man hadever a point of pride that was not injurious to him, so no man hadever a defect that was not somewhere made useful to him. The stag inthe fable[136] admired his horns and blamed his feet, but when thehunter came, his feet saved him, and afterwards, caught in thethicket, his horns destroyed him. Every man in his lifetime needs tothank his faults. As no man thoroughly understands a truth until hehas contended against it, so no man has a thorough acquaintance withthe hindrances or talents of men, until he has suffered from the one, and seen the triumph of the other over his own want of the same. Hashe a defect of temper that unfits him to live in society? Thereby heis driven to entertain himself alone, and acquire habits of self-help;and thus, like the wounded oyster, he mends his shell with pearl. 

Our strength grows out of our weakness. The indignation which armsitself with secret forces does not awaken until we are pricked andstung and sorely assailed. A great man is always willing to be little. Whilst he sits on the cushion of advantages, he goes to sleep. When heis punished, tormented, defeated, he has a chance to learn something;he has been put on his wits, on his manhood; he has gained facts;learns his ignorance; is cured of the insanity of conceit; has gotmoderation and real skill. The wise man throws himself on the side ofhis assailants. It is more his interest than it is theirs to find hisweak point. The wound cicatrizes and falls off from him like a deadskin, and when they would triumph, lo! he has passed on invulnerable. Blame is safer than praise. I hate to be defended in a newspaper. Aslong as all that is said is said against me, I feel a certainassurance of success. But as soon as honeyed words of praise arespoken for me, I feel as one that lies unprotected before his enemies. In general, every evil to which we do not succumb is a benefactor. Asthe Sandwich Islander believes that the strength and valor of theenemy he kills passes into himself, so we gain the strength of thetemptation we resist. 

The same guards which protect us from disaster, defect, and enmity, defend us, if we will, from selfishness and fraud. Bolts and bars arenot the best of our institutions, nor is shrewdness in trade a mark ofwisdom. Men suffer all their life long, under the foolish superstitionthat they can be cheated. But it is as impossible for a man to becheated by anyone but himself, [137] as for a thing to be and not to beat the same time. There is a third silent party to all our bargains. The nature and soul of things takes on itself the guaranty of thefulfillment of every contract, so that honest service cannot come toloss. If you serve an ungrateful master, serve him the more. Put Godin your debt. Every stroke shall be repaid. The longer the payment iswithholden, [138] the better for you; for compound interest on compoundinterest is the rate and usage of this exchequer. 

The history of persecution is a history of endeavors to cheat nature, to make water run up hill, to twist a rope of sand. It makes nodifference whether the actors be many or one, a tyrant or a mob. Amob[139] is a society of bodies voluntarily bereaving themselves ofreason, and traversing its work. The mob is man voluntarily descendingto the nature of the beast. Its fit hour of activity is night. Itsactions are insane like its whole constitution; it persecutes aprinciple; it would whip a right; it would tar and feather justice, byinflicting fire and outrage upon the houses and persons of those whohave these. It resembles the prank of boys, who run with fire enginesto put out the ruddy aurora streaming to the stars. The inviolatespirit turns their spite against the wrongdoers. The martyr cannot bedishonored. Every lash inflicted is a tongue of fame; every prison, amore illustrious abode; every burned book or house enlightens theworld; every suppressed or expunged word reverberates through theearth from side to side. Hours of sanity and consideration are alwaysarriving to communities, as to individuals, when the truth is seen, and the martyrs are justified. 

Thus do all things preach the indifferency of circumstances. The manis all. Everything has two sides, a good and an evil. Every advantagehas its tax. I learn to be content. But the doctrine of compensationis not the doctrine of indifferency. The thoughtless say, on hearingthese representations, What boots it to do well? there is one event togood and evil; if I gain any good, I must pay for it; if I lose anygood, I gain some other; all actions are indifferent. 

There is a deeper fact in the soul than compensation, to wit, its ownnature. The soul is not a compensation, but a life. The soul _is_. Under all this running sea of circumstance, whose waters ebb and flowwith perfect balance, lies the aboriginal abyss of real Being. Essence, or God, is not a relation, or a part, but the whole. Being isthe vast affirmative, excluding negation, self-balanced, andswallowing up all relations, parts, and times within itself. Nature, truth, virtue, are the influx from thence. Vice is the absence ordeparture of the same. Nothing, Falsehood, may indeed stand as thegreat Night or shade, on which, as a background, the living universepaints itself forth, but no fact is begotten by it; it cannot work, for it is not. It cannot work any good; it cannot work any harm. It isharm inasmuch as it is worse not to be than to be. 

We feel defrauded of the retribution due to evil acts, because thecriminal adheres to his vice and contumacy, and does not come to acrisis or judgment anywhere in visible nature. There is no stunningconfutation of his nonsense before men and angels. Has he thereforeoutwitted the law? Inasmuch as he carries the malignity and the liewith him, he so far deceases from nature. In some manner there will bea demonstration of the wrong to the understanding also; but should wenot see it, this deadly deduction makes square the eternal account. 

Neither can it be said, on the other hand, that the gain of rectitudemust be bought by any loss. There is no penalty to virtue; no penaltyto wisdom; they are proper additions of being. In a virtuous action, Iproperly _am_; in a virtuous act, I add to the world; I plant intodeserts conquered from Chaos and Nothing, and see the darknessreceding on the limits of the horizon. There can be no excess to love;none to knowledge; none to beauty, when these attributes areconsidered in the purest sense. The soul refuses limits, and alwaysaffirms an Optimism, [140] never a Pessimism. 

Man's life is a progress, and not a station. His instinct is trust. Our instinct uses "more" and "less" in application to man, of the_presence of the soul_, and not of its absence; the brave man isgreater than the coward; the true, the benevolent, the wise, is more aman, and not less, than the fool and knave. There is no tax on thegood of virtue; for that is the incoming of God himself, or absoluteexistence without any comparative. Material good has its tax, and ifit came without desert or sweat, has no root in me, and the next windwill blow it away. But all the good of nature is the soul's, and maybe had, if paid for in nature's lawful coin, that is, by labor whichthe heart and the head allow. I no longer wish to meet a good I do notearn; for example, to find a pot of buried gold, knowing that itbrings with it new burdens. I do not wish more externalgoods, --neither possessions, nor honors, nor powers, nor persons. Thegain is apparent; the tax is certain. But there is no tax on theknowledge that the compensation exists, and that it is not desirableto dig up treasure. Herein I rejoice with a serene eternal peace. Icontract the boundaries of possible mischief. I learn the wisdom ofSt. Bernard, [141]--"Nothing can, work me damage except myself; theharm, that I sustain I carry about with me, and never am a realsufferer but by my own fault. "

In the nature of the soul is the compensation for the inequalities ofcondition. The radical tragedy of nature seems to be the distinctionof More and Less. How can Less not feel the pain; how not feelindignation or malevolence towards More? Look at those who have lessfaculty, and one feels sad, and knows not well what to make of it. Healmost shuns their eye; he fears they will upbraid God. What shouldthey do? It seems a great injustice. But see the facts nearly, andthese mountainous inequalities vanish. Love reduces them, as the sunmelts the iceberg in the sea. The heart and soul of all men being one, this bitterness of _His_ and _Mine_ ceases. His is mine. I am mybrother, and my brother is me. If I feel overshadowed and outdone bygreat neighbors, I can yet love; I can still receive; and he thatloveth maketh his own the grandeur he loves. Thereby I make thediscovery that my brother is my guardian, acting for me with thefriendliest designs, and the estate I so admired and envied is my own. It is the nature of the soul to appropriate all things. Jesus[142] andShakespeare are fragments of the soul, and by love I conquer andincorporate them in my own conscious domain. His[143] virtue, --is notthat mine? His wit, --if it cannot be made mine, it is not wit. 

Such, also, is the natural history of calamity. The changes whichbreak up at short intervals the prosperity of men are advertisementsof a nature whose law is growth. Every soul is by this intrinsicnecessity quitting its whole system of things, its friends, and home, and laws, and faith, as the shellfish crawls out of its beautiful butstony case, because it no longer admits of its growth, and slowlyforms a new house. In proportion to the vigor of the individual, theserevolutions are frequent, until in some happier mind they areincessant, and all worldly relations hang very loosely about him, becoming, as it were, a transparent fluid membrane through which theliving form is seen, and not, as in most men, an induratedheterogeneous fabric of many dates, and of no settled character, inwhich the man is imprisoned. Then there can be enlargement, and theman of to-day scarcely recognizes the man of yesterday. And suchshould be the outward biography of man in time, a putting off of deadcircumstances day by day, as he renews his raiment day by day. But tous, in our lapsed estate, resting, not advancing, resisting, notcoöperating with the divine expansion, this growth comes by shocks. 

We cannot part with our friend. We cannot let our angels go. We do notsee that they only go out, that archangels may come in. We areidolaters of the old. We do not believe in the riches of the soul, inits proper eternity and omnipresence. We do not believe there is anyforce in to-day to rival or recreate that beautiful yesterday. Welinger in the ruins of the old tent, where once we had bread andshelter and organs, nor believe that the spirit can feed, cover, andnerve us again. We cannot again find aught so dear, so sweet, sograceful. But we sit and weep in vain. The voice of the Almightysaith, "Up and onward forevermore!" We cannot stay amid the ruins. Neither will we rely on the new; and so we walk ever with revertedeyes, like those monsters who look backwards. 

And yet the compensations of calamity are made apparent to theunderstanding also, after long intervals of time. A fever, amutilation, a cruel disappointment, a loss of wealth, a loss offriends, seems at the moment unpaid loss, and unpayable. But the sureyears reveal the deep remedial force that underlies all facts. Thedeath of a dear friend, wife, brother, lover, which seemed nothing butprivation, somewhat later assumes the aspect of a guide or genius;for it commonly operates revolutions in our way of life, terminates anepoch of infancy or of youth which was waiting to be closed, breaks upa wonted occupation, or a household, or style of living, and allowsthe formation of new ones more friendly to the growth of character. Itpermits or constrains the formation of new acquaintances, and thereception of new influences that prove of the first importance to thenext years; and the man or woman who would have remained a sunnygarden flower, with no room for its roots and too much sunshine forits head, by the falling of the walls and the neglect of the gardener, is made the banyan[144] of the forest, yielding shade and fruit towide neighborhoods of men. 

SELF-RELIANCE

"Ne te quæsiveris extra. "[145]

 "Man is his own star; and the soul that can Render an honest and a perfect man, Commands all light, all influence, all fate; Nothing to him falls early or too late. Our acts our angels are, or good or ill, Our fatal shadows that walk by us still. "[146]

 * * * * *

 Cast the bantling on the rocks, Suckle him with the she-wolf's teat; Wintered with the hawk and fox, Power and speed be hands and feet. [147]

I read the other day some verses written by an eminent painter whichwere original and not conventional. The soul always hears anadmonition in such lines, let the subject be what it may. Thesentiment they instill is of more value than any thought they maycontain. To believe your own thought, to believe that what is true foryou in your private heart is true for all men, --that is genius. [148]Speak your latent conviction, and it shall be the universalsense;[149] for the inmost in due time becomes the outmost, --and ourfirst thought is rendered back to us by the trumpets of the LastJudgment. Familiar as the voice of the mind is to each, the highestmerit we ascribe to Moses, Plato, [150] and Milton[151] is, that theyset at naught books and traditions, and spoke not what men, but whatthey thought. A man should learn to detect and watch that gleam oflight which flashes across his mind from within, more than the lusterof the firmament of bards and sages. Yet he dismisses without noticehis thought, because it is his. In every work of genius we recognizeour own rejected thoughts:[152] they come back to us with a certainalienated majesty. Great works of art have no more affecting lessonfor us than this. They teach us to abide by our spontaneous impressionwith good-humored inflexibility then most when[153] the whole cry ofvoices is on the other side. Else, to-morrow a stranger will say withmasterly good sense precisely what we have thought and felt all thetime, and we shall be forced to take with shame our own opinion fromanother. 

There is a time in every man's education when he arrives at theconviction that envy is ignorance; that imitation is suicide;[154]that he must take himself for better, for worse, as his portion; thatthough the wide universe is full of good, no kernel of nourishing corncan come to him but through his toil bestowed on that plot of groundwhich is given to him to till. The power which resides in him is newin nature, and none but he knows what that is which he can do, nordoes he know until he has tried. Not for nothing one face, onecharacter, one fact, makes much impression on him, and another none. This sculpture in the memory is not without preëstablished harmony. The eye was placed where one ray should fall, that it might testify ofthat particular ray. We but half express ourselves, [155] and areashamed of that divine idea which each of us represents. It may besafely trusted as proportionate and of good issues, so it befaithfully imparted, but God will not have his work made manifest bycowards. A man is relieved and gay when he has put his heart into hiswork and done his best; but what he has said or done otherwise shallgive him no peace. It is a deliverance which does not deliver. In theattempt his genius deserts him; no muse befriends; no invention, nohope. 

Trust thyself:[156] every heart vibrates to that iron string. Acceptthe place the divine providence has found for you, the society of yourcontemporaries, the connection of events. Great men have always doneso, and confided themselves childlike to the genius of their age, betraying their perception that the absolutely trustworthy was seatedat their heart, working through their hands, predominating in alltheir being. And we are now men, and must accept in the highest mindthe same transcendent destiny; and not minors and invalids in aprotected corner, not cowards fleeing before a revolution, but guides, redeemers, and benefactors, obeying the Almighty effort, and advancingon Chaos[157] and the Dark. 

What pretty oracles nature yields us on this text, in the face andbehavior of children, babes, and even brutes! That divided and rebelmind, that distrust of a sentiment because our arithmetic has computedthe strength and means opposed to our purpose, these[158] have not. Their mind being whole, their eye is as yet unconquered, and when welook in their faces we are disconcerted. Infancy conforms to nobody:all conform to it, so that one babe commonly makes four or five[159]out of the adults who prattle and play to it. So God has armed youthand puberty and manhood no less with its own piquancy and charm, andmade it enviable and gracious and its claims not to be put by, if itwill stand by itself. Do not think the youth has no force, because hecannot speak to you and me. Hark! in the next room his voice issufficiently clear and emphatic. It seems he knows how to speak to hiscontemporaries. Bashful or bold, then, he will know how to make usseniors very unnecessary. 

The nonchalance[160] of boys who are sure of a dinner, and woulddisdain as much as a lord to do or say aught to conciliate one, is thehealthy attitude of human nature. A boy is in the parlor what the pitis in the playhouse;[161] independent, irresponsible, looking out fromhis corner on such people and facts as pass by, he tries and sentencesthem on their merits, in the swift, summary way of boys, as good, bad, interesting, silly, eloquent, troublesome. He cumbers himself neverabout consequences about interests; he gives an independent, genuineverdict. You must court him: he does not court you. But the man is, asit were, clapped into jail by his consciousness. As soon as he hasonce acted or spoken with _éclat_[162] he is a committed person, watched by the sympathy or the hatred of hundreds, whose affectionsmust now enter into his account. There is no Lethe[163] for this. Ah, that he could pass again into his neutrality! Who[164] can thus avoidall pledges, and having observed, observe again from the sameunaffected, unbiased, unbribable, unaffrighted innocence, must alwaysbe formidable. He would utter opinions on all passing affairs, whichbeing seen to be not private, but necessary, would sink like dartsinto the ear of men, and put them in fear. 

These are the voices which we hear in solitude, but they grow faintand inaudible as we enter into the world. Society everywhere is inconspiracy against the manhood of every one of its members. Society isa joint-stock company, in which the members agree, for the bettersecuring of his bread to each shareholder, to surrender the libertyand culture of the eater. The virtue in most request is conformity. Self-reliance is its aversion. It loves not realities and creators, but names and customs. 

Whoso would be a man must be a nonconformist. [165] He who would gatherimmortal palms must not be hindered by the name of goodness, but mustexplore if it be goodness. [166] Nothing is at last sacred but theintegrity of your own mind. Absolve you to yourself, and you shallhave the suffrage[167] of the world. I remember an answer which whenquite young I was prompted to make to a valued adviser, who was wontto importune me with the dear old doctrines of the church. On mysaying, What have I to do with the sacredness of traditions, if I livewholly from within? my friend suggested: "But these impulses may befrom below, not from above. " I replied: "They do not seem to me to besuch; but if I am the Devil's child, I will live then from the Devil. "No law can be sacred to me but that of my nature. Good and bad are butnames very readily transferable to that or this;[168] the only rightis what is after my constitution, the only wrong what is against it. Aman is to carry himself in the presence of all opposition, as ifeverything were titular and ephemeral but he. I am ashamed to thinkhow easily we capitulate to badges and names, to large societies anddead institutions. Every decent and well-spoken individual affects andsways me more than is right. I ought to go upright and vital, andspeak the rude truth in all ways. If malice and vanity wear the coatof philanthropy, shall that pass? If an angry bigot assumes thisbountiful cause of Abolition, and comes to me with his last news fromBarbadoes, [169] why should I not say to him: "Go love thy infant; lovethy wood-chopper: be good-natured and modest: have that grace; andnever varnish your hard, uncharitable ambition with this incredibletenderness for black folk a thousand miles off. Thy love afar isspite at home. " Rough and graceless would be such greeting, but truthis handsomer than the affectation of love. Your goodness must havesome edge to it, --else it is none. The doctrine of hatred must bepreached as the counteraction of the doctrine of love when that pulesand whines. I shun father and mother and wife and brother, when mygenius calls me. I would write on the lintels of the door-post, _Whim_. [170] I hope it is somewhat better than whim at last, but wecannot spend the day in explanation. Expect me not to show cause why Iseek or why I exclude company. Then, again, do not tell me, as a goodman did to-day, of my obligation to put all poor men in goodsituations. Are they _my_ poor? I tell thee, thou foolishphilanthropist, that I grudge the dollar, the dime, the cent, I giveto such men as do not belong to me and to whom I do not belong. Thereis a class of persons to whom by all spiritual affinity I am boughtand sold; for them I will go to prison, if need be; but yourmiscellaneous popular charities; the education at college of fools;the building of meeting-houses to the vain end to which many nowstand; alms to sots; and the thousand-fold Relief Societies;--though Iconfess with shame I sometimes succumb and give the dollar, it is awicked dollar which by and by I shall have the manhood to withhold. 

Virtues are, in the popular estimate, rather the exception than therule. There is the man _and_ his virtues. Men do what is called a goodaction, as some piece of courage or charity, much as they would pay afine in expiation of daily non-appearance on parade. Their works aredone as an apology or extenuation of their living in the world, --asinvalids and the insane pay a high board. Their virtues are penances. I do not wish to expiate, but to live. My life is for itself and notfor a spectacle. I much prefer that it should be of a lower strain, soit be genuine and equal, than that it should be glittering andunsteady. I wish it to be sound and sweet, and not to need diet andbleeding. [171] I ask primary evidence that you are a man, and refusethis appeal from the man to his actions. I know that for myself itmakes no difference whether I do or forbear those actions which arereckoned excellent. I cannot consent to pay for a privilege where Ihave intrinsic right. Few and mean as my gifts may be, I actually am, and do not need for my own assurance or the assurance of my fellowsany secondary testimony. 

What I must do is all that concerns me, not what the people think. This rule, equally arduous in actual and in intellectual life, mayserve for the whole distinction between greatness and meanness. It isthe harder, because you will always find those who think they knowwhat is your duty better than you know it. It is easy in the world tolive after the world's opinion; it is easy in solitude to live afterour own; but the great man is he who in the midst of the crowd keepswith perfect sweetness the independence of solitude. [172]

The objection to conforming to usages that have become dead to you is, that it scatters your force. It loses your time and blurs theimpression of your character. If you maintain a dead church, contribute to a dead Bible-society, vote with a great party either forthe government or against it, spread your table like basehousekeepers, --under all these screens I have difficulty to detect theprecise[173] man you are. And, of course, so much force is withdrawnfrom your proper life. But do your work, and I shall know you. [174] Doyour work, and you shall reinforce yourself. A man must consider whata blindman's-buff is this game of conformity. If I know your sect, Ianticipate your argument. I hear a preacher announce for his text andtopic the expediency of one of the institutions of his church. Do Inot know beforehand that not possibly can he say a new and spontaneousword? Do I not know that, with[175] all this ostentation of examiningthe grounds of the institution, he will do no such thing? Do I notknow that he is pledged to himself not to look but at one side, --thepermitted side, not as a man, but as a parish minister? He is aretained attorney, and these airs of the bench[176] are the emptiestaffectation. Well, most men have bound their eyes with one or anotherhandkerchief, [177] and attached themselves to some one of thesecommunities of opinion. [178] This conformity makes them not false in afew particulars, authors of a few lies, but false in all particulars. Their every truth is not quite true. Their two is not the real two, their four not the real four; so that every word they say chagrins us, and we know not where to begin to set them right. Meantime nature isnot slow to equip us in the prison-uniform of the party to which weadhere. We come to wear one cut of face and figure, and acquire bydegrees the gentlest asinine expression. There is a mortifyingexperience in particular which does not fail to wreak itself also inthe general history; I mean "the foolish face of praise, " the forcedsmile which we put on in company where we do not feel at ease inanswer to conversation which does not interest us. The muscles, notspontaneously moved, but moved by a low usurping willfulness, growtight about the outline of the face with the most disagreeablesensation. 

For nonconformity the world whips you with its displeasure. [179] Andtherefore a man must know how to estimate a sour face. The bystanderslook askance on him in the public street or in the friend's parlor. Ifthis aversation had its origin in contempt and resistance like hisown, he might well go home with a sad countenance; but the sour facesof the multitude, like their sweet faces, have no deep cause, but areput on and off as the wind blows and a newspaper directs. [180] Yet isthe discontent of the multitude more formidable than that of thesenate and the college. It is easy enough for a firm man who knows theworld to brook the rage of the cultivated classes. Their rage isdecorous and prudent, for they are timid as being very vulnerablethemselves. But when to their feminine rage the indignation of thepeople is added, when the ignorant and the poor are aroused, when theunintelligent brute force that lies at the bottom of society is madeto growl and mow, it needs the habit of magnanimity and religion totreat it godlike as a trifle of no concernment. 

The other terror[181] that scares us from self-trust is ourconsistency;[182] a reverence for our past act or word, because theeyes of others have no other data for computing our orbit[183] thanour past acts, and we are loth to disappoint them. 

But why should you keep your head over your shoulder? Why drag aboutthis corpse of your memory, lest you contradict somewhat[184] you havestated in this or that public place? Suppose you should contradictyourself; what then? It seems to be a rule of wisdom never to rely onyour memory alone, scarcely even in acts of pure memory, but to bringthe past for judgment into the thousand-eyed present, and live ever ina new day. In your metaphysics you have denied personality to theDeity; yet when the devout motions of the soul come, yield to themheart and life, though they should clothe God with shape and color. Leave your theory, as Joseph his coat in the hand of the harlot, andflee. [185]

A foolish consistency is the hobgoblin of little minds, adored bylittle statesmen and philosophers and divines. With consistency agreat soul has simply nothing to do. He may as well concern himselfwith the shadow on the wall. Speak what you think now in hard words, and to-morrow speak what to-morrow thinks in hard words again, thoughit contradict everything you said to-day. --"Ah, so you shall be sureto be misunderstood. "--Is it so bad, then, to be misunderstood?Pythagoras[186] was misunderstood, and Socrates, [187] and Jesus, andLuther, [188] and Copernicus, [189] and Galileo, [190] and Newton, [191]and every pure and wise spirit that ever took flesh. To be great is tobe misunderstood. 

I suppose no man can violate his nature. All the sallies of his willare rounded in by the law of his being, as the inequalities ofAndes[192] and Himmaleh[193] are insignificant in the curve of thesphere. Nor does it matter how you gauge and try him. A character islike an acrostic or Alexandrian stanza;[194]--read it forward, backward, or across, it still spells the same thing. In this pleasing, contrite wood-life which God allows me, let me record day by day myhonest thought without prospect or retrospect, and, I cannot doubt, itwill be found symmetrical, though I mean it not, and see it not. Mybook should smell of pines and resound with the hum of insects. Theswallow over my window should interweave that thread or straw hecarries in his bill into my web also. We pass for what we are. Character teaches above our wills. Men imagine that they communicatetheir virtue or vice only by overt actions, and do not see that virtueor vice emit a breath every moment. 

There will be an agreement in whatever variety of actions, so they beeach honest and natural in their hour. For of one will, the actionswill be harmonious, however unlike they seem. These varieties are lostsight of at a little distance, at a little height of thought. Onetendency unites them all. The voyage of the best ship is a zigzag lineof a hundred tacks. [195] See the line from a sufficient distance, andit straightens itself to the average tendency. Your genuine actionwill explain itself, and will explain your other genuine actions. Yourconformity explains nothing. Act singly, and what you have alreadydone singly will justify you now. Greatness appeals to the future. IfI can be firm enough to-day to do right, and scorn eyes, [196] I musthave done so much right before as to defend me now. Be it how it will, do right now. Always scorn appearances, and you always may. The forceof character is cumulative. All the foregone days of virtue work theirhealth into this. What makes the majesty of the heroes of the senateand the field, which so fills the imagination? The consciousness of atrain of great days and victories behind. They shed an united light onthe advancing actor. He is attended as by a visible escort of angels. That is it which throws thunder into Chatham's[197] voice, and dignityinto Washington's port, and America into Adams's[198] eye. Honor isvenerable to us because it is no ephemeris. It is always ancientvirtue. We worship it to-day because it is not of to-day. We love itand pay it homage, because it is not a trap for our love and homage, but is self-dependent, self-derived, and therefore of an oldimmaculate pedigree, even if shown in a young person. 

I hope in these days we have heard the last of conformity andconsistency. Let the words be gazetted and ridiculous henceforward. Instead of the gong for dinner, let us hear a whistle from theSpartan[199] fife. Let us never bow and apologize more. A great man iscoming to eat at my house. I do not wish to please him; I wish that heshould wish to please me. I will stand here for humanity, and though Iwould make it kind, I would make it true. Let us affront and reprimandthe smooth mediocrity and squalid contentment of the times, and hurlin the face of custom, and trade, and office, the fact which is theupshot of all history, that there is a great responsible Thinker andActor working wherever a man works; that a true man belongs to noother time or place, but is the center of things. Where he is, thereis nature. He measures you, and all men, and all events. Ordinarily, everybody in society reminds us of somewhat else, or of some otherperson. Character, reality, reminds you of nothing else; it takesplace of the whole creation. The man must be so much, that he mustmake all circumstances indifferent. Every true man is a cause, acountry, and an age; requires infinite spaces and numbers and timefully to accomplish his design;--and posterity seem to follow hissteps as a train of clients. A man Cæsar[200] is born, and for agesafter we have a Roman Empire. Christ is born, and millions of mindsso grow and cleave to his genius, that he is confounded with virtueand the possible of man. An institution is the lengthened shadow ofone man; as Monachism, of the hermit Antony;[201] the Reformation, ofLuther; Quakerism, of Fox;[202] Methodism, of Wesley;[203] Abolition, of Clarkson. [204] Scipio, [205] Milton called "the height of Rome"; andall history resolves itself very easily into the biography of a fewstout and earnest persons. 

Let a man then know his worth, and keep things under his feet. Let himnot peep or steal, or skulk up and down with the air of a charity-boy, a bastard, or an interloper, in the world which exists for him. Butthe man in the street, finding no worth in himself which correspondsto the force which built a tower or sculptured a marble god, feelspoor when he looks on these. To him a palace, a statue, a costly book, have an alien and forbidding air, much like a gay equipage, and seemto say like that, "Who are you, Sir?" Yet they all are his, suitorsfor his notice, petitioners to his faculties that they will come outand take possession. The picture waits for my verdict: it is not tocommand me, but I am to settle its claims to praise. That popularfable of the sot who was picked up dead drunk in the street, carriedto the duke's house, washed and dressed and laid in the duke's bed, and, on his waking, treated with all obsequious ceremony like theduke, and assured that he had been insane, [206] owes its popularity tothe fact that it symbolizes so well the state of man, who is in theworld a sort of sot, but now and then wakes up, exercises his reason, and finds himself a true prince. 

Our reading is mendicant and sycophantic. In history, our imaginationplays us false. Kingdom and lordship, power and estate, are a gaudiervocabulary than private John and Edward in a small house and commonday's work; but the things of life are the same to both; the sum totalof both is the same. Why all this deference to Alfred, [207] andScanderbeg, [208] and Gustavus?[209] Suppose they were virtuous; didthey wear out virtue? As great a stake depends on your private actto-day, as followed their public and renowned steps. When private menshall act with original views, the luster will be transferred from theactions of kings to those of gentlemen. 

The world has been instructed by its kings, who have so magnetized theeyes of nations. It has been taught by this colossal symbol the mutualreverence that is due from man to man. The joyful loyalty with whichmen have everywhere suffered the king, the noble, or the greatproprietor to walk among them by a law of his own, make his own scaleof men and things, and reverse theirs, pay for benefits not with moneybut with honor, and represent the law in his person, was thehieroglyphic[210] by which they obscurely signified theirconsciousness of their own right and comeliness, the right of everyman. 

The magnetism which all original action exerts is explained when weinquire the reason of self-trust. Who is the Trustee? What is theaboriginal Self, on which a universal reliance may be grounded? Whatis the nature and power of that science-baffling star, withoutparallax, [211] without calculable elements, which shoots a ray ofbeauty even into trivial and impure actions, if the least mark ofindependence appear? The inquiry leads us to that source, at once theessence of genius, of virtue, and of life, which we call Spontaneityor Instinct. We denote this primary wisdom as Intuition, whilst alllater teachings are tuitions. In that deep force, the last fact behindwhich analysis cannot go, all things find their common origin. For thesense of being which in calm hours rises, we know not how, in thesoul, is not diverse from things, from space, from light, from time, from man, but one with them, and proceeds obviously from the samesource whence their life and being also proceed. We first share thelife by which things exist, and afterwards see them as appearances innature, and forget that we have shared their cause. Here is thefountain of action and of thought. Here are the lungs of thatinspiration which giveth man wisdom, and which cannot be deniedwithout impiety and atheism. We lie in the lap of immenseintelligence, which makes us receivers of its truth and organs of itsactivity. When we discern justice, when we discern truth, we donothing of ourselves, but allow a passage to its beams. If we askwhence this comes, if we seek to pry into the soul that causes, allphilosophy is at fault. Its presence or its absence is all we canaffirm. Every man discriminates between the voluntary acts of hismind, and his involuntary perceptions, and knows that to hisinvoluntary perceptions a perfect faith is due. He may err in theexpression of them, but he knows that these things are so, like dayand night, not to be disputed. My willful actions and acquisitions arebut roving;--the idlest reverie, the faintest native emotion, commandmy curiosity and respect. Thoughtless people contradict as readily thestatement of perceptions as of opinions, or rather much more readily;for, they do not distinguish between perception and notion. They fancythat I choose to see this or that thing. But perception is notwhimsical, it is fatal. If I see a trait, my children will see itafter me, and in course of time, all mankind, --although it may chancethat no one has seen it before me. For my perception of it is as mucha fact as the sun. 

The relations of the soul to the divine spirit are so pure, that it isprofane to seek to interpose helps. It must be that when God speakethhe should communicate, not one thing, but all things; should fill theworld with his voice; should scatter forth light, nature, time, souls, from the center of the present thought; and new date and new createthe whole. Whenever a mind is simple, and receives a divine wisdom, old things pass away, --means, teachers, texts, temples, fall; it livesnow, and absorbs past and future into the present hour. All things aremade sacred by relation to it, --one as much as another. All thingsare dissolved to their center by their cause, and, in the universalmiracle, petty and particular miracles disappear. If, therefore, a manclaims to know and speak of God, and carries you backward to thephraseology of some old moldered nation in another country, in anotherworld, believe him not. Is the acorn better than the oak which is itsfullness and completion? Is the parent better than the child into whomhe has cast his ripened being?[212] Whence, then, this worship of thepast?[213] The centuries are conspirators against the sanity andauthority of the soul. Time and space are but physiological colorswhich the eye makes, but the soul is light; where it is, is day; whereit was, is night; and history is an impertinence and an injury, if itbe anything more than a cheerful apologue or parable of my being andbecoming. 

Man is timid and apologetic; he is no longer upright; he dares not say"I think, " "I am, " but quotes some saint or sage. He is ashamed beforethe blade of grass or the blowing rose. These roses under my windowmake no reference to former roses or to better ones; they are for whatthey are; they exist with God to-day. There is no time to them. Thereis simply the rose; it is perfect in every moment of its existence. Before a leaf-bud has burst, its whole life acts; in the full-blownflower there is no more; in the leafless root there is no less. Itsnature is satisfied, and it satisfies nature, in all moments alike. But man postpones, or remembers; he does not live in the present, butwith a reverted eye laments the past, or, heedless of the riches thatsurround him, stands on tiptoe to foresee the future. He cannot behappy and strong until he too lives with nature in the present, abovetime. 

This should be plain enough. Yet see what strong intellects dare notyet hear God himself, unless he speak the phraseology of I know notwhat David, or Jeremiah, or Paul. We shall not always set so great aprice on a few texts, on a few lives. [214] We are like children whorepeat by rote the sentences of grandames and tutors, and, as theygrow older, of the men and talents and characters they chance tosee, --painfully recollecting the exact words they spoke; afterwards, when they come into the point of view which those had who utteredthose saying, they understand them, and are willing to let the wordsgo; for, at any time, they can use words as good when occasion comes. If we live truly, we shall see truly. It is as easy for the strong manto be strong, as it is for the weak to be weak. When we have newperception, we shall gladly disburden the memory of its hoardedtreasures as old rubbish. When a man lives with God, his voice shallbe as sweet as the murmur of the brook and the rustle of the corn. 

And now at last the highest truth on this subject remains unsaid;probably cannot be said; for all that we say is the far-offremembering of the intuition. That thought, by what I can now nearestapproach to say it, is this. When good is near you, when you havelife in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way; you shallnot discern the footprints of any other; you shall not see the face ofman; you shall not hear any name;--the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. It shall exclude example andexperience. You take the way from man, not to man. All persons thatever existed are its forgotten ministers. Fear and hope are alikebeneath it. There is somewhat low even in hope. In the hour of vision, there is nothing that can be called gratitude, nor properly joy. Thesoul raised over passion beholds identity and eternal causation, perceives the self-existence of Truth and Right, and calms itself withknowing that all things go well. Vast spaces of nature, the AtlanticOcean, the South Sea, --long intervals of time, years, centuries, --areof no account. This which I think and feel underlay every former stateof life and circumstances, as it does underlie my present, and what iscalled life, and what is called death. 

Life only avails, not the having lived. Power ceases in the instant ofrepose; it resides in the moment of transition from a past to a newstate, in the shooting of the gulf, in the darting to an aim. This onefact the world hates, that the soul _becomes_; for that foreverdegrades the past, turns all riches to poverty, all reputation toshame, confounds the saint with the rogue, shoves Jesus and Judas[215]equally aside. Why, then, do we prate of self-reliance? Inasmuch asthe soul is present, there will be power not confident but agent. [216]To talk of reliance is a poor external way of speaking. Speak ratherof that which relies, because it works and is. Who has more obediencethan I masters me, though he should not raise his finger. Round him Imust revolve by the gravitation of spirits. We fancy it rhetoric, whenwe speak of eminent virtue. We do not yet see that virtue is Height, and that a man or a company of men, plastic and permeable toprinciples, by the law of nature must overpower and ride all cities, nations, kings, rich men, poets, who are not. 

This is the ultimate fact which we so quickly reach on this, as onevery topic, the resolution of all into the ever-blessed ONE. Self-existence is the attribute of the Supreme Cause, and itconstitutes the measure of good by the degree in which it enters intoall lower forms. All things real are so by so much virtue as theycontain. Commerce, husbandry, hunting, whaling, war eloquence, personal weight, are somewhat, and engage my respect as examples ofits presence and impure action. I see the same law working in naturefor conservation and growth. Power is in nature the essential measureof right. Nature suffers nothing to remain in her kingdoms whichcannot help itself. The genesis and maturation of a planet, its poiseand orbit, the bended tree recovering itself from the strong wind, thevital resources of every animal and vegetable, are demonstrations ofthe self-sufficing, and therefore self-relying soul. 

Thus all concentrates: let us not rove; let us sit at home with thecause. Let us stun and astonish the intruding rabble of men and booksand institutions, by a simple declaration of the divine fact. Bid theinvaders take the shoes from off their feet, for God is herewithin. [217] Let our simplicity judge them, and our docility to ourown law demonstrate the poverty of nature and fortune beside ournative riches. 

But now we are a mob. Man does not stand in awe of man, nor is hisgenius admonished to stay at home to put itself in communication withthe internal ocean, but it goes abroad to beg a cup of water of theurns of other men. We must go alone. I like the silent church beforethe service begins, better than any preaching. How far off, how cool, how chaste the persons look, begirt each one with a precinct orsanctuary! So let us always sit. Why should we assume the faults ofour friend, or wife, or father, or child, because they sit around ourhearth, or are said to have the same blood? All men have my blood, andI have all men's. [218] Not for that will I adopt their petulance orfolly, even to the extent of being ashamed of it. But your isolationmust not be mechanical, but spiritual, that is, must be elevation. Attimes the whole world seems to be in conspiracy to importune you withemphatic trifles. Friend, client, child, sickness, fear, want, charity, all knock at once at thy closet door, and say, "Come out untous. " But keep thy state; come not into their confusion. The power menpossess to annoy men, I give them by a weak curiosity. No man cancome near me but through my act. "What we love that we have, but bydesire we bereave ourselves of the love. "

If we cannot at once rise to the sanctities of obedience and faith, let us at least resist our temptations; let us enter into the state ofwar, and wake Thor and Woden, [219] courage and constancy, in our Saxonbreasts. This is to be done in our smooth times by speaking the truth. Check this lying hospitality and lying affection. Live no longer tothe expectation of these deceived and deceiving people with whom weconverse. Say to them, O father, O mother, O wife, O brother, Ofriend, I have lived with you after appearances hitherto. HenceforwardI am the truth's. Be it known unto you that henceforward I obey no lawless than the eternal law. I will have no covenants butproximities. [220] I shall endeavor to nourish my parents, to supportmy family, to be the chaste husband of one wife, --but these relationsI must fill after a new and unprecedented way. I appeal from yourcustoms. I must be myself. I cannot break myself any longer for you, or you. [221] If you can love me for what I am, we shall be thehappier. If you cannot, I will still seek to deserve that you should. I will not hide my tastes or aversions. I will so trust that what isdeep is holy, that I will do strongly before the sun and moon whateverinly rejoices me, and the heart appoints. If you are noble, I willlove you; if you are not, I will not hurt you and myself byhypocritical attentions. If you are true, but not in the same truthwith me, cleave to your companions; I will seek my own. I do this notselfishly, but humbly and truly. It is alike your interest, and mine, and all men's however long we have dwelt in lies, to live in truth. Does this sound harsh to-day? You will soon love what is dictated byyour nature as well as mine, and, if we follow the truth, it willbring us out safe at last. [222] But so may you give these friendspain. Yes, but I cannot sell my liberty and my power, to save theirsensibility. Besides, all persons have their moments of reason, whenthey look out into the region of absolute truth; then will theyjustify me, and do the same thing. 

The populace think that your rejection of popular standards is arejection of all standard, and mere antinomianism;[223] and the boldsensualist will use the name of philosophy to gild his crimes. But thelaw of consciousness abides. There are two confessionals, in one orthe other of which we must be shriven. You may fulfill your round ofduties by clearing yourself in the _direct_, or in the _reflex_ way. Consider whether you have satisfied your relations to father, mother, cousin, neighbor, town, cat, and dog; whether any of these can upbraidyou. But I may also neglect this reflex standard, and absolve me tomyself. I have my own stern claims and perfect circle. It denies thename of duty to many offices that are called duties. But if I candischarge its debts, it enables me to dispense with the popular code. If any one imagines that this law is lax, let him keep itscommandment one day. 

And truly it demands something godlike in him who has cast off thecommon motives of humanity, and has ventured to trust himself for ataskmaster. High be his heart, faithful his will, clear his sight, that he may in good earnest be doctrine, society, law, to himself, that a simple purpose may be to him as strong as iron necessity is toothers!

If any man consider the present aspects of what is called bydistinction _society_, he will see the need of these ethics. The sinewand heart of man seem to be drawn out, and we are become timorous, desponding whimperers. We are afraid of truth, afraid of fortune, afraid of death, and afraid of each other. Our age yields no great andperfect persons. We want men and women who shall renovate life and oursocial state, but we see that most natures are insolvent, cannotsatisfy their own wants, have an ambition out of all proportion totheir practical force, [224] and do lean and beg day and nightcontinually. Our housekeeping is mendicant, our arts, our occupations, our marriages, our religion, we have not chosen, but society haschosen for us. We are parlor soldiers. We shun the rugged battle offate, where strength is born. 

If our young men miscarry in their first enterprises, they lose allheart. If the young merchant fails, men say he is _ruined_. If thefinest genius studies at one of our colleges, and is not installed inan office within one year afterwards in the cities or suburbs ofBoston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he isright in being disheartened, and in complaining the rest of his life. A sturdy lad from New Hampshire or Vermont, who in turn tries all theprofessions, who _teams it, farms it_, [225] _peddles_, keeps a school, preaches, edits a newspaper, goes to Congress, buys a township, and soforth, in successive years, and always, like a cat, falls on his feet, is worth a hundred of these city dolls. He walks abreast with hisdays, and feels no shame in not "studying a profession, " for he doesnot postpone his life, but lives already. He has not one chance, but ahundred chances. Let a Stoic[226] open the resources of man, and tellmen they are not leaning willows, but can and must detach themselves;that with the exercise of self-trust, new powers shall appear; that aman is the word made flesh, [227] born to shed healing to thenations, [228] that he should be ashamed of our compassion, and thatthe moment he acts from himself, tossing the laws, the books, idolatries and customs out of the window, we pity him no more, butthank and revere him, --and that teacher shall restore the life of manto splendor, and make his name dear to all history. 

It is easy to see that a greater self-reliance must work a revolutionin all the offices and relations of men; in their religion; in theireducation; in their pursuits; their modes of living; theirassociation; in their property; in their speculative views. 

1. In what prayers do men allow themselves![229] That which they calla holy office is not so much as brave and manly. Prayer looks abroadand asks for some foreign addition to come through some foreignvirtue, and loses itself in endless mazes of natural and supernatural, and mediatorial and miraculous. Prayer that craves a particularcommodity, --anything less than all good, --is vicious. Prayer is thecontemplation of the facts of life from the highest point of view. Itis the soliloquy of a beholding and jubilant soul. [230] It is thespirit of God pronouncing his works good. But prayer as a means toeffect a private end is meanness and theft. It supposes dualism andnot unity in nature and consciousness. As soon as the man is at onewith God, he will not beg. He will then see prayer in all action. Theprayer of the farmer kneeling in his field to weed it, the prayer ofthe rower kneeling with the stroke of his oar, are true prayers heardthroughout nature, though for cheap ends. Caratach, [231] in Fletcher'sBonduca, when admonished to inquire the mind of the god Audate, replies, --

 "His hidden meaning lies in our endeavors; Our valors are our best gods. "

Another sort of false prayers are our regrets. Discontent is the wantof self-reliance; it is infirmity of will. Regret calamities, if youcan thereby help the sufferer; if not, attend your own work, andalready the evil begins to be repaired. Our sympathy is just as base. We come to them who weep foolishly, and sit down and cry for company, instead of imparting to them truth and health in rough electricshocks, putting them once more in communication with their own reason. The secret of fortune is joy in our hands. Welcome evermore to godsand men is the self-helping man. For him all doors are flung wide: himall tongues greet, all honors crown, all eyes follow with desire. Ourlove goes out to him and embraces him, because he did not need it. Wesolicitously and apologetically caress and celebrate him, because heheld on his way and scorned our disapprobation. The gods love himbecause men hated him. "To the persevering mortal, " saidZoroaster, [232] "the blessed Immortals are swift. "

As men's prayers are a disease of the will, so are their creeds adisease of the intellect. They say with those foolish Israelites, "Letnot God speak to us, lest we die. Speak thou, speak any man with us, andwe will obey. "[233] Everywhere I am hindered of meeting God in mybrother, because he has shut his own temple doors, and recites fablesmerely of his brother's, or his brother's brother's God. Every new mindis a new classification. If it prove a mind of uncommon activity andpower, a Locke, [234] a Lavoisier, [235] a Hutton, [236] a Betham, [237] aFourier, [238] it imposes its classification on other men, and lo! a newsystem. In proportion to the depth of the thought, and so to the numberof the objects it touches and brings within reach of the pupil, is hiscomplacency. But chiefly is this apparent in creeds and churches, whichare also classifications of some powerful mind acting on the elementalthought of duty, and man's relation to the Highest. Such isCalvinism, [239] Quakerism, [240] Swedenborgism. [241] The pupil takes thesame delight in subordinating everything to the new terminology, as agirl who has just learned botany in seeing a new earth and new seasonsthereby. It will happen for A time, that the pupil will find hisintellectual power has grown by the study of his master's mind. But inall unbalanced minds, the classification is idolized, passes for theend, and not for a speedily exhaustible means, so that the walls of thesystem blend to their eye in the remote horizon with the walls of theuniverse; the luminaries of heaven seem to them hung on the arch theirmaster built. They cannot imagine how you aliens have any right tosee, --how you can see; "It must be somehow that you stole the light fromus. " They do not yet perceive that light, unsystematic, indomitable, will break into any cabin, even into theirs. Let them chirp awhile andcall it their own. If they are honest and do well, presently their neatnew pinfold will be too strait and low, will crack, will lean, will rotand vanish, and the immortal light, all young and joyful, million-orbed, million-colored, will beam over the universe as on the first morning. 

2. It is for want of self-culture that the superstition of Traveling, whose idols are Italy, England, Egypt, retains its fascination for alleducated Americans. They who made England, Italy, or Greece venerablein the imagination did so by sticking fast where they were, like anaxis of the earth. In manly hours, we feel that duty is our place. Thesoul is no traveler; the wise man stays at home, and when hisnecessities, his duties, on any occasion call him from his house, orinto foreign lands, he is at home still; and shall make men sensibleby the expression of his countenance, that he goes the missionary ofwisdom and virtue, and visits cities and men like a sovereign, and notlike an interloper or a valet. 

I have no churlish objection to the circumnavigation of the globe, forthe purposes of art, of study, and benevolence, so that the man isfirst domesticated, or does not go abroad with the hope of findingsomewhat greater than he knows. He who travels to be amused, or to getsomewhat which he does not carry, [242] travels away from himself, andgrows old even in youth among old things. In Thebes, [243] inPalmyra, [244] his will and mind have become old and dilapidated asthey. He carries ruins to ruins. 

Traveling is a fool's paradise. Our first journeys discover to us theindifference of places. At home I dream that at Naples, at Rome, I canbe intoxicated with beauty, and lose my sadness. I pack my trunk, embrace my friends, embark on the sea, and at last wake up in Naples, and there beside me is the stern fact, the sad self, unrelenting, identical, that I fled from. [245] I seek the Vatican, [246] and thepalaces. I affect to be intoxicated with sights and suggestions, butI am not intoxicated. My giant goes with me wherever I go. 

3. But the rage of traveling is a symptom of a deeper unsoundness ofaffecting the whole intellectual action. The intellect is vagabond, and our system of education fosters restlessness. Our minds travelwhen our bodies are forced to stay at home. We imitate; and what isimitation but the traveling of the mind? Our houses are built withforeign taste; our shelves are garnished with foreign ornaments; ouropinions, our tastes, our faculties, lean, and follow the Past and theDistant. The soul created the arts wherever they have flourished. Itwas in his own mind that the artist sought his model. It was anapplication of his own thought to the thing to be done and theconditions to be observed. And why need we copy the Doric[247] or theGothic[248] model? Beauty, convenience, grandeur of thought, andquaint expression are as near to us as to any, and if the Americanartist will study with hope and love the precise thing to be done byhim considering the climate, the soil, the length of the day, thewants of the people, the habit and form of the government, he willcreate a house in which all these will find themselves fitted, andtaste and sentiment will be satisfied also. 

Insist on yourself; never imitate. [249] Your own gift you can presentevery moment with the cumulative force of a whole life's cultivation;but of the adopted talent of another, you have only an extemporaneous, half possession. That which each can do best, none but his Maker canteach him. No man yet knows what it is, nor can, till that person hasexhibited it. Where is the master who could have taughtShakespeare?[250] Where is the master who could have instructedFranklin, [251] or Washington, or Bacon, [252] or Newton?[253] Every greatman is a unique. The Scipionism of Scipio[254] is precisely that part hecould not borrow. Shakespeare will never be made by the study ofShakespeare. Do that which is assigned to you, and you cannot hope toomuch or dare too much. There is at this moment for you an utterancebrave and grand as that of the colossal chisel of Phidias, [255] ortrowel of the Egyptians, [256] or the pen of Moses, [257] or Dante, [258]but different from all these. Not possible will the soul all rich, alleloquent, with thousand-cloven tongue, deign to repeat itself; but ifyou can hear what these patriarchs say, surely you can reply to them inthe same pitch of voice; for the ear and the tongue are two organs ofone nature. Abide in the simple and noble regions of thy life, obey thyheart, and thou shalt reproduce the Foreworld[259] again. 

4. As our Religion, our Education, our Art look abroad, so does ourspirit of society. All men plume themselves on the improvement ofsociety, and no man improves. 

Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains onthe other. It undergoes continual changes; it is barbarous, it iscivilized, it is Christianized, it is rich, it is scientific; but thischange is not amelioration. For everything that is given, something istaken. Society acquires new arts, and loses old instincts. What acontrast between the well-clad, reading, writing, thinking American, with a watch, a pencil, and a bill of exchange in his pocket, and thenaked New Zealander, [260] whose property is a club, a spear, a mat, and an undivided twentieth of a shed to sleep under! But compare thehealth of the two men, and you shall see that the white man has losthis aboriginal strength. If the traveler tell us truly, strike thesavage with a broad ax, and in a day or two the flesh shall unite andheal as if you struck the blow into soft pitch, and the same blowshall send the white to his grave. 

The civilized man has built a coach, but has lost the use of his feet. He is supported on crutches, but lacks so much support of muscle. Hehas a fine Geneva[261] watch, but he fails of the skill to tell thehour by the sun. A Greenwich nautical almanac[262] he has, and sobeing sure of the information when he wants it, the man in the streetdoes not know a star in the sky. The solstice[263] he does notobserve; the equinox he knows as little; and the whole bright calendarof the year is without a dial in his mind. His notebooks impair hismemory; his libraries overload his wit; the insurance office increasesthe number of accidents; and it may be a question whether machinerydoes not encumber; whether we have not lost by refinement someenergy, by a Christianity intrenched in establishments and forms, somevigor of wild virtue. For every Stoic was a Stoic; but in Christendomwhere is the Christian?

There is no more deviation in the moral standard than in the standardof height or bulk. No greater men are now than ever were. A singularequality may be observed between great men of the first and of thelast ages; nor can all the science, art, religion, and philosophy ofthe nineteenth century avail to educate greater men thanPlutarch's[264] heroes, three or four and twenty centuries ago. Not intime is the race progressive. Phocion, [265] Socrates, Anaxagoras, [266]Diogenes, [267] are great men, but they leave no class. He who isreally of their class will not be called by their name, but will behis own man, and, in his turn, the founder of a sect. The arts andinventions of each period are only its costume, and do not invigoratemen. The harm of the improved machinery may compensate its good. Hudson[268] and Bering[269] accomplished so much in their fishingboats, as to astonish Parry[270] and Franklin, [271] whose equipmentexhausted the resources of science and art. Galileo, with anopera-glass, discovered a more splendid series of celestial phenomenathan any one since. Columbus[272] found the New World in an undeckedboat. It is curious to see the periodical disuse and perishing ofmeans and machinery, which were introduced with loud laudation a fewyears or centuries before. The great genius returns to essential man. We reckoned the improvements of the art of war among the triumphs ofscience, and yet Napoleon[273] conquered Europe by the bivouac, whichconsisted of falling back on naked valor, and disencumbering it of allaids. The Emperor held it impossible to make a perfect army, says LasCasas, [274] "without abolishing our arms, magazines, commissaries, andcarriages, until, in imitation of the Roman custom, the soldier shouldreceive his supply of corn, grind it in his handmill, and bake hisbread himself. "

Society is a wave. The wave moves onward, but the water of which it iscomposed does not. The same particle does not rise from the valley tothe ridge. Its unity is only phenomenal. The persons who make up anation to-day, next year die, and their experience with them. 

And so the reliance on Property, including the reliance on governmentswhich protect it, is the want of self-reliance. Men have looked awayfrom themselves and at things so long, that they have come to esteemthe religious, learned, and civil institutions as guards of property, and they deprecate assaults on these, because they feel them to beassaults on property. They measure their esteem of each other by whateach has, and not by what each is. But a cultivated man becomesashamed of his property, out of new respect for his nature. Especiallyhe hates what he has, if he see that it is accidental, --came to him byinheritance, or gift, or crime; then he feels that it is not having;it does not belong to him, has no root in him, and merely lies there, because no revolution or no robber takes it away. But that which a manis, does always by necessity acquire, and what the man acquires isliving property, which does not wait the beck of rulers, or mobs, orrevolutions, or fire, or storm, or bankruptcies, but perpetuallyrenews itself wherever the man breathes. "Thy lot or portion of life, "said the Caliph Ali, [275] "is seeking after thee; therefore be at restfrom seeking after it. " Our dependence on these foreign goods leads usto our slavish respect for numbers. The political parties meet innumerous conventions; the greater the concourse, and with each newuproar of announcement, The delegation from Essex![276] The Democratsfrom New Hampshire! The Whigs of Maine! The young patriot feelshimself stronger than before by a new thousand of eyes and arms. Inlike manner the reformers summon conventions, and vote and resolve inmultitude. Not so, O friends! will the god deign to enter and inhabityou, but by a method precisely the reverse. It is only as a man putsoff all foreign support, and stands alone, that I see him to be strongand to prevail. He is weaker by every recruit to his banner. Is not aman better than a town? Ask nothing of men, and in the endlessmutation, thou only firm column must presently appear the upholder ofall that surrounds thee. He who knows that power is inborn, that he isweak because he has looked for good out of him and elsewhere, and soperceiving, throws himself unhesitatingly on his thought, instantlyrights himself, stands in the erect position, commands his limbs, works miracles; just as a man who stands on his feet is stronger thana man who stands on his head. 

So use all that is called Fortune. [277] Most men gamble with her, andgain all, and lose all, as her wheel rolls. But do thou leave asunlawful these winnings, and deal with Cause and Effect, thechancelors of God. In the Will work and acquire, and thou hast chainedthe wheel of Chance, and shalt sit hereafter out of fear from herrotations. A political victory, a rise of rents, the recovery of yoursick, or the return of your absent friend, or some other favorableevent, raises your spirits, and you think good days are preparing foryou. Do not believe it. Nothing can bring you peace but yourself. Nothing can bring you peace but the triumph of principles. 

FRIENDSHIP. [278]

1. We have a great deal more kindness than is ever spoken. Barring allthe selfishness that chills like east winds the world, the whole humanfamily is bathed with an element of love like a fine ether. How manypersons we meet in houses, whom we scarcely speak to, whom yet wehonor, and who honor us! How many we see in the street, or sit with inchurch, whom, though silently, we warmly rejoice to be with! Read thelanguage of these wandering eyebeams. The heart knoweth. 

2. The effect of the indulgence of this human affection is a certaincordial exhilaration. In poetry, and in common speech, the emotions ofbenevolence and complacency which are felt toward others, are likenedto the material effects of fire; so swift, or much more swift, moreactive, more cheering are these fine inward irradiations. From thehighest degree of passionate love, to the lowest degree of good will, they make the sweetness of life. 

3. Our intellectual and active powers increase with our affection. Thescholar sits down to write, and all his years of meditation do notfurnish him with one good thought or happy expression; but it isnecessary to write a letter to a friend, and, forthwith, troops ofgentle thoughts invest themselves, on every hand, with chosen words. See in any house where virtue and self-respect abide, the palpitationwhich the approach of a stranger causes. A commended stranger isexpected and announced, and an uneasiness between pleasure and paininvades all the hearts of a household. His arrival almost brings fearto the good hearts that would welcome him. The house is dusted, allthings fly into their places, the old coat is exchanged for the new, and they must get up a dinner if they can. Of a commended stranger, only the good report is told by others, only the good and new is heardby us. He stands to us for humanity. He is, what we wish. Havingimagined and invested him, we ask how we should stand related inconversation and action with such a man, and are uneasy with fear. Thesame idea exalts conversation with him. We talk better than we arewont. We have the nimblest fancy, a richer memory, and our dumb devilhas taken leave for the time. For long hours we can continue a seriesof sincere, graceful, rich communications, drawn from the oldest, secretest experience, so that they who sit by, of our own kinsfolk andacquaintance, shall feel a lively surprise at our unusual powers. Butas soon as the stranger begins to intrude his partialities, hisdefinitions, his defects, into the conversation, it is all over. Hehas heard the first, the last and best, he will ever hear from us. Heis no stranger now. Vulgarity, ignorance, misapprehension, are oldacquaintances. Now, when he comes, he may get the order, the dress, and the dinner, but the throbbing of the heart, and the communicationsof the soul, no more. 

4. What is so pleasant as these jets of affection which relume[279] ayoung world for me again? What is so delicious as a just and firmencounter of two, in a thought, in a feeling? How beautiful, on theirapproach to this beating heart, the steps and forms of the gifted andthe true! The moment we indulge our affections, the earth ismetamorphosed; there is no winter, and no night; all tragedies, allennuis vanish; all duties even; nothing fills the proceeding eternitybut the forms all radiant of beloved persons. Let the soul be assuredthat somewhere in the universe it should rejoin its friend, and itwould be content and cheerful alone for a thousand years. 

5. I awoke this morning with devout thanksgiving for my friends, the oldand the new. Shall I not call God, the Beautiful, who daily showethhimself so to me in his gifts? I chide society, I embrace solitude, andyet I am not so ungrateful as not to see the wise, the lovely, and thenoble-minded, as from time to time they pass my gate. [280] Who hears me, who understands me, becomes mine, --a possession for all time. Nor isnature so poor, but she gives me this joy several times, and thus weweave social threads of our own, a new web of relations; and, as manythoughts in succession substantiate themselves, we shall by-and-by standin a new world of our own creation, and no longer strangers and pilgrimsis a traditionary globe. My friends have come[281] to me unsought. Thegreat God gave them to me. By oldest right, by the divine affinity ofvirtue with itself, I find them, or rather, not I, but the Deity in meand in them, both deride and cancel the thick walls of individualcharacter, relation, age, sex and circumstance, at which he usuallyconnives, and now makes many one. High thanks I owe you, excellentlovers, who carry out the world for me to new and noble depths, andenlarge the meaning of all my thoughts. These are new poetry of thefirst Bard[282]--poetry without stop--hymn, ode and epic, [283] poetrystill flowing, Apollo[284] and the Muses[285] chanting still. Will thesetwo separate themselves from me again, or some of them? I know not, butI fear it not; for my relation to them is so pure, that we hold bysimple affinity, and the Genius[286] of my life being thus social, thesame affinity will exert its energy on whomsoever is as noble as thesemen and women, wherever I may be. 

6. I confess to an extreme tenderness of nature on this point. It isalmost dangerous to me to "crush the sweet poison, [287] of misusedwine" of the affections. A new person is to me a great event, andhinders me from sleep. I have had such fine fancies lately about twoor three persons, as have given me delicious hours, but the joy endsin the day: it yields no fruit. Thought is not born of it; my actionis very little modified. I must feel pride in my friend'saccomplishments as if they were mine, and a property in his virtues. I feel as warmly when he is praised, as the lover when he hearsapplause of his engaged maiden. We over-estimate the conscience of ourfriend. His goodness seems better than our goodness, his nature finer, his temptations less. Everything that is his, --his name, his form, hisdress, books and instruments, --fancy enhances. Our own thought soundsnew and larger from his mouth. 

7. Yet the systole and diastole[288] of the heart are not withouttheir analogy in the ebb and flow of love. Friendship, like theimmortality[289] of the soul, is too good to be believed. The lover, beholding his maiden, half knows that she is not verily that which heworships; and in the golden hour of friendship, we are surprised withshades of suspicion and unbelief. We doubt that we bestow on our herothe virtues in which he shines, and afterward worship the form towhich we have ascribed this divine inhabitation. In strictness, thesoul does not respect men as it respects itself. In strict science, all persons underlie the same condition of an infinite remoteness. Shall we fear to cool our love by mining for the metaphysicalfoundation of this Elysian temple?[290] Shall I not be as real as thethings I see? If I am, I shall not fear to know them for what theyare. Their essence is not less beautiful than their appearance, thoughit needs finer organs for its apprehension. The root of the plant isnot unsightly to science, though for chaplets and festoons we cut thestem short. And I must hazard the production of the bald fact amidthese pleasing reveries, though it should prove an Egyptian skull atour banquet. [291] A man who stands united with his thought, conceivesmagnificently to himself. He is conscious of a universal success, [292]even though bought by uniform particular failures. No advantages, nopowers, no gold or force can be any match for him. I cannot choose butrely on my own poverty, more than on your wealth. I cannot make yourconsciousness tantamount to mine. Only the star dazzles; the planethas a faint, moon-like ray. I hear what you say of the admirable partsand tried temper of the party you praise, but I see well that for allhis purple cloaks I shall not like him, unless he is at least a poorGreek like me. I cannot deny it, O friend, that the vast shadow of thePhenomenal includes thee, also, in its pied and paintedimmensity, --thee, also, compared with whom all else is shadow. Thouart not Being, as Truth is, as Justice is, --thou art not my soul, buta picture and effigy of that. Thou hast come to me lately, and alreadythou art seizing thy hat and cloak. It is not that the soul puts forthfriends, as the tree puts forth leaves, and presently, by thegermination of new buds, extrudes the old leaf?[293] The law of natureis alternation forevermore. Each electrical state superinduces theopposite. The soul environs itself with friends, that it may enterinto a grander self-acquaintance or solitude; and it goes alone, for aseason, that it may exalt its conversation or society. This methodbetrays itself along the whole history of our personal relations. Theinstinct of affection revives the hope of union with our mates, andthe returning sense of insulation recalls us from the chase. Thusevery man passes his life in the search after friendship, and if heshould record his true sentiment, he might write a letter like this, to each new candidate for his love:--

 DEAR FRIEND:--

 If I was sure of thee, sure of thy capacity, sure to match my mood with thine, I should never think again of trifles, in relation to thy comings and goings. I am not very wise; my moods are quite attainable; and I respect thy genius; it is to me as yet unfathomed; yet dare I not presume in thee a perfect intelligence of me, and so thou art to me a delicious torment. Thine ever, or never. 

8. Yet these uneasy pleasures and fine pains are for curiosity, andnot for life. They are not to be indulged. This is to weave cobweb, and not cloth. Our friendships hurry to short and poor conclusions, because we have made them a texture of wine and dreams, [294] insteadof the tough fiber of the human heart. The laws of friendship aregreat, austere, and eternal, of one web with the laws of nature and ofmorals. But we have aimed at a swift and petty benefit, to suck asudden sweetness. We snatch at the slowest fruit in the whole gardenof God, which many summers and many winters must ripen. We seek ourfriend not sacredly but with an adulterate passion which wouldappropriate him to ourselves. In vain. We are armed all over withsubtle antagonisms, which, as soon as we meet, begin to play, andtranslate all poetry into stale prose. Almost all people descend tomeet. All association must be a compromise, and, what is worst, thevery flower and aroma of the flower of each of the beautiful naturesdisappears as they approach each other. What a perpetualdisappointment is actual society, even of the virtuous and gifted!After interviews have been compassed with long foresight, we must betormented presently by baffled blows, by sudden, unseasonableapathies, by epilepsies of wit and of animal spirits, in the heyday offriendship and thought. Our faculties do not play us true, and bothparties are relieved by solitude. 

9. I ought to be equal to every relation. It makes no difference howmany friends I have, and what content I can find in conversing witheach, if there be one to whom I am not equal. If I have shrunk unequalfrom one contest instantly, the joy I find in all the rest becomesmean and cowardly. I should hate myself, if then I made my otherfriends my asylum. 

 "The valiant warrior[295] famoused for fight, After a hundred victories, once foiled, Is from the book of honor razed quite, And all the rest forgot for which he toiled. "

10. Our impatience is thus sharply rebuked. Bashfulness and apathy area tough husk in which a delicate organization is protected frompremature ripening. It would be lost if it knew itself before any ofthe best souls were yet ripe enough to know and own it. Respect the_naturlangsamkeit_[296] which hardens the ruby in a million years, and works in duration, in which Alps and Andes come and go asrainbows. The good spirit of our life has no heaven which is the priceof rashness. Love, which is the essence of God, is not for levity, butfor the total worth of man. Let us not have this childish luxury inour regards, but the austerest worth; let us approach our friend withan audacious trust in the truth of his heart, in the breadth, impossible to be overturned, of his foundations. 

11. The attractions of this subject are not to be resisted, and Ileave, for the time, all account of subordinate social benefit, tospeak of that select and sacred relation which is a kind of absolute, and which even leaves the language of love suspicious and common, somuch is this purer, and nothing is so much divine. 

12. I do not wish to treat friendships daintily, but with roughestcourage. When they are real, they are not glass threads or frost-work, but the solidest thing we know. For now, after so many ages ofexperience, what do we know of nature, or of ourselves? Not one stephas man taken toward the solution of the problem of his destiny. Inone condemnation of folly stand the whole universe of men. But thesweet sincerity of joy and peace, which I draw from this alliancewith my brother's soul, is the nut itself whereof all nature and allthought is but the husk and shell. Happy is the house that shelters afriend! It might well be built, like a festal bower or arch, toentertain him a single day. Happier, if he know the solemnity of thatrelation, and honor its law! He who offers himself a candidate forthat covenant comes up, like an Olympian, [297] to the great games, where the first-born of the world are the competitors. He proposeshimself for contest where Time, Want, Danger are in the lists, and healone is victor who has truth enough in his constitution to preservethe delicacy of his beauty from the wear and tear of all these. Thegifts of fortune may be present or absent, but all the hap in thatcontest depends on intrinsic nobleness, and the contempt of trifles. There are two elements that go to the composition of friendship, eachso sovereign, that I can detect no superiority in either, no reasonwhy either should be first named. One is Truth. A friend is a personwith whom I may be sincere. Before him, I may think aloud. I amarrived at last in the presence of a man so real and equal that I maydrop even those undermost garments of dissimulation, courtesy, andsecond thought, which men never put off, and may deal with him withthe simplicity and wholeness, with which one chemical atom meetsanother. Sincerity is the luxury allowed, but diadems and authority, only to the highest rank, _that_ being permitted to speak truth ashaving none above it to court or conform unto. Every man alone issincere. At the entrance of a second person, hypocrisy begins. Weparry and fend the approach of our fellow-man by compliments, bygossip, by amusements, by affairs. We cover up our thought from himunder a hundred folds. I knew a man who, [298] under a certainreligious frenzy, cast off this drapery, and omitting all complimentsand commonplace, spoke to the conscience of every person heencountered, and that with great insight and beauty. At first he wasresisted, and all men agreed he was mad. But persisting, as indeed hecould not help doing, for some time in this course, he attained to theadvantage of bringing every man of his acquaintance into truerelations with him. No man would think of speaking falsely with him, or of putting him off with any chat of markets or reading-rooms. Butevery man was constrained by so much sincerity to the like plaindealing and what love of nature, what poetry, what symbol of truth hehad, he did certainly show him. But to most of us society shows notits face and eye, but its side and its back. To stand in truerelations with men in a false age, is worth a fit of insanity, is itnot? We can seldom go erect. Almost every man we meet requires somecivility, --requires to be humored; he has some fame, some talent, somewhim of religion or philanthropy in his head that is not to bequestioned, and which spoils all conversation with him. But a friendis a sane man who exercises not my ingenuity, but me. My friend givesme entertainment without requiring any stipulation on my part. Afriend, therefore, is a sort of paradox[299] in nature. I who aloneam, I who see nothing in nature whose existence I can affirm withequal evidence to my own, behold now the semblance of my being in allits height, variety and curiosity, reiterated in a foreign form; sothat a friend may well be reckoned the masterpiece of nature. 

13. The other element of friendship is tenderness. We are holden tomen by every sort of tie, by blood, by pride, by fear, by hope, bylucre, by lust, by hate, by admiration, by every circumstance andbadge and trifle, but we can scarce believe that so much character cansubsist in another as to draw us by love. Can another be so blessed, and we so pure, that we can offer him tenderness? When a man becomesdear to me, I have touched the goal of fortune. I find very littlewritten directly to the heart of this matter in books. And yet I haveone text which I cannot choose but remember. My author says, [300]--"Ioffer myself faintly and bluntly to those whose I effectually am, andtender myself least to him to whom I am the most devoted. " I wish thatfriendship should have feet, as well as eyes and eloquence. It mustplant itself on the ground, before it vaults over the moon. I wish itto be a little of a citizen, before it is quite a cherub. [301] Wechide the citizen because he makes love a commodity. It is an exchangeof gifts, of useful loans; it is good neighborhood; it watches withthe sick; it holds the pall at the funeral; and quite loses sight ofthe delicacies and nobility of the relation. But though we cannot findthe god under this disguise of a sutler, yet, on the other hand, wecannot forgive the poet if he spins his thread too fine, and does notsubstantiate his romance by the municipal virtues of justice, punctuality, fidelity and pity. I hate the prostitution of the name offriendship to signify modish and worldly alliances. I much prefer thecompany of plow-boys and tin-peddlers, to the silken and perfumedamity which only celebrates its days of encounter by a frivolousdisplay, by rides in a curricle, [302] and dinners at the best taverns. The end of friendship is a commerce the most strict and homely thatcan be joined; more strict than any of which we have experience. It isfor aid and comfort through all the relations and passages of life anddeath. It is fit for serene days, and graceful gifts, and countryrambles, but also for rough roads and hard fare, shipwreck, poverty, and persecution. It keeps company with the sallies of the wit and thetrances of religion. We are to dignify to each other the daily needsand offices of man's life, and embellish it by courage, wisdom andunity. It should never fall into something usual and settled, butshould be alert and inventive, and add rhyme and reason to what wasdrudgery. 

14. Friendship may be said to require natures so rare and costly, eachso well-tempered, and so happily adapted, and withal socircumstanced, (for even in that particular, a poet says, love demandsthat the parties be altogether paired, ) that its satisfaction can veryseldom be assured. It cannot subsist in its perfection, say some ofthose who are learned in this warm lore of the heart, betwixt morethan two. I am not quite so strict in my terms, perhaps because I havenever known so high a fellowship as others. I please my imaginationmore with a circle of godlike men and women variously related to eachother, and between whom subsists a lofty intelligence. But I find thislaw of _one to one_, [303] peremptory for conversation, which is thepractice and consummation of friendship. Do not mix waters too much. The best mix as ill as good and bad. You shall have very useful andcheering discourse at several times with two several men, but let allthree of you come together, and you shall not have one new and heartyword. Two may talk and one may hear, but three cannot take part in aconversation of the most sincere and searching sort. In good companythere is never such discourse between two, across the table, as takesplace when you leave them alone. In good company, the individuals atonce merge their egotism into a social soul exactly co-extensive withthe several consciousnesses there present. No partialities of friendto friend, no fondnesses of brother to sister, of wife to husband, arethere pertinent, but quite otherwise. Only he may then speak who cansail on the common thought of the party, and not poorly limited tohis own. Now this convention, which good sense demands, destroys thehigh freedom of great conversation, which requires an absolute runningof two souls into one. 

15. No two men but being left alone with each other, enter intosimpler relations. Yet it is affinity that determines _which_ twoshall converse. Unrelated men give little joy to each other; willnever suspect the latent powers of each. We talk sometimes of a greattalent for conversation, as if it were a permanent property in someindividuals. Conversation is an evanescent relation, --no more. A manis reputed to have thought and eloquence; he cannot, for all that, saya word to his cousin or his uncle. They accuse his silence with asmuch reason as they would blame the insignificance of a dial in theshade. In the sun it will mark the hour. Among those who enjoy histhought, he will regain his tongue. 

16. Friendship requires that rare mean betwixt likeness andunlikeness, that piques each with the presence of power and of consentin the other party. Let me be alone to the end of the world, ratherthan that my friend should overstep by a word or a look his realsympathy. I am equally balked by antagonism and by compliance. Let himnot cease an instant to be himself. The only joy I have in his beingmine, is that the _not mine_ is _mine_. I hate, where I looked for amanly furtherance, or at least a manly resistance, to find a mush ofconcession. Better be a nettle in the side of your friend, than hisecho. The condition which high friendship demands is ability to dowithout it. That high office requires great and sublime parts. Theremust be very two before there can be very one. Let it be an allianceof two large formidable natures, mutually beheld, mutually feared, before yet they recognize the deep identity which beneath thesedisparities unites them. 

17. He only is fit for this society who is magnanimous; who is surethat greatness and goodness are always economy; who is not swift tointermeddle with his fortunes. Let him not intermeddle with this. Leave to the diamond its ages to grow, nor expect to accelerate thebirths of the eternal. Friendship demands a religious treatment. Wetalk of choosing our friends, but friends are self-elected. Reverenceis a great part of it. Treat your friend as a spectacle. Of course hehas merits that are not yours, and that you cannot honor, if you mustneeds hold him close to your person. Stand aside; give those meritsroom; let them mount and expand. Are you the friend of your friend'sbuttons, or of his thought? To a great heart he will still be astranger in a thousand particulars, that he may come near in theholiest ground. Leave it to girls and boys to regard a friend asproperty, and to suck a short and all-confounding pleasure instead ofthe noblest benefits. 

18. Let us buy our entrance to this guild by a long probation. Whyshould we desecrate noble and beautiful souls by intruding on them?Why insist on rash personal relations with your friend? Why go to hishouse, or know his mother and brother and sisters? Why be visited byhim at your own? Are these things material to our covenant? Leave thistouching and clawing. Let him be to me a spirit. A message, a thought, a sincerity, a glance from him I want, but not news, nor pottage. Ican get politics, and chat, and neighborly conveniences, from cheapercompanions. Should not the society of my friend be to me poetic, pure, universal, and great as nature itself? Ought I to feel that our tie isprofane in comparison with yonder bar of cloud that sleeps on thehorizon, or that clump of waving grass that divides the brook? Let usnot vilify but raise it to that standard. That great defying eye, thatscornful beauty of his mien and action, do not pique yourself onreducing, but rather fortify and enhance. Worship his superiorities;wish him not less by a thought, but hoard and tell them all. Guard himas thy counterpart. Let him be to thee forever a sort of beautifulenemy, untamable, devoutly revered, and not a trivial conveniency tobe soon outgrown and cast aside. The hues of the opal, the light ofthe diamond, are not to be seen, if the eye is too near. To my friendI write a letter, and from him I receive a letter. That seems to you alittle. It suffices me. It is a spiritual gift worthy of him to giveand of me to receive. It profanes nobody. In these warm lines theheart will trust itself, as it will not to the tongue, and pour outthe prophecy of a godlier existence than all the annals of heroismhave yet made good. 

19. Respect so far the holy laws of this fellowship as not toprejudice its perfect flower by your impatience for its opening. Wemust be our own before we can be another's. There is at least thissatisfaction in crime, according to the Latin proverb;--you can speakto your accomplice on even terms. _Crimen quos[304] inquinat, æquat_. To those whom we admire and love, at first we cannot. Yet the leastdefect of self-possession vitiates, in my judgment, the entirerelation. There can never be deep peace between two spirits, nevermutual respect until, in their dialogue, each stands for the wholeworld. 

20. What is so great as friendship, let us carry with what grandeur ofspirit we can. Let us be silent, --so we may hear the whisper of thegods. Let us not interfere. Who set you to cast about what you shouldsay to the select souls, or how to say anything to such? No matter howingenious, no matter how graceful and bland. There are innumerabledegrees of folly and wisdom, and for you to say aught is to befrivolous. Wait, and thy heart shall speak. Wait until the necessaryand everlasting overpowers you, until day and night avail themselvesof your lips. The only reward of virtue, is virtue; the only way tohave a friend is to be one. You shall not come nearer a man by gettinginto his house. If unlike, his soul only flees the faster from you, and you shall catch never a true glance of his eye. We see the nobleafar off, and they repel us; why should we intrude? Late, --verylate, --we perceive that no arrangements, no introductions, noconsuetudes or habits of society, would be of any avail to establishus in such relations with them as we desire, --but solely the uprise ofnature in us to the same degree it is in them; then shall we meet aswater with water; and if we should not meet them then, we shall notwant them, for we are already they. In the last analysis, love is onlythe reflection of a man's own worthiness from other men. Men havesometimes exchanged names with their friends, as if they would signifythat in their friend each loved his own soul. 

21. The higher the style we demand of friendship, of course the lesseasy to establish it with flesh and blood. We walk alone in the world. Friends, such as we desire, are dreams and fables. But a sublime hopecheers ever the faithful heart, that elsewhere, in other regions ofthe universal power, souls are now acting, enduring and daring, whichcan love us, and which we can love. We may congratulate ourselves thatthe period of nonage, [305] of follies, of blunders, and of shame, ispassed in solitude, and when we are finished men, we shall graspheroic hands in heroic hands. Only be admonished by what you alreadysee, not to strike leagues of friendship with cheap persons, where nofriendship can be. Our impatience betrays us into rash and foolishalliances which no God attends. By persisting in your path, thoughyou forfeit the little you gain the great. You demonstrate yourself, so as to put yourself out of the reach of false relations, and youdraw to you the first-born of the world, those rare pilgrims whereofonly one or two wander in nature at once, and before whom the vulgargreat show as specters and shadows merely. 

22. It is foolish to be afraid of making our ties too spiritual, as ifso we could lose any genuine love. Whatever correction of our popularviews we make from insight, nature will be sure to bear us out in, andthough it seem to rob us of some joy, will repay us with a greater. Let us feel, if we will, the absolute insulation of man. We are surethat we have all in us. We go to Europe, or we pursue persons, or weread books, in the instinctive faith that these will call it out andreveal us to ourselves. Beggars all. The persons are such as we; theEurope, an old faded garment of dead persons; the books, their ghosts. Let us drop this idolatry. Let us give over this mendicancy. Let useven bid our dearest friends farewell, and defy them, saying, "Who areyou? Unhand me. I will be dependent no more. " Ah! seest thou not, Obrother, that thus we part only to meet again on a higher platform, and only be more each other's, because we are more our own? A friendis Janus-faced:[306] he looks to the past and the future. He is thechild of all my foregoing hours, the prophet of those to come, andthe harbinger[307] of a greater friend. 

23. I do then with my friends as I do with my books. I would have themwhere I can find them, but I seldom use them. We must have society onour own terms, and admit or exclude it on the slightest cause. Icannot afford to speak much with my friend. If he is great, he makesme so great that I cannot descend to converse. In the great days, presentiments hover before me, far before me in the firmament. I oughtthen to dedicate myself to them. I go in that I may seize them, I goout that I may seize them. I fear only that I may lose them recedinginto the sky in which now they are only a patch of brighter light. Then, though I prize my friends, I cannot afford to talk with them andstudy their visions, lest I lose my own. It would indeed give me acertain household joy to quit this lofty seeking, this spiritualastronomy, or search of stars, and come down to warm sympathies withyou; but then I know well I shall mourn always the vanishing of mymighty gods. It is true, next week I shall have languid moods, when Ican well afford to occupy myself with foreign objects; then I shallregret the lost literature of your mind, and wish you were by my sideagain. But if you come, perhaps you will fill my mind only with newvisions, not with yourself but with your lusters, and I shall not beable any more than now to converse with you. So I will owe to myfriends this evanescent intercourse. I will receive from them, notwhat they have, but what they are. They shall give me that whichproperly they cannot give, but which emanates from them. But theyshall not hold me by any relations less subtile and pure. We will meetas though we met not, and part as though we parted not. 

24. It has seemed to me lately more possible than I knew, to carry afriendship greatly, on one side, without due correspondence on theother. Why should I cumber myself with regrets that the receiver isnot capacious? It never troubles the sun that some of his rays fallwide and vain into ungrateful space, and only a small part on thereflecting planet. Let your greatness educate the crude and coldcompanion. If he is unequal, he will presently pass away; but thou artenlarged by thy own shining, and no longer a mate for frogs and worms, dost soar and burn with the gods of the empyrean. [308] It is thought adisgrace to love unrequited. But the great will see that true lovecannot be unrequited. True love transcends the unworthy object, anddwells and broods on the eternal, and when the poor interposed maskcrumbles, it is not sad, but feels rid of so much earth, and feels itsindependency the surer. Yet these things may hardly be said without asort of treachery to the relation. The essence of friendship isentireness, a total magnanimity and trust. It must not surmise orprovide for infirmity. It treats its object as a god, that it maydeify both. 

HEROISM[309]

 "Paradise is under the shadow of swords, "[310] _Mahomet. _

1. In the elder English dramatists, [311] and mainly in the plays ofBeaumont and Fletcher, [312] there is a constant recognition ofgentility, as if a noble behavior were as easily marked in the societyof their age, as color is in our American population. When any Rodrigo, Pedro, or Valerio[313] enters, though he be a stranger, the duke orgovernor exclaims, This is a gentleman, --and proffers civilities withoutend; but all the rest are slag and refuse. In harmony with this delightin personal advantages, there is in their plays a certain heroic cast ofcharacter and dialogue, --as in Bonduca, Sophocles, the Mad Lover, theDouble Marriage, [314]--wherein the speaker is so earnest and cordial, and on such deep grounds of character, that the dialogue, on theslightest additional incident in the plot, rises naturally into poetry. Among many texts, take the following. The Roman Martius has conqueredAthens--all but the invincible spirits of Sophocles, the duke of Athens, and Dorigen, his wife. The beauty of the latter inflames Martius, and heseeks to save her husband; but Sophocles will not ask his life, althoughassured, that a word will save him, and the execution of both proceeds. 

"_Valerius. _ Bid thy wife farewell. 

_Soph. _ No, I will take no leave. My Dorigen, Yonder, above, 'bout Ariadne's crown. [315]My spirit shall hover for thee. Prithee, haste. 

_Dor. _ Stay, Sophocles--with this, tie up my sight;Let not soft nature so transformed be, And lose her gentler sexed humanity, To make me see my lord bleed. So, 'tis well;Never one object underneath the sunWill I behold before my Sophocles:Farewell; now teach the Romans how to die. 

_Mar. _ Dost know what 'tis to die?

_Soph. _ Thou dost not, Martius, And therefore, not what 'tis to live; to dieIs to begin to live. It is to endAn old, stale, weary work, and to commenceA newer and a better. 'Tis to leaveDeceitful knaves for the societyOf gods and goodness. Thou, thyself, must partAt last, from all thy garlands, pleasures, triumphs, And prove thy fortitude what then 'twill do. 

_Val. _ But art not grieved nor vexed to leave thy life thus?

_Soph. _ Why should I grieve or vex for being sentTo them I ever loved best? Now, I'll kneel, But with my back toward thee; 'tis the last dutyThis trunk can do the gods. 

_Mar. _ Strike, strike, Valerius, Or Martius' heart will leap out at his mouth:This is a man, a woman! Kiss thy lord, And live with all the freedom you were wont. O love! thou doubly hast afflicted meWith virtue and with beauty. Treacherous heart, My hand shall cast thee quick into my urn, Ere thou transgress this knot of piety. 

_Val. _ What ails my brother?

_Soph. _ Martius, oh Martius, Thou now hast found a way to conquer me. 

_Dor. _ O star of Rome! what gratitude can speakFit words to follow such a deed as this?

_Mar. _ This admirable duke, Valerius, With his disdain of fortune and of death, Captived himself, has captived me, And though my arm hath ta'en his body here, His soul hath subjugated Martius' soul. By Romulus, [316] he is all soul, I think;He hath no flesh, and spirit cannot be gyved;Then we have vanquished nothing; he is free, And Martius walks now in captivity. "

2. I do not readily remember any poem, play, sermon, novel, ororation, that our press vents in the last few years, which goes to thesame tune. We have a great many flutes and flageolets, but not oftenthe sound of any fife. Yet, Wordsworth's Laodamia, and the ode of"Dion, "[317] and some sonnets, have a certain noble music; andScott[318] will sometimes draw a stroke like the portrait of LordEvandale, given by Balfour of Burley. [319] Thomas Carlyle, [320] withhis natural taste for what is manly and daring in character, hassuffered no heroic trait in his favorites to drop from hisbiographical and historical pictures. Earlier, Robert Burns[321] hasgiven us a song or two. In the Harleian Miscellanies, [322] there is anaccount of the battle of Lutzen, [323] which deserves to be read. AndSimon Ockley's[324] History of the Saracens recounts the prodigies ofindividual valor with admiration, all the more evident on the part ofthe narrator, that he seems to think that his place in ChristianOxford[325] requires of him some proper protestations of abhorrence. But if we explore the literature of Heroism, we shall quickly come toPlutarch, [326] who is its Doctor and historian. To him we owe theBrasidas, [327] the Dion, [328] the Epaminondas, [329] the Scipio[330] ofold, and I must think we are more deeply indebted to him than to allthe ancient writers. Each of his "Lives" is a refutation to thedespondency and cowardice of our religious and political theorists. Awild courage, a Stoicism[331] not of the schools, but of the blood, shines in every anecdote, and has given that book its immense fame. 

3. We need books of this tart cathartic virtue, more than books ofpolitical science, or of private economy. Life is a festival only tothe wise. Seen from the nook and chimney-side of prudence, it wears aragged and dangerous front. The violations of the laws of nature byour predecessors and our contemporaries are punished in us also. Thedisease and deformity around us certify the infraction of natural, intellectual, and moral laws, and often violation on violation tobreed such compound misery. A lockjaw that bends a man's head back tohis heels, hydrophobia that makes him bark at his wife and babes, insanity that makes him eat grass; war, plague, cholera, famineindicate a certain ferocity in nature, which, as it had its inlet byhuman crime, must have its outlet by human suffering. Unhappily, almost no man exists who has not in his own person become, to someamount, a stockholder in the sin, and so made himself liable to ashare in the expiation. 

4. Our culture, therefore, must not omit the arming of the man. Lethim hear in season that he is born into the state of war, and that thecommonwealth and his own well-being require that he should not godancing in the weeds of peace, but warned, self-collected, and neitherdefying nor dreading the thunder, let him take both reputation andlife in his hand, and, with perfect urbanity, dare the gibbet and themob by the absolute truth of his speech, and the rectitude of hisbehavior. 

5. Toward all this external evil, the man within the breast assumes awarlike attitude, and affirms his ability to cope single-handed withthe infinite army of enemies. To this military attitude of the soul wegive the name of Heroism. Its rudest form is the contempt for safetyand ease, which makes the attractiveness of war. It is a self-trustwhich slights the restraints of prudence, in the plenitude of itsenergy and power to repair the harms it may suffer. The hero is a mindof such balance that no disturbances can shake his will, butpleasantly, and, as it were, merrily, he advances to his own music, alike in frightful alarms, and in the tipsy mirth of universaldissoluteness. There is somewhat not philosophical in heroism; thereis somewhat not holy in it; it seems not to know that other souls areof one texture with it; it has pride; it is the extreme of individualnature. Nevertheless, we must profoundly revere it. There is somewhatin great actions, which does not allow us to go behind them. Heroismfeels and never reasons, and therefore is always right; and although adifferent breeding, different religion, and greater intellectualactivity, would have modified or even reversed the particular action, yet for the hero, that thing he does is the highest deed, and is notopen to the censure of philosophers or divines. It is the avowal ofthe unschooled man, that he finds a quality in him that is negligentof expense, of health, of life, of danger, of hatred, of reproach, andknows that his will is higher and more excellent than all actual andall possible antagonists. 

6. Heroism works in contradiction to the voice of mankind, and incontradiction, for a time, to the voice of the great and good. Heroismis an obedience[332] to a secret impulse of an individual's character. Now to no other man can its wisdom appear as it does to him, for everyman must be supposed to see a little further on his own proper paththan any one else. Therefore, just and wise men take umbrage at hisact, until after some little time be past: then they see it to be inunison with their acts. All prudent men see that the action is cleancontrary to a sensual prosperity; for every heroic act measures itselfby its contempt of some external good. But it finds its own successat last, and then the prudent also extol. 

7. Self-trust is the essence of heroism. It is the state of the soulat war, and its ultimate objects are the last defiance of falsehoodand wrong, and the power to bear all that can be inflicted by evilagents. It speaks the truth, and it is just, generous, hospitable, temperate, scornful of petty calculations, and scornful of beingscorned. It persists; it is of an undaunted boldness, and of afortitude not to be wearied out. Its jest is the littleness of commonlife. That false prudence which dotes on health and wealth is the buttand merriment of heroism. Heroism, like Plotinus, [333] is almostashamed of its body. What shall it say, then, to the sugar-plums, andcats'-cradles, to the toilet, compliments, quarrels, cards, andcustard, which rack the wit of all human society. What joys has kindnature provided for us dear creatures! There seems to be no intervalbetween greatness and meanness. When the spirit is not master of theworld then it is its dupe. Yet the little man takes the great hoax soinnocently, works in it so headlong and believing, is born red, anddies gray, arranging his toilet, attending on his own health, layingtraps for sweet food and strong wine, setting his heart on a horse ora rifle, made happy with a little gossip or a little praise, that thegreat soul cannot choose but laugh at such earnest nonsense. "Indeed, these humble considerations[334] make me out of love with greatness. What a disgrace is it to me to take note how many pairs of silkstockings thou hast, namely, these and those that were thepeach-colored ones; or to bear the inventory of thy shirts, as one forsuperfluity, and one other for use!"

8. Citizens, thinking after the laws of arithmetic, consider theinconvenience of receiving strangers at their fireside, reckonnarrowly the loss of time and the unusual display: the soul of abetter quality thrusts back the unreasonable economy into the vaultsof life, and says, I will obey the God, and the sacrifice and the firehe will provide. Ibn Hankal, [335] the Arabian geographer, describes aheroic extreme in the hospitality of Sogd, in Bokhar, [336] "When I wasin Sogd I saw a great building, like a palace, the gates of which wereopen and fixed back to the wall with large nails. I asked the reason, and was told that the house had not been shut, night or day, for ahundred years. Strangers may present themselves at any hour, and inwhatever number; the master has amply provided for the reception ofthe men and their animals, and is never happier than when they tarryfor some time. Nothing of the kind have I seen in any other country. "The magnanimous know very well that they who give time, or money, orshelter, to the stranger--so it be done for love, and not forostentation--do, as it were, put God under obligation to them, soperfect are the compensations of the universe. In some way the timethey seem to lose is redeemed, and the pains they seem to takeremunerate themselves. These men fan the flame of human love, andraise the standard of civil virtue among mankind. But hospitality mustbe for service, and not for show, or it pulls down the host. The bravesoul rates itself too high to value itself by the splendor of itstable and draperies. It gives what it hath, and all it hath, but itsown majesty can lend a better grace to bannocks[337] and fair waterthan belong to city feasts. 

9. The temperance of the hero proceeds from the same wish to do nodishonor to the worthiness he has. But he loves it for its elegancy, not for its austerity. It seems not worth his while to be solemn, anddenounce with bitterness flesh-eating or wine-drinking, the use oftobacco, or opium, or tea, or silk, or gold. A great man scarcelyknows how he dines, how he dresses; but without railing or precision, his living is natural and poetic. John Eliot, [338] the Indian Apostle, drank water, and said of wine, --"It is a noble, generous liquor, andwe should be humbly thankful for it, but, as I remember, water wasmade before it. " Better still is the temperance of king David[339] whopoured out on the ground unto the Lord the water which three of hiswarriors had brought him to drink, at the peril of their lives. 

10. It is told of Brutus, [340] that when he fell on his sword, afterthe battle of Philippi, [341] he quoted a line of Euripides, [342]--"Ovirtue! I have followed thee through life, and I find thee at last buta shade. " I doubt not the hero is slandered by this report. The heroicsoul does not sell its justice and its nobleness. It does not ask todine nicely, and to sleep warm. The essence of greatness is theperception that virtue is enough. Poverty is its ornament. It does notneed plenty, and can very well abide its loss. 

11. But that which takes my fancy most, in the heroic class, is thegood humor and hilarity they exhibit. It is a height to which commonduty can very well attain, to suffer and to dare with solemnity. Butthese rare souls set opinion, success, and life, at so cheap a rate, that they will not soothe their enemies by petitions, or the show ofsorrow, but wear their own habitual greatness. Scipio, [343] chargedwith peculation, refuses to do himself so great a disgrace as to waitfor justification, though he had the scroll of his accounts in hishands, but tears it to pieces before the tribunes. Socrates'[344]condemnation of himself to be maintained in all honor in thePrytaneum, [345] during his life, and Sir Thomas More's[346]playfulness at the scaffold, are of the same strain. In Beaumont andFletcher's "Sea Voyage, " Juletta tells the stout captain and hiscompany, _Jul. _ Why, slaves, 'tis in our power to hang ye. 

_Master. _ Very likely, 'Tis in our powers, then, to be hanged, and scorn ye. 

These replies are sound and whole. Sport is the bloom and glow of aperfect health. The great will not condescend to take anythingseriously; all must be as gay as the song of a canary, though it werethe building of cities, or the eradication of old and foolishchurches and nations, which have cumbered the earth long thousands ofyears. Simple hearts put all the history and customs of this worldbehind them, and play their own play in innocent defiance of theBlue-Laws[347] of the world; and such would appear, could we see thehuman race assembled in vision, like little children frolickingtogether; though, to the eyes of mankind at large, they wear a statelyand solemn garb of works and influences. 

12. The interest these fine stories have for us, the power of aromance over the boy who grasps the forbidden book under his bench atschool, our delight in the hero, is the main fact to our purpose. Allthese great and transcendent properties are ours. If we dilate inbeholding the Greek energy, the Roman pride, it is that we are alreadydomesticating the same sentiment. Let us find room for this greatguest in our small houses. The first step of worthiness will be todisabuse us of our superstitious associations with places and times, with number and size. Why should these words, Athenian, Roman, Asia, and England, so tingle in the ear? Where the heart is, there themuses, there the gods sojourn, and not in any geography of fame. Massachusetts, Connecticut River, and Boston Bay, you think paltryplaces, and the ear loves names of foreign and classic topography. Buthere we are; and, if we will tarry a little, we may come to learn thathere is best. See to it only that thyself is here;--and art andnature, hope and fate, friends, angels, and the Supreme Being, shallnot be absent from the chamber where thou sittest. Epaminondas, [348]brave and affectionate, does not seem to us to need Olympus[349] todie upon, nor the Syrian sunshine. He lies very well where he is. TheJerseys[350] were handsome ground enough for Washington to tread, andLondon streets for the feet of Milton. [351] A great man makes hisclimate genial in the imagination of men, and its air the belovedelement of all delicate spirits. That country is the fairest, which isinhabited by the noblest minds. The pictures which fill theimagination in reading the actions of Pericles, [352] Xenophon, [353]Columbus, [354] Bayard, [355] Sidney, [356] Hampden, [357] teach us howneedlessly mean our life is, that we, by the depth of our living, should deck it with more than regal or national splendor, and act onprinciples that should interest man and nature in the length of ourdays. 

13. We have seen or heard of many extraordinary young men, who neverripened, or whose performance in actual life was not extraordinary. When we see their air and mien, when we hear them speak of society, orbooks, or religion, we admire their superiority; they seem to throwcontempt on our entire polity and social state; theirs is the tone ofa youthful giant, who is sent to work revolutions. But they enter anactive profession, and the forming Colossus[358] shrinks to the commonsize of man. The magic they used was the ideal tendencies, whichalways make the Actual ridiculous; but the tough world had its revengethe moment they put their horses of the sun to plow in its furrow. They found no example and no companion, and their heart fainted. Whatthen? The lesson they gave in their first aspirations, is yet true;and a better valor and a purer truth shall one day organize theirbelief. Or why should a woman liken herself to any historical woman, and think, because Sappho, [359] or Sévigné, [360] or De Staël, [361] orthe cloistered souls who have had genius and cultivation, do notsatisfy the imagination and the serene Themis, [362] nonecan, --certainly not she. Why not? She has a new and unattemptedproblem to solve, perchance that of the happiest nature that everbloomed. Let the maiden, with erect soul, walk serenely on her way, accept the hint of each new experience, search, in turn, all theobjects that solicit her eye, that she may learn the power and thecharm of her new-born being which is the kindling of a new dawn in therecesses of space. The fair girl, who repels interference by a decidedand proud choice of influences, so careless of pleasing, so wilful andlofty, inspires every beholder with somewhat of her own nobleness. Thesilent heart encourages her; O friend, never strike sail to a fear!Come into port greatly, or sail with God the seas. Not in vain youlive, for every passing eye is cheered and refined by the vision. 

14. The characteristic of a genuine heroism is its persistency. Allmen have wandering impulses, fits and starts of generosity. But whenyou have chosen your part, abide by it, and do not weakly try toreconcile yourself with the world. The heroic cannot be the common, nor the common the heroic. Yet we have the weakness to expect thesympathy of people in those actions whose excellence is that theyoutrun sympathy, and appeal to a tardy justice. If you would serveyour brother, because it is fit for you to serve him, do not take backyour words when you find that prudent people do not commend you. Adhere to your own act, and congratulate yourself if you have donesomething strange and extravagant, and broken the monotony of adecorous age. It was a high counsel[363] that I once heard given to ayoung person, --"Always do what you are afraid to do. " A simple manlycharacter need never make an apology, but should regard its pastaction with the calmness of Phocion, [364] when he admitted that theevent of the battle was happy, yet did not regret his dissuasion fromthe battle. 

15. There is no weakness or exposure for which we cannot findconsolation in the thought, --this is a part of my constitution, partof my relation and office to my fellow-creature. Has nature covenantedwith me that I should never appear to disadvantage, never make aridiculous figure? Let us be generous of our dignity as well as of ourmoney. Greatness once and forever has done with opinion. We tell ourcharities, not because we wish to be praised for them, not because wethink they have great merit, but for our justification. It is acapital blunder; as you discover, when another man recites hischarities. 

16. To speak the truth, even with some austerity, to live with somerigor of temperance, or some extremes of generosity, seems to be anasceticism which common good-nature would appoint to those who are atease and in plenty, in sign that they feel a brotherhood with thegreat multitude of suffering men. And not only need we breathe andexercise the soul by assuming the penalties of abstinence, of debt, ofsolitude, of unpopularity, but it behooves the wise man to look with abold eye into those rarer dangers which sometimes invade men, and tofamiliarize himself with disgusting forms of disease, with sounds ofexecration, and the vision of violent death. 

17. Times of heroism are generally times of terror, but the day nevershines in which this element may not work. The circumstances of man, we say, are historically somewhat better in this country, and at thishour, than perhaps ever before. More freedom exists for culture. Itwill not now run against an ax at the first step out of the beatentrack of opinion. But whoso is heroic will always find crises to tryhis edge. Human virtue demands her champions and martyrs, and thetrial of persecution always proceeds. It is but the other day that thebrave Lovejoy[365] gave his breast to the bullets of a mob, for therights of free speech and opinion, and died when it was better not tolive. 

18. I see not any road to perfect peace which a man can walk, but totake counsel of his own bosom. Let him quit too much association, lethim go home much, and establish himself in those courses he approves. The unremitting retention of simple and high sentiments in obscureduties is hardening the character to that temper which will work withhonor, if need be, in the tumult, or on the scaffold. Whateveroutrages have happened to men may befall a man again; and very easilyin a republic, if there appear any signs of a decay of religion. Coarse slander, fire, tar and feathers, and the gibbet, the youth mayfreely bring home to his mind, and with what sweetness of temper hecan, and inquire how fast he can fix his sense of duty, braving suchpenalties, whenever it may please the next newspaper and a sufficientnumber of his neighbors to pronounce his opinions incendiary. 

19. It may calm the apprehension of calamity in the most susceptibleheart to see how quick a bound nature has set to the utmost inflictionof malice. We rapidly approach a brink over which no enemy can followus. 

 "Let them rave:[366] Thou art quiet in thy grave. "

In the gloom of our ignorance of what shall be, in the hour when weare deaf to the higher voices, who does not envy them who have seensafely to an end their manful endeavor? Who that sees the meanness ofour politics, but inly congratulates Washington that he is longalready wrapped in his shroud, and forever safe; that he was laidsweet in his grave, the hope of humanity not yet subjugated in him?Who does not sometimes envy the good and brave, who are no more tosuffer from the tumults of the natural world, and await with curiouscomplacency the speedy term of his own conversation with finitenature? And yet the love that will be annihilated sooner thantreacherous has already made death impossible, and affirms itself nomortal, but a native of the deeps of absolute and inextinguishablebeing. 

MANNERS[367]

1. Half the world, it is said, knows not how the other half live. OurExploring Expedition saw the Feejee Islanders[368] getting theirdinner off human bones; and they are said to eat their own wives andchildren. The husbandry of the modern inhabitants of Gournou[369](west of old Thebes) is philosophical to a fault. To set up theirhousekeeping, nothing is requisite but two or three earthen pots, astone to grind meal, and a mat which is the bed. The house, namely, atomb, is ready without rent or taxes. No rain can pass through theroof, and there is no door, for there is no want of one, as there isnothing to lose. If the house do not please them, they walk out andenter another, as there are several hundreds at their command. "It issomewhat singular, " adds Berzoni, to whom we owe this account, "totalk of Happiness among people who live in sepulchers, among corpsesand rags of an ancient nation which they knew nothing of. " In thedeserts of Borgoo[370] the rock-Tibboos still dwell in caves, likecliff-swallows, and the language of these negroes is compared by theirneighbors to the shrieking of bats, and to the whistling of birds. Again, the Bornoos[371] have no proper names; individuals are calledafter their height, thickness, or other accidental quality, and havenick-names merely. But the salt, the dates, the ivory, and the gold, for which these horrible regions are visited, find their way intocountries, where the purchaser and consumer can hardly be ranked inone race with these cannibals and man-stealers; countries where manserves himself with metals, wood, stone, glass, gum, cotton, silk andwool; honors himself with architecture;[372] writes laws, andcontrives to execute his will through the hands of many nations; and, especially, establishes a select society, running through all thecountries of intelligent men, a self-constituted aristocracy, orfraternity of the best, which, without written law, or exact usage ofany kind, perpetuates itself, colonizes every new-planted island, andadopts and makes its own whatever personal beauty or extraordinarynative endowment anywhere appears. 

2. What fact more conspicuous in modern history, than the creation ofthe gentleman? Chivalry[373] is that, and loyalty is that, and, inEnglish literature, half the drama, and all the novels, from SirPhilip Sidney[374] to Sir Walter Scott, [375] paint this figure. Theword _gentleman_, which, like the word Christian, must hereaftercharacterize the present and the few preceding centuries, by theimportance attached to it, is a homage to personal and incommunicableproperties. Frivolous and fantastic additions have got associated withthe name, but the steady interest of mankind in it must be attributedto the valuable properties which it designates. An element whichunites all the most forcible persons of every country; makes themintelligible and agreeable to each other, and is somewhat so precise, that it is at once felt if an individual lack the masonic sign, [376]cannot be any casual product, but must be an average result of thecharacter and faculties universally found in men. It seems a certainpermanent average; as the atmosphere is a permanent composition, whilst so many gases are combined only to be decompounded. _Comme ilfaut_, is the Frenchman's description of good society, _as we mustbe_. It is a spontaneous fruit of talents and feelings of preciselythat class who have most vigor, who take the lead in the world of thishour, and, though far from pure, far from constituting the gladdestand highest tone of human feeling, is as good as the whole societypermits it to be. It is made of the spirit, more than of the talent ofmen, and is a compound result, into which every great force enters asan ingredient, namely, virtue, wit, beauty, wealth, and power. 

3. There is something equivocal in all the words in use to express theexcellence of manners and social cultivation, because the qualitiesare fluxional, and the last effect is assumed by the senses as thecause. The word _gentleman_ has not any correlative abstract[377] toexpress the quality. _Gentility_ is mean, and _gentilesse_[378] isobsolete. But we must keep alive in the vernacular the distinctionbetween _fashion_, a word of narrow and often sinister meaning, andthe heroic character which the gentleman imports. The usual words, however, must be respected: they will be found to contain the root ofthe matter. The point of distinction in all this class of names, ascourtesy, chivalry, fashion, and the like, is, that the flower andfruit, not the grain of the tree, are contemplated. It is beauty whichis the aim this time, and not worth. The result is now in question, although our words intimate well enough the popular feeling, that theappearance supposes a substance. The gentleman is a man of truth, lordof his own actions, and expressing that lordship in his behavior, notin any manner dependent and servile either on persons, or opinions, orpossessions. Beyond this fact of truth and real force, the worddenotes good-nature and benevolence: manhood first, and thengentleness. The popular notion certainly adds a condition of ease andfortune; but that is a natural result of personal force and love, thatthey should possess and dispense the goods of the world. In times ofviolence, every eminent person must fall in with many opportunities toapprove his stoutness and worth; therefore every man's name thatemerged at all from the mass in the feudal ages, [379] rattles in ourear like a flourish of trumpets. But personal force never goes out offashion. That is still paramount to-day, and, in the moving crowd ofgood society, the men of valor and reality are known, and rise totheir natural place. The competition is transferred from war topolitics and trade, but the personal force appears readily enough inthese new arenas. 

4. Power first, or no leading class. In politics and in trade, bruisers and pirates are of better promise than talkers and clerks. God knows[380] that all sorts of gentlemen knock at the door; butwhenever used in strictness, and with any emphasis, the name will befound to point at original energy. It describes a man standing in hisown right, and working after untaught methods. In a good lord, theremust first be a good animal, at least to the extent of yielding theincomparable advantage of animal spirits. [381] The ruling class musthave more, but they must have these, giving in every company the senseof power, [382] which makes things easy to be done which daunt thewise. The society of the energetic class, in their friendly andfestive meetings, is full of courage, and of attempts, whichintimidate the pale scholar. The courage which girls exhibit is like abattle of Lundy's Lane, [383] or a sea-fight. The intellect relies onmemory to make some supplies to face these extemporaneous squadrons. But memory is a base mendicant with basket and badge, in the presenceof these sudden masters. The rulers of society must be up to the workof the world, and equal to their versatile office: men of the rightCæsarian pattern, [384] who have great range of affinity. I am far frombelieving the timid maxim[385] of Lord Falkland, [386] ("That forceremony there must go two to it; since a bold fellow will go throughthe cunningest forms, ") and am of opinion that the gentleman is thebold fellow whose forms are not to be broken through; and only thatplenteous nature is rightful master, which is the complement ofwhatever person it converses with. My gentleman gives the law where heis; he will outpray saints in chapel, outgeneral veterans in thefield, and outshine all courtesy in the hall. He is good company forpirates, and good with academicians; so that it is useless to fortifyyourself against him; he has the private entrance to all minds, and Icould as easily exclude myself as him. The famous gentlemen of Asiaand Europe have been of this strong type: Saladin, [387] Sapor, [388]the Cid, [389] Julius Cæsar, [390] Scipio, [391] Alexander, [392]Pericles, [393] and the lordliest personages. They sat very carelesslyin their chairs, and were too excellent themselves to value anycondition at a high rate. 

5. A plentiful fortune is reckoned necessary, in the popular judgment, to the completion of this man of the world: and it is a material deputywhich walks through the dance which the first has led. Money is notessential, but this wide affinity is, which transcends the habits ofclique and caste, and makes itself felt by men of all classes. If thearistocrat is only valid in fashionable circles, and not with truckmen, he will never be a leader in fashion; and if the man of the peoplecannot speak on equal terms with the gentleman, so that the gentlemanshall perceive that he is already really of his own order, he is not tobe feared. Diogenes, [394] Socrates, [395] and Epaminondas[396] aregentlemen of the best blood, who have chosen the condition of poverty, when that of wealth was equally open to them. I use these old names, butthe men I speak of are my contemporaries. [397] Fortune will not supplyto every generation one of these well-appointed knights, but everycollection of men furnishes some example of the class: and the politicsof this country, and the trade of every town, are controlled by thesehardy and irresponsible doers, who have invention to take the lead, anda broad sympathy which puts them in fellowship with crowds, and makestheir action popular. 

6. The manners of this class are observed and caught with devotion bymen of taste. The association of these masters with each other, andwith men intelligent of their merits, is mutually agreeable andstimulating. The good forms, the happiest expressions of each, arerepeated and adopted. By swift consent, everything superfluous isdropped, everything graceful is renewed. Fine manners[398] showthemselves formidable to the uncultivated man. They are a subtlerscience of defence to parry and intimidate; but once matched by theskill of the other party, they drop the point of the sword, --pointsand fences disappear, and the youth finds himself in a moretransparent atmosphere, wherein life is a less troublesome game, andnot a misunderstanding rises between the players. Manners aim tofacilitate life, to get rid of impediments, and bring the man pure toenergize. They aid our dealing and conversation, as a railway aidstraveling, by getting rid of all avoidable obstructions of the road, and leaving nothing to be conquered but pure space. These forms verysoon become fixed, and a fine sense of propriety is cultivated withmore heed, that it becomes a badge of social and civil distinctions. Thus grows up Fashion, an equivocal semblance, the most puissant, themost fantastic and frivolous, the most feared and followed, and whichmorals and violence assault in vain. 

7. There exists a strict relation between the class of power, and theexclusive and polished circles. The last are always filled or fillingfrom the first. The strong men usually give some allowance even to thepetulances of fashion, for that affinity they find in it. Napoleon, [399] child of the revolution, destroyer of the oldnoblesse, [400] never ceased to court the Faubourg St. Germain:[401]doubtless with the feeling, that fashion is a homage to men of hisstamp. Fashion, though in a strange way, represents all manly virtue. It is a virtue gone to seed: it is a kind of posthumous honor. It doesnot often caress the great, but the children of the great: it is ahall of the Past. It usually sets its face against the great of thishour. Great men are not commonly in its halls: they are absent in thefield: they are working, not triumphing. Fashion is made up of theirchildren; of those, who, through the value and virtue of somebody, have acquired lustre to their name, marks of distinction, means ofcultivation and generosity, and, in their physical organization, acertain health and excellence, which secures to them, if not thehighest power to work, yet high power to enjoy. The class of power, the working heroes, the Cortez, [402] the Nelson, [403] the Napoleon, see that this is the festivity and permanent celebration of such asthey; that fashion is funded talent; is Mexico, [404] Marengo, [405] andTrafalgar[406][407] beaten out thin; that the brilliant names offashion run back to just such busy names as their own, fifty or sixtyyears ago. They are the sowers, their sons shall be the reapers, and_their_ sons, in the ordinary course of things, must yield thepossession of the harvest, to new competitors with keener eyes andstronger frames. The city is recruited from the country. In the year1805, it is said, every legitimate monarch in Europe was imbecile. Thecity would have died out, rotted, and exploded, long ago, but that itwas reinforced from the fields. It is only country which came to townday before yesterday, that is city and court to-day. 

8. Aristocracy and fashion are certain inevitable results. Thesemutual selections are indestructible. If they provoke anger in theleast favored class, and the excluded majority revenge themselves onthe excluding minority, by the strong hand, and kill them, at once anew class finds itself at the top, as certainly as cream rises in abowl of milk: and if the people should destroy class after class, until two men only were left, one of these would be the leader, andwould be involuntarily served and copied by the other. You may keepthis minority out of sight and out of mind, but it is tenacious oflife, and is one of the estates of the realm. [408] I am the morestruck with this tenacity, when I see its work. It respects theadministration of such unimportant matters, that we should not lookfor any durability in its rule. We sometimes meet men under somestrong moral influence, as a patriotic, a literary, a religiousmovement, and feel that the moral sentiment rules man and nature. Wethink all other distinctions and ties will be slight and fugitive, this of caste or fashion, for example; yet come from year to year, andsee how permanent that is, in this Boston or New York life of man, where, too, it has not the lease countenance from the law of the land. Not in Egypt or in India a firmer or more impassable line. Here areassociations whose ties go over, and under, and through it, a meetingof merchants, a military corps, a college-class, a fire-club, aprofessional association, a political, a religious convention;--thepersons seem to draw inseparably near; yet that assembly oncedispersed, its members will not in the year meet again. Each returnsto his degree in the scale of good society, porcelain remainsporcelain, and earthen earthen. The objects of fashion may befrivolous, or fashion may be objectless, but the nature of this unionand selection can be neither frivolous nor accidental. Each man's rankin that perfect graduation depends on some symmetry in his structure, or some agreement in his structure to the symmetry of society. Itsdoors unbar instantaneously to a natural claim of their own kind. Anatural gentleman finds his way in, and will keep the oldest patricianout, who has lost his intrinsic rank. Fashion understands itself;good-breeding and personal superiority of whatever country readilyfraternize with those of every other. The chiefs of savage tribes havedistinguished themselves in London and Paris, by the purity of theirtournure. [409]

9. To say what good of fashion we can, --it rests on reality, and hatesnothing so much as pretenders;--to exclude and mystify pretenders, andsend them into everlasting "Coventry, "[410] is its delight. Wecontemn, in turn, every other gift of men of the world; but the habit, even in little and the least matters, of not appealing to any but ourown sense of propriety, constitutes the foundation of all chivalry. There is almost no kind of self-reliance, so it be sane andproportioned, which fashion does not occasionally adopt, and give itthe freedom of its saloons. A sainted soul is always elegant, and, ifit will, passes unchallenged into the most guarded ring. But so willJock the teamster pass, in some crisis that brings him thither, andfind favor, as long as his head is not giddy with the newcircumstance, and the iron shoes do not wish to dance in waltzes andcotillions. For there is nothing settled in manners, but the laws ofbehavior yield to the energy of the individual. The maiden at herfirst ball, the countryman at a city dinner, believes that there is aritual according to which every act and compliment must be performed, or the failing party must be cast out of this presence. Later, theylearn that good sense and character make their own forms every moment, and speak or abstain, to take wine or refuse it, stay or go, sit in achair or sprawl with children on the floor, or stand on their head, orwhat else soever, in a new and aboriginal way: and that strong will isalways in fashion, let who will be unfashionable. All that fashiondemands is composure, and self-content. A circle of men perfectlywell-bred would be a company of sensible persons, in which every man'snative manners and character appear. If the fashionist have not thisquality, he is nothing. We are such lovers of self-reliance, that weexcuse in man many sins, if he will show us a complete satisfaction inhis position, which asks no leave to be of mine, or any man's goodopinion. But any deference to some eminent man or woman of the world, forfeits all privilege of nobility. He is an underling: I have nothingto do with him; I will speak with his master. A man should not gowhere he cannot carry his whole sphere or society with him, --notbodily, the whole circle of his friends, but atmospherically. Heshould preserve in a new company the same attitude of mind and realityof relation, which his daily associates draw him to, else he is shornof his best beams, and will be an orphan in the merriest club. "If youcould see Vich Ian Vohr with his tail on![411]--" But Vich Ian Vohrmust always carry his belongings in some fashion, if not added ashonor, then severed as disgrace. 

10. There will always be in society certain persons who aremercuries[412] of its approbation, and whose glance will at any timedetermine for the curious their standing in the world. These are thechamberlains of the lesser gods. Accept their coldness as an omen ofgrace with the loftier deities, and allow them all their privilege. They are clear in their office, nor could they be thus formidable, without their own merits. But do not measure the importance of thisclass by their pretension, or imagine that a fop can be the dispenserof honor and shame. They pass also at their just rate; for how canthey otherwise, in circles which exist as a sort of herald'soffice[413] for the sifting of character?

11. As the first thing man requires of man is reality, so that appearsin all the forms of society. We pointedly, and by name, introduce theparties to each other. Know you before all heaven and earth, that thisis Andrew, and this is Gregory;--they look each other in the eye; theygrasp each other's hand, to identify and signalize each other. It is agreat satisfaction. A gentleman never dodges; his eyes look straightforward, and he assures the other party, first of all, that he hasbeen met. For what is it that we seek, in so many visits andhospitalities? Is it your draperies, pictures, and decorations? Or, dowe not insatiably ask. Was a man in the house? I may easily go into agreat household where there is much substance, excellent provision forcomfort, luxury, and taste, and yet not encounter there anyAmphitryon, [414] who shall subordinate these appendages. I may go intoa cottage, and find a farmer who feels that he is the man I have cometo see, and fronts me accordingly. It was therefore a very naturalpoint of old feudal etiquette, that a gentleman who received a visit, though it were of his sovereign, should not leave his roof, but shouldwait his arrival at the door of his house. No house, though it werethe Tuileries, [415] or the Escurial, [416] is good for anything withouta master. And yet we are not often gratified by this hospitality. Everybody we know surrounds himself with a fine house, fine books, conservatory, gardens, equipage, and all manner of toys, as screens tointerpose between himself and his guests. Does it not seem as if manwas of a very sly, elusive nature, and dreaded nothing so much as afull renconter front to front with his fellow? It were unmerciful, Iknow, quite to abolish the use of these screens, which are of eminentconvenience, whether the guest is too great, or too little. We calltogether many friends who keep each other in play, or by luxuries andornaments we amuse the young people, and guard our retirement. Or if, perchance, a searching realist comes to our gate, before whose eyes wehave no care to stand, then again we run to our curtain, and hideourselves as Adam[417] at the voice of the Lord God in the garden. Cardinal Caprara, [418] the Pope's[419] legate at Paris, defendedhimself from the glances of Napoleon, by an immense pair of greenspectacles. Napoleon remarked them, and speedily managed to rally themoff: and yet Napoleon, in his turn, was not great enough, with eighthundred thousand troops at his back, to face a pair of free-born eyes, but fenced himself with etiquette, and within triple barriers ofreserve: and, as all the world knows from Madame de Stael, [420] waswont, when he found himself observed, to discharge his face of allexpression. But emperors and rich men are by no means the mostskillful masters of good manners. No rent roll nor army-list candignify skulking and dissimulations: and the first point of courtesymust always be truth, as really all forms of good-breeding point thatway. 

12. I have just been reading, in Mr. Hazlitt's[421] translation, Montaigne's[422] account of his journey into Italy, and am struck withnothing more agreeably than the self-respecting fashions of the time. His arrival in each place, the arrival of a gentleman of France, is anevent of some consequence. Wherever he goes, he pays a visit towhatever prince or gentleman of note resides upon his road, as a dutyto himself and to civilization. When he leaves any house in which hehas lodged for a few weeks, he causes his arms to be painted and hungup as a perpetual sign to the house, as was the custom of gentlemen. 

13. The complement of this graceful self-respect, and that of all thepoints of good breeding I most require and insist upon, is deference. I like that every chair should be a throne, and hold a king. I prefera tendency to stateliness, to an excess of fellowship. Let theincommunicable objects of nature and the metaphysical isolation of manteach us independence. Let us not be too much acquainted. I would havea man enter his house through a hall filled with heroic and sacredsculptures, that he might not want the hint of tranquillity andself-poise. [423] We should meet each morning, as from foreigncountries, and spending the day together, should depart at night, asinto foreign countries. In all things I would have the island of a maninviolate. Let us sit apart as the gods, talking from peak to peak allround Olympus. No degree of affection need invade this religion. Thisis myrrh and rosemary to keep the other sweet. Lovers should guardtheir strangeness. If they forgive too much, all slides into confusionand meanness. It is easy to push this deference to a Chineseetiquette;[424] but coolness and absence of heat and haste indicatefine qualities. A gentleman makes no noise: a lady is sereneProportionate is our disgust at those invaders who fill a studioushouse with blast and running, to secure some paltry convenience. Notless I dislike a low sympathy of each with his neighbors's needs. Mustwe have a good understanding with one another's palates? as foolishpeople who have lived long together, know when each wants salt orsugar. I pray my companion, if he wishes for bread, to ask me forbread, and if he wishes for sassafras or arsenic, to ask me for them, and not to hold out his plate, as if I knew already. Every naturalfunction can be dignified by deliberation and privacy. Let us leavehurry to slaves. The compliments and ceremonies of our breeding shouldrecall, [425] however remotely, the grandeur of our destiny. 

14. The flower of courtesy does not very well bide handling, but if wedare to open another leaf, and explore what parts go to itsconformation, we shall find also an intellectual quality. To theleaders of men, the brain as well as the flesh and the heart mustfurnish a proportion. Defect in manners is usually the defect of fineperceptions. Men are too coarsely made for the delicacy of beautifulcarriage and customs. It is not quite sufficient to good breeding, aunion of kindness and independence. We imperatively require aperception of, and a homage to, beauty in our companions. Othervirtues are in request in the field and work yard, but a certaindegree of taste is not to be spared in those we sit with. I couldbetter eat with one who did not respect the truth or the laws, thanwith a sloven and unpresentable person. Moral qualities rule theworld, but at short distances the senses are despotic. The samediscrimination of fit and fair runs out, if with less rigor, into allparts of life. The average spirit of the energetic class is goodsense, acting under certain limitations and to certain ends. Itentertains every natural gift. Social in its nature, it respectseverything which tends to unite men. It delights in measure. [426] Thelove of beauty is mainly the love of measure or proportion. The personwho screams, or uses the superlative degree, or converses with heat, puts whole drawing-rooms to flight. If you wish to be loved, lovemeasure. You must have genius, or a prodigious usefulness, if you willhide the want of measure. This perception comes in to polish andperfect the parts of the social instrument. Society will pardon muchto genius and special gifts, but, being in its nature a convention, itloves what is conventional, or what belongs to coming together. Thatmakes the good and bad of manners, namely, what helps or hindersfellowship. For, fashion is not good sense absolute, but relative; notgood sense private, but good sense entertaining company. It hatescorners and sharp points of character, hates quarrelsome, egotistical, solitary, and gloomy people; hates whatever can interfere with totalblending of parties; whilst it values all peculiarities as in thehighest degree refreshing, which can consist with good fellowship. Andbesides the general infusion of wit to heighten civility, the directsplendor of intellectual power is ever welcome in fine society as thecostliest addition to its rule and its credit. 

15. The dry light must shine in to adorn our festival, but it must betempered and shaded, or that will also offend. Accuracy is essentialto beauty, and quick perceptions to politeness, but not too quickperceptions. One may be too punctual and too precise. He must leavethe omniscience of business at the door, when he comes into the palaceof beauty. Society loves creole natures, [427] and sleepy, languishingmanners, so that they cover sense, grace, and good-will: the air ofdrowsy strength, which disarms criticism; perhaps, because such aperson seems to reserve himself for the best of the game, and notspend himself on surfaces; an ignoring eye, which does not see theannoyances, shifts, and inconveniences, that cloud the brow andsmother the voice of the sensitive. 

16. Therefore, besides personal force and so much perception asconstitutes unerring taste, society demands in its patrician class, another element already intimated, which it significantly termsgood-nature, expressing all degrees of generosity, from the lowestwillingness and faculty to oblige, up to the heights of magnanimityand love. Insight we must have, or we shall run against one another, and miss the way to our food; but intellect is selfish and barren. Thesecret of success in society, is a certain heartiness and sympathy. Aman who is not happy in the company, cannot find any word in hismemory that will fit the occasion. All his information is a littleimpertinent. A man who is happy there, finds in every turn of theconversation equally lucky occasions for the introduction of thatwhich he has to say. The favorites of society, and what it calls_whole souls_, are able men, and of more spirit than wit, who have nouncomfortable egotism, but who exactly fill the hour and the company, contented and contenting, at a marriage or a funeral, a ball or ajury, a water-party or a shooting-match. England, which is rich ingentlemen, furnished, in the beginning of the present century, a goodmodel of that genius which the world loves, in Mr. Fox, [428] whoadded to his great abilities the most social disposition, and reallove of men. Parliamentary history has few better passages than thedebate, in which Burke[429] and Fox separated in the House of Commons;when Fox urged on his old friend the claims of old friendship withsuch tenderness, that the house was moved to tears. Another anecdoteis so close to my matter, that I must hazard the story. A tradesmanwho had long dunned him for a note of three hundred guineas, found himone day counting gold, and demanded payment. "No, " said Fox, "I owethis money to Sheridan[430]: it is a debt of honor: if an accidentshould happen to me, he has nothing to show. " "Then, " said thecreditor, "I change my debt into a debt of honor, " and tore the notein pieces. Fox thanked the man for his confidence, and paid him, saying, "his debt was of older standing, and Sheridan must wait. "Lover of liberty, friend of the Hindoo, friend of the African slave, he possessed a great personal popularity; and Napoleon said of him onthe occasion of his visit to Paris, in 1805, "Mr. Fox will always holdthe first place in an assembly at the Tuileries. "

17. We may easily seem ridiculous in our eulogy of courtesy, wheneverwe insist on benevolence as its foundation. The painted phantasmFashion rises to cast a species of derision on what we say. But I willneither be driven from some allowance to Fashion as a symbolicinstitution, nor from the belief that love is the basis of courtesy. "We must obtain _that_, if we can; but by all means we must affirm_this_. Life owes much of its spirit to these sharp contrasts. Fashionwhich affects to be honor, is often, in all men's experience, only aballroom code. Yet, so long as it is the highest circle, in theimagination of the best heads on the planet, there is somethingnecessary and excellent in it; for it is not to be supposed that menhave agreed to be the dupes of anything preposterous; and the respectwhich these mysteries inspire in the most rude and sylvan characters, and the curiosity with which details of high life are read, betray theuniversality of the love of cultivated manners. I know that a comicdisparity would be felt, if we should enter the acknowledged 'firstcircles, ' and apply these terrific standards of justice, beauty, andbenefit, to the individuals actually found there. Monarchs and heroes, sages and lovers, these gallants are not. Fashion has many classes andmany rules of probation and admission; and not the best alone. Thereis not only the right of conquest, which genius pretends, --theindividual, demonstrating his natural aristocracy best of thebest;--but less claims will pass for the time; for Fashion loveslions, and points, like Circe, [431] to her horned company. Thisgentleman is this afternoon arrived from Denmark; and that is my LordRide, who came yesterday from Bagdad; here is Captain Friese, fromCape Turnagain, and Captain Symmes, [432] from the interior of theearth; and Monsieur Jovaire, who came down this morning in a balloon;Mr. Hobnail, the reformer; and Reverend Jul Bat, who has convertedthe whole torrid zone in his Sunday school; and Signer Torre delGreco, who extinguished Vesuvius by pouring into it the Bay of Naples;Spahr, the Persian ambassador; and Tul Wil Shan, the exiled nabob ofNepaul, whose saddle is the new moon. --But these are monsters of oneday, and to-morrow will be dismissed to their holes and dens; for, inthese rooms every chair is waited for. The artist, the scholar, and, in general, the clerisy, [433] wins its way up into these places, andgets represented here, somewhat on this footing of conquest. Anothermode is to pass through all the degrees, spending a year and a day inSt. Michael's Square, [434] being steeped in Cologne water, [435] andperfumed, and dined, and introduced, and properly grounded in all thebiography, and politics, and anecdotes of the boudoirs. 

18. Yet these fineries may have grace and wit. Let there be grotesquesculpture about the gates and offices of temples. Let the creed andcommandments even have the saucy homage of parody. The forms ofpoliteness universally express benevolence in superlative degrees. What if they are in the mouths of selfish men, and used as means ofselfishness? What if the false gentleman almost bows the true out ofthe world? What if the false gentleman contrives so to address hiscompanion, as civilly to exclude all others from his discourse, andalso to make them feel excluded? Real service will not lose itsnobleness. All generosity is not merely French and sentimental; nor isit to be concealed, that living blood and a passion of kindness doesat last distinguish God's gentleman from Fashion's. The epitaph of SirJenkin Grout is not wholly unintelligible to the present age. "Herelies Sir Jenkin Grout, who loved his friend, and persuaded his enemy:what his mouth ate, his hand paid for: what his servants robbed, herestored: if a woman gave him pleasure, he supported her in pain: henever forgot his children: and whoso touched his finger, drew after ithis whole body. " Even the line of heroes is not utterly extinct. Thereis still ever some admirable person in plain clothes, standing on thewharf, who jumps in to rescue a drowning man; there is still someabsurd inventor of charities; some guide and comforter of runawayslaves; some friend of Poland;[436] some Philhellene;[437] somefanatic who plants shade-trees for the second and third generation, and orchards when he is grown old; some well-concealed piety; somejust man happy in an ill-fame; some youth ashamed of the favors offortune, and impatiently casting them on other shoulders. And theseare the centers of society, on which it returns for fresh impulses. These are the creators of Fashion, which is an attempt to organizebeauty of behavior. The beautiful and the generous are in the theory, the doctors and apostles of this church: Scipio, and the Cid, and SirPhilip Sidney, and Washington, and every pure and valiant heart, whoworshiped Beauty by word and by deed. The persons who constitute thenatural aristocracy, are not found in the actual aristocracy, or onlyon its edge; as the chemical energy of the spectrum is found to begreatest just outside of the spectrum. Yet that is the infirmity ofthe seneschals, who do not know their sovereign, when he appears. Thetheory of society supposes the existence and sovereignty of these. Itdivines afar off their coming. It says with the elder gods, --

 "As Heaven and Earth are fairer far[438] Than Chaos and blank Darkness, though once chiefs; And as we show beyond that Heaven and Earth, In form and shape compact and beautiful; So, on our heels a fresh perfection treads; A power, more strong in beauty, born of us, And fated to excel us, as we pass In glory that old Darkness: . . . For, 'tis the eternal law, That first in beauty shall be first in might. "

19. Therefore, within the ethnical circle of good society, there is anarrower and higher circle, concentration of its light, and flower ofcourtesy, to which there is always a tacit appeal of pride andreference, as to its inner and imperial court, the parliament of loveand chivalry. And this is constituted of those persons in whom heroicdispositions are native, with the love of beauty, the delight insociety, and the power to embellish the passing day. If theindividuals who compose the purest circles of aristocracy in Europe, the guarded blood of centuries, should pass in review, in such manneras that we could, leisurely and critically, inspect their behavior, wemight find no gentleman, and no lady; for although excellent specimensof courtesy and high-breeding would gratify us in the assemblage, inthe particulars, we should detect offense. Because, elegance comes ofno breeding, but of birth. There must be romance of character, or themost fastidious exclusion of impertinencies will not avail. It must begenius which takes that direction: it must be not courteous, butcourtesy. High behavior is as rare in fiction as it is in fact. Scottis praised for the fidelity with which he painted the demeanor andconversation of the superior classes. Certainly, kings and queens, nobles and great ladies, had some right to complain of the absurditythat had been put in their mouths, before the days of Waverley;[439]but neither does Scott's dialogue bear criticism. His lords brave eachother in smart epigrammatic speeches, but the dialogue is in costume, and does not please on the second reading; it is not warm with life. In Shakespeare alone, the speakers do not strut and bridle, thedialogue is easily great, and he adds to so many titles that of beingthe best-bred man in England, and in Christendom. Once or twice in alifetime we are permitted to enjoy the charm of noble manners, in thepresence of a man or woman who have no bar in their nature, but whosecharacter emanates freely in their word and gesture. A beautiful formis better than a beautiful face: a beautiful behavior is better than abeautiful form: it gives a higher pleasure than statues or pictures;it is the finest of the fine arts. A man is but a little thing in themidst of the objects of nature, yet, by the moral quality radiatingfrom his countenance, he may abolish all considerations of magnitude, and in his manners equal the majesty of the world. I have seen anindividual whose manners though wholly within the conventions ofelegant society, were never learned there, but were original andcommanding, and held out protection and prosperity; one who did notneed the aid of a court-suit, but carried the holiday in his eye; whoexhilarated the fancy by flinging wide the doors of new modes ofexistence; who shook off the captivity of etiquette, with happy, spirited bearing, good-natured and free as Robin Hood;[440] yet withthe port of an emperor, --if need be, calm, serious, and fit to standthe gaze of millions. 

20. The open air and the fields, the street and public chambers, arethe places where Man executes his will; let him yield or divide thescepter at the door of the house. Woman, with her instinct ofbehavior, instantly detects in man a love of trifles, any coldness orimbecility, or, in short, any want of that large, flowing, andmagnanimous deportment, which is indispensable as an exterior in thehall. Our American institutions have been friendly to her, and at thismoment I esteem it a chief felicity of this country, that it excels inwomen. A certain awkward consciousness of inferiority in the men, maygive rise to the new chivalry in behalf of Woman's Rights. Certainly, let her be as much better placed in the laws and in social forms, asthe most zealous reformer can ask, but I confide so entirely in herinspiring and musical nature, that I believe only herself can show ushow she shall be served. The wonderful generosity of her sentimentsraises her at times into heroical and godlike regions, and verifiesthe pictures of Minerva, [441] Juno, [442] or Polymnia;[443] and, by thefirmness with which she treads her upward path, she convinces thecoarsest calculators that another road exists than that which theirfeet know. But besides those who make good in our imagination theplace of muses and of Delphic Sibyls, [444] are there not women whofill our vase with wine and roses to the brim, so that the wine runsover and fills the house with perfume; who inspire us with courtesy;who unloose our tongues, and we speak; who anoint our eyes, and wesee? We say things we never thought to have said; for once, our wallsof habitual reserve vanished, and left us at large; we were childrenplaying with children in a wide field of flowers. Steep us, we cried, in these influences, for days, for weeks, and we shall be sunny poets, and will write out in many-colored words the romance that you are. Wasit Hafiz[445] or Firdousi[446] that said of his Persian Lilla, "Shewas an elemental force, and astonished me by her amount of life, whenI saw her day after day radiating, every instant, redundant joy andgrace on all around her. [447] She was a solvent powerful to reconcileall heterogeneous persons into one society; like air or water, anelement of such a great range of affinities, that it combines readilywith a thousand substances. Where she is present, all others will bemore than they are wont. She was a unit and whole, so that whatsoevershe did, became her. She had too much sympathy and desire to please, than that you could say, her manners were marked with dignity, yet noprincess could surpass her clear and erect demeanor on each occasion. She did not study the Persian grammar, nor the books of the sevenpoets, but all the poems of the seven seemed to be written upon her. For, though the bias of her nature was not to thought, but tosympathy, yet was she so perfect in her own nature, as to meetintellectual persons by the fullness of her heart, warming them by hersentiments; believing, as she did, that by dealing nobly with all, allwould show themselves noble. "

21. I know that this Byzantine[448] pile of chivalry of Fashion, whichseems so fair and picturesque to those who look at the contemporaryfacts for science or for entertainment, is not equally pleasant to allspectators. The constitution of our society makes it a giant's castleto the ambitious youth who have not found their names enrolled in itsGolden Book, [449] and whom it has excluded from its coveted honors andprivileges. They have yet to learn that its seeming grandeur isshadowy and relative: it is great by their allowance: its proudestgates will fly open at the approach of their courage and virtue. Forthe present distress, however, of those who are predisposed to sufferfrom the tyrannies of this caprice, there are easy remedies. To removeyour residence a couple of miles, or at most four, will commonlyrelieve the most extreme susceptibility. For, the advantages whichfashion values are plants which thrive in very confined localities, in a few streets, namely. Out of this precinct, they go for nothing;are of no use in the farm, in the forest, in the market, in war, inthe nuptial society, in the literary or scientific circle, at sea, infriendship, in the heaven of thought or virtue. 

22. But we have lingered long enough in these painted courts. Theworth of the thing signified must vindicate our taste for the emblem. Everything that is called fashion and courtesy humbles itself beforethe cause and fountain of honor, creator of titles and dignities, namely, the heart of love. This is the royal blood, this the fire, which, in all countries and contingencies, will work after its kindand conquer ind expand all that approaches it. This gives new meaningsto every fact. This impoverishes the rich, suffering no grandeur butits own. What _is_ rich? Are you rich enough to help anybody? tosuccor the unfashionable and the eccentric? rich enough to make theCanadian in his wagon, the itinerant with his consul's paper whichcommends him "To the charitable, " the swarthy Italian with his fewbroken words of English, the lame pauper hunted by overseers from townto town, even the poor insane or besotted wreck of man or woman, feelthe noble exception of your presence and your house, from the generalbleakness and stoniness; to make such feel that they were greeted witha voice which made them both remember and hope? What is vulgar, but torefuse the claim on acute and conclusive reasons? What is gentle, butto allow it, and give their heart and yours lone holiday from thenational caution? Without the rich heart, wealth is an ugly beggar. The king of Schiraz[450] could not afford to be so bountiful as thepoor Osman[451] who dwelt at his gate. Osman had a humanity so broadand deep, that although his speech was so bold and free with theKoran[452] as to disgust all the dervishes, yet was there never a pooroutcast, eccentric, or insane man, some fool who had cut off hisbeard, or who had been mutilated under a vow, or had a pet madness inhis brain, but fled at once to him, --that great heart lay there sosunny and hospitable in the center of the country, --that it seemed asif the instinct of all sufferers drew them to his side. And themadness which he harbored, he did not share. Is not this to be rich?this only to be rightly rich?

23. But I shall hear without pain, that I play the courtier very ill, and talk of that which I do not well understand. It is easy to see, that what is called by distinction society and fashion, has good lawsas well as bad, has much that is necessary, and much that is absurd. Too good for banning, and too bad for blessing, it reminds us of atradition of the pagan mythology, in any attempt to settle itscharacter. "I overheard Jove, [453] one day, " said Silenus, [454]"talking of destroying the earth; he said, it had failed; they wereall rogues and vixens, who went from bad to worse, as fast as the dayssucceeded each other. Minerva said, she hoped not; they were onlyridiculous little creatures, with this odd circumstance, that they hada blur, or indeterminate aspect, seen far or seen near; if you calledthem bad, they would appear so; if you called them good, they wouldappear so; and there was no one person or action among them, whichwould not puzzle her owl, [455] much more all Olympus, to know whetherit was fundamentally bad or good. "

GIFTS[456]

 Gifts of one who loved me-- 'Twas high time they came; When he ceased to love me, Time they stopped for shame. 

1. It is said that the world is in a state of bankruptcy, that theworld owes the world more than the world can pay, and ought to go intochancery, [457] and be sold. I do not think this general insolvency, which involves in some sort all the population, to be the reason ofthe difficulty experienced at Christmas and New Year, and other times, in bestowing gifts; since it is always so pleasant to be generous, though very vexatious to pay debts. But the impediment lies in thechoosing. If, at any time, it comes into my head that a present is duefrom me to somebody, I am puzzled what to give, until the opportunityis gone. Flowers and fruits are always fit presents; flowers, becausethey are a proud assertion that a ray of beauty outvalues all theutilities of the world. These gay natures contrast with the somewhatstern countenance of ordinary nature: they are like music heard out ofa work-house. Nature does not cocker us:[458] we are children, notpets: she is not fond: everything is dealt to us without fear orfavor, after severe universal laws. Yet these delicate flowers looklike the frolic and interference of love and beauty. Men use to tellus that we love flattery, even though we are not deceived by it, because it shows that we are of importance enough to be courted. Something like that pleasure, the flowers give us: what am I to whomthese sweet hints are addressed? Fruits are acceptable gifts, [459]because they are the flower of commodities, and admit of fantasticvalues being attached to them. If a man should send to me to come ahundred miles to visit him, and should set before me a basket of finesummer-fruit, I should think there was some proportion between thelabor and the reward. 

2. For common gifts, necessity makes pertinences and beauty every day, and one is glad when an imperative leaves him no option, since if theman at the door have no shoes, you have not to consider whether youcould procure him a paint-box. And as it is always pleasing to see aman eat bread or drink water, in the house or out of doors, so it isalways a great satisfaction to supply these first wants. Necessitydoes everything well. In our condition of universal dependence, itseems heroic to let the petitioner[460] be the judge of his necessity, and to give all that is asked, though at great inconvenience. If it bea fantastic desire, it is better to leave to others the office ofpunishing him. I can think of many parts I should prefer playing tothat of the Furies. [461] Next to things of necessity, the rule for agift, which one of my friends prescribed, is that we might convey tosome person that which properly belonged to his character, and waseasily associated with him in thought. But our tokens of complimentand love are for the most part barbarous. Rings and other jewels arenot gifts, but apologies for gifts. The only gift is a portion ofthyself. Thou must bleed for me. Therefore the poet brings his poem;the shepherd, his lamb; the farmer, corn; the miner, a gem; thesailor, coral and shells; the painter, his picture; the girl, ahandkerchief of her own sewing. This is right and pleasing, for itrestores society in so far to its primary basis, when a man'sbiography[462] is conveyed in his gift, and every man's wealth is anindex of his merit. But it is a cold lifeless business when you go tothe shops to buy me something which does not represent your life andtalent, but a goldsmith's. That is fit for kings, and rich men whorepresent kings, and a false state of property, to make presents ofgold and silver stuffs, as a kind of symbolical sin-offering, [463] orpayment of blackmail. [464]

3. The law of benefits is a difficult channel, which requires carefulsailing, or rude boats. It is not the office of a man to receivegifts. How dare you give them? We wish to be self-sustained. We do notquite forgive a forgiver. The hand that feeds us is in some danger ofbeing bitten. We can receive anything from love, for that is a way ofreceiving it from ourselves; but not from any one who assumes tobestow. We sometimes hate the meat which we eat, because there seemssomething of degrading dependence in living by it. 

 "Brother, if Jove[465] to thee a present make, Take heed that from his hands thou nothing take. "

We ask the whole. Nothing less will content us. We arraign society, ifit do not give us besides earth, and fire, and water, opportunity, love, reverence, and objects of veneration. 

4. He is a good man, who can receive a gift well. We are either glador sorry at a gift, and both emotions are unbecoming. Some violence, Ithink, is done, some degradation borne, when I rejoice or grieve at agift. I am sorry when my independence is invaded, or when a gift comesfrom such as do not know my spirit, and so the act is not supported;and if the gift pleases me overmuch, then I should be ashamed that thedonor should read my heart, and see that I love his commodity, and nothim. The gift, to be true, must be the flowing of the giver unto me, correspondent to my flowing unto him. When the waters are at level, then my goods pass to him, and his to me. All his are mine, all minehis. I say to him, How can you give me this pot of oil, or this flagonof wine, when all your oil and wine is mine, which belief of mine thisgift seems to deny? Hence the fitness of beautiful, not useful thingsfor gifts. This giving is flat usurpation, and therefore when thebeneficiary is ungrateful, as all beneficiaries hate all Timons, [466]not at all considering the value of the gift, but looking back to thegreater store it was taken from, I rather sympathize with thebeneficiary, than with the anger of my lord, Timon. For, theexpectation of gratitude is mean, and is continually punished by thetotal insensibility of the obliged person. It is a great happiness toget off without injury and heart-burning, from one who has had the illluck to be served by you. It is a very onerous business, [467] this ofbeing served, and the debtor naturally wishes to give you a slap. Agolden text for these gentlemen is that which I admire in theBuddhist, [468] who never thanks, and who says, "Do not flatter yourbenefactors. "

5. The reason of these discords I conceive to be, that there is nocommensurability between a man and any gift. You cannot give anythingto a magnanimous person. After you have served him, he at once putsyou in debt by his magnanimity. The service a man renders his friendis trivial and selfish, compared with the service he knows his friendstood in readiness to yield him, alike before he had begun to servehis friend, and now also. Compared with that good-will I bear myfriend, the benefit it is in my power to render him seems small. Besides, our action on each other, good as well as evil, is soincidental and at random, that we can seldom hear the acknowledgmentsof any person who would thank us for a benefit, without some shame andhumiliation. We can rarely strike a direct stroke, but must be contentwith an oblique one; we seldom have the satisfaction of yielding adirect benefit, which is directly received. But rectitude scattersfavors on every side without knowing it, and receives with wonder thethanks of all people. 

6. I fear to breathe any treason against the majesty of love, which isthe genius and god of gifts, and to whom we must not affect toprescribe. Let him give kingdoms or flower-leaves indifferently. Thereare persons from whom we always expect fairy tokens; let us not ceaseto expect them. This is prerogative, and not to be limited by ourmunicipal rules. For the rest, I like to see that we cannot be boughtand sold. The best of hospitality and of generosity is also not in thewill, but in fate. I find that I am not much to you; you do not needme; you do not feel me; then am I thrust out of doors, though youproffer me house and lands. No services are of any value, but onlylikeness. When I have attempted to join myself to others by services, it proved an intellectual trick--no more. They eat your service likeapples, and leave you out. But love them, and they feel for you, anddelight in you all the time. 

NATURE[469]

 The rounded world is fair to see, Nine times folded in mystery: Though baffled seers cannot impart The secret of its laboring heart, Throb thine with Nature's throbbing breast, And all is clear from east to west. Spirit that lurks each form within Beckons to spirit of its kin; Self-kindled every atom glows, And hints the future which it owes. 

1. There are days[470] which occur in this climate, at almost anyseason of the year, wherein the world reaches its perfection, when theair, the heavenly bodies, and the earth, make a harmony, as if naturewould indulge her offspring; when, in these bleak upper sides of theplanet, nothing is to desire that we have heard of the happiestlatitudes, and we bask in the shining hours of Florida and Cuba; wheneverything that has life gives sign of satisfaction, and the cattlethat lie on the ground seem to have great and tranquil thoughts. Thesehalcyons[471] may be looked for with a little more assurance in thatpure October weather, which we distinguish by the name of IndianSummer. [472] The day, immeasurably long, sleeps over the broad hillsand warm wide fields. To have lived through all its sunny hours, seems longevity enough. The solitary places do not seem quite lonely. At the gates of the forest, the surprised man of the world is forcedto leave his city estimates of great and small, wise and foolish. Theknapsack of custom falls off his back with the first step he makesinto these precincts. Here is sanctity which shames our religions, andreality which discredits our heroes. Here we find nature to be thecircumstance which dwarfs every other circumstance, and judges like agod all men that come to her. We have crept out of our close andcrowded houses into the night and morning, and we see what majesticbeauties daily wrap us in their bosom. How willingly we would escapethe barriers which render them comparatively impotent, escape thesophistication and second thought, and suffer nature to entrance us. The tempered light of the woods is like a perpetual morning, and isstimulating and heroic. The anciently reported spells of these placescreep on us. The stems of pines, hemlocks, and oaks, almost gleam likeiron on the excited eye. The incommunicable trees begin to persuade usto live with them, and quit our life of solemn trifles. Here nohistory, or church, or state, is interpolated on the divine sky andthe immortal year. How easily we might walk onward into openinglandscape, absorbed by new pictures, and by thoughts fast succeedingeach other, until by degrees the recollection of home was crowded outof the mind, all memory obliterated by the tyranny of the present, and we were led in triumph by nature. 

2. These enchantments are medicinal, they sober and heal us. These areplain pleasures, kindly and native to us. We come to our own, and makefriends with matter, which the ambitious chatter of the schools wouldpersuade us to despise. We never can part with it; the mind loves itsold home: as water to our thirst, so is the rock, the ground, to oureyes, and hands, and feet. It is firm water: it is cold flame: whathealth, what affinity! Ever an old friend, ever like a dear friend andbrother, when we chat affectedly with strangers, comes in this honestface, and takes a grave liberty with us, and shames us out of ournonsense. Cities give not the human senses room enough. We go outdaily and nightly to feed the eyes on the horizon, and require so muchscope, just as we need water for our bath. There are all degrees ofnatural influence, from these quarantine powers of nature, up to herdearest and gravest ministrations to the imagination and the soul. There is the bucket of cold water from the spring, the wood-fire towhich the chilled traveler rushes for safety, --and there is thesublime moral of autumn and of noon. We nestle in nature, and draw ourliving as parasites from her roots and grains, and we receive glancesfrom the heavenly bodies, which call us to solitude, and foretell theremotest future. The blue zenith is the point in which romance andreality meet. I think, if we should be rapt away into all that wedream of heaven, and should converse with Gabriel[473] and Uriel, [474]the upper sky would be all that would remain of our furniture. 

3. It seems as if the day was not wholly profane, in which we havegiven heed to some natural object. The fall of snowflakes in a stillair, preserving to each crystal its perfect form; the blowing of sleetover a wide sheet of water, and over plains; the waving rye-fields;the mimic waving of acres of houstonia, whose innumerable floretswhiten and ripple before the eye; the reflections of trees and flowersin glassy lakes; the musical steaming odorous south wind, whichconverts all trees to wind-harps;[475] the crackling and spurting ofhemlock in the flames; or of pine-logs, which yield glory to the wallsand faces in the sitting-room, --these are the music and pictures ofthe most ancient religion. My house stands in low land, with limitedoutlook, and on the skirt of the village. [476] But I go with myfriend[477] to the shore of our little river, [478] and with one strokeof the paddle, I leave the village politics and personalities, yes, and the world of villages and personalities behind, and pass into adelicate realm of sunset and moonlight, too bright almost for spottedman to enter without novitiate and probation. [479] We penetrate bodilythis incredible beauty: we dip our hands in this painted element: oureyes are bathed in these lights and forms. A holiday, avilleggiatura, [480] a royal revel, the proudest, most heart-rejoicingfestival that valor and beauty, power and taste, ever decked andenjoyed, establishes itself on the instant. These sunset clouds, thesedelicately emerging stars, with their private and ineffable glances, signify it and proffer it. I am taught the poorness of our invention, the ugliness of towns and palaces. Art and luxury have early learnedthat they must work as enhancement and sequel to this original beauty. I am overinstructed for my return. Henceforth I shall be hard toplease. I cannot go back to toys. I am grown expensive andsophisticated. I can no longer live without elegance: but a countrymanshall be my master of revels. He who knows the most, he who knows whatsweets and virtues are in the ground, the waters, the plants, theheavens, and how to come at these enchantments, is the rich and royalman. Only as far as masters of the world have called in nature totheir aid, can they reach the height of magnificence. This is themeaning of their hanging-gardens, [481] villas, garden-houses, islands, parks, and preserves, to back their faulty personality with thesestrong accessories. I do not wonder that the landed interest should beinvincible in the state with these dangerous auxiliaries. These bribeand invite; not kings, not palaces, not men, not women, but thesetender and poetic stars, eloquent of secret promises. We heard whatthe rich man said, we knew of his villa, his grove, his wine, and hiscompany, but the provocation and point of the invitation came out ofthese beguiling stars. In their soft glances, I see what men strove torealize in some Versailles, [482] or Paphos, [483] or Ctesiphon. [484]Indeed, it is the magical lights of the horizon, and the blue sky forthe background, which save all our works of art, which were otherwisebaubles. When the rich tax the poor with servility and obsequiousness, they should consider the effect of man reputed to be the possessors ofnature, on imaginative minds. Ah! if the rich were rich as the poorfancy riches! A boy hears a military band play on the field at night, and he has kings and queens, and famous chivalry palpably before him. He hears the echoes of a horn in a hill country, in the NotchMountains, [485] for example, which converts the mountains into anÆolian harp, [486] and this supernatural _tiralira_ restores to him theDorian[487] mythology, Apollo, [488] Diana, [489] and all divine huntersand huntresses. Can a musical note be so lofty, so haughtilybeautiful! To the poor young poet, thus fabulous is his picture ofsociety; he is loyal; he respects the rich; they are rich for the sakeof his imagination; how poor his fancy would be, if they were notrich! That they have some high-fenced grove, which they call a park;that they live in larger and better-garnished saloons than he hasvisited, and go in coaches, keeping only the society of the elegant, to watering-places, and to distant cities, are the groundwork fromwhich he has delineated estates of romance, compared with which theiractual possessions are shanties and paddocks. The muse herself betraysher son, and enhances the gift of wealthy and well-born beauty, by aradiation out of the air, and clouds, and forests that skirt theroad, --a certain haughty favor, as if from patrician genii topatricians, a kind of aristocracy in nature, a prince of the power ofthe air. 

4. The moral sensibility which makes Edens[490] and Tempes[491] soeasily, may not be always found, but the material landscape is neverfar off. We can find these enchantments without visiting the ComoLake, [492] or the Madeira Islands. [493] We exaggerate the praises oflocal scenery. In every landscape, the point of astonishment is themeeting of the sky and the earth, and that is seen from the firsthillock as well as from the top of the Alleghanies. The stars at nightstoop down over the brownest, homeliest common, [494] with all thespiritual magnificence which they shed on the Campagna, [495] or on themarble deserts of Egypt. The uprolled clouds and the colors of morningand evening, will transfigure maples and alders. The differencebetween landscape and landscape is small, but there is greatdifference in the beholders. There is nothing so wonderful in anyparticular landscape, as the necessity of being beautiful under whichevery landscape lies. Nature cannot be surprised in undress. Beautybreaks in everywhere. 

5. But it is very easy to outrun the sympathy of readers on thistopic, which school-men called _natura naturata_, or nature passive. One can hardly speak directly of it without excess. It is as easy tobroach in mixed companies what is called "the subject of religion. " Asusceptible person does not like to indulge his tastes in this kind, without the apology of some trivial necessity: he goes to see awood-lot, or to look at the crops, or to fetch a plant or a mineralfrom a remote locality, or he carries a fowling-piece, or afishing-rod. I suppose this shame must have a good reason. Adilettantism[496] in nature is barren and unworthy. The fop of fieldsis no better than his brother of Broadway. Men are naturally huntersand inquisitive of woodcraft and I suppose that such a gazetteer aswood-cutters and Indians should furnish facts for would take place inthe most sumptuous drawing-rooms of all the "Wreaths" and "Flora'schaplets"[497] of the book-shops; yet ordinarily, whether we are tooclumsy for so subtle a topic, or from whatever cause, as soon as menbegin to write on nature, they fall into euphuism. Frivolity is a mostunfit tribute to Pan, [498] who ought to be represented in themythology as the most continent of gods. I would not be frivolousbefore the admirable reserve and prudence of time, yet I cannotrenounce the right of returning often to this old topic. The multitudeof false churches[499] accredits the true religion. Literature, poetry, science, are the homage of man to this unfathomed secret, concerning which no sane man can affect an indifference orincuriosity. Nature is loved by what is best in us. It is loved as thecity of God, although, or rather because there is no citizen. Thesunset is unlike anything that is underneath it: it wants men. And thebeauty of nature must always seem unreal and mocking, until thelandscape has human figures, that are as good as itself. If therewere good men, there would never be this rapture in nature. If theking is in the palace nobody looks at the walls. It is when he isgone, and the house is filled with grooms and gazers, that we turnfrom the people, to find relief in the majestic men that are suggestedby the pictures and architecture. The critics who complain of thesickly separation of the beauty of nature from the thing to be done, must consider that our hunting of the picturesque is inseparable fromour protest against false society. Man is fallen; nature is erect, andserves as a differential thermometer, detecting the presence orabsence of the divine sentiment in man. By fault of our dulness andselfishness, we are looking up to nature, but when we areconvalescent, nature will look up to us. We see the foaming brook withcompunction; if our own life flowed with the right energy, we shouldshame the brook. The stream of zeal sparkles with real fire, and notwith reflex rays of sun and moon. Nature may be as selfishly studiedas trade. Astronomy to the selfish becomes astrology; psychology, mesmerism (with intent to show where our spoons are gone); and anatomyand physiology become phrenology and palmistry. 

6. But taking timely warning, and leaving many things unsaid on thistopic, but not longer omit our homage to the Efficient Nature, _naturanaturans_, the quick cause, before which all forms flee as the drivensnows, itself secret, its works driven before it in flocks andmultitudes, (as the ancient represented nature by Proteus, [500] ashepherd), and in undescribable variety. It publishes itself increatures, reaching from particles and spicula, through transformationon transformation to the highest symmetries, arriving at consummateresults without a shock or a leap. A little heat, that is, a littlemotion, is all that differences the bald, dazzling white, and deadlycold poles of the earth from the prolific tropical climates. All changespass without violence, by reason of the two cardinal conditions ofboundless space and boundless time. Geology has initiated us into thesecularity of nature, and taught us to disuse our dame-school measures, and exchange our Mosaic[501] and Ptolemaic schemes[502] for her largestyle. We know nothing rightly, for want of perspective. Now we learnwhat patient periods must round themselves before the rock is formed, then before the rock is broken, and the first lichen race hasdisintegrated the thinnest external plate into soil, and opened the doorfor the remote Flora, [503] Fauna, [504] Ceres, [505] and Pomona, [506] tocome in. How far off yet is the trilobite! how far the quadruped! howinconceivably remote is man! All duly arrive, [507] and then race afterrace of men. It is a long way from granite to the oyster; farther yet toPlato, [508] and the preaching of the immortality of the soul. Yet allmust come, as surely as the first atom has two sides. 

7. Motion or change, and identity or rest, are the first and secondsecrets of nature: Motion and Rest. The whole code of her laws may bewritten on the thumb-nail, or the signet of a ring. The whirlingbubble on the surface of a brook, admits us to the secret of themechanics of the sky. Every shell on the beach is a key to it. Alittle water made to rotate in a cup explains the formation of thesimpler shells; the addition of matter from year to year, arrives atlast at the most complex forms; and yet so poor is nature with all hercraft, that, from the beginning to the end of the universe, she hasbut one stuff, --but one stuff with its two ends, to serve up all herdream-like variety. Compound it how she will, star, sand, fire, water, tree, man, it is still one stuff, and betrays the same properties. 

8. Nature is always consistent, though she feigns to contravene herown laws. She keeps her laws, and seems to transcend them. She armsand equips an animal to find its place and living in the earth, and, at the same time, she arms and equips another animal to destroy it. Space exists to divide creatures; but by clothing the sides of a birdwith a few feathers, she gives him a petty omnipresence. The directionis forever onward, but the artist still goes back for materials, andbegins again with the first elements on the most advanced stage:otherwise, all goes to ruin. If we look at her work, we seem to catcha glance of a system in transition. Plants are the young of the world, vessels of health and vigor; but they grope ever upward towardconsciousness; the trees are imperfect men, and seem to bemoan theirimprisonment, rooted in the ground. The animal is the novice andprobationer of a more advanced order. The men, though young, havingtasted the first drop from the cup of thought, are already dissipated:the maples and ferns are still uncorrupt; yet no doubt, when they cometo consciousness, they too will curse and swear. Flowers so strictlybelong to youth, that we adult men soon come to feel, that theirbeautiful generations concern not us: we have had our day; now let thechildren have theirs. The flowers jilt us, and we are old bachelorswith our ridiculous tenderness. 

9. Things are so strictly related, that according to the skill of theeye, from any one object the parts and properties of any other may bepredicted. If we had eyes to see it, a bit of stone from the city wallwould certify us of the necessity that man must exist, as readily asthe city. That identity makes us all one, and reduces to nothing greatintervals on our customary scale. We talk of deviations from naturallife, as if artificial life were not also natural. The smoothestcurled courtier in the boudoirs of a palace has an animal nature, rudeand aboriginal as a white bear, omnipotent to its own ends, and isdirectly related, there amid essences and billets-doux, to Himalayamountain-chains[509] and the axis of the globe. If we consider howmuch we are nature's, we need not be superstitious about towns, as ifthat terrific or benefic force did not find us there also, and fashioncities. Nature, who made the mason, made the house. We may easily heartoo much of rural influences. The cool, disengaged air of naturalobjects, makes them enviable to us, chafed and irritable creatureswith red faces, and we think we shall be as grand as they, if we campout and eat roots, but let us be men instead of wood-chucks, and theoak and the elm shall gladly serve us, though we sit in chairs ofivory on carpets of silk. 

10. This guiding identity runs through all the surprises and contrastsof the piece, and characterizes every law. Man carries the world inhis head, the whole astronomy and chemistry suspended in a thought. Because the history of nature is charactered in his brain, thereforeis he the prophet and discoverer of her secrets. Every known fact innatural science was divined by the presentiment of somebody, before itwas actually verified. A man does not tie his shoe without recognizinglaws which bind the farthest regions of nature: moon, plant, gas, crystal, are concrete geometry and numbers. Common sense knows itsown, and recognizes the fact at first sight in chemical experiment. The common sense of Franklin, [510] Dalton, [511] Davy[512] andBlack, [513] is the same common sense which made the arrangements whichnow it discovers. 

11. If the identity expresses organized rest, the counter action runsalso into organization. The astronomers said, [514] "Give us matter, and a little motion, and we will construct the universe. It is notenough that we should have matter, we must also have a single impulse, one shove to launch the mass, and generate the harmony of thecentrifugal and centripetal[515] forces. Once heave the ball from thehand, and we can show how all this mighty order grew. " "A veryunreasonable postulate, " said the metaphysicians, "and a plain beggingof the question. Could you not prevail to know the genesis ofprojection, as well as the continuation of it?" Nature, meanwhile, hadnot waited for the discussion, but, right or wrong, bestowed theimpulse, and the balls rolled. It was no great affair, a mere push, but the astronomers were right in making much of it, for there is noend of the consequences of the act. That famous aboriginal pushpropagates itself through all the balls of the system, and throughevery atom of every ball, through all the races of creatures, andthrough the history and performances of every individual. Exaggerationis in the course of things. Nature sends no creature, no man into theworld, without adding a small excess of his proper quality. Given theplanet, it is still necessary to add the impulse; so, to everycreature nature added a little violence of direction in its properpath, a shove to put it on its way; in every instance, a slightgenerosity, a drop too much. Without electricity the air would rot, and without this violence of direction which men and women have, without a spice of bigot and fanatic, no excitement, no efficiency. Weaim above the mark, to hit the mark. Every act hath some falsehood ofexaggeration in it. And when now and then comes along some sad, sharp-eyed man, who sees how paltry a game is played, and refuses toplay, but blabs the secret;--how then? is the bird flown? O no, thewary Nature sends a new troop of fairer forms, of lordlier youths, with a little more excess of direction to hold them fast to theirseveral aims; makes them a little wrongheaded in that direction inwhich they are rightest, and on goes the game again with new whirl, for a generation or two more. The child with his sweet pranks, thefool of his senses, commanded by every sight and sound, without anypower to compare and rank his sensations, abandoned to a whistle or apainted chip, to a lead dragoon, or a ginger-bread dog, individualizing everything, generalizing nothing, delighted with everynew thing, lies down at night overpowered by the fatigue, which thisday of continual petty madness has incurred. But Nature has answeredher purpose with the curly, dimpled lunatic. She has tasked everyfaculty, and has secured the symmetrical growth of the bodily frame, by all these attitudes and exertions, --an end of the first importance, which could not be trusted to any care less perfect than her own. Thisglitter, this opaline luster plays round the top of every toy to hiseye, to insure his fidelity, and he is deceived to his good. We aremade alive and kept alive by the same arts. Let the Stoics[516] saywhat they please, we do not eat for the good of living, but becausethe meat is savory and the appetite is keen. The vegetable life doesnot content itself with casting from the flower or the tree a singleseed, but it fills the air and earth with a prodigality of seeds, that if thousands perish, thousands may plant themselves, thathundreds may come up, that tens may live to maturity, that, at least, one may replace the parent. All things betray the same calculatedprofusion. The excess of fear with which the animal frame is hedgedround, shrinking from cold, starting at sight of a snake, or a suddennoise, protects us, through a multitude of groundless alarms, fromsome one real danger at last. The lover seeks in marriage his privatefelicity and perfection, with no prospective end; and nature hides inhis happiness her own end, namely, progeny, or the perpetuity of therace. 

12. But the craft with which the world is made runs also into the mindand character of men. No man is quite sane; each has a vein of folly inhis composition, a slight determination of blood to the head, to makesure of holding him hard to some one point which nature had taken toheart. Great causes are never tried on their merits; but the cause isreduced to particulars to suit the size of the partisans, and thecontention is ever hottest on minor matters. Not less remarkable is theoverfaith of each man in the importance of what he has to do or say. Thepoet, the prophet, has a higher value for what he utters than anyhearer, and therefore it gets spoken. The strong, self-complacentLuther[517] declares with an emphasis, not to be mistaken, that "Godhimself cannot do without wise men. " Jacob Behmen[518] and GeorgeFox[519] betray their egotism in the pertinacity of their controversialtracts, and James Naylor[520] once suffered himself to be worshiped asthe Christ. Each prophet comes presently to identify himself with histhought, and to esteem his hat and shoes sacred. However this maydiscredit such persons with the judicious, it helps them with thepeople, as it gives heat, pungency, and publicity to their words. Asimilar experience is not infrequent in private life. Each young andardent person writes a diary, in which, when the hours of prayer andpenitence arrive, he inscribes his soul. The pages thus written are, tohim, burning and fragrant: he reads them on his knees by midnight and bythe morning star; he wets them with his tears: they are sacred; too goodfor the world, and hardly yet to be shown to the dearest friend. This isthe man-child that is born to the soul, and her life still circulates inthe babe. The umbilical cord has not yet been cut. After some time haselapsed, he begins to wish to admit his friend to this hallowedexperience, and with hesitation, yet with firmness, exposes the pages tohis eye. Will they not burn his eyes? The friend coldly turns themover, and passes from the writing to conversation, with easy transition, which strikes the other party with astonishment and vexation. He cannotsuspect the writing itself. Days and nights of fervid life, of communionwith angels of darkness and of light, have engraved their shadowycharacters on that tear-stained book. He suspects the intelligence orthe heart of his friend. Is there then no friend? He cannot yet creditthat one may have impressive experience, and yet may not know how to puthis private fact into literature; and perhaps the discovery that wisdomhas other tongues and ministers than we, that though we should hold ourpeace, the truth would not the less be spoken, might check injuriouslythe flames of our zeal. A man can only speak, so long as he does notfeel his speech to be partial and inadequate. It is partial, but he doesnot see it to be so, whilst he utters it. As soon as he is released fromthe instinctive and particular, and sees its partiality, he shuts hismouth in disgust. For, no man can write anything, who does not thinkthat what he writes is for the time the history of the world; or doanything well, who does not esteem his work to be of importance. My workmay be of none, but I must not think it is of none, or I shall not do itwith impunity. 

13. In like manner, there is throughout nature something mocking, something that leads us on and on, but arrives nowhere, keeps no faithwith us. All promise outruns the performance. We live in a system ofapproximations. Every end is prospective of some other end, which isalso temporary; a round and final success nowhere. We are encamped innature, not domesticated. Hunger and thirst lead us on to eat and todrink; but bread and wine, mix and cook them how you will, leave ushungry and thirsty, after the stomach is full. It is the same with allour arts and performances. Our music, our poetry, our language itselfare not satisfactions, but suggestions. The hunger for wealth, whichreduces the planet to a garden, fools the eager pursuer. What is theend sought? Plainly to secure the ends of good sense and beauty, fromthe intrusion of deformity or vulgarity of any kind. But what anoperose[521] method! What a train of means to secure a littleconversation! This palace of brick and stone, these servants, thiskitchen, these stables, horses and equipage, this bank-stock, and fileof mortgages; trade to all the world, country-house and cottage by thewater-side, all for a little conversation, high, clear, and spiritual!Could it not be had as well by beggars on the highway? No, all thesethings came from successive efforts of these beggars to removefriction from the wheels of life, and give opportunity. Conversation, character, were the avowed ends; wealth was good as it appeased theanimal cravings, cured the smoky chimney, silenced the creaking door, brought friends together in a warm and quiet room, and kept thechildren and the dinner-table in a different apartment. Thought, virtue, beauty, were the ends; but it was known that men of thoughtand virtue sometimes had the headache, or wet feet, or could lose goodtime, whilst the room was getting warm in winter days. Unluckily, inthe exertions necessary to remove these inconveniences, the mainattention has been diverted to this object; the old aims have beenlost sight of, and to remove friction has come to be the end. That isthe ridicule of rich men, and Boston, London, Vienna, and now thegovernments generally of the world, are cities and governments of therich, and the masses are not men, but _poor men_, that is, men whowould be rich; this is the ridicule of the class, that they arrivewith pains and sweat and fury nowhere; when all is done, it is fornothing. They are like one who has interrupted the conversation of acompany to make his speech, and now has forgotten what he went to say. The appearance strikes the eye everywhere of an aimless society, ofaimless nations. Were the ends of nature so great and cogent, as toexact this immense sacrifice of men?

14. Quite analogous to the deceits in life, there is, as might beexpected, a similar effect on the eye from the face of externalnature. There is in woods and waters a certain enticement andflattery, together with a failure to yield a present satisfaction. This disappointment is felt in every landscape. I have seen thesoftness and beauty of the summer clouds floating feathery overhead, enjoying, as it seemed, their height and privilege of motion, whilstyet they appeared not so much the drapery of this place and hour, asfore-looking to such pavilions and gardens of festivity beyond. It isan odd jealousy; but the poet finds himself not near enough to thisobject. The pine tree, the river, the bank of flowers before him, doesnot seem to be nature. Nature is still elsewhere. This or this is butoutskirt and far-off reflection[522] and echo of the triumph that haspassed by, and is now at its glancing splendor and heyday, perchancein the neighboring fields, or, if you stand in the field, then in theadjacent woods. The present object shall give you this sense ofstillness that follows a pageant which has just gone by. What splendiddistance, what recesses of ineffable pomp and loveliness in thesunset! But who can go where they are, or lay his hand or plant hisfoot thereon? Off they fall from the round world forever and ever. Itis the same among men and women as among the silent trees; always areferred existence, an absence, never a presence and satisfaction. Isit, that beauty can never be grasped? in persons and in landscapes isequally inaccessible? The accepted and betrothed lover has lost thewildest charm of his maiden in her acceptance of him. She was heavenwhilst he pursued her as a star: she cannot be heaven, if she stoopsto such a one as he. 

15. What shall we say of this omnipresent appearance of that firstprojectile impulse, of this flattery and balking of so manywell-meaning creatures? Must we not suppose somewhere in the universea slight treachery and derision? Are we not engaged to a seriousresentment of this use that is made of us? Are we tickled trout, andfools of nature? One looks at the face of heaven and earth lays allpetulance at rest, and soothes us to wiser convictions. To theintelligent, nature converts itself into a vast promise, and will notbe rashly explained. Her secret is untold. Many and many anOedipus[523] arrives: he has the whole mystery teeming in his brain. Alas! the same sorcery has spoiled his skill; no syllable can he shapeon his lips. Her mighty orbit vaults like the fresh rainbow into thedeep, but no archangel's wing was yet strong enough to follow it, andreport of the return of the curve. But it also appears, that ouractions are seconded and disposed to greater conclusions than wedesigned. We are escorted on every hand through life by spiritualagents, and a beneficent purpose lies in wait for us. We cannot bandywords with nature, or deal with her as we deal with persons. If wemeasure our individual forces against hers, we may easily feel as ifwe were the sport of an insuperable destiny. But if, instead ofidentifying ourselves with the work, we feel that the soul of theworkman streams through us, we shall find the peace of the morningdwelling first in our hearts, and the fathomless powers of gravity andchemistry, and, over them, of life preëxisting within us in theirhighest form. 

16. The uneasiness which the thought of our helplessness in the chainof causes occasions us, results from looking too much at one conditionof nature, namely, Motion. But the drag is never taken from the wheel. Wherever the impulse exceeds the Rest or Identity insinuates itscompensation. All over the wide fields of earth grows theprunella[524] or self-heal. After every foolish day we sleep off thefumes and furies of its hours; and though we are always engaged withparticulars, and often enslaved to them, we bring with us to everyexperiment the innate universal laws. These, while they exist in themind as ideas, stand around us in nature forever embodied, a presentsanity to expose and cure the insanity of men. Our servitude toparticulars betrays us into a hundred foolish expectations. Weanticipate a new era from the invention of a locomotive, or a balloon;the new engine brings with it the old checks. They say that byelectro-magnetism, your salad shall be grown from the seed whilst yourfowl is roasting for dinner: it is a symbol of our modern aims andendeavors, --of our condensation and acceleration of objects: butnothing is gained: nature cannot be cheated: man's life is but seventysalads long, grow they swift or grow they slow. In these checks andimpossibilities, however, we find our advantage, not less than inimpulses. Let the victory fall where it will, we are on that side. Andthe knowledge that we traverse the whole scale of being, from thecenter to the poles of nature, and have some stake in everypossibility, lends that sublime luster to death, which philosophy andreligion have too outwardly and literally striven to express in thepopular doctrine of the immortality of the soul. The reality is moreexcellent than the report. Here is no ruin, no discontinuity, no spentball. The divine circulations never rest nor linger. Nature is theincarnation of a thought, and turns to a thought again, as ice becomeswater and gas. The world is mind precipitated, and the volatileessence is forever escaping again into the state of free thought. Hence the virtue and pungency of the influence on the mind, of naturalobjects, whether inorganic or organized. Man imprisoned, mancrystallized, man vegetative, speaks to man impersonated. That powerwhich does not respect quantity, which makes the whole and theparticle its equal channel, delegates its smile to the morning, anddistills its essence into every drop of rain. Every moment instructsand every object: for wisdom is infused into every form. It has beenpoured into us as blood; it convulsed us as pain; it slid into us aspleasure; it enveloped us in dull, melancholy days, or in days ofcheerful labor; we did not guess its essence, until after a longtime. 

SHAKSPEARE;[525] OR, THE POET

[Transcriber's Note: Shakspeare is spelled as "Shakspeare" as well as"Shakespeare" in this book. The original spellings have been retained. ]

1. Great men are more distinguished by range and extent, than byoriginality. If we require the originality which consists in weaving, like a spider, their web from their own bowels; in finding clay, andmaking bricks, and building the house; no great men are original. Nordoes valuable originality consist in unlikeness to other men. The herois in the press of knights, and the thick of events; and, seeing whatmen want, and sharing their desire, he adds the needful length ofsight and of arm, to come to the desired point. The greatest genius isthe most indebted man. A poet is no rattlebrain, saying what comesuppermost and, because he says everything, saying, at last, somethinggood; but a heart in unison with his time and country. There isnothing whimsical and fantastic in his production, but sweet and sadearnest, freighted with the weightiest convictions, and pointed withthe most determined aim which any man or class knows of in his times. 

2. The Genius[526] of our life is jealous of individuals and will nothave any individual great, except through the general. There is nochoice to genius. A great man does not wake up on some fine morning, and say, "I am full of life, I will go to sea, and find an Antarcticcontinent: to-day I will square the circle: I will ransack botany, andfind a new food for man: I have a new architecture in my mind: Iforesee a new mechanic power:" no, but he finds himself in the riverof the thoughts and events, forced onward by the ideas and necessitiesof his contemporaries. He stands where all the eyes of men look oneway, and their hands all point in the direction in which he should go. The church has reared him amidst rites and pomps, and he carries outthe advice which her music gave him, and builds a cathedral needed byher chants and processions. He finds a war raging: it educates him, bytrumpet, in barracks, and he betters the instruction. He finds twocounties groping to bring coal, or flour, or fish, from the place ofproduction to the place of consumption, and he hits on a railroad. Every master has found his materials collected, and his power lay inhis sympathy with his people, and in his love of the materials hewrought in. What an economy of power! and what a compensation for theshortness of life! All is done to his hand. The world has brought himthus far on his way. The human race has gone out before him, sunk thehills, filled the hollows, and bridged the rivers. Men, nations, poets, artisans, women, all have worked for him, and he enters intotheir labors. Choose any other thing, out of the line of tendency, outof the national feeling and history, and he would have all to do forhimself: his powers would be expended in the first preparations. Greatgenial power, one would almost say, consists in not being original atall; in being altogether receptive; in letting the world do all, andsuffering the spirit of the hour to pass unobstructed through themind. 

3. Shakspeare's youth[527] fell in a time when the English people wereimportunate for dramatic entertainments. The court took offense easilyat political allusions, and attempted to suppress them. ThePuritans, [528] a growing and energetic party and the religious amongthe Anglican Church, [529] would suppress them. But the people wantedthem. Inn-yards, houses without roofs, and extemporaneous inclosuresat country fairs, were the ready theaters of strolling players. Thepeople had tasted this new joy; and, as we could not hope to suppressnewspapers now, --no, not by the strongest party, --neither then couldking, prelate, or puritan, --alone or united, suppress an organ, whichwas ballad, epic, newspaper, caucus, lecture, Punch, [530] and library, at the same time. Probably king, prelate, and puritan, all found theirown account in it. It had become, by all causes, a nationalinterest, --by no means conspicuous, so that some great scholar wouldhave thought of treating it in an English history, --but not a whitless considerable, because it was cheap, and of no account, like abaker's shop. The best proof of its vitality is the crowd of writerswhich suddenly broke into this field; Kyd, Marlow, Greene, [531]Jonson, Chapman, Dekker, Webster, Heywood, Middleton, Peele, Ford, Massinger, Beaumont, and Fletcher. 

4. The secure possession, by the stage, of the public mind, is of thefirst importance to the poet who works for it. He loses no time inidle experiments. Here is audience and expectation prepared. In thecase of Shakspeare there is much more. At the time when[532] he leftStratford, and went up to London, a great body of stage-plays, of alldates and writers, existed in manuscript, and were in turn produced onthe boards. Here is the Tale of Troy, [533] which the audience willbear hearing some part of, every week; the Death of Julius Cæsar, [534]and other stories out of Plutarch, [535] which they never tire of; ashelf full of English history, from the chronicles of Brut[536] andArthur, [537] down to the royal Henries, [538] which men hear eagerly;and a string of doleful tragedies, merry Italian tales, [539] andSpanish voyages, [540] which all the London prentices know. All themass has been treated, with more or less skill, by every playwright, and the prompter has the soiled and tattered manuscripts. It is now nolonger possible to say who wrote them first. They have been theproperty of the Theater so long, and so many rising geniuses haveenlarged or altered them, inserting a speech, or a whole scene, oradding a song, that no man can any longer claim copyright in this workof numbers. Happily, no man wishes to. They are not yet desired inthat way. We have few readers, many spectators and hearers. They hadbest lie where they are. 

5. Shakspeare, in common with his comrades, esteemed the mass of oldplays, waste stock, in which any experiment could be freely tried. Had the _prestige_[541] which hedges about a modern tragedy existed, nothing could have been done. The rude warm blood of the livingEngland circulated in the play, as in street-ballads, and gave bodywhich he wanted to his airy and majestic fancy. The poet needs aground in popular tradition on which he may work, and which, again, may restrain his art within the due temperance. It holds him to thepeople, supplies a foundation for his edifice; and, in furnishing somuch work done to his hand, leaves him at leisure, and in fullstrength for the audacities of his imagination. In short, the poetowes to his legend what sculpture owed to the temple. Sculpture inEgypt, and in Greece, grew up in subordination to architecture. It wasthe ornament of the temple wall: at first, a rude relief carved onpediments, then the relief became bolder, and a head or arm wasprojected from the wall, the groups being still arranged withreference to the building, which serves also as a frame to hold thefigures; and when, at last, the greatest freedom of style andtreatment was reached, the prevailing genius of architecture stillenforced a certain calmness and continence in the statue. As soon asthe statue was begun for itself, and with no reference to the templeor palace, the art began to decline: freak, extravagance, andexhibition, took the place of the old temperance. This balance-wheel, which the sculptor found in architecture, the perilous irritability ofpoetic talent found in the accumulated dramatic materials to which thepeople were already wonted, and which had a certain excellence whichno single genius, [542] however extraordinary, could hope to create. 

6. In point of fact, it appears that Shakspeare did owe debts in alldirections, and was able to use whatever he found; and the amount ofindebtedness may be inferred from Malone's[543] laborious computationsin regard to the First, Second, and Third parts of Henry VI. , inwhich, "out of 6043 lines, 1771 were written by some author precedingShakspeare; 2373 by him, on the foundation laid by his predecessors;and 1899 were entirely his own. " And the proceeding investigationhardly leaves a single drama of his absolute invention. Malone'ssentence is an important piece of external history. In Henry VIII, Ithink I see plainly the cropping out of the original rock on which hisown finer stratum was laid. The first play was written by a superior, thoughtful man, with a vicious ear. I can mark his lines, and knowwell their cadence. See Wolsey's soliloquy, [544] and the followingscene from Cromwell, [545] where, --instead of the meter of Shakspeare, whose secret is, that the thought constructs the tune, so that readingfor the sense will best bring out the rhythm, --here the lines areconstructed on a given tune, and the verse has even a trace of pulpiteloquence. But the play contains, through all its length, unmistakabletraits of Shakspeare's hand, and some passages, as the account of thecoronation, [546] are like autographs. What is odd, the compliment toQueen Elizabeth[547] is in bad rhythm. [548]

7. Shakspeare knew that tradition supplies a better fable than anyinvention can. If he lost any credit of design, he augmented hisresources; and, at that day, our petulant demand for originality wasnot so much pressed. There was no literature for the million. Theuniversal reading, the cheap press, were unknown. A great poet, whoappears in illiterate times, absorbs into his sphere all the lightwhich is anywhere radiating. Every intellectual jewel, every flower ofsentiment, it is his fine office to bring to his people; and he comesto value his memory[549] equally with his invention. He is thereforelittle solicitous whence his thoughts have been derived; whetherthrough translation, whether through tradition, whether by travel indistant countries, whether by inspiration; from whatever source, theyare equally welcome to his uncritical audience. Nay, he borrows verynear home. Other men say wise things as well as he; only they say agood many foolish things, and do not know when they have spokenwisely. He knows the sparkle of the true stone, and puts it in highplace, wherever he finds it. Such is the happy position of Homer, [550]perhaps; of Chaucer, [551] of Saadi. [552] They felt that all wit wastheir wit. And they are librarians and historiographers, as well aspoets. Each romancer was heir and dispenser of all the hundred talesof the world, --

 "Presenting Thebes'[553] and Pelops' line And the tale of Troy divine. "

The influence of Chaucer is conspicuous in all our early literature;and, more recently, not only Pope[554] and Dryden[555] have beenbeholden to him, but, in the whole society of English writers, a largeunacknowledged debt is easily traced. One is charmed with the opulencewhich feeds so many pensioners. But Chaucer is a huge borrower. [556]Chaucer, it seems, drew continually, through Lydgat[557] andCaxton, [558] from Guido di Colonna, [559] whose Latin romance of theTrojan war was in turn a compilation from Dares Phrygius, [560]Ovid, [561] and Statius. [562] Then Petrarch, [563] Boccaccio, [564] andthe Provençal poets, [565] and his benefactors: the Romaunt of theRose[566] is only judicious translation from William of Lorris andJohn of Meung: Troilus and Creseide, [567] from Lollius of Urbino: TheCock and the Fox, [568] from the _Lais_ of Marie: The House ofFame, [569] from the French or Italian: and poor Gower[570] he uses asif he were only a brick-kiln or stone-quarry, out of which to buildhis house. He steals by this apology, --that what he takes has no worthwhere he finds it, and the greatest where he leaves it. It has come tobe practically a sort of rule in literature, that a man, having onceshown himself capable of original writing, is entitled thenceforth tosteal from the writings of others at discretion. Thought is theproperty of him who can entertain it; and of him who can adequatelyplace it. A certain awkwardness marks the use of borrowed thoughts;but, as soon as we have learned what to do with them, they become ourown. 

8. Thus, all originality is relative. Every thinker is retrospective. The learned member of the legislature, at Westminister, [571] or atWashington, speaks and votes for thousands. Show us the constituency, and the now invisible channels by which the senator is made aware oftheir wishes, the crowd of practical and knowing men, who, bycorrespondence or conversation, are feeding him with evidence, anecdotes, and estimates, and it will bereave his fine attitude andresistance of something of their impressiveness. As Sir RobertPeel[572] and Mr. Webster[573] vote, so Locke[574] and Rousseau[575]think for thousands; and so there were foundations all aroundHomer, [576] Menu, [577] Saada, [578] or Milton, [579] from which theydrew; friends, lovers, books, traditions, proverbs, --allperished, --which, if seen, would go to reduce the wonder. Did the bardspeak with authority? Did he feel himself overmatched by anycompanion? The appeal is to the consciousness of the writer. Is thereat last in his breast a Delphi[580] whereof to ask concerning anythought or thing whether it be verily so, yea or nay? and to haveanswer, and rely on that? All the debts which such a man couldcontract to other wit, would never disturb his consciousness oforiginality: for the ministrations of books, and of other minds, are awhiff of smoke to that most private reality with which he hasconversed. 

9. It is easy to see that what is best written or done by genius, inthe world, was no man's work, but came by wide social labor, when athousand wrought like one, sharing the same impulse. Our EnglishBible[581] is a wonderful specimen of the strength and music of theEnglish language. But it was not made by one man, or at one time; butcenturies and churches brought it to perfection. There never was atime when there was not some translation existing. The Liturgy, [582]admired for its energy and pathos, is an anthology of the piety ofages and nations, a translation of the prayers and forms of theCatholic church, --these collected, too, in long periods, from theprayers and meditations of every saint and sacred writer all over theworld. Grotius[583] makes the like remark in respect to the Lord'sPrayer, that the single clauses of which it is composed were alreadyin use, in the time of Christ, in the rabbinical forms. [584] He pickedout the grains of gold. The nervous language of the Common Law, [585]the impressive forms of our courts, and the precision and substantialtruth of the legal distinctions, are the contribution of all thesharp-sighted, strong-minded men who have lived in the countries wherethese laws govern. The translation of Plutarch gets its excellence bybeing translation on translation. There never was a time when therewas none. All the truly idiomatic and national phrases are kept, andall others successively picked out, and thrown away. Something likethe same process had gone on, long before, with the originals of thesebooks. The world takes liberties with world-books. Vedas, [586] Æsop'sFables, [587] Pilpay, [588] Arabian Nights, [589] Cid, [590] Iliad, [591]Robin Hood, [592] Scottish Minstrelsy, [593] are not the work of singlemen. In the composition of such works, the time thinks, the marketthinks, the mason, the carpenter, the merchant, the farmer, the fop, all think for us. Every book supplies its time with one good word;every municipal law, every trade, every folly of the day, and thegeneric catholic genius who is not afraid or ashamed to owe hisoriginality to the originality of all, stands with the next age as therecorder and embodiment of his own. 

10. We have to thank the researches of antiquaries, and the ShakspeareSociety, [594] for ascertaining the steps of the English drama, fromthe Mysteries[595] celebrated in churches and by churchmen, and thefinal detachment from the church, and the completion of secular plays, from Ferrex and Porrex, [596] and Gammer Gurton's Needle, [597] down tothe possession of the stage by the very pieces which Shakspearealtered, remodelled, and finally made his own. Elated with success, and piqued by the growing interest of the problem, they have left nobook-stall unsearched, no chest in a garret unopened, no file of oldyellow accounts to decompose in damp and worms, so keen was the hopeto discover whether the boy Shakspeare poached[598] or not, whether heheld horses at the theater-door, whether he kept school, and why heleft in his will only his second-best bed to Ann Hathaway, his wife. 

11. There is somewhat touching in the madness with which the passingage mischooses the object on which all candles shine, and all eyes areturned; the care with which it registers every trifle touching QueenElizabeth, [599] and King James, [600] and the Essexes, [601]Leicesters, [602] Burleighs, [603] and Buckinghams;[604] and lets passwithout a single valuable note the founder of another dynasty, whichalone will cause the Tudor dynasty[605] to be remembered, --the man whocarries the Saxon race in him by the inspiration which feeds him, andon whose thoughts the foremost people of the world are now for someages to be nourished, and minds to receive this and not another bias. A popular player, --nobody suspected he was the poet of the human race;and the secret was kept as faithfully from poets and intellectual men, as from courtiers and frivolous people. Bacon, [606] who took theinventory of the human understanding for his times, never mentionedhis name. Ben Jonson, [607] though we have strained his few words ofregard and panegyric, had no suspicion of the elastic fame whose firstvibrations he was attempting. He no doubt thought the praise he hasconceded to him generous, and esteemed himself, out of all question, the better poet of the two. 

12. If it need wit to know wit, according to the proverb, Shakspeare'stime should be capable of recognizing it. Sir Henry Wotton[608] wasborn four years after Shakspeare, and died twenty-three years afterhim; and I find, among his correspondents and acquaintances, thefollowing persons:[609] Theodore Beza, Isaac Casaubon, Sir PhilipSidney, Earl of Essex, Lord Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, John Milton, Sir Henry Vane, Isaac Walton, Dr. Donne, Abraham Cowley, Berlarmine, Charles Cotton, John Pym, John Hales, Kepler, Vieta, AlbericusGentilis, Paul Sarpi, Arminius; with all of whom exists some token ofhis having communicated, without enumerating many others, whomdoubtless[610] he saw, --Shakspeare, Spenser, Jonson, Beaumont, Massinger, two Herberts, Marlow, Chapman and the rest. Since theconstellation of great men who appeared in Greece in the time ofPericles, [611] there was never any such society;--yet their geniusfailed them to find out the best head in the universe. Our poet's maskwas impenetrable. You cannot see the mountain near. It took a centuryto make it suspected; and not until two centuries had passed, afterhis death, did any criticism which we think adequate begin to appear. It was not possible to write the history of Shakspeare till now; forhe is the father of German literature: it was on the introduction ofShakspeare into German, by Lessing, [612] and the translation of hisworks by Wieland[613] and Schlegel, [614] that the rapid burst ofGerman literature was most intimately connected. It was not until thenineteenth century, whose speculative genius is a sort of livingHamlet, [615] that the tragedy of Hamlet could find such wonderingreaders. Now, literature, philosophy, and thought, are Shakspearized. His mind is the horizon beyond which, at present, we do not see. Ourears are educated to music by his rhythm. Coleridge[616] andGoethe[617] are the only critics who have expressed our convictionswith any adequate fidelity; but there is in all cultivated minds asilent appreciation of his superlative power and beauty, which, likeChristianity, qualifies the period. 

[Transcriber's Note: Number runs from 12 to 14. Number 13 omitted]

14. The Shakspeare Society have inquired in all directions, advertised the missing facts, offered money for any information thatwill lead to proof; and with what result? Beside some importantillustration of the history of the English stage, to which I haveadverted, they have gleaned a few facts touching the property, anddealings in regard to property, of the poet. It appears that, fromyear to year, he owned a larger share in the Blackfriars'Theater:[618] its wardrobe and other appurtenances were his: and hebought an estate in his native village, with his earnings, as writerand shareholder; that he lived in the best house in Stratford;[619]was intrusted by his neighbors with their commissions in London, as ofborrowing money, and the like; and he was a veritable farmer. Aboutthe time when he was writing Macbeth, [620] he sues Philip Rogers, inthe borough-court of Stratford, for thirty-five shillings, ten pence, for corn delivered to him at different times; and, in all respects, appears as a good husband with no reputation for eccentricity orexcess. He was a good-natured sort of man, an actor and shareholder inthe theater, not in any striking manner distinguished from otheractors and managers. I admit the importance of this information. It iswell worth the pains that have been taken to procure it. 

15. But whatever scraps of information concerning his condition theseresearches may have rescued, they can shed no light upon that infiniteinvention which is the concealed magnet of his attraction for us. Weare very clumsy writers of history. We tell the chronicle ofparentage, birth, birth-place, schooling, schoolmates, earning ofmoney, marriage, publication of books, celebrity, death; and when wehave come to an end of this gossip no ray of relation appears betweenit and the goddess-born; and it seems as if, had we dipped at randominto the "Modern Plutarch, " and read any other life there, it wouldhave fitted the poems as well. It is the essence of poetry to spring, like the rainbow daughter of Wonder, from the invisible, to abolishthe past, and refuse all history. Malone, Warburton, Dyce, andCollier, [621] have wasted their oil. The famed theaters, CoventGarden, Drury Lane, the Park, and Tremont, [622] have vainly assisted. Betterton, Garrick, Kemble, Kean, and Macready, [623] dedicate theirlives to this genius; him they crown, elucidate, obey, and express. The genius knows them not. The recitation begins; one golden wordleaps out immortal from all this painted pedantry, and sweetlytorments us with invitations to its own inaccessible homes. Iremember, I went once to see the Hamlet of a famed performer, [624] thepride of the English stage; and all I then heard, and all I nowremember, of the tragedian, was that in which the tragedian had nopart; simply, Hamlet's question to the ghost, --

 "What may this mean, [625] That thou, dead corse, again in complete steel Revisit'st thus the glimpses of the moon?"

That imagination which dilates the closet he writes in to the world'sdimension, crowds it with agents in rank and order, as quicklyreduces the big reality to be the glimpses of the moon. These tricksof his magic spoil for us the illusions of the green-room. Can anybiography shed light on the localities into which the MidsummerNight's Dream[626] admits me? Did Shakspeare confide to any notary orparish recorder, sacristan, or surrogate, in Stratford, the genesis ofthat delicate creation? The forest of Arden, [627] the nimble air ofScone Castle, [628] the moonlight of Portia's villa, [629] "the antresvast[630] and desarts idle, " of Othello's captivity, --where is thethird cousin, or grand-nephew, the chancellor's file of accounts, orprivate letter, that has kept one word of those transcendent secrets?In fine, in this drama, as in all great works of art, --in theCyclopean architecture[631] of Egypt and India; in the Phidiansculpture;[632] the Gothic ministers;[633] the Italian painting;[634]the Ballads of Spain and Scotland, [635]--the Genius draws up theladder after him, when the creative age goes up to heaven, and givesway to a new, which sees the works, and ask in vain for a history. 

16. Shakspeare is the only biographer of Shakspeare; and even he cantell nothing, except to the Shakspeare in us; that is, to our mostapprehensive and sympathetic hour. He cannot step from off histripod, [636] and give us anecdotes of his inspirations. Read the antiquedocuments extricated, analyzed, and compared, by the assiduous Dyce andCollier; and now read one of those skyey sentences, --aerolites, --whichseem to have fallen out of heaven, and which, not your experience, butthe man within the breast, has accepted, as words of fate; and tell meif they match; if the former account in any manner for the latter; or, which gives the most historical insight into the man. 

17. Hence, though our external history is so meager, yet, withShakspeare for biographer, instead of Aubrey[637] and Rowe, [638] wehave really the information which is material, that which describescharacter and fortune, that which, if we were about to meet the manand deal with him, would most import us to know. We have his recordedconvictions on those questions which knock for answer at everyheart, --on life and death, on love, on wealth and poverty, on theprizes of life, and the ways whereby we come at them; on thecharacters of men, and the influences, occult and open, which affecttheir fortunes; and on those mysterious and demoniacal powers whichdefy our science, and which yet interweave their malice and their giftin our brightest hours. Who ever read the volume of the Sonnets, without finding that the poet had there revealed, under masks that areno masks to the intelligent, the lore of friendship and of love; theconfusion of sentiments in the most susceptible, and, at the sametime, the most intellectual of men? What trait of his private mind hashe hidden in his dramas? One can discern, in his ample pictures of thegentleman and the king, what forms and humanities pleased him; hisdelight in troops of friends, in large hospitality, in cheerfulgiving. Let Timon, [639] let Warwick, [640] let Antonio[641] themerchant, answer for his great heart. So far from Shakspeare's beingthe least known, he is the one person, in all modern history, known tous. What point of morals, of manners, of economy, of philosophy, ofreligion, of taste, of the conduct of life, has he not settled? Whatmystery has he not signified his knowledge of? What office, orfunction, or district of man's work, has he not remembered? What kinghas he not taught state, as Talma[642] taught Napoleon? What maidenhas not found him finer than her delicacy? What lover has he notout-loved? What sage has he not outseen? What gentleman has he notinstructed in the rudeness of his behavior?

18. Some able and appreciating critics think no criticism onShakspeare valuable, that does not rest purely on the dramatic merit;that he is falsely judged as poet and philosopher. I think as highlyas these critics of his dramatic merit, who still think it secondary. He was a full man, who liked to talk; a brain exhaling thoughts andimages, which, seeking vent, found the drama next at hand. Had he beenless, we should have had to consider how well he filled his place, howgood a dramatist he was, --and he is the best in the world. But itturns out, that what he has to say is of that weight, as to withdrawsome attention from the vehicle; and he is like some saint whosehistory is to be rendered into all languages, into verse and prose, into songs and pictures, and cut up into proverbs; so that theoccasion which gave the saint's meaning the form of a conversation, orof a prayer, or of a code of laws, is immaterial, compared with theuniversality of its application. So it fares with the wise Shakspeareand his book of life. He wrote the airs for all our modern music: hewrote the text of modern life; the text of manners: he drew the man ofEngland and Europe; the father of the man in America: he drew the man, and described the day, and what is done in it: he read the hearts ofmen and women, their probity, and their second thought, and wiles; thewiles of innocence, and the transitions by which virtues and vicesslide into their contraries: he could divide the mother's part fromthe father's part in the face of the child, or draw the finedemarcations of freedom and of fate: he knew the laws of repressionwhich make the police of nature: and all the sweets and all theterrors of human lot lay in his mind as truly but as softly as thelandscape lies on the eye. And the importance of this wisdom of lifesinks the form, as of Drama or Epic, out of notice. 'Tis like making aquestion concerning the paper on which a king's message is written. 

19. Shakspeare is as much out of the category of eminent authors, ashe is out of the crowd. He is inconceivably wise; the others, conceivably. A good reader can, in a sort, nestle into Plato's brain, and think from thence; but not into Shakspeare's. We are still out ofdoors. For executive faculty, for creation, Shakspeare is unique. Noman can imagine it better. He was the farthest reach of subtletycompatible with an individual self, --the subtilest of authors, andonly just within the possibility of authorship. With this wisdom oflife, is the equal endowment of imaginative and of lyric power. Heclothed the creatures of his legend with form and sentiments, as ifthey were people who had lived under his roof; and few real men haveleft such distinct characters as these fictions. And they spoke inlanguage as sweet as it was fit. Yet his talents never seduced himinto an ostentation, nor did he harp on one string. An omnipresenthumanity[643] coördinates all his faculties. Give a man of talents astory to tell, and his partiality will presently appear. He hascertain observations, opinions, topics, which have some accidentalprominence, and which he disposes all to exhibit. He crams this part, and starves that other part, consulting not the fitness of the thing, but his fitness and strength. But Shakspeare has no peculiarity, noimportunate topic; but all is duly given; no veins, no curiosities: nocow-painter, no bird-fancier, no mannerist is he: he has nodiscoverable egotism: the great he tells greatly; the small, subordinately. He is wise without emphasis or assertion; he is strong, as nature is strong, who lifts the land into mountain slopes withouteffort, and by the same rule as she floats a bubble in the air, andlikes as well to do the one as the other. This makes that equality ofpower in farce, tragedy, narrative, and love-songs; a merit soincessant, that each reader is incredulous of the perception of otherreaders. 

20. This power of expression, or of transferring the inmost truth ofthings into music and verse, makes him the type of the poet, and hasadded a new problem to metaphysics. This is that which throws him intonatural history, as a main production of the globe, and as announcingnew eras and ameliorations. Things were mirrored in his poetry withoutloss or blur; he could paint the fine with precision, the great withcompass: the tragic and the comic indifferently, and without anydistortion or favor. He carried his powerful execution into minutedetails, to a hair point; finishes an eyelash or a dimple as firmly ashe draws a mountain; and yet these, like nature's, will bear thescrutiny of the solar microscope. 

21. In short, he is the chief example to prove that more or less ofproduction, more or fewer pictures, is a thing indifferent. He had thepower to make one picture. Daguerre[644] learned how to let one floweretch its image on his plate of iodine; and then proceeds at leisure toetch a million. There are always objects; but there was neverrepresentation. Here is perfect representation, at last; and now letthe world of figures sit for their portraits. No recipe can be givenfor the making of a Shakspeare; but the possibility of the translationof things into song is demonstrated. 

22. His lyric power lies in the genius of the piece. The sonnets, though their excellence is lost in the splendor of the dramas, are asinimitable as they: and it is not a merit of lines, but a total meritof the piece; like the tone of voice of some incomparable person, sois this a speech of poetic beings, and any clause as unproducible nowas a whole poem. 

23. Though the speeches in the plays, and single lines, have a beautywhich tempts the ear to pause on them for their euphuism, [645] yet thesentence is so loaded with meaning, and so linked with its foregoersand followers, that the logician is satisfied. His means are asadmirable as his ends; every subordinate invention, by which he helpshimself to connect some irreconcilable opposites, is a poem too. He isnot reduced to dismount and walk, because his horses are running offwith him in some distant direction; he always rides. 

24. The finest poetry was first experienced: but the thought hassuffered a transformation since it was an experience. Cultivated menoften attain a good degree of skill in writing verses; but it is easyto read, through their poems, their personal history: any oneacquainted with parties can name every figure: this is Andrew, andthat is Rachael. The sense thus remains prosaic. It is a caterpillarwith wings, and not yet a butterfly. In the poet's mind, the fact hasgone quite over into the new element of thought, and has lost all thatis exuvial. This generosity bides with Shakspeare. We say, from thetruth and closeness of his pictures, that he knows the lesson byheart. Yet there is not a trace of egotism. 

25. One more royal trait properly belongs to the poet. I mean hischeerfulness, without which no man can be a poet, --for beauty is hisaim. He loves virtue, not for its obligation, but for its grace: hedelights in the world, in man, in woman, for the lovely light thatsparkles from them. Beauty, the spirit of joy and hilarity, he shedsover the universe. Epicurus[646] relates, that poetry hath such charmsthat a lover might forsake his mistress to partake of them. And thetrue bards have been noted for their firm and cheerful temper. Homerlies in sunshine; Chaucer is glad and erect; and Saadi says, "It wasrumored abroad that I was penitent; but what had I to do withrepentance?" Not less sovereign and cheerful, --much more sovereign andcheerful, is the tone of Shakspeare. His name suggests joy andemancipation to the heart of men. If he should appear in any companyof human souls, who would not march in his troop? He touches nothingthat does not borrow health and longevity from his festal style. 

26. And now, how stands the account of man with this bard andbenefactor, when in solitude, shutting our ears to the reverberationsof his fame, we seek to strike the balance? Solitude has austerelessons; it can teach us to spare both heroes and poets; and it weighsShakspeare also, and finds him to share the halfness and imperfectionof humanity. 

27. Shakspeare, Homer, Dante, [647] Chaucer, saw the splendor ofmeaning that plays over the visible world; knew that a tree hadanother use than for apples, and corn another than for meal, and theball of the earth, than for tillage and roads: that these things borea second and finer harvest to the mind, being emblems of itsthoughts, and conveying in all their natural history a certain mutecommentary on human life. Shakspeare employed them as colors tocompose his picture. He rested in their beauty; and never took thestep which seemed inevitable to such genius, namely, to explore thevirtue which resides in these symbols, and imparts this power, --whatis that which they themselves say? He converted the elements, whichwaited on his command, into entertainments. He was master of therevels[648] to mankind. Is it not as if one should have, throughmajestic powers of science, the comets given into his hand, or theplanets and their moons, and should draw them from their orbits toglare with the municipal fireworks on a holiday night, and advertisein all towns, "very superior pyrotechny this evening!" Are the agentsof nature, and the power to understand them, worth no more than astreet serenade, or the breath of a cigar? One remembers again thetrumpet-text in the Koran, [649]--"The heavens and the earth, and allthat is between them, think ye we have created them in jest?" As longas the question is of talent and mental power, the world of men hasnot his equal to show. But when the question is to life, and itsmaterials, and its auxiliaries, how does he profit me? What does itsignify? It is but a Twelfth Night, [650] or Midsummer Night's Dream, or a Winter Evening's Tale: what signifies another picture more orless? The Egyptian verdict[651] of the Shakspeare Societies comes tomind, that he was a jovial actor and manager. I cannot marry thisfact to his verse. Other admirable men have led lives in some sort ofkeeping with their thought; but this man, in wide contrast. Had hebeen less, had he reached only the common measure of great authors, ofBacon, Milton, Tasso, [652] Cervantes, [653] we might leave the fact inthe twilight of human fate: but, that this man of men, he who gave tothe science of mind a new and larger subject than had ever existed, and planted the standard of humanity some furlongs forward intoChaos, --that he should not be wise for himself, --it must even go intothe world's history, that the best poet led an obscure and profanelife, using his genius for the public amusement. 

28. Well, other men, priest and prophet, Israelite, [654] German, [655]and Swede, [656] beheld the same objects: they also saw through themthat which was contained. And to what purpose? The beauty straightwayvanished; they read commandments, all-excluding mountainous duty; anobligation, a sadness, as of piled mountains, fell on them, and lifebecame ghastly, joyless, a pilgrim's progress, [657] a probation, beleaguered round with doleful histories, of Adam's fall[658] andcurse, behind us; with doomsdays and purgatorial[659] and penal firesbefore us; and the heart of the seer and the heart of the listenersank in them. 

29. It must be conceded that these are half-views of half-men. Theworld still wants its poet-priest, a reconciler, who shall not triflewith Shakspeare the player, nor shall grope in graves with Swedenborgthe mourner; but who shall see, speak, and act, with equalinspiration. For knowledge will brighten the sunshine; right is morebeautiful than private affection; and love is compatible withuniversal wisdom. 

PRUDENCE. [660]

What right have I to write on Prudence, whereof I have little, andthat of the negative sort? My prudence consists in avoiding and goingwithout, not in the inventing of means and methods, not in adroitsteering, not in gentle repairing. I have no skill to make money spendwell, no genius in my economy, and whoever sees my garden discoversthat I must have some other garden. Yet I love facts, and hatelubricity[661] and people without perception. Then I have the sametitle to write on prudence that I have to write on poetry or holiness. We write from aspiration and antagonism, as well as from experience. We paint those qualities which we do not possess. The poet admires theman of energy and tactics; the merchant breeds his son for the churchor the bar; and where a man is not vain and egotistic you shall findwhat he has not by his praise. Moreover it would be hardly honest inme not to balance these fine lyric words of Love and Friendship[662]with words of coarser sound, and whilst my debt to my senses is realand constant, not to own it in passing. 

Prudence is the virtue of the senses. It is the science ofappearances. It is the outmost action of the inward life. It is Godtaking thought for oxen. It moves matter after the laws of matter. Itis content to seek health of body by complying with physicalconditions, and health of mind by the laws of the intellect. 

The world of the senses is a world of shows; it does not exist foritself, but has a symbolic character; and a true prudence or law ofshows recognizes the co-presence of other laws and knows that its ownoffice is subaltern; knows that it is surface and not centre where itworks. Prudence is false when detached. It is legitimate when it isthe Natural History of the soul incarnate, when it unfolds the beautyof laws within the narrow scope of the senses. 

There are all degrees of proficiency in knowledge of the world. It issufficient to our present purpose to indicate three. One class livesto the utility of the symbol, esteeming health and wealth a finalgood. Another class live above this mark of the beauty of the symbol, as the poet and artist and the naturalist and man of science. A thirdclass live above the beauty of the symbol to the beauty of the thingsignified; these are wise men. The first class have common sense; thesecond, taste; and the third, spiritual perception. Once in a longtime, a man traverses the whole scale, and sees and enjoys the symbolsolidly, then also has a clear eye for its beauty, and lastly, whilsthe pitches his tent on this sacred volcanic isle of nature, does notoffer to build houses and barns thereon reverencing the splendor ofthe God which he sees bursting through each chink and cranny. 

The world is filled with the proverbs[663] and acts and winkings of abase prudence, which is a devotion to matter, as if we possessed noother faculties than the palate, the nose, the touch, the eye and ear;a prudence which adores the Rule of Three, which never subscribes, which gives never, which seldom lends, and asks but one question ofany project, --Will it bake bread? This is a disease like a thickeningof the skin until the vital organs are destroyed. But culture, revealing the high origin of the apparent world and aiming at theperfection of the man as the end, degrades everything else, as healthand bodily life, into means. It sees prudence not to be a severalfaculty, but a name for wisdom and virtue conversing with the body andits wants. Cultivated men always feel and speak so as if a greatfortune, the achievement of a civil or social measure, great personalinfluence, a graceful and commanding address, had their value asproofs of the energy of the spirit. If a man lose his balance andimmerse himself in any trades or pleasures for their own sake, he maybe a good wheel or pin, [664] but he is not a cultivated man. 

The spurious prudence, making the senses final, is the god of sots andcowards, and is the subject of all comedy. It is nature's joke, andtherefore literature's. The true prudence limits this sensualism byadmitting the knowledge of an internal and real world. Thisrecognition once made, --the order of the world and the distributionof affairs and times being studied with the co-perception of theirsubordinate place, will reward any degree of attention. For, ourexistence, thus apparently attached in nature to the sun and thereturning moon and the periods which they mark; so susceptible toclimate and to country, so alive to social good and evil, so fond ofsplendor and so tender to hunger and cold and debt, --reads all itsprimary lessons out of these books. 

Prudence does not go behind nature and ask whence it is? It takes thelaws of the world whereby man's being is conditioned, as they are, andkeeps these laws that it may enjoy their proper good. It respectsspace and time, climate, want, sleep, the law of polarity, [665] growthand death. There revolve, to give bound and period to his being on allsides, the sun and moon, the great formalists in the sky: here liesstubborn matter, and will not swerve from its chemical routine. Hereis a planted globe, pierced and belted with natural laws and fencedand distributed externally with civil partitions and properties whichimpose new restraints on the young inhabitant. 

We eat of the bread which grows in the field. We live by the air whichblows around us and we are poisoned by the air that is too cold or toohot, too dry or too wet. Time, which shows so vacant, indivisible anddivine in its coming, is slit and peddled into trifles and tatters. Adoor is to be painted, a lock to be repaired. I want wood or oil, ormeal, or salt; the house smokes, or I have a headache; then the tax;and an affair to be transacted with a man without heart or brains, andthe stinging recollection of an injurious or very awkward word, --theseeat up the hours. Do what we can, summer will have its flies. [666] Ifwe walk in the woods we must feed mosquitoes. If we go a-fishing wemust expect a wet coat. Then climate is a great impediment to idlepersons. We often resolve to give up the care of the weather, butstill we regard the clouds and the rain. 

We are instructed by these petty experiences which usurp the hours andyears. The hard soil and four months of snow make the inhabitant of thenorthern temperate zone wiser and abler than his fellow who enjoys thefixed smile of the tropics. The islander may ramble all day at will. Atnight he may sleep on a mat under the moon, and wherever a wilddate-tree grows, nature has, without a prayer even, spread a table forhis morning meal. The northerner is perforce a householder. He mustbrew, bake, salt and preserve his food. He must pile wood and coal. Butas it happens that not one stroke can labor lay to without some newacquaintance with nature; and as nature is inexhaustibly significant, the inhabitants of these climates[667] have always excelled thesoutherner in force. Such is the value of these matters that a man whoknows other things can never know too much of these. Let him haveaccurate perceptions. Let him, if he have hands, handle; if eyes, measure and discriminate; let him accept and hive every fact ofchemistry, natural history and economics; the more he has, the less ishe willing to spare any one. Time is always bringing the occasions thatdisclose their value. Some wisdom comes out of every natural andinnocent action. The domestic man, who loves no music so well as hiskitchen clock and the airs which the logs sing to him as they burn onthe hearth, has solaces which others never dream of. The application ofmeans to ends ensures victory and the songs of victory not less in afarm or a shop than in the tactics of party or of war. The good husbandfinds method as efficient in the packing of fire-wood in a shed or inthe harvesting of fruits in the cellar, as in Peninsular campaigns[668]or the files of the Department of State. In the rainy day he builds awork-bench, or gets his tool-box set in the corner of the barn-chamber, and stored with nails, gimlet, pincers, screwdriver and chisel. Hereinhe tastes an old joy of youth and childhood, the cat-like love ofgarrets, presses and corn-chambers, and of the conveniences of longhousekeeping. His garden or his poultry-yard--very paltry places it maybe--tells him many pleasant anecdotes. One might find argument foroptimism in the abundant flow of this saccharine element of pleasure inevery suburb and extremity of the good world. Let a man keep thelaw--any law, --and his way will be strown with satisfactions. There ismore difference in the quality of our pleasures than in the amount. 

On the other hand, nature punishes any neglect of prudence. If youthink the senses final, obey their law. If you believe in the soul, donot clutch at sensual sweetness before it is ripe on the slow tree ofcause and effect. It is vinegar to the eyes to deal with men of looseand imperfect perception. Dr. Johnson is reported to havesaid, [669]--"If the child says he looked out of this window, when helooked out of that, --whip him. " Our American character is marked by amore than average delight in accurate perception, which is shown bythe currency of the by-word, "No mistake. "

But the discomfort of unpunctuality, of confusion of thought aboutfacts, inattention to the wants of to-morrow, is of no nation. Thebeautiful laws of time and space, once dislocated by our inaptitude, are holes and dens. If the hive be disturbed by rash and stupid hands, instead of honey it will yield us bees. Our words and actions to befair must be timely. A gay and pleasant sound is the whetting of thescythe in the mornings of June; yet what is more lonesome and sad thanthe sound of a whetstone or mower's rifle[670] when it is too late inthe season to make hay? Scatter brained and "afternoon men" spoil muchmore than their own affairs in spoiling the temper of those who dealwith them. I have seen a criticism on some paintings, of which I amreminded when I see the shiftless and unhappy men who are not true totheir senses. The last Grand Duke of Weimar, [671] a man of superiorunderstanding, said: "I have sometimes remarked in the presence ofgreat works of art, and just now especially in Dresden, how much acertain property contributes to the effect which gives life to thefigures, and to the life an irresistible truth. This property is thehitting, in all the figures we draw, the right centre of gravity. Imean the placing the figures firm upon their feet, making the handsgrasp, and fastening the eyes on the spot where they should look. Evenlifeless figures, as vessels and stools--let them be drawn ever socorrectly--lose all effect so soon as they lack the resting upon theircentre of gravity, and have a certain swimming and oscillatingappearance. The Raphael in the Dresden gallery[672] (the only greataffecting picture which I have seen) is the quietest and mostpassionless piece you can imagine; a couple of saints who worship theVirgin and child. Nevertheless it awakens a deeper impression than thecontortions of ten crucified martyrs. For, beside all the resistlessbeauty of form, it possesses in the highest degree the property of theperpendicularity of all the figures. " This perpendicularity we demandof all the figures in this picture of life. Let them stand on theirfeet, and not float and swing. Let us know where to find them. Letthem discriminate between what they remember and what they dreamed. Let them call a spade a spade. [673] Let them give us facts, and honortheir own senses with trust. 

But what man shall dare task another with imprudence? Who is prudent?The men we call greatest are least in this kingdom. There is a certainfatal dislocation in our relation to nature, distorting all our modesof living and making every law our enemy, which seems at last to havearoused all the wit and virtue in the world to ponder the question ofReform. We must call the highest prudence to counsel, and ask whyhealth and beauty and genius should now be the exception rather thanthe rule of human nature? We do not know the properties of plants andanimals and the laws of nature, through our sympathy with the same;but this remains the dream of poets. Poetry and prudence should becoincident. Poets should be lawgivers; that is, the boldest lyricinspiration should not chide and insult, but should announce and leadthe civil code and the day's work. But now the two things seemirreconcilably parted. We have violated law upon law until we standamidst ruins, and when by chance we espy a coincidence between reasonand the phenomena, we are surprised. Beauty should be the dowry ofevery man and woman, as invariably as sensation; but it is rare. Health or sound organization should be universal. Genius should be thechild of genius, and every child should be inspired; but now it is notto be predicted of any child, and nowhere is it pure. We call partialhalf lights, by courtesy, genius; talent which converts itself tomoney; talent which glitters to-day that it may dine and sleep wellto-morrow; and society is officered by _men of parts_, [674] as theyare properly called, and not by divine men. These use their gifts torefine luxury, not to abolish it. Genius is always ascetic; and piety, and love. Appetite shows to the finer souls as a disease, and theyfind beauty in rites and bounds that resist it. 

We have found out[675] fine names to cover our sensuality withal, butno gifts can raise intemperance. The man of talent affects to call histransgressions of the laws of the senses trivial and to count themnothing considered with his devotion to his art. His art rebukes him. That never taught him lewdness, nor the love of wine, nor the wish toreap where he had not sowed. His art is less for every deduction fromhis holiness, and less for every defect of common sense. On him whoscorned the world, as he said, the scorned world wreaks its revenge. He that despiseth small things will perish by little and little. Goethe's Tasso[676] is very likely to be a pretty fair historicalportrait, and that is true tragedy. It does not seem to me so genuinegrief when some tyrannous Richard III. [677] oppresses and slays ascore of innocent persons, as when Antonio and Tasso, both apparentlyright, wrong each other. One living after the maxims of this world andconsistent and true to them, the other fired with all divinesentiments, yet grasping also at the pleasures of sense, withoutsubmitting to their law. That is a grief we all feel, a knot we cannotuntie. Tasso's is no infrequent case in modern biography. A man ofgenius, of an ardent temperament, reckless of physical laws, self-indulgent, becomes presently unfortunate, querulous, a"discomfortable cousin, " a thorn to himself and to others. 

The scholar shames us by his bifold[678] life. Whilst something higherthan prudence is active, he is admirable; when common sense is wanted, he is an encumbrance. Yesterday, Cæsar[679] was not so great; to-day, Job[680] not so miserable. Yesterday, radiant with the light of anideal world in which he lives, the first of men, and now oppressed bywants and by sickness, for which he must thank himself, none is sopoor to do him reverence. He resembles the opium eaters whomtravellers describe as frequenting the bazaars of Constantinople, whoskulk about all day, the most pitiful drivellers, yellow, emaciated, ragged, sneaking; then at evening, when the bazaars are open, theyslink to the opium-shop, swallow their morsel and become tranquil, glorious and great. And who has not seen the tragedy of imprudentgenius struggling for years with paltry pecuniary difficulties, atlast sinking, chilled, exhausted and fruitless, like a giantslaughtered by pins?

Is it not better that a man should accept the first pains andmortifications of this sort, which nature is not slack in sending him, as hints that he must expect no other good than the just fruit of hisown labor and self-denial? Health, bread, climate, social position, have their importance, and he will give them their due. Let him esteemNature a perpetual counsellor, and her perfections the exact measureof our deviations. Let him make the night night, and the day day. Lethim control the habit of expense. Let him see that as much wisdom maybe expended on a private economy as on an empire, and as much wisdommay be drawn from it. The laws of the world are written out for him onevery piece of money in his hand. There is nothing he will not be thebetter for knowing, were it only the wisdom of Poor Richard, [681] orthe State-street[682] prudence of buying by the acre to sell by thefoot; or the thrift of the agriculturist, to stick[683] in a treebetween whiles, because it will grow whilst he sleeps; or the prudencewhich consists in husbanding little strokes of the tool, littleportions of time, particles of stock and small gains. The eye ofprudence may never shut. Iron, if kept at the ironmonger's, will rust;beer, if not brewed in the right state of the atmosphere, will sour;timber of ships will rot at sea, or if laid up high and dry, willstrain, warp and dry-rot. Money, if kept by us, yields no rent and isliable to loss; if invested, is liable to depreciation of theparticular kind of stock. Strike, says the smith, the iron is white. Keep the rake, says the haymaker, as nigh the scythe as you can, andthe cart as nigh the rake. Our Yankee trade is reputed to be very muchon the extreme of this prudence. It saves itself by its activity. Ittakes bank notes, --good, bad, clean, ragged, and saves itself by thespeed with which it passes them off. Iron cannot rust, nor beer sour, nor timber rot, nor calicoes go out of fashion, nor money stocksdepreciate, in the few swift moments in which the Yankee suffers anyone of them to remain in his possession. In skating over thin ice oursafety is in our speed. 

Let him learn a prudence of a higher strain. Let him learn thateverything in nature, even motes and feathers, go by law and not byluck, and that what he sows he reaps. By diligence and self-commandlet him put the bread he eats at his own disposal, and not at that ofothers, that he may not stand in bitter and false relations to othermen; for the best good of wealth is freedom. Let him practise theminor virtues. [684] How much of human life is lost in waiting! Let himnot make his fellow creatures wait. How many words and promises arepromises of conversation! Let his be words of fate. When he sees afolded and sealed scrap of paper float around the globe in a pine shipand come safe to the eye for which it was written, amidst a swarmingpopulation, let him likewise feel the admonition to integrate hisbeing across all these distracting forces, and keep a slender humanword among the storms, distances and accidents that drive us hitherand thither, and, by persistency, make the paltry force of one manreappear to redeem its pledge after months and years in the mostdistant climates. 

We must not try to write the laws of any one virtue, looking at thatonly. Human nature loves no contradictions, but is symmetrical. Theprudence which secures an outward well-being is not to be studied byone set of men, whilst heroism and holiness are studied by another, but they are reconcilable. Prudence concerns the present time, persons, property and existing forms. But as every fact hath its rootsin the soul, and, if the soul were changed, would cease to be, orwould become some other thing, therefore the proper administration ofoutward things will always rest on a just apprehension of their causeand origin; that is, the good man will be the wise man, and thesingle-hearted the politic man. Every violation of truth is not only asort of suicide in the liar, but is a stab at the health of humansociety. On the most profitable lie the course of events presentlylays a destructive tax; whilst frankness proves to be the besttactics, for it invites frankness, puts the parties on a convenientfooting and makes their business a friendship. Trust men and they willbe true to you; treat them greatly and they will show themselvesgreat, though they make an exception in your favor to all their rulesof trade. 

So, in regard to disagreeable and formidable things, prudence does notconsist in evasion or in flight, but in courage. He who wishes to walkin the most peaceful parts of life with any serenity must screwhimself up to resolution. Let him front the object of his worstapprehension, and his stoutness will commonly make his fearsgroundless. The Latin proverb says, [685] "in battles the eye is firstovercome. " The eye is daunted and greatly exaggerates the perils ofthe hour. Entire self-possession may make a battle very little moredangerous to life than a match at foils or at football. Examples arecited by soldiers of men who have seen the cannon pointed and the firegiven to it, and who have stepped aside from the path of the ball. Theterrors of the storm are chiefly confined to the parlor and the cabin. The drover, the sailor, buffets it all day, and his health renewsitself at as vigorous a pulse under the sleet as under the sun ofJune. 

In the occurrence of unpleasant things among neighbors, fear comesreadily to heart and magnifies the consequence of the other party; butit is a bad counsellor. Every man is actually weak and apparentlystrong. To himself he seems weak; to others formidable. You are afraidof Grim; but Grim also is afraid of you. You are solicitous of thegood will of the meanest person, uneasy at his ill will. But thesturdiest offender of your peace and of the neighborhood, if you ripup _his_ claims, is as thin and timid as any; and the peace of societyis often kept, because, as children say, one is afraid and the otherdares not. Far off, men swell, bully and threaten: bring them hand tohand, and they are a feeble folk. 

It is a proverb that "courtesy costs nothing"; but calculation mightcome to value love for its profit. Love is fabled to be blind, butkindness is necessary to perception; love is not a hood, but aneye-water. If you meet a sectary or a hostile partisan, neverrecognize the dividing lines, but meet on what common groundremains, --if only that the sun shines and the rain rains forboth, --the area will widen very fast, and ere you know it, theboundary mountains on which the eye had fastened have melted into air. If he set out to contend, [686] almost St. Paul will lie, almost St. John will hate. What low, poor, paltry, hypocritical people anargument on religion will make of the pure and chosen souls. Shufflethey will and crow, crook and hide, feign to confess here, only thatthey may brag and conquer there, and not a thought has enriched eitherparty, and not an emotion of bravery, modesty, or hope. So neithershould you put yourself in a false position to your contemporaries byindulging a vein of hostility and bitterness. Though your views are instraight antagonism[687] to theirs, assume an identity of sentiment, assume that you are saying precisely that which all think, and in theflow of wit and love roll out your paradoxes in solid column, with notthe infirmity of a doubt. So at least shall you get an adequatedeliverance. The natural emotions of the soul are so much better thanthe voluntary ones that you will never do yourself justice in dispute. The thought is not then taken hold of by the right handle, does notshow itself proportioned and in its true bearings, but bears extorted, hoarse, and half witness. But assume a consent and it shall presentlybe granted, since really and underneath their all externaldiversities, all men are of one heart and mind. 

Wisdom will never let us stand with any man or men on an unfriendlyfooting. We refuse sympathy and intimacy with people, as if we waitedfor some better sympathy and intimacy to come. But whence and when?To-morrow will be like to-day. Life wastes itself whilst we arepreparing to live. Our friends and fellow-workers die off from us. Scarcely can we say we see new men, new women, approaching us. We aretoo old to regard fashion, too old to expect patronage of any greateror more powerful. Let us suck the sweetness of those affections andconsuetudes[688] that grow near us. These old shoes are easy to thefeet. Undoubtedly we can easily pick faults in our company, can easilywhisper names prouder and that tickle the fancy more. Every man'simagination hath its friends; and pleasant would life be with suchcompanions. But if you cannot have them on good mutual terms, youcannot have them. If not the Deity but our ambition hews and shapesthe new relations, their virtue escapes, as strawberries lose theirflavor in garden beds. 

Thus truth, frankness, courage, love, humility, and all the virtuesrange themselves on the side of prudence, or the art of securing apresent well-being. I do not know if all matter will be found to bemade of one element, as oxygen or hydrogen, at last, but the world ofmanners and actions is wrought of one stuff, and begin where wewill[689] we are pretty sure in a short space to be mumbling our tencommandments. 

CIRCLES. [690]

The eye is the first circle; the horizon which it forms is the second;and throughout nature this primary picture is repeated without end. Itis the highest emblem in the cipher of the world. St. Augustine[691]described the nature of God as a circle whose centre was everywhereand its circumference nowhere. We are all our lifetime reading thecopious sense of this first of forms. One moral we have alreadydeduced in considering the circular or compensatory character of everyhuman action. Another analogy we shall now trace, that every actionadmits of being outdone. Our life is an apprenticeship to the truththat around every circle another can be drawn; that there is no end innature, but every end is a beginning; that there is always anotherdawn risen on mid-noon, [692] and under every deep a lower deep opens. 

This fact, as far as it symbolizes the moral fact of the Unattainable, the flying Perfect, around which the hands of man can never meet, atonce the inspirer and the condemner of every success, may convenientlyserve us to connect many illustrations of human power in everydepartment. 

There are no fixtures in nature. The universe is fluid and volatile. Permanence is but a word of degrees. Our globe seen by God is atransparent law, not a mass of facts. The law dissolves the fact andholds its fluid. Our culture is the predominance of an idea whichdraws after it all this train of cities and institutions. Let us riseinto another idea; they will disappear. The Greek sculpture[693] isall melted away, as if it had been statues of ice: here and there asolitary figure or fragment remaining, as we see flecks and scraps ofsnow left in cold dells and mountain clefts in June and July. For thegenius that created it creates now somewhat else. The Greekletters[694] last a little longer, but are already passing under thesame sentence and tumbling into the inevitable pit which the creationof new thought opens for all that is old. The new continents are builtout of the ruins of an old planet; the new races fed out of thedecomposition of the foregoing. New arts destroy the old. [695] See theinvestment of capital in aqueducts, made useless by hydraulics;fortifications, by gunpowder; roads and canals, by railways; sails, bysteam; steam, by electricity. 

You admire this tower of granite, weathering the hurts of so manyages. Yet a little waving hand built this huge wall, and that whichbuilds is better than that which is built. The hand that built cantopple it down much faster. Better than the hand and nimbler was theinvisible thought which wrought through it; and thus ever, behind thecoarse effect, is a fine cause, which, being narrowly seen, is itselfthe effect of a finer cause. Everything looks permanent until itssecret is known. A rich estate appears to women and children a firmand lasting fact; to a merchant, one easily created out of anymaterials, and easily lost. An orchard, good tillage, good grounds, seem a fixture, like a gold mine, or a river, to a citizen; but to alarge farmer, not much more fixed than the state of the crop. Naturelooks provokingly stable and secular, but it has a cause like all therest; and when once I comprehend that, will these fields stretch soimmovably wide, these leaves hang so individually considerable?Permanence is a word of degrees. Every thing is medial. Moons are nomore bounds to spiritual power than bat-balls. 

The key to every man is his thought. Sturdy and defying though he look, he has a helm which he obeys, which is the idea after which all hisfacts are classified. He can only be reformed by showing him a new ideawhich commands his own. The life of man is a self-evolving circle, [696]which, from a ring imperceptibly small, rushes on all sides outwards tonew and larger circles, and that without end. The extent to which thisgeneration of circles, wheel without wheel, will go, depends on theforce or truth of the individual soul. For it is the inert effort ofeach thought, having formed itself into a circular wave of circumstance, as for instance an empire, rules of an art, a local usage, a religiousrite, to heap itself on that ridge and to solidify and hem in the life. But if the soul is quick and strong it bursts over that boundary on allsides and expands another orbit on the great deep, which also runs upinto a high wave, with attempt again to stop and to bind. But the heartrefuses to be imprisoned;[697] in its first and narrowest pulses italready tends outward with a vast force and to immense and innumerableexpansions. 

Every ultimate fact is only the first of a new series. Every generallaw only a particular fact of some more general law presently todisclose itself. There is no outside, no inclosing wall, nocircumference to us. The man finishes his story, --how good! how final!how it puts a new face on all things! He fills the sky. Lo, on theother side rises also a man and draws a circle around the circle wehad just pronounced the outline of the sphere. Then already is ourfirst speaker not man, but only a first speaker. His only redress isforthwith to draw a circle outside of his antagonist. And so men do bythemselves. The result of to-day, which haunts the mind and cannot beescaped will presently be abridged into a word, and the principle thatseemed to explain nature will itself be included as one example of abolder generalization. In the thought of to-morrow there is a power toupheave all thy creed, all the creeds, all the literatures of thenations, and marshal thee to a heaven which no epic dream has yetdepicted. Every man is not so much a workman in the world as he is asuggestion of that he should be. Men walk as prophecies of the nextage. 

Step by step we scale this mysterious ladder; the steps are actions, the new prospect is power. Every several result is threatened andjudged by that which follows. Every one seems to be contradicted bythe new; it is only limited by the new. The new statement is alwayshated by the old, and, to those dwelling in the old, comes like anabyss of scepticism. But the eye soon gets wonted to it, for the eyeand it are effects of one cause; then its innocency and benefitappear, and presently, all its energy spent, it pales and dwindlesbefore the revelation of the new hour. 

Fear not the new generalization. Does the fact look crass[698] andmaterial, threatening to degrade thy theory of spirit? Resist it not;it goes to refine and raise thy theory of matter just as much. 

There are no fixtures to men, if we appeal to consciousness. Every mansupposes himself not to be fully understood; and if there is any truthin him, if he rests at last on the divine soul, I see not how it canbe otherwise. The last chamber, the last closet, he must feel wasnever opened; there is always a residuum unknown, unanalyzable. Thatis, every man believes that he has a greater possibility. 

Our moods do not believe in each other. To-day I am full of thoughtsand can write what I please. I see no reason why I should not have thesame thought, the same power of expression, to-morrow. What I write, whilst I write it, seems the most natural thing in the world: butyesterday I saw a dreary vacuity in this direction in which now I seeso much; and a month hence, I doubt not, I shall wonder who he wasthat wrote so many continuous pages. Alas for this infirm faith, thiswill not strenuous, this vast ebb of a vast flow! I am God in nature;I am a weed by the wall. 

The continual effort to raise himself above himself, [699] to work apitch above his last height, betrays itself in a man's relations. Wethirst for approbation, yet cannot forgive the approver. The sweet ofnature is love; yet if I have a friend I am tormented by myimperfections. The love of me accuses the other party. If he were highenough[700] to slight me, then could I love him, and rise by myaffection to new heights. A man's growth is seen in the successivechoirs of his friends. For every friend whom he loses for truth, hegains a better. I thought as I walked in the woods and mused on anyfriends, why should I play with them this game of idolatry? I know andsee too well, when not voluntarily blind, the speedy limits of personscalled high and worthy. Rich, noble and great they are by theliberality of our speech, but truth is sad. O blessed Spirit, whom Iforsake for these, they are not thee! Every personal considerationthat we allow costs us heavenly state. We sell the thrones of angelsfor a short and turbulent pleasure. 

How often must we learn this lesson? Men cease to interest us when wefind their limitations. The only sin is limitation. As soon as youonce come up with a man's limitations, it is all over with him. Hashe talents? has he enterprises? has he knowledge? It boots not. Infinitely alluring and attractive was he to you yesterday, a greathope, a sea to swim in; now, you have found his shores, found it apond, and you care not if you never see it again. 

Each new step we take in thought reconciles twenty seeminglydiscordant facts, as expressions of one law. Aristotle and Plato[701]are reckoned the respective heads of two schools. A wise man will seethat Aristotle platonizes. By going one step farther back in thought, discordant opinions are reconciled by being seen to be two extremes ofone principle, and we can never go so far back as to preclude a stillhigher vision. 

Beware when the great God lets loose a thinker on this planet. Thenall things are at risk. It is as when a conflagration has broken outin a great city, and no man knows what is safe, or where it will end. There is not a piece of science but its flank may be turned to-morrow;there is not any literary reputation, not the so-called eternal namesof fame, that may not be revised and condemned. The very hopes of man, the thoughts of his heart, the religion of nations, the manners andmorals of mankind are all at the mercy of a new generalization. Generalization is always a new influx of the divinity into the mind. Hence the thrill that attends it. 

Valor consists in the power of self-recovery, so that a man cannothave his flank turned, cannot be out-generalled, but put him where youwill, he stands. This can only be by his preferring truth to his pastapprehension of truth, and his alert acceptance of it from whateverquarter; the intrepid conviction that his laws, his relations tosociety, his Christianity, his world, may at any time be supersededand decease. 

There are degrees in idealism. We learn first to play with itacademically, as the magnet was once a toy. Then we see in the heydayof youth and poetry that it may be true, that it is true in gleams andfragments. Then, its countenance waxes stern and grand, and we seethat it must be true. It now shows itself ethical and practical. Welearn that God is; that he is in me; and that all things are shadowsof him. The idealism of Berkeley[702] is only a crude statement of theidealism of Jesus, and that again is a crude statement of the factthat all nature is the rapid efflux of goodness executing andorganizing itself. Much more obviously is history and the state of theworld at any one time directly dependent on the intellectualclassification then existing in the minds of men. The things which aredear to men at this hour are so on account of the ideas which haveemerged on their mental horizon, and which cause the present order ofthings, as a tree bears its apples. A new degree of culture wouldinstantly revolutionize the entire system of human pursuits. 

Conversation is a game of circles. In conversation we pluck up the_termini_[703] which bound the common of silence on every side. Theparties are not to be judged by the spirit they partake and evenexpress under this Pentecost. [704] To-morrow they will have recededfrom this high-water mark. To-morrow you shall find them stoopingunder the old pack-saddles. Yet let us enjoy the cloven flame whilstit glows on our walls. When each new speaker strikes a new light, emancipates us from the oppression of the last speaker to oppress uswith the greatness and exclusiveness of his own thought, then yieldsus to another redeemer, we seem to recover our rights, to become men. O, what truths profound and executable only in ages and orbs, aresupposed in the announcement of every truth! In common hours, societysits cold and statuesque. We all stand waiting, empty, --knowing, possibly, that we can be full, surrounded by mighty symbols which arenot symbols to us, but prose and trivial toys. Then cometh the god andconverts the statues into fiery men, and by a flash of his eye burnsup the veil which shrouded all things, and the meaning of the veryfurniture, of cup and saucer, of chair and clock and tester, ismanifest. The facts which loomed so large in the fogs ofyesterday, --property, climate, breeding, personal beauty and the like, have strangely changed their proportions. All that we reckoned settledshakes and rattles; and literatures, cities, climates, religions, leave their foundations and dance before our eyes. And yet here againsee the swift circumscription! Good as is discourse, silence isbetter, and shames it. The length of the discourse indicates thedistance of thought betwixt the speaker and the hearer. If they wereat a perfect understanding in any part, no words would be necessarythereon. If at one in all parts, no words would be suffered. 

Literature is a point outside of our hodiernal[705] circle throughwhich a new one may be described. The use of literature is to affordus a platform whence we may command a view of our present life, apurchase by which we may move it. We fill ourselves with ancientlearning, install ourselves the best we can in Greek, in Punic, [706]in Roman houses, only that we may wiselier see French, English andAmerican houses and modes of living. In like manner[707] we seeliterature best from the midst of wild nature, or from the din ofaffairs, or from a high religion. The field cannot be well seen fromwithin the field. The astronomer must have his diameter of the earth'sorbit as a base to find the parallax of any star. 

Therefore we value the poet. All the argument and all the wisdom isnot in the encyclopædia, or the treatise on metaphysics, or the Bodyof Divinity, but in the sonnet or the play. In my daily work I inclineto repeat my old steps, and do not believe in remedial force, in thepower of change and reform. But some Petrarch[708] or Ariosto, [709]filled with the new wine of his imagination, writes me an ode or abrisk romance, full of daring thought and action. He smites andarouses me with his shrill tones, breaks up my whole chain of habits, and I open my eye on my own possibilities. He claps wings to the sidesof all the solid old lumber of the world, and I am capable once moreof choosing a straight path in theory and practice. 

We have the same need to command a view of the religion of the world. We can never see Christianity from the catechism:--from the pastures, from a boat in the pond, from amidst the songs of wood-birds wepossibly may. Cleansed by the elemental light and wind, steeped in thesea of beautiful forms which the field offers us, we may chance tocast a right glance back upon biography. Christianity is rightly dearto the best of mankind; yet was there never a young philosopher whosebreeding had fallen into the Christian church by whom that brave textof Paul's was not specially prized, "Then shall also the Son besubject unto Him who put all things under him, that God may be all inall. "[710] Let the claims and virtues of persons be never so great andwelcome, the instinct of man presses eagerly onward to the impersonaland illimitable, and gladly arms itself against the dogmatism ofbigots with this generous word out of the book itself. 

The natural world may be conceived of as a system of concentriccircles, and we now and then detect in nature slight dislocationswhich apprize us that this surface on which we now stand is not fixed, but sliding. These manifold tenacious qualities, [711] this chemistryand vegetation, these metals and animals, which seem to stand therefor their own sake, are means and methods only, are words of God, andas fugitive as other words. Has the naturalist or chemist learned hiscraft, who has explored the gravity of atoms and the electiveaffinities, who has not yet discerned the deeper law whereof this isonly a partial or approximate statement, namely that like draws tolike, and that the goods which belong to you gravitate to you and neednot be pursued with pains and cost? Yet is that statement approximatealso, and not final. Omnipresence is a higher fact. Not through subtlesubterranean channels need friend and fact be drawn to theircounterpart, but, rightly considered, these things proceed from theeternal generation of the soul. Cause and effect are two sides of onefact. 

The same law of eternal procession ranges all that we call thevirtues, and extinguishes each in the light of a better. The great manwill not be prudent in the popular sense; all his prudence will be somuch deduction from his grandeur. But it behooves each to see, when hesacrifices prudence, to what god he devotes it; if to ease andpleasure, he had better be prudent still; if to a great trust, he canwell spare his mule and panniers who has a winged chariot instead. Geoffrey draws on his boots to go through the woods, that his feet maybe safer from the bite of snakes; Aaron never thinks of such a peril. In many years neither is harmed by such an accident. Yet it seems tome that with every precaution you take against such an evil you putyourself into the power of the evil. I suppose that the highestprudence is the lowest prudence. Is this too sudden a rushing fromthe centre to the verge of our orbit? Think how many times we shallfall back into pitiful calculations before we take up our rest in thegreat sentiment, or make the verge of to-day the new centre. Besides, your bravest sentiment is familiar to the humblest men. The poor andthe low have their way of expressing the last facts of philosophy aswell as you. "Blessed be nothing" and "The worse things are, thebetter they are" are proverbs which express the transcendentalism ofcommon life. 

One man's justice is another's injustice; one man's beauty another'sugliness; one man's wisdom another's folly; as one beholds the sameobjects from a higher point of view. One man thinks justice consistsin paying debts, and has no measure in his abhorrence of another whois very remiss in this duty and makes the creditor wait tediously. Butthat second man has his own way of looking at things; asks himselfwhich debt must I pay first, the debt to the rich, or the debt to thepoor? the debt of money, or the debt of thought to mankind, of geniusto nature? For you, O broker, there is no other principle butarithmetic. For me, commerce is of trivial import; love, faith, truthof character, the aspiration of man, these are sacred; nor can Idetach one duty, like you, from all other duties, and concentrate myforces mechanically on the payment of moneys. Let me live onward; youshall find that, though slower, the progress of my character willliquidate all these debts without injustice to higher claims. If aman should dedicate himself to the payment of notes, would not this beinjustice? Owes he no debt but money? And are all claims on him to bepostponed to a landlord's or a banker's?

There is no virtue which is final; all are initial. The virtues ofsociety are vices of the saint. The terror of reform is the discoverythat we must cast away our virtues, or what we have always esteemedsuch, into the same pit that has consumed our grosser vices. 

 Forgive his crimes, forgive his virtues too, Those smaller faults, half converts to the right. [712]

It is the highest power of divine moments that they abolish ourcontritions also. I accuse myself of sloth and unprofitableness day byday; but when these waves of God flow into me I no longer reckon losttime. I no longer poorly compute my possible achievement by whatremains to me of the month or the year; for these moments confer asort of omnipresence and omnipotence which asks nothing of duration, but sees that the energy of the mind is commensurate with the work tobe done, without time. 

And thus, O circular philosopher, I hear some reader exclaim, you havearrived at a fine pyrrhonism, [713] at an equivalence and indifferencyof all actions, and would fain teach us that _if we are true_, forsooth, our crimes may be lively stones out of which we shallconstruct the temple of the true God. 

I am not careful to justify myself. I own I am gladdened[714] byseeing the predominance of the saccharine principle throughoutvegetable nature, and not less by beholding in morals thatunrestrained inundation of the principle of good into every chink andhole that selfishness has left open, yea into selfishness and sinitself; so that no evil is pure, nor hell itself without its extremesatisfactions. But lest I should mislead any when I have my own headand obey my whims, let me remind the reader that I am only anexperimenter. Do not set the least value on what I do, or the leastdiscredit on what I do not, as if I pretended to settle anything astrue or false. I unsettle all things. No facts are to me sacred; noneare profane; I simply experiment, an endless seeker with no Past at myback. 

Yet this incessant movement and progression which all things partakecould never become sensible to us but by contrast to some principle offixture or stability in the soul. Whilst the eternal generation ofcircles proceeds, the eternal generator abides. That central life issomewhat superior to creation, superior to knowledge and thought, andcontains all its circles. For ever it labors to create a life andthought as large and excellent as itself; but in vain; for that whichis made instructs how to make a better. 

Thus there is no sleep, no pause, no preservation, but all thingsrenew, germinate and spring. Why should we import rags and relics intothe new hour? Nature abhors the old, and old age seems the onlydisease: all others run into this one. We call it by manynames, --fever, intemperance, insanity, stupidity and crime: they areall forms of old age: they are rest, conservatism, appropriation, inertia; not newness, not the way onward. We grizzle every day. I seeno need of it. Whilst we converse with what is above us, we do notgrow old, but grow young. Infancy, youth, receptive, aspiring, withreligious eye looking upward, counts itself nothing and abandonsitself to the instruction flowing from all sides. But the man andwoman of seventy assume to know all; throw up their hope; renounceaspiration; accept the actual for the necessary and talk down to theyoung. Let them then become organs of the Holy Ghost; let them belovers; let them behold truth; and their eyes are uplifted, theirwrinkles smoothed, they are perfumed again with hope and power. Thisold age ought not to creep on a human mind. In nature every moment isnew; the past is always swallowed and forgotten; the coming only issacred. Nothing is secure but life, transition, the energizing spirit. No love can be bound by oath or covenant to secure it against a higherlove. No truth so sublime but it may be trivial to-morrow in the lightof new thoughts. People wish to be settled: only as far as they areunsettled is there any hope for them. 

Life is a series of surprises. We do not guess to-day the mood, thepleasure, the power of to-morrow, when we are building up our being. Of lower states, --of acts of routine and sense, we can tell somewhat, but the masterpieces of God, the total growths and universal movementsof the soul, he hideth; they are incalculable. I can know that truthis divine and helpful; but how it shall help me I can have no guess, for _so to be_ is the sole inlet of _so to know_. The new position ofthe advancing man has all the powers of the old, yet has them all new. It carries in its bosom all the energies of the past, yet is itself anexhalation of the morning. I cast away in this new moment all my oncehoarded knowledge, as vacant and vain. Now for the first time seem Ito know any thing rightly. The simplest words, --we do not know whatthey mean except when we love and aspire. 

The difference between talents and character is adroitness to keep theold and trodden round, and power and courage to make a new road to newand better goals. Character makes an overpowering present, a cheerful, determined hour, which fortifies all the company by making them seethat much is possible and excellent that was not thought of. Characterdulls the impression of particular events. When we see the conquerorwe do not think much of any one battle or success. We see that we hadexaggerated the difficulty. It was easy to him. The great man is notconvulsible or tormentable. He is so much that events pass over himwithout much impression. People say sometimes, "See what I haveovercome; see how cheerful I am; see how completely I have triumphedover these black events. " Not if they still remind me of the blackevent, --they have not yet conquered. Is it conquest to be a gay anddecorated sepulchre, or a half-crazed widow, hysterically laughing?True conquest is the causing the black event to fade and disappear asan early cloud of insignificant result in a history so large andadvancing. 

The one thing which we seek with insatiable desire is to forgetourselves, to be surprised out of our propriety, to lose oursempiternal[715] memory and to do something without knowing how orwhy; in short to draw a new circle. Nothing great was ever achievedwithout enthusiasm. The way of life is wonderful. It is byabandonment. The great moments of history are the facilities ofperformance through the strength of ideas, as the works of genius andreligion. "A man, " said Oliver Cromwell, [716] "never rises so high aswhen he knows not whither he is going. " Dreams and drunkenness, theuse of opium and alcohol are the semblance and counterfeit of thisoracular genius, and hence their dangerous attraction for men. For thelike reason they ask the aid of wild passions, as in the gaming andwar, ape in some manner these flames and generosities of the heart. 

NOTES

THE AMERICAN SCHOLAR

[Footnote 1: Games of strength. The public games of Greece wereathletic and intellectual contests of various kinds. There were fourof importance: the Olympic, held every four years; the Pythian, heldevery third Olympic year; and the Nemean and Isthmian, held alternateyears between the Olympic periods. These great national festivalsexercised a strong influence in Greece. They were a secure bond ofunion between the numerous independent states and did much to help thenation to repel its foreign invaders. In Greece the accomplishedathlete was reverenced almost as a god, and cases have been recordedwhere altars were erected and sacrifices made in his honor. Theextreme care and cultivation of the body induced by this nationalspirit is one of the most significant features of Greek culture, andone which might wisely be imitated in the modern world. ]

[Footnote 2: Troubadours. In southern France during the eleventhcentury, wandering poets went from castle to castle reciting orsinging love-songs, composed in the old Provençal dialect, a sort ofvulgarized Latin. The life in the great feudal chateaux was so dullthat the lords and ladies seized with avidity any amusement whichpromised to while away an idle hour. The troubadours were made much ofand became a strong element in the development of the Southern spirit. So-called Courts of Love were formed where questions of an amorousnature were discussed in all their bearings; learned opinions wereexpressed on the most trivial matters, and offenses were tried. 

Some of the Provençal poetry is of the highest artistic significance, though the mass of it is worthless high-flown trash. ]

[Footnote 3: At the time this oration was delivered (1837), many ofthe authors who have since given America a place in the world'sliterature were young men writing their first books. "We were, " saysJames Russell Lowell, "still socially and intellectually moored toEnglish thought, till Emerson cut the cable and gave us a chance atthe dangers and glories of blue water. "]

[Footnote 4: Pole-star. Polaris is now the nearest conspicuous star tothe north pole of the celestial equator. Owing to the motion of thepole of the celestial equator around that of the ecliptic, this starwill in course of time recede from its proud position, and thebrilliant star Vega in the constellation Harp will become thepole-star. ]

[Footnote 5: It is now a well-recognized fact in the development ofanimal life that as any part of the body falls into disuse it in timedisappears. Good examples of this are the disappearance of powerfulfangs from the mouth of man, the loss of power in the wings ofbarnyard fowls; and, _vice versa_, as new uses for a member arise, itsstructure changes to meet the new needs. An example of this is thetransformation from the hoof of a horse through the cloven hoofs ofthe cow to the eventual development of highly expert fingers in themonkey and man. Emerson assumed the doctrine of evolution to besufficiently established by the anatomical evidence of gradualdevelopment. In his own words: "Man is no up-start in the creation. His limbs are only a more exquisite organization--say rather thefinish--of the rudimental forms that have been already sweeping thesea and creeping in the mud. The brother of his hand is even nowcleaving the arctic sea in the fin of the whale, and innumerable agessince was pawing the marsh in the flipper of the saurian. " A viewafterwards condensed into his memorable couplet:

 "Striving to be man, the worm Mounts through all the spires of form. "]

[Footnote 6: Stint. A prescribed or allotted task, a share of labor. ]

[Footnote 7: Ridden. Here used in the sense of dominated. ]

[Footnote 8: Monitory pictures. Instructive warning pictures. ]

[Footnote 9: The Greek stoic philosopher Epictetus is the author ofthis saying, not "the old oracle. " It occurs in the Encheiridion, ormanual, a work put together by a pupil of Epictetus. The originalsaying of Epictetus is as follows: "Every thing has two handles, theone by which it may be borne, the other by which it may not. If yourbrother acts unjustly, do not lay hold of the act by that handlewherein he acts unjustly, for this is the handle which cannot beborne: but lay hold of the other, that he is your brother, that he wasnurtured with you, and you will lay hold of the thing by that handleby which it can be borne. "]

[Footnote 10: Every day, the sun (shines). ]

[Footnote 11: Beholden. Emerson here uses this past participle withits original meaning instead of in its present sense of "indebted. "]

[Footnote 12: Here we have a reminder of Emerson's pantheism. He meansthe inexplicable continuity "of what I call God, and fools nature, " asBrowning expressed it. ]

[Footnote 13: His expanding knowledge will become a creator. ]

[Footnote 14: Know thyself. Plutarch ascribes this saying to Plato. Itis also ascribed to Pythagoras, Chilo, Thales, Cleobulus, Bias, andSocrates; also to Phemonië, a mythical Greek poetess of theante-Homeric period. Juvenal (Satire XI. 27) says that this preceptdescended from heaven. "Know thyself" and "Nothing too much" wereinscribed upon the Delphic oracle. 

 "Know then thyself, presume not God to scan; The proper study of mankind is man. "

]

[Footnote 15: Observe the brisk movement of these sentences. How theycatch and hold the attention, giving a new impulse to the reader'sinterest!]

[Footnote 16: Nature abhors a vacuum. ]

[Footnote 17: Noxious. Harmful. ]

[Footnote 18: John Locke (1632-1704), an English philosopher whosework was of especial significance in the development of modernphilosophy. The work he is best known by is the exhaustive "Essay onthe Human Understanding, " in which he combated the theory ofDescartes, that every man has certain "innate ideas. " The innate-ideatheory was first proved by the philosopher Descartes in this way. Descartes began his speculations from a standpoint of absolute doubt. Then he said, "I think, therefore I am, " and from this formula hebuilt up a number of ideas innate to the human mind, ideas which wecannot but hold. Locke's "Essay on the Human Understanding" did muchto discredit Descartes' innate ideas, which had been very generallyaccepted in Europe before. ]

[Footnote 19: Francis Bacon, Baron Verulam, Viscount Saint Alban's(1561-1626), a famous English statesman and philosopher. He occupiedhigh public offices, but in 1621 was convicted of taking bribes in hisoffice of Lord Chancellor. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced toimprisonment and a fine of forty thousand pounds. Both these sentenceswere remitted, however. In the seventeenth century, judicialcorruption was so common that Bacon's offence was not considered sogross as it would now be. As a philosopher Bacon's rank has been muchdisputed. While some claim that to his improved method of studyingnature are chiefly to be attributed the prodigious strides taken bymodern science, others deny him all merit in this respect. His bestknown works are: "The Novum Organum, " a philosophical treatise; "TheAdvancement of Learning, " a remarkable argument in favor ofscholarship; and the short essays on subjects of common interest, usually printed under the simple title "Bacon's Essays. "]

[Footnote 20: Third Estate. The thirteenth century was the age whenthe national assemblies of most European countries were putting ontheir definite shape. In most of them the system of _estates_prevailed. These in most countries were three--nobles, clergy, andcommons, the commons being the third estate. During the FrenchRevolution the Third Estate, or Tiers Etat, asserted its rights andbecame a powerful factor in French politics, choosing its own leadersand effecting the downfall of its oppressors. ]

[Footnote 21: Restorers of readings. Men who spend their lives tryingto improve and correct the texts of classical authors, by comparingthe old editions with each other and picking out the version whichseem most in accordance with the authors' original work. ]

[Footnote 22: Emendators. The same as restorers of readings. ]

[Footnote 23: Bibliomaniacs. Men with a mania for collecting rare andbeautiful books. Not a bad sort of mania, though Emerson never had anysympathy for it. ]

[Footnote 24: To many readers Emerson's own works richly fulfill thisobligation. He himself lived continually in such a lofty mentalatmosphere that no one can come within the circle of his influencewithout being stimulated and elevated. ]

[Footnote 25: Genius, the possession of a thoroughly active soul, ought not to be the special privilege of favorites of fortune, but theright of every sound man. ]

[Footnote 26: They stunt my mental growth. A man should not acceptanother man's conclusions, but merely use them as steps on his upwardpath. ]

[Footnote 27: If you do not employ such talent as you have in originallabor, in bearing the mental fruit of which you are capable, then youdo not vindicate your claim to a share in the divine nature. ]

[Footnote 28: Disservice. Injury. ]

[Footnote 29: In original composition of any sort our effortsnaturally flow in the channels worn for us by the first dominatingstreams of early genius. The conventional is the continual foe of alltrue art. ]

[Footnote 30: Emerson is continually stimulating us to look at thingsin new ways. Here, for instance, at once the thought comes: "Is it notperhaps possible that the transcendent genius of Shakespeare has beenrather noxious than beneficent in its influence on the mind of theworld? Has not the all-pervading Shakespearian influence flooded anddrowned out a great deal of original genius?"]

[Footnote 31: That is, --when in his clear, seeing moments he candistil some drops of truth from the world about him, let him not wastehis time in studying other men's records of what they have seen. ]

[Footnote 32: While Emerson's verse is frequently unmusical, in hisprose we often find passages like this instinct with the fairestpoetry. ]

[Footnote 33: Geoffrey Chaucer (1340-1400). The father of Englishpoetry. Chaucer's chief work is the "Canterbury Tales, " a series ofstories told by pilgrims traveling in company to Canterbury. Coleridge, the poet, wrote of Chaucer: "I take unceasing delight inChaucer; his manly cheerfulness is especially delicious to me in myold age. How exquisitely tender he is, yet how free from the leasttouch of sickly melancholy or morbid drooping. " Chaucer's poetry isabove all things fresh. It breathes of the morning of literature. LikeHomer he had at his command all the riches of a new language undefiledby usage from which to choose. 

 "Dan Chaucer, well of English undefyled, On Fame's eternall beadroll worthie to be fyled. "

]

[Footnote 34: Andrew Marvell (1620-1678). An eminent English patriotand satirist. As a writer he is chiefly known by his "RehearsalTransposed, " written in answer to a fanatical defender of absolutepower. When a young man he was assistant to the poet Milton, who wasthen Latin secretary to Oliver Cromwell. Marvell's wit anddistinguished abilities rendered him formidable to the corruptadministration of Charles II. , who attempted without success to buyhis friendship. Emerson's literary perspective is a bit unusual whenhe speaks of Marvell as "one of the great English poets. " Marvellhardly ranks with Chaucer, Shakespeare, and Milton. ]

[Footnote 35: John Dryden (1631-1700). A celebrated English poet. Early in life he wrote almost entirely for the stage and achievedgreat success. In the latter part of his life, however, according toMacaulay, he "turned his powers in a new direction with success themost splendid and decisive. The first rank in poetry was beyond hisreach, but he secured the most honorable place in the second. . . . Withhim died the secret of the old poetical diction of England, --the artof producing rich effects by familiar words. "]

[Footnote 36: Plato (429-347 B. C. ). One of the most illustriousphilosophers of all time. Probably no other philosopher hascontributed so much as Plato to the moral and intellectual training ofthe human race. This pre-eminence is due not solely to histranscendent intellect, but also in no small measure to his poeticpower and to that unrivaled grace of style which led the ancients tosay that if Jove should speak Greek he would speak like Plato. He wasa remarkable example of that universal culture of body and mind whichcharacterized the last period of ancient Greece. He was proficient inevery branch of art and learning and was such a brilliant athlete thathe contended in the Isthmian and Pythian games. ]

[Footnote 37: Gowns. The black gown worn occasionally in America andalways in England at the universities; the distinctive academic dressis a cap and gown. ]

[Footnote 38: Pecuniary foundations. Gifts of money for the support ofinstitutions of learning. ]

[Footnote 39: Wit is here used in its early sense of intellect, goodunderstanding. ]

[Footnote 40: Valetudinarian. A person of a weak, sicklyconstitution. ]

[Footnote 41: Mincing. Affected. ]

[Footnote 42: Preamble. A preface or introduction. ]

[Footnote 43: Dumb abyss. That vast immensity of the universe about uswhich we can never understand. ]

[Footnote 44: I comprehend its laws; I lose my fear of it. ]

[Footnote 45: Silkworms feed on mulberry-leaves. Emerson describeswhat science calls "unconscious cerebration. "]

[Footnote 46: Ripe fruit. Emerson's ripe fruit found its way into hisdiary, where it lay until he needed it in the preparation of somelecture or essay. ]

[Footnote 47: I. Corinthians xv. 53. ]

[Footnote 48: Empyrean. The region of pure light and fire; the ninthheaven of ancient astronomy. 

 "The deep-domed empyrean Rings to the roar of an angel onset. "

]

[Footnote 49: Ferules. According to the methods of education fiftyyears ago, it was quite customary for the teacher to punish aschool-child with his ferule or ruler. ]

[Footnote 50: Oliver Wendell Holmes cites this last sentence as themost extreme development of the distinctively Emersonian style. Suchthings must be read not too literally but rapidly, with alertattention to what the previous train of thought has been. ]

[Footnote 51: Savoyards. The people of Savoy, south of Lake Geneva inSwitzerland. ]

[Footnote 52: Emerson's style is characterized by the frequent use ofpithy epigrams like this. ]

[Footnote 53: Sir Isaac Newton (1642-1727). A great Englishphilosopher and mathematician. He is famous as having discovered thelaw of gravitation. ]

[Footnote 54: Unhandselled. Uncultivated, without natural advantages. A handsel is a gift. ]

[Footnote 55: Druids. The ancient priesthood of the Britons in Cæsar'stime. They had immense power among these primitive peoples. They werethe judges as well as the priests and decided all questions. It isbelieved that they made human sacrifices to their gods in the depthsof the primeval forest, but not much is known of their rites. ]

[Footnote 56: Berserkers. Berserker was a redoubtable hero inScandinavian mythology, the grandson of the eight-handed Starkodderand the beautiful Alfhilde. He had twelve sons who inherited thewild-battle frenzy, or berserker rage. The sagas, the greatScandinavian epics, are full of stories of heroes who are seized withthis fierce longing for battle, murder, and sudden death. The namemeans bear-shirt and has been connected with the old _were-wolf_tradition, the myth that certain people were able to change intoman-devouring wolves with a wolfish mad desire to rend and kill. ]

[Footnote 57: Alfred, surnamed the Great (848-901), king of the WestSaxons in England. When he ascended the throne his country was in adeplorable condition from the repeated inroads of northern invaders. He eventually drove them out and established a secure government. England owes much to the efforts of Alfred. He not only fought hiscountry's battles, but also founded schools, translated Latin booksinto his native tongue, and did much for the intellectual improvementof his people. ]

[Footnote 58: The hoe and the spade. "In spite of Emerson's habit ofintroducing the names of agricultural objects into his writing ('Hay, corn, roots, hemp, flax, apples, wool, and wood' is a line from one ofhis poems), his familiarity therewith is evidently not so great as hewould lead one to imagine. 'Take care, papa, ' cried his little son, seeing him at work with a spade, 'you will dig your leg. '"]

[Footnote 59: John Flamsteed (1646-1719). An eminent Englishastronomer. He appears to have been the first to understand the theoryof the equation of time. He passed his life in patient observation anddetermined the position of 2884 stars. ]

[Footnote 60: Sir William Herschel (1738-1822). One of the greatestastronomers that any age or nation has produced. Brought up to theprofession of music, it was not until he was thirty years old that heturned his attention to astronomy. By rigid economy he obtained atelescope, and in 1781 discovered the planet Uranus. This greatdiscovery gave him great fame and other substantial advantages. He wasmade private astronomer to the king and received a pension. Hisdiscoveries were so far in advance of his time, they had so littlerelation with those of his predecessors, that he may almost be saidto have created a new science by revealing the immensity of the scaleon which the universe is constructed. ]

[Footnote 61: Nebulous. In astronomy a nebula is a luminous patch inthe heavens far beyond the solar system, composed of a mass of starsor condensed gases. ]

[Footnote 62: Fetich. The word seems to have been applied byPortuguese sailors and traders on the west coast of Africa to objectsworshiped by the natives, which were regarded as charms or talismans. Of course the word here means an object of blind admiration anddevotion. ]

[Footnote 63: Cry up, to praise, extol. ]

[Footnote 64: Ancient and honorable. Isaiah ix. 15. ]

[Footnote 65: Complement. What is needed to complete or fill up somequantity or thing. ]

[Footnote 66: Signet. Seal. Emerson is not always felicitous in hischoice of metaphors. ]

[Footnote 67: Macdonald. In Cervantes' "Don Quixote, " Sancho Panza, the squire to the "knight of the metaphysical countenance, " tells astory of a gentleman who had asked a countryman to dine with him. Thefarmer was pressed to take his seat at the head of the table, and whenhe refused out of politeness to his host, the latter became impatientand cried: "Sit there, clod-pate, for let me sit wherever I will, thatwill still be the upper end, and the place of worship to thee. " Thissaying is commonly attributed to Rob Roy, but Emerson with his usualinaccuracy in such matters places it in the mouth of Macdonald, --whichMacdonald is uncertain. ]

[Footnote 68: Carolus Linnæus (1707-1778). A great Swedish botanist. He did much to make botany the orderly science it now is. ]

[Footnote 69: Sir Humphry Davy (1778-1829). The most famous of Englishchemists. The most important to mankind of his many discoveries wasthe safety-lamp to be used in mines where there is danger of explosionfrom fire-damp. ]

[Footnote 70: Baron George Cuvier (1769-1832). An illustrious Frenchphilosopher, statesman, and writer who made many discoveries in therealm of natural history, geology and philosophy. ]

[Footnote 71: The moon. The tides are caused by the attraction of themoon and the sun. The attraction of the moon for the water nearest themoon is somewhat greater than the attraction of the earth's center. This causes a slight bulging of the water toward the moon and aconsequent high tide. ]

[Footnote 72: Emerson frequently omits the principal verb of hissentences as here: "In a century _there may exist_ one or two men. "]

[Footnote 73: This obscurely constructed sentence means: "For theiracquiescence in a political and social inferiority the poor and lowfind some compensation in the immense moral capacity thereby gained. "]

[Footnote 74: "They" refers to the hero or poet mentioned some twentylines back. ]

[Footnote 75: Comprehendeth. Here used in the original sense _toinclude_. The perfect man should be so thoroughly developed at everypoint that he will possess a share in the nature of every man. ]

[Footnote 76: By the Classic age is generally meant the age of Greeceand Rome; and by the Romantic is meant the middle ages. ]

[Footnote 77: Introversion. Introspection is the more usual word toexpress the analytic self-searching so common in these days. ]

[Footnote 78: Second thoughts. Emerson uses the word here in the samesense as the French _arrière-pensée_, a mental reservation. ]

[Footnote 79:

 "And thus the native hue of resolution Is sicklied o'er with the pale cast of thought. " _Hamlet_, Act III, Sc. 1. 

]

[Footnote 80: Movement. The French Revolution. ]

[Footnote 81: Let every common object be credited with the divinerattributes which will class it among others of the same importance. ]

[Footnote 82: Oliver Goldsmith (1728-1774). An eminent English poetand writer. He is best known by the comedy "She Stoops to Conquer, "the poem "The Deserted Village, " and the "Vicar of Wakefield. " "Of allromances in miniature, " says Schlegel, the great German critic, "the'Vicar of Wakefield' is the most exquisite. " It is probably the mostpopular English work of fiction in Germany. ]

[Footnote 83: Robert Burns (1759-1796). A celebrated Scottish poet. The most striking characteristics of Burns' poetry are simplicity andintensity, in which he is scarcely, if at all, inferior to any of thegreatest poets that have ever lived. ]

[Footnote 84: William Cowper (1731-1800). One of the most popular ofEnglish poets. His poem "The Task" was probably more read in his daythan any poem of equal length in the language. Cowper also made anexcellent translation of Homer. ]

[Footnote 85: Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832). The mostillustrious name in German literature; a great poet, dramatist, novelist, philosopher, and critic. The Germans regard Goethe with thesame veneration we accord to Shakespeare. The colossal drama "Faust"is the most splendid product of his genius, though he wrote a largenumber of other plays and poems. ]

[Footnote 86: William Wordsworth (1770-1850). By many considered thegreatest of modern English poets. His descriptions of the ever-varyingmoods of nature are the most exquisite in the language. Matthew Arnoldin his essay on Emerson says: "As Wordsworth's poetry is, in myjudgment, the most important work done in verse in our language duringthe present century, so Emerson's 'Essays' are, I think, the mostimportant work done in prose. "]

[Footnote 87: Thomas Carlyle (1795-1881). A famous English essayist, historian, and speculative philosopher. It is scarcely too much to saythat no other author of this century has exerted a greater influencenot merely upon the literature but upon the mind of the English nationthan Carlyle. Emerson was an intimate friend of Carlyle, and duringthe greater part of his life maintained a correspondence with thegreat Englishman. An interesting description of their meeting will befound among the "Critical Opinions" at the beginning of the work. ]

[Footnote 88: Alexander Pope (1688-1744). The author of the "Essay onCriticism, " "Rape of the Lock, " the "Essay on Man, " and other famouspoems. Pope possessed little originality or creative imagination, buthe had a vivid sense of the beautiful and an exquisite taste. He owedmuch of his popularity to the easy harmony of his verse and thekeenness of his satire. ]

[Footnote 89: Samuel Johnson (1709-1784). One of the eminent writersof the eighteenth century. He wrote "Lives of the Poets, " poems, andprobably the most remarkable work of the kind ever produced by asingle person, an English dictionary. ]

[Footnote 90: Edward Gibbon (1737-1794). One of the most distinguishedof English historians. His great work is the "Decline and Fall of theRoman Empire. " Carlyle called Gibbon, "the splendid bridge from theold world to the new. "]

[Footnote 91: Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772). A great Swedishtheologian, naturalist, and mathematician, and the founder of areligious sect which has since his death become prominent among thephilosophical schools of Christianity. ]

[Footnote 92: Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746-1827). A Swiss teacherand educational reformer of great influence in his time. ]

COMPENSATION

[Footnote 93: These lines are printed under the title of_Compensation_ in Emerson's collected poems. He has also another poemof eight lines with the same title. ]

[Footnote 94: Documents, data, facts. ]

[Footnote 95: This doctrine, which a little observation would confute, is still taught by some. ]

[Footnote 96: Doubloons, Spanish and South American gold coins of thevalue of about $15. 60 each. ]

[Footnote 97: Polarity, that quality or condition of a body by virtueof which it exhibits opposite or contrasted properties in opposite orcontrasted directions. ]

[Footnote 98: Systole and diastole, the contraction and dilation ofthe heart and arteries. ]

[Footnote 99: They are increased and consequently want more. ]

[Footnote 100: Intenerate, soften. ]

[Footnote 101: White House, the popular name of the presidentialmansion at Washington. ]

[Footnote 102: Explain the phrase _eat dust_. ]

[Footnote 103: Overlook, oversee, superintend. ]

[Footnote 104: Res nolunt, etc. Translated in the previous sentence. ]

[Footnote 105: The world . . . Dew. Explain the thought. What gives theearth its shape?]

[Footnote 106: The microscope . . . Little. This statement is not inaccordance with the facts, if we are to understand _perfect_ in thesense which the next sentence would suggest. ]

[Footnote 107: Emerson has been considered a pantheist. ]

[Footnote 108: _[Greek: Hoi kyboi]_, etc. The translation follows inthe text. This old proverb is quoted by Sophocles, (Fragm. LXXIV. 2) inthe form:

 [Greek: Aei gar eu piptousin oi Dios kyboi], Emerson uses it in _Nature_ in the form "Nature's dice are alwaysloaded. "]

[Footnote 109: Amain, with full force, vigorously. ]

[Footnote 110: The proverb is quoted by Horace, Epistles, I, X. 24:

 "Naturam expelles furca, tamen usque recurret. "

A similar thought is expressed by Juvenal, Seneca, Cicero, andAristophanes. ]

[Footnote 111: Augustine, Confessions, B. I. ]

[Footnote 112: Jupiter, the supreme god of the Romans, the Zeus of theGreeks. ]

[Footnote 113: Tying up the hands. The expression is usedfiguratively, of course. ]

[Footnote 114: The supreme power in England is vested in Parliament. ]

[Footnote 115: Prometheus stole fire from heaven to benefit the raceof men. In punishment for this Jupiter chained him to a rock and setan eagle to prey upon his liver. Some unknown and terrible dangerthreatened Jupiter, the secret of averting which only Prometheus knew. For this secret Jupiter offered him his freedom. ]

[Footnote 116: Minerva, goddess of wisdom, who sprang full-armed fromthe brain of Jupiter. The secret which she held is told in thefollowing lines. ]

[Footnote 117: Aurora, goddess of the dawn. Enamored of Tithonus, shepersuaded Jupiter to grant him immortality, but forgot to ask for himimmortal youth. Read Tennyson's poem on _Tithonus_. ]

[Footnote 118: Achilles, the hero of Homer's _Iliad_. His motherThetis, to render him invulnerable, plunged him into the waters of theStyx. The heel by which she held him was not washed by the waters andremained vulnerable. Here he received a mortal wound. ]

[Footnote 119: Siegfried, hero of the Nibelungenlied, the old Germanepic poem. Having slain a dragon, he bathed in its blood and becamecovered with an invulnerable horny hide, only one small spot betweenhis shoulders which was covered by a leaf remaining vulnerable. Intothis spot the treacherous Hagen plunged his lance. ]

[Footnote 120: Nemesis, a Greek female deity, goddess of retribution, who visited the righteous anger of the gods upon mortals. ]

[Footnote 121: The Furies or Eumenides, stern and inexorable ministersof the vengeance of the gods. ]

[Footnote 122: Ajax and Hector, Greek and Trojan heroes in the TrojanWar. See Homer's _Iliad_. Achilles slew Hector and, lashing him to hischariot with the belt which Ajax had given Hector, dragged him roundthe walls of Troy. Ajax committed suicide with the sword which Hectorhad presented to him. ]

[Footnote 123: Thasians, inhabitants of the island of Thasus. Thestory here told of the rival of the athlete Theagenes is found inPausanias' _Description of Greece_, Book VI. Chap. XI. ]

[Footnote 124: Shakespeare, the greatest of English writers, seems tohave succeeded entirely or almost entirely in removing the personalelement from his writings. ]

[Footnote 125: Hellenic, Greek. ]

[Footnote 126: Tit for tat, etc. This paragraph is composed of aseries of proverbs. ]

[Footnote 127: Edmund Burke (1729?-1797), illustrious Irish statesman, orator, and author. ]

[Footnote 128: Pawns, the pieces of lowest rank in chess. ]

[Footnote 129: What is the meaning of _obscene_ here? Compare theLatin. ]

[Footnote 130: Polycrates, a tyrant of Samos, who was visited withsuch remarkable prosperity that he was advised by a friend to breakthe course of it by depriving himself of some valued possession. Inaccordance with this advice he cast into the sea an emerald ring whichhe considered his rarest treasure. A few days later a fishermanpresented the monarch with a large fish inside of which the ring wasfound. Soon after this Polycrates fell into the power of an enemy andwas nailed to a cross. ]

[Footnote 131: Scot and lot, "formerly, a parish assessment laid onsubjects according to their ability. Now, a phrase for obligations ofevery kind regarded collectively. " (Webster. )]

[Footnote 132: Read Emerson's essay on _Gifts_. ]

[Footnote 133: Worm worms, breed worms. ]

[Footnote 134: Compare the old proverb "Murder will out. " See Chaucer, _N. P. T. _, 232 and 237, and _Pr. T. _, 124. ]

[Footnote 135:

"Et semel emissum volat irrevocabile verbum. " HORACE, _EPIST. _, I. XVIII. 65. 

]

[Footnote 136: Stag in the fable. See _Æsop_, LXVI. 184, _Cerva etLeo_; Phædrus I. 12. _Cervus ad fontem_; La Fontaine, vi. 9, _Le Cerfse Voyant dans l'eau_. ]

[Footnote 137: See the quotation from St. Bernard farther on. ]

[Footnote 138: Withholden, old participle of _withhold_, now_withheld_. ]

[Footnote 139: What is the etymology of the word _mob_?]

[Footnote 140: Optimism and Pessimism. The meanings of these twoopposites are readily made out from the Latin words from which theycome. ]

[Footnote 141: St. Bernard de Clairvaux (1091-1153), Frenchecclesiastic. ]

[Footnote 142: Jesus. Holmes writes of Emerson: "Jesus was for him adivine manifestation, but only as other great human souls have been inall ages and are to-day. He was willing to be called a Christian justas he was willing to be called a Platonist. . . . If he did not worshipthe 'man Christ Jesus' as the churches of Christendom have done, hefollowed his footsteps so nearly that our good Methodist, FatherTaylor, spoke of him as more like Christ than any man he had known. "]

[Footnote 143: The first _his_ refers to Jesus, the second toShakespeare. ]

[Footnote 144: Banyan. What is the characteristic of this tree thatmakes it appropriate for this figure?]

SELF-RELIANCE

[Footnote 145: Ne te, etc. "Do not seek for anything outside ofthyself. " From Persius, _Sat. _ I. 7. Compare Macrobius, _Com. In Somn. Scip. _, I. Ix. 3, and Boethius, _De Consol. Phil. _, IV. 4. ]

[Footnote 146: _Epilogue to Beaumont and Fletcher's Honest Man'sFortune_. ]

[Footnote 147: These lines appear in Emerson's _Quatrains_ under thetitle _Power_. ]

[Footnote 148: Genius. See the paragraph on genius in Emerson'slecture on _The Method of Nature_, one sentence of which runs: "Geniusis its own end, and draws its means and the style of its architecturefrom within, going abroad only for audience, and spectator. "]

[Footnote 149: "The man that stands by himself, the universe stands byhim also. "--EMERSON, _Behavior_. ]

[Footnote 150: Plato (429-347 B. C. ), (See note 36. )]

[Footnote 151: Milton (1608-1674), the great English epic poet, authorof _Paradise Lost. _

 "O mighty-mouth'd inventor of harmonies, O skill'd to sing of Time or Eternity, God-gifted organ-voice of England, Milton, a name to resound for ages. "--TENNYSON. 

]

[Footnote 152: "The great poet makes feel our own wealth. "--EMERSON, _The Over-Soul_. ]

[Footnote 153: Then most when, most at the time when. ]

[Footnote 154: "The imitator dooms himself to hopelessmediocrity. "--EMERSON, _Address to the Senior Class in DivinityCollege, Cambridge_. ]

[Footnote 155:

 "For words, like Nature, half reveal And half conceal the soul within. " TENNYSON, _In Memoriam_, V. I. 

]

[Footnote 156: Trust thyself. This is the theme of the present essay, and is a lesson which Emerson is never tired of teaching. In _TheAmerican Scholar_ he says:

"In self-trust all the virtues are comprehended. " In the essay on_Greatness_:

"Self-respect is the early form in which greatness appears. . . . Stickto your own. . . . Follow the path your genius traces like the galaxy ofheaven for you to walk in. "

Carlyle says:

 "The fearful unbelief is unbelief in yourself. "

]

[Footnote 157: Chaos ([Greek: Chaos]), the confused, unorganizedcondition in which the world was supposed to have existed before itwas reduced to harmony and order; hence, utter confusion anddisorder. ]

[Footnote 158: These, _i. E. _, children, babes, and brutes. ]

[Footnote 159: Four or five. Supply the noun. ]

[Footnote 160: Nonchalance, a French word meaning _indifference_, _coolness_. ]

[Footnote 161: Pit in the playhouse, formerly, the seats on the floorbelow the level of the stage. These cheap seats were occupied by aclass who did not hesitate to express their opinions of theperformances. ]

[Footnote 162: Eclat, a French word meaning _brilliancy of success_, _striking effect_. ]

[Footnote 163: "Lethe, the river of oblivion. "--_Paradise Lost_. Oblivion, forgetfulness. ]

[Footnote 164: Who. What is the construction?]

[Footnote 165: Nonconformist, one who does not conform to establishedusages or opinions. Emerson considers conformity and consistency asthe two terrors that scare us from self-trust. (See note 182. )]

[Footnote 166: Explore if it be goodness, investigate for himself andsee if it be really goodness. 

 "Prove all things; hold fast that which is good. " PAUL, _I. Thes. _ v. 21. 

]

[Footnote 167: Suffrage, approval. 

 "What stronger breastplate than a heart untainted? Thrice is he arm'd that hath his quarrel just; And he but naked, though lock'd up in steel, Whose conscience with injustice is corrupted. " SHAKESPEARE, _II. Henry VI. _, III. 2. 

]

[Footnote 168: "There is nothing either good or bad, but thinkingmakes it so. " _Hamlet_, II. 2. ]

[Footnote 169: Barbadoes, an island in the Atlantic Ocean, one of theLesser Antilles. The negroes, composing by far the larger part of thepopulation, were formerly slaves. ]

[Footnote 170: He had rather have his actions ascribed to whim andcaprice than to spend the day in explaining them. ]

[Footnote 171: Diet and bleeding, special diet and medical care, usedfiguratively, of course. ]

[Footnote 172: Read Emerson's essay on _Greatness_. ]

[Footnote 173: The precise man, precisely what kind of man. ]

[Footnote 174: "By their fruits ye shall know them. "--_Matthew_, vii. 16 and 20. ]

[Footnote 175: With, notwithstanding, in spite of. ]

[Footnote 176: Of the bench, of an impartial judge. ]

[Footnote 177: Bound their eyes with . . . Handkerchief, in this game ofblindman's-buff. ]

[Footnote 178: "Pin thy faith to no man's sleeve; hast thou not twoeyes of thy own?"--CARLYLE. ]

[Footnote 179: Give examples of men who have been made to feel thedispleasure of the world for their nonconformity. ]

[Footnote 180: "Nihil tam incertum nec tam inæstimabile est quam animimultitudinis. "--LIVY, xxxi. 34. 

 "Mobile mutatur semper cum principe vulgus. " CLAUDIANUS, _De IV. Consul. Honorii_, 302. 

]

[Footnote 181: _The other terror. _ The first, conformity, has justbeen treated. ]

[Footnote 182: Consistency. Compare, on the other hand, the well-knownsaying, "Consistency, thou art a jewel. "]

[Footnote 183: Orbit, course in life. ]

[Footnote 184: Somewhat, something. ]

[Footnote 185: See _Genesis_, xxxix. 12. ]

[Footnote 186: Pythagoras (fl. About 520 B. C. ), a Greek philosopher. His society was scattered and persecuted by the fury of the populace. ]

[Footnote 187: Socrates (470?-399 B. C. ), the great Athenianphilosopher, whose teachings are the subject of most of Plato'swritings, was accused of corrupting the youth, and condemned to drinkhemlock. ]

[Footnote 188: Martin Luther (1483-1546) preached against certainabuses of the Roman Catholic Church and was excommunicated by thePope. He became the leader of the Protestant Reformation. ]

[Footnote 189: Copernicus (1473-1543) discovered the error of the oldPtolemaic system of astronomy and showed that the sun is the centre ofour planetary system. Fearing the persecution of the church, hehesitated long to publish his discovery, and it was many years afterhis death before the world accepted his theory. ]

[Footnote 190: Galileo (1564-1642), the famous Italian astronomer andphysicist, discoverer of the satellites of Jupiter and the rings ofSaturn, was thrown into prison by the Inquisition. ]

[Footnote 191: Sir Isaac Newton. (See note 53. )]

[Footnote 192: Andes, the great mountain system of South America. ]

[Footnote 193: Himmaleh, Himalaya, the great mountain system of Asia. ]

[Footnote 194: Alexandrian stanza. The Alexandrian line consists oftwelve syllables (iambic hexameter). Neither the acrostic nor theAlexandrine has the property assigned to it here. A palindrame readsthe same forward as backward, as:

 "Madam, I'm Adam"; "Signa te signa; temere me tangis et angis";

or the inscription on the church of St. Sophia, Constantinople:

 [Greek: "Nipson anomêmata mê monan opsin, "]

]

[Footnote 195: The reference is to sailing vessels, of course. ]

[Footnote 196: Scorn eyes, scorn observers. ]

[Footnote 197: Chatham, William Pitt, Earl of Chatham (1708-1778), this distinguished statesman and orator. He became very popular as astatesman and was known as "The Great Commoner. "]

[Footnote 198: Adams. The reference is presumably to Samuel Adams(1722-1803), a popular leader and orator in the cause of Americanfreedom. He was a member of the Continental Congress and a signer ofthe Declaration of Independence. Emerson may have in mind, however, John Adams (1735-1826), second president of the United States. ]

[Footnote 199: Spartan. The ancient Spartans were noted for theircourage and fortitude. ]

[Footnote 200: Julius Cæsar (100-44 B. C. ), the great Roman general, statesman, orator, and author. ]

[Footnote 201: St. Anthony (251-356), Egyptian founder of monachism, the system of monastic seclusion. ]

[Footnote 202: George Fox (1624-1691), English founder of the Societyof Friends or Quakers. ]

[Footnote 203: John Wesley (1703-1791), English founder of thereligious sect known as Methodists. ]

[Footnote 204: Thomas Clarkson (1760-1846), English philanthropist andabolitionist. ]

[Footnote 205: Scipio (235-184 B. C. ), the great Roman general whodefeated Hannibal and decided the fate of Carthage. The quotation isfrom _Paradise Lost_, Book IX. , line 610. ]

[Footnote 206: In the story of _Abou Hassan_ or _The Sleeper Awakened_in the _Arabian Nights_ Abou Hassan awakes and finds himself treatedin every respect as the Caliph Haroun Al-raschid. Shakespeare has madeuse of a similar trick in _Taming of the Shrew_, where Christopher Slyis put to bed drunk in the lord's room and on awaking is treated as alord. ]

[Footnote 207: Alfred the Great (849-901), King of the West Saxons. Hewas a wise king, a great scholar, and a patron of learning. ]

[Footnote 208: Scanderbeg, George Castriota (1404-1467), an Albanianchief who embraced Christianity and carried on a successful waragainst the Turks. ]

[Footnote 209: Gustavus Adolphus (1594-1632), King of Sweden, the heroof Protestantism in the Thirty Years' War. ]

[Footnote 210: Hieroglyphic, a character in the picture-writing of theancient Egyptian priests; hence, hidden sign. ]

[Footnote 211: Parallax, an angle used in astronomy in calculating thedistance of a heavenly body. The parallax decreases as the distance ofthe body increases. ]

[Footnote 212: The child has the advantage of the experience of allhis ancestors. Compare Tennyson's line in _Locksley Hall_:

 "I the heir of all the ages, in the foremost files of time. "

]

[Footnote 213: "Why should we grope among the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into masquerade out of its fadedwardrobe? The sun shines to-day also. "--EMERSON, _Introd. To Nature, Addresses, etc. _]

[Footnote 214: Explain the thought in this sentence. ]

[Footnote 215: Judas Iscariot, who betrayed Jesus. ]

[Footnote 216: Agent, active, acting. ]

[Footnote 217: An allusion to the Mohammedan custom of removing theshoes before entering a mosque. ]

[Footnote 218: Of a truth, men are mystically united; a mystic bond ofbrotherhood makes all men one. ]

[Footnote 219: Thor and Woden. Woden or Odin was the chief god ofScandinavian mythology. Thor, his elder son, was the god of thunder. From these names come the names of the days Wednesday and Thursday. ]

[Footnote 220: Explain the meaning of this sentence. ]

[Footnote 221: You, or you, addressing different persons. ]

[Footnote 222: "The truth shall make you free. "--_John_, viii. 32. ]

[Footnote 223: Antinomianism, the doctrine that the moral law is notbinding under the gospel dispensation, faith alone being necessary tosalvation. ]

[Footnote 224: "There is no sorrow I have thought more about thanthat--to love what is great, and try to reach it, and yet to fail. " GEORGE ELIOT, _Middlemarch_, lxxvi. ]

[Footnote 225: Explain the use of _it_ in these expressions. ]

[Footnote 226: Stoic, a disciple of the Greek philosopher Zeno, whotaught that men should be free from passion, unmoved by joy and grief, and should submit without complaint to the inevitable. ]

[Footnote 227: Word made flesh, see _John_, i. 14. ]

[Footnote 228: Healing to the nations, see _Revelation_, xxii. 2. ]

[Footnote 229: In what prayers do men allow themselves to indulge?]

[Footnote 230:

 "Prayer is the soul's sincere desire, Uttered or unexpressed, The motion of a hidden fire That trembles in the breast. " MONTGOMERY, _What is Prayer?_]

[Footnote 231: Caratach (Caractacus) is a historical character inFletcher's (1576-1625) tragedy of _Bonduca_(Boadicea). ]

[Footnote 232: Zoroaster, a Persian philosopher, founder of theancient Persian religion. He flourished long before the Christianera. ]

[Footnote 233: "Speak thou with us, and we will hear: but let not Godspeak with us, lest we die. "--_Exodus_, xx. 19. Compare also theparallel passage in _Deuteronomy_, v. 25-27. ]

[Footnote 234: John Locke. (See note 18. )]

[Footnote 235: Lavoisier (1743-1794), celebrated French chemicalphilosopher, discoverer of the composition of water. ]

[Footnote 236: James Hutton (1726-1797), great Scotch geologist, author of the _Theory of the Earth_. ]

[Footnote 237: Jeremy Bentham (1748-1832), English philosopher, jurist, and legislative reformer. ]

[Footnote 238: Fourier (1772-1837), French socialist, founder of thesystem of Fourierism. ]

[Footnote 239: Calvinism, the doctrines of John Calvin (1509-1564). French theologian and Protestant reformer. A cardinal doctrine ofCalvinism is predestination. ]

[Footnote 240: Quakerism, the doctrines of the Quakers or Friends, asociety founded by George Fox (1624-1691). ]

[Footnote 241: Emanuel Swedenborg (1688-1772), Swedish theosophist, founder of the New Jerusalem Church. He is taken by Emerson in his_Representative Men_ as the type of the mystic, and is often mentionedin his other works. ]

[Footnote 242: "Though we travel the world over to find the beautiful, we must carry it with us, or we find it not. "--EMERSON, _Art_. ]

[Footnote 243: Thebes, a celebrated ruined city of Upper Egypt. ]

[Footnote 244: Palmyra, a ruined city of Asia situated in an oasis ofthe Syrian desert, supposed to be the Tadmor built by Solomon in thewilderness (_II. Chr. _, viii. 4). ]

[Footnote 245:

 "Vain, very vain, my weary search to find That bliss which only centers in the mind. . . . Still to ourselves in every place consign'd, Our own felicity we make or find. " GOLDSMITH (and JOHNSON), _The Traveler_, 423-32. 

 "He that has light within his own clear breast May sit i' th' center, and enjoy bright day; But he that hides a dark soul, and foul thoughts, Benighted walks under the mid-day sun; Himself in his own dungeon. " MILTON, _Comus_, 381-5. 

Compare also _Paradise Lost_, I, 255-7. ]

[Footnote 246: Vatican, the palace of the pope in Rome, with itscelebrated library, museum, and art gallery. ]

[Footnote 247: Doric, the oldest, strongest, and simplest of the threestyles of Grecian architecture. ]

[Footnote 248: Gothic, a pointed style of architecture, prevalent inwestern Europe in the latter part of the middle ages. ]

[Footnote 249: Never imitate. Emerson insists on this doctrine. ]

[Footnote 250: Shakespeare (1564-1616), the great English poet anddramatist. He is mentioned in Emerson's writings more than any othercharacter in history, and is taken as the type of the poet in his_Representative Men_. 

"O mighty poet! Thy works are not as those of other men, simply andmerely great works of art; but are also like the phenomena of nature, like the sun and the sea, the stars and the flowers, --like frost andsnow, rain and dew, hailstorm and thunder, which are to be studiedwith entire submission of our own faculties, and in the perfect faiththat in them there can be no too much or too little, nothing uselessor inert, --but that, the further we press in our discoveries, the morewe shall see proofs of design and self-supporting arrangement wherethe careless eye had seen nothing but accident!"--DE QUINCY. ]

[Footnote 251: Benjamin Franklin (1706-1790), American philosopher, statesman, diplomatist, and author. He discovered the identity oflightning with electricity, invented the lightning-rod, went onseveral diplomatic missions to Europe, was one of the committee thatdrew up the Declaration of Independence, signed the treaty of Paris, and compiled _Poor Richard's Almanac_. ]

[Footnote 252: Francis Bacon (1561-1626), a famous English philosopherand statesman. He became Lord Chancellor under Elizabeth. He is bestknown by his _Essays_; he wrote also the _Novum Organum_ and the_Advancement of Learning_. ]

[Footnote 253: Sir Isaac Newton. (See note 53. )]

[Footnote 254: Scipio. (See note 205. )]

[Footnote 255: Phidias (500?-432? B. C. ), famous Greek sculptor. ]

[Footnote 256: Egyptians. He has in mind the pyramids. ]

[Footnote 257: The Pentateuch is attributed to Moses. ]

[Footnote 258: Dante (1265-1321), the greatest of Italian poets, author of the _Divina Commedia_. ]

[Footnote 259: Foreworld, a former ideal state of the world. ]

[Footnote 260: New Zealander, inhabitant of New Zealand, a group oftwo islands lying southeast of Australia. ]

[Footnote 261: Geneva, a city of Switzerland, situated at thesouthwestern extremity of Lake Geneva. ]

[Footnote 262: Greenwich nautical almanac. The meridian of the RoyalObservatory at Greenwich, near London, is the prime meridian forreckoning the longitude of the world. The nautical almanac is apublication containing astronomical data for the use of navigators andastronomers. What is the name of the corresponding publication of theU. S. Observatory at Washington?]

[Footnote 263: Get the meaning of these astronomical terms. ]

[Footnote 264: Plutarch. (50?-120? A. D. ), Greek philosopher andbiographer, author of _Parallel Lives_, a series of Greek and Romanbiographies. Next after Shakespeare and Plato he is the author mostfrequently mentioned by Emerson. Read the essay of Emerson onPlutarch. ]

[Footnote 265: Phocion (402-317 B. C. ), Athenian statesman and general. (See note 364. )]

[Footnote 266: Anaxagoras (500-426 B. C. ), Greek philosopher ofdistinction. ]

[Footnote 267: Diogenes (400?-323?), Greek cynic philosopher whoaffected great contempt for riches and honors and the comforts ofcivilized life, and is said to have taken up his residence in a tub. ]

[Footnote 268: Henry Hudson (---- - 1611), English navigator andexplorer, discoverer of the bay and river which bear his name. ]

[Footnote 269: Bering or Behring (1680-1741), Danish navigator, discoverer of Behring Strait. ]

[Footnote 270: Sir William Edward Parry (1790-1855), English navigatorand Arctic explorer. ]

[Footnote 271: Sir John Franklin (1786-1846?), celebrated Englishnavigator and Arctic explorer, lost in the Arctic seas. ]

[Footnote 272: Christopher Columbus (1445?-1506), Genoese navigatorand discoverer of America. His ship, the Santa Maria, appears smalland insignificant in comparison with the modern ocean ship. ]

[Footnote 273: Napoleon Bonaparte (1769-1821), Emperor of France, oneof the greatest military geniuses the world has ever seen. He wasdefeated in the battle of Waterloo by the Duke of Wellington, and diedin exile on the isle of St. Helena. Emerson takes him as a type of theman of the world in his _Representative Men_: "I call Napoleon theagent or attorney of the middle class of modern society. . . . He was theagitator, the destroyer of prescription, the internal improver, theliberal, the radical, the inventor of means, the opener of doors andmarkets, the subverter of monopoly and abuse. . . . He had the virtues ofthe masses of his constituents: he had also their vices. I am sorrythat the brilliant picture has its reverse. "]

[Footnote 274: Comte de las Cases (not Casas) (1766-1842), author of_Mémorial de Sainte-Hélène_. ]

[Footnote 275: Ali, Arabian caliph, surnamed the "Lion of God, " cousinand son-in-law of Mohammed. He was assassinated about 661. ]

[Footnote 276: The county of Essex in England has several namesakes inAmerica. ]

[Footnote 277: Fortune. In Roman mythology Fortune, the goddess offortune or chance, is represented as standing on a ball or wheel. 

 "Nec metuis dubio Fortunæ stantis in orbe Numen, et exosæ verba superba deæ?" OVID, _Tristia_, v. , 8, 8. 

]

FRIENDSHIP

[Footnote 278: Most of Emerson's _Essays_ were first delivered aslectures, in practically the form in which they afterwards appeared inprint. The form and style, it is true, were always carefully revisedbefore publication; this Emerson called 'giving his thoughts a Greekdress. ' His essay on _Friendship_, published in the First Series of_Essays_ in 1841 was not, so far as we know, delivered as a lecture;parts of it, however, were taken from lectures which Emerson deliveredon _Society_, _The Heart_, and _Private Life_. 

In connection with his essay on _Friendship_, the student should readthe two other notable addresses on the same subject, one the speech byCicero, the famous Roman orator, and the other the essay by LordBacon, the great English author. ]

[Footnote 279: Relume. Is this a common word? Define it. ]

[Footnote 280: Pass my gate. The walk opposite Emerson's house on the'Great Road' to Boston was a favorite winter walk for Concord people. Along it passed the philosophic Alcott and the imaginative Hawthorne, as well as famous townsmen, and school children. ]

[Footnote 281: My friends have come to me, etc. : Compare withEmerson's views here expressed the noble passage in his essay on _TheOver-Soul_: "Every friend whom not thy fantastic will but the greatand tender heart in thee craveth, shall lock thee in his embrace. Andthis because the heart in thee is the heart of all; not a valve, not awall, not an intersection is there anywhere in nature, but one bloodrolls uninterruptedly in endless circulation through all men, as thewater of the globe is all one sea, and, truly seen, its tide is one. "]

[Footnote 282: Bard. Poet: originally one who composed and sang to themusic of a harp verses in honor of heroes and heroic deeds. ]

[Footnote 283: Hymn, ode, and epic. Define each of these three kindsof poetry. ]

[Footnote 284: Apollo. In classic mythology, the sun god who presidedover music, poetry, and art; he was the guardian and leader of theMuses. ]

[Footnote 285: Muses. In classic mythology, the nine sisters whopresided over music, poetry, art, and science. They were Clio the museof history, Euterpe of music, especially the flute, Thalia of comedy, Melpomene of tragedy, Terpsichore of dancing, Erato of erotic poetry, mistress of the lyre, Polyhymnia of sacred poetry, Urania ofastronomy, Calliope of eloquence and epic poetry. ]

[Footnote 286: Genius. According to an old belief, a spirit thatwatched over a person to control, guide and aid him. ]

[Footnote 287: "Crush the sweet poison, " etc. This is a quotation from_Comus_, a poem by Milton. ]

[Footnote 288: Systole and diastole. (See note 98. )]

[Footnote 289: Friendship, like the immortality, etc. See on what ahigh plane Emerson places this relation of friendship. In 1840 hewrote in a letter: "I am a worshiper of friendship, and cannot findany other good equal to it. As soon as any man pronounces the wordswhich approve him fit for that great office, I make no haste; he isholy; let me be holy also; our relations are eternal; why should wecount days and weeks?"]

[Footnote 290: Elysian temple. Temple of bliss. In Greek mythology, Elysium was the abode of the blessed after death. ]

[Footnote 291: An Egyptian skull. Plutarch says that at an Egyptianfeast a skull was displayed, either as a hint to make the most of thepleasure which can be enjoyed but for a brief space, or as a warningnot to set one's heart upon transitory things. ]

[Footnote 292: Conscious of a universal success, etc. Emerson wrote inhis journal: "My entire success, such as it is, is composed wholly ofparticular failures. "]

[Footnote 293: Extends the old leaf. Compare Emerson's lines:

 "When half-gods go The gods arrive. "

]

[Footnote 294: A texture of wine and dreams. What does Emerson mean bythis phrase? Explain the whole sentence. ]

[Footnote 295: "The valiant warrior, " etc. The quotation is fromShakespeare's _Sonnet_, XXV. ]

[Footnote 296: Naturlangsamkeit. A German word meaning slowness. Theslowness of natural development. ]

[Footnote 297: Olympian. One who took part in the great Greek gamesheld every four years on the plain of Olympia. The racing, wrestlingand other contests of strength and skill were accompanied bysacrifices to the gods, processions, and banquets. There was a senseof dignity and almost of worship about the games. The Olympic gameshave been recently revived, and athletes from all countries of theworld contest for the prizes--simple garlands of wild olive. ]

[Footnote 298: I knew a man who, etc. The allusion is to Jonas Very, amystic and poet, who lived at Salem, Massachusetts. ]

[Footnote 299: Paradox. Define this word. Explain its application to afriend. ]

[Footnote 300: My author says, etc. The quotation is from _AConsideration upon Cicero_, by the French author, Montaigne. Montaignewas one of Emerson's favorite authors from his boyhood: of the essayshe says, "I felt as if I myself, had written this book in some formerlife, so sincerely it spoke my thoughts. "]

[Footnote 301: Cherub. What is the difference between a cherub and aseraph?]

[Footnote 302: Curricle. A two-wheeled carriage, especially popular inthe eighteenth century. ]

[Footnote 303: This law of one to one. Emerson felt that this same lawapplied to nature. He wrote in his journal: "Nature says to man, 'oneto one, my dear. '"]

[Footnote 304: Crimen quos, etc. The Latin saying is translated inthe preceding sentence. ]

[Footnote 305: Nonage. We use more commonly the word, "minority. "]

[Footnote 306: Janus-faced. The word here means simply two-faced, without the idea of deceit usually attached to it. In Roman mythology, Janus, the doorkeeper of heaven was the protector of doors andgateways and the patron of the beginning and end of undertakings. Hewas the god of the rising and setting of the sun, and was representedwith two faces, one looking to the east and the other to the west. Histemple at Rome was kept open in time of war and closed in time ofpeace. ]

[Footnote 307: Harbinger. A forerunner; originally an officer who rodein advance of a royal person to secure proper lodgings andaccommodations. ]

[Footnote 308: Empyrean. Highest and purest heaven; according to theancients, the region of pure light and fire. ]

HEROISM

[Footnote 309: Title. Probably this essay is, essentially at least, the lecture on _Heroism_ delivered in Boston in the winter of 1837, inthe course of lectures on _Human Culture_. ]

[Footnote 310: Motto. This saying of Mahomet's was the only mottoprefixed to the essay in the first edition. In later editions, Emersonprefixed, according to his custom, some original lines;

 "Ruby wine is drunk by knaves, Sugar spends to fatten slaves, Rose and vine-leaf deck buffoons, Thunder clouds are Jove's festoons, Drooping oft in wreaths of dread Lightning-knotted round his head: The hero is not fed on sweets, Daily his own heart he eats; Chambers of the great are jails, And head-winds right for royal sails. "

]

[Footnote 311: Elder English dramatists. The dramatists who precededShakespeare. In his essay on _Shakespeare; or, the Poet_, Emersonenumerates the foremost of these, --"Kyd, Marlowe, Greene, Jonson, Chapman, Dekker, Webster, Heywood, Middleton, Peele, Ford, Massinger, Beaumont and Fletcher. "]

[Footnote 312: Beaumont and Fletcher. Francis Beaumont and JohnFletcher were two dramatists of the Elizabethan age. They wrotetogether and their styles were so similar that critics are unable toidentify the share of each in their numerous plays. ]

[Footnote 313: Rodrigo, Pedro, or Valerio. Favorite names for heroesamong the dramatists. Rodrigo Diaz de Bivar, known usually by thetitle of the Cid, was the national hero of Spain, famous for hisexploits against the Moors. Don Pedro was the Prince of Arragon inShakespeare's play, _Much Ado About Nothing_. ]

[Footnote 314: Bonduca, Sophocles, the Mad Lover, and Double Marriage. The first, third and fourth are names of plays by Beaumont andFletcher. In the case of the second, Emerson, by a lapse of memory, gives the name of one of the chief characters instead of the name ofthe play--_The Triumph of Honor_ in a piece called _Four Plays inOne_. It is from this play by Beaumont and Fletcher that the passagein the essay is quoted. ]

[Footnote 315: Adriadne's crown. According to Greek mythology, thecrown of Adriadne was, for her beauty and her sufferings, put amongthe stars. She was the daughter of Minos, King of Crete; she gaveTheseus the clue by means of which he escaped from the labyrinth andshe was afterwards abandoned by him. ]

[Footnote 316: Romulus. The reputed founder of the city of Rome. ]

[Footnote 317: Laodamia, Dion. Read these two poems by Wordsworth, thegreat English poet, and tell why you think Emerson mentioned themhere. ]

[Footnote 318: Scott. Sir Walter Scott, a famous Scotch author. ]

[Footnote 319: Lord Evandale, Balfour of Burley. These are charactersin Scott's novel, _Old Mortality_. The passage referred to by Emersonis in the forty-second chapter. ]

[Footnote 320: Thomas Carlyle. Carlyle was a great admirer of heroes, asserting that history is the biography of great men. One of his mostpopular books is _Heroes and Hero-Worship_, on a plan similar to thatof Emerson's _Representative Men_. ]

[Footnote 321: Robert Burns. A Scotch lyric poet. Emerson was probablythinking of the patriotic song, _Scots wha hae wi' Wallace bled_. ]

[Footnote 322: Harleian Miscellanies. A collection of manuscriptspublished in the eighteenth century, and named for Robert Harley, theEnglish statesman who collected them. ]

[Footnote 323: Lutzen. A small town in Prussia. The battle referred towas fought in 1632 and in it the Swedes under Gustavus Adolphus gaineda great victory over vastly superior numbers. Nearly two hundred yearslater another battle was fought at Lutzen, in which Napoleon gained avictory over the allied Russians and Prussians. ]

[Footnote 324: Simon Ockley. An English scholar of the seventeenthcentury whose chief work was a _History of the Saracens_. ]

[Footnote 325: Oxford. One of the two great English universities. ]

[Footnote 326: Plutarch. (See note 264. )]

[Footnote 327: Brasidas. This hero, described by Plutarch, was aSpartan general who lived about four hundred years before Christ. ]

[Footnote 328: Dion. A Greek philosopher who ruled the city ofSyracuse in the fourth century before Christ. ]

[Footnote 329: Epaminondas. A Greek general and statesman of thefourth century before Christ. ]

[Footnote 330: Scipio. (See note 205. )]

[Footnote 331: Stoicism. The stern and severe philosophy taught by theGreek philosopher Zeno; he taught that men should always seek virtueand be indifferent to pleasure and happiness. This belief, carried tothe extreme of severity, exercised a great influence on many nobleGreeks and Romans. ]

[Footnote 332: Heroism is an obedience, etc. In one of his poemsEmerson says:

 "So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is God to man, When Duty whispers low, 'Thou must, ' The youth replies, 'I can. '"

]

[Footnote 333: Plotinus. An Egyptian philosopher who taught in Romeduring the third century. It was said that he so exalted the mind thathe was ashamed of his body. ]

[Footnote 334: Indeed these humble considerations, etc. The passage, like many which Emerson quotes, is rendered inexactly. The Prince saysto Poins: "Indeed these humble considerations make me out of love withmy greatness. What a disgrace it is to me to remember thy name! or toknow thy face to-morrow! or to take note how many pairs of silkstockings thou hast, that is, these and those that were thypeach-colored ones! or to bear the inventory of thy shirts, as, onefor superfluity and another for use!" Shakespeare's _Henry IV. _, PartII. 2, 2. ]

[Footnote 335: Ibn Hankal. Ibn Hankul, an Arabian geographer andtraveler of the tenth century. He wrote an account of his twentyyears' travels in Mohammedan countries; in 1800 this was translatedinto English by Sir William Jones under the title of _The OrientalGeography of Ibn Hankal_. In that volume this anecdote is told inslightly different words. ]

[Footnote 336: Bokhara. Where is Bokhara? It corresponds to theancient Sogdiana. ]

[Footnote 337: Bannocks. Thick cakes, made usually of oatmeal. Whatdoes Emerson mean by this sentence? Probably no person ever met hisvisitors, many of whom were "exacting and wearisome, " and must havebeen unwelcome, with more perfect courtesy and graciousness thanEmerson. ]

[Footnote 338: John Eliot. Give as full an account as you can of thelife and works of this noble Apostle to the Indians of the seventeenthcentury. ]

[Footnote 339: King David, etc. See First Chronicles, 11, 15-19. ]

[Footnote 340: Brutus. Marcus Junius Brutus, a Roman patriot of thefirst century before Christ, who took part in the assassination ofJulius Cæsar. ]

[Footnote 341: Philippi. A city of Macedonia near which in the year 42B. C. Were fought two battles in which the republican army under Brutusand Cassius was defeated by Octavius and Antony, friends of Cæsar. ]

[Footnote 342: Euripides. A Greek tragic poet of the fifth centurybefore Christ. ]

[Footnote 343: Scipio. (See note 205. ) Plutarch in his _Morals_ givesanother version of the story: "When Paetilius and Quintus accused himof many crimes before the people; 'on this very day, ' he said, 'Iconquered Hannibal and Carthage. I for my part am going with my crownon to the Capitol to sacrifice; and let him that pleaseth stay andpass his vote upon me. ' Having thus said, he went his way; and thepeople followed him, leaving his accusers declaiming to themselves. "]

[Footnote 344: Socrates. (See note 187. )]

[Footnote 345: Prytaneum. A public hall at Athens. ]

[Footnote 346: Sir Thomas More. An English statesman and author whowas beheaded in 1535 on a charge of high treason. The incident towhich Emerson refers is one which showed his "pleasant wit"undisturbed by the prospect of death. As the executioner was about tostrike, More moved his head carefully out of reach of the ax. "Pitythat should be cut, " he said, "that has never committed treason. "]

[Footnote 347: Blue Laws. Any rigid Sunday laws or religiousregulations. The term is usually applied to the early laws of NewHaven and Connecticut which regulated personal and religious conduct. ]

[Footnote 348: Epaminondas. (See note 329. )]

[Footnote 349: Olympus. A mountain of Greece, the summit of which, according to Greek mythology, was the home of the gods. ]

[Footnote 350: Jerseys. Consult a history of the United States for afull account of Washington's campaign in New Jersey. ]

[Footnote 351: Milton. (See note 151. )]

[Footnote 352: Pericles. A famous Greek statesman of the fifth centurybefore Christ, in whose age Athens was preëminent in naval andmilitary affairs and in letters and art. ]

[Footnote 353: Xenophon. A Greek historian of the fourth centurybefore Christ. ]

[Footnote 354: Columbus. Give an account of his life. ]

[Footnote 355: Bayard. Chevalier de Bayard was a French gentleman ofthe fifteenth century. He is the French national hero, and is called"The Knight without fear and without reproach. "]

[Footnote 356: Sidney. Probably Sir Philip Sidney, an Englishgentleman and scholar of the sixteenth century who is the Englishnational hero as Bayard is the French; another brave Englishman wasAlgernon Sidney, a politician and patriot of the seventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 357: Hampden. John Hampden was an English statesman andpatriot who was killed in the civil war of the seventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 358: Colossus. The Colossus of Rhodes was a giganticstatue--over a hundred feet in height--of the Rhodian sun god. It wasone of the seven wonders of the world; it was destroyed by anearthquake about two hundred years before Christ. ]

[Footnote 359: Sappho. A Greek poet of the seventh century beforeChrist. Her fame remains, though most of her poems have been lost. ]

[Footnote 360: Sevigné. Marquise de Sevigné was a French author of theseventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 361: De Staël. Madame de Staël was a French writer whosebooks and political opinions were condemned by Napoleon. ]

[Footnote 362: Themis. A Greek goddess. The personification of law, order, and justice. ]

[Footnote 363: A high counsel, etc. Such was the advice given to theEmerson boys by their aunt, Miss. Mary Moody Emerson: "Scorn trifles, lift your aims; do what you are afraid to do; sublimity of charactermust come from sublimity of motive. " Upon her monument are inscribedEmerson's words about her: "She gave high counsels. It was theprivilege of certain boys to have this immeasurably high standardindicated to their childhood, a blessing which nothing else ineducation could supply. "]

[Footnote 364: Phocion. A Greek general and statesman of the fourthcentury before Christ who advised the Athenians to make peace withPhilip of Macedon. He was put to death on a charge of treason. ]

[Footnote 365: Lovejoy. Rev. Elijah Lovejoy, a Presbyterian clergymanof Maine who published a periodical against slavery. In 1837 anIllinois mob demanded his printing press, which he refused to give up. The building containing it was set on fire and when Lovejoy came outhe was shot. ]

[Footnote 366: Let them rave, etc. These lines are misquoted, beingevidently given from memory, from Tennyson's _Dirge_. In the poemoccur these lines:

 "Let them rave. Thou wilt never raise thine head From the green that folds thy grave-- Let them rave. "

]

MANNERS

[Footnote 367: The essay on _Manners_ is from the Second Series of_Essays_, published in 1844, three years after the First Series. Theessays in this volume, like those in the first, were, for the mostpart, made up of Emerson's lectures, rearranged and corrected. Thelecture on _Manners_ had been delivered in the winter of 1841. He hadgiven another lecture on the same subject about four years before, andseveral years later he treated of the same subject in his essay on_Behavior_ in _The Conduct of Life_. You will find it interesting toread _Behavior_ in connection with this essay. ]

[Footnote 368: Feejee islanders. Since this essay was written, thepeople of the Feejee, or Fiji, Islands have become Christianized, and, to a large extent, civilized. ]

[Footnote 369: Gournou. This description is found in _A Narrative ofthe Operations and Recent Discoveries within the Pyramids_, byBelzoni, an Italian traveler and explorer. ]

[Footnote 370: Borgoo. A province of Africa. ]

[Footnote 371: Tibboos, Bornoos. Tribes of Central Africa, mentionedin Heeren's _Historical Researches_. ]

[Footnote 372: Honors himself with architecture. Architecture was asubject in which Emerson was deeply interested. Read his poem, _TheProblem_. ]

[Footnote 373: Chivalry. Chivalry may be considered "as embodying theMiddle Age conception of the ideal life of . . . The Knights"; the wordis often used to express "the ideal qualifications of a knight, ascourtesy, generosity, valor, and dexterity in arms. " Fully tounderstand the order of Knighthood and the ideals of chivalry, youmust read the history of Europe in the Middle Ages. ]

[Footnote 374: Sir Philip Sidney. (See note 356. )]

[Footnote 375: Sir Walter Scott. (1771-1832). His historical novelsdealing with the Middle Ages have some fine pictures of the chivalrouscharacters in which he delighted. ]

[Footnote 376: Masonic sign. A sign of secret brotherhood, like thesign given by one Mason to another. ]

[Footnote 377: Correlative abstract. Corresponding abstract name. SirPhilip Sidney, himself the ideal gentleman, used the word"gentlemanliness. " He said: "Gentlemanliness is high-erected thoughtsseated in a heart of courtesy. "]

[Footnote 378: Gentilesse. Gentle birth and breeding. Emerson was veryfond of the passage on "gentilesse" in Chaucer's _Wife of Bath'sTale_. ]

[Footnote 379: Feudal Ages. The Middle Ages in Europe during which thefeudal system prevailed. According to this, land was held by itsowners on condition of certain duties, especially military service, performed for a superior lord. ]

[Footnote 380: God knows, etc. Why is this particularly true of arepublic such as the United States?]

[Footnote 381: The incomparable advantage of animal spirits. Why doesEmerson regard this as of such importance? In his journals hefrequently comments on his own lack of animal spirits, and says thatit unfits him for general society and for action. ]

[Footnote 382: The sense of power. "I like people who can do things, "wrote Emerson in his journal. ]

[Footnote 383: Lundy's Lane. Give a full account of this battle in theWar of 1812. ]

[Footnote 384: Men of the right Cæsarian pattern. Men versatile as wasJulius Cæsar, the Roman, famous as a general, statesman, orator, andwriter. ]

[Footnote 385: Timid maxim. Why does Emerson term this saying"timid"?]

[Footnote 386: Lord Falkland. Lucius Cary, Viscount Falkland, was anEnglish politician who espoused the royalist side; he was killed inbattle in the Civil War. ]

[Footnote 387: Saladin. A famous sultan of Egypt and Syria who livedin the twelfth century. Scott describes him as possessing an idealknightly character and introduces him, disguised as a physician andalso as a wandering soldier in his historical romance, _TheTalisman_. ]

[Footnote 388: Sapor. A Persian monarch of the fourth century whodefeated the Romans in battle. ]

[Footnote 389: The Cid. See "Rodrigo, " in _Heroism_, 313. ]

[Footnote 390: Julius Cæsar. See note on "Cæsarian, " 384. ]

[Footnote 391: Scipio. (See note 205. )]

[Footnote 392: Alexander. Alexander, King of Macedon, surnamed theGreat. In the fourth century before Christ he made himself master ofthe known world. ]

[Footnote 393: Pericles. See note on _Heroism_, 352. ]

[Footnote 394: Diogenes. (See note 267. )]

[Footnote 395: Socrates. (See note 187. )]

[Footnote 396: Epaminondas. (See note 329. )]

[Footnote 397: My contemporaries. Emerson probably had in mind, amongothers, his friend, the gentle philosopher, Thoreau. ]

[Footnote 398: Fine manners. "I think there is as much merit inbeautiful manners as in hard work, " said Emerson in his journal. ]

[Footnote 399: Napoleon. (See note 273. )]

[Footnote 400: Noblesse. Nobility. Why does Emerson use here theFrench word?]

[Footnote 401: Faubourg St. Germain. A once fashionable quarter ofParis, on the south bank of the Seine; it was long the headquarters ofthe French royalists. ]

[Footnote 402: Cortez. Consult a history of the United States for anaccount of this Spanish soldier, the conqueror of Mexico. ]

[Footnote 403: Nelson. Horatio Nelson, an English admiral, who wonmany great naval victories and was killed in the battle of Trafalgarin 1805. ]

[Footnote 404: Mexico. The scene of Cortez's victories. ]

[Footnote 405: Marengo. The scene of a battle in Italy in 1800, inwhich Napoleon defeated the Austrians with a larger army and madehimself master of northern Italy. ]

[Footnote 406: Trafalgar. A cape on the southern coast of Spain, thescene of Nelson's last great victory, in which the allied French andSpanish fleets were defeated. ]

[Footnote 407: Mexico, Marengo, and Trafalgar. Is this the order inwhich you would expect these words to occur? Why not?]

[Footnote 408: Estates of the realm. Orders or classes of people withregard to political rights and powers. In modern times, the nobility, the clergy, and the people are called "the three estates. "]

[Footnote 409: Tournure. Figure; turn of dress, --and so of mind. ]

[Footnote 410: Coventry. It is said that the people of Coventry, acity in England, at one time so disliked soldiers that to send amilitary man there meant to exclude him from social intercourse; hencethe expression "to send to Coventry" means to exclude from society. ]

[Footnote 411: "If you could see Vich Ian Vohr with his tail on. " VichIan Vohr is a Scotch chieftain in Scott's novel, _Waverley_. One ofhis dependents says to Waverley, the young English officer: "If youSaxon duinhé-wassal [English gentleman] saw but the Chief with histail on. " "With his tail on?" echoed Edward in some surprise. "Yes--that is, with all his usual followers when he visits those ofthe same rank. " See _Waverley_, chapter 16. ]

[Footnote 412: Mercuries. The word here means simply messengers. According to Greek mythology, Mercury was the messenger of the gods. ]

[Footnote 413: Herald's office. In England the Herald's College, orCollege of Arms, is a royal corporation the chief business of which isto grant armorial bearings, or coats of arms, and to trace andpreserve genealogies. What does Emerson mean by comparing certaincircles of society to this corporation?]

[Footnote 414: Amphitryon. Host; it came to have this meaning from anincident in the story of Amphitryon, a character in Greek legend. Atone time Jupiter assumed the form of Amphitryon and gave a banquet. The real Amphitryon came in and asserted that he was master of thehouse. In the French play, founded on this story, the question issettled by the assertion of the servants and guests that "he who givesthe feast is the host. "]

[Footnote 415: Tuileries. An old royal residence in Paris which wasburned in 1871. ]

[Footnote 416: Escurial, or escorial. A celebrated royal edifice nearMadrid in Spain. ]

[Footnote 417: Hide ourselves as Adam, etc. See Genesis iii. 8. ]

[Footnote 418: Cardinal Caprara. An Italian cardinal, Bishop of Milan, who negotiated the famous concordat of 1801, an agreement between theChurch and State regulating the relations between civil andecclesiastical powers. ]

[Footnote 419: The pope. Pope Pius VII. ]

[Footnote 420: Madame de Staël. (See note 361. )]

[Footnote 421: Mr. Hazlitt. William Hazlitt, an English writer. ]

[Footnote 422: Montaigne. A French essayist of the sixteenth century. ]

[Footnote 423: The hint of tranquillity and self-poise. It issuggested that Emerson had here in mind a favorite passage of theGerman author, Richter, in which Richter says of the Greek statues:"The repose not of weariness but of perfection looks from their eyesand rests upon their lips. "]

[Footnote 424: A Chinese etiquette. What does Emerson mean by thisexpression?]

[Footnote 425: Recall. In the first edition, Emerson had here the word"signify. " Which is the better word and why?]

[Footnote 426: Measure. What meaning has this word here? Is this thesense in which we generally use it?]

[Footnote 427: Creole natures. What is a creole? What does Emersonmean by "Creole natures"?]

[Footnote 428: Mr. Fox. Charles James Fox, an English statesman andorator of the eighteenth century. ]

[Footnote 429: Burke. Both Fox and Burke opposed the taxation of theAmerican colonies and sympathized with their resistance; it was on thesubject of the French Revolution that the two friends clashed. ]

[Footnote 430: Sheridan. Richard Brinsley Sheridan, an Irishdramatist, member of the famous Literary Club to which both Fox andBurke belonged. ]

[Footnote 431: Circe. According to Greek legend, Circe was a beautifulenchantress. Men who partook of the draught she offered, were turnedto swine. ]

[Footnote 432: Captain Symmes. The only real personage of this group. He asserted that there was an opening to the interior of the earthwhich was stocked with plants and animals. ]

[Footnote 433: Clerisy. What word would we be more apt to use here?]

[Footnote 434: St. Michael's (Square). St. Michael's was an orderinstituted by Louis XI. Of France. ]

[Footnote 435: Cologne water. A perfumed water first made at the cityof Cologne in Germany, from which it took its name. ]

[Footnote 436: Poland. This kingdom of Europe was, in the eighteenthcentury, taken possession of and divided among its powerful neighbors, Russia, Prussia, and Austria. ]

[Footnote 437: Philhellene. Friend of Greece. ]

[Footnote 438: As Heaven and Earth are fairer far, etc. This passageis quoted from Book II. Of Keats' _Hyperion_. ]

[Footnote 439: Waverley. The Waverley novels, a name applied to all ofScott's novels from _Waverley_, the title of the first one. ]

[Footnote 440: Robin Hood. An English outlaw and popular hero, thesubject of many ballads. ]

[Footnote 441: Minerva. In Roman mythology, the goddess of wisdomcorresponding to the Greek Pallas-Athene. ]

[Footnote 442: Juno. In Roman mythology, the wife of the supreme godJupiter. ]

[Footnote 443: Polymnia. In Greek mythology, one of the nine muses whopresided over sacred poetry; the name is more usually writtenPolyhymia. ]

[Footnote 444: Delphic Sibyl. In ancient mythology, the Sibyls werecertain women who possessed the power of prophecy. One of these whomade her abode at Delphi in Greece was called the Delphian, orDelphic, sibyl. ]

[Footnote 445: Hafiz. A Persian poet of the fourteenth century. ]

[Footnote 446: Firdousi. A Persian poet of the tenth century. ]

[Footnote 447: She was an elemental force, etc. Of this passage OliverWendell Holmes said that Emerson "speaks of woman in language thatseems to pant for rhythm and rhyme. "]

[Footnote 448: Byzantine. An ornate style of architecture developed inthe fourth and fifth centuries, marked especially by its use of goldand color. ]

[Footnote 449: Golden Book. In a book, called "the Golden Book, " wererecorded the names of all the children of Venetian noblemen. ]

[Footnote 450: Schiraz. A province of Persia famous especially for itsroses, wine, and nightingales, and described by the poets as a placeof ideal beauty. ]

[Footnote 451: Osman. The name given by Emerson in his journal andessays to his ideal man, one subject to the same conditions ashimself. ]

[Footnote 452: Koran. The sacred book of the Mohammedans. ]

[Footnote 453: Jove. Jupiter, the supreme god of Roman mythology. ]

[Footnote 454: Silenus. In Greek mythology, the leader of the satyrs. This fable, which Emerson credits to tradition, was original. ]

[Footnote 455: Her owl. The owl was the bird sacred to Minerva, thegoddess of wisdom. ]

GIFTS

[Footnote 456: This essay was first printed in the periodical called_The Dial_. 

It was a part of Emerson's philosophic faith that there is no suchthing as giving, --everything that belongs to a man or that he ought tohave, will come to him. But in the ordinarily accepted sense of theword, Emerson was a gracious giver and receiver. In his family the oldNew England custom of New Year's presents was kept up to his lastdays. His presents were accompanied with verses to be read before thegift was opened. ]

[Footnote 457: Into chancery. The phrase "in chancery, " means inlitigation, as an estate, in a court of equity. ]

[Footnote 458: Cocker. Spoil, indulge, --a word now little used. ]

[Footnote 459: Fruits are acceptable gifts. Emerson took especialpleasure in the beauty of fruits and the thought of how they had beenevolved from useless, insipid seed cases. ]

[Footnote 460: To let the petitioner, etc. We can hardly imagineEmerson's asking a gift or favor. He often quoted the words of Landor, an English writer: "The highest price you can pay for a thing is toask for it. "]

[Footnote 461: Furies. In Roman mythology, three goddesses who soughtout and punished evil-doers. ]

[Footnote 462: A man's biography, etc. Emerson wrote in his journal:"Long ago I wrote of _gifts_ and neglected a capital example. JohnThoreau, Jr. [who, like his brother Henry, was a lover of nature] oneday put a bluebird's box on my barn, --fifteen years ago it mustbe, --and there it still is, with every summer a melodious family in itadorning the place and singing its praises. There's a gift for youwhich cost the giver no money, but nothing which he bought could havebeen as good. "]

[Footnote 463: Sin offering. Under the Hebrew law, a sacrifice oroffering for sin. See Leviticus xxiii. 19. Explain what Emerson meanshere by the word. ]

[Footnote 464: Blackmail. What is "blackmail"? How may Christmasgifts, for instance, become a species of blackmail?]

[Footnote 465: Brother, if Jove, etc. In the Greek legend, Epimetheusgives this advice to his brother Prometheus. The lines are taken froma translation of _Works and Days_, by the Greek poet, Hesiod. ]

[Footnote 466: Timons. Here used in the sense of wealthy givers. Timon, the hero of Shakespeare's play, _Timon of Athens_, wasted hisfortune in lavish gifts and entertainments, and in his poverty wasexposed to the ingratitude of those whom he had served. He becamemorose and died in miserable retirement. ]

[Footnote 467: It is a very onerous business, etc. One of Emerson'sfavorite passages in the essays of Montaigne, a French writer, wasthis: "Oh, how am I obliged to Almighty God, who has been pleased thatI should immediately receive all I have from his bounty, andparticularly reserved all my obligation to himself! How instantly do Ibeg of his holy compassion that I may never owe a real thanks toanyone. O happy liberty in which I have thus far lived! May itcontinue with me to the last. I endeavor to have no need of any one. "

When Emerson, in his old age, had his house injured by fire, hisfriends contributed funds to repair it and to send him to England. Thegift was proffered graciously and accepted gratefully. ]

[Footnote 468: Buddhist. A follower of Buddha, a Hindoo religiousteacher of the fifth century before Christ. ]

NATURE

[Footnote 469: Nature. Emerson's first published volume was a littlebook of essays, entitled _Nature_, which appeared in 1836. In theyears which followed, he thought more deeply on the subject and, according to his custom, made notes about it and entries in hisjournals. In the winter of 1843 he delivered a lecture on _Relation toNature_, and it is probable that this essay is built up from that. Theplan of it, however, had been long in his mind: In 1840 he wrote inhis journal: "I think I must do these eyes of mine the justice towrite a new chapter on Nature. This delight we all take in every showof night or day or field or forest or sea or city, down to the lowestparticulars, is not without sequel, though we be as yet only wishersand gazers, not at all knowing what we want. We are predominated hereas elsewhere by an upper wisdom, and resemble those great discovererswho are haunted for years, sometimes from infancy, with a passion forthe fact, or class of facts in which the secret lies which they aredestined to unlock, and they let it not go until the blessing is won. So these sunsets and starlights, these swamps and rocks, these birdnotes and animal forms off which we cannot get our eyes and ears, buthover still, as moths round a lamp, are no doubt a Sanscrit ciphercovering the whole religious history of the universe, and presently weshall read it off into action and character. The pastures are full ofghosts for me, the morning woods full of angels. "]

[Footnote 470: There are days, etc. The passage in Emerson's journalis hardly less beautiful. Under date of October 30, 1841, he wrote:"On this wonderful day when heaven and earth seem to glow withmagnificence, and all the wealth of all the elements is put undercontribution to make the world fine, as if Nature would indulge heroffspring, it seemed ungrateful to hide in the house. Are there notdull days enough in the year for you to write and read in, that youshould waste this glittering season when Florida and Cuba seem to haveleft their glittering seats and come to visit us with all theirshining hours, and almost we expect to see the jasmine and cactusburst from the ground instead of these last gentians and asters whichhave loitered to attend this latter glory of the year? All insects areout, all birds come forth, the very cattle that lie on the ground seemto have great thoughts, and Egypt and India look from their eyes. "]

[Footnote 471: Halcyons. Halcyon days, ones of peace and tranquillity;anciently, days of calm weather in mid-winter, when the halcyon, orkingfisher, was supposed to brood. It was fabled that this bird laidits eggs in a nest that floated on the sea, and that it charmed thewinds and waves to make them calm while it brooded. ]

[Footnote 472: Indian Summer. Calm, dry, hazy weather which comes inthe autumn in America. The Century Dictionary says it was calledIndian Summer because the season was most marked in the sections ofthe upper eastern Mississippi valley inhabited by Indians about thetime the term became current. ]

[Footnote 473: Gabriel. One of the seven archangels. The Hebrew namemeans "God is my strong one. "]

[Footnote 474: Uriel. Another of the seven archangels; the name means"Light of God. "]

[Footnote 475: Converts all trees to wind-harps. Compare with thispassage the lines in Emerson's poem, _Woodnotes_:

 "And the countless leaves of the pines are strings Tuned to the lay the wood-god sings. "

]

[Footnote 476: The village. Concord, Massachusetts. Emerson's home thegreater part of the time from 1832 till his death. ]

[Footnote 477: I go with my friend, etc. With Henry Thoreau, the loverof Nature. ]

[Footnote 478: Our little river. The Concord river. ]

[Footnote 479: Novitiate and probation. Explain the meaning of thesewords, in the Roman Catholic Church. What does Emerson mean by themhere?]

[Footnote 480: Villegiatura. The Italian name for a season spent incountry pleasures. ]

[Footnote 481: Hanging gardens. The hanging gardens of Babylon wereone of the seven wonders of the world. ]

[Footnote 482: Versailles. A royal residence near Paris, withbeautiful formal gardens. ]

[Footnote 483: Paphos. A beautiful city on the island of Cyprus, wherewas situated a temple of Astarte, or Venus. ]

[Footnote 484: Ctesiphon. One of the chief cities of ancient Persia, the site of a magnificent royal palace. ]

[Footnote 485: Notch Mountains. Probably the White Mountains nearCrawford Notch, a deep, narrow valley which is often called "TheNotch. "]

[Footnote 486: Æolian harp. A stringed instrument from which sound isdrawn by the passing of the wind over its strings. It was named forÆolus, the god of the winds, in Greek mythology. ]

[Footnote 487: Dorian. Dorus was one of the four divisions of Greece:the word is here used in a general sense for Grecian. ]

[Footnote 488: Apollo. In Greek and Roman mythology, the sun god, whopresided over music, poetry, and healing. ]

[Footnote 489: Diana. In Roman mythology, the goddess of the moondevoted to the chase. ]

[Footnote 490: Edens. Beautiful, sinless places, --like the garden ofEden. ]

[Footnote 491: Tempes. Places like the lovely valley of Tempe inThessaly, Greece. ]

[Footnote 492: Como Lake. A lake of northern Italy, celebrated for itsbeauty. ]

[Footnote 493: Madeira Islands. Where are these islands, famous forpicturesque beauty and balmy atmosphere?]

[Footnote 494: Common. What is a common?]

[Footnote 495: Campagna. The plain near Rome. ]

[Footnote 496: Dilettantism. Define this word and explain its usehere. ]

[Footnote 497: "Wreaths" and "Flora's Chaplets. " About the time thatEmerson was writing his essays, volumes of formal, artificial verseswere very fashionable, more as parlor ornaments than as literature. Two such volumes were _A Wreath of Wild Flowers from New England_ and_The Floral Offering_ by Mrs. Frances Osgood, a New England writer. ]

[Footnote 498: Pan. In Greek mythology, the god of woods, fields, flocks, and shepherds. ]

[Footnote 499: The multitude of false cherubs, etc. Explain themeaning of this sentence. If true money were valueless, would peoplemake false money?]

[Footnote 500: Proteus. In Greek mythology, a sea god who had thepower of assuming different shapes. If caught and held fast, however, he was forced to assume his own shape and answer the questions put tohim. ]

[Footnote 501: Mosaic . . . Schemes. The conception of the world asgiven in Genesis on which the law of Moses, the great Hebrew lawgiver, was founded. ]

[Footnote 502: Ptolemaic schemes. The system of geography andastronomy taught in the second century by Ptolemy of Alexandria; itwas accepted till the sixteenth century, when the Copernican systemwas established. Ptolemy believed that the sun, planets, and starsrevolve around the earth; Copernicus taught that the planets revolvearound the sun. ]

[Footnote 503: Flora. In Roman mythology, the goddess of the springand of flowers. ]

[Footnote 504: Fauna. In Roman mythology, the goddess of fields andshepherds; she represents the fruitfulness of the earth. ]

[Footnote 505: Ceres. The Roman goddess of grain and harvest, corresponding to the Greek goddess, Demeter. ]

[Footnote 506: Pomona. The Roman goddess of fruit trees and gardens. ]

[Footnote 507: All duly arrive. Emerson deducts from nature thedoctrine of evolution. What is its teaching?]

[Footnote 508: Plato. (See note 36. )]

[Footnote 509: Himalaya Mountain chains. (See note 193. )]

[Footnote 510: Franklin. Give an account of Benjamin Franklin, thefamous American scientist and patriot. What did he prove aboutlightening?]

[Footnote 511: Dalton. John Dalton was an English chemist who, aboutthe beginning of the nineteenth century, perfected the atomic theory, that is, the theory that all chemical combinations take place incertain ways between the atoms, or ultimate particles, of bodies. ]

[Footnote 512: Davy. (See note 69. )]

[Footnote 513: Black. Joseph Black, a Scotch chemist who made valuablediscoveries about latent heat and carbon dioxide, or carbonic acidgas. ]

[Footnote 514: The astronomers said, etc. Beginning with this passage, several pages of this essay was published in 1844, under the title of_Tantalus_, in the next to the last number of _The Dial_, whichEmerson edited. ]

[Footnote 515: Centrifugal, centripetal. Define these words. ]

[Footnote 516: Stoics. See "Stoicism, " 331. ]

[Footnote 517: Luther. (See note 188. )]

[Footnote 518: Jacob Behmen. A German mystic of the sixteenth century;his name is usually written Boehme. ]

[Footnote 519: George Fox. (See note 202. )]

[Footnote 520: James Naylor. An English religious enthusiast of theseventeenth century; he was first a Puritan and later a Quaker. ]

[Footnote 521: Operose. Laborious. ]

[Footnote 522: Outskirt and far-off reflection, etc. Compare with thispassage Emerson's poem, _The Forerunners_. ]

[Footnote 523: Oedipus. In Greek mythology, the King of Thebes whosolved the riddle of the Sphinx, a fabled monster. ]

[Footnote 524: Prunella. A widely scattered plant, called self-heal, because a decoction of its leaves and stems was, and to some extentis, valued as an application to wounds. An editor comments on the factthat during the last years of Emerson's life "the little blueself-heal crept into the grass before his study window. "]

SHAKESPEARE; OR, THE POET

[Footnote 525: Shakespeare; or the Poet is one of seven essays ongreat men in various walks of life, published in 1850 under the titleof _Representative Men_. These essays were first delivered as lecturesin Boston in the winter of 1845, and were repeated two years laterbefore English audiences. They must have been especially interestingto those Englishmen who had, seven years before, heard Emerson'sfriend, Carlyle, deliver his six lectures on great men whom heselected as representative ones. These lectures were published underthe title of _Heroes and Hero-Worship_. You should read the latterpart of Carlyle's lecture on _The Hero as Poet_ and compare what hesays about Shakespeare with Emerson's words. Both Emerson and Carlylereverenced the great English poet as "the master of mankind. " Even inserious New England, the plays of Shakespeare were found upon thebookshelf beside religious tracts and doctrinal treatises. There theboy Emerson found them and learned to love them, and the man Emersonloved them but the more. It was as a record of personal experiencesthat he wrote in his journal: "Shakespeare fills us with wonder thefirst time we approach him. We go away, and work and think, for years, and come again, --he astonishes us anew. Then, having drank deeply andsaturated us with his genius, we lose sight of him for another periodof years. By and by we return, and there he stands immeasurable as atfirst. We have grown wiser, but only that we should see him wiser thanever. He resembles a high mountain which the traveler sees in themorning and thinks he shall quickly near it and pass it and leave itbehind. But he journeys all day till noon, till night. There still isthe dim mountain close by him, having scarce altered its bearingssince the morning light. "]

[Footnote 526: Genius. Here instead of speaking as in _Friendship_, see note 286, of the genius or spirit supposed to preside over eachman's life, Emerson mentions the guardian spirit of human kind. ]

[Footnote 527: Shakespeare's youth, etc. It is impossible toappreciate or enjoy this essay without having some clear generalinformation about the condition of the English people and Englishliterature in the glorious Elizabethan age in which Shakespeare lived. Consult, for this information, some brief history of England and acomprehensive English literature. ]

[Footnote 528: Puritans. Strict Protestants who became so powerful inEngland that in the time of the Commonwealth they controlled thepolitical and religious affairs of the country. ]

[Footnote 529: Anglican Church. The Established Church of England; theEpiscopal church. ]

[Footnote 530: Punch. The chief character in a puppet show, hence thepuppet show itself. ]

[Footnote 531: Kyd, Marlowe, Greene, etc. For an account of thesedramatists consult a text book on English literature. The Englishdrama seems to have begun in the Middle Ages with what were calledMiracle plays, which were scenes from Bible history; about the sametime were performed the Mystery plays, which dramatized the lives ofsaints. These were followed by the Moralities, plays in which werepersonified abstract virtues and vices. The first step in the creationof the regular drama was taken by Heywood, who composed some farcicalplays called Interludes. The people of the sixteenth century were fondof pageants, shows in which classical personages were introduced, andMasques, which gradually developed from pageants into dramasaccompanied with music. About the middle of the sixteenth century, rose the English drama, --comedy, tragedy, and historical plays. Thechief among the group of dramatists who attained fame beforeShakespeare began to write were Kyd, Marlowe, Greene, and Peele. BenJonson and Beaumont and Fletcher rank next to Shakespeare among hiscontemporaries, and among the other dramatists of the period wereChapman, Dekker, Webster, Heywood, Middleton, Ford, and Massinger. ]

[Footnote 532: At the time when, etc. Probably about 1585. ]

[Footnote 533: Tale of Troy. Drama founded on the Trojan war. Thesubject of famous poems by Latin and Greek poets. ]

[Footnote 534: Death of Julius Cæsar. An account of the plots whichended in the assassination of the great Roman general. ]

[Footnote 535: Plutarch. See note on _Heroism_(264). Shakespeare, likethe earlier dramatists, drew freely on Plutarch's _Lives_ formaterial. ]

[Footnote 536: Brut. A poetical version of the legendary history ofBritain, by Layamon. Its hero is Brutus, a mythical King of Britain. ]

[Footnote 537: Arthur. A British King of the sixth century, aroundwhose life and deeds so many legends have grown up that somehistorians say he, too, was a myth. He is the center of the greatcycle of romances told in prose in Mallory's _Morte d'Arthur_ and inpoetry in Tennyson's _Idylls of the King_. ]

[Footnote 538: The royal Henries. Among the dramas popular inShakespeare's day which he retouched or rewrote are the historicalplays. Henry IV. , First and Second Parts; Henry V; Henry VI. , First, Second, and Third Parts; and Henry VIII. ]

[Footnote 539: Italian tales. Italian literature was very popular inShakespeare's day, and authors drew freely from it for material, especially from the _Decameron_, a famous collection of a hundredtales, by Boccaccio, a poet of the fourteenth century. ]

[Footnote 540: Spanish voyages. In the sixteenth century, Spain wasstill a power upon the high seas, and the tales of her conquests andtreasures in the New World were like tales of romance. ]

[Footnote 541: Prestige. Can you give an English equivalent for thisFrench word?]

[Footnote 542: Which no single genius, etc. In the same way, somecritics assure us, the poems credited to the Greek poet, Homer, werebuilt up by a number of poets. ]

[Footnote 543: Malone. An Irish critic and scholar of the eighteenthcentury, best known by his edition of Shakespeare's plays. ]

[Footnote 544: Wolsey's Soliloquy. See Shakespeare's _Henry VIII. _III, 2. Cardinal Wolsey was prime minister of England in the reign ofHenry VIII. ]

[Footnote 545: Scene with Cromwell. See _Henry VIII. _ III, 2. ThomasCromwell was the son of an English blacksmith; he rose to be lord highchamberlain of England in the reign of Henry VIII. , but, incurring theKing's displeasure, was executed on a charge of treason. ]

[Footnote 546: Account of the coronation. See _Henry VIII. _ IV, 1. ]

[Footnote 547: Compliment to Queen Elizabeth. See _Henry VIII. _ V, 5. ]

[Footnote 548: Bad rhythm. Too much importance must not be attached tothese matters in deciding authorship, as critics disagree about them. ]

[Footnote 549: Value his memory, etc. The Greeks, in appreciation ofthe value of memory to the poet, represented the Muses as thedaughters of Mnemosyne, the goddess of memory. ]

[Footnote 550: Homer. A Greek poet to whom is assigned the authorshipof the two greatest Greek poems, the _Iliad_ and the _Odyssey_; he issaid to have lived about a thousand years before Christ. ]

[Footnote 551: Chaucer. (See note 33. )]

[Footnote 552: Saadi. A Persian poet, supposed to have lived in thethirteenth century. His best known poems are his odes. ]

[Footnote 553: Presenting Thebes, etc. This quotation is from Milton'spoem, _Il Penseroso_. Milton here names the three most popularsubjects of Greek tragedy, --the story of Oedipus, the ill-fated Kingof Thebes who slew his father; the tale of the descendants of Pelops, King of Pisa, who seemed born to woe--Agamemnon was one of hisgrandsons; the third subject was the tale of Troy and the heroes ofthe Trojan war, --called "divine" because the Greeks represented eventhe gods as taking part in the contest. ]

[Footnote 554: Pope. (See note 88. )]

[Footnote 555: Dryden. (See note 35. )]

[Footnote 556: Chaucer is a huge borrower. Taine, the French critic, says on this subject: "Chaucer was capable of seeking out in the oldcommon forest of the Middle Ages, stories and legends, to replant themin his own soil and make them send out new shoots. . . . He has the rightand power of copying and translating because by dint of retouching heimpresses . . . His original work. He recreates what he imitates. "]

[Footnote 557: Lydgate. John Lydgate was an English poet who lived ageneration later than Chaucer; in his _Troy Book_ and other poems heprobably borrowed from the sources used by Chaucer; he called himself"Chaucer's disciple. "]

[Footnote 558: Caxton. William Caxton, the English author, more famousas the first English printer, was not born until after Chaucer'sdeath. The work from which Emerson supposes the poet to have borrowedCaxton's translation of _Recueil des Histoires de Troye_, the firstprinted English book, appeared about 1474. ]

[Footnote 559: Guido di Colonna. A Sicilian poet and historian of thethirteenth century. Chaucer in his _House of Fame_ placed in hisvision "on a pillar higher than the rest, Homer and Livy, Dares thePhrygian, Guido Colonna, Geoffrey of Monmouth, and the otherhistorians of the war of Troy. "]

[Footnote 560: Dares Phrygius. A Latin account of the fall of Troy, written about the fifth century, which pretends to be a translation ofa lost work on the fall of Troy by Dares, a Trojan priest mentioned inHomer's _Iliad_. ]

[Footnote 561: Ovid. A Roman poet who lived about the time of Christ, whose best-known work is the _Metamorphoses_, founded on classicallegends. ]

[Footnote 562: Statius. A Roman poet of the first century afterChrist. ]

[Footnote 563: Petrarch. An Italian poet of the fourteenth century. ]

[Footnote 564: Boccaccio. An Italian novelist and poet of thefourteenth century. See note on "Italian tales, " 539. It is supposedthat the plan of the _Decameron_ suggested the similar but farsuperior plan of Chaucer's _Canterbury Tales_. ]

[Footnote 565: Provençal poets. The poets of Provençe, a province ofthe southeastern part of France. In the Middle Ages it was celebratedfor its lyric poets, called troubadours. ]

[Footnote 566: Romaunt of the Rose, etc. Chaucer's _Romaunt of theRose_, written during the period of French influence, is an incompleteand abbreviated translation of a French poem of the thirteenthcentury, _Roman de la Rose_, the first part of which was written byWilliam of Loris and the latter by John of Meung, or Jean de Meung. ]

[Footnote 567: Troilus and Creseide, etc. Chaucer ascribes the Italianpoem which he followed in his _Troilus and Creseide_ to an unknown"Lollius of Urbino"; the source of the poem, however, is _IlFilostrato_, by Boccaccio, the Italian poet already mentioned. Chaucer's poem is far more than a translation; more than half isentirely original, and it is a powerful poem, showing profoundknowledge of the Italian poets, whose influence with him supersededthe French poets. ]

[Footnote 568: The Cock and the Fox. _The Nun's Priest's Tale_ in the_Canterbury Tales_ was an original treatment of the _Roman de Renart_, of Marie of France, a French poet of the twelfth century. ]

[Footnote 569: House of Fame, etc. The plan of the _House of Fame_, written during the period of Chaucer's Italian influence, shows theinfluence of Dante; the general idea of the poem is from Ovid, theRoman poet. ]

[Footnote 570: Gower. John Gower was an English poet, Chaucer'scontemporary and friend; the two poets went to the same sources forpoetic materials, but Chaucer made no such use of Gower's works as wewould infer from this passage. Emerson relied on his memory for facts, and hence made mistakes, as here in the instances of Lydgate, Caxton, and Gower. ]

[Footnote 571: Westminster, Washington. What legislative bodyassembles at Westminster Palace, London? What at Washington?]

[Footnote 572: Sir Robert Peel. An English statesman who died in 1850, not long after _Representative Men_ was published. ]

[Footnote 573: Webster. Daniel Webster, an American statesman andorator who was living when this essay was written. ]

[Footnote 574: Locke. John Locke. (See note 18. )]

[Footnote 575: Rousseau. Jean Jacques Rousseau, a French philosopherof the eighteenth century. ]

[Footnote 576: Homer. (See note 550. )]

[Footnote 577: Menn. Menn, or Mann, was in Sanscrit one of fourteenlegendary beings; the one referred to by Emerson, Mann Vaivasvata wassupposed to be the author of the laws of Mann, a collection made aboutthe second century. ]

[Footnote 578: Saadi or Sadi. (See note 552. )]

[Footnote 579: Milton. Of this great English poet and prose writer ofthe seventeenth century, Emerson says: "No man can be named whose mindstill acts on the cultivated intellect of England and America with anenergy comparable to that of Milton. As a poet Shakespeare undoubtedlytranscends and far surpasses him in his popularity with foreignnations: but Shakespeare is a voice merely: who and what he was thatsang, that sings, we know not. "]

[Footnote 580: Delphi. Here, source of prophecy. Delphi was a city inGreece, where was the oracle of Apollo, the most famous of the oraclesof antiquity. ]

[Footnote 581: Our English Bible. The version made in the reign ofKing James I. By forty-seven learned divines is a monument of nobleEnglish. ]

[Footnote 582: Liturgy. An appointed form of worship used in aChristian church, --here, specifically, the service of the Episcopalchurch. Emerson's mother had been brought up in that church, andthough she attended her husband's church, she always loved and readher Episcopal prayer book. ]

[Footnote 583: Grotius. Hugo Grotius was a Dutch jurist, statesman, theologian, and poet of the seventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 584: Rabbinical forms. The forms used by the rabbis, Jewishdoctors or expounders of the law. ]

[Footnote 585: Common law. In a general sense, the system of lawderived from England, in general use among English-speaking people. ]

[Footnote 586: Vedas. The sacred books of the Brahmins. ]

[Footnote 587: Æsop's Fables. Fables ascribed to Æsop, a Greek slavewho lived in the sixth century before Christ. ]

[Footnote 588: Pilpay, or Bidpai. Indian sage to whom were ascribedsome fables. From an Arabic translation, these passed into Europeanlanguages and were used by La Fontaine, the French fabulist. ]

[Footnote 589: Arabian Nights. _The Arabian Nights' Entertainment or AThousand and One Nights_ is a collection of Oriental tales, the planand name of which are very ancient. ]

[Footnote 590: Cid. _The Romances of the Cid_, the story of theSpanish national hero, mentioned in note on _Heroism_139:5, waswritten about the thirteenth century by an unknown author; it suppliedmuch of the material for two Spanish chronicles and Spanish and Frenchtragedies written later on the same subject. ]

[Footnote 591: Iliad. The poem in which the Greek, poet, Homer, describes the siege and fall of Troy. Emerson here expresses the viewadopted by many scholars that it was the work, not of one, but of manymen. ]

[Footnote 592: Robin Hood. The ballads about Robin Hood, an Englishoutlaw and popular hero of the twelfth century. ]

[Footnote 593: Scottish Minstrelsy. _The Minstrelsy of the ScottishBorder_, a collection of original and collected poems, published bySir Walter Scott in 1802. ]

[Footnote 594: Shakespeare Society. The Shakespeare Society, foundedin 1841, was dissolved in 1853. In 1874 The New Shakespeare Societywas founded. ]

[Footnote 595: Mysteries. See "Kyd, Marlowe, etc. " 531. ]

[Footnote 596: Ferrex and Porrex, or Gorboduc. The first regularEnglish tragedy, by Thomas Norton and Thomas Sackville, printed in1565. ]

[Footnote 597: Gammer Gurtor's Needle. One of the first Englishcomedies, written by Bishop Still and printed in 1575. ]

[Footnote 598: Whether the boy Shakespeare poached, etc. For a fulleraccount of the facts of Shakespeare's life, of which some traditionsand facts are mentioned here, consult some good biography of thepoet. ]

[Footnote 599: Queen Elizabeth. Dining her reign, 1558-1603, theEnglish drama rose and attained its height, and there was produced aprose literature hardly inferior to the poetic. ]

[Footnote 600: King James. King James VI. Of Scotland and I. OfEngland who was Elizabeth's kinsman and successor; he reigned inEngland from 1603 to 1625. ]

[Footnote 601: Essexes. Walter Devereux was a brave English gentlemanwhom Elizabeth made Earl of Essex in 1572. His son Robert, the secondEarl of Essex, was a favorite of Queen Elizabeth's. ]

[Footnote 602: Leicester. The Earl of Leicester, famous inShakespeare's time, was Robert Dudley, an English courtier, politician, and general, the favorite of Queen Elizabeth. ]

[Footnote 603: Burleighs or Burghleys: William Cecil, baron ofBurghley, was an English statesman, who, for forty years, wasElizabeth's chief minister. ]

[Footnote 604: Buckinghams. George Villiers, the first duke ofBuckingham, was an English courtier and politician, a favorite ofJames I. And Charles I. ]

[Footnote 605: Tudor dynasty. The English dynasty of sovereignsdescended on the male side from Owen Tudor. It began with Henry VII. And ended with Elizabeth. ]

[Footnote 606: Bacon. Consult English literature and history for anaccount of the great statesman and author, Francis Bacon, "the wisest, brightest, meanest of mankind. "]

[Footnote 607: Ben Jonson, etc. In his _Timber or Discoveries_, BenJonson, a famous classical dramatist contemporary with Shakespeare, says: "I loved the man and do honor his memory on this side idolatryas much as any. He was indeed honest and of an open and free nature:had an excellent fancy; brave notions and gentle expressions: whereinhe flowed with that facility that sometimes it was necessary he shouldbe stopped. . . . His wit was in his own power; would the rule of it hadbeen so, too. Many times he fell into those things could not escapelaughter. . . . But he redeemed his vices with his virtues. There wasever more in him to be praised than to be pardoned. "]

[Footnote 608: Sir Henry Wotton. An English diplomatist and author ofwide culture. ]

[Footnote 609: The following persons, etc. The persons enumerated wereall people of note of the seventeenth century. Sir Philip Sidney, Earlof Essex, Lord Bacon, Sir Walter Raleigh, John Milton, Sir Henry Vane, Isaac Walton, Dr. John Donne, Abraham Cowley, Charles Cotton, JohnPym, and John Hales were Englishmen, scholars, statesmen, and authors. Theodore Beza was a French theologian; Isaac Casaubon was aFrench-Swiss scholar; Roberto Berlarmine was an Italian cardinal;Johann Kepler was a German astronomer; Francis Vieta was a Frenchmathematician; Albericus Gentilis was an Italian jurist; Paul Sarpiwas an Italian historian; Arminius was a Dutch theologian. ]

[Footnote 610: Many others whom doubtless, etc. Emerson hereenumerates some famous English authors of the same period, notmentioned in the preceeding list. ]

[Footnote 611: Pericles. See note on _Heroism_, 352. ]

[Footnote 612: Lessing. Gotthold Ephraim Lessing, a German critic andpoet of the eighteenth century. ]

[Footnote 613: Wieland. Christopher Martin Wieland was a Germancontemporary of Lessing's, who made a prose translation into German ofShakespeare's plays. ]

[Footnote 614: Schlegel. August Wilhelm von Schlegel, a German criticand poet, who about the first of the nineteenth century translatedsome of Shakespeare's plays into classical German. ]

[Footnote 615: Hamlet. The hero of Shakespeare's play of the samename. ]

[Footnote 616: Coleridge. Samuel Taylor Coleridge, an English poet, author of critical lectures and notes on Shakespeare. ]

[Footnote 617: Goethe. (See note 85. )]

[Footnote 618: Blackfriar's Theater. A famous London theater in whichnearly all the great dramas of the Elizabethan age were performed. ]

[Footnote 619: Stratford. Stratford-on-Avon, a little town inWarwickshire, England, where Shakespeare was born and where he spenthis last years. ]

[Footnote 620: Macbeth. One of Shakespeare's greatest tragedies, written about 1606. ]

[Footnote 621: Malone, Warburton, Dyce, and Collier. English scholarsof the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries who edited the works ofShakespeare. ]

[Footnote 622: Covent Garden, Drury Lane, the Park, and Tremont: Theleading London theaters in the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries. ]

[Footnote 623: Betterton, Garrick, Kemble, Kean, and Macready, famousBritish actors of the Shakespearian parts. ]

[Footnote 624: The Hamlet of a famed performer, etc. Macready. Emersonsaid to a friend: "I see you are one of the happy mortals who arecapable of being carried away by an actor of Shakespeare. Now, whenever I visit the theater to witness the performance of one of hisdramas, I am carried away by the poet. "]

[Footnote 625: What may this mean, etc. _Hamlet_, I. 4. ]

[Footnote 626: Midsummer Night's Dream. One of Shakespeare's plays. ]

[Footnote 627: The forest of Arden. In which is laid, the scene ofShakespeare's play, _As You Like It_. ]

[Footnote 628: The nimble air of Scone Castle. It was of the air ofInverness, not of Scone, that "the air nimbly and sweetly recommendsitself unto our gentle senses. "--_Macbeth_, I. 6. ]

[Footnote 629: Portia's villa. See the moonlight scene, _Merchant ofVenice_, V. 1. ]

[Footnote 630: The antres vost, etc. See _Othello_, I. 3. "Antres" isan old word, meaning caves, caverns. ]

[Footnote 631: Cyclopean architecture. In Greek mythology, the Cyclopswere a race of giants. The term 'Cyclopean' is applied here to thearchitecture of Egypt and India, because of the majestic size of thebuildings, and the immense size of the stones used, as if it wouldrequire giants to perform such works. ]

[Footnote 632: Phidian sculpture. Phidias was a famous Greek sculptorwho lived in the age of Pericles and beautified Athens with hisworks. ]

[Footnote 633: Gothic minsters. Churches or cathedrals, built in theGothic, or pointed, style of architecture which prevailed during theMiddle Ages; it owed nothing to the Goths, and this term wasoriginally used in reproach, in the sense of "barbarous. "]

[Footnote 634: The Italian painting. In Italy during the fifteenth andsixteenth centuries pictorial art was carried to a degree ofperfection unknown in any other time or country. ]

[Footnote 635: Ballads of Spain and Scotland. The old ballads of thesecountries are noted for beauty and spirit. ]

[Footnote 636: Tripod. Define this word, and explain itsappropriateness here. ]

[Footnote 637: Aubrey. John Aubrey, an English antiquarian of theseventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 638: Rowe. Nicholas Rowe, an English author of theseventeenth century, who wrote a biography of Shakespeare. ]

[Footnote 639: Timon. See note on _Gifts_, 466. ]

[Footnote 640: Warwick. An English politician and commander of thefifteenth century, called "the King Maker. " He appears inShakespeare's plays, _Henry IV. _, _V. _, and _VI. _]

[Footnote 641: Antonio. The Venetian Merchant in Shakespeare's play, _The Merchant of Venice_. ]

[Footnote 642: Talma. François Joseph Talma was a French tragic actor, to whom Napoleon showed favor. ]

[Footnote 643: An omnipresent humanity, etc. See what Carlyle has tosay on this subject in his _Hero as Poet_. ]

[Footnote 644: Daguerre. Louis Jacques Daguerre, a French painter, oneof the inventors of the daguerreotype process, by means of which animage is fixed on a metal plate by the chemical action of light. ]

[Footnote 645: Euphuism. The word here has rather the force ofeuphemism, an entirely different word. Euphuism was an affected ornatestyle of expression, so called from _Euphues_, by John Lyly, asixteenth century master of that style. ]

[Footnote 646: Epicurus. A Greek philosopher of the third centurybefore Christ. He was the founder of the Epicurean school ofphilosophy which taught that pleasure should be man's chief aim andthat the highest pleasure is freedom. ]

[Footnote 647: Dante. (See note 258. )]

[Footnote 648: Master of the revels, etc. Emerson always expressedthankfulness for "the spirit of joy which Shakespeare had shed overthe universe. " See what Carlyle says in _The Hero as Poet_, aboutShakespeare's "mirthfulness and love of laughter. "]

[Footnote 649: Koran. The Sacred book of the Mohammedans. ]

[Footnote 650: Twelfth Night, etc. The names of three bright, merry, or serene plays by Shakespeare. ]

[Footnote 651: Egyptian verdict. Emerson used Egyptian probably in thesense of "gipsy. " He compares such opinions to the fortunes told bythe gipsies. ]

[Footnote 652: Tasso. An Italian poet of the sixteenth century. ]

[Footnote 653: Cervantes. A Spanish poet and romancer of the sixteenthcentury, the author of _Don Quixote_. ]

[Footnote 654: Israelite. Such Hebrew prophets as Isaiah andJeremiah. ]

[Footnote 655: German. Such as Luther. ]

[Footnote 656: Swede. Such as Swedenborg, the mystic philosopher ofthe eighteenth century of whom Emerson had already written in_Representative Men_. ]

[Footnote 657: A pilgrim's progress. As described by John Bunyan, theEnglish writer, in his famous _Pilgrim's Progress_. ]

[Footnote 658: Doleful histories of Adam's fall, etc. The subject of_Paradise Lost, _ the great poem by John Milton. ]

[Footnote 659: With doomsdays and purgatorial, etc. As described byDante in his _Divine Commedia_, an epic about hell, purgatory, andparadise. ]

PRUDENCE

[Footnote 660: The essay on _Prudence_ was given as a lecture inthe course on _Human Culture_, in the winter of 1837-8. It waspublished in the first series of _Essays_, which appeared in 1841. ]

[Footnote 661: Lubricity. The word means literally the state orquality of being slippery; Emerson uses it several times, in itsderived sense of "instability. "]

[Footnote 662: Love and Friendship. The subjects of the two essayspreceding _Prudence_, in the volume of 1841. ]

[Footnote 663: The world is filled with the proverbs, etc. Comparewith this passage Emerson's words in _Compensation_ on "the flights ofproverbs, whose teaching is as true and as omnipresent as that ofbirds and flies. "]

[Footnote 664: A good wheel or pin. That is, a part of a machine. ]

[Footnote 665: The law of polarity. Having two opposite poles, theproperties of the one of which are the opposite of the other. ]

[Footnote 666: Summer will have its flies. Emerson discoursedwith philosophic calm about the impediments and disagreeableness whichbeset every path; he also accepted them with serenity when heencountered them in his daily life. ]

[Footnote 667: The inhabitants of the climates, etc. As anortherner, Emerson naturally felt that the advantage and superioritywere with his own section. He expressed in his poems _Voluntaries_ and_Mayday_ views similar to those declared here. ]

[Footnote 668: Peninsular campaign. Emerson here refers tothe military operations carried on from 1808 to 1814 in Portugal, Spain, and southern France against the French, by the British, Spanish, and Portuguese forces commanded by Wellington. What was the"Peninsular campaign" in American history?]

[Footnote 669: Dr. Johnson is reported to have said, etc. Dr. Samuel Johnson was an eminent English scholar of the eighteenthcentury. In this, as in many other instances, Emerson quotes from hismemory instead of from the book. The words of Dr. Johnson, as reportedby his biographer Boswell, are: "Accustom your children constantly tothis; if a thing happened at one window, and they, when relating it, say it happened at another, do not let it pass, but instantly checkthem; you do not know where deviation from truth will end. "]

[Footnote 670: Rifle. A local name in England and New Englandfor an instrument, on the order of a whetstone, used for sharpeningscythes; it is made of wood, covered with fine sand or emery. ]

[Footnote 671: Last grand duke of Weimar. Saxe-Weimar-Eisenach is agrand duchy of Germany. The grand duke referred to was CharlesAugustus, who died in 1828. He was the friend and patron of the greatGerman authors, Goethe, Schiller, Herder, and Wieland. ]

[Footnote 672: The Raphael in the Dresden gallery. The SistineMadonna, the most famous picture of the great Italian artist, Raphael. ]

[Footnote 673: Call a spade a spade. Plutarch, the Greek historian, said, "These Macedonians . . . Call a spade a spade. "]

[Footnote 674: Parts. A favorite eighteenth century term forabilities, talents. ]

[Footnote 675: We have found out, etc. Emerson always insisted thatmorals and intellect should be united. He urged that power andinsight are lessened by shortcomings in morals. ]

[Footnote 676: Goethe's Tasso. A play by the German poetGoethe, founded on the belief that the imprisonment of Tasso was dueto his aspiration to the hand of Leonora d'Este, sister of the duke ofFerrara. Tasso was a famous Italian poet of the seventeenth century. ]

[Footnote 677: Richard III. An English king, the last of thePlantagenet line, the hero--or villain--of Shakespeare's historicalplay, Richard III. ]

[Footnote 678: Bifold. Give a simpler word that means the same. ]

[Footnote 679: Cæsar. Why is Cæsar the great Roman ruler, given as atype of greatness?]

[Footnote 680: Job. Why is Job, the hero of the Old Testament book ofthe same name, given as a type of misery?]

[Footnote 681: Poor Richard. _Poor Richard's Almanac_, published (1732-1757) by Benjamin Franklin was a collection of maximsinculcating prudence and thrift. These were given as the sayings of"Poor Richard. "]

[Footnote 682: State Street. A street in Boston, Massachusetts, notedas a financial center. ]

[Footnote 683: Stick in a tree between whiles, etc. "Jock, when ye haenaething else to do, ye may be aye sticking in a tree; it will begrowing, Jock, when ye're sleeping. "--Scott's _Heart of Midlothian_. It is said that these were the words of a dying Scotchman to his son. ]

[Footnote 684: Minor virtues. Emerson suggests that punctuality andregard for a promise are two of these. Can you name others?]

[Footnote 685: The Latin proverb says, etc. This is quoted fromTacitus, the famous Roman historian. ]

[Footnote 686: If he set out to contend, etc. In contention, Emerson holds, the best men would lose their characteristic virtues, --the fearless apostle Paul, his devotion to truth; the gentledisciple John, his loving charity. ]

[Footnote 687: Though your views are in straight antagonism, &c. Thiswas Emerson's own method, and by it he won a courteous hearing fromthose to whom his views were most objectionable. ]

[Footnote 688: Consuetudes. Give a simpler word that has the samemeaning. ]

[Footnote 689: Begin where we will, etc. Explain what Emerson means bythis expression. ]

CIRCLES

[Footnote 690: This essay first appeared in the first series of_Essays_, published in 1841. Unlike most of the other essays in thevolume, no earlier form of it exists, and it was probably notdelivered first as a lecture. 

Dr. Richard Garnett says in his _Life of Emerson_: "The object of thisfine essay quaintly entitled _Circles_ is to reconcile this rigidityof unalterable law with the fact of human progress. Compensationillustrates one property of a circle, which always returns to thepoint where it began, but it is no less true that around every circleanother can be drawn. . . . Emerson followed his own counsel; he alwayskeeps a reserve of power. His theory of _Circles_ reappears withoutthe least verbal indebtedness to himself in the splendid essay on_Love_. "]

[Footnote 691: St. Augustine. A celebrated father of theLatin church, who flourished in the fourth century. His most famouswork is his _Confessions_, an autobiographical volume of religiousmeditations. ]

[Footnote 692: Another dawn risen on mid-noon. "Another morn has risenon mid-noon. " Milton, _Paradise Lost_, Book V. ]

[Footnote 693: Greek sculpture. The greatest development ofthe art of sculpture that the world has ever known was that which tookplace in Greece, with Athens as the center, in the fifth centurybefore Christ. The masterpieces which remain are the models on whichmodern art formed itself. ]

[Footnote 694: Greek letters. In literature--in drama, philosophy andhistory--Greece attained an excellence as signal as in art. Emerson asa scholar, felt that the literature of Greece was more permanent thanits art. Would an artist be apt to take this view?]

[Footnote 695: New arts destroy the old, etc. Tell the ways in whichthe improvements and inventions mentioned by Emerson have beensuperseded by others; give the reasons. Mention other similar cases ofmore recent date. ]

[Footnote 696: The life of man is a self-evolving circle, etc. "Throw astone into the stream, and the circles that propagate themselves are thebeautiful type of all influence. "--EMERSON, in _Nature_. ]

[Footnote 697: The heart refuses to be imprisoned. It is asuperstition current in many countries that an evil spirit cannotescape from a circle drawn round it. ]

[Footnote 698: Crass. Gross; coarse. ]

[Footnote 699: The continual effort to raise himself abovehimself, etc. 

 "Unless above himself he can Erect himself, how poor a thing is man!" SAMUEL DANIEL. 

]

[Footnote 700: If he were high enough, etc. 

 Have I a lover Who is noble and free?-- I would he were nobler Than to love me. --EMERSON, _The Sphinx. _

]

[Footnote 701: Aristotle and Plato. Plato was a famous Greekphilosopher who flourished in the fourth century before Christ. He wasthe disciple of Socrates, the teacher of Aristotle, and the founder ofthe academic school of philosophy. His exposition of idealism wasfounded on the teachings of Socrates. Aristotle, another famous Greekphilosopher, was for twenty years the pupil of Plato. He founded theperipatetic school of philosophy, and his writing dealt with all thethen known branches of science. ]

[Footnote 702: Berkeley. George Berkeley was a British clergyman ofthe eighteenth century. He was the author of works on philosophy whichare marked by extreme subjective idealism. ]

[Footnote 703: Termini. Boundaries or marks to indicate boundaries. InRoman mythology, Terminus was the god who presided over boundaries orlandmarks. He is represented with a human head, but without feet orarms, --to indicate that he never moved from his place. ]

[Footnote 704: Pentecost. One of three great Jewish festivals. On theday of Pentecost, the Holy Spirit descended upon the infant Christianchurch, with the gift of tongues. See Acts ii. 1-20. ]

[Footnote 705: Hodiernal. Belonging to our present day. ]

[Footnote 706: Punic. Of Carthage, a famous ancient city, andstate of northern Africa. Carthage was the rival of Rome, but was, after long warfare, overcome in the second century before Christ. ]

[Footnote 707: In like manner, etc. Emerson always urged that in orderto get the best from all, one must pass from affairs to thought, society to solitude, books to nature. 

 "See thou bring not to field or stone The fancies found in books; Leave authors' eyes, and fetch your own, To brave the landscape's look. "--EMERSON, _Waldeinsamkeit_. 

]

[Footnote 708: Petrarch. (See note 563. )]

[Footnote 709: Ariosto. A famous Italian author of the sixteenthcentury, who wrote comedies, satires, and a metrical romance, _OrlandoFurioso_. ]

[Footnote 710: "Then shall also the Son", etc. See 1 Corinthians xv. 28: Does Emerson quote the passage verbatim?]

[Footnote 711: These manifold tenacious qualities, etc. It isremarked of Emerson that the idea of the symbolism of nature which hereceived from Plato, was the source of much of his pleasure inSwedenborg, the Swedish mystic philosopher. Emerson says in his volumeon _Nature_: "The noblest ministry of nature is to stand as anapparition of God. "]

[Footnote 712: "Forgive his crimes, " etc. This is quoted from _NightThoughts_ by the English didactic poet, Edward Young. ]

[Footnote 713: Pyrrhonism. A doctrine held by a follower of Pyrrho, aGreek philosopher of the third century before Christ, who founded thesceptical school. He taught that it is impossible to attain truth, andthat men should be indifferent to all external circumstances. ]

[Footnote 714: I own I am gladdened, etc. Emerson always held fast tothe consoling thought that there was no evil without good, none out ofwhich Good did not or could not come. ]

[Footnote 715: Sempiternal. Everlasting; eternal. ]

[Footnote 716: Oliver Cromwell. An Englishman of the middle classeswho became the military and civil leader of the English Revolution ofthe seventeenth century. He refused the title of king; but as LordProtector of the English commonwealth, he exercised royal power. ]