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 Author of "Canada unitor tKe Administration of tlie Carl of 
 
 Oufi^rih," etc. 
 
 
 DELIVERED BEFORE THE 
 
 LITERARY AND HISTORICAL SOCIETY OF QUEBEC 
 
 « I. •;..., 
 
 Dth January, 1879. 
 
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 QUEBEC: 
 
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 r«/ 
 
 EMERSON, THE THINKER, 
 
 Reap before the Society on Thursday Etenixo, 
 
 9th January, 1879, 
 
 BT 
 
 GEORGE STEWART, Jr., 
 
 Author of "Canada under the Administration of the Earl of 
 
 Dufferin," etc. 
 
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 }[r. Chair m^n, Ladies and GeiJlcmeii, 
 
 Some of you, doubtless, remember seeing a print, issued 
 a few years ago, which represented a literary party at 
 Washington Irving' s. In the centre of the group sat the 
 author of "Rip Van "Winkle," while around him stood and 
 sat the prominent pen men of his time. You have seen 
 hanging on many walls, engravings of a picture which 
 grew. out of the imagination of a great painter, entitled 
 •'Shalcespeare and his friends," and a few of you, perhaps, 
 are familiar with the grand canvas which seems so endowed 
 with life, and which exhibits, with wonderful fidelity, the 
 hard features of the autocratic Johnson, the plastic face of 
 the mercurial Sheridan, the classic front of Burke, the 
 inspired head of the warm-hearted Goldsmith, and the 
 tragic countenance of the player Garrick. One cannot look 
 upon pictures like these without feeling proud of the age 
 which gave birth to such men ; men who have been the 
 moulders of thought in their day, and whose works have 
 came down to us through the long decades of time. It is 
 the literature of a country which tells us of her progress 
 and civilization. The letters of a nation reveal to us in 
 unmistakable language, the culture and social and political 
 advancement of her people.- ' 
 
I will ask you this evening to look upon an ideal canvas 
 which contains the portraits of a few modern literary 
 worthies who have cast a lustre upon these times, and whose 
 labours have enriched the age in which we live. I will 
 ask you to imagine, if you can, anc»tker group. Some of 
 the faces you see, you will recognize, for you have looked 
 upon them in the Irving engraving. Others will be new 
 to you for they have grown great, since Mr. Bryant spoke 
 his eloquent tribute to the memory of the author of "The 
 Sketch Book" and "Bracebridge Hall." Look ! upon the 
 starting, breathing canvas. Look ! upon the figures which 
 burst into form and grow into life I 
 
 This is Longfellow, the gentle poet who has sung for us 
 the ever graceful, ever tuneful Evangeline, that story which 
 winds itself around every heart, and which is so dear to 
 every Acadian youth and maiden, that tearful story of 
 I ;^ expulsion of the French, which, you remember, a 
 Canadian told to Hawthorne, in the hope that a romance 
 might be made out of it. You know the history of the 
 poem; how Hawthorne gave the idea to Longfellow as ho 
 \\, 2 sitting one day in his study in old Cambridge ; how 
 the poet took it up, and in a few days finished the poem in 
 that curious hexameter measure, which Longfellow feared 
 would destroy its popularity. You remember his letter to 
 Procter whom he asked not to reject the poem on account 
 of its metre, w^hich he said could be written in no other 
 way without changing its character completely. You have 
 heard how delighted Hawthorne was when the poem was 
 read to him, and you know, of course, that the poet himself 
 has never beheld the quiet Village of Grand Pre, which 
 his p'vm has so skilfully described. This is Longfellow in 
 his 7iind year, with white hair aiid board, but with eye 
 bright and full of lustre. 
 
 This other form, on the poet's right, is the Quaker bard 
 of New England, who has neai'ly turned his 7Lst year. 
 
^3 — 
 
 
 Hti too, is groy, and though he looks at you with a sternlikd 
 expression, almost approaching to severity, he is the 
 kindliest of all the poets of our day. Using: the conventional 
 Tliee and Thou upon all occasions in his talk and in his 
 letters, he carefully eschews them in his poetry. He is the 
 great anti-slavery apostle, the firm friend of the coloured 
 race, the life-long companion of William Lloyd Garrison, 
 and the orator "Wendell Phillips. His best days were spent 
 in behalf of the slave, and the grandest of his lyrics and 
 idyls breathe out his love for freedom and his a])horrence 
 of oppression and tyranny. 
 
 There stands the translator of Homer, whose venerable 
 head is said to resemble closely the blind Greek's, with 
 white hair and patriarchal beard, and piercing eye that 
 seems to look into a man as if it could read his very soul, 
 and interpret his slightest thought. This is the author of 
 "Thanatopsis," that great poem which startled mankind 
 years before Tennyson wrote a line of poetry, and long 
 before Byron's death was whispered in London ; a poem 
 which was w^ritten when its author had scarcely reached 
 his 18th year. This is Bryant, aged 83, whose death, last 
 June, has left a blank which is still unfilled. It was only 
 the other day, it seems, that he wrote his graceful sonnet 
 to the memory of the historian of the Netherlands — .John 
 liOthrop Motley — and his " Flood of Years," by many 
 esteemed his best w^ork, vas written scarcely three years 
 ago. AVhat a privilege the old poet has enjoyed ! He lived in 
 two centuries. He saw the old school of poetry pass away, 
 and he witnessed the dawn of the new. For 60 years and 
 more he was the intimate of the groat ones, who, in 
 the two hemispheres, have led thought, and scholarship 
 and song. And in his turn, he became a leader himself in 
 all three. He wrote creditable stanzas ere the fanciful 
 Shelley died, and his r.ame rang through the four quarters 
 of the globe loner beiore Coleridije had ceased to write. 
 
 I\ 
 
'the contemporary of Moore, of Slieridan, of Words wortli, 
 of Keats, the Howitts, the Lambs, DeQai^^coT, and William 
 Hazlitt, the companion of Irving, of Cooper, of Cole and of 
 Fitz-Greene Halleck, he saw many a poet blossom into 
 song, live his brief life and silently pass awa}' to the other 
 world. He read the wonderful creations of Scott as they 
 came fresh from the press. He published a volume of 
 poems before the present laureate of England was born, and 
 a second edition of his poetry appeared whefn Longfellow 
 was a babe of scarcely a year old. He began life early, and 
 as a child was as precocious as Macaulay, and us eager to 
 n^ad as Whipple, who knew the "Citizen of the World" 
 before he was six. 
 
 This one to Bryant's le^t is the ever joyous, ever charming, 
 ever sparkling Holmes, tne autocrat, professor and poet of 
 every breakfast +able in the land, the delight of our firesides, 
 the Addison of our day. Lowell compares him to a full- 
 charged Leyden^Jar. None can chat more pleasantly than 
 he. None can tell yoa so much in as little space, as 
 Holmes. Below the medium height, and almost beardless, 
 he stands a man of 69. None surpass him in scholarly 
 ability, readiness of repartee, playfulness of humour or vigor 
 of mind. 
 
 Next to Holmes stands the i^oet and critic Lowell, who, 
 you know, has recently been sent by his government to 
 Spain, as Minister at the Court of Madrid. Observe well 
 the wealth of intelligence in Lowell's face. He it was who 
 wrote the crisp and .natty "Biglow Papers" — those bright 
 satires, which in their time, aroused so much political and 
 social excitement. He is hardly 60 years old, and to look 
 at him you would think him younger even than that. 
 Famed as a critic, he is equally distinguished as a poet and 
 humorist. Few men now living possess his keen analytical 
 power. Few equal his capacity and strength. 
 
The tall gehtt(5man who i6 sitting, by that little table, 
 tiear the window, has a Canadian as well as an American 
 reputation. An hietoriaji of splendid attainments, ho, a 
 a few months ago, published a fresh volupao — "Fronteuac" — 
 and in that book "vve have a complete account of the 
 distinguished French Governor's life in Canada. This is 
 Francis Parkman-!-a great name in literature, a true 
 Canadian at heart — and the author of no less than ei<?ht 
 volumes of history, a charming book on the rose, and one 
 novel. ' 
 
 This is Curtis, the polished and polite editor of "Harper's 
 Magazine," as dainty in his young jdays— and he is not very 
 old now — as Nathaniel Willis was when he called on that 
 s+rong-minded woman, Harriet MartiDeau. 
 
 Standing by him, chatting agreeably, is Edward Everett 
 Hale, the acute observer who w^rote, ydu remember, some 
 years since, that odd thing which everybody believed to 
 be truth at first, called "The Man without a Country" — 
 ill-fated Philip Nolan. 
 
 This is "Whipple. Many of you have seen him doubtless, 
 for he has lectured often in Canada. He is a critic of ex- 
 cellent taste. Hawthorne used to say he liked to read 
 Whipple's opiiioils and criticisms, even when they dis- 
 agreed with his own, because they were so honest and 
 just. Macaulay, too, recognized his originality and culture 
 and superior talents. His face seems to tell you how full 
 of fin he is, how full of dry and shrewd observation. 
 Whipple never cuts up a book, as Jeffrey used to, for the 
 mere love of saying sharp and spiteful things. 
 
 The old gentleman who is sitting a httle behind Professor 
 Lowell, and immediately below that speaking portrait of 
 Henry Thoreau, the Hermit of Walden, which is hanging 
 on the v;all, is Bronson Alcott, the mystic teacher of Con- 
 
 / 
 
— G — 
 
 cord. Age sits lightly upon his brow. He is nearly four 
 score, and a year ago last September witnessed a further 
 volume of Table Talk from his pen. He is the father of the 
 brilliant Alcott girls, May, the artist, whose paintings have 
 won the admiration of that severe art critic John Iluskiii, 
 and Louisa, whose charming " Little AVomen " and " Little 
 Men " are lovingly treasured in many households. 
 
 And this one, with "beard scarce silvered," is Jauu's T. 
 Fields, poet and publisher, of whom "Whittier lias sud : 
 
 " ric knew caoli liviriji pundit well, 
 Ooulil weigh tlu' gifts of him or iici'. 
 
 Aii'I well the iiiurket value tell 
 Uf Poet and Philotjopher." 
 
 Truly, we are in famous company to-night, for these are 
 the illustrious contemporaries of that strange, quizzical 
 looking gentleman, whom you may observe busying him- 
 self wiih looking after the comfort of his guests, in his old- 
 fashioned home, in Concord, which nestles behind a perfect 
 bower of beautiful elms. This is Emerson aged 7o, philo- 
 sopher, poet, essayist. Look well at him, for he will engage 
 a good deal of your attention to-night. Notice the imper- 
 sonal grey eyes, the mouth which seems to reveal his every 
 thought, even before he speaks, the smile which, now and 
 then, plays so lambently over his face. His home is 
 situated on the old Concord and Boston turnpike road, a 
 mile away from the railroad station. You pass it 
 on the way to Mr. Alcott's house, once the resi- 
 dence of Robert Hagburn, the early lover and at 
 last the husband of Rose Garfieid, of whom you have read 
 in Hawthorne's posthumous romance. A little behind 
 Alcott's is the famous Hawthorne Housj, the home of 
 " Septimius Felton," a two-story house, gabled before, but 
 with only two rooms on a floor, crowded upon by the hill 
 behind, a house strongly built with great thick walls ; -ich 
 a house, indeed, as you would expect to find as the dwel- 
 
 f 
 
ling of a man who believed, as the romancer's hero believ- 
 ed, that he was destined to live forever. This curious old 
 house is fast losing its charm. The wide walls never 
 reveal now the secrets which they heard long ago. All is 
 closed to the novelist. No more are the tall stairs climb- 
 ed by the weird magician, who so often climbed them to 
 the square tower-room, where he passed so many quiet 
 days in that seclusion which he sometimes loved. The 
 house is now a girls' school, and the poetry of the place is 
 fast departing. 
 
 Mr. Emerson's habits are very plain and homely. lie is 
 politic and though somewhat idealistic, as you may discover 
 from reading his essays, yet no man living is fuller of 
 common sense, and knowledge of the ways of the world. 
 He does most of his literary work in the morning, and 
 begins immediately after breakfast. You will seldom find 
 him writing later than noon. He composes slowly, and 
 considers thoughtfully every word which he uses. He is 
 full of anecdote and story, and his pages show the result of 
 extensive reading and acute observation. Few men have the 
 faculty w^hich he enjoys, of condensing thought and of 
 imparting information. It is a study to sit before him and 
 watch the growth of ideas as they come fresh from his 
 mind, lie seems to evolve them from his brain until they 
 grow symmetrical and perfect and beautiful. Even an old 
 idea appears new when clothed in the warm Emersonian 
 garb. lie develops his subject until it grows under his 
 hand. It is bright in the gorgeous colouring it receives. 
 It is strong in a marked individuality and tone. You read 
 t lie speeches of Chatham, of Burke, and of Canning ; you 
 listen to the orations of Choate, of Webster, 'M.he God-like 
 Daniel," and of Phillips ; at school you learn the story of 
 Demosthenes and of Cicero, but if you would know what 
 eloquence and true oratory are, you must read the interpre- 
 tation of them as formulated bv Emerson. So with 
 
-6- 
 
 "Greatness," so wilh "Hefoism," so with the passion 
 "Love," so with *'Airt," "Beauty,'^ ^'Nature," and "Poetry." 
 If you would understand ail these, tutn over the pages of 
 the Thinker, and realize hov tie you knew of them before. 
 Sir Walter Scott has told ^a of lie greatness of Napoleon, 
 Mr. Abbott has given yott v,- r^ a-colored if not quite correct 
 life of the little Corpoi \,' Overran Europe with his 
 splendid and 'slaughter ..rmies^ but Emerson tells you 
 something about Napoleon, the man of the world, which 
 makes you wonder at the incisive and intuitive skill of the 
 critic who has something new and original to say about 
 everything and every body.^ You would think after Addison 
 and Maeaulay, after Guizotand Goethe, after Hazlitt and the 
 thousand other scholars who have written so many chapters 
 and books about the "Sweet swan of Avon," that there was 
 little left for mortal man to say about him. But almost 
 defiantly the seer of Concord takes down his pen and 
 unravels from that full-charged and teeming brain of his, a 
 perfect masterpiece of acute criticism on Shakespeare viewed 
 as a poet. You cannot help wondering how it is that he 
 can find so many things untouched by his prfjdecessors, 
 masters as they were in their special art. But why need I 
 enumerate ? His works stand fitting exponents of his power 
 and culture. 
 
 You might think, perhaps, that inasmuch as his essays 
 are, for the most part, on such subjects as "The over soul," 
 " Immortality," " Plato— the Philosopher," ' " Worship," 
 " Culture," "Behavior," and kindred topics, that they would 
 be rather dry reading, with barely a light bit, now and 
 then, to relieve them. But this is a mistake. Emerson 
 has a rare fund of humour, and a' delicious relish for a 
 jest. Scattered ell through his writings, even in his 
 profounder articlesj there are flashes of playful humour, and 
 often quaint bits of good-natured satire. It is Emerson 
 who tells ihe story of the Sultan who looked in the glass 
 
— 9 — 
 
 find seeing how ugly he was, began to weep. A courtier 
 standing near began to weep also, and continued to do so 
 long after the Sultan was consoled. At last his master 
 inquired the occasion of this excessive sorrow, since he, 
 himself, who was the ugly man, had been able to stop his 
 lamentations. But the courtier answered : "If thou hast 
 only seen thy face once, and at once seeing hast not been 
 able to contain thyself, but hast wept, what should we do — 
 we who see thy face every day and night ? If we weep 
 not, w^ho should weep? Therefore have I wept." 
 
 In illustration of the humorous side of his character, 
 there is this somewhat characteristic anecdote. Miss 
 Elizabeth Peabody — a zealous apostle of the Kindergarten 
 schools, in Boston, once called on Mr. Emerson at his home, 
 and soon became very much animated in a discussion on 
 Berkeley's doctrine, that matter had no actual existence, and 
 that spiritual entities are the only realities. She did her 
 best to convince the philosopher of the truth and value of 
 this theory. Emerson listened respectfully to the animated 
 talk of the lady, when, on looking up, he observed through 
 his window, a load of wood being driven into his yard. 
 It distracted his attention for a minute or two, but as he 
 wished to be very polite — he paid no heed to it and 
 continued listening to his guest's conversation, until he 
 chanced to see the waggon passing into the yard. Though 
 loth to interrupt her, he arose and said ho must be excused 
 a moment, as he wished to direct the man where to tinload 
 the wood ; then he added with a smile and a twinkle in 
 his eye : "You know things must be looked after, although 
 they do not exist." 
 
 At another time when a committee waited on him for a 
 lecture, one of the gentlemen asked him his terms. *'0h 
 well," said he, "when I lecture in Boston I charge one 
 hundred dollars, when I lecture in "Worcester my charge is 
 
— 10 — 
 
 Beventy-five dollars. lu Salem I get fifty dollars, and when 
 I come to your town I will charge say — $30, and if that is 
 too mnch, the people may pay me what they choose ; I 
 want to be easy." Mrs. Emerson, who was present, spoke 
 tip and said, "Yes, I think Mr. Emerson is altogether too 
 easy." "Oh, but," said Emerson to the gentleman, "you 
 must not tell that to your people. Tell them I am a tough 
 old fellow." 
 
 He lectured once to an audience of farmers in the "West. 
 The next year he was asked again to the same town, 
 because, the committee said, though lie was pretty dull, he 
 seemed to have a good many good ideas, and it was worth 
 while encouraging such men, now and then. 
 
 "The world is soon coming to an end," cried an excited 
 Millerite to him one day. "Is it," said Emerson, "then we 
 will just have to try and get along without it." 
 
 Emerson seldom speaks publicly without notes, which 
 are usually made on small scraps of paper. Sometimes 
 these loose pages get misplaced, but such an accident does 
 not disturb him in the least. He very deliberately and 
 with admirable nerve, proceeds to gather up his papers, 
 look ti.om calmly over, and w^hen they are all right again, 
 he turns to his audience and goes on with his address or 
 lecture. He is serene and composed through it all — through 
 what many would consider a very trying and painful 
 ordeal. He loves to talk in a friendly way before a 
 company, and it is to these "talks" that w« are indebted 
 for many of the finest things which afterwards get Into his 
 essays, in a somewhat more elaborate form. The excellent 
 paper on "Books," is the outgrowth of one of these informal 
 conversazioni. He chats with delightful freedom about 
 the greater and lesser books of the world, and tells us what 
 we should read and what we should avoid. He prefers 
 good translations of the old masters of literature, in many 
 
 t 
 
 I 
 
 • . 
 
t 
 
 K! 
 
 ■■^ 
 
 J 
 
 — 11 — 
 
 instances, to the originals. Much valuable time, he considers, 
 is lost in reading the latter. He likes to be beholden to the 
 "great Metropolitan English speech, the sea which receives 
 tributaries from every region under heaven." Three rules 
 he lays down for our guidance. They are briefly, first, 
 "never read any book that is not a year old," second, "never 
 read any but famed books," third, "never read any but 
 what you like." 
 
 Harriet Martineau — a jealous and masculine woman, onco 
 said of the wonderfully gifted Margaret Fuller, that she 
 was, in her young days, the most intolerable girl that ever 
 took a seat in a drawing-room. And Emerson, when he 
 first met her, — more advanced in years and in the full 
 possession of her marvellous faculties, — said that he wtis 
 instantly repelled and his first thought was, that he could 
 never like her. Margaret Fuller was, in her time, the best 
 educated woman in New England, I might almost say, in 
 the world. Her father was a lawyer, and a man much given 
 to study. He eagerly crammed his daughter with know- 
 ledge, so much so indeed, that her mind thrived at the 
 expense of her body. Her physical energies decreased as 
 those of her mind increased. She read French and German 
 at an age when other girls were yet in their doll-days. 
 She grew up, naturally, with a high idea of her own 
 intellectual calibre. She saw how superior she was, men- 
 tally, to all her companions. She was vain of her attain- 
 ments, and made no scruple of talking of her own abilities 
 to all who listened to her. Once she said, and this was in 
 her middle age, "I now know all the people worth knowing 
 in America, and I find no intellect comparable to my own." 
 She studied every character she met, and those who saw 
 her for the first time felt uneasy in her presence. She was 
 haughty, cold, uncongenial and repellent. She was all 
 head and no heart before strangers. But when Margaret 
 Fuller thawed out, and accjuaintance ripened into friendship, 
 
— 12- 
 
 you forgot that yon had ever disliked her, or that she was 
 proud and overbearing. You felt that you were in the 
 presence of no ordinary woman. All feeling of uncomfort- 
 ableness vanished as you listened to the conversation of 
 this most brilliant talker of her day,Coleridge and DeQuincey 
 alone excepted. It was her custom to entertain the bright- 
 est and most intellectual men and women of her time, at 
 evening and morning talks. She j'ounded a Club in Boston, 
 in 1839, — a sort of conversation class for women, a?id all of 
 Ihese talks were of the richest character and scope. Some- 
 times she would do most of the talking herself, at others she 
 would start the topic, and watch the turn of the conversa- 
 tion, and when it showed signs of flagging or grew less 
 animated, like a skilful commander she brought up her 
 reserves and plunging into the engagement herself, the 
 talk again became vigorous and active. The discourses 
 Avere generally upon themes likely to awaken thought, and 
 kindle into life such subjects as were dear to the heart of 
 this seemingly inspired lady. It is worth considering the 
 influence which she exercised over her converts, and the 
 way in which she enlisted to her support such minds as 
 liJmerson, Hawthorne, Ripley, Alcott and Curtis. Even 
 Harriet Martincau learned to like her afterwards ; — that is 
 she liked her as much, probably, as she could ever like 
 anybody. Margaret Fuller possessed no personal attractions 
 whatever. She rarely smiled. There was little in her 
 manner calculated to win men and women to her side, 
 and as she grew in years she became more and 
 more unprepossessing in appearance. It was to the 
 vastness of her intellectual powers alone that scholars 
 everywhere bowed. It was her culture which won Mr. 
 Emerson, and made liim aver that he was every day more 
 and more surprised at the range and grasp of her genius. 
 The writings of this lady reveal a tenderness and pathos, 
 which only her own immediate friends knew she pos- 
 sessed. Strangers always misunderstood her. W^ith her 
 
 ^ 
 
 i 
 
4; 
 
 -13 — 
 
 I 
 
 i 
 
 great contemporary 'Emersoii it is different. In personal 
 life people are drawn towards him by the loveliness of his 
 disposition and the sweetness of his character. His writings, 
 perhaps, seem to some a little cold at first. It is only when 
 you have learned how to read them that you enjoy the 
 massive grandeur of his thought and the harmonious 
 beauty of his periods. Johnson, you remember, learned to 
 love Thomson's poetry by skipping every other line. From 
 the primer to Emerson is a wide stretch. You must read 
 many books before you can venture on the perusal of a 
 single sentence. He has none of the affectation of Carlylc, 
 none of the harsh ruggedness of Hume, of whom Home 
 Tooke once said that he wrote his history, as the witches 
 said their prayers — backwards, nrr has he the callous 
 insincerity of Jeffrey, but you are struck with the singularity 
 of his manner, the oddness of his thought, and his frigid 
 way of stating the simplest fact. His chief fault is the 
 glittering coldness, the almost Grecian manner of his style, 
 which obtains in the more profound of his writings. It is 
 only the few who have discovered how many quotable 
 things abound in his works— as many as you lind in George 
 Kliot or Holmes. To understand him aright you must 
 first master his peculiarities of diction, and when you have 
 accomplished that you have done a fair day's work. A 
 great scholar once bought Emerson's essays at a book stall, 
 and then ho went home to enjoy them. The next day he 
 bought a copy of Webster's Dictionary. Ho was not to be 
 baffled. Armed thus he went to work in earnest, 
 and alter a time he succeeded in fully mastering his author. 
 This was the eminent H«jrman Crrimm whose writings 
 of you have doubtless read. ^Mr. Grimm began 
 He attacked the heavy artillery when he should 
 have made his onslaught on Emerson's musketry corps, or 
 cavalry brigade. He should have begun with the lectures, 
 those poetic and popularized addresseswhich were especially 
 prepared for Lyceum audiences. Beginning with these he 
 
 some 
 wrong 
 
M 
 
 II 
 
 — 14 — 
 
 could have worked up with his author until he reached 
 the purple clouds. Arriving there he would know just 
 where he was. After you are familiar with your Latin 
 grammar you had better take up Dilectus. Horace can 
 wait a term or two. 
 
 1 
 
 a 
 c 
 
 Comparisons have been drawn betwsen Carlyle and 
 Emerson. It is averred that a strong similarity of mind 
 exists between these two master-reasoners of this century. 
 It has been hinted that Emerson has borrowed occasionally 
 some of the sage of Chelsea's ideas and better thoughts. 
 This is not so. Anyone who has ever read a page of these 
 Thinkers will yield that. Both men are sincere and earnest. 
 Both possess powerful resources of mind, and both are 
 highly cultured. Both are independent. In some general 
 w^ay perhaps, they think alike, that is they hold ceriain 
 ideas in common, but so do Matthew Arnold and Miix 
 MuUer, and the breath of suspicion has never been uttered 
 against them. Neither of them can tolerate cant, 
 hypocrisy, bigotry nor charlatanism. They both manfully 
 uphold the truth and love the grand and myriad works of 
 Nature. All through his writings Emerson says noble 
 things about Carlyle and his work, and Carlyle in his turn 
 not only edited the English edition of Emeison but he 
 prefaced one volume with these generous words : " Here 
 comes our brave Emerson with neivs from the Empyrean." 
 Carlyle hates a sham, and he never \vould have written 
 that line if he did not believe heartily in Emerson and his 
 teachings. 
 
 In 1833, on his return iVom a tour in Sicily, Italy and 
 France, Emerson a isited the Thinker of Ecclefechan, who 
 Avas then regarde " as the latest and strongest contributor 
 to the English critical journals. In that same year he had 
 met "Wordsworth, the vivacious DeQuiiicey, Lander and 
 the transcendejitftlist Colorid^'o. It was to see these live 
 
 1 
 
i 
 
 — 15 — 
 
 authors that Emerson, who is by no means a good travellei , 
 crossed the Atlantic Ocean. The only other man, he cared 
 to see since Scott was dead, was the Iron Duke, and he 
 saw him some time afterward at the funeral of Wilberforce. 
 The young poet was in splendid frame to see the men who 
 had won renown and his own admiration and esteem, by 
 their writings. He had just come from Florence and 
 Kome, where he had paced the galleries and walked the 
 studios of the painters and sculptors. His susceptible mind 
 had taken in all that was grand and imposing in those 
 magnificent museums which contain all that generations of 
 sculptors and painters have left for the admiration and 
 vronder and instruction of the world. He met Horatio 
 Greenough — a sculptor then fast rising into fame — at 
 Florence, and with him he inspected the gorgeous triumphs 
 of the chisel and the pencil. One can imagine the effect 
 which a visit to Italy would have upon a mind like 
 Emerson's. His intuitive eye saw only the perfections of 
 art, and he lingered long and lovingly over the masterpieces 
 of Angelo, of Raffael, of Perugino, of John • of Bologna, 
 and of others of like fame and name. He had just given 
 up his Church and parted in sadness with his congregation. 
 He turned therefore with relief to the beautiful things which 
 met his eye, in this historic birthplace of all that is 
 enduring and noble in art, in poetry and in song. Landor 
 was in Italy then, and Emerson spent many hours with 
 him. You can imagine how delicious these talks must 
 have been. They talked of Washington, whom the author 
 ol the " Imaginai/ Conversations," greatly admired, of 
 Byron, whose fame was then spreading far and wide into 
 the remotest nooks and corners of the world, of Wordsworth 
 the old poet of Rydal Mount,and a Laker, of the playwrights 
 Massinger, Beaumont and Fletcher, whose writings are 
 highly prized but seldom read. Montaigne, whom Emerson 
 venerated as the apple of his eye, Landor could or would 
 not praise. Mackintosh the reviewer, another favorite of 
 
_16- 
 
 Emersou's, Landor did not like, and so on through the buj^ 
 list, Landor did not fail to express himself strongly and 
 warmly when the occasion needed. Emerson found him 
 living in a cloud of pictures, in a line house overlooking a 
 far-stretching landscape. He was courteous and did not at 
 all bear out the reputation which Emerson had formed of 
 him from the anecdotes he had heard and the stories which 
 had been told about him. He felt, however, that he was 
 despotic and apt to be violent, but in spite of all this none 
 knew .better how to write elegantly and well, and for 
 wisdom, wit and imagination, he was the favourite of all 
 scholars and the readers of scholarly literature. There 
 was still too much of the bluff soldier in his nature however. 
 
 From Italy Emerson went to England and there he saw 
 Coleridge, whom he found taking smilf. lie was a short 
 thick old man, with bright blue eyes and a fine clear 
 complexion. He had read a good many books that had 
 ])een printed in America, and some of these he admired 
 exceedingly, lie spoke favoral)ly of AUoton the poet, 
 whom we know better, perhaps, on account of his paintings, 
 Coleridge knew of them too, for he had met tlu artist ia 
 Kome, and had thought him a master of the true T;tianesque. 
 He spoke of Doctor Channing and regretted the religious, 
 turn in his life, which had developed into Unitarianisni. 
 He told Emerson, among other interesting things, of the 
 extraordinary skill of Montague, the picture dealer who 
 could determine the age of a picture by merely pTssing his 
 hand over its surface. 
 
 . "Wordsworth, Emerson saw in August, lie was then a 
 plain white-haired old man, not prepossessing in appear- 
 ance, and the great green goggles which he wore did not 
 at all improve his looks. He talJted simply and with much 
 freedom. Of course the conversation turned on books and 
 the writers of them. The old poet was quite vigorous in 
 
 t 
 
 i 
 
? 
 
 r^ 
 
 — 17 — 
 
 denouncing and abusing Goethe's masterpiece. What 
 would he say if he were living to-day, to find Joseph Cook 
 ranking it the chief of the six great novels in the world ? 
 Carlyle, Wordsworth thought was insane on some points. 
 He considered him clever and deep but obscure. Ooleridge 
 he thought, wrote in a way not always understood. He 
 recited some new sonnets to Emerson, which he had just 
 finished, and you may be sure the recital ga^^e the young 
 man both pleasure and surprise. Of his own poems he 
 preferred those which touched on the iaffections, rather than 
 the more didactic, which Ijlo thought would perish while 
 the others would live. He esteemed higher than any of 
 his writings the sonnet which he wrote "On the feelings of 
 a high-mmded Spaniard." This and "The two Voices," 
 he quoted rather lovingly. 
 
 The interview with Carlyle was a treat. EmersOrt 
 had long wished to make the acquaintance of this man^ 
 this robust leader of thought, then in the full vigor of his 
 pow ers. Wordsworth w^as old. Coleridge was old. Both 
 had completed their work, that is, by far the best part of it. 
 But here was a man of iron strength and will and purpose. 
 A man who hated shams, a worthy successor to Johnson, 
 one who created and led opinion. Emerson hastened to 
 Craigenputtock, and found the house <* amid desolate 
 heathery hills, where the lonely scholar nourished his 
 mighty heart." Carlyle had been a man from his younger 
 days. He was now tall and gaunt and his brow was cliff- 
 like and severe. He was self-possessed, and talked in an easy, 
 familiar manner. His accent was the broad Scotch of his 
 forefathers, and he used it with an evident relish. He was 
 full of anecdote and humour, and Emerson felt at home in 
 his company from the very first. They talked long about 
 books and of Gibbon whom Carlyle called magnificently 
 "that splendid bridge from the old world to the new." He 
 admired Kousseau, Goethe, Schiller, Robertson, DeFoe and 
 
 
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 EJ'v' 
 
 ." i ri > r ' . ' >'j, r s !; ^'/" 
 
 — 18 — 
 
 Sterne. He belittled Socrates and would not read Plato. 
 He had odd names for everything, Blackwood he called 
 "The Sand Magazine," and Fraser^s, to which >"* da 
 frequent contributor himself, he dubbed "The M i. ^daga- 
 zine." Thus they talked these two men who are brothers 
 in thought, Carlyle to Scotland what Arnold is to England 
 and Emerson is to America. Over the long hills they 
 walked together that day, and looked at Criffel. Then 
 they sat and talked again. Carlyle looked towards London, 
 which was to him, then, the heart of the world. It was a 
 huge machine and he liked it. There is nothing in Emerson's 
 .writings so delightful as these impressions of Carlyle, these 
 jottings from his note book, these pen-portraits of the men 
 of genius whom he saw. Of the five that talked with him 
 in those days, but one remains. Coleridge, DeQuinccy, 
 Landor and Wordsworth are dead. 
 
 No man has been more sinned against for his religious 
 faith than Emerson. No man has been more systematically 
 misrepresented and less understood. He has been called a 
 Pagan, an Atheist, an Unbeliever, a Pantheist. Men 
 profess to see in him much that is bad and little that is 
 good. People who have never read a line of his poetry, 
 or took the merest dip out of his essays, have been the first 
 and the readiest to assail him. He is a good man to abuse 
 for he makes no reply, and those who prefer charges 
 against him have it all their own way. He detests con- 
 troversy, and naturally enough all the small pop-guns in the 
 land are pointed at him. He has allowed these misrepre- 
 sentations to grow so long undisturbed that to-day they 
 assume not only respectable but quite leviathan proportions. 
 There is bomething refreshingly cool about the way in 
 which the Thinker meets every fresh attack which is made 
 upon him. He only smiles at the ingenuity of his foes and 
 
 stys nothing. He does what he believes to be right, 
 
 and the world must be content with that. He 
 
 ; 
 
 ■. 
 
 goes 
 
 on 
 
.71, N| 
 
 1 
 
 — 19 — 
 
 affirming and making stronger his principles and aiirio. 
 He neither apologizes nor explains. He wears no mask and 
 he conceals nothing. Ho grows up, as "Whipple says, *'to a 
 level with the spiritual objects he perceives, and his eleva- 
 tion of thought is the sign and accompaniment of a corres- 
 ponding elevation of character. By his patience he has 
 earned the right to speak as he does and to act as he does." 
 
 Emerson is the outcome of eight generations of orthodox 
 preachers. He was born in 1803, and after graduating 
 with high honors at Harvard in 1821, he entered the 
 divinity class, and shortly afterwards took charge of a 
 congregation in Boston, as the colleague of Henry Ware, 
 Jr. He inherited strong Puritan ideas, and was much 
 given to serious contemplation. His studies took a wide 
 range, and led him to seek out from among the mass of 
 authors w^hose works crowded the shelves of the libraries, 
 such as were congenial to his taste and nature. He read 
 Plato and Socrates, and mastered the logic of Locke and the 
 philosophy of the great G-erman teacher Emmanuel Kant. 
 These writers influenced largely the current of his thought. 
 He could not always agree with them in what they 
 advanced, but less than all with what John Locke taught. 
 Plato was his delight. Kant w^as his guide. He read 
 these authors with much care, but it w^as not for years yet 
 to come that he felt their influence working upon his 
 mind. He continued his reading, and the ministrations of 
 his ofiice, as pastor of a congregation. No preacher was 
 more beloved by his people. They vied with one another 
 in showing proofs of the affection and esteem in which 
 they held him. Even after he had hurled into their 
 midst the thunderbolt which led to the separation between 
 them, there were many in his church who thought some 
 arrangement could yet be made by which he could be re- 
 tained as their spiritual chief. 1 ou know why he resigned 
 his charge, aud why he retired from the ministry after d/ 
 
 ** 
 
Il y » i M tt Mil , I ■ yn» iMiw(i > i ^ » 1.1 »»Mi 
 
 M " l* M i> »ii j n i ( ,i ni y ^ i, _ ^. ii m ii, h|i , , u '* "7 ' Hl 'i f ifn ^ y 
 
 'illiMiiliKliM&':' 
 
 f' 
 
 — 20 — 
 
 Itoi^Vice of four years, for you have seen, doubtless, his 
 remarkable letter of December, 1882, and read the great 
 sermon which he preached, — the only one he ever pub- 
 lished, — about the same time. He gave up his church 
 because, according to his way of thinking, he could not 
 consistently administer the rite of the holy sacrament. It 
 was after this that he went to England and the Continent. 
 On his return he settled down a man of leisure, and of 
 letters, and busied himself with writing papers for the 
 magazines, an occasional book, and lecturing to the people 
 on social and other topics. He achieved fame as a 
 lecturer, and his college orations made him even more 
 famous. His first book was published in 1839. This was 
 "Nature," a volume of essays far in advance of the time in 
 which they were written, and their sale was accordingly 
 slow. It took twelve years to exhaust the first edition of 
 five hundred copies ! This admirable book — the keynote 
 to Emerson's other and perhaps more popular writings, 
 has of late years become a favorite with cultured readers. 
 In July. 1840, Mr. Emerson accepted the editorship of a new 
 journal of philosophy, literature and religion, entitled The 
 Dial. Miss Fuller afterwards became identified with this 
 serial, and for some numbers she w^as the editar. This 
 publication nearly caused a revolution in religious thought. 
 The leading writers of New England contributed poems 
 and papers to its pages, and it soon grew to be quite influ: 
 enlial and vigorous. 
 
 Some of you will be curious to know more about Emerson's 
 belief. He has been called a Transcendentalist, and his 
 associates have been more or less interested in that 
 peculiar faith. The Transcendentalism to which Emer- 
 son pinned his faith was not the Transcendentalism 
 of Kant, or of Fichte, or of Coleridge, or of "Words- 
 worth. It was an institution peculiar and indigenous to 
 the soil of N^w England. It grew nowhere else. It 
 
 i 
 
 
 J 
 
mmmmmBrnky 
 
 -^21 — 
 
 It 
 lit. 
 
 of 
 the 
 
 111 
 \y 
 of 
 oto 
 
 
 I 
 
 could thrive nowhere else. Like a great wave it washed 
 the shores of New England, overran the country and found 
 a foothold and a resting place there and there alone. Its 
 tenets were too exalted, its professors demanded too much, 
 and it soon lost support, then languished and finally died 
 a quiet and natural death. A quarter of a century a^o 
 hardly a man ot any note lived in New England who was 
 not an ardent disciple and sympathizer in this famous 
 newness of thought movement. To-day you could 
 scarcely find a half dozen — I know myself of but one, Mr. 
 Alcott — who hold the same views, even if you looked for 
 them among those who were living twenty-five years a"-o. 
 Frothingham who wrote the life of Gerrit Smith.a biography 
 which you remember was suppressed a few weeks after 
 publication, was once a noted apostle of Transcendentalism. 
 Theodore Parker was another, though it is said of him that 
 he hardly knew it himself. Emerson w^as more of an 
 idealist than a Transcendentalist, but he held some of the 
 same views. Ripley gave up all he had for it, and even 
 sold his valuable library to raise money to help its growth. 
 Whittier felt so warmly towards it that at one time its 
 teachings shone through every line of his poetry. Lowell 
 wrote for the Dial some of his sincerest papers. Margaret 
 Fuller w^as bewitched by it. Sylvester ,Tudd wrote his novel 
 of Margaret as an illustration of the whole creed. Curtis 
 and Hawthorne had their warmest sympathies awakened 
 by it. Indeed, the whole literature of New England was more 
 or less tinged by the doctrine of the new faith. It grew* to 
 be the fashion — and vou know that when Good Dame 
 Fashion speaks her word is law, and her dictum must be 
 obeyed. Every village had its school. It was a new^ reli- 
 gion, and men and women who went to church but seldom, 
 if at all, were foremost in trying to build up and foster the 
 new faith. Some of them hardly knew what it all meant ; 
 but they joined just the same. You have heard the story of 
 the gruff old doctor who on being asked what New Eng- 
 
 Ul 
 
■ i( ■! jrt: r .w'i ^ ( i 'ij^i i ;iit|Jt>J | ltj !i| ili > j. if t'Lli » 
 
 — 22 — 
 
 land Transcendentalism was, replied by pointing to a high 
 blaff and asking: "Do you see that bluff over there with 
 all those swallow holes in it ? "Well, take away the bluff 
 and you have New England Transcendentalism." But 
 smile as we may the new religion succeeded in drawing 
 towards it a coterie of scholars and thinkers which repre- 
 sented the best thought and the highest culture in America. 
 Many, and George Bancroft, the historian, among the rest, 
 believed it would live. It started well, but there were too 
 many heads to it. It was all intellect and each mind strove 
 to interpret the doctrine to suit himself. In a little while 
 a dozen separate Transcendental beliefs were current, then 
 there were more, and finally the theory which had some 
 good points in it, collapsed altogether and became a hope- 
 less wreck. Emerson, as I have said, differed much from 
 his brethren. He was, and is to-day, an Idealist. He 
 believes that in God we live and move and have our being. 
 He believes in the communion of the Spirit of God with 
 the soul of man. He believes in no material hypothesis 
 that imperils man's spiritual interests. He believes in 
 intuition. He does not claim for the soul any especial 
 faculty by which truths of a spiritual relation are seen as 
 objects are noticed by the senses. He is not a dogmatist. 
 He allows full ingress to the mind and egress from it. In 
 his essay on "Worship," he says that "immortality will 
 come to such as are fit for it, and he who would he a great 
 soul in the future, must be a great soul now." The 
 doctrine must rest on our own experience. It is too great 
 to rest on any legend, or on any experience but our own. 
 He says further that the practical faculties are developed fast- 
 er than the spiritual. And in other chapters he tell us you 
 will find skepticism in the streets and hotels, and in places 
 of coarse amusement. Everything is prospective and man 
 is to live hereafter. The soul does not ago with the body, 
 he continues,and the greater the man is the more ambitious is 
 he that his work shall be better, and the more does he be» 
 
 I 
 
 1 
 
— 23 - 
 
 lieve that his work is still far short of what it should be. 
 This flying ideal, Emerson holds, is the perpetual promise 
 of the Creator. Our intellectual action gives us a feeling 
 of absolute existence. "We breathe a purer air. Nature 
 never spares the individual. Future state is an illusion 
 for the ever present state. It is not length of life but 
 depth of life. 
 
 It is because of the serenity of his faith that Emerson 
 avoids controversy and discussion about his religious teach- 
 ings. He is an earnest believer in the doctrine of which I 
 have given you but the merest outline. He has full confi- 
 dence in it. He looks for perfection in individual man. He 
 has boundless charity and openness of heart for all. He 
 demands liberality of thought. He places Faith before 
 Charity, higher even than Charity. He cherishes the sen- 
 timent of a universal brotherhood. He takes every man at 
 his best, and he considers the motive as well as the action 
 of the doer. He believes in a bright, cheerful religion. He 
 peoples his faith with beautiful, delightful things. His 
 imageries are fanciful and pretty. Creeds he holds to be 
 structural and necessary to the action of the human mind. 
 He is an Idealist pure and simple. 
 
 I will not detain you with an account of Brook-farm — 
 that mild and Arcadian experiment which originated in the 
 brain of George Ripley, and to which many of the promi- 
 nent Transcendentalists belonged. It was a short-lived 
 institution, and its scheme was too ambitious to be practi» 
 cable. Emerson, though not a member, had some sympathy 
 with it, and he and Margaret Fuller were occasional guests 
 of the little community at West Roxbury, whose laudable 
 object was the cultivation of the soil as well as the mind. 
 
 Nor will I ask you to consider the courage of Emerson 
 during the abolition movement of half a century ago, when 
 every pulpit in Boston was closed against anti-slavery 
 
f M^ ^ ^ ;.0' i j i i | ii i,j * i 1 11 
 
 
 .i^^^T^VF^sTf^ 
 
 ' J ' l ' t i I 
 
 "£idfliaK^<«t^^MSiii£Si^iWL 
 
 I 
 
 ^24 — 
 
 teachings save his own. He had the daring to bid defiance 
 to the multitude who clamored for the body and the blood 
 of the bondman. It was a memorable Sabbath that of the 
 29th of May, 1831, when the doors of the Hanover Street 
 Church flew open and Samuel J. May mounted the steps 
 of the fpulpit, and thundered his anathemas against the 
 slave-holder and his associates. It was an innovation, and 
 several years had to elapse before the pastors of other 
 churches felt courageous enough to follow the grand exam- 
 ple of Emerson. 
 
 Let us now consider our author as a poet. He is not what 
 the world would call a great poet. His greatness rather 
 appears in his prose. But while he has written few poems 
 of unusual mark, he has written many musical, sunshiny 
 pieces of great excellence and purity. His poetry is the 
 outcome of a cultivated mind. His peculiar views enrich 
 it materially, but his poetry is not always symmetrical and 
 even. His poems remind you of a series of paintings of 
 various degrees of merit. You notice a want of harmony 
 in the one, and a careless disregard for tune and time, in 
 the other. His poems are prophecies, and they appeal 
 directly to the head and scarcely at all to the heart. A 
 scholarly man only, could write them. They have little 
 warmth, and some of them are cold and wanting in those 
 genuine touches of nature which shine so luminously and 
 conspicuously in the verses of Byron, Bryant, Keats, and 
 Robert Burns. Some one has said Scott's poetry is a 
 poetical guide to Scotland. Emerson's poetry is a guide to 
 the Idealist's faith. It is often fanciful, often full of grace- 
 ful images, and always full of thought and expression. I 
 have said he was fanciful at times. He loves to paint in 
 bright, joyous colours the beauties of nature. He does not 
 believe with the Quaker-lady, who, you know, thought 
 it would have been much more seemly if all the flowers 
 had been created drab colour, instead of such flaunting reds 
 
 
 
^!»:;^te!^ti9m£iUil»4iik 
 
 25 
 
 
 
 and blues and yellows. If you would write poetry that 
 would live, something more than mere felicity of expression 
 and smoothness of versification are needed. "We are for- 
 getting poets everyday who have done no more than this — 
 poets whose names have indeed been "writ in water." 
 Tennyson is a fastidious thinker, forever changing and 
 altering his work. AVordsworth was pretty much the 
 same, though he seldom corrected his stanzas after they 
 liad once appeared in type. Emerson has almost a contempt 
 for the versifier w^hose only skill is musicality of rhythm. 
 He considers that the greatness of a poem is due to its 
 conception and design. No skill of execution can atone 
 if these be wanting. "We Avnnt an architect and they 
 bring us an upholsterer." 
 
 Emerson often gets in among the clouds. Ho is dreamy, 
 listless, abstracted and thoughtful. Socrates, you remem- 
 ber, would stand for hours almost motionless, when thought 
 had possession of him. He used to listen to what he called 
 the supernatural and prophetic voices. Dante was often 
 in an abstracted, forgetful mood, and he used to go about 
 the streets as if he were possessed of a demon. People would 
 shudder as he passed, and the whisper went from mouth 
 to mouth, " there goes the man who has been in Hell." 
 Halleck walked about New York for days with whole 
 poems in his head, speaking to nobody, but brooding over 
 his verses until opportunity offering, he wrote down his 
 thoughts, thoughts which were bursting through him at 
 every pore. Lowell composes in his mind long before he 
 commits his work to paper. Longfellow is sometimes 
 haunted for days and cannot rest until he has laid his tor- 
 mentor by writing down what is tearing madly through 
 him. It is the same with Emerson. He can only 
 secure peace and rest to his mind by filling the page before 
 him with the poem which cries for utterance. The range 
 of his poetry is not very large, but it is very deep. I can* 
 
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 — 26 — 
 
 not say that all of Mr. Emerson's poetry is of the very 
 highest order of merit, but "Brahma," ''Rhodora," — full of 
 tender suggestion as it is — "Letters," "The Snow Storm," 
 "The Humble Bee," — which so many refused to listen to 
 at first--"The Sea," "Heroism," and "The Boston Hymn," 
 are poems which enrich the language, and I cannot help 
 feeling that the world is better because they were written. 
 Though a mystic, Emerson is not one quarter as unintelli- 
 gible as Mr. Robert Browning, who gave us a few years ago 
 a poem in two ponderous volui les which he called "The 
 Ring and the Book." Mr. Browning, you know, is the 
 gentleman who wrote " Sordello"— a work which was 
 handed to Douglas Jerrold once, as he was recovering from 
 an illness which had kept him indoors for several days. His 
 wife had gone out to make a few purchases, and the wit 
 sat by the fire with the book open before him. He read 
 the pages over and over again. The perspiration stood in 
 great beads upon his forehead. He laid the volume down 
 and almost shrieked, "Good God ! I am an idiot." His 
 wife coming in just then he handed her the book ; "read, 
 read," he exclaimed wildly. Mrs. Jerrold read a few pages, 
 and throwing the poem down, vexatiously s&id, "Bother the 
 man, I can't understand a word he says." "Thank Heaven 
 for that," cried Jerrold springing from his chair, "I thought 
 it was my own reason which was going." 
 
 Emerson's poetry is admired by the few. He has a select 
 but not a very large audience. One requires to read his 
 poems often. They grow v ^jon you as a beautiful picture 
 does. Ripley, who is ever cautious in hazarding an opinion, 
 thinks that it is Emerson's "subtle thinking and meditative 
 wisdom which impart such a rich and substantial vitality 
 to his verse." Emerson throws his whole soul into his 
 work, and his poetry reveals a phase of his inner self. It 
 is his heaviness of thought, if I might call it by that name 
 for want of a better one, which prevents his poetry from 
 
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— 27- 
 
 becoming popular, and widely read among the masses. Ee 
 has only published two volumes of verse, the first one in 
 1847, and the other *'May-day," some twenty years later. 
 A year or two ago he edited an excellent collection of poems 
 which he called "Parnassus." The book owes its origin to 
 a habit which the poet cultivated of copying into a 
 common-place book such poems or parts of poems as pleased 
 him, in the course of his reading. He had in this way a 
 good collection of his favorites within a small compass. This 
 was an advantage, for he could turn at will and read 
 the poems he loved the best, without having to hunt 
 through his own and his friends' libraries for them. After 
 a time his book grew so large that he had to get a new one, 
 and at last he thought such poems as he possessed might 
 please others beside himself were they printed in conveni' 
 ent form. Accordingly he gathered them up, threw them 
 into divisions, and his "Parnassus," really representing the 
 cream of fugitive and other poetry, became a fact. Many 
 like to read the poetry which a poet selects. As one might 
 expect, the greater part of the volume is composed of 
 poetry which the cultivated classes only care to read. 
 
 Emerson has written but one striking poem — a poem 
 which seems to me to overshadow everything else that we 
 find in his poetry. It is his exquisite description of a snow- 
 storm. I wish that I could read it to you as I once heard it 
 read a few years ago, in the early autumn when the leaves 
 were just beginning to turn : — , 
 
 Amiounrod liy all till' tnniijK-ts of t!u' .-k\ . 
 Arrivi's the snow ; uiul, driving o'er the fieid-^. 
 Sei'Mis nowhere to ali,','h( ; the whitood air 
 Hides hills and woods, die river and the heiivon, 
 And veils the farni-hoiise at the garden's end. 
 The sled and traveller stopped, the eo\irier'ei feet " 
 >■■ Dclaved, III! friends shut out, the honseniales sit 
 
 « Around the radiant lireplaee, oindo^ed 
 
 Jn a tuinultuous priv.icy of storm. 
 
 t'unie see tiie iiortii wind'.- ina^dnrv, 
 
— 28 — 
 
 >■■ . Out of an unseen quarrj-, evermore 
 
 Furnished with tile, the fierce artificer ^ 
 
 Curves his white bastions with projected roof 
 
 Round everj' windward stake, or tree, or door ; ' ' ' 
 
 Speeding, the myriad-handed, his wild work 
 
 So fanciful, so savage ; naught cares he . • 
 
 Fur number or proportion. Mockingly, 
 
 On coop or kennel he hangs Parian wreaths i 
 
 A swan-like form invests the hidden thorn ; 
 
 I'Mlls up the farmer's lane from wall to wall, 
 
 Maugre the farmer's sighs ; and at the gate 
 
 A tapering t\irret overtops the work. 
 
 And when his hours are numbered, and tlie world 
 
 Jm all his own, retiring as he were not, 
 
 Leaves, when the sun appears, astonished Art 
 
 To mimic in slow structures, stone by stone, 
 
 Ilnilt in an age, the mad wind's night-work, 
 
 Tlie frolic arcliiloctiui; nf the snow. 
 
 Ladies and Gentlemen,--! have tried to tell you something 
 this evening about one of the most profound and venerated 
 thinkers of our age It is difficult to treat a subject so vast 
 as this one is, in a popular way, without to a certain extent 
 largely -weakening it. Emerson, is a man whose power for 
 good or evil is very great. He is a thinker who every year 
 gains ground and loses none. He is growing into men's 
 minds. He is enlisting, with no apparent efibrt of his own, 
 new converts, day by day. He is doing his work silently 
 but with terrible earnestness and skill. The vast acres of 
 the universe open before him, and men in every quarter of 
 the globe, sit in wonder and admiration, over the pages of 
 the serene thinker, who never utters an uncertain sound. 
 He has struck a blow at popular prejudice which has dis- 
 ^olved like the dew upon the grass, opinions which the 
 records of centuries made strong and adamantine. For 
 years he has lived in advance of his time. But his day has 
 come now. The centuries have caught up with him at 
 last. I am not advocating Transcendentalism, Idealism, 
 Pantheism, Optimism, or the two score and more isms, of 
 the day, but I cannot shut my eyes to the fact that through 
 
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 — 29 — 
 
 cuch teachers as Emerson and Garlyle, the world is grow- 
 ing, year by year, wiser and >jetter and more liberal. 0.ie 
 cannot help enquiring, just here, are these teachings right 
 and proper ? Is it better for us all that Emerson has come ? 
 Has he done good ? IVhat has he accomplished for man- 
 kind ? Has he made men and women lead purer and 
 holier lives, or are his teachings harmful and erroneous ? 
 Is he satisfying, or does ho only tantalize us with his 
 mystic phrases and orphic sayings ? Must we skip every 
 other line ? 
 
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