SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES 
 
 OF 
 
 THE RADICAL CLUB. 
 

SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES 
 
 OF 
 
 THE RADICAL CLUB 
 
 OF 
 
 CHESTNUT STREET, BOSTON. 
 
 . . FDIYJEP BY 
 
 MRS. JOHN T. SARGENT. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 JAMES R. OSGOOD AND COMPANY. 
 
 1880. 
 
Copyright, 1880, 
 BY. JAMES R. .OgpooD A*fp Co. 
 
 /!// rights reserved. ^ ... 
 
 UNIVERSITY PRESS: 
 JOHN WILSON AND SON, CAMBRIDGE. 
 
TO 
 
 Ht&ing antj t&e Beats 
 
 OF 
 
 THE CHESTNUT-STREET CLUB 
 
 THIS BOOK IS DEDICATED, 
 
 BY M. E. S. 
 
 954548 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 ANY details of meetings ,or discussions which have 
 had a marked influence, or have indicated the 
 growth and tendencies of public opinion, cannot but be 
 interesting. This conviction has led to the collection of 
 some of the essays given at the Chestnut Street Club, 
 with a sketch of the discussions which followed their 
 reading. 
 
 The volume has been made up from the recollections 
 of friends, from notes and reports made of the meetings ; 
 and while I fear it will be found fragmentary and imper 
 fect, still it is my hope that the words here preserved 
 of many distinguished members of the Club, some of 
 whom have now passed from among us, may prove not 
 only of interest but of value to the reader. 
 
 M. E. S. 
 
ORIGIN OF THE CLUB. 
 
 / T"" V HE Eadical Club may be said to have had its 
 -* origin, in the spring of the year 1867, in the 
 growing desire of certain ministers and laymen for 
 larger liberty of faith, fellowship, and communion. In 
 this respect it was akin to the Transcendentalist move 
 ment of earlier date. It was designed to meet a demand 
 for the freest investigation of all forms of religious 
 thought and inquiry. The Club existed with as little 
 formal organization as was possible. It was composed 
 of members of all religious denominations. Thirty 
 persons were present at its first meeting ; and at the 
 closing sessions, in 1880, nearly two hundred were in 
 attendance. 
 
 In its earlier years, the papers were chiefly confined 
 to theological and religious questions; but during the 
 last decade they were generally upon scientific and edu 
 cational problems. The conversations were not less 
 interesting than the essays. Bare thoughtfulness, deep 
 human tenderness, and profound earnestness marked 
 these reunions. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 POEM John Greenleaf Whittier . 1 
 
 I. Keligion ...... Ralph Waldo Emerson . 3 
 
 * II. The Immanence of God . John Weiss 21 
 
 III. Democracy David A. Wasson ... 26 
 
 IV. Limitations Julia Ward Howe ... 30 
 
 V. Nature and Person . . . Henry James .... 37 
 
 VI. Woman John Weiss 41 
 
 VII. The Relation of Jesus to the 
 
 Present Age . . . . C. C. Everett 47 
 
 VIII. Symbolic Conceptions of 
 
 the Deity C. P. Cranch .... 52 
 
 IX. Borromeo 0. B. Frothingham . . 57 
 
 X. The Unseen W. C. Gannett .... 67 
 
 XL The Christian Name . . W. H. Channing ... 73 
 
 XII. The People W. J. Linton .... 82 
 
 XIII. Newspapers F. B. Sanborn .... 89 
 
 XIV. Thou Shalt David A. Wasson ... 95 
 
 XV. Music John Weiss 105 
 
 XVI. Sappho T. W. Higginson . . . 109 
 
 XVII I Essential Christianity . Mary Grew 117 
 
 ! Poem John Greenleaf Whittier . 128 
 
 XVIII. Religion and Art ... Athanase Coquerel ... 130 
 
 XIX. Heart in Religion . . . John Weiss 140 
 
 XX. The Prayer Gauge . . . C. A. Bartol 149 
 
 XXI. Pantheism F. H. Hedge 154 
 
 XXII. Economic Laws . . . . D. A. Wells. . 161 
 
 XXIII. Quakerism A.M.Powell .... 167 
 
 XXIV. Evolution Edward S. Morse . . . 184 
 
 XXV. Law Samuel Longfellow . . 188 
 
Xll 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 XXVI. Self-Oblivion . . . . C. A. Bartol 197 
 
 XXVII. Marriage Henry James .... 208 
 
 XXVIII. Tragedy C.G.Everett 212 
 
 XXIX. Constancy to an Ideal . John Weiss 218 
 
 XXX. Oriental Religion . . Mrs. A. H. Leonowens . 223 
 
 XXXI. Raphael T. M. Coan 227 
 
 XXXII. Bird and the Bell . . C. P. Cranch .... 229 
 
 XXXIII. Fatality John Weiss 234 
 
 XXXIV. Imagination .... C.C.Everett 240 
 
 XXXV. The Nebular Theory . Benjamin Peirce ... 243 
 
 XXXVI. Buckle and Carlyle . . W. J. Potter 251 
 
 XXXVII. Darwinism .... Nathaniel Soutligate Shaler 259 
 
 XXXVIII. Indian Ethics . . . J. W. Powell .... 271 
 XXXIX. The Harmonies of the 
 
 Universe . . . . T. Sterry Hunt .... 285 
 
 XL. Emerson 293 
 
 XLL John Tyndal 298 
 
 XLIL Dom Pedro II 301 
 
 XLIII. Charles Sumner 304 
 
 XLIV. J. T. Sargent 310 
 
 XLV. Heredity Alpheus Hyatt .... 315 
 
 XLVI. Evolution Alpheus Hyatt .... 329 
 
 XLVII. Individuality . . . Thomas Davidson . . . 334 
 
 XLVIII. Ideality Benjamin Peirce . . . 339 
 
 XLIX. Don Quixote . . . . C. C. Everett 343 
 
 L. Language John Fiske 346 
 
 LI. The Comic . . . . C. C. Everett 350 
 
 LII. Philosophy .... George Howison .... 353 
 LIII. Color-Blindness . . . B. Joy Jeffries .... 358 
 LIV. Jonathan Edwards . . 0. W. Holmes .... 362 
 LV. The Impossible in Math 
 ematics Benjamin Peirce . . . 376 
 
 REMINISCENCES. 
 
 I. Extracts from Newspapers commenting on the Club . . 383 
 II. Letters from members of the Club,, and from Charlotte 
 
 Cushman 387 
 
 III. Poems contributed to the "Poetical Picnics" . . . 397 
 
 INDEX ." 413 
 
FOR M. E. S. 
 
 WHATEVER in love s name is truly done 
 
 To free the slave, or lift the fallen one, 
 Is done to Christ. Whoso in deed and word 
 
 Is not against Him, labors for the Lord. 
 When He who, sad and weary, longing sore 
 
 For love s sweet service, sought the sisters door, 
 One saw the heavenly, one the human guest : 
 
 But who shall say which loved the Master best ? 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIEK 
 
SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES 
 
 OF THE 
 
 CHESTNUT STEEET CLUB. 
 
 I. 
 
 RELIGION. 
 
 BY RALPH WALDO EMERSON, MAY, 1867. 
 
 WE know that the world was made at one cast ; what 
 we find in ourselves, we recognize all around us. 
 Whatever man sees, that he has a key to in his own mind. 
 All mythologies, the most barbarous and the most refined, 
 he can translate into his own. The scholar can easily 
 understand how the King of Crete came to be the Olym 
 pian Jove of Homer in old time, and how, in later ages, 
 a saint of Nazareth became the adoration of nations ; for 
 the student is aware, in himself, that the religious impulse 
 is the most revolutionary principle in human experience, 
 uplifting and impelling the man beyond himself. Every 
 nation of the globe is in our day, whether willingly or 
 reluctantly, holding up its sacred books and traditions to 
 our eyes, and we find in our mytholog}^ a key to theirs, 
 and in our experience a key to their experience. There 
 is in all these a general agreement to what we call good 
 morals. In all these sacred books or systems, the anom 
 alies can be accounted for in the peculiar conditions or 
 geography of the people ; and, as a rule, every one, of 
 course with its share of nonsense, has some exceptional 
 
4, , SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 merit, some contribution of a wise and hoty soul to ethics. 
 In each appears the activity of the imagination in a bar 
 barous mind, and the contemporary existence of a minority 
 of comparatively wiser men holding fast to the simple 
 rule of duty. 
 
 All the creeds claim miracles, but we do not therefore 
 accept the creeds ; we measure them by their civilizing 
 power. Thus Christianity strives against the sensual 
 instincts of man ; we hold it therefore in honor. So does 
 Buddhism, and eveiy high enthusiasm. Just so far as 
 they have this power, they prevail. You cannot resist 
 a moral movement. "An arch never sleeps," say the 
 architects. No more does a new truth, once clearly ap 
 prehended. You find a parallel truth in the very begin 
 ning of history for every noble inspiration of our religious 
 history, as well as for every crime of ours committed under 
 the sanction of religion or the claimed sanction of religion. 
 That wise man that I spoke of as appearing alwa^ys the 
 minority of thoughtful persons is expressed in the mar 
 iner s prayer in the storm to Neptune: "O God, thou 
 canst save me if thou wilt, and if thou wilt, thou canst 
 destroy ; but, however, I will steer my rudder true." 
 
 These cosmical statements occur in every nation, and 
 in the sacred books of every nation. Every reader knows 
 that almost eveiy passage in our sacred books can be 
 paralleled with a like sentiment from another book of a 
 distant nation, and of such an age as to show that it was 
 not derived from ours. And so many of the contributions 
 in Eastern literature are so inestimable in themselves that 
 one would think they could not be hidden in obscure trans 
 lations, translations which do not pass into currency. 
 The immense energy of the sentiment of duty and the 
 awe of the supernatural exert a powerful influence on 
 minds that are often perverted, and a tradition is received 
 with awe, but without corresponding action on the intel- 
 
RELIGION. 5 
 
 lect. Then 3-011 find so man}- men infatuated on that one 
 topic of religion. Wise on all other topics, the} T lose their 
 reason the moment they talk of religious things. In a day 
 not far off, these ridiculous attempts to patch the ecliptic 
 of the universe with a piece of tin will come to an end. 
 
 We can never hold airy false belief with impunity. It 
 is claimed that the terrors of the old religious system were 
 wholesome checks on the conduct of men, and that the 
 gradual decline of the influence of the old religious sj stem 
 in this country, and in Germany as well, has been attended 
 with a greater looseness of human action. But the lives 
 of the believers were broken by it, their minds obscured, 
 and their moral sense injured. One is struck with the 
 manner in which clergymen of the old school, as we say, 
 had their minds darkened b} T their gloomy opinions. 
 When somebody said to the late Rev. Dr. Payson, of 
 Portland, " How much you must enjoy religion, since you 
 live always administering it," he replied that nobody 
 enjoyed religion less than ministers, as nobody enjoyed 
 food less than cooks. No doubt he enjo} T ed the remark, 
 but still the remark was remembered because of its truth. 
 
 It is safe to say that no one holds the Christian tradi 
 tions as they were uniformly held in the last generation. 
 We rest on the moral nature, and the whole world shortly 
 must. The church, you tell -us, is an institution of God. 
 But are not wit, and wise men, and good judgment whether 
 a thing be so or no also institutions of God, and older 
 than the other ? The commanding fact which the true soul 
 never does not see is the sufficiency of the moral sentiment. 
 You can never come to any peace or power until you put 
 your whole reliance on the moral constitution of man, and 
 not at all in airy histoiy. George Fox had the courage to 
 say that, though he read of Christ and God, he knew them 
 onl} T from a like spirit in his own soul. 
 
 There is at this time, as we all know, existing and hi- 
 
6 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 creasing, a disposition to complain of opinions that are 
 growing old. In matters of religion, men merely fasten 
 their eyes on the difference between their creed and ours, 
 while the charm of the study is in finding the agreements 
 and identities in all the religions of men. I think we 
 should not assail Christianity or Judaism or Buddhism, 
 but frankly thank each for every brave and just sentence 
 or history that is furnished us. We should not contradict 
 or censure these well-meant approximations, but point out 
 the identity of their inspiration with every other inspira 
 tion. The idea of this age, the idea of our Protestant 
 and Progressive Church, will not be truly reached or ex 
 pressed until it attain the height which religion and philos 
 ophy reached in any former age. One thing is certain, 
 religions are obsolete when lives do not proceed from 
 them. The worst adversary that the Calvinistic, the Epis 
 copal, or the Methodist Church ever had was the discovery 
 that they, or some of them, would not be the friends but the 
 enemies of the emancipation of the blacks. 
 
 I look for the enlargement of that upper class in our 
 society, composed of those who enjoy the luxury of a 
 religion that does not degrade ; who think it the highest 
 worship to expect of Heaven the most and the best ; who 
 do not wonder that there was a Christ, but that there were 
 not a thousand ; who have conceived an infinite hope for 
 mankind ; and who believe that the history of Jesus is 
 the history of every man, written large. 
 
 Rev. JOHN T. SARGENT asked if Mr. Emerson had not 
 rightly measured and defined the absolute religion which 
 underlies all phases and forms of theology and church 
 religion. He was impressed by what had been said of the 
 manifest changes which have gone on and are going on in 
 the doctrines of the church. 
 
 Mrs. JULIA WARD HOWE was conscious of that ; and this 
 
RELIGION. 7 
 
 was one reason why she thought they must not take too 
 polemic and controversial ground with the churches. They 
 complained, " You radicals do not give us a chance. You 
 do not know what we preach or what we believe now. 
 You take pleasure rather in representing us as intolerant as 
 we ever were ; but we think we have learned as well as you." 
 Mr. T. W. HIGGINSON, when he read Mr. Emerson s 
 Divinity Hall Address, felt that at last he had some glimpse 
 of what was meant by religion ; the great thought of a 
 universal religion dawned upon his mind, and he saw that, 
 as Channing said, he had been trying to get religion 
 through something else than religion itself. He did not 
 know how it was with others, but all that was grand and 
 noble that he had ever seen in life had been seen only in 
 the light of that thought ; and it was with no feeling but 
 one of shuddering that he looked back, not merely to the 
 limitations of orthodoxy, but to any limitation which sep 
 arated Christianity from religion. It seemed to him that 
 such sentiments as had been expressed by Mr. Emerson 
 had a vital bearing upon those great interests which Mrs. 
 Howe thought they did not touch. So long as radicalism 
 was negative, it was powerless ; it was impoverishing ; it 
 took the life out of everybody : as soon as it became posi 
 tive, it strengthened everybody. The members of the 
 churches suppose what is positive is their little dogma, 
 and if we reject that, we are nothing ; and, so we are if we 
 think that dogma of sufficient importance to dwell upon 
 much after we reject it. When we recognize the grandeur 
 of all the religions in the world, when we get outside of 
 our little temple and get upon a pinnacle and see the incense 
 that ascends from all the temples in the world, and feel a 
 sympathy for that, then we begin to be believers, and 
 cease to be unbelievers. It had been affirmed that truth 
 is something infinitely grander and larger than Christianity, 
 and that was the true ground for a radical. 
 
8 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Rev. Mr. TIFFANY related an anecdote of a Chinaman 
 whose great grief was that an American friend was a 
 Christian. This was such a complete turning of the tables 
 that it made a powerful impression upon his mind. It 
 seemed to him that the great outer} 7 that was raised when 
 ever anything was said about Christianity not being the 
 root-religion came from the popular ignorance. The 
 majority of men were too busy to read recondite books, 
 but if they would read a popular book like Fortuities book 
 on China, they would see that all the benevolent institu 
 tions for the relief of human want and suffering which we 
 have could be paralleled in that country. He thought the 
 most important work was the spread of knowledge. 
 People would accept the natural conclusions if the} 7 knew 
 the facts, but so little had been brought before them that 
 they believed all these beautiful things were only to be 
 found in one quarter of the world. 
 
 Rev. JOHN WEISS said that many years ago, when he was 
 engaged in attending a course of lectures on Ecclesiastical 
 History, he read a poem of Mr. Emerson s, 
 
 " Set not thy foot on graves, 
 Care not to strip the dead 
 Of his sad ornament, 
 His myrrh, and wine, and rings, 
 His sheet of lead, 
 And trophies buried : 
 
 Go, get them where he earned them when alive. 
 As resolutely dig or dive ! " 
 
 and that poem was a lesson in theology or religion to him, 
 which considerably emancipated him from the routine of 
 the school, and somewhat cast in the shade the wisdom 
 which was being peddled out from day to day in the class. 
 It set him upon a revision of his orthodox conception of 
 Christ ; and he found that if he would have personal relig 
 ion, he must go and get it where he earned it when 
 
RELIGION. 9 
 
 alive." He had clung to that discovery ever since, and 
 perhaps in consequence of that he had said more about 
 Jesus, and used the narrative and the parable and the 
 beatitude more than most radicals. When he read that 
 Jesus said to the people who stood around him, " Ye have 
 heard that other people have said so-and-so. I do not 
 care about that, I say unto you so-and-so," it occurred 
 to him whether that was not meant for every man and 
 woman who was searching after religion. It was the first 
 act of personal religion to stand out alone and say, " I say 
 so-and-so ; " and although a great many people might say 
 so who did not appear to have anything particularly well 
 worth saying, nevertheless he clung to it as the thing that 
 was to save mankind. How easy it was for them to state 
 what was the theism of Jesus ! It was their theism, the 
 theism of Massachusetts, the theism of Mrs. Howe, of 
 Col. Higginson, of Mr. Garrison, of Wendell Phillips, 
 of the antislavery movement, it was the theism of the 
 moral sense, that had interpenetrated the flesh of men and 
 women from the creation of the world ; and it seemed to 
 him that Mr. Emerson, when he said, in his last sentence, 
 that " the histoiy of Jesus is the history of every man, 
 written large," gave the reason why we all loved him. 
 And was not Shakspeare each man and woman sung loud 
 and clear and strong ? Was not Beethoven each man and 
 woman pla}~ed loud and strong, and sweetly too? All 
 stood upon the same platform, and shared in the theism of 
 God. 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS thought they ought not to fight 
 windmills ; they did sometimes fight shadows. He had 
 never met a man of the old faith one worthy to be taken 
 as a type of anything who denied that the religious 
 sentiment had found meet and valuable and admirable 
 expression in the mj thologies ; and he thought that three 
 quarters of all the investigations which had been made into 
 
10 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 Oriental religions, translations of their books, inquiries 
 into their history, and analyses of their faiths, had been 
 made by so-called orthodox men. Yale College was 
 as learned in all that matter as Harvard. He did not 
 think, therefore, they could claim that the truth, as it ap 
 peared in those books and in those religions, had not been 
 recognized by orthodox men. The point where they sep 
 arated was not there, by any means. Of course, the old 
 religions and mythologies grew out of an inspired religious 
 consciousness, to a certain extent. He never knew a man 
 who denied it. Every intelligent man that he ever met, of 
 any sect, acknowledged the contributions to the literature 
 of the West that had been made by many of the older 
 faiths ; they had not neglected, they had not depreciated 
 that development. On all this we agree. There is a 
 great deal of astronomical speculation in the world, yet 
 that does not interfere with the fact that there is a true 
 astronomical method. Because a great many scholars had 
 speculated about the stars, did that show that Copernicus 
 and Sir Isaac Newton are not upon the right track? The 
 question was, " Is there any indication anywhere that we 
 have touched, even slightly, on absolute truth in any of the 
 mythologies?" When it was claimed that some parts of 
 the New Testament could be found in JEsclrylus and 
 Sophocles and Epictetus, he admitted it ; but when any 
 man said that the New Testament could be found in Con 
 fucius and Buddha, he stopped, and demanded the proof. 
 He did not know that any Jew by the name of Jesus 
 Christ had said, "Do unto others as ye would that others 
 should do to you ; " but he knew that the best scholarship 
 of Europe had scrutinized every line of the record in the 
 most exhaustive manner, until we know, if we know any 
 thing, that three hundred } T ears after his death, he was 
 supposed to have said it. So far they were on solid 
 ground. It was said that Confucius, five hundred years 
 
RELIGION. 11 
 
 before Christ, said, " Do not do unto another as you would 
 not have another do to 3^011." There was a remarkable 
 similarity in the sentences, and very little probability that 
 a Jew, in that narrow valle}", ever heard of a Chinese. 
 How did they know Confucius said it? All they knew 
 about the Chinese was not older than three hundred and 
 fifty years. If they could prove to him that three hundred 
 years after the death of Confucius, he was supposed to 
 have uttered those words, he would believe it, but not 
 now ; and he did not give any more weight to the legends 
 about Buddha. No story, forty years old, could be relied 
 upon without scrutiny. 
 
 But suppose it was admitted that Confucius and Buddha 
 did say just what Christ did ? Steam and water were the 
 same elements ; but water would not move a locomotive, 
 steam would. The Sermon on the Mount might be par 
 alleled in Sophocles, they might find a great deal in Con 
 fucius : but one was water, the other steam ; one had 
 moved the world, the other had not. The proof that 
 there was something unusual there was seen in the 
 results. India had all the intellectual brilliancy that 
 Greece had ; she touched all the problems, exhausted all 
 the intellectual debate thousands of years ago, and there 
 she lies to-day. On the other hand, here was Europe. 
 She had made marvellous progress ; and, with the single 
 exception of race, there was no element mixed in the 
 European caldron to distinguish it from the Asiatic. 
 Unless they were going to la} T on this distinction of race 
 the whole difference between European and Asiatic devel 
 opment, they had nothing but Christianity to account for 
 it. It seemed to him that it was wiser to claim for Chris 
 tianity the largest share in the merit of European 
 civilization. 
 
 Everybody knew that the Chinese had hospitals before 
 Christ, if we are to trust history ; everybody knew all 
 
12 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 about their progress in civilization ; but they make no 
 progress to-day. The bee could make an eight-sided cell 
 better than Brunei could make it, but the bee can make 
 nothing else. The Chinese had not advanced for a thou 
 sand years. They had eveiy spring-board and fulcrum 
 and motive power to go ahead, and had not. Europe had 
 constantly gone ahead. "VYe had saved all we had got, 
 and gained more. We had taken the classic and the 
 Roman civilization, taken their law, their ethics, their 
 religious ideas, their idea of popular rights, and we had 
 carried them on. Europe was the hand and brain of the 
 world to-day ; the pioneer, the constructor, the adminis 
 trator of the world to-day ; and there was nothing under- 
 tying her to make her so except race and Christianity. 
 Other portions of the world had had the same intellect. 
 Tocqueville had told us, in his report to the French Insti 
 tute, that there was no theory or dream of social science 
 ever debated in Europe that could not be found in the 
 Hindoo discussions. The difference was not caused by 
 a lack of intellect. Here was a fact to be explained, and 
 it could not be brushed awa} T by saying this man and the 
 other made a very near approach. No doubt that was so ; 
 nobod} 7 ever denied it. God never left any race, nor any 
 man, nor any time, without Himself, and these twilights 
 and approaches to noon were seen ever} r where in histoiy. 
 But the} r had got at last the Copernican theoiy, and no 
 fact appeared that it did not explain. They had got at 
 last the true chemical analysis, and that went down and 
 weighed the atoms. That explained all new combinations 
 and all new discoveries. The reason wh} 7 he believed in 
 Sir Isaac Newton was, that he gave the key to every fact, 
 discovered no matter where. Sir Thomas Browne could 
 tell a great many beautiful dreams about astronomy, but 
 they did not explain the facts. Christianity had faced the 
 facts and explained them. He claimed, therefore, that 
 
RELIGION. 13 
 
 there was something essentially different in it from the 
 religious experience of other races. 
 
 Miss PEABODY asked if that " something" was a method 
 of life. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS replied that what he meant was, that 
 sugar and starch, considered chemically, were the same 
 thing ; steam and water were the same thing ; but their 
 action how different ! So if they showed him every 
 line of the Sermon on the Mount paralleled in Confucius 
 or Antoninus, it did not move him in the least. He still 
 put the problem, How do you explain the fact that one 
 arrangement of them has Europe as the result, and some 
 other arrangement of them has no result, comparatively 
 speaking ? 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON said that the history of the United 
 States testified how well Mr. Phillips s theories fitted and 
 sustained him ; but he was sure there were others besides 
 himself who felt that if they were compelled to look at the 
 history of the world as he looked at it, it would stunt and 
 paralyze them. As he listened to Mr. Phillips, it seemed 
 to him that their eloquent friend did not sa} T a single word 
 in behalf of calling ourselves Christians -in the sphere of 
 morals that could not be adduced with precisely the same 
 force in behalf of calling ourselves Shakspearians in the 
 world of intellect. In each case, it was the difference be 
 tween admitting the superiority of the individual, and sep 
 arating him from the human race. When, at the end, he 
 said the reason why he believed in Sir Isaac Newton was 
 because he found all questions answered in him, it seemed 
 to him (Mr. Higginson) that he annihilated all his previ 
 ous statements. If he believed in Christ as he believed in 
 Sir Isaac Newton, as he believed in Shakspeare, it was all 
 ver} well. Then the question remained, Could Christs be 
 made by the stud} of Christ ? He did not believe it, because 
 Christ did not make himself in that manner. He would re- 
 
14 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 peat, once for all, that he should feel weakened and paralyzed 
 by taking what seemed to him the limited view of God s 
 providence and of human history that Mr. Phillips took. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS explained that in speaking of the scrutin}^ 
 to which the record of Christianity had been subjected, he 
 only wanted to show that they ought to weigh equals against 
 each other. He knew, so far as the most exact scholarship 
 could tell him, that a certain act and a certain word were 
 supposed, three hundred j-ears after Christ, to have been 
 done and said by him. They did not know an} T thing with 
 certainty about their Oriental Scriptures. Old Agesilaus 
 said a very good thing when he said, as they were told, that 
 "to work was infinitely better than to pray." It was a 
 very brave, sound, and Christian thing ; but did he say it? 
 I do not know. Some fine thinker might have found one 
 half of the story, and made the rest. I cannot tell. One 
 half of Plutarch was poetry, the other fact. So, when 
 considering the records of any religion, even Christianity 
 itself, they must remember that principle. But he de 
 manded that they should be put upon the same plane, that 
 they should scrutinize the one as they did the other. The 
 Eastern records were all story and legend until the same 
 criticism was brought to bear upon them to which the 
 records of Christianity had been subjected. 
 
 In regard to Sir Isaac Newton, he believed in him in as- 
 tronoroy. He had got the key to the material universe. 
 When they came down to Laplace, they found the} r could 
 reconstruct the universe on that principle. He would go 
 to the stake on the correctness of the Copernican theory. 
 When they came to religion, it was a different quality. He 
 did not believe in Christ as he believed in Sir Isaac New 
 ton, but he saw that the religious sentiment lay at the basis 
 of civilization ; it was the motive power and the check that 
 could make human nature the highest product of the world. 
 Europe had had a variet}* of religions which had never pro- 
 
RELIGION. 15 
 
 duced anything. We think we are now coming out into 
 the sunlight, and are on the right track to the right goal. 
 Take a single element in European history, the sanc 
 tity of man as an individual, in his personal rights. No 
 other civilization of the world ever gave an inkling of it. 
 Greece knew nothing of it, nor Asia. Though each one 
 had the idea, neither practised it. Europe practises it. 
 With the variety of race there was in Europe, they could 
 not trace it wholly to race. He believed it was largely due 
 to the religious idea upon which Europe rested. It was 
 the natural outgrowth of Christianity, and was paralleled 
 in the civilization of no other race in the world. It was 
 just as much in antagonism to the race qualities of this race 
 as of any other race. The Saxon people from which we 
 sprung were as despotic and tyrannical as any other race ; 
 yet in spite of that, the quality of man was recognized. 
 
 In reply to a suggestion by Mr. Higginson, the speaker 
 said he was, of course, willing to allow the element of free 
 dom in races ; but the question was, why it had not pro 
 duced this regard for personal rights before. Europe ex 
 isted before Christianity ; the Germanic race existed two 
 or three thousand years, perhaps, before Christianity. 
 
 Mr. POTTER wanted to know why, if they were to take 
 Europe as evidence that Christianity was different from 
 other religions, it was not fair to say that Christianity 
 failed in Asia for the same reason that other religions failed 
 there. Did not the facts tend to show that the difference 
 in result was really due to the differences of race and cli 
 mate rather than to an essential difference in the religious 
 idea? 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS replied that he thought Christianity took 
 possession of the Roman Empire, as it then existed. Civili 
 zation what there was of it at that period was a mere 
 belt around the Mediterranean. Up to the last five hundred 
 years, there was no civilization that penetrated a hundred 
 
16 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 miles inward. Christianity took possession of the Roman 
 Empire. He did not think they were necessarily thrown 
 back upon race because it failed in a single province in 
 Judea. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON reminded Mr. Phillips of South America, 
 saying that even South America would compare favor 
 ably with the Chinese Empire, in her recognition of the 
 great principles of the nineteenth century. He believed 
 that the science of three thousand years ago was in many 
 particulars as far advanced as ours. He thought the3 T would 
 find by-and-by that, with half-a-dozen exceptions, the older 
 nations understood Nature about as well as we did. 
 
 Mr. WEISS sympathized very strongly with Mr. Phillips 
 in regard to the emphasis which he put upon the humane 
 and social developments of Christianit} T , but thought he 
 overlooked certain points connected with the theory of the 
 development of religious and intellectual ideas which were 
 very important in the discussion of this question. Mr. 
 Phillips doubted whether Agesilaus said, "It is better to 
 work than to pray." Perhaps he did not, but somebody 
 must have said it, else it would not have been attributed to 
 Agesilaus. What particular consequence was it whether 
 Confucius uttered the Golden Rule or not? Somebody 
 must have uttered it, or it would not have come down to us. 
 [Mr. PHILLIPS (in an undertone] . But when it was first 
 uttered is of consequence.] The important point was, that 
 everything of this kind was a stepping-stone in the stream 
 of time, which led the nations from one position to another. 
 He found an explanation of the whole problem in the rela 
 tions of the great emigrations of the world to the develop 
 ment of the race. It was in the German nation that Chris- 
 tianit} first found its aboriginal element, Germanic regard 
 for women ; and it there gave the spiritual and theistic 
 impulse to those humanitary and social ideas which have 
 given it dominion over the hearts of men. The fact was 
 
RELIGION. 17 
 
 that, as mankind had been growing older, it seemed that 
 God had been growing older, for God expressed himself to 
 different phases and epochs of humanity. As men and 
 women were born into the world, and as the race became 
 more and more perfected in. their organization or fibre by 
 the crossing of blood, by conquest, or by aboriginal purity, 
 its religious impulse took various forms ; not merely the 
 theism of Christ, but the humanitarian idea of the Germanic 
 people. Christianity did not put woman where she belonged 
 until it touched the German races. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS. They were not reached until the fifth or 
 sixth century. What was Christianity doing the first five 
 or six centuries ? 
 
 Mr. WEISS. It was mixing itself with the Greek and 
 Roman elements. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS. Yes, but it recognized woman. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON. It does not now. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE. What does, if it does not? 
 
 Mr. WEISS continued, and said that he had reference to 
 a broad, general recognition. Of course, he understood 
 that when Christian women became food for wild beasts, 
 there was adoration paid to such women. There was al- 
 waj T s exceptional respect and adoration paid to those great 
 lights of the world s history. He thought they overlooked 
 that wonderful development of intelligence which sprang 
 from the Christian mind, which made Europe what it was. 
 He suggested this modification of Mr. Phillips s figure, that 
 the great principles of theism were alwaj^s steam, for the 
 time being, wherever they were ; but the trouble was, the 
 locomotive was not invented. The locomotive had been 
 built by the great and varied intelligence of modern Europe 
 and America, and thus we went ahead on the right track. 
 
 Mr. HALLOWELL wanted a definition of Christianity from 
 Mr. Phillips ; whether it was his Christianity that overcame 
 the Roman Empire, or whether it was the Jewish, Messi- 
 
 2 
 
18 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 anic idea which was held by all the churches. He wanted 
 to ask Mr. Phillips whether he had faith in what is called 
 " the atoning blood of Christ," and the other doctrines and 
 theories of Christianity, or whether it was simply the moral 
 law. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS replied that that was opening a very wide 
 door ; they could not discuss it to-day. 
 
 Mr. HALLOWELL said Mr. Phillips had admitted that 
 Christianity found its parallels in other religions, but that 
 the other religions had failed as civilizing forces. If 
 the sentiment was there, he wanted to know why that sen 
 timent did not operate ? If the force lay in the idea, then 
 the reason must be found in the difference of race, or cli 
 mate, or something else that might be suggested ; but if it 
 was the man Jesus, the Messiah of the Jews, he wanted to 
 know it. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT thought the question had been answered in 
 Mr. Emerson s essay. It had been refreshing to him to 
 listen to the teachings of Mr. Phillips. He felt that in his 
 justification it should be said that, while others had been 
 theorizing about Christianity, Mr. Phillips had been vigor 
 ously at work doing it. 
 
 In response to repeated and urgent calls from the com 
 pany, who were anxious that Mr. Phillips should reply to 
 the suggestions that had been made, that gentleman spoke 
 again, very briefly. He said they did not come there to 
 discuss the items of a technical creed : they were discussing 
 Christianity as a great spiritual force, and he thought it 
 distinct from all other religions. He believed that, in a 
 certain sense, Buddha was inspired, but not in the sense in 
 which Christ was. He thought the essence of Christianity 
 was to be judged by its fruit. That was his Gibraltar. If 
 a man tried to do a thing, he might be cut short, as Lin 
 coln was, by death ; he might be circumscribed by circum 
 stances, and therefore they could never judge of a man s 
 
KELIGION. 19 
 
 character by his results ; but if they gave an idea, a force, 
 a thousand years to work in, they could judge of its 
 essential character by the results. He thought the human 
 race had never reached such a plane as Europe stood upon 
 to-day, and therefore he claimed that no religion had ever 
 done for the world what Christianity had done, or had 
 ever given us that key to human nature which it had given 
 us. Consequently no one of them could claim to stand 
 anywhere near it. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL thought there could be no difference of 
 opinion as to the fact that the name of Christ had taken 
 up history, and that his teachings, as the} 7 had been organ 
 ized, had socially succeeded. He should as soon think of 
 abolishing the word "light" or " sweet" or " strong," as 
 of abolishing the word "Christian." The only question 
 was, whether the individual Christ, or any word or deed 
 of Christ, was the essence and the beginning of the thing, 
 or only a production of it, an illustration of it. Christ, as 
 an individual man, was not the substance of Christianity, 
 he only voiced it. He was the prophet of it, the saint of 
 it, in the best sense, the orator of it; but Christianity 
 altogether was but an illustration of something that lay 
 behind and deeper. They might call it what they would. 
 He did not like the word theism " very much ; but it 
 was something that lay deeper than any particular person. 
 Those stories of the good Samaritan, the Prodigal Son, 
 and the rest, were only so man} 7 writings in invisible ink, 
 which had been laid on the fire of the man s moral feeling 
 until the characters were brought out ; and what the fire 
 in the man s own mind did not bring out, he could make 
 no use of. They were all a part of this Christian story, 
 and could not get out of it. He held all metaphysical 
 notions on the subject of religion of no account that did 
 not take right hold of human life, as Mr. Phillips had been 
 doing. 
 
20 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 People were getting very critical about reading the 
 Bible. They found sentiments expressed which they re 
 garded as untrue, irreligious, unscientific, and they could 
 not abide them. He did not apprehend any evil from this 
 resort to the interior feeling. He should as soon think of 
 sa} ing that the S3 mphonies of Beethoven and the oratorios 
 of Handel and Haydn were all of music, as of sa}*ing that 
 the books of the Bible were all of religion. 
 
THE IMMANENCE OF GOD. 21 
 
 II. 
 
 THE IMMANENCE OF GOD. 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 WHEN Lord and Lady Amberley visited Boston, 
 Mr. Ralph Waldo Emerson desired that they 
 should meet persons who were interested in the reform in 
 which they had been prominent in England. Lord Am 
 berley had contributed valuable papers to the Fortnightly 
 Review," on the work of Conservatives and Liberals in re 
 lation to the English Church, pointing out the defects and 
 limitations of that bocty, and making valuable suggestions 
 in regard to its improvement. Lady Amberley was one of 
 the signers of a petition, presented by Lady Anna Gore 
 Langton, praying that married women and widows, duly 
 qualified as rate-payers, etc., might be admitted to the privi 
 lege of voting for members of Parliament. 
 
 It seemed to Mr. Emerson that his object would best be 
 accomplished by calling together the Chestnut Street Club ; 
 and at his request an extra meeting was held, the arrange 
 ments, as will appear from the following note, being left 
 chiefly with him : 
 
 CONCORD, Monday Eve. 
 
 DEAR MR. SARGENT, My note to Mr. Norton, whom I re 
 quested to arrange with Lady Amberley about the day when our 
 conversation could be secure of its guests, brought me no answer 
 until to-night. Norton, it seems, put off his dinner, to which they 
 had been invited, on account of the death of Governor Andrew. 
 
22 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 To-night I have a note from Lady Amberley, saying that they 
 will stay to attend the meeting at your house, on the 14th. So, 
 if it is still agreeable to you and Mrs. Sargent to receive the com 
 pany, we will consider it h xed for that day, at 10 o clock, A.M. As 
 it is not the true day for the club, I think Mr. Alcott rather wished 
 to consult the best interests of the conversation, and instead of 
 sending notifications to the whole society, to write to those mem 
 bers whom we could least spare, and also to a few ladies and gen 
 tlemen, not members, whose presence would essentially aid the 
 meeting. ... In your absence from town in the interim we can 
 not expect you to charge yourself with this care. . . . 
 With great regard, yours, 
 
 K. W. EMERSON. 
 
 At this meeting Rev. John Weiss read a very able essa}% 
 (since published in his works) on the immanence of God 
 in presence and action everywhere and perpetually, in op 
 position to the popular theoiy of occasional miraculous 
 intervention in past times, limited to those times. 
 
 I can do no justice to Mr. Weiss s boldness of thought 
 and affluence of language. One of the guests said of him, 
 "Then comes a voice from heaven. A man, one fifth 
 flesh and four fifths flame, kindles under his inspiration 
 into a miraculous light, and says words that can never be 
 forgotten. I dare not try to repeat them. Who heard 
 John Weiss can nevermore be quite as petty as his old 
 poor self." 
 
 Mrs. LUCRETIA MOTT said she had been glad to hear an 
 expression of the full faith of the Spiritualists in divine 
 and eternal law ; in view of this she heartily rejoiced in 
 the obvious fact that their movement is doing more than 
 any other movement to break up the ideas popularly called 
 a "plan of salvation," a "scheme of redemption," etc. 
 She believed this reform, like others, must be gradual in its 
 operations, and that the various grades in religious society 
 
THE IMMANENCE. OF GOD. 23 
 
 are still needed, and each must use its own method until 
 it understands some other to be better. 
 
 DAVID A. WASSON did not doubt the continuity of Na 
 ture, but was not sure that that continuity was always 
 traceable. No doubt there is method," he said, but many 
 things in histoiy cannot be apparently adjusted to it. The 
 mythological stories of the Gospels, though quite unworthy 
 of credit as facts, have yet a real value, because they ex 
 press great and fruitful truths." 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW suggested that the word 
 supernatural " is used in such varied senses that dis 
 course upon it cannot be well understood unless each per 
 son defines his idea of it. 
 
 Mrs. JULIA WARD HOWE commented on the essay, and 
 ended by sa} T ing, "There is no antithesis between the 
 real and the ideal. The ideal is to rule the future. The 
 real is striving to overtake the ideal." 
 
 Lord AMBERLEY was glad to have heard an essaj 1 " in 
 tended to show the unity and constanc} of the operations 
 of Nature, an idea with which he thoroughly agreed. He 
 had been favored with the opportunity of hearing the same 
 paper read a few days before, and this second reading had 
 given him a better understanding and a higher apprecia 
 tion of it. 
 
 Mrs. MOTT was also with Lord and Lady Amberley 
 at the first reading, and, far from finding the repetition 
 wearisome, she wished she had a week for the care 
 ful study of the essay. "It is admirable in its meth 
 ods of asserting Divine Providence and justifying the 
 waj s of God to man. Year by } r ear more people are pre 
 pared to accept the plain statement of these ideas. Elias 
 Hicks long ago taught this same doctrine, and when some 
 timid members of the Society of Friends questioned him 
 in regard to it, he asked impressively, Are we to go 
 back to miracles ? Let us carry the high truths suggested 
 
24 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 in this essa} T into life, into social and civil life, into busi 
 ness and politics. Our friends the Spiritualists are said 
 not to be reformatory in practice. We need to show forth 
 our faith by our activity in all good works. The natural 
 and the spiritual ought never to Be spoken of antagonisti 
 cally. Both belong to man, and both should be recognized 
 and cultivated in childhood, so as to give the benefit of 
 both. 
 
 " Elias Hicks, at the close of a meeting where these ideas 
 had been in controversy, once said, To the Christ who 
 was never crucified, who never died or was buried, and who 
 had no need to rise from the dead, I commend you. 
 
 " The great fault in Spiritualism is its looking beyond the 
 grave instead of attending to the present life and state. 
 We need to apply all truths to life, to teach the gospel of 
 truth and humanity for present as well as future uses. 
 Most conversions are made to sects, comparatively few to 
 truth and love. We dwell rather in Judaism than in 
 Christianity, through the prevailing false reverence for the 
 Bible, the Sabbath, and the sacraments. We have not yet 
 learned to treat these things simply and naturally." 
 
 ROBERT DALE OWEN replied, referring to the criticism 
 on nomenclature that had been made: " The French say 
 4 spiritist and spiritism ; but even if these terms are more 
 accurate, the} would mislead the mass of hearers here, 
 and thus would be objectionable. When asked my own re 
 ligious belief, I would prefer to call myself a Jesuit, if this 
 term, instead of bearing its proper signification, a follower 
 of the ideas taught by Jesus, had not been made by 
 circumstances to convey a meaning far different. For 
 the society with which I am identified I prefer the name 
 4 Spiritualist, as having a more extended meaning than the 
 other. 
 
 " I like the essay because it teaches the universality of law. 
 All that we perceive is natural. Between the two worlds, 
 
THE IMMANENCE OF GOD. 25 
 
 visible and invisible, there is but a thin veil. We should 
 give as fair an examination to Spiritualism as to any 
 phenomen a of the natural world, and examine the ultra 
 mundane, so far as we can reach it, as carefully as the 
 mundane. If the evidence for the Scripture miracles be 
 unsatisfactory and insufficient, let that be plainly declared. 
 Dr. Temple, the distinguished master of the Rugby 
 School, and one of the authors of Essays and Reviews, 
 sa\ s that miracles have become a stumbling-block. The 
 wonders of Spiritualism are not miracles. I believe them 
 all to be in accordance with great natural laws ; and these 
 are to be found only by patient and faithful searching." 
 
26 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 III. 
 
 DEMOCRACY. 
 
 BY DAVID A. WASSON. 
 
 MR. DAVID A. WASSON, the essayist of the day, 
 and one of New England s cleverest thinkers, read 
 an elaborate paper upon the elements of true liberty. Be 
 lieving in the " Scriptures of Politics," Mr. Wasson han 
 dled his subject with the fastidiousness of a scholar and 
 the sternness of a moralist. " In what sense is man free 
 by nature?" he asked. "In realhyy, man is a victim to 
 subjection, and it is only by the interposition of Art and 
 Science that he breaks from his fetters. Co-operation is 
 power ; and as physical subjection diminishes, a moral sense 
 steps in. The universe is one vast s} stem and celebration 
 of obedience. Civilization restrains, and man has not per 
 fect property in the blood of his own veins. It is not 
 surprising, therefore, if there be shown a preference for the 
 freedom antecedent to civilization ; and yet this same free 
 life is a mirage. It fetters all man s human nature, and 
 lets only the beast go free. Any freedom is fallacious, as 
 it seems unconditional. 
 
 " Every man has an affection for his own will, and a de 
 sire to make it effective, " continued Mr. Wasson. " This 
 ma} T be called subjective libert} r , and is good as an ele 
 ment, but not as a principle. Yet this constrains ; for, 
 multiply one will by man} , and man is surrounded b} T a net 
 work of such constraints as are productive of humanity s 
 
DEMOCRACY. 27 
 
 true emancipation. When two men come together there 
 is a larger freedom, if they be rightly related ; there is a 
 convergence of powers to a focus of right reason. Man is 
 not born free, but is born to become so, and attains free 
 dom by prophecy and aspiration. Politically, it is man s 
 effective application of right reason to himself and others 
 that makes him free. The serviceableness of men depends 
 upon their liberation in community ; but liberation is not 
 the liberty of thieves to elect thieves to office. Liberty is 
 attained only through the medium of political community. 
 Men shall be knitted together in unity, rational restraint 
 being one of the factors of liberty. It is the shell of the 
 egg, the husk of corn, without which disintegration and 
 demoralization ensue. The ascent of life entails a pro 
 gressive embodiment of restraint. 
 
 " All men crave a true liberation. Liberty in community 
 demands discipline of the will*. Had there ever been such 
 discipline, History would have been different. Emanci 
 pators are victims, and the Cross is their s3 T mbol. Liberty 
 that consists only in voting helps to oppress us. One of 
 our greatest foes is fraudulent work, with its waste of labor 
 and capital. Honesty would increase the value of labor 
 one hundred per cent. We must get rid of reckless indis 
 crimination. There should be formation of guilds which 
 should act as mutual- work insurance companies. It is 
 democratic averages that keep human nature so low. We 
 are forced to struggle against voracities rather than tyran 
 nies that proclaim a law of chaos. The age of right reason 
 will not be brought about by cheap sentimentality. Army 
 hospitals did not conquer Richmond, nor will soup-houses 
 conquer this century. Egotistic power, whether of one or 
 two, must pass away as a dream, leaving to select men 
 and w T omen the divine reign of recta ratio." 
 
 Leading the discussion upon Mr. Wasson s paper, Mr. 
 
28 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 RALPH WALDO EMERSON pronounced it an admirable com 
 ment on political society, and defective only in its attack 
 upon suffrage. Its author s pointed pen would have un 
 doubtedly destroyed monarchy more readily than democ 
 racy. Man has not skill enough to manage either. If 
 offered reforms, Mr. Wasson would be unable to give up 
 the public. The "rings" of New York simply prove the 
 imbecility of any form of government in a bad population. 
 With the exception of Connecticut, which is a suburb of 
 New York, the New England States carry about with them 
 their own cure for political distempers. Schools are the 
 remedy for all populations ; the} qualif} 7 and remove all dan 
 ger that threatens. History gives no preference over suf 
 frage. We must stand for the freest form of government. 
 In California it availed to make the best government among 
 bruisers and gamblers. The best will is the average will. 
 It is only upon extraordinary occasions that the world 
 produces natural emperors, such as Abraham Lincoln and 
 George Washington. In our democracy we show a better 
 average than any succession of kings. The kingdom of 
 God mast come, and then all will be safe. 
 
 Mr. WEISS said Mr. Wasson s paper was most timely, and 
 if the like were heard from rostrum and pulpit, the era of 
 recta ratio would draw near. But it is too late to talk about 
 limiting suffrage. The Plug Uglies have it, the negroes have 
 it ; and it would endanger the safet}* of the republic to take it 
 away from one negro. He would establish a right balance 
 of power b} 7 deploying women upon the field. In them is 
 the emotional, intuitive, and moral element. There are 
 women who have great power of synthesis, of ratiocina 
 tion ; there are men who are strongly emotional and intui 
 tive ; but both are exceptional, and the speaker did not 
 believe there could be a democracy until man and woman 
 stood side by side, the one saying, " Here is my ratioci 
 nation," the other, kt Here is my intuition." Then we shall 
 
DEMOCRACY. 29 
 
 have the whole power of the republic. When we have 
 man, we have half a god. In Massachusetts, where there 
 are 250,000 more women than men, we have more than 
 our share of God. Our safety lies in deploying all of God 
 we have upon the feld. 
 
 44 1 appreciate," said Mrs. HOWE, " and value the justice 
 and nicety of the criticism made b} T Mr. Wasson upon the 
 faults and shortcomings of a democratic society. But while 
 I heard him with pleasure and interest, I yet felt, in hearing 
 him, like the disabled composer, whose cat, running over 
 the keyboard of the piano, struck the third chord, legiti 
 mate and musical in its place, but asking the fourth as its 
 solution. Incompetent as he was, he hobbled from his 
 sofa, and struck the needed chord before he could again 
 rest. The facts, indeed, are much as Mr. Wasson states 
 them, and there are moments in our study and observation 
 in which the evils of the popular rule confront us, and al 
 most turn us back as insurmountable. But our great hope 
 triumphs over these difficulties, and leads us on in the 
 direction already indicated. This seems to be one of the 
 antinomies of morals. It seems almost hopeless to recon 
 cile the real evils of popular sovereignty with its ideal dig 
 nity and security. Yet the two, none the less, co-exist." 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT maintained that a democracy is impossible 
 saving where the whole people are cultivated. Our theory 
 is perfect, but in the absence of culture we are well-nigh 
 swamped. 
 
 44 No man," said Mr. OWEN, 4 is entitled to more libeily 
 than he can use for his own and his neighbor s good." 
 
30 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 IV. 
 LIMITATIONS. 
 
 BY JULIA WARD HOWE. 
 
 OUR life begins with limitations. Very slowly are the 
 liberties of the animal accorded to us ; yet more 
 slowly those of the human being. Our human endowment 
 comprises a little power of discrimination, a little memory, 
 by which to-day is pieced out with yesterday ; and a little 
 power of inference, by which to-morrow is prepared from 
 to-day. . . . The human being soon finds that he has 
 tasks before him. To the man in a wilderness all things 
 belong, sk} r , water, air, sunshine, trees; but this lib 
 erty and fulness are savage, not civil. Man and the uni 
 verse regard each other with no voice to interpret between 
 them. Then the instinct of labor arouses the man to work. 
 He clears his field, builds his house, and shuts himself in, 
 that the elements may no longer visit him with unmitigated 
 liberalit} T . After awhile he invites another to share his 
 house, and so divides all the goods he possesses, but, divid 
 ing also his labors, finds himself the gainer. . . . Provided 
 after a while with material comforts, men begin to do their 
 mental and spiritual work, and again discover in these 
 directions their limitations. Thus the work of ascent from 
 savagism to civilization shows a succession of limitations. 
 Forbearance is an element of every perfect work. All arts 
 tend to overproduction. When we thank a man for giving 
 us one poem, we may thank him for not giving us ten. It 
 
LIMITATIONS. 31 
 
 is the same in friendship. One shall be better befriended 
 by few intimates than by many, and more joy shall grow out 
 of one great affection than out of a hundred easy likings. It 
 is the same with religion, the character of whose demon 
 strations is more important than their frequency. The 
 greater the power, the more imperious the necessity for its 
 limitation. The perception of a high ethical good enables 
 a good man to exercise the needful self-restraint and for 
 bearance ; and he who has a divine idea may be more 
 hopeful in its neglect than in its celebrity. 
 
 Definiteness of object is essential to attainment, and 
 good work presupposes subdivision and limitation. The 
 limitations of the condition in life of Kepler, of Fulton, 
 of Milton, of Jesus, were necessary for their marvellous 
 achievements. Each life has its possible maximum. If it 
 recognize its limitations, narrow its aim, concentrate 
 its force, it w r ill accomplish its highest possibility. Quan 
 tity and quality are factors of a constant product. The 
 noblest genius becomes a hack when it sells all it can write 
 for all it can get. The peculiar limitations of each person 
 make the variety of human character which is essential to 
 societ}*. If any one were infinite in any direction, he 
 would have no need of another. The original limitations 
 of our structure are not accidental, but necessary. Eve^ 
 man needs a brain, but it would be of no advantage to 
 have two. With four eyes w r e could not see more, nor 
 with four hands do more, than we can with those we have. 
 Rights do not change ; they always exist. We discover 
 them, and with each discoveiy a limit is set up beyond 
 which we may not safely trespass. 
 
 In music, also, the seven rays of the prism of sound, lim 
 itation is essential both to melody and harmony. In a 
 vocal concert the soprano is queen, and each subordinate 
 voice maintains its own place. The soprano soars and 
 trills, and scatters notes precious as diamond-dust ; the 
 
32 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 tenor, who knows her intention, meets and supports her ; 
 the contralto, sweet and subject maid of honor, follows 
 three notes behind her royal lady ; and the basso, the 
 basis and foundation of all things, says, "Here I set up 
 my everlasting rest. I am the basso." Like the singers, 
 each of us in the great harmony of life has his place and 
 his limitation. In a given number of men there can be 
 only one first man, one Shakespeare, Dante, Garibaldi, 
 but each of us can strive to be his own best. Our birth 
 makes one limitation, our breeding another. Our profes 
 sion limits us to one function, our marriage to one partner. 
 Sects are the needful limitations of the religious idea. 
 Religious intolerance is a failure to recognize the need of 
 this diversity. There must be limitations in the education 
 of children, whose earl} instruction is the title-deed to 
 their estate. Honors and wealth also, to be valuable, 
 must have their limits. In all things it is needful to know 
 the metes and bounds of man s estate, and to conform 
 one s self to them. 
 
 W. II. CHANNING said he must protest against the word 
 and the idea of limitations. He thought the word u rela 
 tions " would better express the thing intended ; and rela 
 tions, in his view, were not limitations. The problem of 
 the Divine Being must be how to let the human creature 
 be itself. All creatures must exist in Him ; yet every 
 human being is infinitely great in its essence. The ideal 
 that comes to ever} 7 human being is an image of the Infi 
 nite Mind. God does not limit us : he seeks relations with 
 us by which we can increase. 
 
 A crowd of persons is blended in each single person. 
 We cannot have merely a blending of the lives of two 
 parents in each individual. There must be a germinal 
 point where every person shall begin, and whence a new 
 
LIMITATIONS. 33 
 
 being may be formed, that shall find his genuine, har 
 monious relations to the persons and things around him. 
 In short, he who seeks to realize God s ideal of him 
 should look for it in harmonious co-operation with others, 
 rather than by looking at limitations. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON objected to overmuch consideration of 
 limitations or of prospective disappointments ; he felt, with 
 Thoreau, that he did not want to practise resignation in 
 advance of the necessity for it. It was clearly undesir 
 able that trees should grow so high as to lift their boughs 
 into the sky, but not much trouble seemed taken by Nature 
 to prevent it. To his thinking, limitations had their use 
 in being something to struggle against ; and these struggles 
 against bounds are illustrated by all things. The very 
 baby in arms struggles against its mother s bountiful 
 breast and sacred knees. Nature is our mother, against 
 whom we struggle. Some of us would be worsted, to be 
 sure, and die failures ; but let us struggle as long as we 
 can. He believed in a vast power to enhance the gifts of 
 Nature, even plrysically : spiritually, how much more ! 
 When Shakespeare comes into the world, his greatest 
 work is to show what infinite things a man can do. And 
 other men, not Shakespeares, have spoken single sen 
 tences which would emancipate whole planets, whole gen 
 erations of life. See Bryant, after seventy, translating 
 Homer, and Goethe writing " Faust " when still older. We 
 do not yet know what we can do. He, himself, might yet 
 invent a wonderful steam-engine after he was eighty, 
 though now he could never attain to a clear understanding 
 of the principles of one ; and Heaven forbid that he should 
 limit, even by a steam-engine, the future possibilities of 
 Mrs. Howe. Let us stick to Pegasus as long as we can : 
 be like Nick Bottom, who tries to play all the parts. 
 
 Mr. WEISS thought the Infinite Mind showed no objec 
 tion to limitation. The first act of the Infinite Mind was 
 
 3 
 
34 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 to make nebulosit} T then set to work to discriminate, to 
 limit. The further the Divine Mind travels from nebulos- 
 it} , the more deeply it enters into limitation. Mr. Weiss 
 alluded to Mrs. Howe s musical illustration. Pointing to 
 a harp in one of the pictures of the room, he said that 
 " every chord had its note because it was tied at both ends, 
 and was limited to a portion of the infinite space which 
 had been thus measured off to it as the bound of its 
 activity." So each individual had measured off to him his 
 limited portion of infinity, within which his life might be 
 made a sweet note, having its place in the grand harmony 
 of the universe. 
 
 Are you not confounding the limitations of matter with 
 the limitations of soul ? " asked Mr. HIGGINSON. 
 
 Mr. WEISS replied that he thought both were subject to 
 limitation. 
 
 "Would you say," rejoined Mr. HIGGINSON, "that the 
 progress. of the soul is limited?" 
 
 "Certainly," said Mr. WEISS; "but the limitations of 
 the soul may expand as it goes on. You cannot say the 
 soul has no limitations without saying that it is infinite ; 
 and thus you would people the universe with beings, each 
 of whom is infinite." 
 
 Mr. MCCAULEY alluded to Psyche, her wanderings 
 and perils before achieving immortalit}*. Being spirits, we 
 were doubtless immortal, but might progress forever 
 toward the infinite without attaining it. Perhaps our limi 
 tations might be typified by those of the railwa} train, 
 which may go on in one direction, but must keep to its 
 track. We ma} 7 pursue the paths of our lives forever, but 
 cannot deviate from them. 
 
 Mr. WASSON said our limitations served to compel us 
 to singleness of aim and concentration of labor. To 
 attempt everything insures the accomplishment of nothing. 
 Colonel Higginson ma}^ never achieve his steam-engine ; 
 
LIMITATIONS. 35 
 
 but if lie does, it will be only by accepting his limitations 
 and working on steadily within them. 
 
 Mr. CHANNIXG said it would have been easy for God to 
 have made us infinite at once ; and it was a sacrifice not to 
 make us at the start as perfect as we shall ever become in 
 eternity. That he has not done so indicates that now we 
 are hedged about in certain directions, and, like every in 
 strument in the orchestra, we must utter the tone that our 
 condition makes possible for us as well as we may. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON did not like the orchestra illustration, 
 notwithstanding it had been so beautifully used. The 
 instruments were tied at both ends. He was sure that, on 
 one side at least, he was not tied, and he did not intend to 
 be. He preferred the railroad illustration, though proba 
 bly, after a certain degree of progress, he should want to 
 widen the gauge. 
 
 Mr. WEISS replied that if we were tied at both ends it 
 was that each might vibrate, and sound his own note 
 surely in the grand orchestra. 
 
 "I will compromise on one end," said Mr. HIGGINSON, 
 " but must have the infinite part unfettered." 
 
 Mr. WASSON spoke of the races at fairs, where the 
 combatants ran in sacks ; and he thought Mr. Higginson 
 considered limitation in the light of a hampering sack, 
 while Mrs. Howe meant something quite other and differ 
 ent by it. He himself desired to be always so limited that 
 he should stand in relations with others and be dependent 
 upon them. In that consisted the happiness of being a 
 famil} man. It was well that the heavens should be open, 
 so that we were in no danger of striking our heads against 
 them ; but the grand sally toward the heavens comes early 
 in all nations, and God is one of the first words. We 
 must separate the human from the divine : one does one 
 thing and the other another. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE said it was her own suffering under the 
 
36 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 oppressing, hampering limitations of life, which seemed 
 sometimes not less than cruel, that set her thoughts in the 
 direction they had taken ; and she felt that in writing her 
 essay she was justifying the ways of God to herself. She 
 asked Mr. Higginson if he did not think one who kept in 
 mind the limitations of time, the exact length of a day, 
 would accomplish more than one who worked on the theory 
 that the day had no end. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON was ready with a decided negative, and 
 he quoted a sentence from Goethe, Time is infinitely 
 long, and each day will hold all you can put into it." 
 
 The last speaker was Mr. CHANNING, who said that our 
 planet will by and by be crowded, and that while there re 
 mains room to work comfortably, each person had better 
 do what he can do best. 
 
 At one point in the conversation Mr. "Weiss was asked 
 why it was the Greeks did not understand music. Mr. 
 WEISS replied the Greeks did not love music ; that the hour 
 for the development of that art had not struck. The 
 work of the Greek genius was sculpture. It was reserved 
 for the German genius to show the world the majesty and 
 the mystery of music. 
 
NATURE AND PERSON. 37 
 
 V. 
 
 NATURE AND PERSON. 
 
 BY HENRY JAMES. 
 
 MR. HEXRY JAMES S reputation as a profound 
 metaphysician, and the brilliancy which he dis 
 played in discussion at former club-meetings were suffi 
 cient reason for the large audience of listeners to his 
 essay at Chestnut Street. The host, the Rev. John T. 
 Sargent, called the club to order at eleven o clock and in 
 troduced the essayist, who announced as his subject, 
 " Nature and Person," saying that he had chosen it 
 because he regarded Nature as the sole true theatre of 
 creative power, and hence the sole true field of divine 
 revelation. the spiritual world being of no interest save as 
 it shed light on the great problem of Nature, our origin 
 and destiny. The essay was devoted to showing the differ 
 ence between nature and person, both as actualities and as 
 forces, and to showing the evil results that have sprung 
 from confounding the two terms and the two things. 
 
 Person affords ground for a moral or quasi individual 
 development in man as good and evil, but it offers no hint 
 of a future divine blending of these finite or contrasted 
 men in a perfect, infinite, or unitary style of man. Thus 
 Mr. James looked upon the element of person in human 
 nature, which constitutes its finite identifying element, as 
 designating the creature, and as being therefore the infe 
 rior element in the nature. And he looked upon law, 
 which constitutes the infinite or individualizing principle 
 of the nature, as indicating the divine or creative side of 
 it, rigidly subjecting all persons to itself. In short, the 
 
38 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 lecturer s fundamental idea clearly was that human nature 
 was originally a chaos or confusion of creator and creature : 
 thus of infinite spiritual good in the creator, with the ut 
 most possible or conceivable natural evil in the creature. 
 But as the utmost possible or conceivable natural evil " 
 is indefinite or universal evil, Mr. James considered the 
 creative end or purpose in the original constitution of 
 human nature to have been the vindication of its own 
 omnipotence or infinitude in begetting an offspring which 
 shall be in itself a most real or objective subjection of 
 evil to good. 
 
 After stating the general scope of his idea, Mr. James, 
 leaving abstract theory aside, soon proceeded to show the 
 mischievous practical results that flowed from an undue ex 
 altation of the private or personal element in conscious 
 ness over the natural or social one. He affirmed that the 
 rage for multiplying schools and colleges in our country 
 was a real insanity, as promoting an exclusively per 
 sonal or isolated culture among us, and to that extent 
 retarding the development of a common or public con 
 sciousness. In this connection he referred to the con 
 dition of England, which was spiritually rotting from 
 excessive personal culture, or the over-education of a 
 scholarly class, which could do nothing but criticise, from 
 its own idle, luxurious point of view, every scheme that 
 looked to distinctively general or race culture, and so 
 proved itself hostile to man s natural affranchisement. 
 But ever}~where person is the born foe of nature ; every 
 where the vicious principle of personality and nowhere 
 so much as in the religious sphere of life erects itself 
 against the just principle of community in natural things ; 
 so that God, if we listen to our traditional pulpit-teaching, 
 would seem to have been the original inventor of the hell 
 ish principle of emulation or competition in the human 
 bosom, instead of its mere assiduous utilizer. Supposing 
 
NATURE AND PERSON. 39 
 
 a stupid and limitary sELF-righteousness to be God s ex 
 clusive aim in man, and not a unitary RACE-righteousness, 
 this is what alone we have gone on to crave at God s 
 hands ; and the only result of our ungodly prayers and 
 pious strivings has been to impose upon the spiritual world 
 the dread antagonism of hell and heaven, and perpetuate 
 it there. The spiritual world consequently is fast becom 
 ing a complete nuisance to human thought, and men find 
 themselves reverting to Nature with the ardor with which 
 the child betakes himself to the sincere milk of its mother s 
 breast. In fact, the believing world is becoming utterly 
 atheistic to the deity proclaimed in the churches ; and it 
 would not be long before the entire honest or disinterested 
 lay element in the churches themselves would demand a 
 God for their worship capable of meeting the inexorable 
 wants of human nature, rather than of ministering to the 
 self-righteous cupidities of the individual heart. 
 
 Nature is the principle of community or identity in 
 existence, and is the only just basis therefore of spiritual 
 individuality ; for an individuality in man which should 
 acknowledge no common or identical basis in human life 
 would be wholly inconceivable like heaven without earth, 
 or a house without a foundation. This natural or common 
 principle in existence is called selfhood, and is in itself 
 the .source of all disorder and evil. For nothing can be 
 easier to see than that common or natural selfhood (being 
 the principle of unrelated or independent existence in the 
 creature), however it may lend itself to the ends of the 
 creative infinitude, is in itself the principle of hell in man. 
 Every atom of creation on its natural or constitutional side 
 bristles with selfhood, is selfhood in fact, else creature 
 would be undistinguishable from creator. And the cre 
 ator s spiritual omnipotence is displayed as a principle of 
 free, spontaneous RELATIONSHIP among these discordant, 
 warring atoms, binding them all in eventual harmony, and 
 
40 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 giving them the order of a unitary life. Thus, though self 
 hood (or unrelated, independent personality) be the stigma 
 of created existence, giving us an insuperable felt remote 
 ness to our Creator, yet without it creation would be, in a 
 spiritual regard, mere sentimental rubbish. Personality is 
 the dense mask behind which the Supreme Artist securely 
 operates the enlargement of our nature in giving it gradual 
 social form. Very slowly to our eyes, through marriage 
 and the family unity constituted by it, and so on through 
 all the successive expansions of that empirical unity in 
 the tribe, the commune, the city, the nation, the republic, 
 men s divine-natural consciousness struggles toward the 
 light ; for each of these successive stages of its develop 
 ment has been a stage of bondage to it. But the great 
 final emancipation of the nature in social form and order 
 has never been the least uncertain from the beginning. 
 For it has alwaj^s had the Divine omnipotence to guarantee 
 it, and that omnipotence has found no surer tools to work 
 with than the inveterate selfishness and imbecilit} T of men. 
 
 At Mr. Sargent s invitation remarks were made by Dr. 
 Clarke, Mr. Abbot, Professor Everett, and Dr. Holmes ; 
 the last speaker seemed to express the general feeling by 
 saying that when he was invited to speak without prep 
 aration on a carefully written essay he always felt as he 
 should if, at a chemical lecture, somebody should pass 
 around a precipitate, and when the mixture had become 
 turbid, should request him to give his opinion on it ; be 
 sides, he added, the fallacies constantly arising in such a 
 discussion, from the lack of a proper definition of terms, 
 always made him feel as if quicksilver had been substituted 
 for the ordinary silver of speech. He declared that he 
 preferred to take the essay home, slowly assimilate it, and 
 not talk about it until it had become a part of himself. 
 This closed the discussion, but many of the members 
 lingered to talk over the essay socially. 
 
WOMAN. 41 
 
 VI. 
 
 WOMAN. 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 "TV/TR. WEISS began with a witty statement of the imper- 
 1* A fections of our present political machinery, satirizing 
 the attempts which men have made to give a monopoly of 
 the regulations of public affairs to the rougher and coarser 
 half of the human family. He gave a rose-colored view 
 of the future, when women should combine with men in 
 political not less than in domestic arrangements ; claimed 
 their right to such partnership, and seemed to expect a 
 speedy if not an immediate change for the better in our 
 state and national politics as soon as women should 
 assist in directing them. To attempt to report the essay 
 would be as futile as to attempt a description of Bee 
 thoven s heroic symphony. 
 
 Every one felt that the best had been said, and there 
 was nothing left but silence. There was a spell upon us 
 which none wished broken, and Mr. Emerson truly ex 
 pressed the almost universal sentiment, when he said that 
 he thought it would be far better to hold a silent meeting. 
 
 Mr. EMERSON seemed strongly impressed by the enthu 
 siasm and confidence of the essaj ist. He believed it was 
 for woman to decide what her political status should be. 
 He had been accustomed to suppose that women of refine 
 ment and culture those whose thought would be most 
 available for political reform, if it were used in that direc- 
 
42 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 tion shrank from taking part in those labors, and were 
 well content to keep the position public opinion had 
 assigned to them. If it were otherwise, and thoughtful 
 women did choose to apply themselves to efforts for im 
 provement in legislation and government, he could not 
 doubt the advantage of such action. When women of any 
 State are accorded the rights of suffrage, it would be the 
 graceful part of man to make all such arrangements as 
 would be convenient for women ; and he added that we 
 are all the better for hearing of the riches in store for us, 
 and can only await the eventful arrival. 
 
 Mr. WASSON thought there should be no more votes 
 granted until preliminaiy steps were taken to base votes 
 on qualit}\ Mr. Emerson had remarked at a previous 
 meeting that a government was no better than the people. 
 It seemed to Mr. Wasson it were as wise to say that a 
 ship is no better than the w r ood in a forest. "There is 
 danger all round, and it is only the virtue of the structure 
 that saves : the proper artisan must gather everything. 
 The principle of selection comes in, a principle that is 
 absolutely necessary. There should be a qualification 
 basis for suffrage, and certain departments of the govern 
 ment should be made over to women. I think that to 
 bring the feminine element into political pla} r would be a 
 waste of good material." 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY replied: " Women would regard the bal 
 lot as a heavy responsibility. There will be no purification 
 of politics until women do it. The finest men take no act 
 ive part in politics so long as the} r can make excuses to 
 their consciences. They shrink from this duty, until neg 
 lect becomes criminal. Women may be placed in the same 
 category. They consider it as part of the solemn duty of 
 life, and their very reluctance is an argument in favor of 
 their fitness for the trust. It denotes responsibilit} . Char 
 acter will be the only test. If the two classes, refined and 
 
WOMAN. 43 
 
 intellectual men and women, would make the effort to work 
 together for reform in politics, and no longer leave that de 
 partment to the control of persons less competent and less 
 worth}-, an advance would be made such as the world has 
 never seen." 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT argued: "Numbers need not embarrass 
 democracy. Magnetism must come from superior force. 
 It is the rule of the best to magnetize the man}-. In the 
 household there is real democracy. In men and women 
 there is the polarity of magnetism. When did Saxon beauty 
 bear its loveliest" flowers ? When Shakspeare wrote, and 
 Elizabeth reigned as the ornament of history. Would 
 Shakspeare and Raleigh have done their best, would that 
 galaxy have shone so brightly in the heavens, had there 
 been no Elizabeth on the throne ? Give woman her place 
 in history. She keeps the world in its orbit. If grace and 
 culture mean anything, she should hold her rightful sceptre. 
 The fine womanly element is culture, and begins with a 
 sense of beauty. Can there be any culture or rule in gov 
 ernment until it is made beautiful? Moore, in his Utopia, 
 spoke for women as well as for men, and educated his 
 daughter as he would have educated his sons. In Plato s 
 4 Republic, women become rulers of the State after having 
 given citizens to it. We practically theorize and fall be 
 hind antiquity. None of us can be sufficiently thankful for 
 our essay to-day. It is feminine eloquence." 
 
 Judge WARREN placed the claim for woman suffrage in 
 municipal matters upon justice, and supported the claim by 
 the analog}- of church and corporation voting, where women 
 do vote. li Unmarried women can now make contracts, 
 widows can administer the estates of their deceased hus 
 bands ; these and other responsibilities and powers given 
 women by our laws show their ability to discharge the 
 functions of voters. Women would have especial influence 
 in business relating to education, charity, administration, 
 
44 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the issuing of licenses, and the like. Men and women are 
 protected by government, but only men can vote. Suffrage 
 is not a natural right, it is a question of expedienc} ." 
 
 President WARREN gave as his only objection to women 
 voting, their own indifference. He also regarded the ques 
 tion as one of expedienc} T , and that the same principle 
 should fix suffrage for one sex as for the other, extending 
 it only to those who desire it, so as not to increase the num 
 ber of disinterested voters. 
 
 Mr. WM. I. BOWDITCII spoke of the question as one of 
 right, not expediency ; but he believed that education should 
 be made a qualification for all voters. 
 
 Prof. C. C. EVERETT favored a qualification as an incite 
 ment to the voter, and did not consider sex to be a ground 
 of discrimination, if suffrage was not conferred on non-tax 
 payers. 
 
 Prof. W. W. GOODWIN considered that a property qual 
 ification would be better than the present ruinous system 
 of voting. 
 
 Mr. TEDLOW recommended that women be given more 
 power in educational matters, where they are of great 
 practical benefit ; but he doubted their success as public 
 financiers. 
 
 Rev. Mr. ELDER began by enumerating the reasons which, 
 if existing, might make it necessaiy to bestow the suffrage 
 upon women. If it could be shown that it was needed to 
 protect women in their rights, essential to insure the gene 
 ral welfare, it should be given to them. If it could be shown 
 that the majoritj" of women wanted the ballot, it would af 
 ford a presumption in favor of giving it to them. If it 
 could be shown that men were generally indifferent to the 
 privileges of women, then they should have the right to 
 vote. He himself was opposed to granting women the 
 right to vote, and contended that the laws were, if anything, 
 rather more than just to woman. 
 
WOMAN. 45 
 
 Mr. D. A. WASSON dryly remarked that he should have 
 been a believer in female suffrage if he had not heard the 
 arguments in its favor. 
 
 This quotation from Theodore Parker was read as an ap 
 propriate ending for the discussion : 
 
 We want the excellence of man and woman both united ; 
 intellectual power, knowledge, great ideas, in literature, 
 philosophy, theology, ethics, and practical skill ; but we 
 want something better, the moral, affectional, religious 
 intuition, to put justice into ethics, love into theology, 
 piety into science and letters. Everywhere, in the family, 
 the community, the Church and the State, we want the 
 masculine and feminine element co-operating and conjoined. 
 Woman is to correct man s taste, mend his morals, excite 
 his affections, inspire his religious faculties. Man is to 
 quicken her intellect, to help her will, translate her senti 
 ments to ideas, and enact them into righteous laws. Man s 
 moral action, at best, is only a sort of general human prov 
 idence, aiming at the welfare of a part, and satisfied with 
 achieving the greatest good of the greatest number. 
 Woman s moral action is more like a special human provi 
 dence, acting without general rules, but caring for each par 
 ticular case. We need both of these, the general and the 
 special, to make a total human providence. 
 
 " If man and woman are counted equivalent, equal in 
 rights, though with diverse powers, shall we not mend 
 the literature of the world, its theology, its science, its laws, 
 and its actions too ? I cannot believe that wealth and want 
 are to stand ever side by side as desperate foes ; that cul 
 ture must ride only on the back of ignorance ; and feminine 
 virtue be guarded by the degradation of whole classes of 
 ill-starred men, as in the East, or the degradation of whole 
 classes of ill-starred women, as in the West ; but while we 
 neglect the means of help God puts in our power, why, the 
 present must be like the past, property must be theft, 
 
46 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 law the strength of selfish will, and Christianity what 
 we see it is, the apology for every powerful wrong. 
 
 " To every woman let me say, Respect your nature as 
 a human being, } T our nature as a woman ; then respect 
 3 our rights ; then remember your duty to possess, to use, 
 to develop, and to enjoy every faculty which God has given 
 you, each in its normal way% 
 
 " And to men let me sa} , Respect with the profound- 
 est reverence respect the mother that bore you, the sisters 
 who bless you, the woman that } ou love, the woman that 
 you marry. As you seek to possess your own manly rights, 
 seek also, by that great arm, by that powerful brain, seek 
 to vindicate her rights as woman, as your own as man. 
 Then we may see better things in the Church, better things 
 in the State, in the community, in the home. Then the 
 green shall show what buds it hid, the buds shall blos 
 som, the flowers bear fruit, and the blessing of God be on 
 us all." 
 
THE RELATION OF JESUS TO THE PRESENT AGE. 47 
 
 VII. 
 
 THE RELATION OF JESUS TO THE 
 PRESENT AGE. 
 
 BY CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. 
 
 ON this topic, Dr. C. C. EVERETT presented a beautiful, 
 symmetrical, and logical essay. He regarded Christ 
 as a problem and a power. In considering his relations to 
 the present age, he considered each as a receiver, and each 
 as a giver. Christ needs the present age, and the present 
 age needs Christ. The opposition is only apparent. He 
 spoke first of the external history of Christ, next of his 
 teaching, and finally of his personalit} T in relation to the 
 present age. The external history of Christ contains ele 
 ments which are opposed to the habits of thought most 
 peculiar to the present century. He referred to miracles. 
 The idea of miracle is so foreign to the spirit of the age 
 that it has a fascination for it. There is a certain degree 
 of right to both sides of the controversy. The very 
 antagonism between the two shows that each has a contri 
 bution for the other which could be received from no other 
 source. Law is infinite ; the miracle itself can be only the 
 manifestation of some grander law. For the first time 
 miracle has its full logical meaning. No miracle, how 
 ever stupendous, can prove the truth of a principle in 
 morals. When the miracle testifies of the comprehensive 
 law which it manifests, then first does it have a meaning. 
 On the other hand, the miracle makes a no less important 
 contribution to the spirit of the age. It demonstrates to 
 
48 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the senses that physical laws are not absolute in their own 
 realm ; that they are interposed and penetrated by spiritual 
 force ; that matter is at the last subordinate to spirit. 
 
 Prof. CALVIN E. STOWE doubted that science was antag 
 onistic to Christianity ; he did not think the essayist meant 
 to convey that idea, but many do make that claim. He 
 did not see but that the moral worth and intellectuality 
 and influence on the public mind was at least as great in 
 the men who upheld Christianity as in the scientific men. 
 He did not see why Christians should not be thought " the 
 age," as well as scientific men. " But I do think," he said, 
 " that there is one thing that bids fair to be established, 
 and that is, a fact never can do any harm ; a well-devel 
 oped fact should be received just as it is, regardless of 
 consequences. But if the thought of the age is opposed 
 to Christian it}*, so much the worse for the thought of the 
 age ; for Christianit} is the only permanent thing there is. 
 We know that the thought of the age has always been 
 changing. I think the human race have been a wonder- 
 full} 7 foolish set from the beginning. I think there is no 
 history so melancholy as the history of man. So far as I 
 can see, it would have been a great deal more to the gloiy 
 of God to have made fewer human beings, and had them 
 of better quality. But I have faith in God and faith 
 in the New Testament. I believe it is all going to come 
 right. I believe God knows more than I do, and more 
 than the spirit of the age, and more than the Church, and 
 that we shall all do better when we come to that." He did 
 riot agree with the essayist in sa} ing that Christ did not 
 attach very great importance to his miracles. He certainly 
 did. What he condemned was the constant longing of the 
 Jewish mind for an external miracle. 
 
 DAVID A . WASSON acknowledged the system of miracles 
 
THE RELATION OF JESUS TO THE PRESENT AGE. 49 
 
 as incomprehensible to him. He respected that open, 
 broad something which took in the fact of the world, and 
 did not push it aside with a thought. He did not want to 
 put his personal feeling in place of the fact of the world, 
 and could not sympathize with the idea that a man was good 
 if he recognized no evil. 
 
 Dr. HEDGE said : " All we get out of fact, at last, is an 
 idea, and that is what we get from fable. It makes no 
 real difference whether the idea is suggested by fact or 
 fable." For himself, he believed a large proportion of the 
 New Testament narratives were fabulous, that what they 
 related as facts were myths. But they were none the less 
 important for that. Jesus is not the Christ. With refer 
 ence to the miracles, we cannot put faith in those which 
 affront our common-sense. The Positivisms denial of 
 whatever is not reconciled with human facts is quite unsat 
 isfactory. No individual really believes a miracle which 
 affronts natural law. With many of the miracles of the 
 New Testament he did not wish to raise a doubt. It was 
 possible to account for them in other ways than by viola 
 tion of the natural system of the universe. But the influ 
 ence of miracles in this age is slight. They cannot be 
 proved, and therefore nobody will believe them who is 
 not originally disposed to. He disagreed with Professor 
 Stowe about the Church and the thought of the age. They 
 are not merely the representatives of men, but they influ 
 ence men, and are the higher power which directs and 
 determines individual thought. He also disagreed with 
 Professor Stowe concerning there being too many people 
 in the world. He thought a world of only good people 
 would be a very useless world. 
 
 Prof. STOWE asked Dr. Hedge whether bad people could 
 not be spared in the next world ; to which Dr. Hedge 
 replied, " No." Whereupon Prof. Stowe rejoined, " Then 
 we must have the devil in heaven, after all ! " 
 
 4 
 
50 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Dr. HEDGE continued. He once thought that Chris- 
 tianit} r would absorb all other religions, but he did not 
 think so now. He found noble elements in all religions, 
 calculated to inspire and content the human heart. There 
 was one idea of Buddhism equal to anything in Christian 
 ity. It was the equality of all classes of the human race. 
 
 Prof. STOWE wanted to explain a little his idea of the 
 human race. He had just been examining very closely 
 the histoiy of the Inquisition and witchcraft for three hun 
 dred j^ears, and he thought that we could have got along 
 without them, if the Lord had been so disposed. The 
 only nvysteiy I know of is the mystery of the human race, 
 and the only solution of that is the eighth chapter of 
 Romans. He could not agree with Dr. Bartol in his idea of 
 Christ coming out of humanit} , made up of Fiji Island 
 ers and Iroquois Indians, etc. He did not want any such 
 God as that. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT. We might inquire whether that is 
 humanity. 
 
 Prof. STOWE. They are people on two legs. 
 
 -Dr. BARTOL. Had we not better take it all in save 
 it all? 
 
 Prof. STOWE. I would not. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL. Are they children of God? 
 
 Prof. STOWE. In the sense of being derived from him, 
 they are. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL. Did he make them? 
 
 Prof. STOWE. Just as he did the devil. He created 
 him an archangel, and he made himself a devil. I suppose 
 God was remotely responsible for it. 
 
 Col. T. W. HIGGINSON said emphatically that he be 
 lieved this world was a ver} r good world, both to live and 
 work in. Men were ignorant; but they were not half so 
 bad as they were represented. It would be too much to 
 expect, in this age of the race, that it had made greater 
 
THE RELATION OF JESUS TO THE PRESENT AGE. 51 
 
 progress than it has. He had lived a long time among 
 people who were said to be the most degraded on the con 
 tinent, concerning whom he, and he supposed that others 
 present, had written pamphlets to show how degraded they 
 were. Perhaps the Digger Indians were lower in the scale, 
 but they were not so much known then. He referred to 
 the slaves, and the admitted low r est class of them who 
 lived on the Sea Islands. He had learned to wonder, by 
 his association with these people, at the great goodness 
 of human nature. There was ignorance ; but the degree 
 of wilful wickedness was less than anybody would suppose. 
 He had also known a great deal about criminals, in prison 
 and out of prison, and the amount of goodness in their 
 natures was surprising. He had seldom found a man any 
 where in the world whose better nature could not be struck 
 directly and effectively. " The more I know of my fel 
 low-creatures," said Col. Higginson, "the more I am im 
 pressed with the general preponderance of good in them." 
 
 Prof. STOWE. Here in Boston ? 
 
 Col. HIGGINSON. Yes. But I was thinking of the Five 
 Points, New York. 
 
 Prof. STOWE discharged a parting shot at the delicious 
 optimism of Dr. Bartol. " I have the gout in my foot 
 awfully" he said. "I suppose Dr. Bartol would try to 
 persuade me that it is a pleasant sensation." u And if I 
 did," said Dr. BARTOL, " you d say I was a figure of 
 speech." 
 
52 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 VIII. 
 SYMBOLIC CONCEPTIONS OF THE DEITY. 
 
 BY C. P. CRANCH. 
 
 MR. CRANCH considers that the importance of imagi 
 nation, the symbolizing faculty, has been generally 
 underrated, inasmuch as processes of thought, especially on 
 theological topics, are almost impossible without s}*mbols ; 
 and he considers that one proof that imagination foreruns 
 theology can be found in language, as evidences of the 
 action of the air, heat, and light can be found in the geo 
 logical strata. There is a wide range of difference in the 
 symbolic representations of the Deity ; a wide distance be 
 tween the fetichism of the South Seas, the reverential atti 
 tude of those inquirers who own that they do not entirety un 
 derstand God, and those who seem, from their own account, 
 to have held privileged interviews with him, and to be 
 perfectly familiar and confidential with him. To the scien 
 tific man he is light and force ; to the poet, an all-pervad 
 ing soul ; to the artist, eternal beaut} r ; to the theologian, a 
 being of differing phases, as, for instance, to the Hebrew 
 a Warrior and a King ; to the Orthodox Christian a Father 
 and a Saviour ; the Roman Catholic requires that the soft 
 ening influence of the Virgin Mother be added to his ideal 
 Divinity ; to the Calvinist he is a being to whom the nat 
 ural man is perverted and corrupt ; to the Swedenborgian, 
 he is the " maximus homo" The Rationalist and the Rad 
 ical refuse to accept any conception that savors of antliro- 
 
SYMBOLIC CONCEPTIONS OF THE DEITY. 53 
 
 pomorphism, and consider him merely as an " oversoul," 
 to use an expression of Emerson s. 
 
 The essayist then dwelt at some length on the impossi 
 bility of the creation by any one race at any period of time 
 of a S3 mbolic representation of the Deity which should be 
 adequate for any other race or any other era. Such con 
 ceptions, in his estimation, cramp and maim rather than 
 strengthen. To endeavor to adopt as correct the concep 
 tions of Palestine is as if an astronomer should endeavor 
 to mingle the mystic formulas of ancient Arabian science 
 with the pure mathematics of to-day. The monarchical 
 form of the Hebrew government tinged the whole concep 
 tion of the divine economy, whereas the modern idea is 
 more republican, man, instead of a subject, being consid 
 ered as a co-worker of God, and as such entitled to some 
 credit. How is theolog} r justified in accepting the popular 
 conceptions of one age as formulated for all time to come ? 
 Why should not the modern conception be framed to ac 
 cord with the most advanced knowledge ? Precisely as the 
 Copernican system has displaced the Ptolemaic, as chem 
 istry has thrust aside alchem} T , so the changes of science 
 have pushed aside local religions, leaving only the vital 
 elements incorporated in them. The great element in re 
 form is an adequate conception of the Deity, and obser 
 vations and calculations in all climes and lands the most 
 remote must be made for the settling of this parallax. To 
 put one s thought of God into words is almost as difficult 
 as to translate a s} mphony of Beethoven into phrases. 
 Still, as we must use s} mbols, there is a choice. How pro 
 saic was the old conception of God as an artificer who 
 created the world, set it going, and has been watching it 
 ever since, read}", if a screw becomes loose, to step down 
 from his high stool and work a miracle ! The world begins 
 to see that character is salvation rather than aitything else, 
 and to discredit the idea that any one religion furnishes its 
 
54 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 votaries with a pass-ticket to the front seats of Paradise, 
 while infidels are relegated to seats in the pit less comfort 
 able than those in any earthly theatre, and not calculated to 
 allow any enjoyment of the grand drama of redemption. 
 Mr. Cranch likened the popular mistakes in symbolic con 
 ception to the optical deception that causes a wharf from 
 which a steamboat is receding to seem, to a passenger, to 
 be in motion, and said that to him the substitution of the 
 Copernican for the Ptolemaic system seemed to strike the 
 ke}*note by which the great s} mphonies of all the religions 
 might be harmonized. In relation to the much-vexed 
 prayer question, he asked whether it would do any real 
 harm to believe that God did not come to the soul, but 
 that the soul moved towards him : it was simply substi 
 tuting one philosophy for another, the real for the apparent 
 motion, explaining miracles by reference to subjective 
 and not objective causes. The old Hebrew pictured God as 
 rending the heavens to come down : the modern hymn is 
 "Nearer, my God, to thee." For himself, the essa} ist 
 preferred to conceive God as the oversoul in which we 
 live and move, the most real of all realities, whose per 
 petual presence we see b} 7 faith, and from whose worship 
 nothing can separate us. 
 
 The Rev. W. J. POTTER said it seemed to him that 
 the imaginative element in theolog3 T was not sufficiently 
 recognized by those persons who used symbolic terms with 
 out reference to the poetic element in them, and by those 
 who refuse to acknowledge church and religion because 
 the former had not yet succeeded in finding accurate sym 
 bols for the latter. He said he thought the democratic 
 influence of which Mr. Cranch had spoken might bring 
 about a new phraseology, and thus, possibly, the religion 
 of the future. In regard to the question of prayer, why 
 
SYMBOLIC CONCEPTIONS OF THE DEITY. 55 
 
 should not God come to man as well as man go to God ? 
 Why, if immanent, should it not be in accordance for him 
 to come if the avenues of approach are thrown open by 
 prayer ? 
 
 The Rev. JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE was the next speaker, 
 and he began by declaring that he did not like to hear 
 slighting allusions to theology, which is the queen of the 
 sciences, and of a date long anterior to that of Judaism. 
 For his part, there was nothing arbitrary or abnormal 
 to him in a conception of the Deity that makes him as 
 free as a human being. If man is able to rise to God, 
 why should God not be able to come to us? He did 
 not, he said, believe in the impossibility of knowing God ; 
 we could not comprehend him, for we could not compre 
 hend even a human soul, but we could know nothing which 
 is not a revelation of him. 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY agreed with Mr. Clarke, illustrating her 
 belief by saying that the next step to learning that the 
 earth moves was that the sun also moves. She believed 
 that there were really sincere atheists. 
 
 Mr. W. C. GANNETT found the best symbols in modern 
 science, and could best conceive of God as the universal 
 ether. He spoke in deprecation of the spirit which could 
 take a humorous view of another person s conception of 
 the Deity, and he asked whether it was not almost impos 
 sible to talk of God. 
 
 In reference to this, Mrs. CHENEY asked whether any 
 modern artist would be likely to attempt to paint God as 
 the old masters had done. 
 
 Mr. HENRY JAMES begged to ask Mr. Gannett whether 
 his s}*mbol was capable of verification ; and preferred 
 society, as an element which surrounds and vivifies the 
 individual, so that even his flesh responds. At present 
 there is only typical society : physical necessities must 
 be considered, and thus this form of society is justi- 
 
56 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 fied. It can be verified ; it is not, like the ether, a mere 
 working hypothesis. We value society ; we would give 
 life to verify it ; we all look to future harmony, else we 
 were read} to abandon life. 
 
 Mr. CRAXCH and Mr. JAMES discussed the word "over- 
 soul" at some length, the latter gentleman protesting 
 against it as inadequate ; he did not know his own soul, 
 nor that of any other person: he never should and did 
 not want to. What was wanted was a humanitarian con 
 ception of God. He never heard any attempt to typifj* 
 God as a soul, without thinking of Thoreau s remark to 
 Alcott at a conversation when the Concord philosopher 
 began by saying, " All souls are plural." kk I m sorry for 
 that," said Thoreau ; " one is more than I can take care 
 of." 
 
 Mr. TIFFANY spoke of the universal interdependence of 
 things, saying that, for instance, as the mind of Newton 
 had the idea of gravity, the whole solar system was neces 
 sary to its production. He did not think religion and 
 science to be hostile. The enmity between different med 
 ical schools was as bitter as that between theologians. 
 As fine an inquisition might be organized in Paris among 
 the Communists as ever there was in Spain. Neither did 
 he think that theologians are slower to accept ideas than 
 other persons. The human mind was alwaj s reluctant to 
 adopt new theories. 
 
BORROMEO. 57 
 
 IX. 
 
 BORROMEO. 
 
 BY OCTAVICS B. FROTHIXGHAM. 
 
 ON taking up his manuscript, Mr. Frothingham ob 
 served that lie was delighted to see so goodly a 
 company, but rather appalled at the thought that he must 
 entertain them. He should ask them to stand before an 
 old picture which he had taken down from his gallery and 
 retouched somewhat. Perhaps he had been bold in think 
 ing it presentable, but if they should think so they were 
 at liberty to say it after he had finished. The portrait 
 was that of " Borromeo, the Saint." The outline, with 
 now and then a bit of coloring, is here reproduced. 
 
 Travellers going by the Simplon into Italy commonly stop 
 at the tower of Bare no on the shore of the Lago Maggiore. 
 There in a row-boat they visit the Borromean Islands, the 
 most southerly of which, the Isola Bella, lies about a mile 
 from the borders of the lake, like an emerald set in crystal. 
 The island was once a ban-en rock, but wealth has con 
 verted it into beautiful gardens. Two terraces*, rising one 
 above another, one hundred feet above the water, contain 
 most luxuriant products of the southern climes. By trel 
 lises of orange and lemon trees, beneath tall cedars and 
 shadowy cypresses, breathing an air fragrant with aromatic 
 shrubs, pleased by the gleaming of marble statues, de 
 tained bj* curious mosaic work, wonder-struck by grottoes 
 of shells, fascinated by the colors of water and sky, the 
 
58 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 wooded slopes and graceful outlines of mountains, the rav 
 ishing green of valleys that shelter their tiny villages from 
 the world, and fairly tormented by the variety that every 
 turn in the path discloses, the visitor spends his. hour in 
 an earthly paradise. A princely chateau opens to him 
 marble halls and galleries, rooms of state and collections 
 of paintings. The beauty of line and color of material and 
 workmanship is bewildering. But an observant eye fails 
 not to be struck at every pause by an inscription consist 
 ing of a single Latin word. It is emblazoned on tapestry, 
 carved in wood, let in letters of marble into mosaic floors, 
 fashioned in gay shells on the pavements and walls of grot 
 toes, stamped on ornamental vases and even on earthen 
 flower-pots ; it is spelled in flowery characters on the green 
 turf. The word is Humilitas. It was the motto of the 
 man who has made illustrious the family of Borromeo. 
 Farther down the lake on the west stands the ancient town 
 of Arona. On the slope of a hill, at some little distance 
 from the town, on a height overlooking the whole district, 
 stands upon a pedestal of forty-two feet a colossal statue 
 seventy feet high. The head, hands, and feet are of bronze, 
 the robe is of wrought copper. The image has stood nearly 
 two hundred years in memory of the man whose motto we 
 have been reading on the terraced rock. From the city of 
 Arona the traveller pursues his wa}- to the cit} T of Milan. 
 There a miracle of architecture breaks on his view, the 
 great white cathedral, next to St. Peter s at Rome and the 
 cathedral at Seville the largest church in Europe. It stands 
 in a vast square, a mass of exquisitel} carved marble, 
 gleaming in the soft sunlight, and making brighter the 
 bright moonlight of Italy, from plinth to the gilded ma 
 donna that surmounts the spire, a masterpiece of skill. 
 Two hundred architects of renown, among whom were 
 Brunelleschi, Leonardo da Vinci, and Julio Romano, spent 
 their genius on the building. Sculptors of fame contributed 
 
BORROMEO. 59 
 
 to the font and to the five thousand statues of saints and he 
 roes that cluster among its pinnacles, fringe its cornices, or 
 hide within its niches. The skill of Procaccini is displayed 
 in more than one figure of silver ; Celleni s delicate hand 
 is seen in at least one graceful form ; and Michael Angelo s 
 bold thought is expressed in the majestic monument. The 
 roof of the temple is adorned with ninety-eight Gothic 
 turrets. Nigh two hundred statues have place in the 
 superb fa$ade, whose fringe of spires bears up twelve colos 
 sal images. Inside and outside the building one may count 
 more than seven thousand marble statues, not a few of 
 them worthy to be placed in a gallery of sculpture. The 
 fifty-two columns that support the arches rise like the 
 trunks of venerable trees, carrying the eye into a wilder 
 ness of tracery, and through the gorgeous windows the 
 light wanders into the sombre spaces as through a distant 
 opening in a forest. The bright sunbeam glides between 
 the leaves to give a parting glor} T to the grass. As we 
 wander over the structure, we are perpetually reminded of 
 the single name. The high altar suggests it ; the choir, 
 the subterranean chapel, the spacious gallery and colon 
 nade, the porphyry font with its beautiful canopy, the 
 carved pulpit and screen, and man} r a precious bit of work 
 manship in metal, jewels, and stone. The power of this 
 name breaks upon us, as, descending a broad flight of steps, 
 traversing a spacious galleiy lined with finest marbles, and 
 passing under a portal with perfect columns, that flash out 
 glory as the guide s lamp goes by, we enter a small octa 
 gonal chapel. Eight massive bas-reliefs in silver record, 
 in fairest modelling, scenes in the life of a saint. Eight 
 busts, also of massive silver, represent in allegoiy his vir 
 tues. Costly tapestiy of gold woven upon crimson silk 
 after artistic designs covers the spaces not occupied b} the 
 silver. The chapel contains an altar ; and above the altar 
 stands a bronze casket with silver mountings. The guide 
 
60 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 lets down the front of the casket, and displays within a 
 sarcophagus of rock crystal bound with silver bands, the 
 gift of a king of Spain. Numerous small images of silver, 
 tokens of respect from princely donors, impart an air of 
 quaint sumptuousness to the whole. In the midst of all 
 this splendor, robed in pontifical dress, the golden staff 
 beside it, the golden crown and cross of emeralds above, 
 lies a shrunken brown body. It is the body of the man 
 whose motto, Humilitas, was inscribed all over the Isola 
 Bella, and whose crystal statue looked down from the 
 hill above Arona, where he was born, towards the Lom- 
 bardy that he blessed. Who and what sort of man was 
 this, whose ciystal coffin royal people have adorned with 
 gems that would have glorified the state of any earthly 
 majesty? 
 
 The ruins of a castle at the southern extremity of the 
 Lago Maggiore mark the place where he saw the light, 
 October 2, 1538. Like the rest of us, he was predestined 
 from the cradle. His father was a noble, a knight, and a 
 devotee ; his mother a court lad} , the sister of a cardinal, 
 and, best of all, a womanly woman. The child was a 
 priest in petticoats. He made a convent of his nursery. 
 This boy will never outgrow his altar forms. He is a 
 priest by nature, a saint in the bud. At the University of 
 Paris he is a fair scholar, a gentle companion, courteous 
 and amiable, but still a priest and saint. Borromeo was 
 no sentimental, morbid milksop : he was a youth who bore 
 under his silk gown an iron will. His father, d}-ing, en 
 trusted to him the management of his household. When 
 Borromeo was twent} T -one, Pope Paul IV. died, and John 
 Angelo Medici, own uncle to the young man, was elected in 
 his stead. The new pope was all cordiality and condescen 
 sion. He felt himself fortunate in having a nephew gifted 
 with genius for labor and goodness. The jovial old man 
 piled toilsome honors on the youth of twentj -two. In the 
 
BORROMEO. 61 
 
 course of a single month be was made cardinal ; nine days 
 afterward he was created archbishop of Milan. The main 
 conduct of the pontifical government was committed to 
 his care. Borromeo is now in the bloom of } T outh, rich, 
 handsome, the pride of a luxurious court, the kinsman of 
 a genial pope. The delighted old pope gathers up his 
 crosses, ke} s, and ribbons, heaps them on the } oung man, 
 and mounts his horse for a ride on the Carnpagna. The 
 youth accepted the burdens, but, instead of mounting a 
 throne, dropped on his knees. Frequent and absorbing 
 were his acts of devotion ; fasting and the scourge reduced 
 his flesh ; lonely vigils took the bloom from his cheek. 
 The citizens wondered to see a prince in the open day 
 bestowing alms on the beggars, himself in appearance 
 more squalid than they. Borromeo was in earnest : he 
 went to the root of things. Pie purged the libraries of 
 immoral books ; he instituted a rigid control of the press, 
 that works of irreligious tendency might be suppressed ; 
 he bade his agents search travellers for heretical tracts ; 
 he forbade intercourse with the Jews. In his zeal he 
 became a persecutor. But to the ugly habit of persecu 
 tion he added the lovelier habit of compassion for the 
 persecuted. He pleaded, warned, and wept before he 
 punished. In the heat of summers and the rigor of 
 winters his frail form was seen among the lonely passes, 
 with Alpine staff in hand, going from village to village, 
 consecrating churches, dedicating altars, hearing confes 
 sion, and granting absolution for sin. No sigh of fatigue 
 ever escaped his lips ; no complaint ever strayed from his 
 patient heart. 
 
 In Milan, Borromeo was not popular. Was ever a re 
 former popular in a great city ? He is praised who beauti 
 fies a temple. He is cursed who would beautify men s 
 lives. The common people complained that he put an 
 end to their harmless amusements of brawling and getting 
 
62 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 drunk ; the magistrates complained that he encroached on 
 their jurisdiction. A new pope summons the faithful to 
 celebrate in Rome the jubilee of the holy year. Borromeo 
 obeyed the summons. It is winter, but the pilgrim lingers 
 at every wayside shrine and worships at every holy grave. 
 Arrived in the great city, he retires at once to a convent, 
 and passes several da}*s in meditation. Issuing thence, he 
 marches forth murmuring prayers. He walks with down 
 cast eyes ; he returns no greeting ; nobles dismount to 
 salute him, but he takes no heed of them. A story gains 
 currency that he has been miraculousl} saved from the 
 bullet of an assassin who fired at him as he knelt at prayer. 
 The bullet struck him fair, men said, and dropped harm 
 less from the folds of his garment. From that moment his 
 fame as a saint is established. 
 
 And now Milan is to hold jubilee. Devotees flock into 
 the city. Day and night the streets are thronged with 
 processions. The archbishop sets example of unwhole 
 some austerity. The feet are naked again ; the mone}^ is 
 flowing in streams to the beggars ; the sacraments are 
 administered in chapels stifling from close and fetid air. 
 The example is contagious. Nobles, men and women, go 
 about with bare feet and coarse, dirty raiment. The city 
 is full of strangers, beggars, pickpockets, diseased persons, 
 carrying pestilence in their clothes. The odors of sanctity 
 and the stenches of depravity infect the air. And in the 
 midst of the jubilee a gaunt figure, unexpected though not 
 uninvited, stalked into the city. The plague is in Milan. 
 Borromeo s theory of the plague was simple. Of secondary 
 causes he knew nothing ; of natural laws he had never 
 heard. In his view the pestilence was a special dispensa 
 tion, sent by the immediate will of Heaven in judgment for 
 some terrible sin. That it came in consequence of his own 
 imprudence ; that it was the result of the crowding, the 
 suffocating heat, the promiscuous assemblies ; that riotry 
 
BORROMEO. 63 
 
 and dissipation had anything to do with it, could not occur 
 to him. It was a doom to be averted by suffering. His 
 only thought was of offering himself instead of his people, 
 in hope that by his stripes they might be healed. How he 
 watched and praj ed, and slept his hour or two on the floor ; 
 how marched up and down the street in penitential attire, 
 and devoted himself to daily death, is related by his 
 biographers with touching simplicity. The poor wretches 
 crowded to the windows of the pest-house as Borromeo 
 passed b} r , thrust their hands through the bars, and with 
 poisonous breath called for the consolation of religion. 
 But the great soul does not despair. Scattering his wealth 
 like sand, toiling night and day, aiding the living, shriving 
 the dead, he bears the iniquities of his people. From 
 sixty to seventy thousand persons are living on daily 
 alms. Yet the brave soul does not faint. He adopts 
 orphaned children. Two horses laden with provisions go 
 with him on his marches. A purse hangs at his girdle. 
 People fling themselves at his feet, call him father, wor 
 ship him as an angel of light. The privations he under 
 goes are incredible. At length the pestilence abates. It 
 has burned up its fuel. The archbishop spends himself 
 in praises as he has done in prayers. 
 
 Borromeo is now forty-six years old. The flame of 
 sanctity has burned his material part away. In Rome, in 
 Venice, in all high places, Church and State vie with one 
 another in rendering honor to the man who made the Infi 
 nite wrath relent, and turned aside the heavy hand of the 
 Lord. Seven years after the plague, Carlo Borromeo fell 
 an early prey to a fever which struck him in the solitudes 
 of Mount Varallo. 
 
 Borromeo was a t}-pical man, an ideal saint and hero. 
 His personal virtues were matchless. He was saintly, 
 though a prince. His faith, trust, devotion, have been 
 justly celebrated outside of his own church. His charity 
 
64 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 knew no bounds ; he could forgive his enemies. In the 
 great virtue of self-abnegation he has no superior. 
 
 The saint all over the world is one who resigns his will 
 to the Supreme. The narrow doctrine makes the narrow 
 saint. There was about Borromeo s saintliness an air 
 of limitation. His rule in regard to temptation was to 
 keep out of its wa} T , to run from it. He avoided society, 
 never looked in a woman s face, ate his meals alone, and 
 never looked out of a window. He published a letter 
 against beards as a weak concession to nature, but was 
 as scrupulous as a dandy about the cut and color of his 
 priestly vestments. He was jealous of his office because 
 it was the gift of the Church, and the symbol of the Church 
 outranked in his eyes even the rights and duties of kings. 
 Let me beg }*ou to remember that the Supreme Power 
 may be apprehended otherwise than as Borromeo appre 
 hended it. 
 
 The modern saint will not be behind in the singleness 
 of his devotion to Divine Power. To it he will give him 
 self ; to it he will belong ; to it he will bring the rich but 
 unworthy offering of his substance, his capacity, his talents, 
 and his time. In meek service to it he will find his absorb 
 ing occupation, his high privilege, his sufficient joy. But 
 the Divine Power will stand revealed to him in the awful 
 yet gracious laws that guard his well-being. B} T obedience 
 to the organic conditions of health, by hryalty to the rules 
 that secure happiness in personal and social relations, by 
 allegiance to the larger human principles of kindness and 
 equit} that watch over the prosperities of communities and 
 the steadfastness of States, by doing his best that the 
 best may prevail, the modern citizen will be the modern 
 saint. It will be his distinction to make saintliness and 
 manliness one, to marry liberty and law, to reconcile re 
 nunciation with gladness, satisfaction with sacrifice, self- 
 development with self-denial, desire with dut}*. He at 
 
BORROMEO. 65 
 
 length will prove the proverb true, "He that loseth his 
 life shall find it." 
 
 Rev. W. J. POTTER thought it was so beautiful a story 
 and so beautifully told that no one could feel like adding a 
 word. None denied the beauty of Borromeo s character, 
 but a little difference of opinion existed in relation to his use 
 fulness, whether, according to the light of his age, his 
 life was wisely directed. Mr. Potter recognized the power 
 of soul over matter, the superiority of goodness. The be 
 lief in miracles rests in the power of goodness. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said it was not a restored picture, but a 
 new one. He thought there was a species of selfishness 
 in this self-sacrifice. Not self-sacrifice, but self-forgetful- 
 ness, is, he thought, the true state. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE admired the great onward sweep of Borro 
 meo s life. Most of us have to stop for business. She 
 believed in this great power of religion. The great defect 
 in Borromeo s life was that it was not a human life. 
 Christ s life was human and simple. The piety of those 
 days we might call imitative Christianity ; not the spirit. 
 The last antithesis is self-denial, development. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON thought the great force of this life grew 
 from its limitations. Roman Catholics can bring all their 
 power to bear. In weak moments we choose limited ways. 
 He sympathized with Mr. Frothingham s view of the char 
 acter, and compared it to a beautiful river turned from its 
 true course. He was concerned lest the glamour of distance 
 should cast a fascination over a character whose example 
 modern Christians ought not to seek to imitate, but rather 
 to avoid. 
 
 Dr. C. C. EVERETT thought Borromeo s was a high life ; 
 he did his best with his light. If we would all do that, 
 we should do well. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON objected to the word "saint." He 
 
 5 
 
66 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 thought we were passing into a broader state, in which 
 there is something better. Some one remarked that there 
 are saints to-da} of equal value. 
 
 Mr. GANNETT asked if any one of our helpers combine 
 so much as Borromeo. 
 
 After a little further conversation of this nature the 
 meeting broke up. 
 
THE UNSEEN. 67 
 
 X. 
 
 THE UNSEEN. 
 
 BY W. C. GANNETT. 
 
 WC. GANNETTS essay attempted to evolve the 
 real harmony from the seeming discord between 
 science and religion, and he entitled it "Looking at the 
 Unseen." 
 
 When Paul says, " We look not at the things which are 
 seen, but at the things which are unseen," he speaks for 
 all of us. It is not specially the scientific, not specially 
 the religious, but the human attitude. The outside never 
 satisfies. What lies behind ? What is it made of? What 
 is it for? How came it to be? Such are the questionings 
 with which men have alwaj s stood before Nature. We are 
 all philosophers in our search for causes and destinies. 
 The child in his nnrser3 T is an irrepressible asker of conun 
 drums. And how his science runs into his religion ! 
 "What makes my gun go bang?" he begins with; but 
 soon it is, " Who made me?" and, when that is answered, 
 " Who made God ? " " Who was the first mother, the very 
 first?" asked one small questioner ; and " Where did God 
 stand to make the world before there was any place to 
 stand on?" asked another. " How could Satan have been 
 so wicked, before there was an} devil to put him up to 
 it?" wondered a third. The savage is also a philosopher, 
 seeking with his childlike reason into causes ; and with 
 him, also, science and religion are not two but one. The 
 
68 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 thunder rolls above him. " Hush ! " said the old-time Ger 
 man, "Hush! The god Thor is hurling his mighty ham 
 mer." The moon passed between the earth and the sun, 
 eclipsing it : " It is the great Dog-monster swallowing the 
 sun," and the Indian would shout and shoot his burning 
 arrows into the air to drive him off. That was the sav 
 age s science, his theory of the cause, to account for the 
 seen effect ; but his theory took him at once to the gods 
 and the demons. In this respect the child is only father 
 to the man ; and the savage wiry, every professor in 
 Harvard College is the son of a savage. We of to-day 
 peer more eagerly than ever into the unseen, and the more 
 we see convinces us the more how little we see. Every 
 anxious guess at our origin or our destiii} T , every sacred 
 aspiration, testifies how truly we look at things not seen. 
 And this we are in the habit of calling the looking of 
 religion. Is the looking of science altogether different? 
 When the chemist seeks to find the treasures of the snow, 
 and the astronomer the place where light dwells, and 
 Owen studies his fossil bones till he calls back the day 
 that passed a million years ago, they also are looking at the 
 things not seen ; and this we call the looking of science. 
 We are wont to separate religion from science, but their 
 attitudes before Nature are just the same ; and that sug 
 gests that child and savage may be essentially right, after 
 all, in making them not two but one. Science looks at the 
 things not seen in three ways, of educated eyes, of im 
 proving instruments, and of careful reasoning, each 
 method adding new realms to her gaze. The very beginning 
 of a scientific education is to learn to see really to ob 
 serve, with minute and accurate attention, what is going on 
 around us. For many a long century eyes were all there 
 was to see with. Now the eyes are armed with instru 
 ments which give far, new worlds to our vision. As one 
 looks into telescope or microscope, great realms of the 
 
THE UNSEEN. 69 
 
 Unseen burst into the Seen ; Infinitude seems to open in 
 both directions, toward the all of space and toward the 
 nought of space. But Science does not stop with the 
 vision of her instruments. She feels her way to the laws 
 of events, and dares to predict what instruments and eyes 
 shall see. These foreseeings are the feats of science. On 
 what was thought to be the verge of our S} r stein, a planet 
 showed strange haltings and quickenings in its pace around 
 the sun. At last astronomers began to guess that some 
 unknown body might exist outside, which held our neigh 
 bor in its spell. Adams and Leverrier set themselves to 
 calculate from these irregularities whereabout in the wide 
 circle of the heavens the strong outsider might be found. 
 The figuring was finished, and the telescopes were turned to 
 the designated place. And then, punctual to the appoint 
 ment, a new planet swam into their ken, the one we now 
 call Neptune. And farther on, into infinit}*, Science is 
 still making magnificent guesses, suggesting and theoriz 
 ing things which cannot }"et be seen. But, all through her 
 growing vision, she has not yet passed beyond the ma 
 terial. The matter, at its finest, is matter still, unseen, 
 indeed, but strictly conceived of as seeable. The motion 
 is quick beyond all possibilit} of our catching, but not be 
 yond the possibility of catching if eyes were better. The 
 universe to her, from farthest space to the brain-cell, is 
 nothing but matter and motion. This is all that Science 
 sees when she looks at the things unseen, and so we call 
 her Physical Science ; and some say, and more half fear, 
 that there is nothing in the universe but matter and 
 motion. 
 
 What is Religion when it begins its witness ? Is it not 
 this same Physical Science? Does not this, itself, betray 
 something in the universe beyond its mere matter and 
 motion, something that is not only unseen but unseeable ? 
 Look again at the three steps of Science. What is that 
 
70 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 reason with which she trod the last one so confident!}", into 
 limits where no instrument could follow her? In the 
 second step, what is the cunning that calculates the curves 
 of the lens-surfaces for her instruments ? Nay, in the first 
 step what is the mere sensation of sight when our e} T es 
 open and we see? Traced along from the Without toward 
 our Within, the process is first that rapid flashing of the 
 ether waves ; that is, of course, physical. The} strike 
 through the e3 e-layers to the retina, and there give up 
 their motion to certain nerve- filaments behind ; still we 
 are in the physical. The thrill passes inward to a certain 
 spot of gray nerve-matter in the brain, and thence, per 
 haps, further to the upper brain. And all this, too, is 
 purely physical ; matter and motion account for all. But 
 now what happens? A mystery that no one has yet 
 fathomed. This physical becomes ps3 cliical. The nerve- 
 thrill becomes consciousness. Through the organ of sense 
 something has passed into a sensation. Religion says that 
 this consciousness which we find in ourselves, overlying 
 all the matter and motion of our brain-cells and our body, 
 overlies the whole universe of matter and motion ; and 
 that what we can fairly trace as the facts and laws of this 
 Self-Consciousness of ours belongs, in a dim wa} T at least, 
 to some Great Consciousness that overlies the Whole ; that 
 our Will betokens Will there ; our Reasoning betokens 
 Thought there ; our Sense of Right, Sense of Right there ; 
 and so we make God in our own image. Some people cry 
 out at this as fetichism, but there is reason in it. Nature 
 must be in some degree conscious in order to evolve con 
 sciousness, for that is a part of Nature ; but her conscious 
 ness must be a conscious unity. In every atom, then, of 
 this vast material world, in every faintest thrill of its phy 
 sical motion, the other side the spirit side must be 
 somehow represented. This makes Nature alive and God 
 immanent. But self will alwa} s make God in its own 
 
THE UNSEEN. 71 
 
 image ; and as the self becomes more conscious, wise, 
 and noble, so will Nature fill and fill to us with a wiser, 
 nobler God-life. The man who is thoroughly imbued with 
 a sense that Nature is the life of God is everywhere a 
 worshipper. What others call accident, he feels sure is 
 invisible law ; what seems confusion, he doubts not is hid 
 den order. What seems horror, he cannot help trusting 
 as unknown goodness. To him the universe is a temple. 
 
 The discussion which followed was more brief than usual. 
 Dr. BARTOL said it seemed strange that there should be any 
 alarm about the tendency of Materialism when it was con 
 tinually taking the direction toward spirit. Before science, 
 as before the Great White Throne in Revelation, the heav 
 ens and the earth flee away, and nothing is left but pure 
 force. Some scientists carry their theory beyond the atom. 
 One Frenchman in particular goes behind the atom to atom 
 icities. When it gets so far as that, Materialism has com 
 mitted suicide. Putting on immortalury is not the first step : 
 the first step is for spirit to put on matter. Matter clothes 
 us, and introduces us to each other. Spirit is the first term. 
 
 Mr. POTTER saw no reason for going back to a begin 
 ning, when soul existed without world. It seemed to him 
 less rational than the notion which puts matter and spirit 
 together in the beginning, and never separates them. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL explained, in repVv, that he did not believe 
 in a beginning of the universe, any more than a beginning 
 of God. It was not chronologically that matter comes 
 after mind, but logically, psychologically ; matter is the 
 servant of mind. 
 
 Rev. R. COLLYER. I do not feel afraid of the revela 
 tions that come from the other side. I think the more we 
 know the better it will be for all around, for ourselves, 
 for those to whom we minister, and to the whole world. I 
 
72 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 do not want to have the two things separate for a moment, 
 but made more intimately one. So that, if possible, I want 
 to believe that God is present in every rush of the waves 
 or the billows of the fiercest sea-storm, as well as in the quiet 
 of the New England meeting-house on Sunday morning. 
 Mr. Colder related a prairie experience which he had had 
 years ago, in a tremendous storm, when everything seemed 
 so bleak and woful on his journey that the idea of God 
 was almost obliterated ; but when he got to the house of a 
 friend, who had a happy, cheerful home, he was instantly 
 cured. He found God there. He thought if we could find 
 God anywhere, we could find him in a cheerful, happy 
 home, nestling and shining in human hearts. And while 
 he would try to realize God in the forms of Nature, and 
 trace him deeper and deeper into the infinite depths of the 
 universe, he would at the same time cling to the realization 
 of God as he comes into and out of the human hearts fitted 
 to receive him ; he would find him in this temple of the Holy 
 Ghost which we call man. He did not want God set up 
 aloof in a picture painted on a roof. " If I have to go through 
 anything that pulls upon the last inch of manhood, I want 
 him to go through it too. He came here before I did, and 
 knows all about it, and I do not want him to come here and 
 be alone and have a good time all the while. If I have 
 something that wrings my heart, he has got to have his 
 heart wrung too. I do not want science to take away the 
 sympathy of God from me. If it does, then I fight science. 
 But I think it will bring us into sweeter and deeper rela 
 tions to him to know the universal^ of his presence. 
 Some great French thinker says it is not hard to believe in 
 God if you do not try too much to define him. Thackeray 
 says, It is not the right thing to open a rose with a 
 penknife : if you let the sun shine on it, it will open time 
 enough. " 
 
THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 73 
 
 XI. 
 
 THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 
 
 BY WILLIAM H. CHANNING. 
 
 MR. CHANNING S subject was suggested by an essay 
 with the same title read by another member at a 
 former meeting of the Club. After speaking of the need 
 of careful discriminations upon this subject, and sa} T ing 
 that, in the strict acceptation of the word, no nation, no 
 community in the world, was now or had ever been Chris 
 tian, and that the customary attitude of civilized nations 
 toward savage nations was by itself sufficient to prove the 
 former unworthy of this name, Mr. Channing went on 
 to say that the word Christian " (whatever our theological 
 theories might be) stood for the idea of a heavenly life. 
 The beginning of the Christian religion is faith in a divine 
 humanity, in a ministry of heavenly reconciliation to make 
 all human life new and pure. Mr. Channing then enlarged 
 upon the idea of divine humanit} , God making himself 
 man, set forth by such writers as Schleiermacher, Schel- 
 ling, and Hegel. God identifying himself with man, man 
 becoming godlike, total devotedness and disinterested 
 ness, man knows not himself until he discovers the 
 germ of these divine ideas within him. Mediation, how 
 ever, is universal, not after one type only. We can 
 learn its meaning only as we put away our own antag 
 onisms. 
 
 Do we enter into the meaning of a ministry of recon- 
 
74 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 dilation, of an atonement, of God taking on himself 
 the sins of the world? " I," said Mr. Channing, " accept 
 this idea. The well-beloved Son gave his life for man. 
 Yet the Church has put upon this fact an interpretation 
 far too narrow, too exclusive. 
 
 4 The Church ! have we exhausted its idea ? Do we un 
 derstand all its numerous branches ? The true Church is a 
 body of the children of God, giving themselves for the wel 
 fare of their brethren of mankind. The organized bodies 
 which call themselves Christian churches have never yet 
 come up to this standard, and hence the Christian religion 
 has had a far deeper influence than theirs on the world. It 
 has implanted the germ of that reverence for humanity which 
 is spreading through societ} , the conviction that every 
 human being is a child of God. This idea will not ouly put 
 away the distinctions between classes, but will prevent us 
 from attempting to divide men into good and bad. 
 
 "The influence of this idea on the community has 
 already been most powerful. It has broken the chains 
 of slaver} , it has raised our estimate of useful labor, it 
 is going on to dignify all ministries of human service. 
 It has put away the view of woman as merely an ap 
 pendage to man. It will go on to introduce the spirit of 
 peace and love between nations, in opposition to the law of 
 force." 
 
 This expression led Mr. Channing to say that he had 
 formerly accepted the doctrine of non-resistance, but that 
 this persuasion had given way when he saw the Boston 
 court-house girdled with chains for the maintenance of 
 Slavery, and again when he saw a gigantic rebellion arise 
 for the same purpose. Then he had taken down the peace 
 flao-. Yet he must still declare his conviction that the 
 
 O 
 
 influence of peace is a divine influence, and that it must 
 ultimately prevail. 
 
 As to the present time, the Christian religion seems 
 
THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 75 
 
 passing out of its local and partial forms to appear as 
 the universal religion. Every one of us is welcomed by 
 God and the well-beloved Son. A divine germ is within 
 each of us. God is centred there, and will fill us in pro 
 portion as we welcome and cherish him. Each of us may 
 say, By the grace of God I am what I am. We are to 
 be transformed into his image. Our constant effort should 
 be to be perfect, as the Father in heaven is perfect. God 
 means that we should be his well-beloved children, and 
 we should keep ourselves in attitude to receive all the 
 high influences which he pours upon us. If we really 
 believe that the work which God assigns to us is to trans 
 form earth to heaven, our daily lives will give token of 
 this conviction. 
 
 Every human being should be a reconciler of all differ 
 ences. p Dare not to draw back from this mission. Strive 
 for the perfect life. To gain this needs the mutual help of 
 all. We must be redeemers together of the human race, 
 as the Christ has never yet been. We must embody in so 
 ciety the true idea of the Christian Church, and look into 
 the sources of human degradation that we may know how to 
 combat them. " The difference between me and the people 
 classed as criminals is that I have been helped more than 
 they. It is thus my dut} T to help them. I renew, with ten 
 fold emphasis, the assertion of the possibility and duty of 
 a union of interests and efforts in human society." 
 
 He had learned from the venerated relative who was 
 his teacher how glorious the Christian ministry might be. 
 Yet while in the domain of speculation, and before enter 
 ing on the work of the ministry, his position might perhaps 
 have been classed as Deism. His first attempts at preach 
 ing did not extricate him from this position. His doubts 
 were not relieved until he went to Europe, and studied 
 society and theology there. In the midst of this exam 
 ination, his feelings rallied around " the well-beloved Son" 
 
76 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 in his ministr} 7 to the poor. He returned to New York, 
 and entered on a system of ministry to the poor, under 
 standing himself to be a Christian. Livingly, as a matter 
 of fact, he found himself ready and glad to devote all his 
 powers to that work. He wished to be a brother of that 
 well-beloved Son. 
 
 Can we cut ourselves off from all the noble souls who 
 have illustrated the excellences of the Christian system? 
 To hold by that system is not to recognize Jesus as the 
 Jewish Messiah. Who does so recognize him ? The true 
 Christianity is girdling the earth, and Providence is using 
 this great central power to bind the nations together, and 
 fuse them into one. Neither the nations nor the churches 
 now represent Christian society. Our work is to make 
 them do it. 
 
 At the close of Mr. Channing s address, Mr. SARGENT, 
 the host, referred with deep feeling to his own experience, in 
 former years, of the hostility of the clergy and the churches 
 to reform, and the exercise of their influence against that 
 fraternization with the suffering and oppressed which his 
 friend, Mr. Channing, had declared to be the essence of 
 Christianity. He (Mr. Sargent) was not particularly zeal 
 ous for the retention of the name Christian. What he val 
 ued was a life manifestly devoted to human welfare, such 
 as the lives of Wendell Phillips and John G. Whittier, 
 both of whom, he was happy to inform the Club, were then 
 present. 
 
 Many persons expressing the desire to hear Mr. Phillips, 
 he came forward from the side-room where he had been 
 sitting. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS was glad to be strengthened by the expe 
 rience and testimony of the friend who had addressed 
 them. " Christianity," said he, " is a great moral power, 
 
THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 77 
 
 the determining force of our present civilization, as of past 
 steps in the same direction. Jesus is the great religious 
 genius who has given its peculiar t} pe to the modern world. 
 Speculations as to the why and the how may differ, but 
 we see the fact. We cannot rub out history. Europe 
 shows a t} T pe of human character not paralleled anj where 
 else. The intellect of Greece centred around power and 
 beauty ; that of Rome around legal justice. The civiliza 
 tion of modern Europe was inspired by a great moral pur 
 pose. Imperfect as it was, and limited in many wa} T s, 
 the religious element there had steadily carried those 
 nations forward. The battle for human rights was finally 
 fought on a Christian plane. Unbelief has written books, 
 but it never lifted a million men into a united struggle. 
 The power that urged the world forward came from Chris 
 tian^. Mr. Channing has explained to us its origin. I 
 look at its results, and they lead to the same conclusion. 
 He claims to be Christian. So do I. The best part of 
 the life of Europe may be traced to Christianity. 
 
 " The religious literature of Asia has been compared with 
 the Christian Scriptures. The comparison is not just. 
 That literature has many merits, and contains scattered 
 sayings and precepts of great excellence ; but there are 
 heaps of chaff in that and in the writings of the early 
 Christian fathers ; none in the Gospels and Epistles. Of the 
 mediaeval writings one half was useless. Of the boasted 
 works of Confucius seven tenths must be winnowed out to 
 find what the average reason of mankind would respect." 
 
 T. W. HIGGINSON said that nothing would have more 
 amazed him, twenty years ago, than to be told that he 
 would come to differ, entirely and absolutely, with the two 
 friends who had just spoken. Yet he did so differ. The 
 address of Mr. Channing was like the song of a seraph to 
 people in prison, bidding them to be content with their lot. 
 For his part, Mr. Iligginson said, he preferred to be out- 
 
78 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 side the walls, and even to fight, if necessary, for a larger 
 liberty. He could not agree that all spiritual life was an 
 effluence from Jesus. The S3^stem he accepted must be 
 such as would leave him still a man. 
 
 The defect of the doctrine taught by his esteemed friends 
 who had just spoken was that it was not true. The New 
 Testament was not so free from chaif as had been repre 
 sented. What was true in the Gospels was written in the 
 world s life before Jesus was born, though it had never, 
 perhaps, been so sublimely carried out. 
 
 Jesus was a man. He took in not only the sublimity, 
 but the delusions of Hebrew Scripture. He taught his 
 disciples that he was the literal as well as the spiritual 
 Messiah, and that he was to come again in that generation 
 to judge the world. He was so far in error. How can 
 I found a hope for the redemption of the world on the 
 basis of an error? We can afford to put Jesus into the 
 categor} 7 of men ; and examination will show that all our 
 best lessons did not come from him. 
 
 From whom did we learn resistance to Slavery ? Not 
 from Jesus, but from Garrison. From whom did we learn 
 the rights of women? From Frances Wright and from 
 Lucy Stone, who found the call of duty in the promptings 
 of their own hearts. 
 
 Mr. Phillips should have claimed for enthusiasm that 
 motive power which he ascribed to Christianity. The same 
 mistake had often before been made. Instead of clinging 
 blindly to the past, we should recognize the great teachers 
 of our own time. Mr. Abbot s fifty affirmative proposi 
 tions, published in " The Index," are not surpassed, either 
 in boldness or in truth, by the famous theses of Luther. 
 
 Multitudes have for years been longing to step out of the 
 limitations of Christianity into the glorious liberty of the 
 sons of God. As to myself (said Mr. Higginson), I am 
 never clouded in this faith, the belief that God inspires 
 
THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 79 
 
 every man that comes into the world. Inspiration is com 
 mon to all. We all have intellect, and we must seek our sup 
 plies where the ablest men of all ages have sought theirs. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS replied to Mr. Higginson very briefly, 
 controverting his doctrine respecting the origin of the Anti- 
 slavery struggle and the Woman s Rights cause. Both 
 these movements, in his opinion, grew out of Christianity. 
 The sweep of centuries of this influence had removed 
 slavery and would elevate woman. 
 
 Mr. WEISS believed with Mr. Higginson. It seemed to 
 him, however, that Mr. Channing held the same idea. 
 What the latter praised as Christianity was not the system 
 now commonly called by that name. The presence of 
 God everywhere, at all times, and now here in this room, 
 which Mr. Channing has described, is the thing to be 
 believed in. His inspiration was in Jesus, no doubt, and 
 so it was in Burns, when he wrote of the field-mouse and 
 the daisy. 
 
 "Our phraseology," added Mr. Weiss, "is one of our 
 obstacles. I enjoyed Mr. Channing s words, because I 
 interpreted them with a running commentary. We must 
 recognize the fact that we, as well as Jesus, are inspired 
 of God." 
 
 Mrs. JULIA WARD HOWE said: "While we were hear 
 ing Mr. Channing, we were one. He is a reconciling 
 medium. Those are the choicest speakers who show us 
 wherein we agree." She was surprised that any one could 
 think that Mr. Channing s view of Christ excluded any 
 other human being from God s inspiration. 
 
 Dr. BAKTOL. We have grown out of the past. We 
 do not bear the root, but the root us. I cannot believe 
 that God has set us to copy only one of his lines of 
 beauty, the Judsean line. He is himself drawing a line in 
 the heart of each of us. 
 
 JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE said that the differences ex- 
 
80 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 pressed here seemed to him to be mainly questions of words. 
 He agreed with Charming, and he agreed with Weiss. 
 There were excellent things in the Asiatic Scriptures ; but 
 the doctrines of Confucius would never have raised the 
 Chinese to effect the emancipation of slaves. When men 
 are questioning whether Jesus called himself the Jewish 
 Messiah, he would inquire what was meant by that phrase. 
 For there were two Jewish views of the Messiah ; and we 
 know that Jesus did not identify himself with that one of 
 them which contemplated taking arms against the Romans 
 and holding temporal rule over the Jews. 
 
 One of the parables of Jesus represented him as prais 
 ing the deeds of some who were quite ignorant that they 
 had done the things in question. The}" did not know that 
 they had ever fed or clothed, or otherwise relieved him. 
 Perhaps some of the speakers here would hereafter find 
 their position cleared up in a similar manner. 
 
 Rev. JOHN CIIADWICK, from Brooklyn, expressed his 
 gratification at having heard the discussion. The true 
 meaning of any old myth, he thought, was the best and 
 highest meaning that would fit it. So of the word " Chris 
 tian ; " the best meaning of it is that which stands for our 
 highest ideal of manhood and womanhood. In this view, 
 how can we wish to call ourselves anything but Christians, 
 though others make a point of denying us that name? 
 
 As to the relative rank of Jesus, it is certain that God 
 does give to one man five talents, to another two, and to 
 another one. We are the creatures not only of organiza 
 tion, but of circumstances. We must always recognize 
 that God is as near the world now as he ever was, and that 
 his laws of inspiration remain the same ; and yet we may 
 hold Jesus to be the greatest, as having been born in the 
 fulness of time. We accept his words, not by constraint, 
 but when the God in us responds to the God in him. 
 
 Mr. POTTER, of New Bedford, had great satisfaction in 
 
THE CHRISTIAN NAME. 81 
 
 hearing Mr. Charming. He thought the chief difference 
 between them was where he had pictured the universal 
 church as that which Christianity was to open. Rabbi 
 Ellinger has lately pictured the ultimate messianic era from 
 the Jewish standpoint, and his view of it greatly resem 
 bles what we have just heard from Mr. Channing. Our 
 wisdom will be to seek in all religions the universal ele 
 ment, emancipated from the specific form. 
 
 Mr. WASSON felt very little interest in claiming, or mak 
 ing any reference to, the name Christian. He thought 
 facts more important than names. In regard to Jesus, 
 he had no sense of any personal relation to him. Still, 
 he would not fail to acknowledge the function of Jesus 
 in history. Christianity has had immense influence on the 
 Western world, but not through the person of Jesus. He 
 would long since have been forgotten had he not been 
 called God. Christianity never has by itself transformed 
 the world. Where it entered into the inheritance of Greek 
 and Roman civilization it succeeded ; elsewhere it failed. 
 Christianity in Asia has been unprogressive, both in 
 former and latter times. Only where helped by European 
 civilization did it prosper. There was no reason, Mr. 
 Wasson thought, to choose Christianity for our S3 T stem, 
 either at present or in the future. 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS reaffirmed his idea, the moral 
 earnestness of the world lives in Christianity. To a ques 
 tion by Mrs. Cheney, " What abolished slavery in Tunis? " 
 he answered that this was an outgrowth from the moral 
 earnestness of Europe. 
 
 Mr. WASSON replied with some details of the early civ 
 ilization of India and China, before the mention of Chris 
 tianity there, and then the lateness of the hour dissolved 
 the meeting. 
 
 6 
 
82 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XII. 
 THE PEOPLE. 
 
 BY W. J. LINTON. 
 
 A REAL democracy is the beginning of the republic, 
 an assembling of the free in order to turn their free 
 dom to its full account for the good of the whole. This 
 organization of the powers of all, this government of all, 
 by all, for all, is the republic. Democracy is either the 
 basis of this or it is anarchy. Among kings and aristo 
 crats had been wise rulers and lovers of order ; and there 
 might be some justification for the rule of the One or the 
 Few in old days, when the great truth of human brother 
 hood was unknown. The essayist spoke of aristocracy 
 as only monarchy held in commission ; the two oppos 
 ing principles are monarchy and democracy, or authorit} 
 and conscience. Yet democracy alone is insufficient. It 
 has but one word upon its banner, THE PEOPLE ; " 
 but one definition, " the People as the sole source of 
 power." There is no aim in this, no religion. It is the 
 mere egotistical assertion of power, of universal rights, 
 not to be universally used. "Your fathers," said Mr. 
 Linton, "did their best for the time they lived in; but 
 the Christian assertion of rights has done its work : we 
 need advance our programme to the higher realms of 
 dut}\" The republican banner bears upon it a religious 
 creed, giving also the aim of the republican life. The 
 European republican formula " GOD AND THE PEOPLE " 
 
THE PEOPLE. 83 
 
 implies the organization of the whole people in order to 
 do the will of God ; the association of the whole people, 
 men and women, not merely to make such laws as may 
 suit the tastes of some party conspiracy, a majority for 
 the nonce, but to enact the laws of God in human statutes 
 to rule the current life of all, to realize in human life the 
 prayer of all life to the Father which is in heaven, u Thy 
 will be done on earth ! " 
 
 Is there such organization now? Mr. Linton did not 
 find it in Europe, where they are yet struggling against 
 that old dynastic division and disintegration of the world, 
 of which the Austrian empire is the type, struggling even 
 for national existence. Without political organization 
 social organization is impossible. He referred to Eng 
 lish and Irish poverty and emigration, to the demoraliza 
 tion of France under the ruffianism of a Napoleon, and, 
 turning to the young republic of America, asked, What 
 organization is there here ? What in Georgia and Tennes 
 see and Texas ? nay, what in New York and Massa 
 chusetts ? In your magnificent Empire City there is not 
 organization enough to sweep the streets after a snow 
 storm. In the city of the Puritans you may have the 
 cleanliness which is next to godliness ; but of the godliness 
 how much? What chance of virtue with the present 
 ordering of labor and of trade ? Is your labor ordered for 
 the benefit of all ? And } T our buying and selling, is it 
 not the greedy game of middle-men, robbing both sides, 
 in vindication of the Jewish proverb, "As mortar stick- 
 eth between stones " ? Organization of society ! Ask 
 your criminal population ; ask the unfortunate women of 
 all Christian streets ; ask the unhappy strangers } ou take 
 into 3 our families as servants. Are } T OU decently organized 
 even in your homes ? Organization ! You dare not, as a 
 nation, even whisper an encouragement to the struggling 
 republicans of other lands. And the bcst-natured, the 
 
84 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 most gifted among you, keep out of politics from a very 
 proper disgust at what is called " politics," stand by 
 without attempt at organization. 
 
 Then Mr. Linton proceeded to define his ideal republic, 
 imagining a ship-load of emigrants, men and women, land 
 ing in a new country and founding their government ; 
 conferring as to this or that law, and adopting or rejecting 
 each according to the will of the majority, excluding none 
 from their council and excusing none, avoiding the tyr 
 anny of a permanent majority by confining the majority 
 to each law, and so changing the majority with every law. 
 This is the direct sovereignty of the people, which he 
 claimed as a religious duty. What service more accept 
 able to the Eternal than the devout considering what law, 
 or alteration of an old law, shall make our lives more 
 honest, more hoty, and more God-like? Why should 
 not the town-hall and the church be one? And why 
 should the increase of the community render this more 
 difficult? Is this republican organization a mere Utopian 
 dream ? 
 
 On one day you cast the votes of the whole land for 
 President. Would it be more difficult to cast them for a 
 certain law ? 
 
 Two things would be gained by having the people thus 
 directly vote their own laws. Their will and conscience 
 would be represented, and the habitual voting as a patri 
 otic duty would be of educational value. In war you ex 
 cuse none. Why excuse any in peace? In great crises the 
 need of a convention of the whole people is admitted. 
 The direct sovereignty of the people is only a permanent 
 convention. And when is not consentaneous action neces 
 sary for the common weal? 
 
 And three questions not able to be answered now might 
 then obtain solution, the religious question, the woman 
 question, and the educational question. The labor ques- 
 
THE PEOPLE. 85 
 
 tion and that of mone}^ must also wait for a real republic. 
 Men will no longer be ashamed to be thought religious 
 when all the business of life is organized on a religious 
 basis, when religion is recognized as the science of life, 
 and politics as only the practical application of religion. 
 Woman, not wanted now in the political arena, will then 
 take her right place as the helpmate of man, the Priestess 
 standing beside the Priest ; and the whole current of life 
 will be educational, educational arid religious, bearing us 
 on and onward to the Eternal Peace of God. 
 
 When an essay is so true that little else can be truer, 
 and when the force of its truth strikes home to an audience, 
 there is room for a great deal of eulog3 T , but for little of 
 argument. Mr. Linton s paper was severely critical, 
 unsparingly caustic ; but, however certain details might 
 be objected to, it defied contradiction as a whole. No 
 one attempted the task. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT said that, though the pill was a bitter one, 
 the most graceful act we could perform would be to swallow 
 it without a murmur. He for one accepted the criticism, 
 particularly in its reference to Boston. 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT thought the essayist merited the thanks of 
 all assembled. Americans are braggarts in words, brag 
 garts in deeds, and refuse to recognize themselves when 
 the mirror of truth is placed before them. The highest 
 friendship admits of the bravest truth-telling, and is 
 attained when a man or a nation is told of faults even by 
 an enemy. Much more should we be grateful to the critic 
 who is a friend. It was delightful to see any one who 
 believed anything. Mr. Linton is his own republic ; and 
 if there be one of the opposite sex who subscribes to his 
 tenets, then does it exist on earth. But Mr. Linton has 
 
86 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES* 
 
 taken us into the middle of the next century, where many 
 now living belong. We may walk the streets of modern 
 Athens, and }^et feel very solitary. Such papers, however, 
 make contemporaries, and he subscribed to this one with 
 his whole heart. Thirty years ago an attempt had been 
 made to carry out a similar idea, and for a time success 
 attended the efforts. "When indeed its moving spirit again 
 took his place in the world, he left Brook Farm, feeling 
 that one day it would be a reality. Mr. Alcott was happy 
 to hear of its counterpart. 
 
 Mr. WEISS, who always carried in his heart the lighted 
 torch of eloquence, recognized the ideal republic, that 
 which mild and respectable republican journals are wont 
 to call the serenely Utopian. Our skilful engraver but 
 pours a little acid over the plate to eat away extraneous 
 substance and leave a work of art. The little child of the 
 republic is born, or if not born we are bearing it in our 
 bosoms. He liked the criticism, sharp as it might seem. 
 It was from berries pressed harsh and crude. The critic 
 was not drunk with new wine. Mazzini and his disciples 
 had tasted of the vintage gathered when God put the 
 world up. It was the aboriginal wine, all ready to be 
 opened and quaffed by mankind ; and America, in spite of 
 the shoddy element, was not unprepared to put its lips to 
 the sacramental cup. We hold our opportunity, born of 
 the bloody throe of the last four years. Mr. Weiss 
 thought that there could be nothing so ineffably mean as 
 our treatment of struggling nationalities. It is ours to 
 say, " God bless }-ou, old Greece ! God bless every man 
 who believes that every other man has a right to share in 
 the divine presence ! We are going to stand by that young 
 people." It was a part of our mission to stretch out a 
 hand to all peoples that cry aloud, " I want to be a part 
 of the United States of the world," though they be Greek 
 or French, Italian or Spanish. 
 
THE PEOPLE. 87 
 
 Mr. POWELL felt greatly indebted to Mr. Linton. The 
 doctrine was good, but it would take the people a long 
 time to see and understand it. Mr. Linton s doctrine 
 was, after all, but the kernel or substance of Quaker 
 ism. Quakers, more than airy associated people, have 
 upheld this ideal government of God in the human soul, 
 and their decline is because of an ideal beyond popular 
 conception. 
 
 Mr. ROBERT DALE OWEN thought the first part of the 
 essay masterly, but was not prepared to agree to its later 
 details. In the earlier portion of his congressional experi 
 ence there was not such corruption as now exists. Look 
 ing back a quarter of a century, he remembered well that 
 there was not a member of Congress who was even accused 
 of a willingness to accept a bribe. He did not say that 
 there was not a certain amount of lobbying, but positive 
 corruption there certainly was not. This could not be said 
 of recent years. It is almost an impossibility to pass a 
 bill through Congress without money ; and if the States go 
 on twenty-five years longer under the present regime, there 
 will not be honesty enough to keep the body politic to 
 gether. Mr. Owen could recall the time when intemperance 
 in the West was so terribly prevalent as to cause four 
 fifths of all the crime. At last it became so bad that a 
 remedy was found in total abstinence. 
 
 He was himself not a devoted adherent of total absti 
 nence, but as the lives of the best are spent in choosing 
 between the less of two evils, he hailed the new dogma 
 with gratitude. Now there is not one drunkard where 
 there were ten. Mr. Owen thought that in like manner 
 public opinion would rise up against political corruption. 
 There ought to be protest, but we should lose hope did we 
 look at the reverse of the shield. He had never expected 
 to live to see Slavery abolished, yet his e} T es had beheld 
 the impossible. What may not be foretold of the 
 
88 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 " Woman s Rights " movement? He could go back to the 
 time when married women in Indiana had no right to their 
 own property. Since then there has been the greatest 
 progress. 
 
NEWSPAPERS. 89 
 
 XIII. 
 NEWSPAPERS. 
 
 BY F. B. SANBORN. 
 
 WHEN Horace Walpole was furnishing his fine house, 
 his friend and former tutor, the poet Gray, wrote 
 him that his chairs ought to be new, unless he would cramp 
 or torture his guests. " Every chair that is easy is mod 
 ern," said Gray ; and with quite as much truth we may 
 claim that all newspapers that are good are recent. Syd 
 ney Smith was fond of dating events before or after " the 
 invention of common-sense ; " and certainly the common- 
 sense that controls the modem newspaper does not go back 
 many centuries. 
 
 The newspaper of to-day is a very different thing from the 
 newspaper which Dickens satirized in " Martin Chuzzlewit." 
 Not onl} T have the means of communication been infinitely 
 enlarged, so that our news flashes to us with the speed of 
 lightning from every quarter of the world, but the news 
 paper has ceased to be the vehicle of mere news. Moral 
 and scientific questions are ably discussed, reforms are ad 
 vocated, discoveries are chronicled, in short, the newspa 
 per holds its mirror up to every aspect of the times. Tho- 
 reau was in the habit of condemning newspapers. He 
 read them once a week, but considered himself the worse for 
 even so much dissipation. " Read not the Times," he said, 
 "read the Eternities." But there came a season when 
 Thoreau read every newspaper he could find. It was when 
 
90 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 John Brown lay wounded at Harper s Ferry, and his ene 
 mies, thronging about and questioning him, drew from him 
 those answers which rang through the country for years, 
 and still thrill the heart as we recall them. It was the re 
 porter of the New York newspaper who then and there 
 noted down the undying words, which might else have been 
 lost ; and thus was it made manifest for what reason the 
 New York newspaper had been allowed to exist all these 
 years, since no other paper could have had a reporter there. 
 In those days the Times and the Eternities got printed 
 on the same sheet, as they always do when a hero appears. . 
 Of late 3 ears there has been a marked increase in the cour 
 age as well as in the resources of newspapers. Contented 
 formerly with following in the wake of public opinion, they 
 have sprung to the front, and aspire to lead where they 
 used to follow. In the last ten years the tone of our own 
 journals has greatly changed. If they are not yet models 
 of courage, they are by no means deficient in boldness, and 
 no longer deem it their duty to feel round for the aver 
 age judgment of their readers and express that," as Wen 
 dell Phillips used to accuse them of doing. One reason for 
 this change is the rapidity with which, as a nation, we have 
 passed from a provincial to an imperial position among the 
 nations ; for, waiting on our prosperh"y, have come fabu 
 lous wealth, increased culture, a prodigious diversity of 
 tastes and interests, and a wide expansion of the horizon 
 of individual ambition. Under the spur of these excite 
 ments a new class of newspaper editors has appeared. An 
 English traveller, in 1833, spoke of the American editors 
 as " shrewd but uneducated men;" the description no 
 longer applies. Nearly all the rising or lately risen jour 
 nalists in the countiy are educated men, many of them 
 highly accomplished in scholarship or literature. They are 
 travelled men, too, familiar with foreign countries and 
 with their own. Either as editors or correspondents, jour- 
 
NEWSPAPERS. 91 
 
 nalism is drawing into its service the highest culture and 
 the best brain in the country, whether of men or women. 
 When Mrs. Child, that genial grandmother of feminine 
 journalism in America, wrote her "Letters from New 
 York," when Margaret Fuller went to the same city to help 
 Mr. Greeley edit " The Tribune." how daring and strange 
 their ventures seemed to their countrywomen ! Now their 
 successors in the same field are legion. But, with so many 
 recruits to the ranks of journalism, it must be confessed 
 that the number of really able editors is still small. Bril 
 liant, forcible, and sensible as American journalists are, 
 they seldom develop into marked superiority ; each has his 
 drawback, and does not rise beyond a certain standard. 
 Had Franklin lived in our daj^, and devoted himself to a 
 newspaper, he might perhaps have come nearer than any 
 one else to being the ideal editor ; but even of Franklin 
 Timothy Pickering observed that " he was never found in 
 a minoritj 7 ," and the ideal journalist, like the greatest gen 
 eral, must sometimes lead a forlorn hope. Courage, high 
 moral courage, is still the quality most lacking in journal 
 ism, though we meet it not infrequently, and believe that 
 it is constantly increasing, as the temptations to cowardice 
 are decreasing. It becomes every year more difficult to 
 hire or bu}^ a successful newspaper ; for the successful 
 newspaper is rich enough to live without bribery. More 
 over, papers thrive now b} r their advertisements rather than 
 by their subscribers. One of the besetting sins of the jour 
 nalist, especially of the war and Washington correspond 
 ent, is self-conceit. " I wish I knew anything," said Lord 
 Melbourne, " as positively as Macaulay knows eveiy thing ; " 
 and it were surely a high enough ambition for the most as 
 piring scholar to be certain of everything as is an Ameri 
 can editor. But our daily or weekly instructors have, after 
 all, the right to a little comforting self-glorification. It 
 is no mean talent which they use, and they do not use 
 
92 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 it ill. It is sometimes objected to journalism that it is 
 anoirymous ; a newspaper is always responsible for what it 
 prints. The shield of anonymous publication is necessan r 
 to the man who is to criticise fearlessly ; without it he 
 would be exposed to the reproaches, the hatred, the bribes, 
 and the blandishments that would certainly interfere with 
 his proper duty. There are enthusiasts who hope for the 
 model newspaper which they have never yet seen : when 
 ever it is established it will require in its editor the deepest 
 purpose, the broadest thought, the highest culture, the 
 most tolerant heart, the noblest manhood, of which human 
 ity is capable. 
 
 Mr. WEISS followed, and spoke of his own enjo3 T ment of 
 newspapers. He never took one up without wanting to 
 cut a scrap from it. The relative importance of the press 
 and the pulpit would bear discussing : for his part, he 
 thought the press had filched a good deal of power from 
 the pulpit, and preached its sermons quite as effectively. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL wondered whether the press* as well as the 
 church, might not need its Luther. He was struck by the 
 blind, irrational belief of the great journalist that he is 
 not a responsible man, but a gigantic behemoth who shall 
 bear down all prejudices. He was once entertaining 
 Thackeray at breakfast, and they fell into talk about 
 Goethe. Dr. Bartol made some strictures on the morals 
 of the great German ; but Thackeray shook his head. 
 "We can t judge such a man," he said, "by ordinary 
 standards. He is too great for our measurements." Simi 
 larly the editorial mind seems to think itself be}*ond common 
 judgment ; and we are afraid of the press, all of us, as we 
 are of the Irish vote. The facilit} with which newspapers 
 change their minds is something amusing to watch. A 
 savage one day was talking to some missionary about 
 virtue, and betrayed his opinion that people are good be- 
 
NEWSPAPERS. 93 
 
 cause they are afraid. " When he grow strong he grow 
 bad," said the savage, commenting upon human nature as 
 he saw it : might not the same be said of newspapers ? 
 
 Mr. WASSON did not think newspapers became bad in 
 proportion as they grew strong, but the reverse. The 
 richest paper could afford to be the bravest ; and the worst 
 paper in New York was one struggling to establish the fact 
 of its existence. But there was one danger about news 
 papers, and the better the paper the greater this became, 
 the danger that we should be satisfied to get our informa 
 tion from them. Mr. Weiss always wanted to cut " scraps " 
 from them, and their tendenc} r was to make one s mind run 
 to scraps. The diminution of the faculty for concentrated 
 study may be largely traced to newspapers ; and this is 
 not at all the fault of the newspapers, but of those who 
 are contented with mere mention. We are, indeed, no 
 longer provincial, and that is a great gain ; but it is bought 
 dearly by the loss of the power of long and close thinking. 
 Thought itself is worth quite as much as the results of 
 thought. Will not some editor begin by and by to define 
 the province of journalism, and tell people that they are 
 not to depend on newspapers for their opinions ? 
 
 Gen. ARMSTRONG had just been spending an hour in a 
 convention of orthodox ministers. They had been dis 
 cussing the bondage of the pulpit, and they concluded that 
 the escape from it must be through the force of strong con 
 viction : so about the press ; if journalists have strong con 
 victions, to which they dare not be disloyal, the force of 
 truth will make them free. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE thought neither pulpit nor press could sup 
 plant the other. The newspaper is indispensable, God 
 forbid we should be deprived of it ! but the church also 
 is indispensable, God forbid that we should be deprived 
 of that ! It is the old fable of the hare and the tortoise. 
 Let the hare do the swift running : we need the slow, safe 
 
94 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 tortoise as well. The people must not forget that the busi 
 ness of the Church is to set forth high ethical culture. 
 
 Mr. ROBINSON said that he did not believe newspaper 
 influence was really increasing ; he thought the newspapers 
 of to-day followed the people rather than led them. He 
 entirely agreed with Mr. Wasson about the danger of be 
 lieving in newspapers. He detested newspapers, but ho 
 read them constantly. After he had flung a paper upon 
 the floor, he would pick it up and look at it again, and all 
 the time he knew that newspapers were the worst possible 
 reading ; and if he was not ruined by this reading, it was 
 because he did not remember what he read. He then spoke 
 of some papers having a definite personality) as, indeed, is 
 characteristic of all newspapers more or less. There is a 
 paper called "Our Society" ("I even read that," he par 
 enthesized), which he considered as the most offensive 
 result of this rage for newspaper gossip. 
 
 There was a general laugh, a general enjoyment of this 
 sharp fusilade from the prince of newspaper correspon 
 dents, and after a few words more the meeting broke up, 
 never more reluctantly ; and then one began to see the 
 various faces come out of the corners, and to find that 
 Samuel Bowles, of the " Springfield Republican," had been 
 a listener to this newspaper talk, to which he could so well 
 have contributed. 
 
THOU SHALT. 95 
 
 XIY. 
 
 THOU SHALT. 
 
 BY DAVID A. WASSON. 
 
 SCIENCE does not satirize history more than it does 
 physical nature. In either case it assumes in the 
 observed facts, however remote in time or grotesque in 
 appearance, a significance to be found in harmony with 
 all existing truth. In respect to organic truth, Goethe 
 divined the truth now generally acknowledged, that one 
 and the same type governs growth through all its stages 
 and transformations. We await the Goethe or the Lyell 
 who shall apply this law of uniformity to history, sustain 
 ing the identity of principles in all the ages of civilization. 
 An apprehension of this fact is fast spreading, Nature 
 instructing us how to study civilization, with all the ideas, 
 institutions, customs, and formative processes which belong 
 either to its history or to its present state ; and historical 
 criticism, at once animated and disciplined by the scien 
 tific spirit, is steadily becoming graver, more appreciative, 
 more disposed to assume as its guiding clew the identity of 
 type and uniformity of ideal force in all that upbuilding 
 of humanity, all that organic vivification, structure, and 
 growth which modern speech is accustomed to designate by 
 the term " civilization." 
 
 It is incontestable that man recognizes somewhat as 
 sovereign over his will so soon as he has any sentiment of 
 the kind which distinguishes human nature. By the first 
 
96 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 civilizers, law and rule were thought to come only from 
 above. It is precisely this notion of their origin that gives 
 them authority and engages obedience. Primitive senti 
 ment knows nothing of law-makers, but only of law-givers. 
 It is obvious that Moses, in saying, " Thou shalt not kill," 
 sought not to impose his individual will upon others, while 
 he as little professed, or was understood to be, the mere 
 reporter of their wills. lie was accepted as an interpreter. 
 Homer s Themistes signify the same. May it not be that 
 in their instinctive reference of all authority to a ground 
 above any will or inclination whatsoever we also find an 
 old friend, though one who awaits our recognition ? Prin 
 ciples are sovereign ; men are so but as the media or 
 exponents of principles. The laws of social welfare date 
 from the foundation of the world, and are as unchangeable 
 as its constitution. Men may discover, acknowledge, 
 apply them, but are as incapable of making them as the 
 eye of making what it sees. These laws every man is, by 
 the fact of his existence as a human being, bound to obey ; 
 while any obedience enforced upon him otherwise than in 
 furtherance of their claims is injurious and odious. Po 
 litical thought which does not begin here, and thence pro 
 ceed to all political functions, is ipse facto discredited. 
 
 But beginning here, we are led to an unqualified rejec 
 tion of all mere personal authorit} r , whether of one or of 
 many, of king or of people. To this intent government 
 is organized, not to render some dominant over others, 
 be it the few over the many, or the many over the few, but 
 to make reason dominant over all. The State exists, it has 
 been a thousand times said of late, to express the will of 
 the people as supreme. The State exists in truth, to 
 express the loyal submission of all wills whatsoever to the 
 laws of social welfare, as by the best lights of reason de 
 termined, to express an allegiance we all naturally owe. 
 A sovereign human will let us have done with that. 
 
THOU SHALT. 97 
 
 Authority is vicious ; it lacks the genius of authority in 
 the degree that its ground is an} mere will, however com 
 pounded. A compound, indiscriminate personal domina 
 tion, on the mildest scale, is democracy ; the sovereignty 
 of the laws of welfare, represented by qualified agents 
 whose sole title to that function is found in their translu- 
 cenc} to authoritative principles, is Republicanism. The 
 latter is the ideal aim of the modern world ; but, unhap 
 pily, in passing over the crust of a period of transition it 
 has slumped into the former. Our chief question, there 
 fore, should be, not who it is, but what it is in which 
 authority resides. This ma} seem an abstract way of con 
 templating the matter, but it is not more abstract than 
 science and common-sense must be. 
 
 The speaker proceeded to define political obligation as 
 having two factors independent of any man s will. The 
 first is found in necessary conditions, necessary either 
 absolute or relative, including necessary laws of conse 
 quence and the like. These make a certain conduct mat 
 ter of moral necessity. For this necessity human author- 
 it} is to stand, representing the imperative requisition of 
 the facts. An enforced mandate is a crime against nature 
 if it be not a mandatory form of the truth, having a 
 deeper ground than mere volition. Public duty can as lit 
 tle be willed into existence as the force of a syllogism. 
 The facts are thus and so ; therefore duty is thus and so. 
 A rational inference, a considerate judgment, mediates 
 between the facts and the duty. Government, then, is a 
 means of getting the considerate judgment where it is 
 wanted, that the facts may speak through it and afterward 
 be rendered obligatory in force as in right. 
 
 Now it is obvious that just force can be represented only 
 by the considerate and judicious mind, as only a polished sur 
 face can serve the purpose of a mirror. Only such mind, 
 therefore, is capable of a political act in the proper sense 
 
98 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 of the term. There is much in every demand, and an 
 obvious preponderance in some, of force that is good while 
 it is kept under, and infernal when it is not kept under. 
 We are brute beasts, every one of us, and none the worse 
 for that so long as our brute part does not attempt the role 
 of law-giver ; but when the beast in the individual or so 
 ciety proceeds to legislate, Satan s statute-book receives 
 the record. I hear much of each man s superior knowl 
 edge of his own interest, and of this supposed or pretended 
 fact as the one from which the theory of government should 
 be derived. Well, the prisoner at the bar is above all in 
 terested in the event of his trial. Does his interest call 
 him to the place of judgment? It excludes him. Do we 
 say the will of the people is sovereign, and has a right to 
 acquit or condemn at pleasure? That were barbarous or 
 below barbarism. What is to decide? The special facts 
 of the case placed in proper relation to those general facts 
 and truths which all men ought to regard submissively. 
 What can reflect these accurate!} ? Considerate and judi 
 cial mind. 
 
 Political obligation also presupposes a purpose which is 
 of such a nature that all men are under obligation to 
 recognize it. The ideal ends of life, of which those of 
 government form a part, have a claim to regard which is 
 simply indefeasible. Good alone is regal ; all the lines of 
 just authority derive from it and lead to it. We are under 
 a natural obligation to seek welfare, to accept the condi 
 tion of it, to adjust the conduct to the laws of it. 
 
 Are not these discriminations important to others be 
 sides theorists? A critical hour has struck in the world. 
 That time must be critical when general principles reflec- 
 tively distinguished gain practical importance and give the 
 initiative to action. So long as men act instinctively Nature 
 charges herself, so to speak, with their guidance. Like 
 bees, they build better than they know. 
 
THOU SHALT. 99 
 
 In politics, as in other provinces, the epoch I have 
 hinted at has arrived. But, because this epoch has come, 
 we must distinguish, as men never had need to do before, 
 the principles which justify authorit} T . In this time, when 
 class is taking up arms against class, and avocation 
 against avocation ; when capital is imperilled by lawless 
 wealth, and labor compromised by the spirit in which even 
 its just demands are made ; when fraud and rapacity 
 occupy the very citadels, and we know not whether to fear 
 most those who make the laws or those who stand ready to 
 break them, I discern one point, and after long reflection 
 see it even more clearly, where reformation, to be at all radi 
 cal, must begin. We must put authority in a condition to 
 engage respect. At present the very principle of authority 
 is in disgrace. The actual authority is always a makeshift, 
 an expedient for the hour. Indeed, it is esteemed endur 
 able onl} r because it is ephemeral. Rule is submitted to 
 because we are so soon to be rid of it. It is a tooth which 
 we do not have out because it aches but a little while at a 
 time ; the twinge would be in another place before we 
 could reach the dentist s. The national attitude toward 
 its governing power is much like the mutual attitude of a 
 husband and wife, who should each, the day after the wed 
 ding, purchase and keep always in view the other s coffin, 
 b} T way of strengthening the marriage tie! "There is a 
 divinity doth hedge a king," said the Old World. That 
 generous delusion dignified obedience, if it did no more ; 
 and to do this was much. To obey what you honor is 
 wholesome and elevating ; to obey what you do not and 
 cannot honor is debasing, and in the end morally destruc 
 tive. There s a divinity doth hedge a caucus, the poetry 
 of our politics has come to that. Power now is simply 
 power ; we submit to it, but we do so much in the spirit of 
 the ancient Pistol, dining upon leeks : "I eat, and eke I 
 swear." The degradation of our civil service and the 
 
100 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 absence of airy public sentiment to be shocked by its 
 degradation; the great American principle, " Rotation in 
 office ; " and the great American maxim, " To the victors 
 belong the spoils," these things and a great many similar 
 ones might suggest a set of political urchins, who, while 
 capable, like other urchins, of fine sallies of bravery and 
 generosity, know not the value of what they handle, and 
 would burn an insurance policy to fire a to} cannon. 
 Mr. Wasson closed with the following summaiy : 
 
 1. To the laws of welfare, which are the ratio between 
 necessary conditions and obligatory ends, every man s 
 allegiance is due. But welfare is a qualitative term, sig 
 nifying an elevated manner of life. Only to this are we 
 ideally bound ; any other bond imposed is enslaving. 
 
 2. Human government arises to represent the just force 
 of that system of laws, and human law is legitimate when 
 it stands transparently for their authority. 
 
 3. A quality in man adequate to the representation of 
 these laws is Nature s basis for all governing function ; rule 
 which does not signify a respect to qualit} 7 in man, and 
 through that an allegiance to right ends of life, is a bar 
 barism Nature may tolerate for a day, but surely will not 
 tolerate forever. 
 
 Rev. WILLIAM H. CHANNING said that " extemporaneous 
 remark on a theme so grand, and so ably treated by the 
 essayist, must needs be insufficient. Also, before com 
 menting on the essa} T , there was need to know more precisely 
 what the author meant by will, what by welfare, and 
 what by law. " 
 
 "We can find no ultimate source of authority," Mr. Chan- 
 ning said, "except being, personal being, God himself. 
 Essential goodness is the will which presides over us. We 
 have heard that there is no sanctity in a caucus, and there 
 
THOU SHALT. 101 
 
 is a sense in which it is so ; nevertheless we see that God 
 sometimes speaks in the hearts of a whole people. It is 
 on account of this unquestionable fact that I trust in uni 
 versal suffrage. Also, I expect great benefit from the next 
 step towards getting the voice of humanity as a whole, 
 namely, the voting of women. Let us listen religiously to 
 the voice of God which will speak through the heart of 
 woman. If she apprehends this responsibility aright, and 
 uses it aright, she will be to us a prophet, a savior." 
 
 Mrs. HOWE said : " Though I know how solid and logical 
 Mr. Wasson s work has been, and I followed with intense 
 interest as one must follow when he reads, I have wanted 
 several times to say, Stop, you are not leading me right. 
 I do not see where morals can be found, if when we tell a 
 man Thou shalt, he is unable to say I will. The 
 foundation of morals, the very first thing which religion 
 appeals to, is to raise and exert the will ; it is energizing 
 and inspiring, that is the real and palpable element of 
 command and authoruyy. And I feel there is something 
 very divine about a caucus. I have a great and very 
 tender reverence for it, no matter how badly it ma} r do. 
 Then I don t like the words beast and brute applied to 
 anything human. However debased a man ma}^ be, I do not 
 think of him in that way one instant. I should say to such 
 a man, What you do is brutal ; what you are is divine. 
 That, I think, would be the way to touch the right string ; 
 the other is demoralizing." 
 
 Mr. WEISS. We must accept the situation. The criti 
 cism of the paper was particularly suggestive. It instantly 
 awoke and sent flashing through every vein of my thought 
 a belief in the old ideal of the republic, toward which all 
 criticism, the most hostile, the most searching, is tending ; 
 and as in all the cases where our friend Mr. Wasson has 
 treated this subject, this one thought has always occurred 
 to me : " How are you going to get your best men, how 
 
102 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 are 3^011 going to get } our best minds to assume that au 
 thority which all the other minds and consciences will 
 recognize as being the best ? " And so I ask in the case 
 of Mr. Wasson, though I love to hear the criticism and 
 agree to every word of it, and I do not think there is a man 
 living who can paint the gold ring, or the caucus ring, or 
 the whiske} ;r ring, or the railroad ring, in colors too black 
 for the truth. How are you going to get the conscientious 
 men, the true and just men ? 
 
 It seems to me we have to recognize one plain fact, 
 as we have to do in everything which relates to this uni 
 verse, that here we are ; we are not different from what 
 we are, and we are not in any other place. Here are the 
 tools ; we have nothing else. We cannot go to work and 
 forge tools for the future out of the impalpable. You 
 must take men and women just as they are born into the 
 world. All the men and women of this republic are the 
 people who compose the future welfare of the republic. 
 Mr. Wasson spoke of the beginning of superficial equality ; 
 and it is onl} r in the beginning of superficial equalit} T that 
 the cereal product of earth becomes fit for the food of man. 
 When the forests which covered the earth and usurped the 
 nourishment of the soil were cut away, were the victims of 
 a cataclysm or a catastrophe, the buried grass first began 
 to appear; and it was superficial equality. Each blade 
 was very hirsute, and not fit to eat ; yet it contained the 
 life of the human race. The ancient people understood 
 it perfectly well, in the tradition that the grass which grew 
 on the mountain-side was transformed into men. I only 
 mean to say that in America it is superficial equality which 
 is going to furnish you with the staff of life. It is by having 
 all the men and all the women turned into it that this mill of 
 government is slowly going to refine itself in the future : I 
 do not see what else. I would like to ask Mr. Wasson to re 
 flect upon that point. Has he any other way of eliminating 
 
THOU SHALT. 103 
 
 the best mind, and best justice, and best authority, to 
 secure the universal welfare? Is not that the practical 
 point, that here we are, such as we are ; and we have got 
 to work with the good that is within us ? 
 . Mrs. LIVERMORE said : u While Mr. Wasson was reading 
 his paper, I could not but assent to all that he was saying 
 concerning the evil tendencies of the times, concerning the 
 terrible upheaval of the late war which has brought all sorts 
 of uncleanness to the surface. And then I said, Does it fol 
 low that the republic is a failure ; that, after all, this experi 
 ment that we have tried of a government carried on b} T the 
 people is bearing us to anarchy? and I thought, Wlvy, we 
 have not a republic : we have tried a form of government in 
 which we have allowed the masculine mind to rule, but we 
 have never yet invoked the feminine nature. I have great 
 faith that whenever the men of our country our misgov 
 erned country call to their aid the female half of nature, 
 which may not be better, but is different, and was intended 
 by God to supplement and complement the other half 
 that we shall find we have taken a new departure from 
 that hour." 
 
 ABBY KELLEY FOSTER observed, " I would remark that 
 the old adage, There is a power behind the throne that is 
 stronger than the throne, and which moves the power, is 
 the whole sum and substance of the great general concep 
 tion uttered here. As Mr. Gerrit Smith once said, The 
 power behind the throne is made up of the masses ; and 
 because the masses have not felt their responsibility, the 
 rulers have not felt it. Shall it be said that because the 
 masses have not been educated up to the point to which 
 they need to be, that then the government is a failure? 
 The very business of government is to raise the moral and 
 intellectual standard of the people. " 
 
 Hon. GEORGE B. LORING said, " I am happy to say 
 that I have heard more of just such talk as this among the 
 
104 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 common people in their caucuses and assemblies than some 
 of the more refined might suppose. There is an immense 
 amount of common-sense, conscience, and humanity in the 
 masses of the common people, more than we think there is, 
 sometimes ; and I assure you it is the hardest thing in the 
 world to lead the masses of men astray. Their sense of jus 
 tice is keen. I am not surprised that so much is said of 
 corruption in means. Wherever the carcase is, there will 
 the eagles be. But they are not all eagles. I don t believe 
 anything is pure. I think there is a spot somewhere in the 
 heart that we all have to get rid of the best way we can ; 
 and the individual heart is a t}*pe of the public heart. In 
 spite of all the discouraging facts of the situation, I have 
 great hope. I have seen through all our history one great 
 fact, and that is, that that which is dominant, that which 
 has ruled all men, has been obedience to nationality." 
 The speaker commented on the purity of Washington, 
 and said: "There never has been a time in this country 
 when the great ruling thought of the countiy has not been 
 saved by universal suffrage . It is not a question of educa 
 tion, a man is not required to know the alphabet to teach 
 him right and wrong : and so, I think, one of the great 
 marvels of our time has been the way in which the masses 
 of the people have reasoned up to the great ruling thought, 
 and supported it." 
 
 The discussion was thus terminated, and the company 
 dispersed. 
 
MUSIC. 105 
 
 XV. 
 
 MUSIC, 
 i 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 THOSE who have been accustomed to hear Mr. Weiss 
 need not be assured that his essay on " Music" was 
 full of melody and harmony, and that it wrought the effect 
 of rich and deep music on the hearers. I can only give the 
 scattered fragments which follow. 
 
 Mr. WEISS began by saying that every age has its own 
 style of art, which, after serving the purpose of its time, 
 gives place to another. The voices of Nature are variously 
 interpreted by men, and each period finds its own appro 
 priate form of expression. The ancient Greeks wrought 
 wonders in stone. Instead of expending our strength in 
 the attempt to imitate or surpass them, should we not 
 rather assume that the Phidian exigency has passed, and 
 turn to labors more suitable to our own time ? 
 
 He cited the somewhat remarkable fact that there were 
 certain great writers, like Ben Jonson, Pope, and Burke, 
 who had no music in their souls, cared nothing for it. 
 This he explained satisfactorily to himself. His theory 
 was that the microscopic disks in the cochlea of the ear 
 discovered by Helmboldt were in the above instances 
 disarranged naturally, and could not recognize and tele 
 graph to the brain the pleasure in harmony that is the 
 delight of other ears. But most great writers and noted 
 
106 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 men like Shakspeare, Milton, Tennj son, and of all oth 
 ers the last to be thought of, Nero were fond of music 
 and capable to a large degree of appreciating its appeals 
 to the soul. 
 
 Mr. Weiss then went on to show what music is, by 
 pointing out where it fails us, or, in other words, what it 
 is not. For instance, music cannot imitate anything. The 
 imitations of the voices of animals, which the performer 
 on the violin executes with good effect generally, are onty 
 perfect so far as we anticipate and make an effort to 
 recognize them as such. To be brief, music is in no way 
 descriptive ; it cannot describe anything. As illustrative 
 of this point, the essayist referred frequently to well-known 
 S} T mphonies by Beethoven, Mendelssohn, and others, in 
 which the word attributed by some writers on music might 
 be replaced by its opposite, and the description still hold 
 good. In the latter part of his essay Mr. Weiss sought to 
 define to some extent the place that music occupies among 
 the arts, or rather to sum up in a few words what it has to 
 do with us. It speaks to us in language to which words 
 cannot possibly be adapted : and, in fact, if a S3 mphony 
 could be completely expressed in words, the need of con 
 veying it to us through music would be eliminated. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON had highly enjoj ed Mr. Weiss s testimony 
 to the superiority of words over music as a means of de 
 scription : words have this advantage, that exact descrip 
 tion or criticism can be given only in them. He doubted 
 whether there was any soundness in the claim of supe 
 rior expressiveness in music. Odors are as suggestive as 
 sounds, and the power of association belongs to all our 
 senses. External life is secondaiy, human life is primaiy, 
 as even Thoreau, the champion of external nature, had 
 felt himself obliged to confess. 
 
MUSIC. 107 
 
 Dr. BARTOL quoted the opinion of Mendelssohn that 
 language was less definite than music, but declared his own 
 opinion to be otherwise. Words contain most and suggest 
 most. Genuine, sincere words surpass musical notes in 
 the expression of spiritual as well as material things. Pie 
 referred to the experience of Dr. Channing, who found 
 new tones developed in his voice through his experience 
 as preacher and pastor. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE thought that by the alternation of words 
 and music a ladder of ascent might be formed, reaching 
 heights greater than either b} T itself could bring us to. 
 
 Mr. WEISS, referring to an apparent misunderstanding 
 of his meaning by some of the speakers, said that he had 
 not intended to declare music superior to speech, but to 
 say that it produced some effects, recalled some impres 
 sions, which words did not produce or recall. Something 
 is done to the appreciative hearer of the best music which 
 is not done to him by Shakspeare or Dante. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON referred to the fact that no woman had 
 ever excelled in the composition of music, though many had 
 admirably illustrated it b} performance. 
 
 ROBERT DALE OWEN said that even if women have not 
 composed highest music, the lady who wrote "Charles 
 Auchester " taught us better than most composers have 
 done the power of music. 
 
 A lady expressed her conviction that music is the highest 
 kind of language. An orchestra, she thought, has greater 
 power over the audience than any speaker. Music repre 
 sents God to the soul better than words can do. It 
 gives a clearer expression to spiritual things. If women 
 have not yet distinguished themselves in musical composi 
 tion, it is because their time has not yet arrived ; and she 
 declared her conviction of the superiority of Robert Schu 
 mann to all other musical composers, and found in his 
 pieces a clearer expression of the thought and feeling 
 
108 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 intended than in those of any other composer. This merit 
 she ascribed to the remarkable combination, in him, of 
 masculine and feminine characteristics. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT closed the conversation by remarking that 
 the best music is that which quickens human emotion to 
 move towards the promotion of the welfare of humanity. 
 
SAPPHO. 109 
 
 XVI 
 
 SAPPHO. 
 
 BY THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSOtf. 
 
 THE lovely city of Mitylene, on the island of Lesbos, 
 was one of the centres, long ago, of the highest 
 Greek civilization. We think of it now, however, only as 
 the home of Sappho ; for it was in the city of Mitylene that 
 she lived and loved, and taught and sang. Her birthplace 
 was at nearly the other end of Lesbos, in the little village 
 of Cresos, where the women seem to have been more beau 
 tiful than elsewhere, and the bread better ; and where, as 
 in very few parts of Greece, the women, perhaps because 
 they still make the same good bread, are now admitted to 
 share the meals of the men. Sappho was favored in her 
 birthplace and in her nurture ; but one likes best to think 
 of her in her later abode of Mitylene, where she lived her 
 true life. Here, in some grove of olive or n^yrtle, or in 
 that marble house which she called the " Dwelling of the 
 Muses," one finds her among the maidens and wives who 
 had come from other parts of Greece to share her training. 
 Anactoria is here from Miletus, Eunica from Salamis, 
 G ongyla from Colophon. Erinna and Damophila are study 
 ing the difficult art of verse in the Sapphic meters ; Althis 
 learns how to strike the harp with the plectron which Sap 
 pho invented ; some o ne else embroiders a sacred robe for 
 the temple. Sappho corrects the rhythm of one, the notes 
 of another, the stitches of a third ; then bids them abandon 
 
110 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 their work to rehearse together some sacred chorus, or stop 
 to read a verse, or shall one say it ? to expose and 
 satirize a rival. If Andromeda, the fascinating, draws 
 away Sappho s pupils to one of those rival feminine acade 
 mies which extend as far as illiterate Sparta, then Sappho 
 may at least be allowed to remark, " and her language is 
 plain," that Andromeda does not know how to dress herself. 
 Out of the long list of Greek poetesses there were seven 
 women who, as the Greek anthology sa} s, were " divinely- 
 tongued," speaking like gods ; and of these Sappho was 
 the admitted chief. Homer was known to that nation as 
 " the poet," and Sappho as " the poetess." She is believed 
 to have lived somewhere between the years 628 and 572 
 B. c., thus dating three or four centuries after Homer, and 
 two centuries before the time of Pericles. Her husband s 
 name was Cercolas ; but little more than his name is known 
 of him. It is supposed that Sappho early became a widow, 
 and that most of her poetic career was during her widow 
 hood. The story of her family records little more than 
 their names ; and of the facts of her own life history treats 
 so vaguely as to leave us in most unsatisfactory ignorance. 
 We do not even know with certaint} T whether she was beau 
 tiful. Tradition represents her as little and dark ; but tra 
 dition sa} s the same of Cleopatra, and we cannot put aside 
 as unimportant the crises in the world s story brought about 
 by small brunettes. Plato calls her " the beautiful Sap 
 pho," and Plutarch and others use similar epithets. The 
 loveliest thing of all was said of her, naturally enough, by 
 a man who loved her, Aleseus. He called her 
 
 "Violet-crowned, pure, sweetly smiling Sappho." 
 
 The freshness of those violets, the charm of that smile, 
 the assurance of that purity, all rest upon that one line, and 
 rest securely. The most remarkable intellectual associa 
 tion of Sappho s life was undoubtedly that which she held 
 
SAPPHO. Ill 
 
 with this same Alcseus ; but there is not only no evidence 
 that she returned his love, but considerable reason to think 
 she did not. These two will always be united in fame as 
 the joint founders of the lyric poetr} 7 of Greece, and there 
 fore of the world. There were no limits to the enthusiasm 
 felt in ancient times for the poetry of Sappho. A tradition 
 is preserved that even in her lifetime the recitation of one 
 of her poems so affected the great law-giver, Solon, that he 
 expressed the wish that he might not die till he had learned 
 it by heart. Plato called her "the tenth Muse." 
 
 Now why is it that over a woman so admired in her own 
 time some cloud of reproach has so long lingered ? Modern 
 critics account for this by two simple reasons. First, be 
 cause she had to endure the cruel criticism which mere con- 
 spicuousness in a woman always provokes ; and secondly, 
 and more especially, because she was the scapegoat of a 
 quarrel between two types of Greek civilization. She 
 stood between the simplicity of the old Greek manners and 
 the luxurious culture of the new. In half-barbarous peri 
 ods, like the Homeric, women enjo} T the simplicity and free 
 dom of a peasant life. And the poetry of Homer shows 
 that women were then held in honor. But as culture ad 
 vances, the question comes up what to do with the women. 
 Sparta solved it in the old rough way, and said, " We must 
 exclude the culture." Softer, more polished Athens said, 
 " No, let us let in the culture, but exclude the women." 
 Lesbos and the JEolian colonies said, "Let us have the 
 culture and extend it to the women." The3 r stood thus 
 between the two extremes, and their reputation and their 
 civilization were crushed in the process. The Athenians 
 thought the uncultured freedom which Sparta accorded to 
 her women bad enough ; but when Lesbos gave to hers a 
 cultured freedom, it was intolerable, and those reckless pre- 
 Bohemians, the comedians of Athens, began to pick up mud 
 and stones to throw at the one woman who had most glori- 
 
112 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 fied Lesbos. An openly immoral Aspasia was tolerated at 
 Athens ; but for a better poet and wit at Lesbos to be at 
 the same time an example of the domestic virtues was not 
 to be tolerated. 
 
 It is fortunate, perhaps, for historic justice that we have 
 within our reach an illustration of the way in which a whole 
 race of women may be misconstrued. If a Frenchman vis 
 its America and sees a } oung girl walking or driving with 
 a 3 oung man, he assumes at once that she is of a doubt 
 ful character ; just as an Athenian imagined that a Les 
 bian woman who taught what in Athens no modest woman 
 was allowed to know must be no better than she should be. 
 An Athenian would no more imagine any difference between 
 Sappho and Aspasia than a Frenchman between Margaret 
 Fuller and George Sand. If they saw any apparent differ 
 ence, they imputed it to the additional vice of lrypocris3 T . 
 So they set the fashion, which future ages too long followed, 
 of writing Sappho down. Ovid, himself corrupt, censured 
 her, and his censure has been echoed by Christian ecclesi 
 astics. But modern research and criticism have the honor 
 of giving us back our Sappho, " violet-crowned and pure." 
 Since the essay of the German Welcker (1816), the name 
 of Sappho has stood clear and honorable among nearty all 
 competent scholars. Among her vindicators Bishop Thirl- 
 wall may be honorably mentioned. 
 
 As Sappho was widely distinguished as a teacher, and 
 trained pupils in music, poetry, and embroidery, her 
 time must have been fully occupied. An account of her 
 academy, written by Maximus Tyrius, still remains to 
 us. To be sure, one stout Scotch Presbyterian, Colonel 
 Mure, has taken up the cudgels against her as fiercely 
 as John Knox did against the fair Queen Mary ; thus 
 showing, as Professor Felton says, the native antagonism 
 between Scotch Presb3 terianism and handsome women. 
 But the position taken against Sappho by this latest of 
 
SAPPHO. 113 
 
 the unfavorable critics is better accounted for by the 
 essential impurity of Colonel Mure s mind. The argument 
 against the purity of " the tenth Muse," which unkind in 
 genuity has wrought out from disjointed fragments of her 
 poetry, falls to the ground when one considers the dramatic 
 attitude which she first introduced into poetry. If one is 
 to be called to account for having personally occupied every 
 position one describes, it will go hard with the poets. 
 Shall some forty-fourth century Colonel Mure so arraign 
 Robert Browning, who depicts every conceivable variety of 
 age, sex, and sin? Why, he could only be saved by the 
 sheer impossibility of being indicted in any court for so 
 many crimes. 
 
 The beautiful fragments which have been handed down 
 to us of Sappho s verse fully explain the raptures of the 
 ancients ; and her one complete poem which remains, the 
 "Hymn to Aphrodite," has, it is safe to say, excited 
 more enthusiasm among critics than any verse of Dante, 
 any sonnet of Petrarch s, or any song of Shakspeare. 
 Hear a verse or two of it, and see how its subtile beauty 
 survives even the hazard of translation. Suffering from 
 the pain of disappointed love, she has summoned Aphro 
 dite, love s goddess, whom at length she sees before her, 
 smiling, with face immortal in its beauty. 
 
 "Asking what I sought, thus hopeless in desiring, 
 Wildered in brain and spreading nets of passion, 
 Alas, for whom ? and saidst thou, "Who has harmed thee, 
 my poor Sappho ? 
 
 " Trust me, though he flies, ere long he shall pursue thee, 
 Fearing thy gifts, he, too, in turn shall bring them : 
 Loveless to-day, to-morrow he shall woo thee 
 Though thou shouldst spurn him. " 
 
 A love of external nature is one of the features promi 
 nent in the fragments of Sappho. She says little of her- 
 
114 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 self. She seems to have belonged to that class of enemies 
 of the human race who give out riddles to be guessed b}* 
 their neighbors. Her excuse is that this art was in great 
 demand in Greek societ} 7 . 
 
 Sappho never mentioned, in the fragments which remain 
 to us, the name of Phaon, supposed to have been her 
 lover ; but she must have loved some one : what matter 
 whether he were Phaon or another? Stern criticism also 
 pretty nearly does away with her Leucadian leap, and 
 leaves us uncertain as to how and where she died. It is 
 certainly difficult to suppose that the most lovelorn lady, 
 living upon an island where every shore was a precipice, 
 should take ship and sail for weary days over five hundred 
 miles of water to seek a more available rock. Be this as 
 it may, Sappho is gone, as are her music, her pupils, and 
 the city where she dwelt, all, save the island she loved, 
 ,and a few meagre gleanings from her w r ords. But this 
 woman, who lived twenty-five centuries ago, played such 
 a part in moulding the great literature which has moulded 
 the world, that the women of to-day have made little pro 
 gress unless they do that and more. Greece idealized 
 woman, and degraded her. We have outgrown, in the 
 centuries which have passed since then, the theories of 
 an exclusively masculine social life, but we still make 
 our political life masculine onty, and shall fail like the 
 Greeks, who rejected the hint furnished by the -ZEolian 
 school of Sappho, unless we learn wisdom from their 
 failure. 
 
 Miss PEABODY agreed in the correctness of the parallel, 
 or rather the statement of points of resemblance, between 
 Sappho and Margaret Fuller. She had supposed Aspasia 
 also to have been substantially vindicated, and was sur 
 prised to hear the censure upon her which had been 
 
SAPPHO. 115 
 
 implied, if not expressed, in the essay. She thought the 
 view of her taken in Lander s " Imaginary Conversations " 
 the correct one. 
 
 Prof. GOODWIN of Cambridge said he had been surprised 
 to find an ill judgment of Sappho so widely prevailing in 
 former times. He had been brought up in the doctrine 
 taught b} T Prof. Felton on that subject, and heartily agreed 
 with the representations of the essay. 
 
 Mr. WASSON, liking much in the essay, disagreed with 
 its concluding sentence. He thought the change from 
 literaiy culture to politics was a descent, and that politics 
 rarely improved those who dealt in them. 
 
 Mr. POWELL of New York was very glad of that last 
 sentence ; glad of the moral to be drawn for our life and 
 times from the story of Sappho s ; glad to hear afresh 
 how far back the glories and achievements of woman 
 dated, and to realize what encouragements were to be 
 drawn from these facts for our present labors. 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY found in Margaret Fuller a beautiful in 
 stance of the individual power of character, leaving a great 
 impression with but few writings. Sappho, she thought, 
 may have been of this sort. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON said : " As to the differences between 
 Margaret Fuller and George Sand, and between Sappho 
 and Aspasia, if we could get at the facts, perhaps no 
 defence would be necessary ; but in the existing obscurit}^ 
 inferences will be drawn on both sides, and there is no 
 help for it. It is well to hold on to all the representative 
 women of the world ; but happy is that cause whose rep 
 resentatives do not need to have allowances made for 
 them. As to Aspasia and George Sand, it is very difficult 
 to discriminate ; the gentlest judgment must still find 
 something to be explained awa} or apologized for. Mar 
 garet Fuller has written very well on that point, justifying 
 Mary Wollstoncraft, but saying that such as she, though 
 
116 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the prophets of a new era, could never be the parents of 
 it. These last must be unquestioned and unquestionable 
 persons. While there is much to discourage, there is 
 much to encourage." 
 
 Miss HANNAH STEVENSON thought that character and 
 principle, matters of the greatest consequence, were here 
 involved. It was bad to have it supposed that one could 
 be at once wisest, greatest and meanest, as was said of 
 Bacon. Great principles are condensed in these contro 
 versies about individuals. 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 117 
 
 XVII. 
 
 ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 
 
 BY MARY GREW. 
 
 THE founders of every system of religion, of every 
 sect, of ever} school of philosophy, have been more 
 or less misrepresented, and their teachings grossly per 
 verted by their friends and followers. The more intense 
 the interest excited by the system, the greater will be 
 this misrepresentation and perversion. This is inevitable, 
 for the conditions are the natural imperfection of the hu 
 man intellect, the great number of interpreters, and the 
 tendency of enthusiasm to intensify the diversity of in 
 terpretations when the opposing advocates meet for con 
 flict. The religious element being the strongest in the 
 human soul, religious controversies and wars have been 
 the most bitter and deadly which the world has known ; 
 and in their process it is not strange that creed or the 
 ory, transformed into a battle-cry, should lose its original 
 spirit. 
 
 One who is interested in Swedenborg, Luther, George 
 Fox, or John Wesley must learn what they thought from 
 their writings, not from the comments or the lives of their 
 followers. Few thoughtful persons will deiry that in a dis 
 cussion of Christianity it is fair to claim that it shall be in 
 terpreted or defined from its founder s life and teaching, 
 not from those of his followers. What, then, did Jesus 
 Christ teach? What did he propose as essential to his 
 
118 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 religion and the eternal life of man? What did he say 
 was the object of his mission ? He answered these ques 
 tions when he said, " For this end was I born, and for 
 this cause came I into the world, that I might bear witness 
 unto the truth." But what truth? It is with this inquiry 
 that the mistake arose which confounds theology and re 
 ligion, the one a science, a schedule of propositions to 
 be apprehended. intellectually ; the other an inspiration and 
 a life. The question, What is Christianity? is but ask 
 ing, What were the main ideas in the teachings ofChrist ? 
 Surely these two, the fatherhood of God, and the brother 
 hood of man. The ideal of God which he presented was 
 that of a father, loving and tender be3 ond human concep 
 tion ; tenderest to those who most needed him. The duty 
 toward God which he enjoined was reverent love and trust 
 and obedience ; the duty toward man, brotherly love and 
 brotherly service. His religion was preached to the hum 
 ble, uncultured souls of his time, and the common people 
 heard him gladly ; but no philosopher or metaphysician 
 has ever evolved a system of ethics equal to that which he 
 taught, or given to the world a rule of life so profound and 
 so simple as his precept, " Whatsoever ye would that men 
 should do to }T)u, do } e even so unto them." He did not 
 propound dogmas which required laborious intellectual 
 comprehension. On the contrary, he only asked of his 
 followers that they should trust the Father whom he re 
 vealed, and to this end he desired that the t y should become 
 as little children. He would have them show love to God 
 by love toman ; by feeding the hungry, clothing the naked, 
 ministering to the sick, and comforting the afflicted. 
 Whether the dogmas which the Church presents us are 
 true or false, they do not belong to the religion of Christ ; 
 whether good or evil in their tendencies, they are not to 
 be charged upon him. If Christianity be interpreted lry 
 the words and life of Jesus, does it not command our pro- 
 
. ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 119 
 
 foundest reverence in proportion to our development in 
 virtue, holiness, and love? We sometimes hear that cer 
 tain ancient moral philosophers and religious teachers who 
 lived before Jesus was born gave to the world moral pre 
 cepts similar to those upon which he has impressed his 
 name. But why is it, I ask, that his name, and not theirs, 
 is indelibly impressed upon them ; and why has not one 
 of them taken such a grip of the world s heart, unless it 
 was that never man spake like this man " ? 
 
 The advocates of the religion of Jesus may justly com 
 plain that the leaders of the Church are responsible for 
 much of the criticism made upon that religion. One ob 
 jector sa} T s, " I cannot be a Christian, because if I am I 
 must sanction slavery and war and the taking of oaths. 
 Those who expound Christianity find in it the sanction for 
 these things." The responsibility of such rejection as this 
 rests heavily upon the leaders of .Christian churches. They, 
 not Christ, have piled upon men s shoulders burdens griev 
 ous to be borne. They have constructed various sj stems 
 of doctrine and ritual which they have presented to men as 
 the embodiment of that religion, and taught that belief and 
 observance of these were necessary conditions of Christian 
 character, while their standard of morals has alwa} T s been 
 little higher than that of the government under which they 
 have lived. The Antislavery struggle of thirty years in 
 this nation revealed most clearly the character of the 
 American church. Not only did it uphold that wicked 
 system, but the negro and his defenders were alike the 
 objects of the church s scorn. It fell into the grave error 
 of thinking creed more important than character. Of one 
 branch of the American church it was wittily said that it 
 was so occupied with "original sin" that it had no time 
 for the consideration of actual transgression. That the 
 church and the clergy have usually been in all ages the 
 opponents of moral reforms is the testimony of Albert 
 
120 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Barnes, a clergyman honored in the Presbyterian Church 
 of America. 
 
 The fact is that the Church has fallen into the grave 
 error of accounting the soundness of a man s creed and 
 form of worship of more importance than his moral char 
 acter. The churches, Papal and Protestant, bearing the 
 Christian name, have forged fetters for human thought and 
 practical!}- sought to impose them. In the departments of 
 religion, of science, of art, the Church has placed its spir 
 itual detectives, who have stood trembling at the progress 
 of thought, of discoveiy, of invention, and who have been 
 prompt in the use of club and fetters. It was an extreme 
 Protestant illustration of this fact which was recently fur 
 nished by the New York clergyman who announced that 
 44 science must stop, or religion cannot go on." Yet while 
 this absurd declaration awakens the ridicule of the Church 
 to-day, multitudes of its leaders are crying in alarm, 
 " Doubts of our creeds and our rituals must be suppressed, 
 or religion will die out of the land. Freedom of thought 
 is dangerous to religion." 
 
 Upon the leaders of the Church who have thus slandered 
 Christ and his teaching, I charge the responsibility of much 
 of the rejection of Christianity. 
 
 The objectors to Christianity have often been intelligent 
 men, yet they have made the blunder of taking their idea 
 of that system from the followers instead of the founder. 
 Instead of this we must look at the words and acts of 
 Jesus himself, study his life, and judge of his spirit by 
 that as well as by his words. Let us go back to that 
 life spent in doing good ; to that boundless pity ; that 
 tender love, which reserved its rebukes for prosperous 
 hypocrites, and poured out its treasures on publicans 
 and sinners. The fruit is not all, but by its fruits you 
 know the tree. Christianity thus understood will prove 
 attractive to man} who reject it as now presented in the 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 121 
 
 churches. Nowhere will they find anything more worthy 
 their acceptance. 
 
 Christianity consists of 
 
 1. Faith in God (not belief in a creed, but confidence in 
 a Father) ; 
 
 2. The soul s consciousness of its intimate filial relation 
 to God ; and 
 
 3. Love to God and the neighbor, co-existing with the 
 faith above mentioned. 
 
 Out of these vital principles all true religion grows, and 
 upon them Christianity is based. To them Jesus always 
 appealed, referring his hearers for corroborative testimony 
 to their own consciences. Facts of spiritual conscious 
 ness are our true foundation, not less than facts in the 
 other departments of human life. Our highest ideal is 
 God, whom we assume to be perfectly just and perfectly 
 benevolent. We know that justice and benevolence are 
 right in themselves, and we know also that they are suited 
 to promote human welfare. We think no more of doubt 
 ing these facts of consciousness than of doubting the 
 multiplication table. The very claim of the existence of 
 internal evidence of the inspiration of the Bible is an 
 admission of the existence of an adequate standard of 
 judgment in our own minds by which that inspiration is 
 to be tested. 
 
 The best foundation for a Christian character is the love 
 of God and the desire of conformity to his will. The best 
 illustration of Christianity is the life of Jesus. " Father," 
 he said, " I know that thou nearest me always." Every one 
 of us should understand and recognize this intimate rela 
 tion as existing also between ourselves and the Father. 
 It is a low idea of God to assume that he communicates 
 the knowledge of himself to Christians only. This assump 
 tion is the dictate of narrow bigotiy. The Universal 
 Father is mindful of all his children. He has not left him- 
 
122 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 self without witness in any soul. His testimonies are 
 within us as well as around us. But his highest lessons 
 were taught us through Jesus, revealing the way to him 
 self and the truth concerning himself. 
 
 The first speaker was Dr. BARTOL. He felt sure that all 
 present agreed in considering this essa}* a correct exposition 
 of what its author undertook to describe. Perhaps now 
 we might well go on to inquire, What was Jesus? 
 
 The loudest declarations of loyattr to him may be fur 
 thest off from a real understanding of his character. Pro 
 fessions and compliments were no good test. 
 
 The great mistake about Jesus is to suppose that he 
 intended any system. He wished rather to show us a 
 method, to give us a spiritual impulse and motive. In 
 the mind of Jesus, so clear was God s truth that any dog 
 matic system would have been an offence to him. One step 
 of approach to him is the recognition that he taught no 
 system. Another step of approach to him is the recognition 
 that he did not look down only. He looked up, having, 
 no doubt, an ideal which he never reached, never realized. 
 Was he the embodiment of all those best things that he 
 conceived? We are told that he grew in favor with God 
 and man. Did he ever get his growth? Do we any of us 
 get our growth here ? 
 
 What we owe to Jesus, more than to any other, is that 
 over him floated, almost visibry, the ideal of what man 
 should become. The great means of being in sympathy with 
 him is, like him, to look up ; like him, to strive toward the 
 highest. Unitarian or Trinitarian matters little. Is the 
 man himself upward-looking, at once abashed and exalted 
 by the vision of God? If so, be he Jew or Gentile, with 
 him Jesus would have fellowshipped. Jesus knew no boun 
 daries. He knew none between God and himself, for he 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 123 
 
 said, " I and my Father are one ; " knew none between 
 himself and man : did he not call himself The Son of 
 man " ? It was the infinity of his spiritual life which has 
 made him the power he has been so long. Dr. Bartol 
 thought that all would agree that in this method of 
 Jesus there is something ultimate and final. He hit on a 
 line of beauty, which must be recognized as something real 
 and substantial, running through heaven and earth, through 
 time and eternity. 
 
 Col. HIGGIXSOX spoke of Dr. Bartol s remarks as so fine 
 that they prostrated and submerged criticism, and that after 
 such an improvisation discussion seemed hardly allowable. 
 All must admire the sweetness of tone and the spiritual 
 appreciation of Jesus which Miss Grew has shown ; but, 
 like the anti-sceptical course of sermons given in this cit\- 
 last winter, she does not confront the real objection. She 
 does not take a leading type of those who disavow the 
 Christian name, like Abbot, Huxley, and Herbert Spencer. 
 Mr. Abbot also goes to the record ; but he takes all, and 
 does not pick out the sweet and lovely things in the life of 
 Jesus to make a character of. If we go to histor}* at all, 
 we must take ah 1 it gives. According to that, Jesus was 
 not merely a spiritual teacher, but a Jewish Messiah, look 
 ing to rule in the new heaven and new earth, and announc 
 ing that he himself was to come in that very generation 
 ;t to judge the quick and the dead." Belief in the second 
 advent of Christ is still the overwhelming faith of the 
 Christian Church, but the Church has extended the time. 
 Jesus himself evident!} taught that he was to come again 
 before the men of his own day should be gathered to their 
 fathers. He considered the teaching of the things here 
 mentioned an essential part of his mission, and we must 
 admit them into our estimate of him. Can any one read 
 the Gospels candidly, and not see this? If Christ had 
 taught merely the fatherhood of God and the brotherhood 
 
124 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 of man, Mr. Abbot might have been a Christian. His 
 disavowal of that name is justified b}~ his quotations from 
 the record. Whether such disavowal is the wiser course, 
 compared, for instance, with the position of Mr. Emerson, 
 who is too busy to disavow, and leaves his attitude to be 
 divined from his works and defined by others, ma} be 
 questionable. Mr. Higginson had always thought that the 
 word " Christian " had little more significance than the title 
 "Reverend." There was not much in it, but it was not 
 worth the trouble of disavowing. There are certain advan 
 tages in keeping the Christian name. It keeps one in 
 relation with more souls. Christianity is a historic and 
 secular word, as well as a religious one. Theodore 
 Parker, feeling all this, always called himself a Chris 
 tian. To offset these advantages, if you do name your 
 self Christian, you are liable to be constantly called to 
 account for your opinions, and explain them, and smooth 
 over and pretend something that you do not believe. On 
 the whole, Mr. Higginson thought, there was a point of 
 view for the non-Christian side not represented in the 
 essay. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT said that while he accepted and endorsed 
 Miss Grew s definition of Christianity as a practical sys 
 tem, yet the question must be bravely met, whether, after 
 all, Jesus was other than a radical of his time. The 
 assertion of miraculous works did not prove his divinity ; 
 for some of the wisest men question the fact. Was he not 
 a great teacher, who was treated as all teachers in advance 
 of their time are treated ? He was a great teacher ; yet 
 he said to his disciples, " Greater works than these shall 
 ye do." 
 
 Rev. FRANCIS TIFFANY said the work of distinguishing 
 between the followers of a man and the man himself could 
 never be avoided, because no amount of explicit statement 
 and no amount of clear action can ever prevent a man 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 125 
 
 from becoming one of the greatest oppressors of human 
 thought, from the fact that his works fall into the hands of 
 narrow men. Neither Calvin, nor Luther, nor Theodore 
 Parker ever claimed to be infallible ; but he had seen fol 
 lowers of each of those men who had the spirit within them 
 to burn another who differed from an} T thing that one of those 
 men had said. It seemed to him to be a waste of time to 
 define words when they admitted of such a latitude of 
 interpretation. It was very evident that the word " Chris 
 tian " stood in the mind of Miss Grew for a line of beauty 
 in life and character, and he did not believe that it could 
 be overthrown by any man s protest. 
 
 Mr. R. P. HALLOWELL said: "The great objection we 
 have to giving up the name Christian is from our educa 
 tion, which has led us to regard Jesus as a final authority." 
 The worship of Jesus was really idolatry, false and dan 
 gerous like all other idol worship. 
 
 Gen. ARMSTRONG spoke vigorously in behalf of practical 
 Christianity. He thought the true representatives of Or 
 thodoxy were to be found, not among the clerg} , but among 
 the men and women who were quietly and unostentatiously 
 doing the practical work of spreading Christianit} T ; and he 
 thought the system ought to be judged by the latter rather 
 than the former. He related his experience in the Sand 
 wich Islands, where his father was a missionary, and he 
 spent several years witnessing such heroic self-sacrifice as 
 he believed no other religion could induce. In order to 
 replace Christianity he thought there must arise a system 
 which should not only be logical, but generate enthusiasm. 
 He liked nothing better than being enrolled under a leader, 
 and he believed that Christ was the true leader of humanity. 
 He thought that Christ was Catholic and not Protestant, 
 and that he represents all that is good in Protestant 
 ism and Roman Catholicism and Mormonism and Radi 
 calism, and that no one had any right to attempt to 
 fasten upon him the name of a class. 
 
126 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Col. HIGGINSON fully appreciated Gen. Armstrong s 
 admiration for the noble work done by the missionaries, 
 but called his attentton to the fact that one had only to 
 look a little wider to see the same enthusiasms, and that 
 other religions have been equally effective. He fully recog 
 nized the value of having a leader, especially to the 
 young ; but, after all, there is an unspeakable value in 
 the strength which comes when a man can see his leaders, 
 one by one, take their position in the ranks of humanity, 
 and still can see the personal relations which have grown 
 between himself and them. One of the great forming 
 sentences of his life was that saying of Emerson, that, 
 once leave direct acquaintance with God and take sec 
 ondary knowledge, as through St. Paul s mediation or 
 George Fox s or Swedenborg s, and we begin to grow 
 weak. He thought the vital worth of such a book as Plu 
 tarch s "Lives," or his "Morals," or the works of Epic- 
 tetus, is that, while there is a certain charm in Christian 
 works that you do not feel in those, there is in them a mag 
 nificent directness ; there is a feeling that here was a man 
 who depended directly on God. You can wipe out all the 
 religion of Jesus Christ, and all the Renans and Strausses, 
 and it does not affect these men ; and this quality of direct 
 ness, he thought, gives to their work great value. While 
 he knew a great many people who had been strengthened 
 and encouraged b} r Jesus, he saw not less the weakness 
 in some persons which comes from the habit of acting in 
 directly, the habit of acting outside of the inspiration of 
 their own souls. 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY said : " The real life is the life of religion, 
 and this truth agrees with what was said both by the 
 essayist and by Gen. Armstrong. The life is a test of 
 the animating spirit of the individual, but not of the form 
 or the doctrine he holds. Jesus never used the word 
 Christian, and we may feel the just and inspiring ele- 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 127 
 
 mcnt of loyalty whether we use that word or not. Each 
 soul must find religion for itself. The Buddhist meets in 
 the teachings of Buddha the fatherhood of God and the 
 brotherhood of man ; and the devout Mohammedan looks 
 for them, not in vain, in the teachings of Mohammed. Let 
 us seek to dwell in the large country of religion, where 
 is hospitality for all souls." 
 
 Mr. TIFFANY inquired whether the Independents, like 
 Mr. Higginson, did not merely take new leaders, Plutarch, 
 Epictetus, and the like, when the}* proclaimed their free 
 dom from old leaders. Complete isolation was not good 
 for either soul or body. The lonely, independent men 
 after a time degenerate, as Alexander Selkirk did. Our 
 life is fed from external as well as internal fountains ; and 
 the more faithfully one applies himself to both, the better 
 he will develop his right, real self, the estate God gave 
 him to improve. 
 
 Dr. NEWELL said : " The successful religious teachers of 
 all times are those who have patiently worked out some great 
 idea in its application to life. Mere talk about religion is 
 injurious, and a good deal of silence is needed to combat it." 
 
 Mr. R. P. HALLOWELL thought it was singular that, 
 though Jesus teachings were opposed to war, yet, when 
 the countiy became involved in war, we found the Chris 
 tians, not only going themselves, but urging everybody 
 else to go. He inquired whether Gen. Armstrong s idea 
 of Christianity would allow him to enter into fellowship 
 with a man who showed by his life that he loved Chris 
 tianity, and yet believed that Christ was a man. 
 
 Gen. ARMSTRONG replied that faith in Christ was a power 
 which had been more efficient in the moral improvement of 
 the world than any other influence. Still, he believed that 
 a man could have the essential light of Christ without the 
 doctrines of Orthodox} . He thought that denominations in 
 the Church are proper, right, and essential to its progress. 
 
128 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said he believed Miss Grew s essay to be 
 essential Christianity. The spirit which animated it was 
 purely Christian. Christ, he thought, cared not to be wor 
 shipped ; he did not wish men to crouch in lowly reverence 
 at his feet. His purpose was to inspire them with the true 
 feeling which should lead them on in the right way. The 
 church which had been reared on his teaching, Christ 
 never intended, he thought, as a finality. The Bible he 
 deemed a Chinese puzzle, composed of parts which men 
 were endeavoring so to marshal as to construct a map, a 
 chart of heaven ; and the reason wiry the puzzle had never 
 been resolved was that the pieces were not made to fit. 
 Jesus, he thought, holding all heaven in solution, came 
 not to create a church, but to preach the brotherhood of 
 man. Beautifully developed as his nature was, he had an 
 ideal which he strove to attain, that was greater, higher, 
 purer than himself. Men lived in imitation of him, grew 
 closer to his nature, when they also, with upturned faces 
 and earnest spirit, pressed nobly on towards the attain 
 ment of ideal truth and loveliness. 
 
 Mr. WHITTIER, who was unable to attend the meeting, 
 sent with his apology for absence the following lines : 
 
 HOW MAEY GREW. 
 
 With wisdom far beyond her years, 
 And graver than her wondering peers, 
 So strong, so mild, combining still 
 The tender heart and queenly will, 
 To conscience and to duty true, 
 So, up from childhood, Mary Grew ! 
 
 Then, in her gracious womanhood 
 She gave her days to doing good. 
 She dared the scornful laugh of men, 
 The hounding mob, the slanderer s pen. 
 She did the work she found to do, 
 A Christian heroine, Mary Grew ! 
 
ESSENTIAL CHRISTIANITY. 129 
 
 The freed slave thanks her ; blessing conies 
 To her from women s weary homes. 
 The wronged and erring find in her 
 Their censor mild and comforter. 
 The world were safe if but a few 
 Could grow in grace as Mary Grew ! 
 
 So, New Year s Eve, I sit and say, 
 By this low wood-fire, ashen gray ; 
 Just wishing, as the night shuts down, 
 That I could hear in Boston town, 
 In pleasant Chestnut Avenue, 
 From her own lips how Mary Grew ! 
 
 And hear her graceful hostess tell 
 
 The silver- voiced oracle 
 
 Who lately through her parlors spoke 
 
 As through Dodona s sacred oak, 
 
 A wiser truth than any told 
 
 By Sappho s lips of ruddy gold, 
 
 The way to make the world anew, 
 
 Is just to grow as Mary Grew ! 
 
130 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XVIII. 
 RELIGION AND ART. 
 
 BY ATHANASE COQUEREL. 
 
 A THANASE COQUEREL belonged to one of those 
 ~"X French Protestant families so distinguished by the 
 talent and solid virtue of their members. His early ances 
 tors were Jansenistes, and had settled in Rouen. From 
 this city the Coquerel family removed to Paris after having 
 embraced Protestantism. The father of the author of this 
 paper was noted as an elegant and original preacher and a 
 sincere lover of tolerance and freedom of thought. 
 
 His son, Athanase Coquerel, was born in Amsterdam in 
 Holland during his father s residence in that countiy. He 
 began at first his education in Geneva and finished it in 
 Strasburg. At the age of three-and -twenty he was or 
 dained minister, and was sent to Nimes to take charge of a 
 church there. In 1848 he returned to Paris, and was 
 appointed almoner of the College Henri IV. In 1850, in 
 spite of strong opposition to him on account of his liberal 
 views, he entered upon his duties as assistant pastor of 
 the Church of Sainte Marie. 
 
 During a period of eleven years M. Coquerel acted in 
 this capacity, being re-elected eveiy three } ears. His 
 eloquent address, his learning, his generous character, 
 winning manners, and broad opinions were all calculated 
 to bring around him many warm friends ; but, on the 
 other hand, the conservatives were displeased to see the 
 
RELIGION AND ART. 131 
 
 growing influence which the young preacher was acquiring 
 among his parishioners, and were never willing to grant 
 him any more than the mere situation of an assistant. 
 
 At that time the Protestant theological school of Stras- 
 burg was creating a considerable stir b} T its liberal views, 
 its critical investigations, and the freedom with which it 
 treated the historical development of the Christian religion. 
 M. Coquerel s open sympathies with this school, as well as 
 his constant propaganda in favor of the freedom of relig 
 ious teaching, were broadening the gaps which existed be 
 tween liberal and orthodox Protestantism in France. When 
 M. Kenan s " Life of Jesus " appeared, not only the Catho 
 lics but the orthodox Protestant clergymen thought it was 
 their duty to attack the book with extreme violence. M. 
 Coquerel on this occasion wrote an article in which, although 
 making reservations in many a point of detail, he expressed 
 his admiration for the work and its distinguished author, 
 whom he called his " dear and learned master." 
 
 This was enough to break asunder the last barrier be 
 tween him and his opponents. The latter, now completely 
 roused against him, threatened him with nothing less than 
 impeaching and competing him of heresy. A commis 
 sion was appointed to this end. After a fruitless attempt 
 to effect a compromise, the accusation was brought forth 
 publicly. M. Coquerel pleaded " Not guilty " in an eloquent 
 address, in which he claimed for his own conscience the 
 right of freedom of belief, and challenged the right of the 
 Consistory to compel him to adopt certain dogmatic views 
 which suited them. To this declaration M. Guizot, the 
 celebrated historian and statesman, haughtily replied that 
 the duty of orthodoxy was to preserve itself from heresy, 
 and to prevent men s souls from being polluted b} T corrupted 
 beliefs. 
 
 The dismissal of M. Coquerel was then voted by a ma 
 jority of twelve votes against three, on the 26th of Febru- 
 
132 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 ary, 1864. Many were the protests raised against this 
 arbitrary decision. Five thousand Protestants in Paris 
 sent a petition to the Consistory. From all parts of 
 France an appeal was heard in his behalf. But the or 
 thodox party remained immovable and inflexible, being 
 positive that they were doing this for the great glory of 
 their religion ; and twice, in 1864 and 1867, they rejected 
 M. Coquerel s candidacy for the office of pastor. This 
 ostracism was not confined to him alone, but his friends 
 also shared a similar fate. 
 
 Athanase Coquerel is best known in this country through 
 his literary essays, admirable in form and thought, in 
 which he shows himself, perhaps, the sole legitimate suc 
 cessor of Sainte-Beuve. A few months before his recent 
 death, M. Coquerel visited our shores, hoping here to find 
 that sympathy with his views, and encouragement and aid 
 in his plans, which would enable him to erect a church for 
 the further promulgation of his ideas. 
 
 Among those gathered to hear M. Coquerel on the oc 
 casion of his reading at the Chestnut Street Club were 
 Colonel T. W. liigginson, Mr. Alcott, Rev. J. F. Clarke, 
 Rev. Dr. Hedge, Rev. Dr. Lothrop, Rev. Phillips Brooks, 
 Mr. David Wasson, and Professor John Fiske. 
 
 M. Coquerel began by saying that he was not himself an 
 artist, but had during several years made the history of 
 art a special study, and had visited most of the public col 
 lections of art work, and many of the private ones, in all 
 the countries of Europe. He desired to speak particularly 
 of the relation of art to Christianit}^ with the view of pre 
 senting some of the reasons which had induced him not to 
 put faith in the current dogma that art had flourished and 
 could flourish only under the protection of the Roman 
 Catholic Church. In order to be an artist one must first be 
 a man if he can, must have something to say individually ; 
 
EELIGION AND AET. 133 
 
 and in the next place must know the grammar of the lan 
 guage in which he would speak his thought, whether that lan 
 guage be architecture, sculpture, painting, poetry, or music. 
 All art has an element of religion in it. It is the aspira 
 tion of the finite to express something of the infinite. 
 Before the advent of Christianity this character of art was 
 apparent not only in the Greek but in the ante-Greek types. 
 The Doric temples expressed the simplicity, serenity, and 
 permanence of the nature of the gods as conceived by the 
 designers of these temples. When Christian art began it 
 was blended with Pagan art, types of each appearing in the 
 same picture or statue group, and it was sometimes im 
 possible to distinguish whether a figure was intended for 
 Christ or a heathen deity. The catacombs furnish many 
 illustrations of this sort. 
 
 After the early Christian art, which had no complete 
 development, came the Byzantine era. Byzantine art was 
 simply no art. It had nothing to say, and wholly lacked 
 that freedom and spirit of life which is the first condition 
 of real art. It was stiff and formal. This continued its 
 sway until about the year A. D. 1000, when there began 
 to be a change, and the Gothic architecture sprang up. 
 It typified the aspiration and praj er of a nation. All the 
 best Gothic architecture was more Christian than Roman 
 Catholic. Most of the cathedral-building was between the 
 years 1100 and 1400. True art began about A. D. 1300, 
 with a marked emancipation from the B} zantine school. 
 Giotto is the representative of a school which did much to 
 effect this. Both in the drawing and in the life and energy 
 of expression of his figures there was apparent a power 
 very far surpassing anything before known. After him 
 came the giants Michael Angelo, Leonardo da Vinci, and 
 Raphael. It is doubtful if there have ever lived their 
 equals in individuality of character. The works of these 
 men have given the Roman Catholic Church its prestige as 
 
134 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the nursery of art. But they were not ver} r devoted Cath 
 olics. Leonardo was in the habit of painting, in his land 
 scapes, John the Baptist or Bacchus indifferently, and 
 sometimes it was impossible to tell which he intended. 
 Angelo s sonnets addressed to Vittoria Colonna, a Protes 
 tant, revealed how little of a Catholic he was. One of 
 them would indicate that he was far advanced toward high 
 Calvinism. Raphael was not an earnest or sincere man, 
 and led an irreligious life, though perhaps not much worse 
 than was usual with men high in the Church in that day. 
 But the disposition of his mind is shown b} T the incident 
 that in an allegorical picture representing Theology, 
 painted in the palace of the Pope, he represented True 
 Religion by a portrait of Savonarola, the martyr reformer ; 
 and this the Pope had to tolerate or get another Raffaelle 
 to decorate his palace. M. Coquerel strongly insisted on 
 the position that these men were in character essentially 
 Protestants, and not devotees. Their religion was of 
 a broad faith, such as is common to all races of men. 
 After these were Correggio, Titian, and Domenichino, 
 great artists, and almost ranking with the greatest ; but 
 they were not really Roman Catholics, or at most were 
 such only by a liberal classification. Then came the 
 school of which Guido is the master, when convention 
 alism became the rule of art, and independent individ 
 uality died out. This was the end of Roman Catholic art 
 in Italy. 
 
 The Catholic Church has pretended that it fostered art 
 by governing it, laying down the rules of it, and giving 
 orders for innumerable pictures. It has undertaken to say 
 what are proper subjects for religious art, and even under 
 taken to prescribe particular rules for the treatment of each 
 subject. The result is that we have galleries full of Ma 
 donnas, Annunciations, etc., repeated in tiresome succes 
 sion without a gleam of inspiration or individual power. 
 
RELIGION AND ART. 135 
 
 One of its art inquisitors has declared that the Virgin should 
 always be represented shod. A paper is published in 
 Rome which undertakes to drill artists to conformity to set 
 patterns. The Church has treated art with gross irrever 
 ence, spoiling pictures by clouds of incense, and ruining 
 their effect by brilliant tapestry hangings. It is now a 
 practice, when dampness is spoiling pictures, to take them 
 away and place them in museums, which is the best thing 
 that could happen to them. Their places are supplied 
 by painted copies or mosaics which damp does not 
 injure. The Greek Church has a council in St. Petersburg 
 to sit in judgment on all religious pictures. The result 
 is dreadful. 
 
 What was the effect of the Reformation? Luther was 
 himself an artist in nature, and his best friend was a 
 painter, who did great service in Luther s aid by illustrat 
 ing for the common people the features of Luther s protest. 
 Diirer and Holbein were also great artists. The latter did 
 effective work against the Catholic Church by his satirical 
 pictures. The satirical Passion is an example where the 
 obnoxious characters are represented by the Pope and 
 monks. War crushed this school, and during its long and 
 fierce political struggles since, Germany has had no great 
 school. The Dusseldorf school is doing some meritorious 
 work, but it is not }*et great. 
 
 With regard to the English school, M. Coquerel said he 
 had never been able to like it. Reynolds s allegorical 
 females seemed to him to be all made of ice-cream, and 
 he sometimes thought he would like to hold a torch to 
 them till they melted, so that he could discover where their 
 bones were if they had any. He did not like to be troubled 
 bj- anatomical preoccupation when looking at pictures. 
 Gainsborough s works are better. The trouble with the 
 English school was that its imagination had no substance 
 of reality ; it was all dream-stuff. He quoted a remark of 
 
136 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Ary Scheffer s to the effect that Shakspeare s most fanci 
 ful creations were but features of reality idealized. The 
 English painters proceeded by another method, and failed. 
 He thought the skeletons of Reynolds s women must be 
 unlike any ever seen. It was not generally known that in 
 the early days of the Reformation in France there was a 
 French school of art which was very complete and pro 
 duced excellent work. Of these Androuet du Cerceau was 
 distinguished as an architect, Jean Cousin as a painter, 
 Jean Goujon as a sculptor, Palissy as a potter, and Claude 
 Goudimel as a musician. The latter wrote the music of 
 the French Protestant Psalms. Most of these artists were 
 the victims of Catholic persecution, and their works are 
 more celebrated than their names. Francis I., the Medici, 
 and others, flooded France with Italian pictures and 
 models, and true art soon yielded to conventionalism. 
 The Flemish school, at the head of which is Rubens, was 
 merely noticed. The Dutch school, with Rembrandt as 
 its representative, was dwelt upon at some length. Rem 
 brandt himself was characterized as one of the boldest and 
 truest artists who ever lived. He was an inventor. The 
 Italians had seemingly exhausted the capacity of lines and 
 color in painting: he first discovered and applied the 
 element of light and shade. Disgusted with Dutch pic 
 tures of Italian skies, and Greek faces which the painters 
 had never seen, he tried to paint what he saw. In Holland, 
 the constant fog makes imperceptible the outlines of ob 
 jects which are so sharp under an Italian sky. Rembrandt 
 painted everything in a fog, every thing vague and unde 
 fined, except the spot illuminated b}~ a ray of light. 
 
 M. Coquerel would not deny that the Roman Catholic 
 Church had done much by demanding many pictures, but 
 its rules had strangled real art. The best work done for 
 the Catholic Church was done by men whom it influenced 
 but little. 
 
RELIGION AND ART. 137 
 
 With regard to art in America, M. Coquerel said he had 
 only a slight knowledge of it. He thought, however, 
 our country was now old enough to begin doing good 
 work, and to American artists he would repeat what he 
 said at the beginning. The two essentials of a good 
 artist are that he should be a man having something of 
 his own to say, and should as the first step learn the gram 
 mar of the language he desired to speak in. If he felt 
 that these things were beyond his powers, let him turn his 
 attention to something else. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT said he felt authorized to express for the 
 whole company, as well as for himself, their gratitude for 
 the very interesting discourse which had been given. He 
 himself felt confident that there was an intimate relation 
 between religion and the fine arts. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE suggested that, young as our nation is, 
 its members have wrought some good work in sculpture 
 and painting. 
 
 Mr. HIGGLNSON found one thing unsatisfactory in the 
 address, its brevity. In regard to one point contained in 
 it, he could not help feeling that Roman Catholicism was 
 a positive epoch, and Protestantism a negative one, and 
 thus not favorable to the highest artistic work. In the new 
 time coming we might look for another positive epoch. 
 
 Rev. Dr. HEDGE thought M. Coquerel had shown con 
 clusively that art, in its very beginning, was essentially 
 Protestant. Protestantism he thought a return to primi 
 tive Christianity. The Roman Catholic Church was for a 
 long time the only church, and Christianity could act upon 
 art onl} r through that. 
 
 The Church of Rome has furnished a mythology, some 
 thing absolutely indispensable to religious art. The non- 
 existence of this in Protestant art shows a deficiency on 
 
138 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 that side ; on the other hand, the realism of human life has 
 freer scope in Protestant art. Dr. Hedge suggested the 
 inquiry what was the relation of painting to the art of 
 illumination, as we see it in the old missals. 
 
 M. COQUEREL said : "As the spiral never returns, always 
 goes upward, man always feels his relation to God, and 
 his need to approach him. Aspiring to perfection is the 
 rule in art as in morals and religion. Practically how 
 ever, development is always unequal, one side in excess, 
 the other deficient." As to the end of Protestantism, he 
 thought there was no end to airy thing. Protestantism 
 was a vindication of real rights, and thus a spiritual prog 
 ress. As to the illumination of missals, that was an 
 important work at the time it was done, and really 
 great artists were engaged in it. Fra Angelico did 
 some of the best work of that class, but even in him the 
 Christian feeling was stronger than the Roman Catholic 
 feeling. 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT quoted Aristotle, as saj ing that art was 
 the reason of things without the matter. He (Mr. Alcott) 
 thought the word " personality " would be a better expres 
 sion of what M. Coquerel had called " individualism." As 
 to high art, we must be flooded w r ith divinity before we can 
 have it. When we live superior lives, we shall have supe 
 rior art. 
 
 Dr. CLARKE expressed his full sympathy with the defini 
 tion of art in the discourse, and the statement in regard to 
 its historic development. " Artists and connoisseurs," he 
 said, " do not make art. That comes from the existence of 
 some great thing to be expressed, whence arises the im 
 pulse to express it. Veiy likely we do not see the art now 
 existing among us. "Christianity came as a great in 
 spiration to see truth and to do good. The Roman Cath 
 olic Church, while trying to do the good, forgot to see and 
 insist on the truth, a matter quite as important." 
 
RELIGION AND ART. 139 
 
 M. COQUEREL said he must adhere to his expression 
 "individualism." He vindicated the word as well as the 
 thing. He thought Protestantism by no means a negative 
 matter. It protested because outrages had been committed 
 against truth and freedom, and this was a positive as well 
 as a most salutary work. 
 
 The charm of M. Coquerel s discourse fluently uttered 
 in excellent English, and evidently showing full acquaint 
 ance with his subject had strongly impressed the com 
 pany, who would gladly have heard more. The session, 
 though long, was a delightful one, and all who heard the 
 distinguished Frenchman on this occasion were charmed 
 with him. 
 
140 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XIX. 
 HEART IN RELIGION. 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 IF the heart, Mr. WEISS said, has any function to discharge 
 in religion, it must be such an organ as is not de 
 scribed in the anatomy of the sentimental theologians. 
 The so-called feminine virtues may be admirable, if the 
 allo} T of valor tempers them ; but does an}^ organic con 
 nection exist between moods of feeling and a condition of 
 religiousness? Must a person rise to ecstasy, rush into 
 the rhetoric of sympathy, dissolve in tender devoutness, 
 grovel in self-opprobrium, before he can claim to lead a 
 divine life ? Mr. Matthew Arnold has lately given a defi 
 nition of religion, which he says is " ethics heightened, 
 enkindled, lit up b} T feeling: it is morality touched by 
 emotion." Mr. Arnold says we made an application of 
 emotion to moralit} 7 " b}^ dwelling upon it, by staying our 
 thoughts upon it, by having it perpetually in our mind." 
 But one might as well expect to become poetical by brood 
 ing upon a poet s subjects, or scientific by revolving the 
 details of discoveries. Like poetry, emotion is born, and 
 cannot be made or imitated. It is an affair of tempera 
 ment, and ma} r be absent in Seneca and Epictetus, although 
 they dwelt upon ethical subjects with all the substantial 
 conviction which Paul clothed in more magnetic language. 
 Religion cannot depend upon a surplus of imagination and 
 poetic sensibility. Its pivot is not a dread of sin, and it 
 
HEART IN RELIGION. 141 
 
 is very inadequately expressed by language that is highly 
 charged with remorse. For religion is simply the recog 
 nition of the facts and laws of facts which constitute a uni 
 verse. Such a recognition may of course include a sense 
 that all these laws precede us, are beyond our personal 
 limits, and that health and gladness depend upon our con 
 formity to them. If we conform, our act involves the very 
 essence of religion, whether our temperaments are stoical 
 or ardent. To be well, within and without, is to inhabit 
 the kingdom of God. But in the expression of the mind s 
 consciousness of God is a whole gamut, which runs from 
 the low grumble of the materialist to the soaring note of 
 the ecstatic ; and it is a bad habit to estimate religiousness 
 b}^ expression instead of by the state of health. Technical 
 religious experiences, accesses of emotion, no more alter 
 the texture and character of the moral law in individuals 
 than these or other states of sentiment alter the nature of 
 counterpoint and harmon}^. Set half a dozen musical 
 people to play the same piece, and each one will lend to it 
 the color of his temperament, the timbre of his voice, the 
 manifoldness of his nature : the result will be the presen 
 tation of half a dozen different st3*les ; but the style does 
 not alter the substance. Expressions of regret, remorse, 
 of lively conviction of unworthiness, find their way into 
 spiritual books ; but a person who uses them aptly is no 
 more religious than any plain, sober, just man, with little 
 ardor of speech, or any cool sinner who deliberately sets 
 about reforming his habits and resuming healthy condi 
 tions. If the kingdom of heaven is exposed to being 
 taken by the scaling-ladder of warm and strong expres 
 sion, I think that the New Bedford negro would have been 
 the first to enter, for he distanced all previous saints by a 
 simultaneous appeal to the infinite heart and pocket. In 
 a revival meeting that was rapidly running to hysteria, 
 he jumped up and cried: " Come down, O Lord, into dis 
 
142 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 rneetin ! Don t scrutinize de expense ; come down right 
 frou de roof. I 11 pay for de shingles ! " When religionists 
 use the word "heart," it seems to represent to them the 
 traits that distinguish a type of nature called womanly. 
 
 It is useless to argue that birth and constitution largely 
 secure the presence or absence of this tone, so long as the 
 beatitudes stand printed in every New Testament, and lend 
 the glow of the word " blessed" to moods which have the 
 credit of being full of heart. Now, the beatitude of right 
 eousness leaps well through human veins, but its source is 
 human integrity. No man hungers after righteousness 
 who has not the structure which gives him a sense of jus 
 tice. The beatitude of merc}^ is the complement of this 
 righteousness. No man can be merciful who is not abso 
 lutely just. Mercy is the quality which we enjoy latest in 
 life, for it corresponds to the development of the judgment. 
 An old man is merciful because he is old : if he has not 
 thrown away his opportunities for knowledge, his age is a 
 dispassionate state into whose equilibrium all that he ever 
 heard, suffered, or inflicted has settled. But what shall 
 we say of the poor in spirit, and of the meek, and of the 
 peacemakers? How did the Teacher himself, illustrate 
 these texts ? No man ever lived who had a more exact 
 appreciation of his own moral and spiritual condition than 
 Jesus. He never pretended that he was not vastly supe 
 rior to the average run of men, nor did any scruples of 
 modesty detain him when he reminded them of his gifts. 
 How, in fact, could he illustrate his first beatitude, if 
 Nature had made him incapable of it by furnishing him 
 with a sumptuous soul which knew and exulted in his own 
 powers? u I and my Father are one," he sa} r s ; and he 
 expects to judge the dead, and distribute eternal rewards 
 and punishments. Fastidious critics try to manipulate the 
 scene in the temple, where a scourge of small cords seems 
 to have been wielded with considerable muscular Christi- 
 
HEART IN RELIGION. 143 
 
 anity, if we may trust the report that both men and cattle 
 evacuated the premises with cheerfulness. Some preachers 
 try to maintain that the Master merely flourished the 
 scourge, but was too gentle to strike a blow. However 
 that may have been, it is certain that his tongue could 
 inflict a chastisement compared with which a whipping 
 would have been luxurious. To the Scribes and Pharisees 
 he showed a face flushed with indignation, and meekness 
 did not prevent him from declaring them a generation of 
 vipers, or saying, " Ye are of your father, the Devil." We 
 need not be at the expense of any scheme of atonement to 
 account for the crucifixion. Every nail that was driven 
 was a speech tempered and sharpened in flaming moments 
 of the victim. For no man ever burst forth into such a 
 clear resistance to error and to the anarchy of bad institu 
 tions as this man of sorrows. The beatitude on the peace 
 makers stands modified by the more daring utterance of 
 the one who says he came to set the members of families 
 against each other, and to make divine truth the motive 
 which should introduce foes into the household. The life 
 of Jesus preached a more vigorous and salient doctrine 
 than the beatitudes, when his virile arms came to close 
 grips with pretence and bigotry. His mildness appears to 
 be hardly more than class sympathy with workmen and all 
 the takers of rich men s contemptuous wages. "Blessed 
 are ye," he said, "when men shall revile 3*011 and perse 
 cute you." He would have repudiated that weak phrase 
 of ours, when we say in praise of a man, " He has not 
 an enenry in the world." Miserable man ! He does not 
 then deserve to have a friend. 
 
 The only heart which religion can organically claim is of 
 a quality to subserve its organic laws, those, namely, 
 which sustain the universal health, and found society upon 
 equality and justice. This is something better than pious 
 consciousness of a God ; it is embodiment of one, the 
 
144 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Word made flesh. God is in all men. He retires behind 
 overturned omnibuses and piles of paving-stones, and 
 proves capable of a wrath destructive as his own earth 
 quakes and typhoons. Here is God, in the next man 
 and woman, gaunt as a wolf with famine, on a strike 
 in coal-mines and factories, cowering wretchedly in the 
 gutter. 
 
 " He is the green in every blade, 
 The health in every boy and maid ; 
 111 yonder sunrise-flag he blooms 
 Above a nation s well-earned toinbs ; 
 That empty sleeve his arm contains, 
 That blushing scar his anger drains ; 
 That flaunting cheek beneath the lamp 
 
 He hoists for succor, from a heart 
 "Where Love maintains a wasted camp 
 
 Till Love arrive to take its part. 
 This bloodless face against the pane 
 
 Goes whitening all the murky street 
 With his own dread lest hunger gain 
 Upon his love s woe-burdened feet." 
 
 Rev. J. T. SARGENT invited M. Coquerel to open 
 the discussion. Monsieur remarked, with his French 
 accent which gives charm and piquancy to whatever he 
 sa}*s, that he understood English best when he spoke it 
 himself. He found himself lagging behind often during 
 the essa3 T , not quick-winged enough to follow through 
 heaven and earth and all the universe. First, he had 
 thought the lecturer s plan was to accuse heart, and he 
 said, "No, we would not be dissected, and have our 
 hearts taken away. Heart must defend itself." lie 
 thought next that injustice was being done to the beati 
 tudes. We could not spare any of them. They must 
 stand all together, as in the New Testament, and then 
 they go through the whole range of life, and one is the 
 
HEART IN RELIGION. 145 
 
 supplement of the other. We had the mild and meek 
 Jesus in the beginning, and the man of sorrows in the 
 end. We have had much analysis, and now we want a 
 little synthesis. When we find in monkish books an effem 
 inate Jesus, we will not worship him: but we find the 
 Jesus of the Gospels a man, and we like to see meek and 
 mild Jesus able to use a scourge of small cords. Love 
 for the poor and the lowly is the same thing as rage 
 against tyrants and sycophants. One must be on the 
 track of everything good, and then he will always see 
 Jesus walking before him. 
 
 Rev. CHARLES BROOKS hoped that M. Coquerel would 
 now understand how Americans feel when in Paris, listen 
 ing to a French lecture. If he thought Mr. Weiss s dis 
 course was rapid, he hardly knew how he would characterize 
 that of a Frenchman. This created a good deal of amuse 
 ment, as M. Coquerel had spoken with great fluency. 
 
 Mr. SUMNER, in answer to a call for his opinion, re 
 marked that he had come as a listener, had come from 
 one of the outposts, and was glad to find himself among 
 the leaders. 
 
 Dr. HEDGE said he had never listened to Mr. Weiss 
 when he felt himself so much at one with him in sentiment ; 
 but he must entirely dissent from the speaker s definition 
 of religion as recognition of the facts of the universe. 
 Religion is not a recognition of facts, not a form of intel 
 lectual statement, but a feeling. It seemed to him a 
 misfortune when Christianity was apprehended merely as 
 a religion : it is more than a religion ; it is the divinely- 
 appointed and progressive incarnation of God in society. 
 Morality appeared to him of more importance than religion. 
 The best that religion can do is to vivify morals, even as 
 it is the inspiring soul of art and of patriotism. He had 
 seldom been so pleased with a presentation of Christ as 
 with that given this morning. But he did not think the 
 
 10 
 
146 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 beatitude of the poor in spirit referred to those conscious 
 of spiritual poverty, but to the outcasts of the religious 
 world, the unchurched of that day and generation. Christ 
 invites those whom the Scribes and Pharisees reject. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE said that the essay made her feel like asking 
 Mr. Weiss with whom was his controversy. There was 
 a martial spirit in it, and it seemed to her poetical without 
 the peace of poetry. She was not satisfied with Dr. 
 Hedge s definition of religion. Perhaps that was a man s 
 definition ; but, to her, religion was something more than 
 a feeling of less value than morality, whose best work was 
 to vivify morals. 
 
 Dr. J. F. CLARKE wished to endorse all that had been 
 said concerning the masculinity of Christ. All paintings 
 of him had failed to express him, through weakness. We 
 are yet too far behind Christ to comprehend him. We 
 shall have better pictures of him when the world catches 
 up with him. For the "blessed" in the beatitudes he 
 would substitute " good news." And he thought the good 
 news was not for the "unchurched" alone, but for the 
 sinners, for the utterly poor in spirit. He believed religion 
 was more than a recognition of the facts of the universe : 
 it was the aspiration of the whole nature toward some 
 thing higher than itself, toward the highest of which it 
 can conceive. 
 
 Mr. WASSON next expressed his approbation of the 
 change from the minor to the major key in religion. Mr. 
 Beecher, he said, had published the first volume of a Life 
 of Christ, the frontispiece to which was doubtless the 
 Christ of his admiration ; but it looked like a discarded 
 lover suffering the pangs of unrequited sentiment. He 
 thought it was time to set forth the virtues of power and 
 vigor, and to distinguish principle from emotion. In the 
 last portion of the essay, it seemed to him, Mr. Weiss him 
 self slipped into sentimentality. In one sense God might 
 
HEART IN RELIGION. 147 
 
 be everywhere, in grog-shops and slums and scamps ; 
 so He might be in the rattlesnake, which we do not hesi 
 tate to rap on the head. He had a friend who believed 
 that God loves every man but a good man ; but to his 
 thinking the Divine Mind does not necessarily prefer the 
 evil, or even the poor. 
 
 Mr. WASHBURN followed with a word of sympathy for 
 the " churched " people. If we recognize God in a hungr} T 
 highwa3 r man, we must also recognize him in a well-fed 
 priest ; and he thought God was at a minimum in the 
 scoundrel, and at a maximum in the one man who seemed 
 to him, so far, the crown of humanit}", Jesus Christ. 
 
 Mr. AMES, from California, avowed a faith as wide as 
 the great country from which he came. He believed, he 
 said, in everything and everybocty. Surely, neither Pagan 
 nor Christian could ask more. There was yet need for the 
 word " heart," to express the provision of Nature for spir 
 itual warmth. Action was at present the glorious idol of 
 glorious Boston ; but we must not lose sight of the 
 warmth-giver, or cease our quest for the point of contact 
 between God and man. 
 
 Mr. POTTER thought that we needed a second essay to 
 balance this one, an essay on the claims of the religious 
 sentiment. It certainly had its place, and we can none 
 of us withhold a sympathetic admiration from the old 
 mystics. 
 
 Mr. WENDELL PHILLIPS wished, with great respect and 
 deference, to maintain that the character of Jesus was 
 no mystery. " You need not analyze a lemon to find out 
 whether it is sour. You speculate as to whether Jesus 
 was a masculine character ! Look at the men who have 
 learned of him most closely, at Paul and Luther and 
 Wesley. Were they effeminate? yet the disciple is but 
 a faint reflection of his Master. The character from which 
 came the force which has been doing battle ever since 
 
148 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 with wrong and falsehood and error was nothing less than 
 masculine ; but sentiment is the toughest thing in the 
 world, nothing else is iron. And, in spite of friend 
 Wasson, Jesus was right in pitying the poor in pocket, 
 the burden-bearers, the takers of other men s wages. 
 Compulsory labor is a curse always has been." 
 
 Mr. WASSON protested against the injustice of leaving 
 Mr. Phillips the last word ; but the time was up, and it 
 appeared 
 
 " He heard a voice we could not hear, 
 Which said he must not stay." 
 
THE PRAYER-GAUGE. 149 
 
 XX. 
 
 THE PRAYER-GAUGE. 
 
 BY CYRUS A. BARTOL. 
 
 DR. BARTOL S subject was suggested by Prof. Tyn- 
 dall s much-talked-about proposition to subject the 
 use of pra3*er to an experimental scientific test. "Does 
 prayer," asked Dr. Bartol, " make any difference? I think 
 yes, if the asking be genuine. Not by praying against 
 law. . . . This great world were an arrested development 
 but for the appearance on it of the human actor to dom 
 inate the rest. He brings into existence new species of 
 plants by his fostering ; he sails over seas ; he is the ex 
 ponent of the uses of the world, the illustrator of its 
 beauty. It is man who makes of pigments, pictures ; of 
 marble, statues ; he is a co-creator, and in the accomplish 
 ment of his designs he finds the answer to his pra}*ers. 
 Luther was right, to have labored is to have prayed. The 
 whole of Nature, from protoplasm to man, is forever climb 
 ing higher ; and what is this perpetual aspiration but a per 
 petual prayer ? . . . Science cannot stop prayer, because 
 there is no final statement of laws ; and the scientist is but a 
 provisional bishop, even in his own realm. Mr. Mill thinks 
 that not only morals but mathematics may be different in 
 some other world. We are cognizant only of phenomena. 
 There are no provable properties of matter without mind ; 
 without seeing there is no light ; without hearing, no sound. 
 The sun and moon are our servants, to be dismissed when we 
 
150 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 can be better served ; and our own aim at perfection is as 
 much a law as the starry attraction, our sense of duty a 
 higher law, indeed a moral gravitation, to hold though the 
 bands of Orion be loosed. Every struggle after purer living, 
 to cleanse our own hearts, or to purify a State, is prayer. 
 But prayer which is not a want, but a wish for private gain, 
 not public good, is spent on the air, and must pass by God 
 as the idle wind which he regards not. The real appeal to 
 the Most High is no impertinent presuming on a violation 
 of his statutes, which are himself in motion ; it is a reach 
 ing toward Him, to flout which on the ground of an 
 everlasting title in the fleeting phenomena around us to be 
 the recognized order of the universe is the part of a shal 
 low brain. No prayer-gauge can reach these deep-sea sound 
 ings. True praj er is an act of faith, which has warrant to 
 act as much as any sense or organ. It is an experiment 
 according to eternal commandment, which must succeed. 
 Luther was right in saying, God, thou must hear me ! 
 for prayer is a power which constrains God, were not his 
 law his freedom. With prayer God has complicity ; it is 
 an address to the throne moved by the king. 
 
 "As to the experiment proposed in the hospital-wards, 
 it is hard to see how it could be instituted, like a chemical 
 one, under all the conditions requisite to an indubitable 
 result. Can any philosophy ultimately declare the laws of 
 health and disease so conclusively as to exclude the possi 
 bility that part and parcel of them may not be that mixture 
 of divine and human will which we call praj er, though 
 any attempt to appropriate or pervert its virtue to special, 
 private use might be like the vain and impious offer of 
 Simon Magus to buy the Holy Ghost? The Lord s 
 Prayer has been as real a power in the world as that 
 which raised the Alps or scooped out the bed of the At 
 lantic. Without consideration of the nature of the Being 
 to whom we pray there can be no true prayer. Hath 
 
THE PRAYER-GAUGE. 151 
 
 not the potter power, said a Calvinistic mother to her 
 free-thinking son, over the clay, to make one vessel to 
 honor and another to dishonor? Madam, was the re 
 ply, God is not a potter. Neither is he a trader, selling 
 so much blessing for so much entreaty. No delusion is 
 blessed. Fear of the truth is unbelief. In the Confes 
 sions of a Beautiful Soul, Goethe writes that some cham 
 pions of religion require examples of prayer actually heard. 
 But, sa3 s the Fair Saint, as Carlyle translates, how 
 unknown to such persons must the true feeling be ! I 
 never returned empty when in straits and oppression I 
 called on God. " 
 
 The discussion which followed was quite an animated 
 one. The Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW thought that the 
 prayer-gauge proposition referred only to prayer for physi 
 cal results ; and this seemed not to be pra}~er at all to those 
 who understood the w r ord in its deeper meaning of spiritual 
 aspiration. " We can each of us tell what prayer does for 
 us, and we know whether or not it is a need of our natures. 
 The truest prayer is that which offers ourselves as chan 
 nels for the divine will." 
 
 A stranger present spoke with much feeling in favor of 
 actual petitions for direct and recognizable ends. To dis 
 believe in the efficacy of such prayer would be, he thought, 
 to abandon ourselves to fatalism. It should not be the 
 descendants of the Puritans, who settled these shores that 
 they might pray here in such wise as it pleased them, who 
 should esteem prayer of small account. Had the men who 
 had accomplished great things in the world been praying 
 men, or had they not? 
 
 To this WILLIAM LLOYD GARRISON replied that the old 
 notion of prayer seemed to him a libel on God, as if he 
 needed something to stir him up ; as if it were not enough 
 for him to know our needs. He had never, in his long strug- 
 
152 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 gle against American slavery, thought of praying to God to 
 abolish it : the task of abolition belonged to the American 
 people. If there is danger of fatalism on the one hand , is 
 there not danger of superstition and credulity on the other ? 
 Is there anything uncertain in God, that we should ask 
 him to change his appointments ? How dare the mother 
 pray that her child may live ? Why her child more than 
 another s? Why not accept sickness, accept death, accept 
 loss, this lesson to-day, another to-morrow, as seems 
 good to the Great Disposer? Assuming that God is infi 
 nitely good, infinitely wise, why not assume that, uncon 
 strained Irrour entreaties, he will of himself do the best he 
 can ? What have we to ask save the good- will, of which 
 already we are assured if God be omniscient and omni 
 present ? What is there of need or of desire which we can 
 communicate to him? Just in proportion as we sit in 
 darkness do we indulge in vain repetitions. If we have 
 alreacty received the power of locomotion, do we need to 
 ask God to enable us to walk? 
 
 To this the Rev. E. B. WILSON made answer: "It is 
 vain if it pour, and my cup is bottom side up : with what 
 draught shall I quench in} thirst? Prayer is my struggle 
 to get my cup right side up. And the mother s God 
 bless you ! and the friend s God help you ! will be, as 
 long as humanity lasts, the soul s instinctive ciy to a God 
 in whose ability to hear and answer prayer it will never 
 cease to believe." 
 
 Mr. POWELL expressed his cordial assent to the belief 
 that prayer is a deep and, for the most part, silent com 
 munion of the soul with God, and related two or three 
 beautiful incidents illustrating the powerful influence of 
 silence ; adding that it seemed to him the office of silence 
 in the Quaker form of worship found no substitute in the 
 much-talking of other religious sects at all comparable 
 with it as an agency for purifying the heart, ennobling 
 the aims, and strengthening the purpose. 
 
THE PKAYER-GAUGE. 153 
 
 Mrs. ABBY KELLEY FOSTER spoke of doing the Master s 
 will as a means of coming to a knowledge of his attributes. 
 Metaphysical speculations about the divine character have 
 their place ; but she believed whoever went about among 
 men, entirely devoted and self-consecrated to the work of 
 doing them good, seeking the poor, the tempted, and the 
 sorrowing, as Jesus did, would be more sure of growing 
 into sympathy with God s heart and coming to. an under 
 standing of his will than by any other process. 
 
154 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXL 
 
 PANTHEISM. 
 
 BY F. H. HEDGE. 
 
 PANTHEISM is a name of bad repute in theology, 
 where it passes for something akin to Atheism, and 
 a good deal more dangerous. The doctrine is of ancient 
 origin, and many noble souls have held it boldly. In 
 1720 the English deist, Toland, in a defence of Pan 
 theism, expressed his faith in a "God, the creative and 
 ruling power of the universe, distinguished by reason alone 
 from the universe itself." If this statement of Pantheism 
 be accepted, we have in it a theory discriminated from 
 Theism proper by the immanence in Nature of the Supreme 
 Power, but not less widely separated from Atheism b}^ the 
 acknowledgment of a power to which the title of God 
 is applied. Toland, so far as we know, was the first to 
 assume the name of Pantheist, but he was by no means 
 the first who held the pantheistic faith. Nor does his 
 definition embrace all the varieties of views which might, 
 with equal propriety, be designated as Pantheism. The 
 Pantheist Schelling declared that the Pantheists, so far 
 from maintaining, as has been asserted, that the sum of 
 sensible objects is God, contend that the very reason of 
 their being objects of sense is their privation of Deity. 
 Giordano Bruno, unquestionably a Pantheist, distinctly 
 acknowledges God as the author of Nature, which, he 
 maintains, must have had a beginning and a cause. He 
 
PANTHEISM. 155 
 
 calls Nature the mirror in which God is imaged. Scotus 
 Erigena, that wonderful intellect which lighted the ninth 
 century, is commonly regarded as a Pantheist; but he 
 constantly and earnestly enforced the distinction between 
 created and uncreated. Even Spinoza emphasizes causal 
 ity in God, and distinguishes between the infinite and the 
 finite. Pantheism is theistic, not atheistic, in its concep 
 tion of cause and effect. It puts the universe as second 
 ary, as effect ; and God as primaiy, as cause. It confesses 
 a God super-mundane, but not extra-mundane. And here 
 comes in one principal point of difference between Theism 
 and Pantheism. 
 
 The popular Theism supposes a God existing outside of 
 the universe which he has made, a Creator who once 
 in time called a universe into being, and has been ever 
 since a spectator and director of its on-goings, having no 
 substantial connection with it, but only a providential and 
 governmental one. The God of Pantheism is immanent, 
 interfused, all-penetrating, the ground of all dependence, 
 the life of all life. It is true that the view of man}* un 
 questioned Theists coincides with this pantheistic concep 
 tion of Deity. But this is only one stage. That which 
 really and fundamentally distinguishes Pantheism, as rep 
 resented by Spinoza, from Theism, as usually understood, 
 is not the doctrine of the one substance, but the doctrine of 
 the one sole agent, the denial of any other agency than 
 that of the one God, as well in the spiritual as in the 
 phenomenal world. Spinoza not only denies freedom of 
 will to man, but denies to man substantial existence. He 
 considers the human mind to be part of the infinite in 
 tellect of God ; so that when we say the human mind 
 perceives this or that, we say nothing else but that God, 
 not in his infinity, but as explained by the nature of the 
 human mind, or as constituting the essence of the human 
 mind, has this or that idea. In other words, there is no 
 
156 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 such entit}^ as the human mind or soul : what we call such 
 is but a thought of God. We accordingly find it a 
 marked distinction between Theism and Pantheism, that 
 the latter does not at all recognize that attribute of Deity 
 which Theism expresses by the term u Lord." The God of 
 Pantheism is in no sense Lord, for he has no intelligent 
 subjects, the mind or soul of man being only one of his 
 own thoughts. But to the Theist godhead is lordship. 
 Therefore it appears that, howeA^er the theistic and pan 
 theistic conceptions of God in Nature might be harmonized, 
 their conceptions of man and his relations to God must 
 remain wide asunder. The one sees in man a moral agent, 
 the other an irresponsible expression of divinhyy. 
 
 Spinoza is the typical exponent of Pantheism. His sys 
 tem, given to the world two hundred }*ears ago, remains to 
 this da} T the most thorough and complete of all pantheistic 
 statements. His influence upon thought has been immense. 
 To him Goethe owed more than to any other mind, and 
 acknowledged his obligations with enthusiastic gratitude. 
 Schleiermacher, in his discourses on Religion, bids us sac 
 rifice reverently to the manes of the hoi} outcast, Spinoza, 
 who was full of religion and of the Holy Ghost. Spinoza s 
 ontology supposes a single and whole substance, compris 
 ing all that is, and of which all phenomena and all finite 
 existences are modes and affections. Therefore he is said 
 to have turned the Devil out of the world. There is no 
 room for his Satanic Majesty in a universe which is all an 
 expression of God. He sa}~s that in the nature of things 
 nothing is contingent, but all things are determined from 
 the necessity of the divine nature to a certain mode of exis 
 tence and operation. You perceive this takes away all 
 idea of the free agency of man, and, theoretically, all 
 human responsibility. " Experience as well as reason 
 teaches," he affirms, " that men believe they are free only 
 because they are conscious of their actions, and ignorant 
 
PANTHEISM. 157 
 
 of the causes by which they are determined." The great 
 weakness of Pantheism, as expressed by Spinoza,- consists 
 in the relaxation of the moral sense consequent on refer 
 ring all action, good or bad, to God as the one immediate 
 and direct cause of all. Its great strength is the quick 
 ened sense it gives us of the all-pervading and immediate 
 presence of God. It has changed the divine omnipres 
 ence from a cold and unmeaning dogma to a fact of con 
 sciousness. Thus it has given to Nature a new soul. 
 Wordsworth is the truest exponent of this sentiment 
 among the English poets. In all Greek literature there is 
 nothing which embodies it. Greeks and Romans painted 
 no landscapes like ours, suggestive of mystery within and 
 beyond. The soul of Nature is interpreted by Pantheism. 
 But Pantheism and Theism are not of necessity contradic 
 tory terms : they should be complementary. Theism gives 
 us the Holy Person, the providential care, the moral will ; 
 Pantheism gives us the diffused presence, the all-pervading 
 life, the divine nearness in the outspread landscape. To 
 Pantheism belongs the world of nature ; to Theism, the 
 world of spirits. 
 
 Mr. WEISS endorsed Dr. Hedge s statement that the 
 Greek mind did not know what a landscape was. The only 
 pantheistic ideas of which we find any trace in antiquity 
 were Egyptian. Their " Phanes " meant emanation, but it 
 was an isolated idea in Egypt, and when it was translated 
 into Greek it became Pan, merely a rural deity. To 
 Socrates there was nothing in a plane-tree but its shadow. 
 Before Theocritus, and thence down to Dante, you can 
 find no such thing as the projection of human moods upon 
 Nature. The Greeks vexed Nature with personalities, in 
 deed gave to every tree its dryad ; but they split with the 
 prism of plurality the pure, white light of its unity. Music 
 itself was only born into the world when Synthesis was born. 
 
158 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 The sense of the interfusion of Nature with God is modern. 
 Not only did Spinoza turn the Devil out of the world, he 
 exploded also the old idea that long ago God packed into 
 germs the potentialities of all that has happened since, 
 and then withdrew himself into vacancy. Spinoza shows 
 that the creative spirit is present every moment, God is 
 alwa}*s in the process. 
 
 Mr. WASSON was glad to have Spinoza appreciated, but 
 he himself had alwaj S felt a certain want in him, a linear 
 character in all his speculations. He did not know about 
 so projecting God into all things that we left no margin 
 for resistance. It seemed to him quite impossible to rec 
 oncile with our idea of God the direct derivation from him 
 of canker- worm and cobra, or of all the evil which we see 
 in ourselves and others. The opposition which has to be 
 overcome by God is the real Devil, and Spinoza has not 
 3~et turned that out of the universe. Eveiy organism in 
 the world is a victoiy, and is assailed at ten thousand 
 points by agents looking toward its destruction. There 
 were alwa} s the struggle and the overcoming. 
 
 Mr. WEISS thought that there must be antithesis, and the 
 Divine Mind conceived it in the first place ; the struggle 
 and the overcoming are part of the divine plan. 
 
 Dr. HEDGE said that a boy coasting down hill wanted a 
 long hill. There must be histo^, and it must have length 
 of days and years for its making. To the adequate idea 
 of things there can be no evil. 
 
 Mr. WASSON thought that at any rate there was some 
 thing to be overcome, and plenty to do. 
 
 Mrs. MOTT said she had been thinking of a remark made 
 b} Dr. Hedge very long ago, at a Unitarian Convention in 
 Philadelphia, that Unitarians must be true to themselves 
 in the expression of their convictions. It was at a time when 
 she had great need of the strength which would enable her 
 to disregard the condemnation of others, just after the 
 
PANTHEISM. 159 
 
 Hicksites, as they were called, had been cut off from their 
 brethren. She learned then how fiercely people could do 
 battle for words and formulas. The heathen make graven 
 images : we make verbal ones, and we worship as ar 
 dently as they. Truth is one in all ages ; and always the 
 listening soul can hear the still, small voice. The trouble 
 is that we do not listen. 
 
 Mr. FROTHINGHAM adverted to the general impression 
 that Pantheism weakens the conscience and destroys the 
 moral sense. The antithesis between good and evil seemed 
 to him a necessary part of the education of mankind. 
 One can do nothing without encountering obstacles. Let 
 one s theories be ever so pantheistic, still the struggle will 
 go on, and still the man of conscience will resist tempta 
 tion. The good man will find stimulus for right doing in 
 his creed, be that creed what it may. But if a man s con 
 science be lax, could anything more surely arouse him than 
 the sense of the ever-present God, the God not far off 
 but near at hand, all in all? Pantheism is a religious 
 idea. The great nasties have all been Pantheists, as the 
 great poets are Pantheists. The great sweep of the affec 
 tions toward God demands that he should not be a being 
 whom we can measure his outlines should fade into mist. 
 Then you set him flowing in the universe, and all religions 
 have windows which open to those all-governing skies. 
 Americans are more pantheistic than other peoples, be 
 cause their sympathies are more general and quicker. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW said the essa}^ had carried him back 
 twenty-five 3~ears, to a time when he, with other students, 
 used to walk into town to hear Dr. Walker talk about Pan 
 theism. He remembered the doctor s saying : What do 
 men mean by calling those Atheists who believe in nothing 
 but God ? But if you ask me if Pantheism is less dangerous 
 than Atheism, I answer, No, it is a great deal more danger 
 ous, for it takes away the sense of moral responsibility." 
 
160 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 But there is a pantheistic conception of God which brings 
 him so close that we feel him everywhere. It is the ideal 
 tendency which inclines ns toward Pantheism ; and the 
 Americans incline to it more readily than the English, be 
 cause they are a more ideal people. 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS hereupon protested against our judg 
 ing men by their theories. Theoretically Calvinism dis 
 penses with works ; but where do we find a higher stand 
 ard of morals or better works than among the Calvinists ? 
 While human nature is capable of a feeling of remorse 
 as if, having a will, one might have done right and had 
 done wrong we shall not be able to put aside a sense 
 of personal responsibility, or to turn the devil out of 
 doors. Spinoza gives no theoty which explains awa}^ the 
 fact of suffering, and he had seen suffering which he felt 
 sure was unmitigated evil. 
 
 The conversation closed with a final protest from Dr. 
 BARTOL against this notion of unmitigated evil. Rethinks 
 belief in any essential evil, in any fatality of everlast 
 ing pain, is philosophically inconsistent with our belief 
 in God ; and he believes that human nature is incapable 
 of doing a thing which God cannot utilize for good. 
 
ECONOMIC LAWS. 161 
 
 XXII. 
 ECONOMIC LAWS. 
 
 BY DAVID A. WELLS. 
 
 THE HON. DAVID A. WELLS S essay on the rela 
 tion of economic laws to public and private morality 
 sharpty opposed the present economic legislation of the coun- 
 tiy. The essay did not lack in stinging epithets wherewith 
 to characterize what seems abominable in the opinion of the 
 essaj-ist. The grouping of thought is unusual, and covers 
 a wide field of history, though the pernicious moral influence 
 of statutes which violate economic laws is not a new con 
 ception. The distress of England pecuniarily and her 
 rottenness morally, for the several hundred years she was 
 under the system of guilds, apprenticeship, and navigation 
 laws, was the theme of the first part of the paper, and the 
 effect of internal revenue and tax laws in this country was 
 the subject of the closing pages. What was said about 
 our noble Revolutionary fathers, so exalted in modern 
 esteem, must have surprised those who are not accus 
 tomed to think of them as chronic smugglers and law 
 breakers ; but the facts show their human nature, and the 
 listeners seemed to like the rascals (speaking, of course, 
 as a ro} r al revenue officer would have done) all the better 
 for their contempt of law when it interfered with economi 
 cally legitimate money-making. 
 
 Dr. HEDGE expressed dissent from the estimate placed 
 on Adam Smith s "Wealth of Nations," and from the judg- 
 
 11 
 
162 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 ment that the Golden Rule, "Do ye unto others as ye 
 would that others do unto you," has an economic signifi 
 cance, and that the full purport of the precept is not grasped 
 till it is interpreted by an enlightened selfishness. When 
 the selfish element becomes a motive, the rule ceases to be 
 moral. 
 
 Next was Mr. WENDELL PHILLIPS, and before he ceased 
 the clash of opposing doctrines and the earnestness of posi 
 tive natures made the discussion singularly entertaining. 
 Mr. Phillips stated first his disbelief in the fcfl^trncte rlnc- 
 trine, though he held that creed fifteen }^ears ago. He had 
 been misled by the theoretical arguments in favor of free 
 trade, but had been set right by hearing the facts as stated 
 by Mr. Henry Gary, the patriarch of political economy, to 
 whose judgment the world listens. He had heard Mr. 
 Gary say: "I had just finished a crushing reply to the 
 New England tariff men, one that I thought demolished 
 their whole structure of argument. I went to bed delighted 
 with in} 7 success in stating my case. Somehow I could not 
 help seeing that, though the logic seemed perfect, it did 
 not cover the facts. On paper it was all right ; out in the 
 world the facts were the other way. I lay awake all night, 
 chewing on the contradiction, and arose the next morning 
 a tariff man." Any one who listened from Gary s lips to 
 the stern facts which converted him in that night of anx 
 ious, honest thought would never again be duped by free 
 trade. 
 
 Nations are large enough, Mr. Phillips thinks, to be 
 considered separately from each other. Internal industry 
 should be diversified. Under free-trade rule our country 
 would be wholly agricultural. Other elements must be 
 considered besides the mere question of wealth. Should 
 we lose our diversified occupations, we should suffer a 
 great loss, though there might be a pecuniary gain. Na 
 tions might gain the whole world that is, half the mate- 
 
ECONOMIC LAWS. 163 
 
 rial wealth of the world and yet lose their own souls 
 and most of their bodies too. Theories are pleasing things, 
 and seem to get rid of all difficulties so very easily. One 
 must begin with abstract principles, and study them. 
 But wisdom consists in perceiving when human nature 
 and this perverse world necessitate making exceptions to 
 abstract truths. Any boy can see an abstract principle. 
 Only threescore years and ten can discern precisely when 
 and where it is well, necessar} r , and right to make an ex 
 ception to it. That faculty is wisdom, all the rest is play 
 ing with counters. And this explains how the influx into 
 politics of a shoal of college-boys, slenderly furnished with 
 Greek and Latin, but steeped in marvellous and delightful 
 ignorance of life and public affairs, is wrecking the Republi 
 can party. 
 
 National lines artificial lines trip up fine theories 
 sadly. If all the world were under one law, and every man 
 raised to the level of the Sermon on the Mount, free 
 trade would be so easy and so charming! But while 
 nations study only how to cripple their enemies, that is, 
 their neighbors, and while each trader strives to cheat 
 his customer and strangle the firm on the other side of the 
 street, we must not expect the millennium. 
 
 From this point Mr. Phillips proceeded to state how 
 he would get protection without the arbitrary laws which 
 Mr. Wells denounced, and unfolded his well-known views 
 upon paper currency, by which money enough for business 
 can be borrowed for two or three per cent. Mr. Wells, 
 asked him how it is that intprpst. here is now seven per 
 cent, and Mr. Phillips promised to answer him a littkJiir- 
 ther on, and explained his theory of using the crediLof 
 the Government as the basis of the currency. 
 
 " The next presidential election," said Mr. Phillips, "will 
 turn to a great extent on the currency question. If the 
 South can be broken into natural divisions and brought to 
 
164 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. , I ^ 
 
 behave decently, the currency will be the only great ques 
 tion. The next step of the Democracy will be to establish 
 the greenback system." 
 
 " It will be worthy of it " [the Democracy 7 ], keenly inter 
 rupted Mr. WASSON, and his sally was received with laugh 
 ter and applause by the unsympathizers. 
 
 "Yes," said Mr. PHILLIPS, "it will be the first work 
 needed by a true Democratic party. For this greenback 
 question only means whether we shall trust the Declara 
 tion of Independence that all men are equal in money 
 matters, as in everything else. Hitherto we have been 
 Tories in money questions, and trusted the people only in 
 other matters. July 4, 1776, said: The sober second 
 thought of the people is the safest and best guide in all 
 civil affairs, personal rights, property, marriage, crimes 
 and all. And we can devise machinery which will secure 
 that sober second thought. 
 
 " We have been living successfully and prosperously for 
 a hundred years on that plan and platform, with one 
 exception, money matters. In those, capitalists, bank 
 directors, and a select class have been thought to be the 
 only safe guides. The people now claim that the} can 
 and will decide these as wisely atfd honestly as they do all 
 other matters. This is the last fight between wealth and 
 the people, not between noble and serf, but between 
 mone} T -bags and the workingmen ; between the men who 
 create wealth and those who steal a living by the hocus- 
 pocus of banking and the nonsense of coin. The people 
 will now carry the Declaration of Independence into Wall 
 Street, where it has never yet penetrated, and we shall 
 have a more honest finance than the world has yet seen." 
 
 Mr. WELLS retorted, " We are the most dishonest nation 
 on the face of the globe." 
 
 "No," said Mr. PHILLIPS, "not the most dishonest 
 nation. Perhaps ours has been of late as dishonest an 
 
ECONOMIC LAWS. 
 
 165 
 
 administration as the world often sees, not the fault of 
 the masses, but of the capitalists. ThreeJiais within a 
 
 dozen years, capitalists, with their knives on the throat of . 
 the Government, have compelled it to chant, its largest cred-^ 
 itor, the people ; whose claim, Burke said, was the most 
 sacred. First, the pledge that greenbacks should be ex 
 changeable with bonds was broken. Secondly, debts origi 
 nally payable in paper, as Sherman confessed in the 
 Senate, were made payable in coin. Thirdly, silver was 
 demonetized, and gold made the only tender. A thousanc 
 million dollars were thus stolen from the people. Thes< \ 
 are the crimes of capital : the people are honest enough 
 if left to themselves." 
 
 To one who doubted this popular virtue. Mr. PHILLIPS 
 replied: "Never expect heaven in Boston. I never said 
 that a democracy was a good government. A thing may 
 be the best we can get, and yet not be good. Democracy is 
 not a good government, but it is the best we can get 
 while we have only this poor, rotten human nature to 
 work with. Governments created by the people have 
 always been more honest and less corrupt than those origi 
 nating with the aristocracy, and revolutions made by the 
 people have generally been more merciful and less blood}^ 
 than the victories of the upper classes. No student of 
 European history can fail to see this." 
 
 Mr. Phillips s enthusiastic advocacy of his scheme of 
 abolishing all coin, and issuing two thousand million dol 
 lars (an amount equal- to the national debt), based on 
 the thirty thousand millions of propert^y of the country, so 
 that interest should never be more than five per cent, was 
 welcomed with much good-natured laughter, which be 
 trayed no sign of a new convert to greenbackism. 
 
 Mr. WELLS replied to the so-called facts of Hemy Caiy, 
 that he had once looked upon Mr. Gary as his Gama 
 liel, had been very intimate with him, and was brought up 
 
166 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 as a protectionist ; but he found Mr. Gary s facts were no 
 facts, and he became a free-trader perforce. He has 
 repeatedly challenged Mr. Gary to public discussion, and 
 has received only abuse in reply. More sparks were 
 struck from each side, and Mr. Wells declared he hoped 
 the question would go into the next presidential campaign, 
 as Mr. Phillips said it would, and he wished that they 
 two could meet in public discussion, and see which was 
 right. He would be glad to meet Mr. Phillips on the 
 platform. 
 
 So the warfare of words raged bravely and profitably, if 
 public discussion for popular enlightenment shall be the 
 outcome. A few other gentlemen spoke briefly, and the 
 company dispersed, after a sitting of more than two and a 
 half hours. 
 
QUAKEEISM. 167 
 
 XXIII. 
 QUAKERISM. 
 
 BY A. M. POWELL. 
 
 THE following is a synopsis of Mr. POWELL S paper : 
 The distinctive doctrine of Quakerism is the affir 
 mation of the immediate teaching and influence of the 
 Holy Spirit" in the human soul. It has no elaborately- 
 wrought creed, or articles of faith. Among Friends there 
 is a general unity of belief concerning the immediate teach 
 ing of the Spirit, but a diversity of opinion in relation to 
 other points of doctrine. 
 
 Inheriting a birthright-membership among Friends, I 
 was early interested in their simple, humanitarian phase of 
 religious life. But introduced in boyhood to the anti- 
 slavery movement, and largely absorbed by it through 
 the intervening years to the hour of its glorious con 
 summation, I have had little interest in merely sectarian 
 religion, except to relax its hold upon men and women. 
 Added years only serve, however, to strengthen my faith 
 in the fundamental doctrine which distinguishes Quaker 
 ism, and my admiration for the more important features of 
 its historical record. The estimate of the human capacity 
 which the doctrine of the Inner Light " necessitates is an 
 exalted one. It should be our business to lift all human- 
 it} 7 up to the level of immediate, conscious communication 
 and fellowship with God. This has been pre-eminently the 
 mission of Quakerism. The capacity to receive the " im- 
 
168 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 mediate teaching and influence of the Holy Spirit" is not 
 limited to the ministry or the membership of Friends, but 
 is as universal as human nature. Acting upon this belief, 
 Friends have borne a most honorable and successful part 
 in almost every great practical missionary and benevolent 
 enterprise of the past two hundred years. Even with un 
 tutored savages, where others fail, the}^ have been enabled 
 to establish peaceful, harmonious relations. Each in their 
 way recognize the common spiritual Fatherhood, and re 
 spect each other s individual rights. Nearer, probably, 
 than any other denomination of professed Christians have 
 Friends, judged by their fruits, practically embodied the 
 Christian ideal. 
 
 One whose words are weighty in this circle somewhere 
 mentions Quakerism as " the lengthened shadow of George 
 Fox." That this shadow has had more substance than 
 shadows are usually supposed to possess, I shall hope to 
 make apparent. George Fox appeared at a time when the 
 reign of externalism in matters pertaining to religion was 
 well-nigh supreme. He was born in 1624, at Dray ton, in 
 Leicestershire, England. Even in his minority he exhib 
 ited a gravity and staidness of mind seldom seen in 
 children." It was proposed to make a priest of him, but 
 he was finally apprenticed to a shoemaker, who was also a 
 dealer in cattle. He often used in his dealings the word 
 " verily," and then kept so strictly to it that people who 
 knew him would sa} , If George says Verity/ there is 
 no altering him." He was remarkable, at eleven years 
 of age, for questions and conversation concerning religious 
 matters. At eighteen and nineteen his mind became much 
 exercised. He was greatly oppressed by the outward, 
 superficial, and corrupt type of religion which prevailed 
 among his associates. He sought counsel of priests, but 
 only to become still more perplexed by what each clerical in 
 terview revealed to him. Once he went to a distinguished 
 
QUAKERISM. 169 
 
 priest in Warwickshire, and talked with him about the 
 ground of despair and temptation ; but the only conso 
 lation the priest could offer was to bid him "take tobacco 
 and sing psalms." He sought still another, of great repu 
 tation, for light upon the problems which oppressed him, 
 and this priestly plrysician, we are told, was for giving 
 Fox some " physic, and for bleeding him." He had other 
 kindred interviews and disappointments. After much 
 striving with himself, he at last saw clearly, as he was 
 walking alone by himself in a field on a First-day morn 
 ing, that merely to be bred at Oxford or Cambridge was 
 not enough to make a man a minister. Thereafter, greatly 
 to the distress of his worthy and respectable family con 
 nections, he refused to go to church and to listen to the 
 priests whom he had spiritually weighed and found want 
 ing. He would go into the orchard or the fields by 
 himself, and with his Bible seek the light which he had 
 failed to get from others. There were at this time dis 
 senters from the Established Church, but they also were 
 equally powerless to afford him spiritual enlightenment. 
 Again, as he w r as walking alone in the fields, he saw that 
 though priests and people were wont to call their churches 
 holy places, temples of God, etc., that "God, who made 
 the world, did not dwell in temples made with hands, but 
 rather in the hearts of his people." These were to him 
 new, radical, important conceptions of fundamental truth. 
 At this juncture his old family priest, named Stephens, 
 became afraid of Fox, "for going after new lights" 
 Fox now had many more revelations. He dwelt much 
 alone Try himself, apart from his relatives and friends, that 
 his mind might not be unduly biased and distracted. He 
 passed many sleepless nights, and would spend whole days 
 in solitary walks and sitting in a hollow tree, studying 
 the lessons of the Bible and meditating upon the problems 
 of life. After much tribulation many things which had 
 
170 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 been obscure became clear to his understanding, doubts 
 which had perplexed him disappeared, and he became 
 filled with light, and possessed of a sweet peacefulness of 
 spirit inexpressibly precious. His work as a reformer 
 then began in real earnest. Of course he became a thorn 
 in the side of the priesthood, and shocked, as he would to 
 day, both priests and church-people by his want of rever 
 ence for what the} 7 deemed sacred offices and sacred places. 
 He never joined any church, but gave himself to following 
 the "Inward Light." He diligently sought out the poor 
 and sutfering, and did much to alleviate their sorrows. It 
 is somewhat singular to note, in view of the present promi 
 nence of the Woman s Rights reform, that one of the first 
 of the "odd notions," then prevalent in England, which 
 George Fox felt called upon to combat was that women 
 had no souls " / 
 
 In some things he was doubtless narrow-minded ; but 
 as his minor peculiarities are forgotten, he will be remem 
 bered in history as a far-seeing, comprehensive reformer. 
 William Howitt pays him a merited tribute in the " West 
 minster Review," wherein he says : " On almost all those 
 great questions of civil and religious polity, which the 
 world is now coming to a late discussion of, he made up 
 his mind at once, and, as at one splendid leap, vaulted 
 across the broad morass of the errors and sophistries of 
 ages." 
 
 Quakerism had its martyr period. The legend of " Cas 
 sandra Southwick," and more recently the " New England 
 Tragedies," have told the painful story in modern phrase, 
 reminding those who read of the great cost at which our 
 present religious freedom has been purchased, and teach 
 ing anew the always timely lesson of toleration. The 
 persecution was more wholesale in England, but, if pos 
 sible, more violent in New England. Some idea of its 
 extent in England may be gained from Sewall s statement 
 
QUAKERISM. 171 
 
 that there were upwards of four thousand two hundred 
 Quakers, both men and women, crowded in the English 
 prisons at one time ! Many of these had been grievously 
 beaten, or their clothes torn or taken away from them ; 
 many were confined in dungeons indescribably loathsome. 
 Some of the prisons were crowded so full of both men and 
 women that there was not room for all even to sit down. 
 There were ear-croppings, burnings, and all imaginable 
 methods of torture, and hundreds of deaths in consequence. 
 But in this astonishing record of cruelty and persecution 
 for opinion s sake New England has a bad pre-eminence, 
 and Boston especially so. It seems incredible, to-day, 
 that Bostonians could ever have been so extensively 
 engaged in imprisoning, whipping, starving, and hanging 
 innocent, devout women and men. Think of a vagrant 
 law in Massachusetts, under which, if a Quaker was found 
 in Boston, no matter what the errand, even if, as in the 
 case of Edward Wharton, to visit- a sick friend, he or 
 she might be arrested, imprisoned, and punished by the 
 lash on the naked body. Nor was this statute a dead letter. 
 For such a visit in this city to a sick friend Wharton was 
 arrested, and by order of Gov. Endicott was led to the 
 market-place, stripped and bound to a cart-wheel, and 
 punished with thirty lashes. So cruelly was the punish 
 ment inflicted that, as was testified, "peas might lie in 
 the holes that the knots of the whip had made in the flesh 
 of his back and arms." That was puritan Boston two 
 hundred years ago ! Many others endured kindred suffer 
 ings, women not less than men. I need not more than 
 allude to the case of Mary Dyer, a true and noble 
 woman, whose only offence was pleading the cause of 
 religious freedom, and who was hanged in Boston by order 
 of Gov. Endicott. Her brave, serene death finds a mod 
 ern parallel only in John Brown. 
 
 The New England Puritans were here themselves in 
 
172 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 quest of religious freedom ; but their cruel and murderous 
 treatment of the Quakers illustrates how limited were 
 their notions of religious freedom, and how effective was 
 the more simple Quaker doctrine concerning matters of 
 religion in disturbing and overturning sectarian bigotry 
 here, as also in England. 
 
 To judge a tree, or a religious movement, by the fruit 
 it yields is a safe rule. Quakerism has produced few 
 books ; its literature is limited in extent ; it has few Bibli 
 cal commentaries ; theological seminaries and ministerial 
 colleges are to it wholly unknown : but its record in the 
 sphere of good works, for the amelioration and improve 
 ment of the condition of mankind, challenges comparison. 
 
 On going forth as a religious teacher, George Fox indi 
 cated to the people that it was one of their first duties to 
 deal justly and kindly with servants. On the subject of 
 Slavery, he was not led at once to announce the doctrine 
 of immediate emancipation ; that was left for Elizabeth 
 He3 rick, at a later date. Such was the character, how 
 ever, of the preaching in the early Friends meetings, by 
 Fox and others, that the slaveholders of Barbadoes, as 
 early as 1676, moved by the slaveholder s shrewd instinct, 
 were so much alarmed as to make a law to prevent the 
 attendance of negroes at these meetings. 
 
 Clarkson, in speaking of his preaching against negro 
 slavery in the West Indies, says, " Thus was George Fox 
 probably the first person who publicly declared against 
 this species of slaver}-." Clarkson, who was not himself 
 a Friend, also pays to Friends a most heai%, affectionate 
 tribute for their faithful and generous help in the anti- 
 si avery and anti-slavetrade struggle in England. In our 
 own country, antedating airy other antislavery record 
 here so far as I know, Elihu Coleman and other Friends 
 in Nantucket, as early as 1716-20, and Friends in Penn 
 sylvania at about the same or a little later date, com- 
 
QUAKERISM. 173 
 
 menced the preliminary labor within the Society which 
 ended in making it a disciplinary offence for a Friend to 
 own or hire a slave, and incorporated it as a standing 
 counsel to Friends in the Book of Discipline to abstain 
 from the use or purchase of anything wrought by the labor 
 of slaves. In this struggle within the Society John Wool- 
 man bore an important part. His influence was felt also 
 beyond the limits of the Society of which he was a mem 
 ber. When, in the future, the comprehensive history of 
 the great conflict between freedom and slavery is adequately 
 written, Woolman will be recognized as one of the most 
 conscientious, effective, self-sacrificing, and moralty heroic 
 pioneer workers in the righteous cause. Benjamin Lundy, 
 also a Quaker, rendered distinguished antislavery service, 
 prior to and co-operative with William Lloyd Garrison, 
 connecting the past with the distinctively modern anti- 
 slavery movement in this country. He, too, was of the 
 unpretending, self-sacrificing, morally courageous spirits, 
 whose labors, in the important period of time covered by 
 them, helped much to increase the current and swell the 
 tide of successful opposition to the iniquitous chattel sys 
 tem. The modern, immediate emancipation movement, 
 inaugurated here by Mr. Garrison, has been largely 
 strengthened, as you are aware, by forces recruited from 
 the Quaker ranks. There are associated therewith rep 
 resentative names of women and men which will suggest 
 themselves to your minds without mention ; as well as 
 many others less prominent, but not less devoted, self- 
 sacrificing, and efficient among Abolitionists. I do not 
 forget that Abby Foster felt conscientiously constrained to 
 disown her Society ; that the New York Yearly Meeting dis 
 honored itself by disowning Isaac T. Hopper and Charles 
 Marriott because of their connection with the American 
 Antislaver} T Society ; that Lucretia Mott for a long time 
 was but barely tolerated, sometimes bitterly persecuted, 
 
174 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 on account of her antislavery testimony ; or that many 
 of the most efficient Abolitionists of the Quaker stock 
 have done their work mainly outside and independent of 
 the Society. Of course I put forth no claim of exclusive 
 superiority on the part of Friends in the antislavery 
 struggle. It is safe, however, to say that in proportion 
 to their numbers they have furnished a relatively larger 
 quota than any other denomination of people in the effect 
 ive working forces of that arduous preliminaiy moral war 
 fare which preceded emancipation and made final success 
 possible. 
 
 George Fox was an early defender of the right of 
 women to speak in churches. At the outset of his itiner 
 ant missionary labors this question antedating woman s 
 rights conventions by two hundred years came up. 
 Hearing of a great union-meeting to be held at Leicester, 
 wherein Presb} T terians, Independents, Baptists, and Epis 
 copalians were to unite in the discussion of religious topics, 
 George Fox attended it. During the progress of the 
 meeting, a woman started a question about some saying 
 by the Apostle Peter. The presiding priest, instead of 
 entertaining or answering her question, did very much as 
 it is probable Dr. Todd would do by Gail Hamilton or 
 Anna Dickinson under like circumstances ; he said to her, 
 " I permit not a woman to speak in the church," though 
 he had before given liberty for any one to speak. This 
 so outraged Fox s sense of justice and propriet\ T , and so 
 kindled his zeal, that he stepped up and asked the priest, 
 4 Dost thou call this place [the Steeple House] a church ? 
 Or dost thou call this mixed multitude a church ? " But 
 the priest, Yankee-like, answered by asking him what a 
 church was ; when Fox replied that the Church was 
 the pillar and ground of truth, made up of living stones, 
 living members, a spiritual household, which Christ was 
 the head of; but he was not the head of a mixed multi- 
 
QUAKERISM. 175 
 
 tilde, or of an old house made of lime, stones, and wood." 
 This caused such a stir that the priest came down out of 
 his pulpit, others came out of their pews, and the meeting 
 broke up in confusion. Many followed Fox to an inn, 
 where the discussion was continued, and several were con 
 verted by him to Quakerism, among them the woman 
 who asked the question and who was forbidden to speak 
 in the church. Other women were convinced by his 
 teaching, and presently became themselves most effective 
 preachers. They shared with men, with quiet courage 
 and rare moral heroism, the fearful persecution and untold 
 sufferings in which all were involved by devotion to the 
 truth as it became known to them. 
 
 Another and yet more striking illustration of the be 
 neficent influence of Quakerism, quite outside and beyond 
 the society limits of Friends, may be seen in their past 
 and present relations with the Indians. To the humane 
 experiment inaugurated on the Western frontier the pres 
 ent year among the Indians, official and authentic unofficial 
 testimony accords, though tried under very discouraging 
 circumstances and with embarrassing limitations, a large 
 measure of success. Just and humane treatment now, so 
 far as the Indians have been brought under its influence, 
 is restoring their confidence and transforming them into 
 peaceful neighbors, as did kindred treatment of their an 
 cestors by William Penn and the early Friends. Fortu 
 nate will it be for the Indian and for the nation if the 
 experiment, so well begun, can be continued and enlarged, 
 until the Indians are peacefully settled upon permanent 
 homesteads, recognized and protected as citizens, to be 
 instructed and encouraged in agricultural industry, and 
 their children to receive education and training for a man 
 hood and womanhood of citizenship. 
 
 Other subjects historically identified with Friends, treated 
 in Mr. Powell s paper, and which in this synopsis we can 
 
176 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 but barely mention, were " Peace," " Capital Punish 
 ment," " Temperance," " The Poor among Friends," 
 "Oaths," "Marriage," "Hireling Ministry," "Peculiari 
 ties of Speech and Dress," " Ceremonies and Titles," etc. 
 Each branch of the societ} T , Mr. Powell said, presents 
 its present rarest fruit in a living representative, both of 
 national and transatlantic reputation, the one a poet, the 
 other a preacher. They worthily perpetuate for Quakerism 
 the good repute won for it by George Fox and William 
 Penn. Both are larger than the sect. In its merely sec 
 tarian aspect Quakerism is as uninteresting, narrow, timid, 
 selfish, and conservative as is mere sectarianism under any 
 other name. Too many Friends have little comprehension, 
 apparently, of the meaning of Quakerism be} T ond a blind 
 observance of the peculiarities of dress and speech, and 
 the formality of the Meeting. Oblivious to the demands 
 of the present, they cling to now meaningless protests of 
 the past. They are as inaccessible to new conceptions of 
 truth and as much afraid of following after new lights " 
 as was the priest Stephens, who was disturbed b} r and afraid 
 of George Fox. To such Friends Fox himself, should he 
 reappear among them, would be a " disturbing element" 
 and a most unwelcome visitor. They have dishonored the 
 important fundamental principle, and tarnished the Socie 
 ty s good name by subordinating it to narrow views of 
 religion, to commercial selfishness, and the prevalent pal 
 sying conservatism of the outside world. The history of 
 Quakerism in this respect is but the counterpart of sec 
 tarianism in other phases. Originally a protest against 
 externalism, Quakerism, with too many Friends, has 
 degenerated into a barren observance of its own peculiar 
 formalities. With such, the letter quenches the spirit. 
 Under their administration Quakerism, as a religious move 
 ment, declines in power and numbers, as it must. Having 
 conquered for itself respectability and peace, after its hard- 
 
QUAKERISM. 177 
 
 fought battle. QuaKerism has lost its former aggressive 
 character, and lives now too largely upon the accumulated 
 moral capital of the past. The inheritance which comes to 
 young Friends to-da,y has a value which, as simple birth 
 right members, they but slightly appreciate, and therefore 
 fail wisely to use. This will follow the law of all other 
 inheritances, of which there can be continued possession 
 only on the condition of judicious use. 
 
 The sources of spiritual strength for our contest, which 
 so marvellous!} 7 sustained the early Friends in their martyr 
 period, and which have upheld kindred spirits in all time, 
 are still at our command. That was a wholesome injunc 
 tion of a venerable Quaker preacher who said, " We should 
 so live that the garment which fits us to-day will be too 
 small to-morrow." That will prove itself the best religion 
 which shall stimulate mankind to unite with the clearest 
 thought the most beneficent action. 
 
 Seeking the right earnestly, and striving alone, if need 
 be, in field and orchard, turning confidingly to the "In 
 ward Light," may we not all hope to realize 
 
 " strength the evil to forsake, 
 The cross of Truth to bear, 
 And love and reverend fear to make 
 Our daily lives a prayer " ? 
 
 Mrs. JULIA WARD HOWE thought we could not philos 
 ophize about religion without feeling our obligation to 
 Quakerism. The limitations of that system were more 
 aesthetic than moral. The maintenance of the rio-ht of 
 
 ZD 
 
 women to speak freely in public was an instance of unsur 
 passed courage in the early Quakers. The individuality of 
 inspiration was better and more practically taught by them 
 than by the mystics. The privation of amusement, which 
 they insisted on, materializes life and lessens its resources. 
 
 12 
 
178 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 The usefulness of sect, with these people as with others, * 
 is only temporaiy. As to the revolutionary tendency 
 which appeared in the first preaching of Quakerism, we 
 must remember that Jesus was the most radical of revolu 
 tionists. 
 
 Mr. WEISS was glad to hear an account so clear and so 
 candid as the paper had given. The radical error of the 
 Quakers was that, believing in the inner light, they had 
 undertaken to organize it into a system. He had been 
 conversant with the best form of Quakerism during his 
 residence in New Bedford, and had seen many of its 
 members advance into radical Unitarianism. You find 
 among these people a placid and equable wa} T of meeting 
 the losses and burdens of life. They know nothing of 
 Calvinistic despairs, floods of tears, and outbursts of grief. 
 You feel that the Spirit of God dwells among them. Yet, 
 if you hear the Quakers in their meeting-houses, 3 ou do 
 not find them satisfying or instructive. If their preachers 
 are not u hireling priests," neither are they inspired. Many 
 of them have fallen back into preaching the blood of 
 Christ." 
 
 A great moral sincerity is the prominent characteristic 
 of Quakerism. The}^ tell you your faults to 3 our face. 
 Other people praise this honest} , but they do it, and do it 
 without arousing a hostile feeling in the person so labored 
 with. This calm resoluteness is ingrained in the Quaker 
 life. Socrates w r as a born Quaker. He recognized the 
 inward light, in the form of a restraining voice within him. 
 Theodore Parker also had this ; but in him it was more 
 than a restraining voice, giving him an intuitive conscious 
 ness of right as well as of wrong. 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS said he had known the Quakers as in 
 timately perhaps as Mr. Weiss had done ; and he might have 
 said some things in criticism of them had not Mr. Powell 
 so fairly covered both sides of the question. To him (Mr. 
 
QUAKERISM. 179 
 
 Phillips) Quakerism, like the earlier sects, showed the lim 
 itations of human nature. A religious genius arises, and 
 bears the precise testimony needed by the world at that 
 time ; but if he tries to organize or perpetuate himself, he 
 fails. George Fox was a great religious genius. William 
 Penn was a trimmer, who, if he had lived in New England 
 in our time, would have been a dough-face. 
 
 The decline of Quakerism began earlier than our friend 
 has represented in his essay. Josiah Foster in that de 
 nomination was a pope. Elizabeth Fiy was a noble 
 woman ; but in religion was a narrow-minded bigot, who 
 would not stay in the house with Lucretia Mott because 
 the latter did not believe in the Trinity. George Fox 
 was motion. When he ceased to move Quakerism, it 
 fell back. It has not continued the aggressive attitude 
 which he took. Quakerism has taken care of its own 
 poor, but has never combated pauperism in the community 
 at large. 
 
 Fox shows us how little we owe to colleges. The great 
 religious ideas of modern Europe all came up from the peo 
 ple. Intellect led by scholars opposes progress. If Fox 
 were here among us, he would be as radical now as he was 
 then, and would be again imprisoned as a disturber of 
 society. 
 
 At first, the plain dress showed a spirit of self-denial 
 and reform. Afterwards it became, like a monk s frock, 
 only the uniform of a sect. 
 
 As to the persecutions practised by our forefathers, 
 though Mary Dyer was a glorious apostle of truth, many 
 of the Quakers who came after her were really a nui 
 sance, and needed a restraining force. This should be 
 kept in mind as a palliation, though it does not excuse 
 the manner in which the Quakers were treated. 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW said he had hoped to hear 
 some good silence, as more appropriate to the theme before 
 
180 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 them. It was true, as had been said, that some Quakers 
 by birthright were making progress beyond the bounds 
 of the denomination. One of them had told .him that 
 his daughter attended a Unitarian chapel, though he him 
 self felt bound to continue the protest against a hireling 
 ministiy. Mr. Longfellow thought the} r might properly 
 reflect that the hireling spirit was the thing to be opposed. 
 The Quaker self-control and tranquillity were admirable 
 in aged people, but more spontaneity seemed desirable in 
 the young. The doctrine of immediate inspiration was a 
 very precious one ; and precious also was the Quaker faith 
 in the power of testimony borne against wrong, the simple 
 saying of how it looks to j our conscience, and a firm per 
 sistence in this testimony. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL remarked : " The doctrine of immediate in 
 spiration existed long before Quakerism. This is religion. 
 This makes religious books, made the prophets, made 
 Jesus himself. If we think Jesus a special exception, we 
 mistake. He, like us, heard an inward voice speaking to 
 his soul. There can be no such thing as religion, or a 
 God, without a speaking of that God to the soul, and the 
 soul knowing that it is God who speaks. We must not 
 only hear a voice, but know what voice it is. We hear 
 his voice, and he hears ours. Instead of one Son of God 
 only, there is an innumerable multitude." Dr. Bartol had 
 heard it said of Father Taylor, who taught the possi 
 bility and the duty of being perfect, that, on being asked 
 whether any one else had ever been as good as Jesus, he 
 had answered, "Millions ! " 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY then gave a brief testimony, saying that, 
 though Quakerism is a very great phenomenon in religious 
 history, its ignoring of art and science, and consenting to 
 neglect so many of their gifts, is a serious defect. Its 
 method is always to cut off, without constructing anything 
 or adding anything ; and a tendency to morbidness of con- 
 
QUAKERISM. 181 
 
 science is manifest not only among them but among those 
 who have come out from them. 
 
 Mr. FRANK B. SANBORN said that to him Quakerism 
 seemed an English institution, springing up at a time of 
 great mental activity among the English people. There 
 was a decided and absolute difference between the first 
 Quakers and the Quakers of to-day, although both held 
 the doctrine of immediate inspiration. The light seen 
 by George Fox and James Na}ior was identical with the 
 cases of spiritual illumination which have been known 
 in all ages and countries. Socrates, however, was not a 
 Quaker, and had little in common with the fervor and the 
 energy of destructiveness shown by the founders of that 
 sect. The English habit of mind crystallized the doctrine 
 of the early Quakers, and tended to perpetuate just that 
 thing without variation. Yet if we class our Quakers 
 with the early ones, we shall confound things essentially 
 different. If George Fox should now come among us, he 
 would sympathize rather with the Methodists than with 
 any other sect. The Quakers of our time shut themselves 
 up in a corner, and seem content with a small part of the 
 field of human nature. 
 
 EICHARD P. HALLOWELL said that Quakerism seemed to 
 him a reaffirmation of what Jesus said and taught. The 
 original Quakers believed thoroughly in the inspiration of 
 the Bible, in the atonement, and other Calvinistic doctrines. 
 The decline of the Societ} 7 had proceeded largely from its 
 sectarianism. The committee supervise the preachers. 
 The majority of Quakers of the reformatory and progres 
 sive sort not only hold to the doctrine of immediate inspi 
 ration but sympathize with the Free Religious Associa 
 tion. 
 
 Mrs. ABBY KELLEY FOSTER said that Quakerism had 
 now no high moral or religious principle to distinguish it 
 from the other sects. It had not only made no valuable 
 
182 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 attainment of late, but had even lost its original spirit of 
 reform. She had been brought up in the Orthodox branch 
 of the Quaker Church, but while there she was a doubter, 
 even an atheist, living without God and without hope in the 
 world, with no anchor for her soul. When the living work 
 of the temperance movement and the antislavery move 
 ment began, inspired by the doctrine of love to God as 
 a Father and love to man as a brother, the doctrines 
 enforced by Christ, " Love thy neighbor as tlryself," " He 
 who loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how can he 
 love God whom he hath not seen?" "Whatsoever ye 
 would that men should do uiato you, do ye even so unto 
 them," in these doctrines she perceived and embraced 
 a living Christianity, a Christianity of work. Therefore 
 her life had been devoted to labor for the world s uplift 
 ing. She came to this meeting in one of the brief intervals 
 of labor for the still oppressed black man of the South. 
 She had no time to theorize, had never been able to 
 understand the theological speculations of the Orthodox 
 Church, her only idea of salvation being salvation from the 
 sin of trampling on God s moral laws. She had no leisure 
 for speculations or aesthetics. While Lazarus lies at the 
 gate, who can sit at speculative study in his libraiy or 
 revel in the cultivation of his tastes. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW said it was a comfort to know that in 
 all these sects, crystallized as they might be, there was a 
 movement party and a progressive wing. 
 
 Mr. SANBORN said that John Brown spoke well of the 
 Quakers, and found them helpful to him. 
 
 Mr. POWELL said the great fact of Quakerism was that 
 it was a working, practical religion. It seemed to him 
 that the Free Religious Association needed that vigorous 
 working spirit which the best of the Quakers had shown. 
 He doubted if the Methodists were now the most pro 
 gressive church. The experiment of the Quaker Commis- 
 
QUAKERISM. 183 
 
 sion among the Indians was working most satisfactory 
 results, exercising a restraining force upon the savage 
 people, and making some of the whites realize the dis- 
 gracefulness of cheating them. Quakerism is not an 
 English, but a human institution, and its lesson to people 
 of other sects is that they should work as well as enjoy. 
 
 Rev. WILLIAM H. CHANNING had unfortunately missed 
 the reading of Mr. Powell s paper, but he owed thanks to 
 Quakerism for its testimony to an ever-present Spirit of 
 Truth, and its free communication with human beings. 
 This let him into the heart and life of " the beloved Son." 
 Fox and his friends reaffirmed that doctrine of the abiding 
 of God in the human soul which has wrought such wonders 
 in modern societ} T . Angelina Grimke was a product of the 
 Quaker Church, and her faithful testimony against slaveiy 
 while it was strong and prosperous was a manifest work of 
 the indwelling Spirit of God. The Quakers see with per 
 fect clearness the equality of woman with man in regard to 
 rights and duties. Another cause of gratitude to them is 
 their constant inculcation of the doctrine of peace. We 
 must never give up the doctrine of the abiding of God in 
 the individual soul. If he were a Quaker, Mr. Charming 
 said, he would preach it more confidently than ever. 
 
184 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXIV. 
 EVOLUTION. 
 
 BY EDWARD S. MORSE. 
 
 DESPITE the many technicalities inevitable in the 
 treatment of the subject of Evolution, and the un- 
 familiarity of literary people with its details, no one who 
 has heard Professor Morse lecture will need to be assured 
 that, in presenting this branch of science to the Chestnut 
 Street Club, he was able to hold closely the attention of his 
 hearers. His happy power of translating scientific terms 
 into familiar language, with his remarkable skill in black 
 board drawing, rendered his treatment at once easily in 
 telligible and fascinating. As he so rapidly and skilfully 
 executed with both hands his illustrations, Dr. Bartol re 
 marked that it seemed as if the chalk had been transmitted 
 from Agassiz s fingers. 
 
 The essaj^ist endeavored to show that certain of the 
 groups into which the animal kingdom is divided, though 
 widely separated at advanced stages of development, con 
 verged at earlier periods, so that they came very near each 
 other in some instances, and in others seemed to have a 
 common origin. Birds, he said, had always been consid 
 ered a closed type, that is, a group of which any member 
 is at once recognizable by characteristics common to all. 
 Reptiles, on the other hand, are known to partake of the 
 distinctive features of other groups. He then undertook 
 to prove that the latter class runs into the former, thus 
 
EVOLUTION. 185 
 
 overturning the old theor}^ that classified birds are a dis 
 tinct and complete type. In illustration he gave repre 
 sentations of a bird and reptile in embryo, which he said 
 so closely resemble each other at this stage as to be un- 
 distinguishable. He then traced them from the point 
 whence they diverged, showing how they developed, stage 
 by stage, their distinctive characteristics. Thus he argued 
 that birds and reptiles have a common origin, and the same 
 truth holds in regard to insects and worms. 
 
 Professor Morse then went on to speak of men and apes. 
 He pointed out certain peculiarities in the formation of 
 the skull, which, in all the human species of to-day, he 
 declared, never vary except in the smallest degree. He 
 showed their marked difference from the corresponding 
 parts of the monkey. Yet he asserted that these very 
 parts in old skulls and by old he meant those of 30,000 
 years ago had no similarity with the identical portions 
 of the human skull of our time, but did exactly resemble 
 the corresponding features of our monkey. These facts, 
 the speaker urged, must be by eveiy one regarded as signifi 
 cant and suggestive ; although a thorough knowledge of 
 the details of the anatomy of animals was necessary to a 
 complete understanding of the principles involved in the 
 question of evolution. 
 
 The members of the Club felt some delicacy about ven 
 turing upon a discussion in the face of the last statement, 
 recognizing that with Professor Morse as the advocate of 
 evolution, a debate in regard to his scientific position would 
 be altogether too one-sided. They were unanimous, how 
 ever, in expressing their interest in the essa} r and their 
 pleasure in having so important a subject clearly set 
 before them ; and in this way the Club slid half-uncon- 
 sciously into expressions of opinion upon the topic of the 
 paper itself. 
 
186 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Rev. JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE then stated, that, having 
 read several books for and against Darwinism, he was still 
 unprepared to say where the burden of proof rested. In 
 deed, he thought the question was yet hypothetical. A 
 great many scientific men, he thought, had accepted the 
 theory because they did not believe in spontaneous crea 
 tion ; and, on the other side, the man} persons who did 
 put faith in the theory of instantaneous generation would, 
 not listen to that of gradual development. His own relig 
 ious views, he continued, were no stumbling-block to his 
 recognition of the plan of evolution should it be fairly based 
 upon proof. 
 
 The conversation soon drifted away from questions of 
 anatomy to the relations of human nature to that of the 
 lower animals. Some one remarked that the likeness- to 
 animals, sometimes very marked both in the appearance 
 and character of human beings, might be considered as a 
 token and proof of their descent or ascent from a former 
 order of being. The opinion was expressed that there 
 might be an evolution downward instead of upward ; at all 
 events, it w r as plain that individual men deteriorated, losing 
 their spiritual qualities and acquiring beastly ones. It 
 was suggested further that a soul which had been thus 
 degraded might be reintroduced to life in the form of an 
 animal. 
 
 In this way the general subject of the transmigration of 
 souls came into discussion, and many interesting things 
 were said, those participating in the talk becoming so 
 much engaged that efforts to find an opportunity of in 
 troducing Mr. Clemens (Mark Twain) , who was present, 
 were unsuccessful, as he was obliged to leave at an 
 early hour. Mr. Clemens had been hovering upon the out 
 skirts of the audience, closely watching Professor Morse s 
 skilful manipulation of the crayon, and apparently much 
 interested. A friend who accompanied him relates the 
 
EVOLUTION. 187 
 
 following incident of their homeward walk from the meet 
 ing of the club. 
 
 u As we passed out," he writes, " Mr. A. joined the party, 
 and while the rest of us were chatting briskly about the inci 
 dents of the meeting, Mr. Clemens was silent until we got 
 up into Beacon Street, when he spoke out in a serious way, 
 saying, as nearly as I can recall his language : "Well, that 
 was an extraordinary meeting ! How that chap did draw on 
 the blackboard ! I never saw anj thing like that. I rn sorry 
 we had to come a\vay, for I was mightily interested in the 
 talk going on, and wanted to sa}" something nvyself. "When 
 Mrs. Sargent asked me if I would speak, I did n t want to 
 do it at all, but I thought it would n t be polite to decline. 
 I did n t care much about evolution, but when they struck 
 the doctrine of metempsychosis, I got interested. That doc 
 trine accounts for me : I knew there was something the 
 matter, but never knew what it was before. It s the pass 
 ing off on a man of an old, damaged, second-hand soul 
 that makes ah 1 the trouble. " 
 
188 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXV. 
 
 LAW. 
 
 BY SAMUEL LOXGFELLOW. 
 
 THE subject was " The Idea of Law," treated mainly in 
 reference to religious thought and feeling. The idea 
 of law," said Mr. Longfellow, "holds a large place in 
 modern thought. The laws of Nature, the laws of society, 
 are phrases familiar in all our ears. We hear also of the 
 laws of trade, of supply and demand, and the like ; indicat 
 ing a sense of a certain order of events taking place be} ond 
 the control of individual wills, something inherent in the 
 nature of things, making them to be what they are, and to 
 go on as they do. This idea of law is ever3 T where taking the 
 place of the notion of accident, or of arbitrary will, in the 
 carrying on of the world ; indeed, Mr. Huxley, the English 
 physiologist, thinks it will soon banish the notion of an} T - 
 thing like spontaneity in the universe. But the idea of 
 spontaneity and the idea of freedom, which we believe in 
 because we feel them in ourselves and must needs ascribe 
 them to all spirits, are not necessarily opposed to the idea 
 of law. For by law we mean the orderly and continuous 
 method according to which a force operates ; and a force 
 may be spontaneous in its origin even though it must act 
 under fixed conditions. We need not be afraid that we 
 shall lose our freedom because we are under law. There 
 is more freedom in order than in lawlessness. It would be 
 foolish, under the notion of enjoying greater freedom, 
 to try to see with our ears, or to hear with our eyes. So 
 
LAW. 189 
 
 in the domains of the mind and the heart. True free 
 dom of thinking is found in thinking logically and consec 
 utively, not in thinking at random. True freedom in loving 
 is found in loving wisely and chastely, not as passion s 
 slave, but as passion s master. We mark the progress of 
 civilization b} the gradual substitution of a government of 
 laws for the arbitrary power of despotism. As intelligence 
 progresses, the autocrat gives way to the limited monarchy, 
 and that in its turn to the republic. 
 
 We hear much complaint of the evils of popular liberty, 
 and, clearly, such evils exist ; but the benefits of liberty 
 greatly exceed these evils. A monarchist has said that 
 there is no sentiment of loyalty in a republic. This, how 
 ever, is a great mistake. The love of country is better 
 than that of a prince, who may require much idealization 
 to make him worthy of love ; and we find have found in 
 the history of our own nation loyalty to country a 
 stronger and deeper sentiment than loyalty to any king. 
 Our delight in law is a delight in order, physical order, 
 or beauty ; moral order, or justice. Statute law is vener 
 able only when coincident with justice. So too in science. 
 The scientific observer cannot rest contented with a new 
 fact till he brings it under a general statement, sees in it 
 the expression of a law. We all find a crystal more beau 
 tiful than a clod ; and we delight to know that each mineral 
 crystallizes invariably into a special form. Out of the same 
 materials of earth, air, and water, the rose will always 
 form roses, the apple-tree apples. What security as well 
 as delight we have in this presence of law in outward Na 
 ture ! It is the sense of order, of the omnipresence of law, 
 which makes scientific men so unwilling to accept the idea 
 of miracle. Even conservative theologians are beginning 
 to speak of miracles as the operations of a hidden law ; but 
 when a miracle is acknowledged to be the result of law, 
 hidden or other, does it not cease to be a miracle, and 
 
190 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 become simply a rare event ? All changes, all eccentricities, 
 must be classed under law before we can be satisfied with 
 them." 
 
 Here Mr. Longfellow referred to the remarkable fact 
 of a lecture by Rev. Dr. A. P. Peabody, entitled "The 
 Sovereignty of Law," a lecture expressly claiming this 
 doctrine "without limit, interruption, or exception," and 
 also expressly specifying under it God s answers to pra} r er, 
 and the phenomena called miracles in the Old and New 
 Testaments, having been delivered in the course popu- 
 larly known as the " Anti-Sceptical Lectures," delivered in 
 Boston winter before last, and since published in a vol 
 ume entitled " Christianity and Scepticism." 
 
 The truly religious man must see God as much in ordi 
 nary things as in extraordinary. Order, to him, is perpetual 
 Divine presence. To the devout mind the order of Nature 
 is far more sacred, far more divine, far more full of God, 
 than an} r interruption of order could be. Is there more of 
 God in a fig-tree withering than in a cherry-tree blossom 
 ing? For nrvself, miracle, a deviation from order, is a 
 hindrance to religious belief. I do not say that the order 
 proves God any more than the miracle would. In outward 
 Nature we find no proof of God, and we had better cease 
 looking for it there. In the soul alone, in the human 
 spirit, the conscience, the affections, the will, the ideal im 
 agination, in these lies that primal sense of God which 
 is its own proof. But when in the soul we have met and 
 known God we look abroad, and the universe becomes 
 full of illustrations of him, and our research into his 
 ways in the world of matter throws light upon his ways 
 in the world of man. We must learn not to think of 
 the law of God for us as the arbitrary utterance of his 
 will, but to look for it in every one of our conditions, 
 physical, moral, and spiritual, and so to respect our natures 
 as the revelations of his purposes for us. All deep ex- 
 
LAW. 191 
 
 perience awakens, deepens, and confirms our sense of 
 God s presence. 
 
 "The hymn of Cleanthes to Jupiter, from which Paul, 
 speaking on Mars Hill, quoted to the Athenians the dec 
 laration, For we are also His offspring, contains many 
 just and elevated sentiments, such as are commonly thought 
 to have originated with Christianity." Mr. Longfellow read 
 a translation of portions of this beautiful poem, and added 
 that Cleanthes, who gratuitously taught philosophy and 
 religion, was himself, on the complaint of an enemy, once 
 brought before the tribunal of the Areopagus, charged with 
 having no visible means of support. The sentence was, 
 after hearing his defence, that he should receive from the 
 State a hundred pounds of gold yearly ! 
 
 4 The cxixth Psalm has much to say of the law of the 
 Lord and thy law. But by law is here meant statute 
 law. The scientific idea of law is veiy different. The law 
 of a thing is found in its nature. We need to substitute 
 the idea of inward principle for that of outward enactment. 
 We should recognize the law of God in our own native con 
 stitution. We want to recognize that what we call sin is 
 but the perversion or misuse of some faculty or passion or 
 propensity which in its right use leads only to good. We 
 want to recognize that the Love of God, and the Justice of 
 God, and the Truth of God, and the Providence of God 
 all work according to their law. Not that God is Law, or 
 Law is God : law is not a power, but only the orderly 
 method by which a power acts. The love of God is a 
 spiritual force, working in an orderly method. So his 
 will is a perpetual principle of good, working in and 
 through all things by a regular method. 
 
 " We see how a distinct conception of God s operation 
 by law would modify our relation to him. We should 
 seek abiding faith in the rectitude of law, and strive for 
 personal conformity to it. Obedience to law is our only 
 
192 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 safety, spiritually as well as physically. The recognition 
 of this truth will not interfere with our use of prayer, which 
 is an opening of the soul upward, an exercise of reverent 
 trust. From this attitude of the soul we may derive great 
 advantage, if we do not abuse it by petitions for external 
 things. The love of God, to which we thus voluntarily 
 open our hearts, is not an individual interest, but all-em 
 bracing. It is not indulgence and cosseting ; it seeks not 
 our ease, but our welfare. This love, acting by law, is the 
 strength which bears us up in trial. The providence of 
 God is neither special interference nor general superintend 
 ence, but perfect saving presence, saving still, through 
 all seeming destruction and loss. 
 
 " It may be objected that in this estimate of providence 
 we make no allowance for accident. Some one has said that 
 in the universe of God there are no accidents. What he 
 meant by that is strict!} true, and yet the coincidence of two 
 events, as the undesigned intersection of two trains of cars, 
 may bring about an accident. AVhen we consider how 
 manifold are these intersections, we shall find ample room 
 for as much of this element of chance as we need to ex 
 plain life ; and we ma}- also remember that to an immortal 
 soul the safety of the body is not a matter of the highest 
 importance. 
 
 Religious teaching commonly represents some arbi 
 trary punishment as assigned to sin. But the justice of 
 God, viewed in the light of law, loses every shade of im 
 placability or arbitrariness. It is the justice of cause and 
 effect. It accomplishes precise and full retribution. The 
 thought of God s justice should be a comfort and delight 
 to us, instead of a terror. Justice, in his hands, is a per 
 fect law, tending to bring all men back to obedience. 
 Transgression is bad, because it is disorderly. God s law 
 is not external to us, but internal. This is our judge, not 
 on some one appointed future da} , but now, and every da} . 
 
LAW. 193 
 
 And it is not our judge only, but our redeemer. Every 
 moral truth of which we once had vision ; every thought 
 and purpose of good ; that which we are capable of being, 
 however faithless we have proved ; the ideal of our life, 
 it is that to which we shall be held until it be accom 
 plished." 
 
 Mr. WEISS said that one point of exception to the essay 
 occurred to him, the statement that external Nature 
 did not suggest God. He thought that the conception of 
 the Infinite did proceed from the observation of order in 
 the universe. The idea of unity is the fragrance of the 
 soul, the topmost blossom on the tree of life. Having that 
 idea, you find the perfection of development and of sym 
 metry in everything. We cannot know deity till we know 
 unity, and until then there can be no such thing as intel 
 ligent worship. One of the finest contributions to the idea 
 of law is, that the advocates of miracles are beginning to 
 ascribe them to a, deeper law, not seeing that they thus 
 cease to be miracles. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW explained that what he had said was 
 that Nature did not prove God. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE thought all expressions on these subjects 
 must be inadequate. As to special providence, if we dis 
 card the idea of it, how else shall we name that divine 
 presence which accompanies us, which makes all things 
 work together for our good, and allows no accidents? 
 
 Mrs. LIVERMORE was inclined to feel that no accident 
 was possible in God s economy. All things were arranged 
 to a good end. 
 
 Rev. Mr. BLAKE remarked that perhaps our idea of 
 accident comes from our not being accustomed to follow 
 law into its minute ramifications. That final step in syn 
 thesis which can comprehend our own union with the 
 
 13 
 
194 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 Infinite can never be taken by a finite mind. He never 
 had found anything happen to him which did not prove 
 afterward to have subserved a good purpose. But, as 
 a good woman once said to him, "You stand an excel 
 lent chance in life of getting a great deal that you don t 
 want." Mr. Blake expressed his satisfaction at the ground 
 clearly taken in the essay, that the law was not God, 
 and that God was not the law. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW said that in physics law was often 
 confounded with force. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said : " Though we cannot prove, plrysically 
 or metaphysically, the existence of God, we are riot less 
 assured of it ; and in this faith men may not only will 
 ingly but gladly accept any form of death or affliction." 
 He related an affecting story of a deep grief which had 
 befallen one of our own members, the story of two who 
 loved each other and were about to marry. The wedding- 
 dress was made ready, the wedding-house was prepared, 
 and the bridegroom his heart beating high with hope 
 and pride was suddenly taken out of this world. Ac 
 cident we will not call this blow providence shall we 
 name it ? It is harder to explain than railroad collisions 
 or steamboat disasters. But the remarkable thing about 
 it was not the providential appointment nor the human 
 disappointment, but the quiet acceptance of it by the re 
 cipient. He found the bereaved soul, not complaining, not 
 lamenting, but just taking sides with God, and accepting 
 his work. The noble soul is the one that does not take 
 note of its personal affliction, but hears through its still 
 ness the voice of its God, and is not afraid. And this 
 arises from the perception of unity to which Mr. Weiss 
 referred. When the soul is unselfed, then we are con 
 vinced of immortality ; we heave in sight of that great 
 country on the crest of the wave which carries us up. 
 You may call this deep sense of unity faith, if you choose ; 
 
LAW. 195 
 
 it is a wide-spread faith. Huxley and the rest of the 
 scientists investigate because they are sure beforehand, 
 sure they shall find order, full of faith in law. A 
 good Episcopal clergj^man said : We may talk of the 
 beauty of holiness, but hardly of the holiness of beauty. 
 Did that man quite understand the divine unity in which 
 holiness and beauty are one ? " 
 
 Mr. MCCAULEY believed in no such special interventions 
 of divine power as were called miracles by the mediaeval 
 Church. Life is the real miracle ; God is a reality : all 
 else is either natural or supernatural. But the method of 
 God s action is above our comprehension. 
 
 Dr. BARTOLsaid: " We cannot do anything fatal. Of 
 sin as well as of sorrow we must say, it never can be 
 fatal. Griefs and sins are a part of our salvation, and 
 we should hardly be willing to part with their fruit in our 
 hearts." 
 
 Mr. GANNETT said : " If God is in one thing, he is in 
 everything. What we call cause and effect are one series 
 of relations ; but all things are related to each other, though 
 we cannot explain how. If man can triumph over Nature 
 and accident, God surely can." 
 
 Mrs. LIVERMORE expressed her gratification at Dr. Bar- 
 tol s statement that there was nothing fatal. We must 
 learn to exercise such patience as God does. As to 
 herself, she had come to feel by experience that there 
 is no such thing as accident, though her life had been 
 modified against her will by what were called accidents. 
 "Somehow," she said, "I rest in God as a safe guide 
 and friend, never to be lost or alienated. All is planned 
 by him, all is just as he intended, and so I rest resigned 
 in him." 
 
 Dr. BARTOL rejoiced in our unity as well as in the unity 
 of God. As to prayer, sometimes it seemed to him 
 that God prays to us as well as we to him. He begs us 
 
196 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 to do right. But whatever of him may be unknown, one 
 thing, as Whittier said, we know : 
 
 " We know not where His islands lift 
 
 Their trended palms in air ; 
 
 We only know we cannot drift 
 
 Beyond His love and care." 
 
 And with these consoling words the session ended. 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 197 
 
 XXVI. 
 SELF-OBLIVION. 
 
 BY CYRUS A. BARTOL. 
 
 I KNOW not what divinity or divination, according to 
 the Orientals, is in dreaming. I dreamed of being in 
 a convocation discussing Jesus, till, as the air grew some 
 what vexed with the battledoor-and-shuttlecock passing 
 to and fro of his name, he himself, in my vision or dream, 
 rose, and said to the assembled company, "Touch me 
 not." What was meant originally by that seemingly rude 
 repulse ? Was he a ghost the hand would pass through ? 
 Did he reserve his first greeting for another? Or did he 
 go on to say rather, The God I ascend to is j-ours as 
 much as mine. Let me alone ; the time to dote on me is 
 past." This was the topmost round of Christ s character ; 
 one step above self-sacrifice on the cross, self-abnegation 
 after the crucifixion. Not that he would disparage his 
 aim. He knew and asserted that he was a showing of 
 God, but, having shown him, would retire. What appear 
 ance on the stage could match such self- withdrawal ? He 
 was a medium whose virtue is to display the object, if I 
 may take so trivial a figure, like the window in a house 
 3 7 ou pass by in the evening, where no window, noth 
 ing but the entry-lamp is to be seen. You cannot see 
 the Master, whose mastery is perfect to reveal, behind, 
 within the all-informing soul ; as you do not notice much 
 the man who unveils a picture in some great cathedral, to 
 
198 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 be the valet of its beauty the business of his life. This 
 temper of self-renunciation Jesus hinted not at the close 
 only, but throughout his career, resenting being called 
 good, willing airybocty" should speak against him, but 
 not against the Holy Ghost. As the absence of his statue 
 brought Brutus to mind, Christ was manifest less in his 
 advent than his exit. His arrest of us is paradox of 
 beauty his refusing to be stopped with. We have Jesus 
 only in being passed on by him ; and to worship him or 
 abide in him as a Finality, if it be orthodoxy, is never 
 theless infidelity and rejection of Christianity, the fetichism 
 he abjures, and flat contradiction of his own bidding. To 
 make him an idol is to lose him altogether. 
 
 With that sublime soul to put one s end above one s 
 self, then, is the method of character. Do your work, 
 and divert attention from } our hand in it. The fine actor, 
 what makes him, but to be lost in the personage he 
 represents ; orator in the theme of his discourse ; singer 
 in the melod^y he chants ; poet in the verse he writes ; 
 ever} artist, builder, agent, in the business Heaven sends 
 him on? What does Michael Angelo know of bending 
 his neck out of joint painting the ceiling of the Sistine 
 Chapel? What does John the Baptist resolve himself 
 into but a voice in the wilderness, as Garrison did in the 
 land Slavery was making a worse desert? Why did John 
 Brown think the sovereign State of Virginia and the whole 
 South no disproportionate antagonist, but that his cause 
 was more than Union or nation ? The best work every 
 where is that of those absorbed in it, like the silk-worm 
 in the cocoon it weaves for its shroud ; the bee lost in the 
 heart of the flower it sucks, and then, as my honey-mer 
 chant told me, like other devotees, killed, suffocated for 
 his pains ; the coral insect, continent builder, in the rocky 
 reef. To be great for a man is to note and hit the dis 
 tinction between beino: a tool and an instrument. What 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 199 
 
 is the captain with his plume, the general, president, king, 
 Bismarck in Germany, Grant in America, but that? Self- 
 oblivion is God s remembrance. The glass of admiring 
 eyes is a fragile preserver, service of your kind a safe 
 the last fire will not crumble. "That is a Raphael," we 
 say of the picture on the wall. Is Raphael in it at full 
 length ? No : figures of others, the Hoi} 7 Family, angels 
 that stoop, or cherubs that peep. "That is Beethoven," 
 t is an orchestra playing his symphonies, till his bronze 
 fades from your misty eyes. "That is Shakspeare," - 
 yes, most hid when most revealed ; less apparent in the 
 self-referring sonnets than in the disinterested plays, all 
 the dramatis persons but the lines and angles to measure 
 his immense personality, a dwarf in the incidents of his 
 biography, a seraph that soars and sings in his immortal 
 lines. If you know how fine you write, }~ou are second- 
 rate. You have no business to be so smart ; the great 
 author never reflects on the grandeur of his page. So 
 Jesus says, "Not me, but my purpose, my method, my 
 direction, my affection for God and man, in these my 
 mission is fulfilled. The New Jerusalem has mam T ave 
 nues : arrive at your station how you will, I am content." 
 Jesus would have us not for his servants, but for his 
 friends ; whither he is gone we can follow him. His was 
 the ideal method ; but are we bound to his ideal ? Rather, 
 is there not one ideal for him and for us ; and are not soci 
 ety, state, church, the household we live in, as well as stars 
 that shine over us, members of God? By the laws of life 
 we reach him, over ever} r causeway that is portion of him 
 self. " I put myself," says one friend, " outside of Chris 
 tianity." That were to be, so far as Christianity is any 
 thing, outside of God? There is no such thing as a 
 " Come-outer." We are all Stay-inners, and in some 
 sense Christian ; we are inside of all human life. Purely 
 individual we cannot be. In every man is an Ideal greater 
 
200 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 than any man, and than all men. This vision, let me pro 
 test, is not for show, like the gilt pipes on the old organs, 
 but for use. The soldier in our war had it, who, burning 
 and perishing with thirst, refused to touch the officer s can 
 teen, lest the blood from his wounded lip might spoil it for 
 the other men. When the English collier, in his bucket with 
 the broken rope, cries " From under ! " to those at the bot 
 tom ; when the French soldier begs the surgeon to keep 
 his ether for those worse wounded, and stifles his own cry 
 of pain with his bloody handkerchief; when the American 
 acrobat, dying on the stage to which he has fallen, is the 
 only man who looks out for the safety of the trembling girl 
 left on the trapeze ; when the conductor runs forward on 
 the track of a Western railroad to save a little child, 
 clears death by a hand s-breadth, and goes on punching 
 tickets, each one saw, with more or less clearness, the 
 something higher than mere living. Relinquishment is 
 possession ; and Death can mortgage Life eternal. 
 
 God can take care of his property ; but Calvin s God is 
 Saturn over again, devouring his own children. T is the 
 beggar with whom the seeker after the Holy Grail shares 
 his crust. When it was proposed in a convention to re 
 solve Christianity into love to God and man, it was objected 
 that this is the end to which Christianity is the means. 
 But as we learn to vote by voting, walk b} walking, swim 
 by swimming, so one learns to love God and man by lov 
 ing them. Immortality is present. We are not going to 
 be immortal unless we are so. We were shocked at Chief- 
 Justice Taney for affirming from the Supreme Bench that 
 the negro in this country had no rights which white men 
 were bound to respect. Yet what was his decision but 
 part of the larger decision that mankind has no rights 
 which God is bound to respect ; that he would be justified 
 in purely arbitrary dealing with this corrupt race? Nay, 
 we have claims on Our Father which he will own and 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 201 
 
 never deny. Has the child yonder there in his cradle no 
 claim on you because he is ignorant and weak ? Rever 
 ently, but firmly, I ask God to justify to me my existence 
 and my nature, to compensate me for loss and console me 
 for grief ; and he who did not resent Job s expostulation 
 will not condemn my demand, but in time or in eternity 
 will satisfy me that his creation was wisdom. 
 
 Mr. WEISS said: " I think sometimes that the pure intel 
 lect of a man or perhaps it would be safer to say his 
 understanding, which makes deductions from experimental 
 observation is tempted to conclude that the struggle 
 for life, on Mr. Darwin s principle of natural selection, sub 
 sists in this matter of immortality. One of the legacies of 
 modern science to man is that surmise which infests him 
 every now and then that the best livers, the most thoroughly 
 rounded people in every sense, are those whom Nature picks 
 out to survive the death of the body for a purpose not yet 
 known, but existing in the divine intelligence ; and there is 
 a certain feeling that the divine economy conspires with 
 that, such as we perceive prevailing in the present aspects 
 of all things. We are cajoled into fancying for a while that 
 that analogy passes, by some aerial pontoon, the abyss of 
 the grave, and furnishes some future hopes of good by 
 means of the most veteran minds, and that the rest fall off; 
 that thousands and millions of years of barbarism, which 
 succeeded to the reign of the mammoth, thus fell off into 
 nonentity and annihilation ; and that the Divine Mind 
 throughout all those epochs, b}^ tentative processes, was 
 slowly feeling its way towards that race of men and women 
 which should embody that aboriginal idea of natural selec 
 tion and furnish him with his souls. I will tell you what ex 
 tricates me from that idea, for. I consider it to be an idea 
 which is fatal to the development of mankind, fatal to the de- 
 
202 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 velopment of the most insignificant as well as the most glori 
 ous of God s creatures, utterly destructive to any sentiment 
 of paternity or personality of the divine intelligence, fatal 
 and arrogant, and threatening to establish a hideous aristoc 
 racy of intellect and virtue. One recollects what Abraham 
 Lincoln said, who had a very rare intuitive ability, for 
 I must insist on continuing to use that word intuition, 
 though I believe in experimental observation, that rare 
 intuitive, sometimes called metaphysical, ability. He was 
 asked one day if he believed in the immortality of the soul, 
 and he pondered, and turning, simply said, All, or none. 
 And that, it seems to me, is just the redemption of man 
 kind ; it is the salvation of men and women to believe 
 that. I don t care what you call it, whether you call it 
 an induction from a long series of experimental facts, or 
 whether you call it the original form of mind, or an imme 
 diate touch of divine presence. I think if we cling to that 
 fact, to that intuitive sense of the divine meaning in mak 
 ing men and women, we shall find that we extricate our 
 selves from that surmise derived from modern science b} T 
 the help of the principle of that paper which has just been 
 read to us, which contains so many points, which was so 
 bristling with fine turns and delicate phrases like Self- 
 oblivion is God s remembrance that we hardly know 
 where to take it up ; yet out of the whole of it comes 
 that perception that the totality of a person s character is 
 equivalent to personal immortality and the proof of per 
 sonal continuance, and that we are just as likety to find a 
 thoroughly rounded and symmetrical soul in some heathen 
 proximity and neighborhood as we are in this room. And 
 am r thing short of that is going to undermine, faster than 
 science can work above ground or underneath it, our faith 
 in man, and our faith in God, and our raison d etre, our 
 reason for being here at all. Am thing short of that makes 
 it impossible for you with all your intelligence to account 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 203 
 
 for the fact that you sit in this room, and that we feel 
 each other s presence across the room, and that by having 
 come here to sit together we flow instantly though invis 
 ibly into a- very fine and deep perception that our presence 
 is nothing but the outpost of God in the room, and that 
 when our intuition speaks to us of personal continuance 
 for all or none, it is God furnishing us with his counter 
 sign ; and we pass to and fro across that frontier which 
 science declares to be impassable, we pass to and fro as 
 a bird crosses a hedge or goes through the densest thicket 
 without touching twig or bole, by that fine intuition of 
 frying which causes him to escape all obstruction and to 
 come through again into the clear air. So it seems some 
 times as if one would not come out on the other side of 
 the jungle through the thick-set growth existing within, 
 and as if there could not be another side to it and the 
 light and air be} r ond, yes, the sun and the moon, and a 
 heaven full of stars beyond the jungle. I say, in our high 
 moments, when we recover ourselves from the arrogance 
 of petty facts which seek to limit us and restrain our per 
 sonality, and free ourselves from the idiosyncrasies and 
 conceits which make us nothing better than a herd of 
 chimpanzees with their domination over us, we resume 
 ourselves, and pass that jungle without knowing it, by that 
 feeling which comes down out of heaven. Yet I know 
 that it is here, not elsewhere ; it is not t\\akjenseits, the 
 other side. But it is all that divine perception which is 
 made up of observation and of intuition, that irresistible, 
 far-reaching, and personal consciousness which is our per 
 ception of the divine. And character serves as a proof 
 of this because it is totality of living. It is not knack or 
 talent ; it is not your capacity for making a statement ; it 
 is not m} T capacity for thinking an argument ; it is not Bar- 
 tol s exquisite capacity for those nice and fine compari 
 sons ; it is not your preference for the struggle of entering 
 
204 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 into a great reforming issue : it is that fact which makes 
 all those things possible when the time comes and the man 
 or woman comes ; it is that part of the most despised, hum 
 blest, modestest soul now breathing in six-and-thirty States 
 which makes God s heroism through him possible, perhaps, 
 if he may be elected. The elements of personal char 
 acter in a thoroughly rounded individual start from a 
 supremacy of a natural sense penetrating all talents, re 
 forming and reconstructing the inside and the outside of a 
 man, so that it is possible for God to make use of him as 
 his postern into the finite. This is the way I extricate 
 myself from that film or nebula which the vast accumulat 
 ing facts of science throw around my mind. 
 
 Rev. CHARLES Low wanted to say a few words because 
 there was- so much in the essay which met his own feelings. 
 Dr. Bartol had wisely dwelt on the danger of putting 
 Jesus in the place of God, the means instead of the 
 end. The essay, commencing as it did w T ith a dream, had 
 reminded him of another dream, Jean Paul Richter s, 
 in which the dreamer, appalled at the danger of this same 
 substitution of Christ instead of God, dreamed that he 
 saw Jesus wandering through the universe in search of 
 the Father ; till at last he went into the churchyard, and 
 the little children rose and crowded to his knees, cr} T ing 
 sorrowfully u Where is He?" and Jesus answered, "We 
 are all orphans, I and you." But, because it is fatal to put 
 the means in the place of the end, we should not fall into 
 the other danger of losing sight of the means altogether. 
 Christ is the best means of showing us the Father ; and 
 while we need a guide, a leader, surety it is well to receive 
 our direction from the one who is best and highest. 
 
 Mr. POTTER thought the great power in character to be 
 personality. Our life is not in our surroundings, or in 
 what we inherit from others, but in personal quality. If 
 he might criticise Dr. Bartol at all, he would note what 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 205 
 
 seemed to him a defect, that of so presenting the charac 
 ter of Jesus as to make him seem passive, the medium of 
 a force which passed through him, instead of originated 
 with him. We have looked too much at the feminine side 
 of the character of Jesus. It has a masculine side, a 
 force and power and tremendous energy of which it is not 
 well to lose sight. Two men, above all, came to his mind 
 as representing in this age the moral force of Christ. 
 Thomas Garrett used to meet, unarmed, slaveholders 
 armed and angry, and quell and abash them simply by the 
 moral power of his presence. Isaac T. Hopper was of this 
 kind also. The divine spirit does its work, not through 
 human passivity, but through personal will and energy: 
 
 Dr. BARTOL assented to this, and disclaimed an} r in 
 tention to represent Jesus as merely passive. Without 
 personal force he would have been no illustration of the 
 personal force which moves the universe. 
 
 The Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW felt that the doubts of 
 science were answered when character was accepted as 
 the true key to unlock spiritual knowledge. The doubter 
 finds himself silenced by his own highest moments. The 
 scientific explorer in theology is bound to accept the ex 
 periences of saints as the very facts on which he must 
 base his deductions. But we must verify spiritual truths 
 in our own experience before they are true for us. It is 
 always the pure in heart who see God, hearts purified 
 from self-seeking as from slavish fear. 
 
 Mr. POWELL expressed his delight in the essa} , which 
 he had come from New York to hear. We are moved 
 to-day by the thought of Jesus, as men were moved by 
 him when he was on earth, because he was so largely 
 endowed with a divine personal magnetism. More than 
 other men Jesus drew near to God ; but the knowledge 
 of God was not his prerogative alone. He had stood 
 lately beside the coffin of Thomas Garrett, and had realized 
 
206 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 there the power and force of character. Seldom in this 
 country had such a tribute been paid to private worth as 
 was the assembly which gathered together to do honor to 
 this man, who did not write or speak, but only lived. 
 Thomas Garrett had passed through stormy scenes. 
 Dwelling just on the border between slavery and freedom, 
 he had assisted more than two thousand slaves to flee from 
 the one and find the other. When he was sixty years old, 
 Chief- Justice Taney sentenced him to pay for this work 
 by a fine so heav} T that it swallowed up every dollar of 
 his property. A few years ago he stood at Wilmington, 
 alone, as the opponent of the slave-power. Even the 
 Quakers, to whom he belonged, withdrew from him. But 
 he did not falter, and late recognition of his worth crowned 
 his bier. For more than two hours a strange procession 
 filed in and out of his house to look at the calm face of 
 this conqueror, who had at last gained the victoiy over 
 death. Slaveholders were there as well as Abolitionists, 
 colored persons, rich and poor, grown men and little 
 children, hundreds and thousands. The great personal 
 magnetism of his character drew them. 
 
 Mr. WASSON said that it seemed to him there must be 
 an eye in the soul which is the supreme eye of the human 
 intelligence. Darwin considers what we call the instinct 
 of birds the result of their long ages of experience as a 
 race. When a bee constructs a cell, his work is the 
 growth of half a million, perhaps, of years. But neither 
 busy bee nor swallow flying south could tell , even if he had 
 the gift of speech, why the cell is built in such a manner, 
 or the flight is so timed. Man, summing up in himself 
 the experience of all the ages, has come to an intelligence 
 of which the record is character. Shah 1 he regret all this, 
 and say, " I am going to put away all the results of the 
 past, and stand alone, on this bank and shoal of time" ? 
 Verily, bird and bee might pity his poverty. 
 
SELF-OBLIVION. 207 
 
 Dr. BARTOL thought we were conscious of that in our 
 selves which must have duration ; but he was less impa 
 tient to know our destiny than our origin. That we came 
 from God seemed to him the primary truth ; and if he 
 must believe only one of two things, either that he drew 
 his being from an infinite source, or that he himself should 
 endure forever, he would choose the former, and, so 
 choosing, be sure of the latter. 
 
208 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXVII. 
 
 MARRIAGE. 
 
 BY HENRY JAMES. 
 
 THE memory of the last essay b % y Plenry James, Sr., 
 was so fresh in the minds of all the members of the 
 Chestnut Street Club that they assembled with unusual 
 punctuality, apparently determined not to lose one word 
 of the paper which everybody felt would be so truly 
 valuable. Mr. James announced that he should en 
 deavor to set forth the true or philosophic grounds of 
 marriage in human nature, and show the reason why the 
 marriage bond has always claimed, even in its imperfect 
 civil form, such a ruthless divine sanctity ; and the result 
 of his effort was an essay as remarkable for the orthodoxy 
 of its spirit as for the heterodoxy of its form. 
 
 Mr. JAMES began his essay by remarking that the literal 
 or enforced sanctity of the marriage tie appeared to be 
 dying out, and this at a daj r , too, when its sanctity as a 
 free or spiritual bond between the sexes seemed to be very 
 much enhanced. He thought this change was incidental 
 to the nature of marriage, which was much better under 
 stood at present than it used to be, when it was maintained 
 in the interest of the family bond among men, or regarded 
 as merely legitimating a man s offspring. The reproduc 
 tive instinct has never been honored for its own sake in 
 men. It has always been felt to be a mere survival of 
 the animal in man, and as men grow in refinement of 
 
MARRIAGE. 209 
 
 nature its tendenc}^ is more or less to die out. Accord 
 ingly, the instinct is nowhere so luxuriant as it is among 
 the poorer classes, in whom animal want is still very 
 tyrannous ; so that the uncultivated negro of our Southern 
 States and the uncultivated Irish of the Northern cities 
 rightfully dispute the dubious honor of being designated 
 as " the American proletariat. 
 
 This explains why marriage has always been held nec 
 essary to legitimate the procreative instinct in men. It 
 is as if the creator of men had said to himself: " So long 
 as men are base enough in imagination to identify them 
 selves with the animal in them, instead of looking at the 
 animal as a mere negative stepping-stone to the human 
 form, I will take care that their propagative instinct 
 shall at least be presided over by a ritual which shall 
 indicate that the ultimate or accomplished form of human 
 life is not a gregarious, but a social one, capable of recon 
 ciling the most pronounced antagonisms of temperament 
 in its subjects, and producing harmony out of the most 
 abounding discords." Such, at all events, has been the 
 practical function of marriage, to lower the brute-mate 
 rial force in our nature, and educate its divine-human force. 
 While the constant effect of it in a large, general wa} r has 
 been to put an ineffaceable stigma upon the animal in 
 man, it has practically developed his rich interior human 
 nature or quality as no other influence could ; and the 
 way it has done this is as truty marvellous (or miraculous) 
 as anything in history. Marriage has effected this capital 
 service for the race in commending the wife to her hus 
 band s affection as personating exclusively the real, ob 
 jective, or race element in humanhyy, its neighborly 
 element, so to speak, while the husband himself has 
 been restricted to personating its phenomenal, subjec 
 tive, conscious, or personal element. In this way of 
 utter submissive wifehood and motherhood woman has 
 
 14 
 
210 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 been an absolutely unmixed blessing to man throughout 
 history. Being cut off from all ridiculous rivalry with her 
 husband by her religious and civic identification with him 
 in marriage, it has been the wife s good fortune to avoid 
 provoking her husband s jealous self-love ; and she has, 
 accordingly, been able to quicken in his heart a flame of 
 chaste, interior, spiritual tenderness, such as no other 
 sexual tie would ever have evoked. Any more carnal 
 tie than marriage between the sexes would have left men 
 more than ever a prey to every selfish cupidity, jealousy, 
 and revenge ; so that the heart of man, instead of being 
 gently opened, as it has been by marriage, to the access 
 of the social sentiment, would in course of time have been 
 relentlessly closed against it. 
 
 Here, then, according to Mr. James, is the inappreciable 
 boon conferred by marriage upon human kind, that, out 
 of selfish, it has made the isolated individual heart of men 
 social, by taking advantage of woman s superior spiritual 
 quality, and promoting every way her spontaneous subjec 
 tion to man. But now that this immense result has been 
 secured, and man s innate selfishness and savagery have 
 .been thus softened and socialized by the unselfish ministry 
 of the wife and mother, it is impossible and contrary to 
 nature, the lecturer thought, that the marriage institution 
 itself should not reflect the surprising resurrection, in be 
 coming spiritual out of literal. For example, Mr. James 
 thought that a man at this day who should be inclined to 
 insist upon his wife s legal or literal that is to say, her 
 voluntary or enforced subjection to himself in marriage 
 would be spiritually no man, but an abject, imbecile cad, 
 who ought to be denied a marriage certificate, and rele 
 gated back to celibacy. Subjection on the wife s part, we 
 all know, has been the immemorial letter of the marriage 
 law. But we also very well know that the letter of a law 
 has notoriously no other use than to minister death to its 
 
MARRIAGE. 211 
 
 obedient subjects, while the spirit alone gives them life. 
 And now that woman has revealed our better and diviner 
 nature to us, in her long, uncomplaining servitude as wife 
 and mother, any man must be a downright fool, in all 
 spiritual regards, who should still invoke the deceased 
 letter of the law in order to excuse or justify himself in 
 disowning or flagrantly violating its living spirit. No ; 
 the literal dispensation of marriage has now given place to 
 the spiritual dispensation : and spiritual marriage consists 
 in making woman henceforth the supreme object of the 
 bond, and man its free, spontaneous, devoted, even adoring 
 subject. Where these conditions do not exist, accordingly, 
 marriage in any divine or spiritual sense does not exist, but 
 only and at best a legalized conventional concubinage. 
 
 Free-love finds no advocate in Mr. James. For, look 
 ing as he does upon love as constituting at most the fickle, 
 perishing earth or ground of marriage, he naturally looks 
 on the latter in its turn as constituting the essential heav 
 ens or eternal home of love: so that free-love or love 
 not inwardly attuned to marriage is, in his estimation, an 
 absolutely inhuman pretension, and can only legitimately 
 mean a crude protest of love against the tyranny of literal 
 marriage, and its prayer to be raised from the grave of 
 the senses to which every such marriage consigns it, into 
 that higher, chaste, and immortal form which spiritual mar 
 riage alone confers upon it. The partisans of free-love " 
 are doubtless for the most part sincere and honest men, as 
 men go ; but they are, at least, extremely unintelligent 
 men, for the} T pretend that the most selfish and rapacious 
 of the passions that which has done more, when left to 
 its own independent devices, to harden the heart and bru 
 talize the manners of men, than all other causes combined 
 is now read} r to supplant, in the esteem and affection of 
 mankind, a tie with which the veiy highest dignity and 
 interest of human life are indelibly associated. 
 
212 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 xxvm. 
 
 TRAGEDY. 
 
 BY CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. 
 
 THE subject of Dr. Everett s paper was "The Tragic 
 Element in Literature and Life," and he illustrated 
 his theme very aptly. The Orestes, Antigone, and CEdi- 
 pus were the examples which he selected from Greek 
 literature as showing that t} pe of tragedy in which the 
 actors are the mere instruments of eternal law ; he chose 
 King Lear to represent the blindness which seems an in 
 herent part of the characters in tragedy, and Victor lingo s 
 Marion de Lorme as a play in which the inevitable retribu 
 tion of sin is well set forth. Turning to history, the es- 
 sa} r ist went on to show how Socrates, the most subjective 
 of all the Greeks, was slain by the will of the most object 
 ive of all States, because he advocated principles which, if 
 carried out, would have caused its destruction. In the same 
 waj^, the essayist argued, the Jews killed Jesus because they 
 saw that his teachings would lead to the destruction of Ju 
 daism : he atoned for his words with his life ; they atoned 
 for their acts with the destruction of their city. 
 
 For a more modern instance, Dr. Everett selected the 
 example of Napoleon, who atoned for his mistaken trust 
 in England s chivalry by imprisonment and death on a 
 desolate rock ; and England s atonement for her want of 
 magnanimity to him in feeling the scorn of all generous 
 souls, until at last she was glad to yield to the prayer of 
 
TKAGEDY. 213 
 
 his people, and allow his bones to be removed from their 
 dreary island sepulchre. All tragic forces, like all natural 
 forces, were pronounced good by the essayist, in whose 
 estimation the principal source of all trouble lies in suffer 
 ing lower forces to act through the medium meant for a 
 higher. He then touched upon the tragedies arising from 
 radical differences of character in persons thrown together 
 either by kinship or marriage. The end of all tragedy, 
 he said, considered as strife is repose, either when one is 
 successful or when one is defeated. The calmness of success 
 is evanescent, that of death permanent ; so that the thought 
 of it as a symbol of the highest rest becomes inspiriting. 
 In closing, Dr. Everett spoke of those who, although they 
 cannot change facts, 3 T et use them for their own advance 
 ment, as Jean Valjean, in Hugo s novel, uses his early 
 career as an incentive to more earnest effort in later life. 
 Freedom does not beget freedom, but moral necessity ; and 
 in free, pure personal liberty all tragic conflicts find at last 
 their solution. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL spoke of the universality of tragedy con 
 sidered as a struggle, and said that great was the joy 
 where a tragedy was enacting, as in a home where a fire 
 burns brightly on the hearth. As good historical illustra 
 tions of traged} 7 ", Dr. Bartol pointed to the lives of Daniel 
 Webster and Abraham Lincoln ; the former, yielding to 
 the temptations of the lower law, was killed by the higher ; 
 the latter, resolutely following the teachings of the higher 
 law, was killed by the lower. " Perhaps," said Dr. Bartol, 
 " those who hear me have found some tragedies in their 
 Unitarian, Universalist, Baptist, Methodist, Episcopal 
 education before coming here." 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON began his remarks by speaking as Dr. 
 Everett had done of the grand, majestic mask worn by 
 Greek tragic actors, but gave the preference to the mo- 
 
214 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 bile human face. Modern literature, he considered, had 
 a finer grasp than ancient, as, instead of the mask of 
 the universal, it gave each individual a mask of his 
 own. Margaret Fuller, in criticising "Elective Affini 
 ties," had pointed out the fact that in painting a villain it 
 was necessary to know the justification which he makes to 
 himself; and the best test of truly artistic literary work 
 was, that in it there would be found no wasted villains. 
 " I wish," said Col. Higginson, "that our friend "Wasson 
 were here to act as advocatus diaboli, and put in a plea for 
 the epic theology. Some say that the antagonism between 
 good and evil is going to be eternal, and not ending 
 so easily as Prof. Everett and I think. Nothing is so 
 conspicuous in Nature as the economy of tragedy. It 
 was a compensation to Dr. Livingstone. for having been 
 shaken by a lion, certainly, a compensation to us 
 for his having been shaken, to know that the apparent 
 torture is really a blessing, as it stupefies the victim. 
 Drowning and freezing are easy deaths ; gunshot wounds 
 cause torpor; and I have been on board a steamboat 
 freighted with the wounded from a battle-field, and heard 
 no more noise than I heard here while Prof. Everett 
 was reading. Dr. Channing assured me that in all his 
 practice he had never seen a person who was afraid of 
 dying. So that those accounts of death-bed agonies which 
 are found so useful at prayer-meetings and revivals may 
 be fairly considered as unworthy of confidence." 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY said a few words concerning the manner 
 in which Dorothea in Middlemarch " puts aside the tragedy 
 which seems almost inevitable in her life by calm persist 
 ence in well-doing, and Romola retains all that is best in 
 her existence by self-renunciation. In " Elective Affini 
 ties" Charlotte retains, by simple calmness, the happiness 
 which the other characters, although far more brilliantly 
 endowed, lose by rashness and selfishness. 
 
TEAGEDY. 215 
 
 Dr. BARTOL spoke of the sublime happiness which evi 
 dently filled the soul of Ottilie at the moment of perfect 
 self-renunciation. 
 
 Dr. MINER seemed inclined to the opinion that the real 
 battle of life was from the struggle of certain opposing quali 
 ties in human nature, rather than from any conflict between 
 man and the law of things, and that the struggle generally 
 resulted from a lack of insight and foresight. In all trouble, 
 it is said, there is educating power ; God serves us kindly 
 by using us roughly. We do not know how short is the 
 road to the repose of heaven, but I hope it will not be so 
 long as some sad ones think before it is all open to the 
 light. 
 
 Mr. WEISS, in his usual very quiet manner, proceeded 
 to testify to his dislike of the idea of a heaven full of re 
 pose, and declared that in his opinion it would be contrary 
 to the whole cosmic plan to suppose that an immortal soul 
 was going to be satisfied with sixty or seventy years of 
 fighting. The Spiritualists, he said, are given to speaking 
 of heaven as the Summer-land. Their idea of it seems 
 to be a mush of universal indolence ; a paradise of sugar- 
 candy and gingerbread, in which everybody has a flower 
 bed and a garden and a house with a verandah. As for 
 marriage, it is evident that in that relation it is the inten 
 tion of Providence to bring together two persons who never 
 can, by any possibility, agree. 
 
 Dr. MINER inquired if Mr. Weiss would believe in a 
 divorce on the ground of incompatibility. 
 
 Mr. WEISS replied that he should not, as that would 
 put an end to the discipline. It would not do any good, 
 either, he said, because, if the parties married again, 
 the trouble would begin once more. Recurring to his first 
 thought, he went on : " We are the same persons as ever, 
 when at the end of our sixty years of life we enter another 
 world, stocked with men of different races and eras. There 
 
216 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 } are, in hordes and clans and crowds and epochs and 
 generations ; and we have to live among them, and cannot 
 shut ourselves up in our little Pedlingtons. 1 never thought 
 of traged} as a slur on God, and I hail it, not for art, but 
 for immortalit}-." 
 
 Dr. MINER asked whether, when freed from earthly limi 
 tations, we might not see things with more clearness, and 
 not be so prone to engage in contests. 
 
 Mr. WEISS declared that, rather than be at rest, he would 
 prefer to accept the pantheistic theory of indefinite absorp 
 tion into the Absolute. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL agreed with Mr. Weiss that freedom of life 
 really ended when the struggle was over ; it was time then 
 to call the sexton and make } our grave. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON said that in this world there was an 
 obvious limit to trouble, since, being only able to learn 
 of such false reports as were repeated to us personally, or 
 as we read in untrustworthy weekty journals, we could 
 only quarrel with a limited number of persons per diem, 
 while b}^ and by we can fight with mjTiads and a3ons con 
 temporaneously. 
 
 Some general discussion now ensued, in which Mr. Long 
 fellow and Dr. Bartol joined, and Mr. Higginson defined the 
 theory of everlasting conflict as the gospel of eternal dis 
 cussion. Mr. Longfellow asked why it might not be possible 
 that, as we went on, the elements of conflict might disap 
 pear from our lives, while the energy which they had gen 
 erated remained ; and Mr. Higginson assented, sa} ing that 
 it might also be possible that we met and conquered evil 
 in higher and higher forms. For instance, he said, Prof. 
 Everett and Dr. Miner devoted their lives to a struggle of 
 a certain sort ; probably there were not many desperadoes 
 or cutthroats either at Cambridge or Tufts, but still the 
 gentlemen had as good a chance to work themselves to 
 death, and deserved as much honor, as the teachers in a 
 
TRAGEDY. 217 
 
 school-ship or a reform school, and it was not right to exalt 
 those who fought a lower form of evil at the expense of 
 those who fought with a higher. When Mr. Weiss declared 
 that he adhered to his original theory of eternal conflict, 
 and expressed a willingness to have the steel in his nature 
 refined to its utmost capability, but wished that it should 
 never lose its point, Mr. Cranch wanted to know if the 
 things which Mr. Higginson called quarrels and Mr. Weiss 
 antitheses did not result for good. Mr. Weiss thought that 
 the lively time caused by his bomb-shell proved that point, 
 and asked what kind of a Radical Club Mr. Higginson 
 meant to get up in heaven without any quarrels. Mr. 
 Temple wished to know what sort of music that would be 
 in which there were no dissonances that needed resolution, 
 using this analog} 7 to prove that quarrels gave zest to life ; 
 and Mr. Powell told an anecdote of a Quaker lad} T , who, 
 while lying in a cateleptic trance, felt as if her soul were 
 severed from her body ; while in this state she was con 
 scious of an abilit\ T to will her spirit back into its earthly 
 tenement, and did so by an effort. This, in Mr. Powell s 
 opinion, showed that the soul was always in a state of 
 action. 
 
 Mr. ABBOTT said that he had been listening with interest 
 to the discussion in the Halls of Valhalla, but it was too 
 much for his avoirdupois, and he had to come down to 
 earth. He thought Socrates was the best illustration of 
 the absolute elimination of tragedy, and that in him that 
 element found a solution in a pure personality. Man was 
 really dead when he gave himself up to evil, abandoning 
 the ideal. 
 
218 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXIX. 
 CONSTANCY TO AN IDEAL. 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 \ LLUDING to the sajdng that " God is on the side of 
 *jL the strongest battalions," Mr. WEISS said that un 
 doubtedly God is on the side of valor, foresight, self-control, 
 and perseverance. He referred to the way in which the 
 Dutch nation were prepared, in the providence of God, to 
 struggle effectively in the maintenance of civil and religious 
 liberty. Beginning in a marsh, where their utmost efforts 
 were needed to preserve life and a standing-place, for centu 
 ries they seemed to be only building and repairing dykes ; 
 but they were really gaining the qualities needful to fence 
 out bigotry and tyranny, and their education in physical de 
 fence blossomed into noble traits of moral and spiritual life. 
 
 The will is the directing impulse of all the powers that 
 the human being possesses. All the labor of human hands 
 and brains is resolved into simplicity and elemental iden 
 tity by the spiritual chemistry of the Creator. He is happy 
 who can pass through Circe s den, not only unsullied, but a 
 liberator of his comrades. 
 
 One great danger which threatens us is that of being 
 content with our arrival at any given point. He did well 
 w r ho burned his ships that his party might be compelled to 
 move onward. The true way to deal with our attainments 
 is to use them as stepping-stones to something higher still. 
 The men in best condition to move on are the men likely 
 
CONSTANCY TO AN IDEAL. 219 
 
 to be most demoralized by waiting. "WTien a man is dis 
 posed to view his course with complacency, and remark 
 even to himself, How well I have done ! " he is in danger. 
 His only safety is to burn his ships, and pass on to further 
 achievement. Men are not made for such conceited rev 
 eries. God has always more work laid out for us. 
 
 Nevertheless, there come inevitable periods of discour 
 agement, and these form a trial intensely severe to those 
 persons whose physical and moral constitutions seem to be 
 the culmination of generations of one form or another of 
 careless or vicious living. Here Mr. Weiss drew a most 
 vivid picture of the condition of one who has inherited 
 from several ancestors the results of reckless indulgence of 
 appetite, or the habit of avaricious accumulation. Even 
 such, however, are not forsaken of the Father. For them 
 too there is a continuance of the divine opportunity upon 
 the earth ; they must burn, their ships, reject the past, and 
 press resolutely towards a better future. 
 
 We inherit a portion of the divine imagination, and no 
 society is corrupt enough utterly to extinguish it. Man 
 kind is expressly built to perpetuate God s pure intentions. 
 Heaven is never in despair, and a new progeny is con 
 stantly coming forward to execute its purpose. It is a 
 blessed thing that parents, however they may desire it, 
 cannot decant the old wine into the new bottles. 
 
 The essay closed with a description of the fervency of 
 Bernard Palissy in sacrificing all things else to the attain 
 ment of his ideal, and a representation that thus only could 
 the greatest successes be accomplished. 
 
 Mr. CHANNING spoke first of what all seemed to feel, 
 the fertility of thought and tropical luxuriance of expres 
 sion in the essay, which made it difficult to select a point 
 for comment. It was also, he said, a solemn sermon, in 
 
220 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 which each hearer must find himself brought to judgment. 
 Happy is he to whom the Spirit says distinctly, According 
 to }*our measure of power you have been true to your 
 ideal. His ideal, Mr. Channing said, had alwa} T s been a 
 city of God on earth. Our business is not to be singly 
 perfect, but to form, in intimate connection with our 
 brethren, an image of God in humanity. He, however, 
 had had no occasion to burn his ships : his idea had always 
 been to pursue, to advance. God is great, and very slow 
 in his processes ; and he asks of us steady persistency 
 in the course which appears right. Sometimes we are 
 accosted by veiled angels, sometimes by veiled tempters. 
 We are sure to meet with difficulties, yet we should 
 never yield to discouragement. A city of God on earth ! 
 Has God indeed given to men free opportunity to build 
 one? Some of us once tried the experiment at Brook 
 Farm. Much merriment has been made over the result 
 of that experiment, and it may seem a great practical 
 joke of Providence that that establishment ultimately be 
 came a poorhouse. Ludicrous as the seeming failure was, 
 Mr. Channing thought that the attempt had had its uses. 
 The state of England was in many respects very unlike 
 our own ; }-et when he went to England, Mr. Channing 
 said, he found numbers of people there interested to try 
 the intermediate steps between our present imperfect state 
 and the complete establishment of the city of God on 
 earth. All the evidence still goes on to show that this 
 work must be effected through that sublime word of peace, 
 "co-operation." The facts coming to light ever since 
 have proved the correctness of what we said at Brook 
 Farm in 1846. We, stigmatized at that time as vision 
 aries and Utopians, were right. Co-operation was the real 
 tendenc} 7 of that time. The real battle was between capi 
 tal and industry. It was first fought out on the Slavery 
 question, and has since proved its reality in other forms. 
 
CONSTANCY TO AN IDEAL. 221 
 
 Our work on this continent is to build God s city of 
 peace. Those in Europe who study the course of events 
 here think that we have an eminently favorable oppor 
 tunity to become ideal men and women. We must be 
 worthy of the better birthright that has come to us through 
 the civil war. We must build the city of God in each 
 township, in each home. But we cannot build this city 
 with the hands of men alone ; our sisters must do their 
 part towards it, and they know as we do not what their 
 proper work should be. Mr. Charming closed with a fer 
 vent eulogy upon Margaret Fuller, from whom an influence 
 had come to him nobler than from any other human being. 
 
 R. W. EMERSON, who was the next speaker, said he 
 had highly enjoyed both the text and the comment. Every 
 temperament, said he, has had its sect in the Church. 
 Once Calvinism, the Church of the bilious temperament, 
 ruled in the world ; since then, every variety of tempera 
 ment has found its appropriate sect. As a result, there 
 has come a vast difference in the character of the preach 
 ing. Formerly, human affection had no voice in the pulpit, 
 or only in rarely exceptional cases ; now, an improved 
 method very generally prevails. With regard to Brook 
 Farm, so far as Mr. Emerson knew, none of the people 
 engaged in that experiment considered it a failure. All 
 have rejoiced that they were there, considering it a rich 
 experience and a useful part of their education. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE had been much gratified, both with the 
 subject chosen for the essay and the profoundly sympa 
 thetic treatment of it. In its language, music had found 
 a complete expression, and the comment upon it had given 
 us history and prophecy. She agreed to the truth of 
 what Mr. Channing had said of our special opportunities 
 and duties in these days ; and she was glad also to hear 
 him say that the city of God was not to be built of sepa 
 rately perfect people. The Brook Farm experiment had 
 
222 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 not been useless, for even the scattered stones of that 
 edifice were seen beautiful and useful in all the situations 
 where they have since distributed themselves. 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW was glad to be so eloquently 
 reminded of the claims of the ideal, and rejoiced in the 
 conviction that every attempt to follow ideal excellence 
 would bring its own reward. He wished to ask, Was there 
 no way of preventing that war which, it had been said, 
 impended over us? It seemed sad that peace could be 
 expected only through war. He had hoped that we had 
 reached the beginning of the foundation of the city of God 
 in the mutual co-operation which was beginning to be prac 
 tised in various ways ; but whether the desired end were 
 to come early or late, we must still work on in hope. 
 
 Mr. WASSON had not been quite satisfied with the state 
 ment that the impending war was to be between industry 
 and capital. So far as his experience went, labor was 
 quite as much demoralized as wealth. The working 
 classes were no more moved than the rich by an appeal 
 to disinterestedness. The new future will not open upon 
 us until both classes, the indigent and the wealthy, re 
 member the vocation of man to the highest. If, while we 
 talk of human rights, we go on putting power into the 
 hands of men who abuse it by taking every possible 
 advantage, we shall continue to find new complications of 
 disorder. The abolition of Slaveiy w r as more God s work 
 than ours. We may well ask ourselves whether some new 
 understanding of the laws of social .life be not necessar}-. 
 A demoralization now going on and growing worse in our 
 country is a fact ; and our road to the realization of God s 
 ideal is likely yet to witness some terrible contests. 
 
ORIENTAL RELIGIONS. 223 
 
 XXX. 
 
 ORIENTAL RELIGIONS. 
 
 BY MRS. A. H. LEONOWENS. 
 
 MRS. LEONOWENS began by speaking of the great 
 antiquity of the Rig- Veda, as indicated not only b} r 
 the assertions of those who believe in its sacredness, but 
 by the evidence of an astronomical record which is included 
 in one of the early books. She read a most gorgeous de 
 scription of the ancient ctty of Ayodhya, the modern Oude, 
 and then left the subject of the antiquity of Hindu sacred 
 books and Hindu civilization, and went on to present 
 the claims of the former to the admiration of Christians. 
 By way of doing this, she read several passages from the 
 Rig- Veda and the Mahabharatta, dwelling particularly 
 upon the fact that the Deity is constantly called Father 
 and Mother, by which compound epithet the universality 
 of his nature is recognized, and also drawing attention to 
 the monotheistic spirit of Brahmanism. She quoted some 
 of the Brahmanic definitions of the Deity, saying that 
 she doubted if all the so-called development of the hu 
 man mind had added anything to them, and then spoke 
 of the coincidences between the meaning of the Hindu 
 names for natural objects and the discoveries of modern 
 science concerning them. 
 
 Mrs. Leonowens then went on to say that the more 
 one studied the more firmly was one convinced that the 
 Hindu religion- had, by migration, been carried all over 
 
224 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the world, and become the parent of all other forms of 
 faith. She dwelt particular!} upon the coincidence be 
 tween the Christian idea of the Trinity and the Hindu con 
 ception of a Deity formed of Brahma the divine cause, 
 Krishna the preserver, and Siva the divine spirit, argu 
 ing that this proved that the younger religion derived its 
 idea from the elder. She spoke of the Vedic chivalry of 
 feeling towards women, saying that the modern tendency 
 to give them their rights and their proper place was but 
 a return to the ancient standard. The essay closed by 
 a comparison between the universal sacrifice performed 
 daily by all Brahman priests and the sacrifice of the mass, 
 which, in Mrs. Leonowens s opinion, are not only similar 
 in ceremonial but in significance. 
 
 The Rev. JOHN T. SARGENT then spoke in commen 
 dation of the essay, and said that he thought it must 
 be conceded that modern forms of religion had added 
 little to some of the noble ideas of which Mrs. Leonowens 
 had spoken. 
 
 A. BRONSON ALCOTT remarked that all present must feel 
 that a wider horizon had been opened by what they had 
 heard. All Christians were beginning to feel that they 
 must, even while reverencing those things which they held 
 sacred, extend their hospitality to the religious ideas of 
 other races, remembering that all truth has not been re 
 vealed exclusively to us. 
 
 The Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW evinced a decided pref 
 erence for the Christian Scriptures, and remarked that 
 there was an immense mass of stuff in the Brahmanic 
 sacred books which was unfit for reading ; he also ventured 
 to contradict an assertion made by Mrs. Leonowens that 
 Christ and Krishna were identical in meaning, and said 
 
ORIENTAL RELIGIONS. 225 
 
 that whereas the former word signified " anointed," the 
 latter meant " black." 
 
 Mrs. LEONOWENS explained that Krishna really meant 
 "dark blue," which was the color of the robe worn by 
 kings at their anointing, and also the hue of the sky, which 
 was the anointing of the earth. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW expressed his pleasure at learning the 
 real meaning of the name. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL then spoke on prayer, enunciating his fa 
 vorite theorj^ that the soul which is nearest to God does 
 not like to speak of him, and does not need to speak to 
 him, but merely listens for his word, content to do his will. 
 The speaker also dwelt at some length on the dissatisfac 
 tion which he considered that every one must feel with a 
 day in which he had not toiled and suffered. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT said that he supposed it was the modern 
 opinion that there was no efficacy in prayer, except in its 
 reaction upon the petitioner. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said that prayer was a realization of the unity 
 of the soul with its source, not a carrier pigeon sent out to 
 ask for aid, nor a cable reaching from a wreck to the shore. 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT followed this up, saying that the earnest 
 desires of our hearts are our real prayers, and that the 
 Friends truly appreciate this when they sit in silence and 
 wait for the Spirit. 
 
 This series of remarks drew forth an earnest speech 
 from JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE, who asked why we prayed 
 if we did not long for something, and did not hope to 
 receive it by praying. "I cannot," he said, "agree to 
 the theor} r which w r ould make prayer a mere reaction. 
 If I thought so, I would call it meditation. Why should 
 I pretend to ask God for anything if I do not expect an 
 answer ? Am I so cut off from the Infinite that he cannot 
 hear my petitions ? Am I so far from him that, while I can 
 ask a man for anything and receive it, I may pray to God 
 
 15 
 
226 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 in vain? When man asks God for help and opens his 
 soul to receive it, in order that he may do his will, real 
 help comes. My friend here sa} r s, To labor is to pray ; 
 but suppose there is no life, no heart, no love in } T OU, and 
 there is a vast work for you to do, and no help but that 
 of the Spirit, what then? That is the time for prayer. 
 Then is the time to put ourselves in the place where the 
 work is to be done, and without undue solicitude to open 
 our souls to God, and help will certainly come. He will 
 give his spirit to us if we ask for it, for he is more ready 
 to bestow favors upon us than we are to heap them upon 
 our children. I feel this so deeply," Dr. Clarke concluded, 
 that I am relieved from all sense of responsibility, and 
 know that all I have to do is to open my soul to God. 
 Year by year my creed has grown shorter ; now it is only 
 From God, for man, and I cannot leave out either part." 
 
 A little burst of applause followed Dr. Clarke s remarks, 
 and, as it died away, Mr. SARGENT said that the sunshine 
 of God was all about us, and our error was in not open 
 ing our hearts to it. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said that he should not object to anything 
 which Dr. Clarke had said, but he thought we must be 
 at a distance from God, and not united with him as we 
 should be, before we could ask him anything. He gave 
 before we could ask. 
 
 Dr. CLARKE commented on this by saying that he thought 
 that even the childish babble of her infant was sweet to a 
 mother. 
 
RAPHAEL AND HIS CRITICS. 227 
 
 XXXI. 
 
 RAPHAEL AND HIS CRITICS. 
 
 BY TITUS MUNSON COAN. 
 
 DR. COAN contended that there was too much indis 
 criminate and conventional praise bestowed upon the 
 works of the great painter. He thought it had been as 
 little the fashion to criticise Raphael as Shakspeare, and 
 the consequence is that the general impression has pre 
 vailed that Raphael was faultless. 
 
 Dr. Coan considered the limitations of Raphael s genius. 
 The first of these which he mentioned was the fact that the 
 artist seemed to see beauty in the human form, and not 
 elsewhere, being in this respect like all the artists of his 
 age, none of whom studied Nature. Raphael sometimes 
 fell so far short of truth in the portrayal of some minor 
 objects as to cease to produce decorative pictures, thus 
 falling below the requirements of even the German critics, 
 who have not, as yet, decided that ugliness is really de 
 sirable in art. To illustrate this point, Dr. Coan criticised 
 the frescos of the Loggie of the Vatican, and pointed out 
 that in these Raphael had curiously erred in the represen 
 tation of the horse, the ass, the camel, the sheep, and of 
 flame and water. In regard to composition, also, these 
 frescos were pronounced defective, monotony being very 
 common. He then entered upon an inquiry as to Raphael s 
 probable view of art, questioning whether he regarded its 
 mission as simply decorative, or considered that it should 
 
228 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 be ennobling, and quoted Ruskin as an advocate of the 
 former and Taine as an expounder of the latter view. The 
 essay closed with a glowing tribute to the artist, who, 
 Dr. Coan declared, while he had faults which the hon 
 est critic could not ignore without self-abasement, was } T et 
 the guardian of the highest in art, and had produced the 
 noblest pictures which had yet appeared in this shining 
 world. 
 
 Mr. CRANCH spoke in defence of Raphael, saying that 
 landscape and animal painting hardly existed in his time. 
 
 Mr. SARGENT suggested that possibly he fell into his 
 faults from subordinating all other things to the presen 
 tation of the sacred personages whom he painted. 
 
 One of the guests accused Raphael of inaccuracy in 
 drawing the human figure, and seemed to think the art 
 ists of the present age had advanced far beyond him. 
 
 Mr. GANNETT asked if more importance should not be 
 given to the nature of an artist s mistakes than to their 
 number, and suggested that as Raphael only failed in 
 minor details, his errors were less grave than if he had 
 looked at his subject in a narrow, unartistic spirit. If the 
 artist s conception is grand, we may overlook some faults 
 of execution. 
 
THE BIRD AND THE BELL. 229 
 
 XXXII. 
 THE BIRD AND THE BELL. 
 
 BY C. P. CRANCH. 
 
 IT was the first occasion on which a poem had been sub 
 stituted for an essa} T , and of course the innovation 
 gave rise to some speculation. " What will there be to 
 discuss in verses ? " asked one and another ; but the result 
 proved that themes for subsequent discourse were not 
 wanting. Mr. CRANCH S title was " The Bird and the Bell," 
 a real bird and a real bell, which symbolized, as the theme 
 grew, the clear music of "natural religion and the brazen 
 clangor of dogmatic theologj^. The poem opened with a 
 description of an early morning of early spring, in Flor 
 ence, in which, waking from sleep, the poet heard the 
 carol of a bird, so clear and fresh that no heart could hear 
 it and not rejoice, a carol of youth and hope and 
 spring. Upon this music broke the clamor of a brazen 
 bell, " joined in a moment by a hundred more." 
 
 " Oft have I listened in the dead of night, 
 
 "When all those towers like chanting priests have prayed, 
 And the weird tones seemed tangled in the height 
 Of palaces." 
 
 While this " incessant peal filled all the air," the sweet 
 bird-music was drowned and ceased, and the clanging bell 
 seemed a symbol of the church of many burdens griev 
 ous to be borne, which drowns with the monotonous 
 echo of its creeds and formulas the glad, spontaneous cry 
 
230 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 of the recognizing soul to its God. Here followed a long 
 apostrophe to the might} church, the Church of Rome, 
 "old, but still adorned with jewels of her youth." Mr. 
 Cranch saw in this " wrinkled bride, affianced to the blind," 
 the nurse, not the mother of art, an unwise nurse, always 
 cramping and fettering the children in her charge, while 
 these great souls looked over and beyond their prison-walls, 
 and caught from the earth below and the skies above new 
 splendors for Rome s tarnished crown. Still addressing 
 this cruel foster-mother, he cried : 
 
 " Is there a daring thought thou liast not crushed ? 
 Is there a generous faith thou hast not cursed ? 
 
 "Dark Sorceress, whose Circean cup bereft 
 Man of his fair proportions and large hope, 
 Thy throne is built on darkness ! 
 
 " Art thou our mother, truly ? None so bold 
 As lift thy veil, and show how hard and cold 
 Those eyes of tyranny, that mouth of guile, 
 That low and narrow brow, the witchcraft of that smile, 
 That subtle smile, deluding while it warmed." 
 
 A picture followed of Italy struggling for her freedom ; 
 then of Italy made free, while 
 
 " The nations greet her as some lovely guest 
 
 Arriving late, where friends pour out the wine. 
 Ay, press around, and pledge her in the best 
 Your table yields, and in her praise combine ! 
 And ye who love her most, press near, and twine 
 Her locks with wreaths, and in her large, dark eyes 
 See all the sorrowing Past, and her great Future rise." 
 
 Mr. Cranch thinks that this church of darkness can do 
 little to-day, when the sun of progress is risen. But we 
 of to-day may not boast ourselves, unless 
 
THE BIRD AND THE BELL. 231 
 
 " "We are, indeed, so sure our faith is best 
 
 That we can dare to leave it large and free, 
 Nor fear to bring the creed to reason s test, 
 Scorning intolerance toward all who see 
 With other eyes. " 
 
 Striving thus, through trust in God and man and tolera 
 tion toward all sincere believing, for the truth 
 
 " The music of the soul can ne er be mute. 
 
 What though the brazen clang of antique form 
 Stop for a hundred years the angel s lute ? 
 
 The angel smiles, and when the deafening storm 
 Has pealed along the age, he sings again, 
 Clearer and sweeter, like the sunshine after rain." 
 
 It seemed to Dr. BARTOL the great test-question about 
 any truth, " Can it be sung, can it be set to music? " The 
 words of Jesus were of themselves rhythmical ; they were 
 a song of hope, a chant of courage. But this test would 
 make sad work of dogmatic theology. We should have 
 trouble to sing Calvinism. Election is not musical, nor is 
 everlasting punishment melodious. 
 
 Mr. JOHN DWIGHT spoke of Bach as the singer of Cal 
 vinism, some of his compositions go into all the literal 
 details of the crucifixion. But he thought it made no dif 
 ference about the creed of Bach ; there was something be 
 neath the creed, and the creed was only a moving power. 
 It was only the true thing which can be sung or printed ; 
 false things do not last. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE said that the poem to which we had listened 
 seemed to her the truest and the best word she had ever 
 heard about Italy in connection with the subject. She 
 thought that in Mr. Cranch s poem there was a new 
 point of presentation ; and she was reminded by his name 
 and this suggestion of another and earlier Christopher, 
 
232 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Christopher Columbus ; and she thought that Mr. Cranch 
 also belonged to the discoverers in his discovery of new 
 thoughts. 
 
 Mr. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW followed this with a word 
 about the other side ; he said there were plenty of persons 
 who could speak on the other side, or the ecclesiastical 
 side, if they were present, but it seemed to him that Nature 
 must eventually win over ecclesiasticism. He then illus 
 trated this by a pleasing incident which had come under 
 his own observation in one of the Italian cities. He saw a 
 little child dancing on the pavement of the church interior 
 with perfect abandon and ease, who presently approached 
 the altar and dropped upon her knees with the rest, said 
 her little prayer and danced out. Here was a touch of 
 Nature which seemed to offer such contrast with the old 
 forms. He then spoke of John Hay s poem of " Jim Blud- 
 soe," with its fidelity to Nature, which fact had made it so 
 universal in acceptance and appreciation. We must hold 
 fast to everything natural, he said, whether in church or 
 out of it. 
 
 Mr. POTTER, referring to what had been said about 
 Calvinism, that it could not be sung, wanted to know 
 what we would do with Milton s u Paradise Lost" then. 
 A good many people found it rather hard reading now, but 
 no one would den} that Milton was a great singer. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL again spoke of the man being greater than 
 his creed, and therefore singing above it. 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT believed that eveiything true and high set 
 itself to music. All men and women who influence man 
 kind are idealists. The sentiments harmonize and become 
 melodious. The New Testament itself was a poem ; so 
 were the utterances of Jesus. 
 
 CHARLES G. AMES alluded to the isms of the cla3 T , and 
 said that all the isms had a mission ; Calvinism he de 
 clared to be the greatest ism of all. He believed in Cal- 
 
THE BIRD AND THE BELL. 233 
 
 vinism, with Calvin and the ism left out. He believed 
 that Catholicism, too, was of greater importance and 
 meaning than we thought. It fitted into history in a way 
 we do not understand. He could not believe so great 
 a power could spend itself as an evil force. Other forces 
 are to play upon it, and eventually work it to its will. 
 Why cannot we fall into some way to harmonize with all 
 beliefs? "I do not belong to the church," he said, " but 
 the church belongs to me." 
 
 Mr. GANNETT said in reference to what seemed to be the 
 central point of the discussion, Calvinism, that he thought 
 Calvinism did sing. Life is the highest expression, and 
 what great musical lines were in that life ! He thought we 
 should accept all things ; and he quoted from Mr. Emerson, 
 " I accept the universe." He thought that was significant 
 of a broad belief. 
 
 Mrs. HOWE begged to say another word just here, 
 that it was not Emerson who had made that statement, but 
 Margaret Fuller. She said she did not know that the uni 
 verse was ever offered to Mr. Emerson. 
 
 A general laugh ensued here, and Mr. AMES, catching 
 the spirit of it, in his happy manner said that he thought 
 the universe was offered to us all ; that we were all here 
 for that ; and he, for himself, had always felt like one of 
 the largest stockholders. 
 
234 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXXIII. 
 FATALITY. 
 
 BY JOHN WEISS. 
 
 MR. WEISS treated in the most delightful manner the 
 subject of "Fatality," which he illustrated by the 
 Greek story of CEdipus. The Greeks were in the habit of 
 considering every calamity as the punishment for some es 
 pecial sin ; but in this story they embodied a feeling that 
 besides Fate there was also Fatality in human life, some 
 thing in the regular sequence of events which could not be 
 referred to violations of divine law, though it might be due 
 to ignorance and weakness ; something unfortunate as well 
 as retributive, which deepened the Greek reverence for 
 the closeness of the invisible world. We often say of a 
 person, "It is just his luck," not blaming him, but recog 
 nizing the fact of his being, so to speak, born to misfor 
 tune. Now, CEdipus seems to have been pre-eminently 
 born to misfortune. 
 
 He was the son of Laius and Jocasta of Thebes. Ex 
 posed on Mount Cithaeron by his parents to forestall the 
 fulfilment of a prophecy that his father would lose his life 
 at his hands, left there with his feet pierced through and 
 tied together, he }^et lived to be called CEdipus, a word 
 which means " swollen feet," for he was, though comely and 
 well-proportioned, a trifle halt and uncertain in his move 
 ments from this early exposure. A shepherd finds him, 
 and carries him to the palace of Polybus and Merope, at 
 
FATALITY. 235 
 
 Corinth, where, by that royal couple, he is adopted and 
 brought up. 
 
 For a long time he supposes himself to be their son, but 
 learning by some chance that he is not, he repairs to Delphi 
 to consult an oracle. He is cautioned by the oracle to be 
 ware of meeting his father and his mother, for if he should 
 meet his father he would slay him, and if he should meet 
 his mother a yet more direful disaster would ensue. Still 
 half believing that Potybus is his father, he will not return 
 to Corinth, but takes the road to Thebes. Now this was 
 about the time of the ravages of the Sphinx, and Laius, 
 the real father of QEdipus, chanced to be on his way to 
 Delphi to consult the oracle. Father and son met in a 
 narrow passage, where some trouble about passing each 
 other grew into a quarrel, and CEdipus killed his father. 
 
 Arrived at Thebes, he found the whole country agitated 
 by the presence of the Sphinx. She had propounded a 
 famous riddle, and refused to leave the place until it was 
 guessed ; but every one who attempted to guess it and 
 failed she devoured, a practice not conducive to Theban 
 cheerfulness. The Thebans in despair proclaimed that who 
 ever would guess the riddle should become their king and 
 the husband of Jocasta, the widowed mother of CEdipus. 
 
 The Sphinx propounded her puzzle to (Edipus, as to 
 his predecessors, " What animal is that which walks on 
 four feet in the morning, on two at noon, and on three at 
 night? It has but one voice, and when it has the most feet 
 it is the weakest." You are not surprised at the Greek 
 mind s guessing it a modern school-boy could do that. 
 What animal is it? Why, man, of course, answers the 
 awakening Greek : and he himself, the answer, is the 
 greatest riddle ; for though he crawls as a babe, walks 
 in the noon of his manhood, and declines upon a staff 
 at night, he has but one voice, and that is the inspired, 
 inspiring soul. 
 
236 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Not many years had QEdipus been seated upon the 
 throne of his father, with his queen, his own mother, by 
 his side, when a pestilence broke out to ravage the land 
 which he had freed from the Sphinx. Of course, instead 
 of searching for a natural and physical cause for this visi 
 tation, he betakes himself to an oracle. The oracle tells 
 him that the murderer of King Laius yet lives among the 
 Thebans. At once CEdipus resolves to become the dead 
 king s avenger. At last he finds out that he himself was 
 the murderer. Jocasta thereupon understands the whole 
 complication of events, and kills herself. Then OEdipus, 
 horror-stricken, snatches the golden buckles from her robe, 
 and plunges and replunges them into his eyeballs. " Let 
 me go sightless into Hades," he exclaims, "for how can 
 I ever behold my father again ? " 
 
 Lame, blind, gray in a moment with the shock of his 
 misfortunes, he is thrust forth by the other members of 
 the ro3~al house, and totters into exile, invoking upon his 
 own head the Erinnys of his mother. But the very Fates 
 are softened towards him, and the gods make him their 
 care. His children grow up to be his comforters. His 
 daughter Antigone, the loveliest woman of all literature, 
 waits lovingly upon his footsteps. Even his death is an 
 unaccountable, painless fading out of sight. 
 
 Round this immortal story Mr. Weiss spun the golden 
 threads of his eloquence. 
 
 Mr. EMERSON broke the momenta^ silence after the 
 essay. He thought it well for us to sit upon the riddle of 
 the Sphinx ; and he had very much enjo} T ed Mr. Weiss s 
 suggestive paper. Those old tragedies and stories were 
 full of human significance. We could not have a better 
 definition of the Greek chorus than that it was the voice 
 of humanity throughout the play. We should need a wide 
 
FATALITY. 237 
 
 generalization to reconcile all the speeches of the Greeks 
 on the matter of fate ; but a poet is not bound to reconcile 
 what he does and says with everything else which he has 
 said or shall say. 
 
 Col. HIGGINSON remarked that it seemed to him the 
 Greeks were simply more daring than we in recognizing 
 the cloudy aspects of existence. They played freely with 
 these vast conceptions of fate, and the like. The modern 
 tendency is to analyze and explain, and rather to put out 
 of sight what cannot be reduced to system. Aristotle 
 asked questions boldly and baldly enough ; but before his 
 da} 7 if the Greeks must suggest an interrogation-point 
 they did it grandly, as in the case of the Sphinx. Among 
 the moderns, Hawthorne, indeed, wrote with a certain 
 grand mysticism, gave sublime hints, after the manner 
 of the ancients ; but the Greek idea of fate belongs to 
 the cloudy region, and it is difficult for us to treat it satis 
 factorily. 
 
 Mr. FROTHINGHAM said that a man living in New York 
 saw little of Greek philosophy, though a good deal of cer 
 tain kinds of fate. He never touched a Greek tragedy 
 without feeling that it included eveiything ; but we did 
 not always get, as we had this morning, an interpreter 
 who could bring to light all the shades of meaning. There 
 seemed to be nothing to take us out of the dilemma be 
 tween optimism and despair until we came to the poetic 
 view. The old Greeks were happy, fated to be happy, 
 and so bequeathed happiness to the world ; and we feel it 
 in going back into their atmosphere. It is not merely for 
 the cultivated, but for simple human nature. Imagina 
 tion is above dogmatism. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL expressed his thanks to Mr. Weiss as well 
 as his interest in every sentence of the essay. But he felt 
 that if fatality be the last result of fate, fate itself is but 
 a voice, as its derivation shows : the speaker is behind. 
 
238 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Law did not make the world. Fate is the gesture and 
 voice of the Infinite Person, who is Love. Goodness is 
 the first idea. We ma}* not see till we are nearer to the 
 light, but we must believe. He should be sorry for us to 
 date from Fate, or believe ourselves Fate s children, in 
 stead of the children of God. 
 
 Miss GREW thought the age which produced the Greek 
 story could not have produced the interpretation which 
 Mr. Weiss had given. He had drawn from it more than 
 its framers knew was there. 
 
 Mr. POTTER said the history of the universe is a Sphinx, 
 intelligence striving to develop itself into individuality, 
 or force into intelligence. The history of each individual 
 is the history of a struggle between spirit or moral force, 
 and this blind fate or circumstance the background on 
 which we are developed. 
 
 Col. HIGGINSON observed that the two poles of our lives 
 must include all the wide range of inherited tendencies and 
 causes with which Dr. Holmes has dealt, as well as their 
 opposite, the individual will. What was grandest in Tho- 
 reau was his conception of a man s power to ennoble his 
 own life. He, himself, had no fear of science. It gave 
 even to poetry much more than it took away. We do not 
 see Dr. Howe enumerated among the literary men of Amer 
 ica ; but few things were written which thrilled him as did 
 Dr. Howe s reports. They were as noble and inspiring as 
 any Greek tragecty ; and while reading them one under 
 stood how science is coming to the aid of art and poetry 
 and religion. We are yet to work into our own lives all 
 which the Greeks knew of excellence and of beauty. 
 About a thousand years hence we shall have very nice 
 times. 
 
 Mr. POWELL wondered if distance does not lend some 
 enchantment to the Greek view. He fancied that to-day 
 humanity is nobler than ever before. We do not need 
 
FATALITY. 239 
 
 to dwell apart from the natural world in one of imagination, 
 because the most beautiful pictures are strictly true. We 
 are only on the threshold, as } et, of the unexplored world 
 of spiritual forces. They are indicated by all history, and 
 are everywhere at work ; and we ought to look more at 
 life from that side. 
 
 Miss PEABODY thought the point of the tragedy of GEdi- 
 pus to be that he who had unriddled the Sphinx knew 
 nothing of himself. While that ignorance exists, the 
 Sphinx must tear men in pieces. CEdipus states the truth 
 intellectually, but is not saved by it. The tragedy of life 
 is that everybody drifts. We perceive, and are not helped 
 by our perceiving. There is truth enough in the world to 
 save it, but it is not saved. The story of CEdipus illus 
 trates this. What the oracle says shocks him, but does 
 not hinder him from rashness ; and such is the always 
 recurring tragedy of life. 
 
240 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XXXI Y. 
 IMAGINATION. 
 
 BY CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. 
 
 PROFESSOR EVERETT began by saying that he had 
 noticed a tendency at the present day to repress, and 
 even to disown, the imagination. The imagination is sim 
 ply the faculty of imagining. This simple power is of more 
 importance than we often think. If we could learn to see, 
 to look accurate!} 7 and take in all that we see, and then 
 remember what we see and reproduce it to the eye of the 
 mind as it existed for the e} T e of the body, life would be a 
 new thing for us. This was the real end of education, 
 and in this the training of the imagination held no small 
 place. But this is onl} T a small part, indeed the smallest 
 part, of the functions of the imagination. Not merely does 
 it reproduce for the mind that which the eye has seen : it 
 goes beyond, and separates the elements of that which has 
 been beheld, and recombines them in new forms. It goes 
 even farther : it introduces new elements, creating for the 
 mind that which the outward senses could not discern. In 
 all this it keeps true to the lessons it has learned, and keeps 
 true to Nature even when it changes the nature which has 
 been beheld. The imagination and the fane} 7 might thus 
 be distinguished. The imagination follows the lines of 
 Nature : the fanc}~ works more independently, forsaking 
 the intent of Nature and adapting ends of its own, com 
 bining the elements of Nature arbitrarily and artificially. 
 
IMAGINATION. 241 
 
 The fancy brought together the parts of the man and of 
 the horse, and created the centaur : imagination created the 
 Apollo. The world of fancy is a world apart by itself, 
 while the world of imagination ma} be more natural than 
 that of Nature itself. Tyndall recognizes the fact that 
 the imagination is an instrument of science itself. The 
 grandest discoveries of science were made when it had left 
 the regions of the seen and the known and followed the 
 imagination by new paths to regions before unseen. New 
 ton, watching the fall of the apple, began dreaming of the 
 movements "of the stars. His imagination leaped to a con 
 ception which embraced the universe. The discoveries of 
 science become to the minds of most men hard, cold, pro 
 saic facts. It is forgotten that when the a y first dawned 
 they came as poetry, and were the outgrowth of the imagi 
 nation, the poetic facuhy. Nowhere to-day is imagina 
 tion more active than in the realms of science. The theory 
 of development was as truly a creation of the mind as the 
 fables of ^Esop. The fable may be more fanciful, but 
 the theory is more imaginative. Not only is the imagina 
 tion thus efficient in science, in the practical affairs of life 
 it fills a place no less important. The man of affairs is 
 largely dependent for his success on the powers of the im 
 agination. It is less by a process of conscious reasoning 
 than b}* the flash of intuition that he la} s his vastest plans. 
 Here, as before, it is. the imagination of the trained mind 
 that oftenest does its work successfully. There is a ge 
 nius in affairs as truly as in literature or art ; but it is im 
 agination, and not fancy. The man of fancy also dreams 
 dreams and risks his money on their truth, but has left 
 only the memory of his wasted means and of his palace in 
 the clouds. The poet or student, living largely in the 
 regions of the imagination, wonders how life is possible 
 amid its cold, hard realities without the play of the im 
 agination. He is right in this, but wrong in supposing 
 
 16 
 
242 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 that the imagination is excluded from these so-called 
 practical affairs. It is looked upon by its masters as a 
 good servant if well-trained. But is the imagination 
 merely a servant? To whom does the world rightfully 
 belong? As it exists for us, it is the creation of the 
 imagination. She lends it to science to study, to analyze, 
 to reason about. She lends it to business to work or to 
 play with. But when, because she is thus helpful, she 
 is treated as a servant onh r , she may well assert the right 
 of sovereignty. Art and poetry are the methods of the 
 imagination, and these complete the world. Art gives us 
 the ideal man, life, and Nature. As we look upon them 
 we feel that this is the real man, the real life, the real 
 Nature. The perfect man is the ideal man ; the perfect 
 life, as yet largely a dream life, the ideal life. It is the 
 goal of humanity. I believe in all that the botanist tells 
 about the flower ; but if he sees nothing more in the flower 
 than his analysis can show him, then the little child who 
 claps its hands in delight at the beauty of the first blos 
 som of the spring sees the flower more truly than he does. 
 The whole is more than the sum of its parts. The ideal 
 is more real than the actual : it destroys the actual that 
 it may fulfil itself. The oak which the little sapling 
 became is more real than the sapling, for the sapling 
 yielded to its power and became the oak. The imagina 
 tion, first the explorer and then the poet of the race, 
 became at last its seer, its prophet, and its priest. The 
 senses give us only a confused series of sensations ; the 
 understanding gives us only lifeless fragments ; the im 
 agination gives us the universe in its wholeness, and trans 
 forms it into the living garments of divinity. 
 
THE NEBULAR THEORY. 243 
 
 XXXV. 
 
 THE NEBULAR THEORY. 
 
 BY BENJAMIN PEIRCE. 
 
 THE speaker distinguished four general periods in neb 
 ular evolution, chaos, nebula, star, planet. How 
 this subject takes hold on infinity may be imagined from 
 Professor Peirce s statement that, incomprehensible as the 
 duration is from chaos to planet, with its unnumbered 
 millions of years, it is possible that there may have been 
 many chaotic periods from the beginning to the present 
 time. There was at first, speaking of our present sj stem, 
 a collection of matter in a simple, inactive state, not neces 
 sarily infinitely diffused. It may have been the remains of 
 old stars which have retained the resultant of their former 
 motion, and so the harmony of the universe now may be 
 the result of a previous harmony, and may be transmitted 
 to the end. The division which has occurred in matter 
 must have had its beginning in the original chaos, or 
 the organized system could not have come from it. The 
 plan must have been in the system from the beginning, as 
 the plan of the eagle is in the egg. To the idea that there 
 was in the beginning a system without a plan Professor 
 Peirce is resolutely opposed, as to an}^ other absurdit} r in 
 the minds of unthinking men. The original chaos must 
 have been invisible. Luminousness is evidence of living 
 force. Yet we can imagine what chaos is from what we 
 see about us. The grains of sand, the cold planets, and 
 dead suns may be potentially chaos. 
 
244 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 But as soon as there is light we come to the second 
 stage, that of the nebula. Seven periods are recognized 
 in this epoch, nebulosit} , the nebula proper, the cluster, 
 the annular nebula, the spiral nebula, the Milky Way, and 
 the Magellanic clouds. This classification approaches that 
 made by Sir William Herschel. Nebulosit} 7 " shows the 
 slightest diffusion of light which can be perceived by a 
 telescope. In almost every point of the heavens there is 
 some light to be found. The nebula proper has more dis 
 tinct boundaries than the nebulosity, and the intensity of 
 light in it is unequal. Sometimes the variation is very 
 marked, and sometimes very faint. In the former case 
 several nebulae are supposed to be connected. When 
 these nebulae are concentrated the} 7 form clusters, but the 
 approach to this condition from the single nebula is made 
 gradually. Next comes the annular nebula, which, in its 
 simplest form, is a mere ring. This is found in all parts 
 of the universe, and the arrangement of matter in circular 
 form is thought to be under the very same law which de 
 termines the arrangement of molecules. In the case of 
 dumb-bell nebulae the outline is filled to a full circle by 
 telescopes of high power. It is thought that some of 
 these nebulae may be annular, with the side presented 
 towards us. 
 
 A little episode in the address at this point was notice 
 able, for a subdued applause greeted the speaker s heartfelt 
 earnestness. He spoke of the identit} r of the controlling law 
 in the nebula and the child s top. The same force goes 
 through its period in a hundredth part of a second in the 
 child s top which completes the precession of the equinoxes 
 in long ages. Then he said : "It seems as if the divine 
 truth loves to nestle in the arms of little children. Who 
 dares to sa} r , in the face of such facts, that there is no love 
 in Nature but in this cold, selfish heart of man? 31 
 
 The spiral nebula, first noted by Lord Rosse, is not 
 
THE NEBULAR THEORY. 245 
 
 limited to that one case, but is found in a great number of 
 instances. The Milky Way was studied closely b} Sir 
 William Herschel. lie thought it was nothing but a neb 
 ula in an advanced stage. Magellan s clouds we do not 
 see. They are found in the southern sky, and appear as 
 clouds of light. They are an immense quantity of stars, 
 double stars, clusters, and nebulae, of all kinds known. It 
 appears to be a wonderful s} stem. 
 
 Herschel came to the conclusion that it is impossible to 
 draw any line of demarcation between the different stages 
 of star development. His conclusion was proper and 
 natural, that the very appearance of the periods running 
 into each other is only an indication that they are different 
 stages of the same thing. He compares the development 
 of the stages of plant-life. In these successive stages we 
 can read the ideal history. The question is, u Is it true? 
 Is Nature a false witness, or can we believe her?" 
 
 Five stages mark the star epoch, the round nebula, 
 the nebulous star, the star proper, the double star, and the 
 solar sj stem. The round nebula ma} have no concentra 
 tion at the centre, but usually it does. In proportion as it 
 is round, is there a concentration of light at the centre. A 
 nebulous star is one stage forward. What appears a star 
 under a low power of the telescope will appear as a nebular 
 star under a higher power. So the development proceeds 
 till we come to the stars which show no nebulosit} under 
 a telescope of the highest power. But some stars without 
 a nebula are known to be connected. They are seen to 
 revolve about each other. No line can be drawn between 
 these stages of change ; and so the nebular theoiy has 
 arisen, that in the mass of matter there is a disposition 
 to concentrate, and that this concentration is continually 
 going on, and that heat is given out by the compression of 
 the parts upon each other, and the mass is heated till it 
 becomes more and more luminous. The compression goes 
 
246 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 on, and finally the particles come into such connection 
 that the action of chemical force is possible, and the gases 
 appear. Then deposits are made in the mass, solid 
 substances, which give a very different kind of light from 
 the gases or the nebula. This can be distinguished by the 
 spectroscope ; but Herschel did not have means to make 
 the distinction, and hence he doubted whether there was 
 an} r real nebula. The spectrum of a star has continuity, 
 but the spectrum of a nebula has not. Yet the spectra of 
 of nebulae differ among themselves so they can be distin 
 guished from each other. The variety of nebulas in form 
 is so great that Professor Peirce thinks it is impossible for 
 the mind of man to conceive any possible kind which is 
 not actually found in the sidereal heavens. 
 
 Of solar systems we know but one, yet there are prob 
 ably many in the universe. The characteristic is a self- 
 luminous body surrounded by bodies not self-luminous. 
 We cannot expect to see other solar S3~stems, because the 
 amount of light reflected from the satellites is so small. 
 The new telescopes are not likely to bring out this small 
 amount of light. Professor Peirce at this point dropped 
 some casual remarks, which, very comforting to Cam 
 bridge, may be profitable to ambitious telescope-makers. 
 The telescope at Cambridge, he says, is probably richer in 
 results than the larger one at Washington or the one in the 
 West. With a larger glass the magnif3*ing, which greatly 
 influences the twinkling of the stars, will be increased. 
 With the Cambridge telescope there are only two or three 
 nights in a year when it can be used, and the professor 
 avers that he would rather work with a glass of ten or 
 twelve inches than with a larger one. A good night for 
 the Washington telescope cannot be expected more than 
 once in three or four years. For larger telescopes they 
 must wait a length of time proportional to the magnitude 
 of the telescope, and, perhaps, get one night in a centmy. 
 
THE NEBULAR THEORY. 247 
 
 In the solar s} stem there are about one hundred and 
 eighty small planets and eight large ones, all moving 
 around the sun in the same direction. The satellites of 
 the planets generally move in the same direction also ; but 
 the partial reversal of the movement in the case of the 
 outer planets, when fully explained and understood, does 
 not interfere with the nebular theory, but rather sustains it. 
 These satellites also rotate on the axes in the same direc 
 tion as their motion, and it is infinite^ improbable that 
 this coincidence could have happened by chance. The 
 planets are nearty all on the sun s equator, and have their 
 own equators in nearly the same plane. These phenomena 
 were brought forward by La Place, in the beginning of the 
 century, as evidence of the nebular theor} T . His proof was 
 the result of remarkable mathematical logic, tracing back 
 the course of physical power. The wonderful uniformity 
 of motion and position prove a great plan behind, and an 
 intelligence to execute it. 
 
 Seven stages mark the planetary epoch, the frozen 
 star, the inorganic period, the organic, the planet proper, 
 the satellite, the comet, and the chaotic mass. 
 
 As the planet concentrates, it comes to have a solid ex 
 terior. On the question whether the centre or the outside 
 solidifies first, probably no reasoning is better than that of 
 Dr. T. Sterry Hunt. Solidification must begin at the cen 
 tre. He has shown that solidification of particles would 
 take place on the surface, and these masses would sink to 
 the centre ; but some substances water, for instance 
 solidif}* first on the surface, and we do not know how far 
 the process continues. We may have a solid centre and a 
 solid surface, with a liquid mass between, and Professor 
 Peirce is inclined to accept that view. Sir William Thomp 
 son thinks he lias proved that the earth is solid to its cen 
 tre, but Professor Peirce does not regard it proved by any 
 means. Thompson s proof by the precession of the equi 
 noxes is not convincing. 
 
248 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 When the planet is solid on the exterior it is in the inor 
 ganic period. When it has cooled down so plants can live, 
 it is in the organic. A very pertinent illustration of the 
 proof of original heat was given by the speaker from his 
 loaf of brown bread. Fresh from the baker s, it is warmer 
 on the inside than on the outside. On the second day, 
 wanned over in his oven, it is warmer on the outside. So 
 a body which is warm on the inside must sometime have 
 been eqnallj* hot on the outside. Now the earth is hotter 
 in the interior than at the surface. Then it is cooling off. 
 The heat of the interior could never have been greater 
 than it was sometime at the surface. Scientific men know 
 at what rate heat will pass through the strata at the sur 
 face of the earth. They know how long it would take for 
 the heat to disappear wholly. As we descend toward the 
 centre of the earth the heat increases one degree Fahren 
 heit for every fifty feet. This continues to be the ratio so 
 far as our knowledge extends. Sir William Thompson 
 estimated the time for cooling down to the present condi 
 tion at a hundred million years. This period has been 
 reduced by Tate to twenty millions, a time altogether 
 too short for the phenomena of the organic world as the}* 
 are observed. 
 
 How did organic life come into the world? Professor 
 Peirce will not undertake to say ; but he thinks no scien 
 tific man will den}* that if any planet should be subjected to 
 the same changes as this, animal life would appear upon 
 it, just as it has upon this. The professor maintains a 
 firm belief in the action of secondary causes in the work 
 ings of Nature, and that God intrusts the outworking of 
 his plans to them. By secondary cause only, he says, is 
 science possible, and in that way alone can intelligence 
 have any meaning in its application to tho physical 
 universe. 
 
 Are there inhabitants in other parts of the universe? 
 
THE NEBULAR THEORY. 249 
 
 In considering this question, the Professor spoke first of 
 the moon. In its long days and nights it is alternate!}- so 
 heated and cooled that either extreme must be destructive 
 to all organic life. In the case of a self-luminous bod} r , 
 like the sun, after it had become sufficiently cool to permit 
 animal life, the opportunity for such life could not last more 
 than fifty of our days at the extreme, judging from the 
 rapidity with which in the night-time heat from our own 
 earth passes off into the starry spaces. Life is to be ex 
 pected onlj* on a planet. There must be an atmosphere to 
 maintain an equable temperature, and there must be a sun 
 to give warmth. So far as evolution is concerned with 
 these conditions, there can be no evolution without some 
 outside action. 
 
 The other planets of our S3 r stem were next considered. 
 Mercury is probably not in a state fit for animal life. Nep 
 tune and Uranus are so remote that their temperature must 
 be very low. Jupiter and Saturn are so heated that it is 
 not likely that animal life could exist upon them. Mars 
 is thought to be much like the earth, but a recent English 
 observer doubts it very much. He thinks that what are 
 called snow-caps on the poles are but clouds of vapor. It 
 is probable that Mars is not yet cold enough for animal 
 life. Only Venus and the earth are left as probably fit for 
 animal or intellectual life. 
 
 What is all this for? The Professor asks the question ; 
 and his answer is, that the universe is a vehicle of intelli 
 gence to intelligent beings, and we are made to study the 
 universe. There is a plan in the earth, and we should 
 study it. The greatest facts of our comprehension rest 
 upon the laws which first attract our attention, those of 
 gravitation and motion. Wiry do these great laws come 
 down to the smallest matters ? Only one answer is possi 
 ble. It is absurd to sa}- it is the result of an unintelligent 
 evolution of Nature. It may be that evolution is the 
 
250 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 machinery to which the working out of the plan is sub 
 mitted ; that the Professor believes as firmly as he does 
 the law of gravitation : but there must be a plan behind 
 it. The idea of design which he himself has cannot be 
 explained unless there is a Designer in Nature. 
 
 As the address closed there was less desire than is gen 
 erally the case to venture theories or criticisms, though the 
 lack was fully made up by expressions of regard and in 
 debtedness to the speaker of the hour. 
 
 Mr. WEISS affirmed again his belief in the imagination 
 which is the source of all imagination ; and Mr. WASSON 
 questioned in regard to secondary causes whether there 
 were not points where the theory of evolution is not ade 
 quate to explain the phenomena. Such points, he suggests, 
 may be the passage from the inorganic to the organic 
 periods, the development of sex, the passage from the 
 organic to the mental, and the passage from the germinal 
 cell to the adult form. He questions whether the form 
 of ever} living thing can be accounted for on physical 
 principles. 
 
 Prof. PEIRCE, appealed to, preferred to leave those 
 questions to the naturalists, and the company then dis 
 persed. 
 
BUCKLE AND CARLYLE. 251 
 
 XXXVI. 
 
 BUCKLE AND CARLYLE. 
 
 BY WILLIAM J. POTTER. 
 
 THOMAS CARLYLE says, " The history of what man 
 has accomplished in this world is at bottom the history 
 of the great men who have worked here." Henry Thomas 
 Buckle sa3*s that in the history of mankind, as in the 
 physical world, "all is order, symmetry and law ;" and 
 that it is the business of the historian to show that " the 
 movements of nations are perfectly regular, and that, like 
 all other movements, they are solely determined by their 
 antecedents. If he cannot do this, he may be an annalist 
 or a biographer or a chronicler, but is no historian. * 
 These two statements represent two quite opposite, though 
 not perhaps irreconcilable, ways of regarding human 
 history. The one emphasizes and magnifies the impor 
 tance of persons as leaders of the human race ; resolves 
 history substantially into personal character and volition, 
 makes it the sum of the dispositions, energies, and acts 
 of the men who have shown conspicuous ability in human 
 affairs. The other seeks primarily to discover and trace 
 that kind of law and method in human affairs which is 
 behind and antecedent to the character and actions of 
 persons ; regards persons as merely the instruments in 
 the unfolding of events which they have little or no 
 power in producing ; conceives of humanity in the mass 
 as being pervaded, shaped, and developed by an intel- 
 
252 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 ligent force and purpose, which may be called divinity 
 or destiny. On the one hand Carlyle, himself the most 
 brilliant illustrator of his own definition of history, gives 
 us the life of Frederick the Great as the history of Germany 
 for the eighteenth century ; the letters and speeches and 
 acts of Cromwell for the history of Puritanism and Eng 
 land s civil war in the seventeenth centuiy ; glowing pic 
 tures of a few leading persons, and of events happening 
 under their leadership, as the history of the French Rev 
 olution. And in this Carlyle but carries to the extreme 
 what may be said to have been, until quite recent times, 
 the general theory of history- writing, namely, the chron 
 icling in their proper connection and order of the deeds 
 of great men, and the transactions of communities and 
 nations under the guidance of great men. On the other 
 hand, in opposition to this theory, Mr. Buckle and the 
 new school of historical writers agreeing with him give us 
 histories of human progress, and even of specific national 
 affairs, in which the personal influence and existence of 
 individual men, however great and active, are lost sight 
 of almost as if they had never been. These writers en 
 deavor to trace the progress of events to the progress of 
 impersonal ideas and tendencies working in human society 
 in the aggregate. They follow the movements of nations, 
 civilizations, religions, back to certain primary dispositions 
 and sentiments of the human mind, and attempt to show how 
 the development of these, tinder the various conditions of 
 migration, hereditary law, mixture of race, climate, natural 
 surroundings of all kinds, action and reaction of nations 
 and ideas upon each other, has produced all that variety 
 and stead} progress of human affairs which we call history. 
 They claim that both events and ideas have been developed 
 in a certain necessaiy sequence which personal volition has 
 no power to break or change ; and that even the great men 
 who seem to lead, are, with all their capacities for thought 
 
BUCKLE AND CARLYLE. 253 
 
 and action, the product of past general conditions of human 
 development, and have not so much moulded society as 
 been moulded by it. 
 
 Of these two theories of histoiy, the latter is evidently 
 getting the ascendancy. A disposition is gaining ground 
 everywhere to believe more in the steady progress of law 
 in human affairs than in the fitful, arbitrary power of will; 
 to trust the logic of events rather than the authority of 
 persons ; to follow the lead of ideas rather than the beck 
 of the hero. 
 
 More and more with every generation do events seem 
 to follow the average thought and tendencies of a com 
 munity or a nation, and less and less to be controlled by 
 the dominating power of a few great minds. This was 
 strikingly illustrated in America by our late war. It was 
 most emphatically a people s war. It did not produce one 
 single man of transcendent, overmastering genius. Abra 
 ham Lincoln became most truly the nation s leader by 
 closely watching and following the national mind ; but we 
 criticised him freely while he lived, and only canonized 
 him after his tragic death. Secretary Stan ton, with his 
 iron will, and heart all aflame with patriotic devotion, 
 showed more than any other the power of a strong per 
 sonal^ ; but his power arose from the fact that he was a 
 true representative of the courage, patriotism, and love of 
 justice in the heart of the nation. 
 
 Looking abroad, we see that Gladstone and the Reform 
 part} follow rather than lead the English people. Italy 
 misses Cavour to this da\ r , indeed ; and the cause of Ger 
 man unity would be seriously endangered by the loss of 
 Bismarck s sagacity and energy : but these men have been 
 leaders only because they have incarnated, for the time 
 being, in their own persons the souls of their respective 
 nations. It begins to be seen that thoughts lead, rather 
 than persons ; and thinking people are perceiving that 
 
254 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 this must apply to all phases and departments of human 
 progress, religious as well as secular ; that all history is a 
 tracing of certain impersonal forces or laws in the opera 
 tion and progress of human society, rather than a col 
 lection of personal memoirs and biographies. This theory 
 eliminates the miraculous element from religious history, 
 and hence conies into accord with the scientific thought 
 of modern times. It shows religion at bottom to be alle 
 giance to certain naturally-revealed principles of intelli 
 gence and rectitude rather than to supernatural personages, 
 and seeks to explain how the belief in such supernatural 
 personages has arisen out of these natural and universal 
 religious sentiments. 
 
 The theory of law in the domain of morals is pushed to 
 its extreme by the statistical school of moralists, who 
 maintain, on the authority of carefully-gathered tables of 
 statistics, that there are laws which govern the most trivial 
 as well as the gravest acts of men ; that, whatever individ 
 uals may do by way of stemming the current, there must be 
 just so many crimes in a given population in a given time. 
 Now, the human mind makes a natural protest against 
 these sweeping assertions. One very important part of 
 human nature feels itself overlooked when the operations 
 of human societj are reduced to mere machine activit} . 
 And against this extreme the Buckle theoiy must be 
 guarded by adapting to it a very important element from 
 Carlyle s statement. 
 
 But, first, let us glance a moment longer at the merits 
 of this theory of the agency of law in the world s history. 
 Of course, ecclesiastical Christendom quarrels with it, 
 must quarrel, if it would save its traditional schemes of 
 theolog} . For this theory would have us stud} Christi 
 anity from a different point of view than that of theology, 
 regard it not as a new creation, but as a growth, the 
 natural result of what had gone before. This theory of 
 
BUCKLE AND CARLYLE. 255 
 
 history is making a harmonious adjustment between re 
 ligious philosophy and progress and the new knowledge 
 which man is gaining in other directions. It points to the 
 way of reconciliation between religion and science. All 
 religions, traced backward, show marks of near kinship. 
 The very sign of the cross, which more than any other 
 symbol is identified with Christianity, was in use among the 
 Phoanicians, the Romans, the Etruscans ; entered into the 
 mythology of the Brahmaic religion in India, and was 
 familiar to the Aztecs in America, and even to the ancient 
 Ma}*a race who preceded the Aztecs. On the hammer of 
 Thor, the old God of Thunder, Baring Gould finds the 
 cross ; and nations whose very names are lost in antiquity 
 left it sculptured on the urns in which the} put the ashes of 
 their dead. The view of Buckle and his sympathizers is 
 the grand democratic view of history. It lends dignity to 
 human nature ; for it makes all men necessary, and tells 
 us that God does not and cannot incarnate himself wholly 
 in any one person, but must have all humanity for his 
 organs. He works through the whole. 
 
 But this theory becomes dangerous and detrimental 
 when it is pushed to the extreme of denying altogether the 
 agency of personal volition and personal responsibility. 
 It then violates both facts and philosoph} . We must allow 
 for the element of personal power for which Carlyle pleads. 
 The two theories are to be reconciled in a higher synthesis 
 which shall grasp and unite both agencies, the agency 
 of law and the agency of persons. That which we call 
 law in the universe becomes in human persons vital, self- 
 conscious, self-active. Both characters and events must 
 be referred back to one train of causes. And what are 
 these impersonal forces, laws, tendencies, ideas, which this 
 scientific view of history brings into such prominence, if 
 not what religion must call the living presence and po 
 tency of Divinity itself ? Thus the old doctrine of Divine 
 
25 G SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Incarnation, superstitious as a specific dogma, but most 
 true and beautiful as an ideal aspiration of the race, be 
 comes a veritable realization. Infinite intelligence, en 
 ergy, love, clothes itself in the form, activities, and life 
 of humanity. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL spoke of the essay as a fair and judicial 
 statement of a great question, which is growing more and 
 more important. The question seems to be, What is the 
 personal quantity of the universe? Is there any quantity 
 or power at all but the personal? But "personal" is 
 only a word, behind which we must hunt for its meaning. 
 "Person" meant originally a mask, through which the 
 actor s voice sounded. And what is every soul but a 
 mask through which a great power speaks? Yet we are 
 conscious of will and of individuality, of some likeness 
 between ourselves and the universal Nature. 
 
 Rev. JOHN CHADWICK referred to the importance of 
 having both sides of a question brought out, as in the 
 essay. He was afraid of saying anything which might be 
 a signal for polemics, yet he could not help saying that, 
 in speaking of the cross, the essay did not show them that 
 it had been in those old times the symbol of self-sacrifice, 
 of which it is the symbol in Christianity. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON said that he did not think the essay 
 ist meant to shoot his arrow quite so high as those who 
 had criticised him. The interest for him was largely in 
 this, that it taught lessons of the distribution of ability 
 in human beings, and therefore of the proper distribution 
 of power in human beings. He thought some persons, 
 as they lived longer, tended to see a concentration of 
 power in individuals, and others tended more and more 
 to look away from leading individuals to the whole of hu 
 manity ; some people, as they lived longer, saw more and 
 more brains in themselves and their friends, while others 
 
BUCKLE AND CARLYLE. 257 
 
 saw less and less in themselves and more in the people at 
 large. The question was whether Deity incarnates him 
 self in certain great leaders or in the whole of the human 
 race. For himself, he held the latter view, and said that 
 Emerson had shown how the leader was fed from all 
 sources, and all other times were constantly pressing upon 
 him. The longer he lived, the more weight he attached 
 to the general voice. He never was on a committee with 
 out finding that the humblest member of it had something 
 to say, some word of his own which could be of use to all 
 the rest. But when history is written we see more and 
 more in the leaders and less and less in the followers. 
 It is the tendency of history to concentrate itself on lead 
 ing minds ; but he pitied profoundly those launched on 
 the Cavlyle sea, which sweeps out of thought and consider 
 ation all but the very few whom some chance of merit or 
 circumstance has raised upon the safe height of memory 
 and observation. 
 
 Mr. CIIADWICK said that the great man comes always 
 as Jesus came, that the thoughts of many hearts might 
 be made plain. Those failed to comprehend Jesus who 
 did not see that he blossomed as a rosebud does from its 
 stem, out of the fulness of the time which had prepared 
 all things for him. 
 
 Mr. ALCOTT said that great men were always the proph 
 ets of an age to come ; the world has to be educated up 
 to them. Through the great minds the revelations are 
 made to the multitude. 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY thought that while the last part of the 
 essa} indicated fully the reconciliation of the sides which 
 exist in histoiy, the method of treating history by person 
 alities did not get quite so fair a representation as the 
 other side. Carlyle, the extremist, was put forward as a 
 representative of one, and the very best of the other side 
 as the representative of the other. She thought there 
 
 17 
 
258 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 were much happier instances of the first method of treat 
 ing history than Carryle, brilliant as he is ; and that our 
 own country furnishes very powerful evidences of this in 
 Mote s " History of the Netherlands," where William of 
 Orange seems to flow all through the history as a benefi 
 cent father. 
 
 Rev. SAMUEL LONGFELLOW said that our own individual 
 interest in the matter under discussion to-day is that we 
 may be able to rescue our own individualit} 7 from the ab 
 solutism of law. We cannot be satisfied without feeling 
 that our individual wills are powers and centres of powers ; 
 that we are not merely passive but creative. The greatest 
 teachers do not desire to be idolized, and would rather 
 show us how to think than think for us. It is indolence 
 which makes us accept their teachings unquestioned ; it 
 is so much easier to worship than to work. 
 
DARWINISM. 259 
 
 XXXVII 
 
 DARWINISM. 
 
 BY NATHANIEL SOUTHGATE SHALER. 
 
 PROFESSOR SHALER said: "It is the present be 
 lief of most naturalists that man comes from the ani 
 mals below him, not necessarily by natural selection, but 
 still through some simple genetic way. It may be that the 
 ape mother bore a child which was a marvel to her loving 
 e} T es, so far did it go beyond its kind ; still it was her 
 child, and she, though happier than her race in its great 
 ness, was still its mother. On this matter of the genetic 
 connection of animals, students are of more accord than 
 upon any other broad question ; natural selection, how 
 ever, seems to me not the god of the human race, but 
 a most important, though not the only agent in creating 
 and perpetuating the differences among animals. Proba 
 bly the most notable influence which can be exercised by 
 any pure science is brought about through its power of 
 modifying our conceptions of life. If science has done no 
 more for man than to expand the notion of the depend 
 ence of effects upon causes, of which the untutored man 
 has only a trace, it would still have given an inestimable 
 force to his sense of dut}-. Who can measure the in 
 fluence which astronomy has had on the conception of life ? 
 When Science took the heavenly bodies from the unsteady 
 hands of heathen deities, or the blind rule of aimless Fate, 
 and placed them in the government of immutable, benefi- 
 
260 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 cent law, it gave a basis for confidence in the destiny of 
 the universe and all its parts, which did not exist before. 
 Who can reckon how man} lives have been broadened 
 and brightened since those heavens have been lifted, 
 since the crystal arch which was always ready to fall 
 upon an unhappy world has given place to boundless 
 space and infinite creation? When Science, with other 
 means, gave us the earth on which we stand, not as a 
 plaything of yesterday to be destroyed in cruel sport to 
 morrow, as the infant man had fancied, but with foun 
 dations from all time and an architecture so contrived 
 that decay but brings new creation, when it peopled 
 it with purposes, and made it the throne, not the grave, 
 of man, there was indeed a new heaven and a new earth. 
 In the beginning the world was veiled with the common 
 place to its savage denizen. When he began to seek for 
 a determining cause for the things which stood out promi- 
 nenth against the background of dark fatality, it was 
 natural to attribute them to something like himself, only 
 bigger and stronger, a method to be commended for 
 its simplicity. This anthropomorphism was a merciful 
 padding, keeping him from bruises against those stern 
 laws, which, though they come to be friends by and by, 
 are at first sight implacable and severe. Polytheism gave 
 man company in that dreary time when else he would 
 have been lonely as the babes in the wood in this wilder 
 ness of things. But when man came up to abstractions 
 he brought with him polytheistic habits. Little by little, 
 to be sure, the gods of old were put away to live in marble, 
 and the world given in charge of more puritanical person 
 alities. Man would follow his reason in remitting all else 
 to the operations of law ; but he was apart, and for him 
 self. Force might make or unmake the world, but he 
 was the pet of the supernatural. True, he was not a god 
 now, but he had been in the beginning ; and it was only 
 
DARWINISM. 261 
 
 some ugly mischance, some game played on him by snake 
 or woman, that had dragged him down. In his sombre 
 fits he was degenerate, fallen, a poor worm, but still a 
 fallen god, held down by the Devil. Soon he was to be 
 lifted to the purple royalty of his birthright. Yet, poor 
 man, what mattered it if the heavens were raised, the 
 earth broadened, the past made a vista of providential 
 events, the future secured while suns endure, if yet he 
 stands among them the only accident, the only fallen 
 thing, stands, while the universe moves on ? This night 
 mare which held him spell-bound is gone now ; he, too, 
 joins the great procession, reaching back into an illimita 
 ble past, and forward to a future aglow with hope. When 
 man took the beast for his kinsman, empty heads laughed ; 
 but there can be no doubt that when he chose to come up 
 from the worm, rather than down from the god, there was 
 the basis laid for a moral revolution which exceeded any 
 that our world has seen. When we corne to believe that 
 our race is the last of a series of determined steps by 
 which life has climbed up from inorganic matter ; when 
 we see that through the space of a hundred million years 
 4 one increasing purpose runs, the building of man, 
 then he becomes more to himself than he has ever been 
 before. Man could not seem thoroughly respectable to 
 himself so long as his future was at the mere} of an im 
 pending millennium ; he was a creature under sentence, 
 and awaiting execution. When he links himself with the 
 animal series, all this is changed. The wonderful certainty 
 of that evolution gives a logical certainty of greatness to 
 the future, and its hope is immense ; it cannot fail to illu 
 minate life with something of the glow of religious faith. 
 
 " This doctrine of genesis gives us a new sense of kin 
 ship with creation, a new sense of duty to the life below us ; 
 and this is the greatest addition to our moral code since 
 the days of Christ. There has been little trace of this 
 
262 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 feeling before the beginning of this new line of thought, 
 while now it grows apace. We have societies for the 
 prevention of cruelty to animals ; of modern knights, who 
 go about redressing the wrongs of these helpless ones, 
 as the knights of old went forth in defence of women and 
 children. It is true that other races, long ago, have 
 stumbled upon a certain kind of reverence for the brute 
 creation ; but it was another form of self-love when the 
 Hindu refrained from injuring an animal because it might 
 be inhabited by the soul of one of his kindred, and to this 
 complexion might he, too, come at last. It is a different 
 thing, this kindly gratitude with which we look upon the 
 creatures who once carried our lives, and left them higher 
 than they found them. The man who feels this is a patri 
 arch, and round his tent cluster kinsmen of every degree, 
 none so humble but they may claim share of his high 
 estate, part in his strong protection. In this view sin 
 becomes a relapse into lower forms of being, a spiritual 
 malformation, to be healed if it may be, restrained if it 
 must be ; but in any case, understood and pitied, not 
 scorned. The comprehension of our alliance with the 
 past shows us the future in our own keeping. Races to 
 come must ban or bless us, as we make the most or the 
 least of our opportunities. Already man has taken him 
 self out of the struggle for existence. The law of natural 
 selection no longer has power over him. The weakly no 
 longer die from weakness alone, but too often live to trans 
 mit their woes to a plentiful generation. Better, indeed, 
 that the race should suffer the loss of giving its best to 
 the weakest of its children, than take the moral damage 
 which would come from the regulated infanticide which 
 has sometimes been recommended. But the race will not 
 improve to its uttermost capacity until at least as much 
 sanity rules over human reproduction as over well-organ 
 ized stock-breeding. The progress of a nation is not to 
 
DARWINISM. 263 
 
 be estimated by its census, but by the quality of its indi 
 viduals. We must come to the knowledge that to bring 
 a mortal into life without a chance for insuring its physical 
 and moral welfare is a wrong to the creature who is to 
 suffer, and to society which must bear the burden. Let 
 those only be parents who can transmit qualities worthy 
 of being handed down, and the race will speedily distance 
 the centuries which have gone before. The conviction of 
 this duty is penetrating thoughtful minds already. Is it 
 too much to hope that by-and-by its leaven will spread 
 through the race ? It consecrates many lives to a living 
 mart3 rdom, indeed ; but will not a strong soul suffer as 
 much and as willingly for the sake of a sublime duty as 
 myriads of fanatics have suffered for a delusion or a 
 dogma? No features of the world have been so difficult 
 to reconcile with the instinctive conception of the justice 
 and utility which rules the universe as pain and fear. But 
 suffering, in the light of these new ideas, loses the sting 
 of injustice. The old must pass away, that the new and 
 better may come ; the individual, the species, the class, 
 the very scheme, dies that it may grow. The jaw of the 
 shark and the lion s claw are rude tools of plrysical and 
 intellectual culture. 
 
 "Will the belief in immortality be weaker or stronger 
 for the evolution of these ideas ? Scientific proof of im 
 mortality there is not, and is not likely to be ; and per 
 haps no greater evil could come to mankind than to find 
 such proof. Hope gOes out when certainty comes in, and 
 it is doubtless best for the race that its crowning ques 
 tion should be left to that faith which comes most surely 
 from a high, pure life, and the broadest study of Nature ; 
 for, to my thinking, the study of Nature is full of immor 
 tal hope. Shall future waste give the lie to the economy 
 of all the past? Must it not be, rather, that when the 
 sun itself shall grow dim with countless ages, this life 
 
264 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 of the soul, to which all the ages have rendered tribute, 
 must go on, with ever-increasing powers, to a future of 
 glory beyond our present poor conception ? " 
 
 Dr. HEDGE thought that one of the best things religion 
 has given us is reverence for lower orders and forms of 
 life, and that the Hindu reverence for animals did not 
 grow out of the notion of the transmigration of souls, 
 but was the offspring, not the parent, of consideration for 
 animals. The Hindus, long ago, had hospitals for sick 
 animals ; and this sense of kinship with the dumb creation 
 is one of the points of contrast between the Hindu and the 
 Semitic beliefs. This reverence seemed to him rather the 
 growth of religious ideas than of Darwinian theories, which 
 can hardly as \Qt have become general in their influence. 
 He himself had been a Darwinian in theory before Darwin 
 ever wrote, but he believed these Darwinian theories must 
 be supplemented with something else ; something, perhaps, 
 corresponding to Swedenborg s doctrine of influx, the 
 breathing in of spiritual life. This influx must be in pro 
 portion to development; and it is only when man, in his 
 upward progress, has reached a certain stage that he is 
 capable of receiving it. 
 
 Mr. FROTIIINGIIAM thought that the movement for the 
 protection of animals was hardly the offspring either 
 of religion, so-called, or of Darwinism, but of philan 
 thropy, of a tenderness for suffering which has grown 
 with our civilization. He spoke of Mr. Bergh, who he 
 believed was an Orthodox believer, and not a Darwinian 
 philosopher. " As to the belief in immortality," he said, 
 " there is surely no reason to fear any war which science 
 can wage against it : one cannot put an ethereal soul 
 into a crucible, nor dissect it with a scalpel. At present 
 
DARWINISM. 265 
 
 either is not subject to science. What right have we to 
 immortality if our mortality bears no fruit ; if the years go 
 on and leave us no better or wiser than the} T find us? 
 Immortality means growth, and is to be seized upon with 
 endeavor, justified by progress." 
 
 LUCRETIA MOTT said that she had been interested for 
 the last fifty years in the developments of science, and 
 she had learned to welcome it as a friend, not to fear it as 
 a foe. She considered the conjunction of theology with 
 religion lamentable, and would fain depose the usurper, 
 theology. Religion is not a thing of dogma ; its fruits 
 are not to be found in creeds and forms, but in clean 
 living, in doing right, in common honesty. 
 
 Mr. LONGFELLOW opposed Mrs. Mott s condemnation of 
 theolog} T , because all statements of religious truths are the 
 ology, and statements of great truths have not yet become 
 unnecessary ; but he believed religion should fashion the 
 ology, and satisfy reason as well as sentiment. 
 
 Mr. CIIADWICK agreed with Professor Shaler that sci 
 ence tends not away from religion, but toward it ; for to 
 pursue science is to think God s thoughts after him, and 
 thought, as much as action, greatens the soul. 
 
 At a later meeting the Darwinian theory was again dis 
 cussed, FRANCIS E. ABBOT reading an essay, which in 
 substance was as follows : 
 
 The importance of the theory itself is evident from the 
 fact that it has created a literature in man} languages. 
 There have been two attempts to penetrate the mystery 
 of the universe. Imagination developed and formed the 
 great myths of the creation of the universe, and created 
 the supernatural as a distinct being in the guise of matter, 
 but vaster, because it looked upon matter as dead until 
 breathed into by this supernatural Being. Reason finds 
 that Nature is infinite in duration and space, and that 
 
266 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 natural causes produce the endless evolution of the uni 
 verse. The God of the granite and the rose, the God whom 
 reason discovers working in Nature, is infinitely superior 
 to the God of the imagination. Science alwa} s has won 
 when pitted against the imagination, and progress of sci 
 ence may be measured by the extent to which the natural 
 dispossesses the supernatural, and supersedes it. The 
 great point of Darwin is that he substitutes natural for 
 supernatural causes. We cannot hesitate to accept the 
 leading principles enunciated by him, for their great feat 
 ure is not speculations, but facts. No one maintains that 
 Darwin supplies a complete explanation of the origin of 
 species, but we know the development theory is the only 
 scientific one, and that it is in harmony with the records 
 of history and consonant with the spirit of the age. Man, 
 as never before, glories in his future. I would call this 
 theory the Ascent of Man, it being the one hopeful and 
 scientific, while the supernatural is imaginative and dis 
 couraging. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL began the conversation. u I am a Darwin 
 ian so far as Darwin goes ; but his theory of evolution is 
 insufficient to account for the universe, and I would not 
 call Nature a cause, but an effect, the apparent effect 
 of an unapparent cause, and a part of the psychological 
 and supernatural. The universe was not made from a 
 vesicle. If dust is the beginning of the ascent of man, 
 may it not be the end of the descent of spirit? Certainly 
 it is not the beginning of spirit. We must begin and end 
 our scientific theory in dust, which is but the pathway of 
 the spirit. Darwin cannot deny volition, nor can he 
 account for it on the theory of evolution. There is one 
 solemn fact of which we are cognizant, we have known 
 individuals and types to degenerate. We have the phrase 
 
DARWINISM. 267 
 
 4 primeval night : it is hateful. The primeval condition 
 was glorious da} , Cosmos." 
 
 Rev. JOHN WEISS said: "I wish to say a word for 
 Darwin. This question of will or no will is not the one he 
 has undertaken to answer. His question is one of method, 
 
 how, not why. People think because he does not write 
 
 the three letters of the word God into every sentence that 
 he ignores will and spirit. If we did not believe in God, 
 every page of his, read thoughtfully, would require us to 
 invent God. The great naturalist is a man who has under 
 taken a special work, the study and exposition of the 
 natural development of species ; he has kept to it with 
 wonderful tenacity, concentration, and exclusiveness, and 
 this characteristic, which can hardly be praised sufficiently, 
 has given rise to a remarkable, strange, and absurd mis 
 understanding of him. Not only Darwin, but every scien 
 tific writer with whose works I am acquainted, except 
 a few German materialists, makes a God necessary. 
 Every page of a really scientific work is a door which opens 
 into infinite will, infinite mind. Darwin s province is to 
 classify and explain : what would he gain by pausing to 
 say, In the beginning was spirit, when spirit he could 
 neither classify nor explain? The inference that Darwin 
 denies the existence and supremacy of a Divine Being is 
 utterly without reasonable warrant in anything in his scien 
 tific writings." 
 
 Rev. Mr. WASHBURN of Milton replied: "I understood 
 that it had been said natural causes are the all, and that 
 the theory of evolution leaves no room for the supernatural. 
 In that case there is inevitably a controversy between those 
 who believe in a Divine Cause, a self-acting Volition, 
 independent of and above Nature, and those who be 
 lieve Nature began and develops her own manifestations 
 by her own involuntary laws." 
 
 Dr. BARTOL objected to the phrase " natural causes " as 
 
268 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 applied to the evolution theory, if it is to be interpreted 
 inclusively ; for although these are causes in Nature, they 
 are not all causes. 
 
 Mrs. CHENEY expressed the opinion that evolution ac 
 counts only for the method of the working of natural 
 causes, and does not deny the permanence of God in 
 Nature, and leaves unsolved the point concerning the 
 permanence of species. 
 
 Col. HIGGINSON sympathized with Mr. Washburn, and 
 added : The most which can be said at present in favor 
 of Mr. Darwin s theoiy is that it is a theory, and therefore 
 entitled to candid consideration. It is true that most of 
 the outspoken opposition in this country comes from the 
 theologians ; but there are two sides to the question even 
 in the scientific world, and several men of acknowledged 
 position in scientific circles abroad do not accept it. 
 Professor Agassiz will tell you no scientific men accept it ; 
 but he, despite his eminent abilities and character, is one 
 sided and tenacious of his own theories. It is said Dar 
 winism is the only scientific theory of the origin of species. 
 Emerson says the world is yet too }~oung ~by several thou 
 sand years to formulate a creed. For myself, I am disposed 
 to believe Darwin is right, but that he is not yet proved. 
 To claim more is unwise. It is a remarkable fact that, in 
 spite of all the marvellous concentration of ingenuity and 
 industry in investigation, not a single example has yet 
 been discovered of the origin of a species in the way Dar 
 win shows they might have originated. 
 
 " So far as personal feeling is concerned, the Darwinian 
 theory is far nobler than any other ever formed. After the 
 ignoble scheme of the theologians, it is like opening the 
 windows to sunlight and heaven, and in its light the great 
 march of humanity becomes superb. The theologian is 
 defunct as a power in the world ; but I fear the despotism 
 of science more than the despotism of theology. Science 
 
DARWINISM. 269 
 
 monopolizes the thought and activity of man, drawing him 
 away from religion, poetiy, and art. If the God of theol 
 ogy were put out of the world, what would take the place 
 of the sacred literature of all ages and all nations ? Poets 
 who patronize science assume faith and love and rever 
 ence, but science does not. We may hope and expect 
 that Darwinism is correct, but cannot affirm it is ; and 
 much less may we construct the whole theory of the uni 
 verse on it." 
 
 ROBERT DALE OWEN was invited to join in the conver 
 sation. "It is hard to deny Darwinism, and as hard to 
 affirm it. Ma} r not the appearance of species at a certain 
 time, man for instance, be owing to an inherent condition 
 of the law of evolution? Babbage s calculating machine 
 can be set to continue for a long time making computations 
 by one process, and suddenly, without any warning, at a 
 certain stage, to completely change the process. We see 
 a similar condition of law operating in various fields of 
 knowledge. Man lives one day very much as another, 
 and is on Thursday very much the same man he was on 
 Monday ; but there comes a time, without any special 
 interference of superhuman agency, when the law of his 
 being suddenly changes, and he changes, we do not know 
 to what extent, but he certain!} drops the body. Might 
 not such a change, inherent in the law of existence, occur 
 in the gradual evolution of species, the new one appearing 
 suddenly when the time was ripe ? I do not deny Dar 
 winism, but I see no proof of it." 
 
 Rev. L. T. CHAMBERLAIN, being asked to speak, said he 
 came only to listen, and had taken great pleasure in the 
 development of the views of those present. He sympa 
 thized with the view that there is not in the scientific 
 writings of Darwin, or of other much-feared scientists, any 
 necessaiy antagonism with the conception of an infinite 
 God, and felt it was a sad and unfortunate circumstance 
 
270 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 that Christian people had assumed that there is. A Cal- 
 vinist himself, he rejoiced in the work of these able, sin 
 cere, and devoted searchers for truth in the realm of Nature. 
 He sometimes thought it a blessed thing that such men cast 
 themselves loose from theological ties ; for, under this ban 
 of an unjust prejudice, they showed more grandly the con 
 secration of their lives. He saw nothing in the theory of 
 evolution inconsistent with the supremacy and glory of the 
 infinite God, and doubted not that, when more fully under 
 stood and more accurately defined, it would appear an 
 additional motive for reverence and love. He anticipated 
 that the theory would eventually have a wider application 
 than Darwin had given it, and particularly that it would 
 reconstruct the science of geology. To him this Divine 
 Being would continue to be the personal God to whom he 
 prayed and whom he loved ; Nature would still remain the 
 impress of the divine mind ; and the noble conception of 
 the divine immanence, for which we have to thank the 
 Pantheists, will fill and satisfy us as never before. 
 
 Mr. POTTER thought Mr. Abbot s idea had been mis 
 apprehended, and that he included spirit in Nature. He 
 believed Darwinism, when confined to physiology, to be 
 strong and apparently indubitable ; but he doubted the 
 universality of the theory of evolution if stretched to 
 envelop the all. 
 
 Mr. ABBOT closed : " I believe Nature is the great word. 
 I do not exclude spirit from the universe. Nature 
 includes the spiritual and the material realm, and science 
 will include all soul and mind, as well as matter, and the 
 science of the future will unify philosophy." 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 271 
 
 XXXVIII 
 INDIAN ETHICS. 
 
 BY J. W. POWELL. 
 
 MAJOR POWELL, who has been a twenty-years 
 traveller among the wild tribes of savage countries, 
 gave an account of the theology and mythology of the 
 North American Indians. 
 
 First giving the cosmology of the North American sav 
 age, he slid into a fine story-telling vein, depicting by 
 graphic touches the myths and customs, the curious ma 
 terialism of the Indian, which had within it at every turn 
 a spiritual or mythical belief. The arts and industries 
 of savagery and civilization are not in greater contrast 
 than their philosoplry. To present to you fully the con 
 dition of savagery, as illustrated in their philosophy, three 
 obstacles appear. After all the years I have spent among 
 the Indians in their mountain villages, I am not certain 
 that I have sufficiently divorced myself from the thoughts 
 and ways of civilization to appreciate properly their child 
 ish beliefs. The second obstacle subsists in your own 
 knowledge of the methods and powers of Nature, and the 
 wa} 7 s of civilized society ; and when I attempt to tell you 
 what an Indian thinks, I fear you will never fully forget 
 what } ou know, and thus you will be led to give too deep 
 a meaning to a savage explanation ; or, on the other hand, 
 contrasting an Indian concept with j T our own, the mani 
 fest absurdity will sound to you as an idle tale, too simple 
 to deserve mention, or too false to deserve credence. The 
 
272 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 third difficulty lies in the attempt to put savage thoughts 
 into civilized language, our words are so full of mean 
 ing, carry with them so many great thoughts and civilized 
 ideas. In English I sa} r wind, and you think of atmosphere 
 in revolution with the earth, heated at the tropics and cooled 
 at the poles, and set into great currents which are diverted 
 from their courses in passing back and forth from tropical 
 to polar regions. But I saynein to a savage, and he thinks 
 of a great monster, a breathing beast, beyond the moun 
 tains of the West. In treating of savage philosophy I 
 shall speak of their cosmology, theology, religion, and 
 mythology. 
 
 4 Their cosmology is not alwa}*s cosmogony. Some of the 
 objects in the universe are supposed to have had an origin, 
 to have been created ; but many others to have had everlast 
 ing existence. They are accepted as facts, or existences 
 without origin, primary concepts, if you please. 
 
 " A savage philosopher believes in a system of worlds, 
 not globes- swinging in the heavens, but places of existence, 
 the world of this life, the land on which we tread and the 
 water in which we swim, and the world or worlds of land 
 and water to which we go. Among the different tribes of 
 North America, two methods in the arrangement of worlds 
 are observed. The lower tribes have their worlds arranged 
 horizontally or topographically : the Nu-gun-tu-wip, the 
 Ghost Land, the Land of the Hereafter, is beyond some great 
 topographic feature. The coast tribes say, beyond the 
 sea ; the dweller on the river-banks, beyond the river ; 
 tribes who dwell in valleys surrounded by crags and peaks 
 say, be} ond the mountains ; the tribes who dwell on 
 the brinks of the great canons, beyond the chasm. 
 Among those tribes having their worlds arranged topo 
 graphically, a past world is not an item in their philoso- 
 plry : with some the progenitors of the human race, with 
 all the animal races, came from the ground, where they 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 273 
 
 burrowed in miserable existence ; with other tribes the 
 progenitors of the human race, with the races of animals, 
 came from the depths of the sea. There are alwa}~s two 
 future worlds, one for the good, one for the bad, a land 
 of joy and a land of sorrow. 
 
 " When the future world is * beyond the chasm, the way 
 is by a magical bridge ; when be} T ond the mountains, 
 b} T a dangerous pass among the rocks ; when beyond 
 the river, or beyond the sea, a ferry is provided. 
 
 "Among the higher tribes, we find the worlds arranged 
 vertically or architecturally, a world or worlds below 
 a world or worlds above. In this higher stage of savage^ 
 there is also a past world : that is, humanity came to this 
 existence from a former, another land. Sometimes the 
 land from which he came is above, sometimes below ; but 
 the land to which the righteous goes is always in a direction 
 opposite to that from which he came. 
 
 u Thus, among the Pueblo Indians there are seven worlds, 
 one world below this and five above. We came from the 
 world below bj* a magical ladder held by Ma-chi-to, one of 
 their hero-gods, who had previously discovered a hole in 
 the sky from that lower world, the floor of this world, 
 the sky of the lower. The souls of the newly born have 
 escaped from below to be clothed with bodies here ; and the 
 souls of the righteous shall go on from world to world until 
 the bliss of the seventh heaven is reached. 
 
 " I must content myself with this brief account of the 
 worlds of savagery, though the theme is attractive by rea 
 son of the many wonderful myths told of these worlds. 
 
 " The Heavenly Bodies. The sun and moon are alwa} T s 
 personages ; with nomadic tribes primordial personages, 
 uncreated personages, but slaves, compelled to travel in 
 appointed ways. They have been subjugated. With the 
 Pueblo tribes the sun and the moon are personages created 
 for a purpose, to give light and warmth. 
 
 18 
 
274 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 " The stars of the nomads are human beings or animals 
 translated from earth to the firmament for various reasons ; 
 but the stars of the Pueblos were created from the frag 
 ments remaining when the moon was made. 
 
 " Meteorologic Phenomena. Indian cosmology also deals 
 with all the meteorologic phenomena. The aurora is the 
 dancing of ghosts ; the rainbow is made of the tears of the 
 eagle-god ; the thunder is the screaming of a great bird ; 
 the lightning is the arrow of Ta-vwots, the hare-god. Rain 
 and snow are variously explained. Among the Pueblos 
 the rain-god dips his brush, made from the feathers of the 
 birds of heaven, into the lakes of the skies, and sprinkles 
 the water therefrom over the face of this world ; in winter 
 time he breaks the ice of the lakes and scatters ice-dust 
 over the earth. 
 
 " Geographic Phenomena. Their cosmology explains the 
 origin of mountains. Each mountain had a special creation ; 
 the shapes of all the storm-carved rocks were determined 
 b} r the gods ; the great bends of the rivers were fixed ; the 
 lakes were made, and the springs had a miraculous be 
 ginning. 
 
 u Remarkable Facts in Nature. Their cosmology also 
 deals with all the curious minutiae of Nature. It explains 
 the tawny patch of fur on the shoulder of the little rabbit, 
 the cardinal head of the woodpecker, the top-knot of the 
 crested jay, and the rattle of the serpent. So there is 
 nothing seen which is not explained. 
 
 Important Facts of Human Society. In like manner all 
 the more important facts observed by them in human soci 
 ety, all the institutions, and all the habits and customs 
 have their origin, and were determined by the gods. Every 
 tribe has its Babel nvyth, its explanation of the dispersion 
 of the human family over the earth, and the diversity of 
 tongues. The} 7 tell when birth and death began, and when 
 marriage was instituted. 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 275 
 
 " The theology of the North American Indian is not fe- 
 tichistic, though there are many survivals from fetichism. 
 All of the nomadic tribes are zooloters ; their gods are 
 animals. The savage, the sylvan man, as the word signi 
 fies, is intimately associated with the animals with which 
 he is surrounded. From them he obtains the larger part 
 of his clothing and much of his food, and he carefully 
 studies their habits and finds many wonderful things. 
 Their knowledge and skill and power appear to him to be 
 superior to his own. In all animal nature he sees things 
 too wonderful for him ; and from admiration he grows to 
 adoration, and the animals become his gods. Another \ 
 trait of character comes in to modify his theologic beliefs. 
 I mean ancientism, veneration for the past and for the 
 people of the past. This is a very common trait in human 
 nature. Individuals of eveiy species are supposed to have 
 descended from the more ancient animal, the progenitor 
 of the race, who was a wonderful being. The wolf of 
 to-day is a howling pest, but that wolfs grandfather was 
 a god. And so they have a grizzly -bear gocl, an eagle 
 god, a rattlesnake god, a trout god, and a spider god, 
 a god for every race or species of animal. There is 
 another very curious and interesting fact in Indian phi 
 losophy. They do not separate man from the beast by 
 any broad line of demarcation. Mankind is supposed 
 simply to be one of the many races of animals, in some 
 respects superior, in many others inferior, to those races. 
 So the Indian speaks of our race " as of the same rank 
 with " the bear race, the wolf race, or the rattlesnake race ; 
 and, as he deifies ancient beasts, he deifies ancient men, 
 and thus he has a special class which we may denominate 
 hero-gods. I have said that the theology of the North 
 American Indians was not fetichistic, but among them we 
 find many survivals from fetichism, and one of these is a 
 survival by special development. I mean their daimon 
 
276 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 gods. I use the word daimon rather than demon, for 
 the latter has a Christian meaning of devil, while these dai- 
 mons are simph* the presiding spirits of places. It must 
 be understood that these daimons have animal forms, 
 but they have the power of transforming themselves 
 and assuming any shape at will, anthropomorphic or zoo- 
 morphic. This is true also of the beast-gods. The sun, 
 moon, and stars are also gods, and do many wonderful 
 things, though they are not usually held in very high 
 esteem. So all their gods are animals, and the form in 
 which the} may appear at any time is a matter of momen 
 tary whim ; a vicious human trait plays some strange 
 freaks in Indian theology, and often their gods become mon 
 sters, beasts with seven heads and ten horns. The third- 
 class monsters are those based on the discovered bones of 
 extinct elephants and mastodons. Avarice plays a very 
 important part in Indian theolog}^. The Indian has but a 
 small store of material things, and the religious element 
 greatly prevails in his life, and his desire for possession, 
 ownership, is very strong. Families also have tutelar 
 gods and so do clans and tribes. 
 
 " Such are the gods of the nomads of North America, 
 firmament-gods, which are animals ; hero-gods, animals 
 also, as man is an animal ; beast-gods, the progenitors or 
 protot}*pes of the present races of animals ; and daimon- 
 gods, presiding spirits of places, also zoomorphic. 
 
 "In studying the myths of North American Indians many 
 have sought to evade this conclusion ; and one of our bril 
 liant writers on the ni3 ths of the New World exclaims : 
 Man, the paragon of animals, pra} ing to the beast, is a 
 spectacle so humiliating that, for the sake of our common 
 humanity, we may seek the explanation of it least degrad 
 ing to the dignity of our race. 
 
 "There have been many curious wa}*s of interpreting 
 Indian myths. The latest and most attractive is that by 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 277 
 
 which they are converted into wonderful sjTnbols, so that 
 whenever an Indian calls his god wolf, he does not mean 
 wolf, he means wind, for the wind howls, and the wolves 
 howl ; when he says serpent, he does not mean serpent, he 
 means lightning, for the serpent darts and the lightning 
 darts. Now that such symbolism has existed among peo 
 ple whose grade of culture is higher cannot be denied. 
 The fact of general Nature-worship by the ancient Indo- 
 European people is fully established, and in many waj s 
 and by diverse methods a wonderful system of symbols 
 grew up among these earlier Aryans. This Nature- worship 
 was the personification and deification of the forces and 
 phenomena of Nature. The later Greek and Roman phi 
 losophy was a personification and deification of human 
 attributes, passions, and sentiments. 
 
 " The literature of North American ethnography is vast, 
 and scattered through it is a great mass of facts pertain 
 ing to Indian theology, a mass of nonsense, a mass of 
 incoherent folly, whenever those facts are looked upon 
 from that standpoint which assumes that Indian theology 
 is a degeneracy from some higher type ; but when accepted 
 as it is understood by the Indian himself, the great mul 
 titude of facts fall into place, and assume the form of a 
 theological organism : ethically a hideous monster of lies, 
 but ethnographical!}* a s}*stem of great interest, a sys- 
 tem which beautifully reveals the mental condition of 
 savagery. 
 
 I have no time to dwell on the theology of the Pue 
 blo Indians, but simply to say that a mixture of Nature 
 and animal worship exists among them, so that they may 
 be considered as in a transition state. 
 
 " In Indian philosophy the gods are not very far from us 
 in intrinsic nature. They are poor brutes like ourselves, 
 with like passions and like prejudices ; quick to anger, 
 and of generous impulse ; revengeful to enemy, and faith- 
 
278 SKETCHES ASD REMINISCENCES. 
 
 ful to friend. In many respects they have no greater 
 power than ourselves, and none of them have greater 
 power than the ancients. The gods are the ancients. Our 
 inferiority is due to our late degeneracy. 
 
 " The lowest grade of priests I call witches. This craft 
 is carried on chiefly by women. There is a general belief 
 that old women, unless they die at a reasonable time, are 
 transformed into witches, and are finally carried away by 
 whirlwinds. So great is the dread of some of the Indian 
 women of the approaching witch-stage that they commit 
 suicide to avert the fate." The Major gave a graphic pic 
 ture of a scene which he himself witnessed in a rock} 7 defile 
 on one occasion. Riding along, he suddenly came upon 
 two "old hags," as he expressed it, who had probably 
 had too much of the unenviable witch reputation. They 
 were standing before a certain cleared space, where at 
 intervals they swayed and swung their bodies, while they 
 sung in mournful monotone, in the Indian dialect, some 
 thing to this effect : 
 
 " Here we have stayed long enough ; 
 Here we have worked long enough. 
 It is time that we died, 
 It is time that we died. " 
 
 The Indian dialect which Major Powell first gave was 
 exceedingly musical, reminding one of some of the soft 
 syllables in " Hiawatha." 
 
 " Among many of the religious ceremonies which prevail 
 is amuletism. This is probably a relic from fetichism. 
 The Shamans are very skilful in the decoction of sorcery 
 broth, usually foul mixtures which are prepared prior to 
 engaging in an} important enterprise. Religion also has 
 to do with admission to the Land of the Hereafter. Admis 
 sion to the Land of Want is always free ; the terms of ad 
 mission to the Land of Plenty are variously and vaguely 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 279 
 
 fixed. All the living righteous, who are few, will go to the 
 former ; all the living bad, who are many, to the latter. 
 The dead, those who lived in the happy days of yore, are 
 almost all good, and few have been denied entrance to 
 the home of the blessed. But who are the wicked, and who 
 are the good ? The ethic standards of savagery and civil 
 ization are as widely contrasted as their ideas of meteors. 
 The bad man is he who failed to sacrifice to his tutelar god 
 the spleen of the last elk killed ; or he slept on his back 
 the night before the battle, when the gods have taught him 
 to sleep on his belly. They have some very curious soul- 
 ometers ! 
 
 " Sometimes the good land is beyond the bad, and through 
 the latter the ghostty traveller passes in great dismay, hap 
 pily reaching the former if his savage sins have been duly 
 propitiated and the angry gods appeased ; but woe to him 
 who dies with savage guilt resting on his ghost. Some 
 times there are two ways : the angry gods lead here, the 
 appeased gods lead there. 
 
 " In every Indian tribe there is a great body of story lore, 
 tales purporting to be the sayings and doings, the his 
 tory, of the ancients, the gods. Every tribe has one or 
 more persons skilled in the relation of these stories, 
 preachers. In all the Shoshoni tribes the preacher is 
 called a Nar-i-gwi-nump, one who tells of the ancients. 
 The long winter evenings are set apart for this purpose. 
 Then the men and women, the boj T s and girls, gather 
 about the camp-fire to listen to the history of the ancients, 
 to a chapter in the unwritten Bible of savagery. Such a 
 scene is of the deepest interest. A camp-fire of blazing- 
 pine or sage boughs illumines a group of dusky faces intent 
 with expectation, and the old man begins his stoiy, talk 
 ing and acting, the elders receiving his words with 
 reverence, while the younger persons are pla} T ed upon by 
 the actor until the} 7 shiver with fear or dance with de- 
 
280 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 light. An Indian is a great actor. The conditions of 
 Indian life train them in natural sign-language. Among 
 the two hundred and fifty or three hundred thousand In 
 dians in the United States there are scores of languages, 
 so that often a language is spoken by only a few hundred 
 or a few score of people ; and as a means of communica 
 tion between tribes speaking different languages a sign- 
 language has grown up, so- that an Indian is able to talk 
 all over with the features of his face, his hands and feet, 
 the muscles of his bod} . And thus a skilful preacher talks 
 and acts ; and, inspired lay a theme which treats of the 
 gods, he sways his savage audience at will, and ever as he 
 tells his story he points a moral. The mythology, theology, 
 religion, history, and all human duties are taught. The 
 whole bod} of nvyths current in a tribe is the sum total of 
 their lore, their philosophy, their miraculous history, 
 their authority for their governmental constitutions, their 
 social institutions, their habits and customs ; it is their 
 unwritten Bible. In a single lecture I cannot introduce 
 of these tales ; one must suffice for illustration. 
 
 " ORIGIN OF THE ECHO. 
 
 " I-o-wi (the turtle-dove) was gathering seeds in the val 
 ley, and her little babe slept. Wearied with carrying it on 
 her back, she laid it under the ti-ho-pi (sage-bush) in care of 
 its sister O-ho-chu (the summer yellow-bird). Engaged 
 in her labors, the mother wandered away to a distance, 
 when a tso-a-vwits (a witch) came, and said to the little 
 girl, Is that your brother? and O-ho-chu answered, 
 This is my sister/ for she had heard that witches preferred 
 to steal boys and did not care for girls. Then the tso-a- 
 vwits was angry and chided her, saying that it was very 
 naughty for girls to lie ; and she put on a strange and hor 
 rid appearance, so that O-ho-chu was stupefied with fright, 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 281 
 
 and then the tsd-a-vwits ran away with the bcrr, canning 
 him to her home on a distant mountain. Then she laid 
 him down on the ground, and taking hold of his right foot 
 stretched the baby s leg until it was as long as that of a 
 man, and she did the same to the other leg ; then his body 
 was elongated, and also his arms, and behold ! the baby 
 was as large as a man, and the tso-a-vwits married him 
 and had a husband. But though he had the body of a 
 man he had the heart of a babe, and knew no better than 
 to marry a witch. 
 
 "Now, when I-o-wi returned and found not her babe 
 under the ti-hd-pi. but learned from O-hd-chu that it had 
 been stolen by a tsd-a-vwits, she was very angry, and 
 punished her daughter very severely. Then she went in 
 search of the babe for a long time, mourning as she went, 
 and her friends joined her in the search. Chief among 
 her friends was her brother Kwi-na (the eagle) , who trav 
 elled far and wide over all the land, until one day he heard 
 a strange noise, and, coming near, he saw the tsd-a-vwits 
 and U-ja her husband ; but he did not know that this large 
 man was indeed the little boy who had been stolen. Yet he 
 returned and related to I-o-wi what he had seen, who said, 
 If that is indeed my boy he will know my voice. So the 
 mother came near to where the tsd-a-vwits and U-ja were 
 living, and climbed into a cedar-tree, and mourned and 
 cried continually. Kwi-na placed himself near by on an 
 other tree to observe what effect the voice of the mother 
 would have on U-ja, the tsd-a-vwits husband. When he 
 heard the cry of his mother, U-ja knew the voice, and said 
 to the tsd-a-vwits : I hear my mother, I hear my mother, 
 I hear my mother ! But she laughed at him, and per 
 suaded him to hide. 
 
 " Now, the tsd-a-vwits had taught U-ja to hunt ; and, a 
 short time before, she had killed a mountain-sheep which 
 was lying in camp. The witch emptied the contents of 
 
282 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the stomach, and with her husband took refuge within ; 
 for she said to herself: Surely I-o-wi will never look 
 in the paunch of a mountain-sheep for my husband. In 
 this retreat the} 7 were safe for a long time, so that the}" 
 who were searching were sorety puzzled at the strange dis 
 appearance. At last Kwi-na said : They are hid some 
 where in the ground, may be, or under the rocks. After a 
 long time they will be very hungry and will search for 
 food ; I will put some in a tree so as to tempt them. So 
 he killed a rabbit and put it on the top of a tall pine, from 
 which he trimmed the branches and peeled the bark, so 
 that it would be very difficult to climb ; and he said : 
 When these hungiy people come out they will try to 
 climb that tree for food, and it will take much time ; and 
 while the tsd-a-vwits is thus engaged we will carry U-ja 
 awa}V So they watched some days, until the tsd-a-vwits 
 was very hungiy, and her bab} -hearted husband cried for 
 food ; and she came out from their hiding-place and sought 
 for something to eat. The odor of the meat placed on the 
 tree came to her nostrils, and she saw where it was and 
 tried to climb up, but fell back many times ; and while so 
 doing, Kwi-na, who had been sitting on a rock near by 
 and had seen from where she came, ran to the paunch 
 which had been their house, and taking the man carried 
 him awa} r and laid him down under the very same ti-hd-pi 
 from which he had been stolen ; and behold ! he was the 
 same beautiful little babe that I-o-wi had lost. 
 
 And Kwi-na went off into the sky and brought back a 
 storm, and caused the wind to blow, and the rain to beat 
 upon the ground, so that his tracks were covered, and the 
 tsd-a-vwits could not follow him ; but she saw, Vying upon 
 the ground near b} r , some eagle-feathers, and knew well 
 who it was that had deprived her of her husband, and she 
 said to herself : Well I know Kwi-na is the brother of 
 I-o-wi ; he is a great warrior and a terrible man. I will go 
 
INDIAN ETHICS. 283 
 
 to To-g6-a (the rattlesnake), my grandfather, who will 
 protect me and kill my enemies. 
 
 " To-gd-a was enjoying his mid-day sleep on a rock, 
 and as the tsd-a-vwits came near her grandfather awoke, 
 and called out to her : Go back, go back ! You are not 
 wanted here, go back ! But she came on, begging his 
 protection ; and while they were still parleying they heard 
 Kwi-na coming, and To-go-a said, Hide, hide ! But 
 she knew not where to hide, and he opened his mouth and 
 the tso-a-vwits crawled into his stomach. This made To- 
 gd-a very sick, and he entreated her to crawl out, but she 
 refused, for she was in great fear. Then he tried to throw 
 her up, but could not, and he was sick nigh unto death. 
 At last, in his terrible retchings, he crawled out of his own 
 skin and left the tsd-a-vwits in it ; and she, imprisoned 
 there, rolled about and hid in the rocks. When Kwi-na 
 came near he shouted, Where are } r ou, old tsd-a-vwits? 
 Where are you, old tsd-a-vwits ? She repeated his words 
 in mockery. 
 
 " Ever since that day witches have lived in snake-skins, 
 and hide among the rocks, and take great delight in re 
 peating the words of passers-b}\ The white man, who has 
 lost the histoiy of these ancient people, call these mock 
 ing cries of witches domiciliated in snake-skins c echoes, 
 but the Nu-mas know the voices of the old hags. This is 
 the origin of the echo." 
 
 After giving various myths and fables which were points 
 of the Indian theolog} r , and which reminded one of nothing 
 so much as JEsop s fables, Major Powell cunningly said 
 that he would conclude with a wise Indian proverb, which 
 he gave in Indian sing-song that by no means detracted 
 from its pith : 
 
 Let a man talk a very long time, 
 Let a man talk a very long time, 
 Le.t a man talk a very long time, 
 A hole he will bore into a rock." 
 
284 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 And, amidst general laughter and applause, the Major took 
 his seat. 
 
 Mr. CLARKE asked if the Indian believed in the doctrine 
 of purification hy transmigration. 
 
 Major POWELL replied that such an idea was altogether 
 too high for the Indian mind, and that the great mistake 
 which the missionary had made was to learn the Indian 
 language that he might teach the Indian the Christian re 
 ligion ; for they have no words for the ideas which must be 
 conveyed to them. But he had no hesitation in declaring 
 that the Indians must of necessity die out as a race. To 
 the question, if the Indians had not been greatly changed 
 and influenced by the teachings of the missionaries, he re 
 plied emphatically, " No ; there has been very little impres 
 sion made upon them." "But about the Great Spirit, 
 why had he said nothing of that?" asked one. Major 
 Powell replied that the Indian knew of no such being 
 until the white man came with his teaching of God. But 
 in accepting the Great Spirit he had only taken another 
 god, and given up none of his old ones. 
 
 As to the treatment of the Indians, Major Powell said 
 that the missionaries made a great mistake in trying to 
 teach them in the Indian language. The savages should 
 learn through the English, which the children acquire 
 easily. The right policy has at last been reached in set 
 ting them to work, and teaching them to supply their 
 physical wants. After that they can have religion preached 
 to them. 
 
HARMONIES OF THE UNIVERSE. 285 
 
 XXXIX. 
 
 THE PHYSICAL AND CHEMICAL HAR 
 MONIES OF THE UNIVERSE. 
 
 BY T. STERRY HUNT, LL.D., F.R.S. 
 
 TV/TY DEAR MRS. SARGENT, When a few weeks since 
 -*-*-*- you asked me for a copy of a communication made by me 
 to the Chestnut Street Club one spring morning in 1877, I feared 
 that I should be unable to comply with your request. The com 
 munication in question was not of the nature of a formal essay, 
 and being delivered without notes I had no record of it whatever. 
 Fortunately for myself, you had however two printed preserved 
 abstracts, which, unknown to me, had been prepared by friendly 
 hands. From these I was enabled to prepare a more detailed 
 sketch of the lecture, which I now offer for your acceptance. 
 
 In my remarks on that occasion I aimed at a presentation, in a 
 popular form, of some of the teachings of modern chemical and 
 physical science as to the history of our earth and its relations 
 to the macrocosm, supplemented, however, by certain speculations 
 for which I alone am responsible. I shall feel gratified if these 
 pages are found worthy of a place in the memoirs of the Club 
 which for so many years has furnished a tribune where the newest 
 and boldest thoughts of the time have found free expression and 
 sympathetic listeners, and which will always hold an honored 
 place in the intellectual history of our generation. 
 I remain, my dear Mrs. Sargent, 
 
 Always gratefully yours, 
 
 T. STERRY HUNT. 
 
 MONTREAL, Sept, 27, 1880. 
 
 THE essayist, after remarking that he should depart 
 in a measure from the traditions of the Club, which 
 have been to discuss questions of philosoplry and theology, 
 
286 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 gave in a conversational manner and without notes a 
 sketch of the physical and chemical history of the earth 
 and its relations to the visible universe. He spoke of the 
 conception of the unity of Nature which had inspired the 
 early hermetic philosophers and their successors, the alche 
 mists of the Middle Ages, but had been too often lost sight 
 of by later students of science. The studies of modern 
 physicists, chemists, and naturalists have, however, now 
 given a higher and deeper significance to what were for 
 merly little more than poetic imaginings. The speaker then 
 alluded to the well-known relations and interdependence 
 of the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, and to 
 the fact that, while plants are nourished by mineral ele 
 ments, they in turn subserve the wants of the animal world, 
 which, by its decay, restores once more to the air and 
 waters the plastic elements of the vegetable kingdom. All 
 this complex order is, in the view of some philosophers, sub 
 servient to man, while to other teleologists man has seemed 
 destined only to hold in check the carnivorous animals, 
 which in their turn keep down the herbivorous creatures, 
 the end of which seemed, to a botanist like Linnaeus, to 
 keep in check a too abundant vegetation. The weak 
 ness and the inherent contradictions of all such modes of 
 reasoning were commented upon, and it was declared that 
 the only adequate conception of Nature was that of an organic 
 whole, which attains its end in its own perfect development. 
 The speaker, while thus briefly denning his position, dis 
 claimed any intention to discuss the philosophical aspect 
 of the question. His object was to present a few thoughts 
 respecting the physical and chemical agencies which have 
 presided over the development of our planet, or rather of 
 the material universe of which it forms a part. It would 
 seem at the first glance as if there were no field for such 
 investigations outside of our own earth, and that having 
 exhausted this planet, the votary of science must, like 
 
HARMONIES OF THE UNIVERSE. 287 
 
 Alexander, weep for the lack of other worlds to conquer. 
 But modern science has given us arms wherewith to reach 
 and to conquer new worlds, and we are enabled b} r means 
 of the spectroscope and the telescope to learn somewhat of 
 their chemistry and their physics, and to discover that the 
 same great laws which reign here on earth rule in the re 
 motest spheres. 
 
 The history of the cosmos is unfolded in the study of 
 the nebulae, those cloud-like masses of luminous matter 
 which the telescope discovers far be} r ond the limits of the 
 solar system. From these nebulae, as we have reason to 
 believe, suns, planets, and satellites are generated by in 
 ternal forces, thus repeating the process by which our own 
 system, with the sun for its centre, was itself formed from 
 some nebula of an earlier time. The light which comes 
 from these far-off suns is, through the medium of the spec 
 troscope, made to reveal the secret of their chemical con 
 stitution and to telegraph us the fact that the chemical 
 elements there present are the same with those of our own 
 planet, and, furthermore, that the constituents of the lumi 
 nous clouds themselves are identical with those of our 
 atmosphere. More than this, we are led by various con 
 siderations to the conclusion that this very atmosphere, 
 which surrounds our earth and becomes less and less dense 
 as we rise from its surface, extends in an attenuated form 
 throughout all space, and constitutes the so-called ether of 
 the interstellar} regions. Wherever, then, worlds exist, a 
 portion of this medium will be found condensed around them, 
 and they will have atmospheres in constitution like our own. 
 
 When we trace still further the history of these forming 
 worlds, we learn the progress of the birth, growth, and 
 subsequent changes of suns, and find the various stages 
 marked by changes in their chemical constitution ; while 
 from the successive appearance of new chemical species 
 during the development of these bodies, we are led to con- 
 
288 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 elude that these new species are likewise the result of a 
 process of growth, that the} are not really elementary, as 
 formerly supposed, but compound. Suns which are white 
 in color exhibit fewer of the so-called chemical elements 
 than those which give a yellower light, and in the light of 
 the red stars we find a still larger number of these elements 
 identical with those found in our earth. In that process 
 by which glowing suns are condensed from nebulae, combi 
 nations are effected by a cosmical chemistry of which our 
 laboratories have not yet learned the secret, and which prob 
 ably depends on temperatures far higher than we have at 
 our command. Heat, as we know, breaks up or dissociates 
 chemical compounds, and those suns which present the 
 fewest chemical elements in their light are doubtless the 
 highest in temperature. 
 
 But whence come the nebula? themselves, which have 
 hitherto been accepted as primordial parts in the history of 
 the cosmos? In the opinion of the speaker, the air and 
 watery vapor which make up our atmosphere are, as 
 alread} said, diffused in a highly rarefied condition through 
 out all space ; and, this conceded, the nebulae may be con 
 ceived to be formed from it b} a process of condensation. 
 This he illustrated by an analog} 7 : we see in the trans 
 parent blue of our atmosphere the formation of a haze, 
 which gathers into a cloud that later condenses into drops 
 of rain or into frozen hail. In like manner a nebula is 
 but a cosmic cloud produced by some cause in the far-off 
 ether, this universal atmosphere, of which its light re 
 veals to us the elements. From this cloud we have alread}* 
 traced the progress to suns and planets. This conception 
 of the origin of nebulae seems to be necessary to the com 
 pleteness of the so-called nebular hypothesis. 
 
 Our own earth, in accordance with the view here ad 
 vanced, was once a glowing mass of vapor detached from 
 a still greater mass which became our sun ; and we have 
 
HARMONIES OF THE UNIVERSE, 289 
 
 next to follow its history as it slowly condensed into a 
 molten liquid, and finally into a solid mass surrounded with 
 ocean and atmosphere. Astronomy traces a similar history 
 in our sister planets from still luminous globes like Jupiter, 
 to Mars, in which the telescopic changes observed show sum 
 mer and winter seasons, and the alternate accumulation and 
 disappearance of snow in the circumpolar regions. The 
 chemical and physical history of the various planets is doubt 
 less similar to that of our own earth. We are not, indeed, 
 wanting in messengers from other worlds, which help to sup 
 port this a priori conclusion. Aerolites or uranolites, those 
 rocky masses which come to us from beyond our atmos 
 phere, are composed of the same mineral elements as our 
 own earth, and even tell us, by signs unmistakable to the 
 chemist, of the presence of water and of organic life in the 
 far-off and unknown regions from which these falling stars 
 have come down to us. 
 
 The history of the changes which took place in our own 
 cooling globe belongs to geology. There was a time when 
 it was a mass of intensely heated rock, solid at the surface, 
 and probably also solid to the core, and surrounded 
 by a heavy atmosphere, the condensation of which set up 
 chemical action upon the half-cooled surface and began 
 the series of processes which have resulted in the present 
 mineralogical and chemical conditions of the earth s crust. 
 In the earlier times of its history the conditions were un 
 favorable to the existence of life on the planet. The at 
 mosphere was too highly charged with carbonic acid, and 
 the ocean with noxious salts. The rocks which then formed 
 the surface (which were not granite, but probably more 
 nearl} T allied to basalt in composition) were slowly disin 
 tegrated by the action of the atmosphere, which separated 
 from them their combined soda, lime, and magnesia in the 
 form of carbonates soluble in water, and converted the 
 rocks into clay. These soluble salts, carried by rains to 
 
 19 
 
290 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 the ocean, there gave rise to limestones, and changed its 
 bitter waves into waters fitted to sustain the life of sea 
 weed, mollusk, and coral, for the growth of which the same 
 process furnished abundance of carbonate of lime. Every 
 mass of clay thus generated by the decay of the rocks 
 corresponds to a definite portion of carbonic acid removed 
 from the air, and to its equivalent of salt dissolved in the 
 sea and of limestone deposited from its waters. 
 
 These processes were not accomplished in years or in 
 centuries, but required the long process of ages, which 
 probably intervened after the first appearance of. life in 
 the sea before the land was prepared for vegetation. The 
 records of unnumbered- dynasties of vegetable and animal 
 life are written on tables of stone in the earth s crust, 
 wherein we read of the successive appearance of higher 
 and higher forms of life, till man at length appears upon 
 the scene. 
 
 The climatic changes of the earth form a curious chapter 
 in its geological history. In former ages a semi-tropical 
 vegetation extended over islands and continents, even within 
 the polar circle ; and there seems no evidence of the exist 
 ence of ice in those early periods, save on mountains or 
 high plateaus, where it may be found to-day in tropical 
 regions. Changes in the relations of sea and land, and in 
 the distribution of the heated waters whose currents flow 
 from the equatorial region towards either pole, are potent 
 elements in modifying climate ; but the speaker believed 
 that there is another still more potent and a cosmical 
 cause of the greater mildness of climate in former geologi 
 cal ages, and of the slow progressive refrigeration which 
 is shown in the successive arctic floras from the time of the 
 cretaceous period to that of the middle tertiary. 
 
 It is demonstrated that the presence of small quantities 
 of carbonic acid gas in the air exerts by its absorbent power 
 a great influence on terrestrial radiation and consequently 
 
HARMONIES OF THE UNIVERSE. 291 
 
 on climate ; so that a slight increase in the proportion of this 
 gas in our atmosphere would suffice to produce everywhere 
 at the sea-level an almost tropical climate. The effect of 
 such an atmosphere would be analogous to that of a vast 
 protecting dome of glass, which, while permitting the pas 
 sage of solar heat to the surface of the earth, would prevent 
 its escape. Such a condition of things, the speaker sup 
 posed to have existed throughout long ages ; nor was it until 
 a time, geologically very recent, that the slow condensa 
 tion of the carbonic acid, by processes already explained, 
 brought about the present climatic conditions of our earth, 
 in which much of the polar area is now permanently cov 
 ered with snow and ice . A small proportion of this gas , how 
 ever, still remains in the atmosphere and helps to protect 
 us from the cold of the interstellary spaces and to nourish 
 vegetation. Vegetable life could not exist without carbonic 
 acid in the atmosphere, and its total removal would cause 
 the death of every plant, and consequently of all animal 
 life. An interchange, though perhaps a very gradual one, 
 in the speaker s opinion, goes on between our atmosphere 
 and that of all other worlds, by which the changes at our 
 earth s surface are shared with the universe. The minute 
 portions of mineral matter which, in the form of so-called 
 cosmic dust, are believed by many to come to us from the 
 regions of space are, he conceived, evidences of that free 
 commerce which is carried on throughout the cosmos ; 
 so that not only gravitation and light, but material inter 
 changes, connect us with the remotest orbs in space. 
 
 And here we may well inquire whether the present order 
 of the universe is permanent. The suns, which are the cen 
 tres and the sources of life to systems, may fade and grow 
 cold. Although we may discern agencies which afford them 
 fresh supplies of heat, the very process of growth, which 
 we have watched from the nebula, implies their decay. 
 Change is written on all things. The energy dormant in 
 
292 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 each orb would, if called into action, suffice, as is mathe 
 matically demonstrated, to reduce it to a condition of 
 vapor, a tenuous gas, which, in accordance with our previ 
 ously exposed Irypothesis, would soon be diffused and form 
 a part of the infinite azure, an insignificant contribution 
 to that all-pervading universal ether of which our own life- 
 giving atmosphere is a part, and from which, as we believe, 
 new nebulae, new suns, and new worlds are generated. 
 
 Thus in the words of our own Emerson, in his divine 
 song of " Nature," 
 
 "And thefts from satellites and rings 
 
 And broken stars I drew ; 
 And out of spent and aged things 
 I framed the worlds anew. 
 
 " No ray is dimmed, no atom worn, 
 My oldest force is good as new, 
 And the fresh rose on yonder thorn 
 
 Gives back the bending heavens in dew." 
 
 With this view of the Cosmos and its divine harmonies, 
 which modern science permits me to set before J T OU, we are 
 prepared to understand the words of Faust, as he contem 
 plates the sign of the Macrocosm : 
 
 "Now each the Whole its substance gives, 
 Each in the other works and lives ! 
 Like heavenly forces rising and descending, 
 Their golden urns reciprocally lending. 
 With wings that winnow blessing 
 From heaven through earth I see them pressing, 
 Filling the All with harmony increasing." 
 
EMEKSON. 293 
 
 XL. 
 
 CLUB RECEPTION GIVEN TO MR. 
 EMERSON IN 1873. 
 
 EMERSON. 
 
 Midway in summer, face to face, a king 
 
 I met. No king so gentle and so wise. 
 
 He calls no man a subject ; but his eyes, 
 
 In midst of benediction, questioning, 
 
 Each soul compel. A first-fruit s offering 
 
 Each soul must owe to him whose fair land lies 
 
 Wherever God has his. No white dove flies 
 
 Too white, no wine too rich and red, to bring. 
 
 With sudden penitence for all her waste, 
 
 My soul to yield her scanty hoards made haste, 
 
 When lo ! they shrank and failed me in that need, 
 
 Like wizard s gold, by worthless dust replaced. 
 
 My speechless grief, the king, with tender heed, 
 
 Thus soothed : " These ashes sow. They are true seed. " 
 
 king, in other summer may I stand 
 
 Before thee yet, the full ear in my hand ! 
 
 H. H. 
 
 IT may be said, that while the genius of Ralph Waldo 
 Emerson belongs to the whole world he is essentially the 
 property of Boston, in whose people he finds the warmest 
 recognition of his gentle and noble qualities as a man. 
 
 Among those who assembled on the last day of the year 
 to show their respect and admiration for Mr. Emerson, 
 were John G. Whittier, Henry W. Longfellow, Dr. Hedge, 
 
294 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Wendell Phillips, Henry Wilson, and Hemy James ; and 
 the half lights of bright wood-fires and gathering twilight 
 revealed many familiar faces, including some of the choicest 
 spirits in New England and guests from other continents. 
 Mr. Emerson doubtless understood the welcome greeting 
 him on every hand, though, as the principal actor, he 
 probably did not realize the impression the scene in 
 spired. 
 
 There could have been a no more fitting day for the 
 reception, or one more lovely in clear winter beauty ; and 
 as the poet and philosopher sat in the fading light, read 
 ing to these friends his rhythmic story of the Boston Tea 
 Party, one hundred years ago, the picture passed into his 
 tory, its very simplicity and dignity being in harmony 
 with all that is known of the wise and gentle Emerson. 
 
 BOSTON. 
 
 The rocky nook with hill-tops three 
 
 Looked eastward from the farms, 
 And twice each day the flowing sea 
 
 Took Boston in its arms ; 
 The men of yore were stout and poor, 
 And sailed for bread to every shore. 
 
 And where they went on trade intent 
 
 They did what freemen can, 
 Their dauntless ways did all men praise, 
 
 The merchant was a man. 
 The world was made for honest trade, 
 To plant and eat be none afraid. 
 
 The waves that rocked them on the deep 
 
 To them their secret told : 
 Said the winds that sung the lads to sleep, 
 
 " Like us be free and bold ! " 
 The honest waves refuse to slaves 
 The empire of the ocean caves. 
 
EMERSON. 295 
 
 Old Europe groans with palaces, 
 Has lords enough and more : 
 
 We plant and build by foaming seas 
 A city of the poor ; 
 
 For day by day could Boston Bay 
 
 Their honest labor overpay. 
 
 We grant no dukedom to the few, 
 We hold like rights and shall, 
 
 Equal on Sunday in the pew, 
 On Monday in the mall. 
 
 For what avail the plough or sail, 
 
 Or land or life, if freedom fail ? 
 
 The noble craftsman we promote, 
 Disown the knave and fool ; 
 
 Each honest man shall have his vote, 
 Each child shall have his school. 
 
 A union then of honest men, 
 
 Or union nevermore again. 
 
 Mr. Emerson reads with beautiful simplicity, as if the 
 words were just whispered to him out of his best experi 
 ence, as if translating to our comprehension some 
 dream and unintelligible harmony of the upper sphere. 
 
 Mr. BRADLAUGH, at the close of the reading of the poem, 
 said : " I ascribe to Mr. Emerson s essay on Self-reliance 
 my first step in the career I have adopted. Twenty-six 
 years ago, when too poor to buy a book, I copied parts of 
 that famous lecture ; and I now stand for the first time in 
 the presence of the great preacher, an example at least 
 of a self-reliant man." 
 
 Many were present who had little sympathy with Mr. 
 Bradlaugh s peculiar teachings, but none could fail to be 
 touched by the deep feeling with which he spoke. 
 
 A question whether the Boston of to-day would always 
 act with the same spirit as it did a century ago drew out 
 
296 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 divers opinions as to the causes of that uprising, and 
 touching the minorities of great men who had always won 
 against the majorities of public opinion. 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS opened the discussion : u I believe 
 the pictures of that Boston, a hundred years ago, are 
 very highly colored. That the word caucus has been 
 even guessed to have taken its origin from the Calkers 
 betrays the popular notion and estimate of the rising Ee- 
 bellion. John Hancock s scarlet coat becomes historic as 
 being the only one which covered a rebel. That brace of 
 Adamses, whom Hutchinson has immortalized, were then 
 men of no repute, vulgar fanatics heading a crowd of 
 workingmen, scoffed at and scorned by the respectables 
 of the day. The marvel is that the middle, well-to-do, 
 and commercial classes headed a rebellion which had no 
 religion in it. That is explained by the fact that every 
 successful merchant in Boston was obliged to be a smug 
 gler. England crippled our trade to save her own, as she 
 has been doing with Ireland for the last century. So the 
 traders, angered by self-interest, calculated it would pay 
 to join the mob and rise. But To^ ism had the fashion, 
 the old wealth, and the prestige, as it has always had. 
 
 " As to our day rising as high even as that, I doubt. 
 Not much if a reform city is one which puts a rope round 
 Garrison to hang him, which even yet hates Sumner ; one 
 whose Unitarian pulpit deserted and betrayed Pierpont 
 for his temperance fidelity, and where there never has 
 been, even to this day, a fashionable Orthodox church 
 opened for an abolition meeting. Would any young en 
 thusiast, on fire with a new reform idea, be crazy enough 
 to go to State Street, Beacon Street, the Old South, or 
 Harvard College for countenance ? If so, he must be very 
 young, and will soon learn better. The young patriots 
 who when Sumter called leaped to arms, ten years ago, 
 were exceptions, not average specimens by any means." 
 
EMERSON. 297 
 
 HENRY WILSON replied, mentioning many men who in 
 the last thirty years had been the brain and sinew of New 
 England, and whose work proved that the age of action 
 had not passed into empty words. 
 
 It would be injustice to the speakers to attempt to re 
 produce fully the eloquent impromptu discussion thus 
 briefly sketched. 
 
298 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XL! 
 
 JOHN TYNDALL. 
 
 PROFESSOR TYNDALL, of London, delivered a 
 course of lectures on Chemistry, in the winter of 
 1873, under the auspices of the Lowell Institute. 
 
 His mastery of the whole subject, the clearness with 
 which he opened its abstruse mysteries, the witchery of a 
 manner which made the dr} est details interesting, and the 
 generous self-forge tfulness with which, in closing his lec 
 tures, he gave the merit of any success he had achieved 
 to the two assistants, whose accuracy and adroitness had 
 made every experiment wonderfully perfect, charmed an 
 audience which night after night crowded the old Marl 
 boro Chapel, and which included Professors Agassiz and 
 Peirce and Dr. Holmes. 
 
 In closing, he thanked his hearers, and added : " I have 
 now seen America. I wish every Englishman could see 
 it, and that every American could see England ; for I am 
 sure mutual misunderstanding is the root of nine tenths 
 of the wars between nations. Every lover of peace should 
 wish, first of all, that nations should understand each other ; 
 and I go home to do all I can to make England know 
 America." 
 
 Half an hour after he was seated, with a few friends, 
 the late Rev. John Weiss, Mr. Goddard of the " Daily 
 Advertiser," Mr. Wendell Phillips, and a few others, at 
 a small supper-table under Mrs. Sargent s roof. Tyndall 
 was in excellent spirits, relieved of the responsibility of 
 
JOHN TYNDALL. 299 
 
 his lectures, and poured out reminiscence and anecdote 
 without ceasing. 
 
 He spoke of the Lowell Institute, under whose auspices 
 he had delivered the course of lectures just closed, and was 
 full of praise of the benefits resulting from such institu 
 tions ; "though," he added, "they tell me Emerson has 
 never been asked by the managers to lecture in ah 1 these 
 forty years." 
 
 " No, and will not be," said some one, "if he lives 
 another forty years. You, sir, never would have been 
 asked had you proposed in Boston to test prayer by sta 
 tistics. London is at a safe distance, and English radi 
 calism grows less frightful to Boston conservatism four 
 thousand miles off. A running stream, } T OU know, breaks 
 the fairy charm ; so distance opens doors tightly closed 
 against home heretics." 
 
 " But you don t really mean that anj T body in Boston 
 ignores Emerson ? " 
 
 " Yes, all that clusters round the Lowell Institute. Such 
 a class disowns Emerson and Parker. Parker, during all 
 the years when he drew crowds, was never iiwited to lec 
 ture by the Institute. Neither Oriental Societies nor His 
 torical Societies dared to ask the first scholar Boston had 
 in both their fields to join them." 
 
 Surprising ! I don t think even London could beat 
 that," was Tyndall s comment. 
 
 Some one repeated the well-known sarcasm of Thack 
 eray when in Boston. The first places he had sought 
 were Theodore Parker s church and study. Talking, 
 towards the close of his visit, with George Ticknor, 
 Thackera} 7 burst out : " Ticknor, I have not got into the 
 best Boston circle after all, no, not the best." 
 
 Mr. Ticknor assured him that he certainly had ; and 
 counted up the known Boston men and women he had 
 met. 
 
300 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 "True," answered Thackeray, "but still I can t have 
 seen the best. No, no ! Wiry, Prescott tells me he does 
 not visit Parker," and the portrayer of snobs smiled 
 archry, not to Ticknor, but to a friend sitting on the other 
 side. 
 
 "Well," said Tyndall musingly, and half to himself, 
 "the first time lever knew Waldo Emerson was when, 
 years ago, a young man, I picked up on a stall a copy 
 of his Nature. I read it with such delight, and I have 
 never ceased to read it ; and if any one can be said to 
 have given the impulse to my mind, it is Emerson. What 
 ever I have done, the world owes to him." 
 
 We involuntarily clapped our hands at this cordial tes 
 timony to the serene genius at Concord. 
 
 Mr. GODDARD said: " That reminds me of an incident 
 told me a short time ago by Mr. E. H. Derby, who had 
 then just returned from the International Statistical Con 
 gress at St. Petersburg. At a banquet given in the im 
 perial palace to the members of the congress and ladies 
 with them, the Grand Duchess Marie, aunt of the present 
 emperor, a lady of seventy years, who speaks English 
 perfectly, said to Mr. Derb} that she was familiar with the 
 books of one of his countrymen, Mr. Emerson. She had 
 read his essay on Nature many times, and never trav 
 elled without it as a companion." 
 
 It was now Tyndall s turn to clap his hands. " You see 
 what august indorsement I have." 
 
 Mr. WEISS proposed three cheers for the grand-duchess, 
 which Tyndall s cousin timed. 
 
 It is said that Professor Tyndall generously devoted 
 the profits of this American lecture tour to the aid of poor 
 students. 
 
DOM PEDRO. 301 
 
 XLII. 
 
 DOM PEDRO. 
 
 IN the month of June, 1876, His Imperial Majesty Dom 
 Pedro II. of Brazil visited Boston. While here he 
 showed the keenest interest in scientific, practical, and edu 
 cational matters, visiting public works and private manu 
 factories, in the evident desire to take back with him a 
 knowledge of the best methods of the world s work. He 
 evinced a quiet determination not to be lionized, it being 
 soon understood that he declined invitations of a social 
 nature, making exceptions only in favor of Mrs. Louis 
 Agassiz and Professor Longfellow. 
 
 The Emperor had for years, however, been a warm 
 admirer of John G. Whittier, with whom he had corre 
 sponded both in regard to poetry and the emancipation of 
 slaves. He had translated into his own tongue Whittier s 
 beautiful poem entitled "The Cry of a Lost Soul," be 
 ginning, 
 
 " In that black forest, where, when day is done, 
 With a snake s stillness glides the Amazon," 
 
 and had sent to the poet several beautiful specimens of the 
 bird from which the lyric takes its name. The Emperor 
 expressed to Mrs. Agassiz a wish to meet Whittier, and 
 accordingly arrangements were made for their coming to 
 gether in the Chestnut Street parlors. Being asked to 
 fix the time, Dom Pedro named three o clock of the fol 
 lowing day, Wednesday, June 14, and a few distinguished 
 gentlemen were invited to be present. 
 
302 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 When the Emperor arrived, the other guests had already 
 assembled. Sending up his card, His Majesty followed it 
 with the quickness of an enthusiastic school-boy ; and his 
 first question, after somewhat hastily paying his greetings, 
 was for Mr. Whittier. The poet stepped forward to meet 
 his imperial admirer, who would fain have caught him in 
 his arms and embraced him warmly, with all the enthusi 
 asm of the Latin race. The diffident Friend seemed some 
 what abashed at so demonstrative a greeting, but with a 
 cordial grasp of the hand drew Dom Pedro to the sofa, 
 where the two chatted easily and with the familiarity of old 
 friends. 
 
 The rest of the company allowed them to enjoy their 
 tete-a-tete for some half hour, when they ventured to 
 interrupt it, and the Emperor joined very heartily in a 
 general conversation. "I went," said he, "to see the 
 Frog Pond, no frogs ! " He told of his driving over 
 to see the Bunker Hill Monument at six o clock in the 
 morning ; found the keeper a-bed, and when he was at 
 last roused, His Majesty was obliged to borrow half a 
 dollar of his hackman to pay the entrance fee. He did 
 not know what the rest of the company had heard, that, 
 two hours later, Mr. Richard Frothingham coming in and 
 seeing the signature in the book, asked the keeper how 
 the Emperor looked. Putting on his glasses to examine 
 the handwriting, the fretful guardian muttered: "Em 
 peror ! that s a dodge ; that fellow was only a scapegrace 
 without a cent in his pocket." 
 
 He described with a boy s glee his visit to Wellesley 
 College and the girls rowing on the lake ; indignantly 
 exclaiming, in answer to a query whether such a bevy of 
 ladies did not awe him, "No, indeed; I am not afraid 
 of girls." With more seriousness he entered somewhat 
 into the details of his examination of the Medical College ; 
 spoke of its perfect arrangements, etc., adding, "You 
 
DOM PEDRO. 303 
 
 know I m a Doctor of State diseases." He spoke warmly, 
 too, of Charming, whose grave at Mt. Auburn he had 
 visited, cop} r ing carefully into his note-book the inscription 
 on the tomb-stone. As he sipped his coffee, he noted the 
 hour. "It is five o clock, Mrs. Sargent; not my fault, 
 only my misfortune," and, rising, he placed his arm round 
 his brother poet s waist and gently drew him downstairs. 
 
 Speaking of the distinguished Brazilian s courtesy, a 
 3 T oung lady friend, who had served the guests with ices, 
 said, " The other gentleman thanked me, but the Emperor 
 rose." As Dom Pedro and Whittier passed downstairs 
 one of the company began to repeat an incident which 
 occurred on the occasion of His Majesty s visit to the 
 famous Wartburg. The commandant was conducting the 
 Emperor over his beloved castle, and when they reached 
 the Kemnate, the room which had served Luther as a 
 chapel, the Reformer s noble hymn Eine feste Burg ist 
 unser Gott was played on the long-silent organ, in honor 
 of the royal visitor. As the first notes of the hymn broke 
 the summer stillness, startling into song the birds which fill 
 the tree-tops about that ancient tower, the Emperor fell 
 on his knees, and remained devoutly kneeling until the 
 solemn strains died away. His wife, more Roman and 
 less catholic, crossed herself devoutly, shocked to see the 
 chapel of the arch-heretic so honored. While this tale 
 was told, the parting of poet from poet took place unseen 
 by any curious observer. Some did suspect that, in the 
 privacy of that farewell, Dom Pedro asserted the conti 
 nental manners ; and, as Bliicher kissed Wellington the 
 evening of Waterloo, in the same way Dom Pedro cele 
 brated his achievement in securing an interview with the 
 poet of the Merrimac. What the company actually saw 
 was the delighted Brazilian potentate standing erect in his 
 open barouche, waving his hat with a seeming hurrah at 
 the house which held his venerable friend. 
 
304 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XLIII. 
 CHARLES SUMNER. 
 
 " But the final greatness of a fortunate man is rarely made by any 
 violent effort of his own. He has sown the seed in the time foregone, 
 and the ripe time brings up the harvest. His fate seems taken out of 
 his own control ; greatness seems thrust upon him. He has made 
 himself, as it were, a want to the nation, a thing necessary to it ; he 
 has identified himself with his age, and in the wreath or the crown on 
 his brow the age itself seems to put forth its flowers." BULWER. 
 
 THE gathering in honor of Senator Sumner was one of 
 the most brilliant ever witnessed here. The parlors 
 were full of flowers and fragrance ; of men honored, gifted, 
 and famous. On a stand was Milmore s grand bust of 
 Sumner, a stately and noble presentment, by which Mr. 
 Sumner expressed his desire to be known to posterity. 
 In front of this, at a little distance, sat Carl Schurz, 
 with his graceful wife by his side. Not far off was the 
 poet Longfellow, with his countenance as serene and re 
 fined and full of gracious charm as one of his own poems. 
 Whittier was near at hand, a man whose very look is a 
 benediction. Clerg3 T men and men of letters, politicians 
 and artists and solid Boston merchants, take it all in 
 all, such a company is seldom gathered together ! The 
 poet Stedman told an "interviewer" the next day that 
 the literary centre was being removed from Boston to New 
 York ; but one felt to-day as if the Hub had not yet been 
 shorn of its glory. 
 
CHARLES SUMNER. 305 
 
 Rev. J. T. SARGENT paid an eloquent tribute to the 
 moral worth of Mr. Sumner, a man of deeds rather than 
 of professions. 
 
 Rev. JOHN WEISS followed him. He began by speaking 
 of the necessity for utterance and action which the pos 
 session of lofty qualities imposes upon their possessor, 
 compelling him to speak when he would rather be silent, 
 and said that the life of Sumner might teach us not to 
 condemn all things in these later days. He then dwelt 
 briefly upon the great senator s habit of devoting himself 
 to literary study, and rinding solace therein for the social 
 condemnation which he had brought upon himself by his 
 uncompromising adherence to ideas which were unpopular ; 
 and afterwards proceeded to consider Mr. Sumner s reli 
 gion. " We incline," said the speaker, "to call him the 
 most religious person of this or an} other age, because his 
 life was devoted to the ideal method of the Deity. Such 
 divine work as his only a religious soul would set itself to 
 do. If to aspire towards the higher life be a religious 
 gesture, he was perfectly religious, for he climbed strongly 
 and incessantly upwards." Mr. Weiss drew strongly con 
 trasting portraits of Mr. Sumner and the so-called "reli 
 gious " slaveholders whom he opposed, and said that if at 
 the Judgment he should ask, " Lord, when saw I thee in 
 prison and visited thee?" the answer would be, "Four 
 million times you saw me in prison ; beneath four million 
 dusky skins you recognized me." Mr. Weiss then spoke 
 of Mr. Sumner s eloquence, and, after warning young men 
 to remember that he who wore the breast-plate of truth, 
 and cut down all wrong with the sword of the spirit, 
 belonged to no sect, spoke of the duty of imitating his 
 noble example, following in his footsteps, and "taking 
 care of his civil rights bill." 
 
 Rev. W. J. POTTER then spoke of Mr. Sumner s conduct 
 after the battle of Bull Run, when he, seeing that this 
 
 20 
 
306 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 temporary defeat would be productive of final good results, 
 rejoiced while others were despondent ; and said that this 
 did not show heartlessness but prophetic clearness of 
 sight. 
 
 He was followed by John Gr. Whittier, the first time 
 I ever knew him to speak in any assembly. 
 
 Mr. WHITTIER said; "Had Sumner supposed while in 
 life that I should attempt to talk of him in a memorial 
 gathering, he would have exclaimed with the Scotch poet, 
 when told that a certain militia company would fire a 
 salute over his grave, Don t let that awkward squad fire 
 over me ! " Mr. Whittier then spoke a few words, ex 
 pressing his gratification that the vote of censure passed 
 by the Massachusetts Legislature had been repealed be 
 fore Sumner s death. Only a few words did Mr. Whit- 
 tier give to his friend, but they were eloquent in their 
 brevity and simplicity. 
 
 Senator SCHURZ said : " In regard to my feeling for 
 Sumner there is little more that I can s&y. We fought 
 side by side, or rather back to back, during the three 
 bitterest years of Sumner s life. I feel like a man who, 
 seeing his comrade fall by his side, holds his body in one 
 hand and waves his sword with the other. I, perhaps, more 
 than an} r other know how Sumner s work must be carried 
 on, and I shall defend him and his memory to the end." 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS felt that nothing could be added, 
 indeed nothing need be added, to what had been already 
 said so heartily. He quoted Gerard Hamilton s words 
 when Johnson died : 4 He has made a chasm which not 
 only nothing can fill up, but which nothing has any ten 
 dency to fill up. Johnson is dead. Let us go to the next 
 best : nobody can be said to put you in mind of Johnson." 
 So, in civil life, we may sa3 r , Sumner is dead. Let us go 
 to the next best : there is no other Sumner. 
 
 Mrs. E. D. CHENEY alluded to the national sorrow at 
 
CHARLES SUMNER. 307 
 
 the death of Mr. Sumner, saying that it amounted almost 
 to a feeling of orphanage ; and then spoke of the feeling at 
 the time of the Trent affair, when the popular sentiment 
 was so easily changed by Mr. Sumner s decision that the 
 prisoners must be returned, and said that precisely such 
 a spirit of uncompromising fidelity was that which was 
 needed to carry the nation forward. 
 
 The poet and painter, C. P. CRANCH, was the conclud 
 ing speaker ; and his brief speech contained so perfect a 
 picture that I give it to you in full : 
 
 " It may be superfluous for me, who had so slight an 
 acquaintance with Mr. Sumner personalty, and who saw 
 his public career chiefly from across the Atlantic, to add 
 my humble testimony to the well-deserved eulogies which 
 have been spoken by so many eloquent lips. Of his com 
 manding position in our political history ; of his uncom 
 promising steadfastness and unshrinking courage ; of his 
 persistent assertion of absolute justice in behalf of an 
 oppressed race, and against the overbearing assumptions 
 and brutal assaults of the defenders of Slavery ; of his 
 large and far-sighted vision, which made him the prophet 
 of a new era in America, and of his untiring labors that 
 the nation should recover its lost ideals, there has been 
 and can be but one opinion, as there has been but one 
 voice of praise, among the friends of truth, freedom, and 
 humanity. 
 
 4 But allow me to recall one little circumstance, a trifle 
 in itself, yet sj^mbolizing to me the man and his career. 
 Many years ago, long ere the land was convulsed by the 
 earthquake whose premonitory tremors should have proved 
 on what a volcanic soil we stood, I was staj ing at Nahant 
 with my friend William W. Story, where I afterward met 
 Mr. Sumner, then in his sunny and elastic youth, before 
 he was elected to the Senate. 
 
308 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 " On one of those summer afternoons I was seated on 
 the shore, busily engaged in painting the picturesque rocks 
 and views in front of Mr. Story s cottage, stretching out 
 towards the sea. All that the picture needed was a figure 
 on the rocks. Just then, at the farthest end of the long 
 ledge, the tall form of Simmer appeared, and was at once, 
 in landscape-painter s fashion, jotted down into the pic 
 ture. He stood in the right place. But he was quite un 
 conscious of his position, or that any one was observing him. 
 Nor did he stand there as a lounger. He was waiting 
 impatiently for the evening steamboat to bring him the 
 papers from Boston. He had his eye on the State and 
 the nation, while I had mine only on that little ledge 
 of picturesque rock and that stretching sea, and the tall 
 figure which happened to stand there just at the right 
 moment. 
 
 " As I recall that little study from Nature, it seems to 
 fix and sjinbolize the future senator. As he stands there 
 in the picture, on the end of the long gray ledge, look 
 ing seaward, so did he stand through his life upon the firm 
 rock of political principle, facing the great uncertain sea 
 of the future destinies of America. There he stands, 
 alwa} T s in the right place, though on the extreme point 
 of the time. There he stands, eagerly waiting for the 
 news, the latest news which year after year might bring, 
 of the slow gains of justice upon force and fraud and 
 compromise. There he stands, looking into the misty dis 
 tance of the coming twilight, the mist which afterward 
 gathered into storm and hurricane, while I and my 
 friends were thinking chiefly of Nature and art and litera 
 ture, and the poetry of life. 
 
 " This is only a picture, hardly an incident ; but it ma} 7 , 
 perhaps, serve to add a small vignette or bit of scroll-work 
 to the earnest pages of his biography." 
 
CHARLES SUMNER. 309 
 
 With these words the exercises fitly concluded. They 
 left in our minds the picture of a great soul in a great 
 body, opposing with his kingly presence and with the 
 majesty born of pure intentions and a pure life all shams 
 and all wrong-doing. 
 
310 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XLIV. 
 JOHN T. SARGENT. 
 
 (The first meeting of the Club after his death.) 
 
 DR. BARTOL spoke in terms of the utmost feeling of 
 respect and affection of Mr. Sargent, the one in 
 whose place he had been called to preside, whose mind he 
 felt was upon them, "the eye of the mind, more pierc 
 ing than the eye of the body," and whose presence he 
 welcomed. The Club has now reached its second decade. 
 Its reputation abroad is that it is the jumping-off place of 
 all belief into negation. On the contrary, it has never 
 been an anti-Christian company. It has stood for freedom 
 of thought and freedom of speech, not " negative," but 
 valuing the elements of freedom and truth beyond all price, 
 as also its fidelity to its precepts and premises. It has 
 held to no atheism or flouting of belief, neither has it made 
 of Jesus a fetich ; but it has wished for larger faith and 
 freedom, fuller and freer investigation of religious belief. 
 Let it be judged on the just principle that the cause is 
 equal to the effect. 
 
 The host, moderator, president, has risen in his seat. 
 Farewell, let his peers and comrades say, with greeting, to 
 the man who saluted his human sisters with intellectual 
 respect, in whom the old love for his clerical brothers 
 survived all degrees of sectarian heat, having in his soul 
 a glow beyond the warmth of his own ardent tempera 
 ment, and whose last effort on earth was a smile, which 
 
JOHN T. SAEGENT. 311 
 
 on (tying lips is, beyond all knowledge or tongues or 
 prophecies, the clearest announcement of heaven. 
 
 Mr. W. H. CHANNING addressed the company, and in a 
 few brief remarks paid a just and fitting tribute to the late 
 Rev. J. T. Sargent, " whose spirit he felt was with us ; " 
 and, from the earnestness and pathos of his face, words, 
 and manner, one could almost imagine that he saw the 
 one of whom he spoke, and felt as if each might recog 
 nize him through the mute appeal from all the surround 
 ings and their influences, with which he was so closely 
 identified. Mr. Channing gave but an outline of Mr. Sar 
 gent s life, his boyhood, college days, and the later 
 years, with their varied experiences ; dwelt on his gener 
 ous, high-toned nature, his quick wit and always ready 
 badinage, his unswerving integrity and great moral cour 
 age, which never failed him under the severest tests, 
 one of which was exchanging with Theodore Parker, which 
 cost him his ministry. "Keep him close with Theodore 
 Parker, with dear Charles Sumner, with Edmund Quinc3 T . 
 We will not think of them as gone, but near in spirit." 
 
 The following words of tribute were spoken on another 
 occasion. 
 
 Rev. JOHN WEISS said: "Let me anticipate the spring 
 which will soon blossom over his resting-place, and add 
 my offering to these fragrant flowers. It will be at least 
 fragrant with the recollection of one of the truest men 
 who ever lived. His opening manhood met an epoch in 
 American history which the present generation cannot 
 appreciate. Hardly, by any effort of imagination, can the 
 young men and women of to-day understand what was 
 involved in being faithful to private conviction in 1840, 
 and from that time downward through the dark period. 
 As Jesus said, i Come unto me, all ye who labor and are 
 heavy laden, so said our friend : and his life opened with 
 that practice. When every politic and aristocratic priv- 
 
312 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 ilege might have claimed him, when the influences of 
 society and of his own rearing would have attracted him 
 into an easier career, he quietly put away all these asso 
 ciations, and began to collect around him the poor and 
 neglected classes of this city of his birth ; going from ten 
 ement to tenement at the South End, inspired with the 
 feeling to make a chapel for these unchurched people, 
 which he did at length, in Suffolk Street, and preferred 
 his post there to any other." 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON said : " In recalling him it is impos 
 sible not to place him in imagination by his own ample 
 fireside, fit emblem of the old-time hospitality of the 
 house. That which gave the peculiar charm to the meet 
 ings of the Radical Club the combination of the 
 most modern thoughts with those stately colonial parlors 
 was expressed also in the manner of Mr. Sargent in 
 his own home. It linked us with other days, with the 
 mother as she was portrayed in the old portrait above his 
 head : there she sat at her harp, in perpetual youth, the 
 harp itself stood, now unstrung and tuneless, in the cor 
 ner ; and the serene and courteous manners, which the 
 son had learned from her, still kept their youthful strain 
 and were never out of tune. High or low, rich or poor, 
 it made no difference ; you might meet an emperor there, 
 or a city pauper, but so far as the host s manners went 
 there was no visible variation. Even advancing age and 
 declining health left untouched this innate courtesy. The 
 habit of hospitality remained. 
 
 " The practice of the house, in these respects, dated from 
 the period of the Antislavery reform, when there existed 
 among New England reformers an activity of fellowship 
 such as the milder antagonisms of to-day can hardly cre 
 ate. There must be a sense of common danger, a mob, 
 in the air, to bring out that full identity of life and purpose. 
 At least, there must be some social isolation or ostracism 
 
JOHN T. SARGENT. 313 
 
 to give the complete charm to the warm meeting of reform 
 ers, the excitement of Convention Da} , the storms 
 of the platform, the rebellion of the galleries, the final 
 reunion in the hospitable home, fighting the battles over 
 again. There is to this day a great closet in the Sargent 
 house, where all the remaining copies of all the Autislavery 
 tracts are arranged on shelves, neatly sorted and ticketed 
 by the careful hand of Mr. Sargent. I never went into 
 that room without drawing a long breath, to think of the 
 accumulated thunders that lay asleep there. Slavery dead ! 
 and there were the spare weapons of the conflict ! Those 
 solemn halls in the Tower of London, where the effigies 
 of knights and sovereigns sit silent, each in his gleaming 
 armor, are not more impressive to the imagination. I 
 cannot bear to think that this closet is ever to be dis 
 turbed ; it should be kept sacred, like the Old South. " 
 
 WENDELL PHILLIPS said there never was a better illus 
 tration of Wordsworth s line, "The child is father of the 
 man," than the life which had just ended. Those who 
 were old enough to remember his boyhood could not fail to 
 recall the simplicity and honor and purity of those childish 
 years. Inheriting almost ever3 thing that men work for, 
 it was beautiful to see the way with which he put aside all 
 those openings and facilities for ambition, and gave himself 
 to the work of the ministry of the poor, the service of 
 those whom many men forgot. It was no lack of spirit ; 
 it was from no poverty of gifts. Dowered with the wit 
 and taste and graces which seem to go with his blood, the 
 exquisite instinct of beauty in word, in art, in action, 
 which gave a certain fitness and beauty to his whole life, 
 they graced but they did not weaken. Life with him was 
 no pla}*thing. It was a great career, to be entered upon 
 with courage and ended in self-sacrifice. 
 
 It was only another illustration of his serious mood, 
 which made one able to say with truth that the seventy 
 
314 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 years of that life were a prayer. The earnest mood, which 
 never trifled with an hour, justified this. There are very 
 few lips which God touches with fitness to utter for us our 
 prayers. Only a life of peculiar simplicity and seriousness 
 can give this grace. Those who knelt at the altar with 
 him cannot fail to remember the simplicity and tenderness, 
 the deep feeling and trembling pathos of his prayers, which 
 seemed to lift us into the very presence of God ; and one 
 was sure that he who uttered them must stand with familiar 
 love at the very feet of the Father. 
 
HEREDITY. 315 
 
 XLY. 
 
 HEREDITY. 
 
 DEAR MADAM, My recollections of the first time I was 
 invited to your house are dimmer than I should have sus 
 pected, if you had not asked me to write them out. I can only 
 recall a few things of a personal nature. It was an informal gath 
 ering, of about fifty persons in all, and among these were Moncure 
 D. Conway, Mr. Richard Proctor, Mr. Wasson, and Mr. Weiss. 
 I had the honor of being called upon to speak, and tried to ex 
 plain, as well as was possible without the aid of diagrams or 
 blackboard, the laws of heredity, etc., which were subsequently 
 given in full before the Club. 
 
 Rev. M. D. Conway expressed his satisfaction that the hy 
 pothesis of evolution was being adopted in this country, and as 
 tonished me a little in a subsequent conversation by saying that 
 " in London they thought Professor Agassiz influence had given a 
 wrong turn to the minds of young American naturalists in this 
 part of the country." I took the opportunity of showing him 
 that Professor Agassiz influence in this respect was wholly good. 
 He had prevented us from becoming speculative before we knew 
 enough to think effectually, and had kept nearly all of his students 
 from being swept away by the fascinations of Darwinism, or any 
 other single theory of evolution. 
 
 Mr. Proctor also took a lively interest in the communication, 
 and asked several questions, as also did Mr. Wasson and Mr. 
 Weiss. 
 
 One of the most curious results of this and the subsequent lec 
 ture was the impression which some very good people seemed to 
 get, that my facts were aimed with deadly intent at the doctrine of 
 the immortality of the soul. One stout gentleman asserted pri 
 vately "that he had that within him which he felt could not die, 
 
316 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 in spite of what I had said," an undeniable proposition, if I had 
 said anything against his claims, or if quantity alone could have 
 settled them ! 
 
 Why will many people persistently skip all that is reliable in 
 what you say, and present you with some remote inference ? You 
 observe that it looks like rain to-day, and they infer that you mean 
 that the rains will increase to a flood involving the world in a 
 deluge within a certain limited period. 
 
 My impressions of the Club, derived from my first and subse-^ 
 quent visits, were that it embraced a number of unusually active 
 people, very much in earnest, and disposed to respect the same 
 quality in others. I have learned much from the various more or 
 less eminent and well-informed persons with whom I have come 
 in contact, and have had more appreciative audiences in the par 
 lors of your house than anywhere else. I judge of this from the 
 lively interest which has been manifested on several occasions, 
 and the incisive, impartial, and instructive criticism of the " after- 
 talks," as they have been appropriately called. 
 
 Hoping you will not cease from your efforts in our behalf, 
 I remain very sincerely yours, 
 
 ALPHEUS HYATT. 
 
 THE lecture was directed to the exposition of the peculiar 
 views of the lecturer, with regard to the laws of heredity 
 and the relations of the life of the individual to the phe 
 nomena presented by the history of the rise and decline of 
 the group of which it formed a part. 
 
 Beginning, then, the subject proper of the lecture, the 
 professor showed a specimen of the nautilus as now exist 
 ing, and explained the internal structure of the Nautiloids, 
 accompanying the talk with blackboard sketches. Next 
 he passed around a fossil Nautilus, belonging to one of the 
 middle geological periods ; then another one of a still 
 older period, and in this the coil of the Nautilus was more 
 unwound. It, with the other forms given, also showed the 
 fact that the young of the present species is represented in 
 the adult forms of ancient times, a fact which was gener- 
 
HEREDITY. 317 
 
 alized into a law by Professor Louis Agassiz. Other more 
 ancient forms were shown, where the uncoiling progressed 
 to absolute straightness of form, but the continuity of 
 the species was more or less demonstrable throughout. 
 These changes were the result of perhaps millions of years 
 of progress. 
 
 Having reached the bottom of the series in the simple, 
 straight form of the Orthoceras, the course of the lecture 
 was again turned upward to trace the branching off of the 
 Ammonoids from the Nautiloids. The first simple form met 
 is that of the Goniatites. The difference between Ammo 
 noids and Nautiloids is very slight, consisting in a bag, 
 the egg-shell being attached to the shell in the Ammo 
 noids, and containing part of the animal, while in the other 
 a scar marks the spot where the bag was attached. 
 
 Professor Hyatt then showed drawings of the young of 
 Goniatites in which the form of the shell was straight, as 
 among the earlier Nautiloids, the straight Orthoceratites, and 
 others, in which the coiling and many of the characteristics 
 of the septa between the air chambers and the structure of 
 the siphon at early periods were similar to the characteris 
 tics of the same parts in the more ancient but full-grown 
 adult forms of the lower Nautiloids. 
 
 According to the well-known laws of heredity, that like 
 produces like, this repetition of the older Nautiloid forms 
 and characteristics in the young of the later-occurring 
 Ammonoids can only be explained on the supposition that 
 the Ammonoids are the direct descendants from the same 
 stock as the Nautiloids, branches, at least, from the same 
 common trunk. 
 
 From this point, having established the probable identi 
 cal origin of the two, the lecture treated of the Ammo 
 noids. The Clymenia, one of the lowest, simplest forms, 
 intermediate between Nautiloids and Ammonoids, is iden 
 tified with the Ammonoids by the egg-bag, though it has 
 
318 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 been confounded with the Nautiloids. Following the de 
 velopment and change of the Ammonoid forms, illustra 
 tion after illustration was given, till nine had been shown, 
 coming down to comparatively recent time through long 
 geologic periods, all showing a gradual uncoiling of the 
 form, till one was reached which was almost perfect!} 
 straight, with the exception of the young spiral shell on the 
 pointed end. The later straight forms resembled the earlier 
 straight ones, just as in old age any animal resembles its 
 youthful condition. This gradual straightening of the form 
 of the Ammonoid is due to the introduction of diseased 
 forms, and the inheritance of their disabilities by the race in 
 the same manner that other characteristics are inherited. 
 
 In order to make these statements clear the lecturer 
 traced again the history of the Ammonoids. The straight, 
 cone-like Orthoceras type and its coiling up as it was 
 evolved into the modern Nautilus a closely- coiled shell 
 was shown. The loose coiling of the oldest of the Am 
 monoids and of their young in the Silurian, and the prev 
 alence of both closely-coiled young and closely-coiled 
 adults in the later times of the Carboniferous, Trias, and 
 Jura were described. The appearance of diseased indi 
 viduals in some species of Jurassic Ammonoids, and the 
 gradual increase of these more or less uncoiled shells 
 until they supplanted the whole of the closely-coiled forms 
 in the Upper Cretaceous, and the young closely-coiled, and 
 resembling the health} 7 closely-coiled adult forms of the 
 older formations of the Jura, were shown. Thus the de 
 formities, the uncoiling, etc. of a few species in the Jura, 
 which had been transmitted, had been inherited at earlier 
 and earlier periods in the different species of Cretaceous 
 Ammonoids ; but though in this wa} 7 the whole form had 
 become straightened out, the process had not gone far 
 enough to destro}* the form of the young, which even in 
 the almost straight Toxoceras was still closely coiled. 
 
HEREDITY. 319 
 
 The young of these newer uncoiled forms thus resemble 
 the adults of the Devonian and Silurian Ammonoids, just 
 as the 3~oung of the latter resemble the adults of their 
 still more remote uncoiled ancestors. Thus, whatever the 
 process by which a character becomes fixed in the organiza 
 tion, it is inherited at earlier and earlier periods in succes 
 sive generations, until it finally enters the earliest periods. 
 This law is what has been called by the discoverers 
 Professor Cope and the lecturer the law of acceleration, 
 or accelerated heredity. 
 
 When a characteristic comes within the reach of this 
 law there is no exception, no interference possible ; neither 
 natural selection nor plrysical influences can affect the 
 result, except, of course, to the same degree that they can 
 interfere with or affect the action of the laws of growth 
 and heredity. 
 
 The lecturer then proceeded to show the resemblances 
 w r hich exist between the old and } r oung forms of the same 
 individual, and traced out the way in which these occurred. 
 The loss of the ornaments and shape of the adult shell 
 is easily followed out in large specimens which are very 
 aged, and when the extremely old whorl has become 
 smooth and round and slightly uncoiled, it is very similar 
 to its own young. The process of retrograde development 
 by which it has lost the adult characteristics reduces it 
 again to a resemblance to its own young. This produces 
 a close parallelism between the life history of the individ 
 ual and the life history of its race. 
 
 Thus the individual has a smooth, cylindrical, more or 
 less straight, uncoiled or loosety-coiled shell in the young ; 
 and, though it becomes highly ornamented, extremely 
 closely coiled, and of a different form perhaps in the adult, 
 it returns at last to a similar, smooth, cylindrical, more or 
 less uncoiled, and sometimes straightened-out shell in 
 extreme old age. 
 
320 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 In the same manner the race springs from cylindrical, 
 straight, or loosely-coiled forms, and becomes in course 
 of time distinguished for its numerous species of various 
 forms, ornamented with spines, etc. ; and then, disease 
 creeping in, the malformed species with wiiich it termi 
 nates return to the straight, cylindrical, or loosely-coiled 
 type of form with which the race began. 
 
 Professor Hyatt did not attempt to trace the causes of 
 this remarkable parallelism further than might be done 
 by referring them both to laws of accelerated heredity, 
 and ended by pointing out the fact that these phenomena 
 indicated that there was a law of death as well as of life, 
 which probably limited the evolution of the life of the race, 
 as we know it does that of the individual ; that, in fact, 
 if a race were not cut off by physical change, and lived 
 out a full term, it would not fail to show signs of decay, 
 and these would be malformed species resembling the old 
 age of individuals among their immediate ancestors. Old 
 age was a pathological condition, due to the fact that the 
 organs failed to perform the function of assimilation. 
 The waste of the body could no longer be supplied by 
 new structures derived from food. This failure was evi 
 dently due to the unfavorable character of the physical 
 surroundings, which called for perpetual exertion on the 
 part of the function, and it was evident that a wearing-out 
 took place in the self-acting machinery of the body which 
 could not be supplied. 
 
 Wounds, etc. cause uncoiling in recent shells, and other 
 unfavorable surroundings produce diseased forms similar 
 to the cretaceous forms of uncoiled Ammonoids. 
 
 Thus it may be said that the race and the individual 
 live in the presence of forces which are tending perpetually 
 to destroy, and which always do eventually destro}^ them ; 
 and that both alike have limited lives and limited capacities 
 for progress, dependent upon their original organization, 
 inherited strength, and so on. 
 
HEREDITY. 321 
 
 The lecture was rather a talk. It was delivered without 
 reference to notes, and it was illustrated by blackboard 
 diagrams. These eluded reproduction in a printed ac 
 count, but were easily seen and understood in the bright 
 gaslight of the parlors. 
 
 In answer to questions by Dr. Bartol as to whether any 
 of the higher qualities of the adult age seemed to disap 
 pear in the older ages of races, Professor HYATT remarked 
 that, while this was a matter of some doubt, it seemed to 
 be so indicated. The life of races seems to be epitomized 
 in that of individuals. If you know the individual, you 
 know the whole race. Evolution does not seem to indi 
 cate perpetuity. This he had tried to illustrate in the 
 groups of Ammonites and Nautiloids. Races develop as 
 individuals ; groups branch off, grow old, and finally the 
 race becomes worn out ; the power of heredity to reproduce 
 the t}*pe diminishes, as in individuals, and the race dies. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL asked if the essayist had noticed, when 
 extraordinary powers were inherited by individuals in the 
 human race, whether they had appeared earlier than in 
 the parents, and that vitality had become sooner exhausted 
 in their descendants. While ignorant on this subject, he 
 had the impression that this tendency is indicated in his 
 tory and biography. 
 
 Professor HYATT could not answer this question, having 
 only investigated animals ; but its discussion was extremely 
 interesting to him. If the facts were as Dr. Bartol sup 
 posed, it was a very strong point. Darwin had only ac 
 counted for the inheritance of favorable qualities, not of 
 unfavorable ones. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL. Then are the so-called " missing links " 
 a necessary consequence of the facts of the case in the 
 disappearance mentioned by you ? 
 
 21 
 
322 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Professor HYATT. There is no possibility of ever trac 
 ing all the links ; for the distinction of species really means 
 nothing. No two persons would decide alike in marking 
 out species ; it is only an idea. Mediterranean and West 
 Indian sponges are examples. Even dealers could see 
 great differences ; yet when you try to draw the lines 
 defining the differences, you find it very difficult. Species 
 run together as you get more facts. Darwin s hypothesis 
 does not explain all the facts, as for instance those of old 
 age. He does not treat of growth or the laws of heredity, 
 at least in his published writings. 
 
 Dr. \VARREX. At what point in the history of races 
 do new races originate ? Do the}* alwa}*s spring from the 
 younger growth of races and never from their old age ? 
 
 Professor HYATT. This is a very important question. 
 The investigations so far made point decidedly in this direc 
 tion. Some races also are much longer-lived than others. 
 In fact, the hypothesis I have stated seems to agree with 
 the fact almost too well. It seems as if there should be 
 some exceptions to prove the rule. 
 
 In reply to questions by Mr. TTasson, Professor HYATT 
 said that the whole discussion lies in the fact that succes 
 sive small variations ma} be traced, showing that wide 
 differences, like those between man and animals, are only 
 differences of degree, not of kind. 
 
 Mr. SAVAGE. If the evolution and Darwinian theories 
 be discarded, is there anything else which can take their 
 place ? 
 
 Professor HYATT. I will not go so far as to say that 
 there is no other possible hypothesis. Agassiz believed 
 in special creations. 
 
 Mr. SAVAGE. Is the Creator, then, a performer of 
 miracles ? 
 
 Professor HYATT. Not to me. "We cannot take ac 
 count of miracles in scientific investigations. 
 
HEREDITY. 323 
 
 Mr. ABBOT was glad that discussions like this were 
 introduced into the Club, and was confident that in the 
 future the scientific method would be introduced with great 
 advantage in the investigations of religious questions. He 
 believed that no solutions arrived at by other methods 
 would ever again command general credence. 
 
 Here Professor Hyatt had a sketch upon the board, 
 showing a trunk-line with man} branches, but all originat 
 ing in a single point at the bottom. Mr. "WASSOX, step 
 ping to the board, and pointing to this origin, asked : 
 " Have you any theory of the production of this point?" 
 Professor Hyatt replied that he had no explanation to 
 offer. 
 
 Dr. HUNT. It seems to be the question in the minds 
 of the people here, What is the nature of life itself? We 
 are shown how animals differ from each other, how 
 they change from lower to higher. If man has sprung 
 from a lower type of animal, what is the vis or force within 
 which is creating these new forms? 
 
 Professor HYATT. I do not beh eve we can go be} ond 
 what we can show. Science can at present take no note 
 of any force exclusive of physical force. Forms can be 
 explained by inherent physical powers, and science tends 
 to establish Huxley s opinion that there is no principle 
 vitality an} more than water has the principle aquosity. 
 But a different conclusion may be reached when the solu 
 tion really comes to the world ; it is not safe or scientific 
 to prophesy so far in advance of what we really know. 
 
 ON another and later occasion Professor H} att again 
 addressed the Club on topics complementary to the sub 
 ject of Heredity. In opening, the Professor alluded to 
 his paper before the Club some months ago, showing the 
 gradual development of forms in the Ammonoids, and their 
 dying out, and the correlations he had traced between 
 
324 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 these phenomena and those of the rise and decline of life 
 in the individual. He then exhibited diagrams illustrating 
 the acquisition b} T a species of new characteristics, and the 
 equally rapid development in the }"oung of traits which 
 had originated in the adult period of life among its ances 
 tors. The stage of youth, in which are so man} T traits 
 formerly adult, is a protected stage ; hence the young are 
 able to maintain the ancient characteristics of the type and 
 transmit them to future generations. 
 
 In the order of thought there follow the consideration of 
 the relationship of animals to their surroundings, and the 
 facts which support the theory that plrysical forces alone 
 produce organic changes. Animals leading very simple 
 lives, such as those which float in water or are attached to 
 rocks underwater (corals, barnacles, and the like), have 
 little protection from the action of the surroundings, and 
 show corresponding modifications in their forms and many 
 of their characteristics. 
 
 Parasites usually give the strongest argument for this 
 theory. The barnacles are parasites in one sense, being 
 sedentary upon the rocks, and having an organization modi 
 fied so curiously for this purpose that no explanation is 
 possible except the one which attributes their characteris 
 tics to the direct action of the sedentary habitat. They are 
 true swimming Crustacea in the young, but in the adult 
 are cemented to the rock, head downwards, surrounded by 
 a calcareous shell, and otherwise greatly changed, so that 
 if it were not for the young we should never suspect they 
 were realty the remote allies of the crabs and lobsters. 
 They have also true parasites, also barnacles, living on 
 them, which show still greater changes to correspond with 
 their surroundings. One of these has no stomach, and is 
 otherwise greatly modified. The males in several cases 
 live on the female, and being true parasites have in some 
 lost nearly every vestige of the true barnacle. There is 
 
HEREDITY. 325 
 
 but one explanation, that change of habitat and sur 
 roundings has produced change in organization ; then that 
 these organic changes have been inherited at earlier and 
 earlier periods in successive generations, until finally the 
 barnacle characteristics have almost all given place to the 
 new parasitic characteristics, except in the earliest stages, 
 which have been protected from the effects of the parasitic 
 surroundings. The experiments of Schmankewitch in 
 changing Artemia into Branchippus with an additional 
 joint in the tail, and other strong proofs of the theory of 
 the origin of characteristics solely through the action of 
 physical agencies, were next presented. 
 
 Coming back to the other side, the truth remains that 
 certain animals go on growing larger and larger, becoming 
 more and more complicated in their relations with others, 
 as well as in their individual structure, through many gen 
 erations. It is done b} the acquisition of new characteris 
 tics. These originate in ancestral forms during the adult 
 period, and are then inherited in succeeding generations 
 at earlier and earlier stages of life, perhaps even before 
 birth ; so they are protected more and more as they near 
 the embryonic stage, and the surroundings are more uni 
 form. Now the animals in which this concentration of 
 characteristics is greatest are the highest in the scale of 
 existence. The young of man resembles man}- different 
 forms of animals in different respects. It concentrates in 
 the earh r stage a larger number of traits than the young 
 of any other class of vertebrates. Thus we get an immense 
 protection in our young daj s ; we combine the results 
 of the development of large numbers of ancestral forms, 
 and have the chance of growing higher and becoming 
 more complicated. 
 
 Professor Hyatt next considered the protection which is 
 given to the young by a storing up of food in the egg. In 
 the lower animals the egg all goes to form the individual. 
 
326 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 As we reach more complicated forms, more food in propor 
 tion is stored up for the young. The egg is divided into two 
 parts, the food part and the generative part. In fishes 
 the food portion of the egg is very large, especially in the 
 sharks and skates. When we reach mammalia, the law is 
 universal that protection is given to the animal. Not only 
 is the egg in two portions, but the young is connected with 
 the mother so that she nourishes the young with the blood 
 which circulates in her own bod} r . Another element of 
 protection comes in nursing. By this the } oung are kept 
 under control of the mother. An extension of the idea 
 would be that protection is also seen in the education given 
 to children, though Professor Hyatt would not yet state 
 that as a part of a scientific system at this stage of inves 
 tigation. It is not wholly the physical theory of the origin 
 of characteristics which must govern us in this matter. 
 We must introduce another element. Physical influences 
 explain well enough the origin of different characteristics, 
 but not their perpetuation. Animals protect themselves 
 against their surroundings. Man is eveiywhere man, the 
 same creature, though the physical surroundings are dif 
 ferent. The inner force which he derives from growth and 
 heredity makes the embiyo develop in a certain way. 
 This position cannot be overthrown. If plrysical surround 
 ings are different, they cannot produce similarities, but 
 must produce differences ; they cannot preserve the type 
 and change it at the same moment. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL, opening the after-talk, said that the thought 
 of education as a form of protection to the human young 
 had come to his mind before Professor Hyatt stated it. It 
 ought to be the means of making a bigger man, of getting 
 a new ring or wrinkle into him. It seemed that a powerful 
 argument had been brought for the old doctrine of a new 
 
HEREDITY. 327 
 
 birth or regeneration. There is hope that man may acquire 
 new characteristics ; there is hope for a bigger man, a big 
 ger State and a bigger Church, a better South than the old 
 or solid one, a bigger and better North than a solid one, a 
 bigger and better country and human race. 
 
 In reply to a question by Mr. Savage, Professor HYATT 
 stated the position of the advocates of the physical theory 
 to be that all characteristics are produced by the sur 
 roundings. 
 
 Mr. WASSON expressed immense satisfaction with the 
 facts advanced. He regards the forces of Nature without 
 and of the animal within as working together to produce 
 given characteristics. There is a concurrence or correla 
 tion of forces. So it is impossible for him to be a monist. 
 There are alwa\ s two forces concerned. There is a re 
 sponse of the animal to its surroundings. Changes are not 
 simply mechanical. 
 
 A remark by Mr. Wasson led Professor Hyatt to observe 
 that there is now absolutely no proof of spontaneous gen 
 eration, and till it is a proved fact scientific men ought to 
 have nothing to say. The conversation was then mostly 
 sustained by Professor Benjamin Peirce and Mr. Hyatt. 
 Professor Hyatt told of his studying the changes of a score 
 of different species of fossil shells in a lake-bed in Wur- 
 temburg, and thought they could all have been developed 
 from one form in several hundred years. He would not be 
 positive ; five hundred would probably be the outside limit. 
 From the analog} T of his studies he should think there was 
 a very rapid acceleration in the development of man in 
 early times. Darwin s periods seem extravagant. Pro 
 fessor Peirce asked if fifteen million } T ears was long enough 
 time in which to bring the earth to its present condition, but 
 Professor Hyatt was not ready to give an opinion. Geolo 
 gists want a hundred million years, but he would doubt 
 the necessity of so many. Calculation of time by the ero- 
 
328 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 sion of rocks is a method which is just now in a state of 
 chaos. 
 
 Professor PETRCE then went on to speak of the time re 
 quired by the cooling of the earth to reach its present 
 condition, and stated that about a hundred million years 
 would be required. The heat from the sun at the present 
 rate, with the supply of meteors considered, shows also 
 that about the same time has elapsed since it began its 
 radiation. At present the heat we get from the direct 
 meteors is about the same in amount as that which we get 
 from the sun. They fall into the sun (whose heat is main 
 tained by them), and their heat is radiated back to us. 
 More accurately, the direct heat from meteors is about 
 ninety per cent of that from the sun. A large amount of 
 the heat of the sun is due to the contraction of its mass. 
 If meteors did not fall into the sun, the temperature of the 
 earth would fall to 200 or 300 degrees below zero. The 
 heat of space and of the earth (in part as is shown by 
 night temperature) is caused one half b} 7 meteors. The 
 mass of the sun is enlarging by them, and the orbits of the 
 planets becoming less eccentric. By independent modes 
 of calculation upon these facts, the time necessary for the 
 development of the solar system to its present state is 
 computed at a hundred million j ears, though a few years, 
 a million or two, would be of little account ; and for this 
 reason Professor Peirce was much interested in Professor 
 Hyatt s opinion that there was not need of so much time 
 for the development of the animals on the earth. 
 
EVOLUTION. 329 
 
 XLVI. 
 EVOLUTION. 
 
 BY PROFESSOR ALPHEUS HYATT. 
 
 PROFESSOR HYATT S essay was somewhat didactic, 
 and especially directed against the hasty and sensa 
 tional inferences made by many evolutionists in advance 
 of what was really known. He considered this to be an 
 abuse of the authorit} at present given to scientific utter 
 ances by the confidence of the public. 
 
 Professor Hyatt illustrated his paper b}^ blackboard 
 diagrams, and confined himself closely to the subject in 
 hand. A brief sketch of the development of the theory 
 of evolution occupied the beginning of the reading, and 
 the date of rising interest in the idea was fixed in the 
 latter part of the seventeenth century. The theory is a 
 revolt against the theocracy of the Middle Ages, has been 
 strongly opposed by religious teachers, and has never 
 won general approval in France. After deprecating the 
 unwise excesses of rash converts of evolution, Professor 
 Hyatt paid a deserved compliment to the modesty and 
 caution of some of the leading men of the school to-day, 
 especially Virchow, from whose address before the Society 
 of German Naturalists he repeatedly quoted. 
 
 The opposition which the Darwinian theory has met 
 would haA r e crushed it had it not been for the state of 
 preparation in which it found naturalists and educated 
 classes. The rightful claims of Darwin s " Origin of 
 
330 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Species " are that it led to a revolution in the methods of 
 thought on the question of evolution ; that it turned the 
 attention of investigators to more exact methods of re 
 search ; that it presented a most perfect t} pe of scientific 
 morality ; and that it proved a new and true view of evo 
 lution. The first three points show that the " Origin of 
 Species " is the book of the day, and its author the lead 
 ing mind of this centur} . The last point, though impor 
 tant in the view of most men, is least in Professor Hyatt s 
 opinion ; for the Darwinian laws, he affirms, have only a 
 limited application. He thinks Mr. Darwin unwittingly 
 prefixed a misleading title to his book, and that the theory 
 fails to explain the origin of a single characteristic or 
 modification. The title should have been, " The Laws of 
 the Survival and Perpetuation of Differences between 
 Species." Darwin based his theory upon a now admitted 
 axiom in biology, that species have a constant tendency to 
 vary. Huxley, the exponent of radical Darwinism, says 
 the world now needs a good law of the origin of vari 
 ations ; and this statement is undoubted^ true. Dar 
 win s theory rests upon variations already existing, and 
 tries to account by the law of natural selection for their 
 success, or their survival and perpetuation, as compared 
 with other competing variations, which fail or die out. 
 
 The larger divisions did not originate by this process ; 
 they arose from the increasing number of those possessing 
 ancestral differences which belong as much to them as to 
 the original forms. It is begging the question, after the 
 most approved form of the teleological school, to make a 
 cut between the ancestors and the successive groups of 
 descendants, saying the species originated here or there. 
 
 In every large species two classes of differences seem to 
 be perpetuated, and others are transitory. These are 
 those which distinguish the species from other closely 
 allied species, .and those which correspond to the local 
 
EVOLUTION. 331 
 
 physical surroundings. The former have more or less 
 independence and distinguish the species everywhere, 
 whereas the latter change with the habitat. 
 
 At this point the lecturer read from a memoir on 
 sponges, of which he was the author, and gave the details 
 of several noted experiments showing the effects of light, 
 heat, food, etc. upon the specific and even generic char 
 acteristics of animals. 
 
 The Darwinist replies that those animals only survive 
 in the tanks of the experimenter which are peculiarly 
 fitted to live under the new conditions in which they are 
 placed ; but the answer is equally reassuring and convinc 
 ing. No selection of certain varieties takes place. All 
 the animals experimented upon change without the inter 
 vention of such causes. They are protected from a strug 
 gle for existence. Single varieties which may be supposed 
 to have been better fitted than others to survive are not 
 selected. And here we strike out the verj r keystone of 
 the arch which supports the universal application of Dar 
 win s theory. 
 
 If Darwin s theory does not explain the origin of varia 
 tions, yet we have no right to say that physical causes 
 would produce all variations ; for many variations are 
 transient, and many more are derived from inheritance, 
 and may be traced often to remote ancestors. 
 
 Professor PEIRCE spoke first, as belonging more to the 
 scientific school than any other present. He is a man of 
 marked and venerable aspect, his head and shoulders of 
 rather a leonine appearance ; and when he rose to his 
 feet, his dark eyes glowing beneath his wide brow, snow 
 capped with thick white hair, I thought, as Charlotte 
 Bronte thought of Thackeray when she first saw him : 
 
332 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 " And there arose a lion out of Judah." It was a little 
 odd to hear this mathematical lion take up for the ideal as 
 he did, and declare that the great danger in the scientific 
 researches of the present day lay in the fact that it seemed 
 to strike at the ideal. But it was only in seeming. The 
 ideal was indestructible ; it would ever elude the positive 
 approach. And the professor made a most happy illus 
 tration of his meaning by stating that two magnetic forces 
 of entirely opposite poles would never destroy each other. 
 Professor Peirce condensed Professor Hyatt s paper into 
 the statement that the events and phenomena in the 
 world have followed certain immutable laws ; that, given 
 anywhere in the universe the conditions existing in our 
 planet, the subsequent history would be exactly the same ; 
 that if any characteristic disappears from the sj^stem, it 
 will never reappear. Yet the gist of Professor Peirce s 
 comments was directly against the adequac} T of the mate 
 rialistic philosophy to explain the idea, that which is 
 above the physical. 
 
 Mr. WEISS expressed the general opinion of the audience 
 when he warmly commended the simplicity and modesty 
 of scientific men like Professor Hyatt. He said that he 
 was profoundly grateful for the facts which had been given 
 him ; but that, when a scientific man led him down to the 
 plrysical basis of all things, he always wanted to know 
 who made this basis. Then, following Professor Peirce, 
 only a good deal more so, Mr. Weiss declared for the 
 ideal. The best results of materialism, he said, were from 
 the ideal, the inspiration of the imagination. 
 
 Mr. WASSON politely and kindly attacked the paper on 
 the same grounds, and said that the scientists could never 
 explain the mental and spiritual phenomena. 
 
 Colonel HIGGINSON gave his opinion that, considering 
 the state of science at the time when Darwin s book on 
 evolution was published, its title was not a misnomer. He 
 
EVOLUTION. 333 
 
 also said that it was possible that Darwin s law may hold 
 good in higher orders of animals, while it seems to fail in 
 the lower, and stated that Agassiz had admitted privately 
 that he had some doubts of the absolute permanence of 
 species in all cases, though he was a strong opponent of 
 the theory of variation. 
 
334 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 XLVII. 
 INDIVIDUALITY. 
 
 BY THOMAS DAVIDSON. 
 
 MR. DAVIDSON traced the progress of philosophical 
 thought from its beginning with the Greek philoso 
 phers, and concluded with a statement of his own views on 
 the doctrine of individually, and the necessity of contra 
 diction in our ideas of unity and multiplicity. " Individ 
 ual," in its radical meaning, is much like u atom" as it is 
 used by modern physicists. The fundamental question of 
 all, which embraces the whole subject of philosophy, is, 
 "What is the nature of individuality?" All early at 
 tempts at philosophy were to find a rational explanation 
 of the external universe. Thought first rested upon the 
 conception of a universal physical element ; then Pythag 
 oras introduced the idea of abstract form or number. 
 First there was the idea of unity ; Pythagoras introduced 
 that of multiplicit}^ though he really assumed it in his very 
 argument. Thus we get the primitive forms of the anti 
 thetic identity and multiplicity which runs through all 
 philosophy. Heraclitus developed the Ionic school, and 
 the Eleatics the Pythagorean. Among the followers of 
 the former are the Stoics and the whole school of Hegel. 
 Neither Heraclitus nor the Eleatics arrived at permanent 
 individualit} r . The one assumed absolute matter and de 
 nied absolute form ; the other assumed absolute form and 
 denied absolute matter; but both matter and form are 
 predicates of individuals, though neither is alone. 
 
INDIVIDUALITY. 335 
 
 Mr. Davidson traced the progress of philosophy in its 
 quest for a tenable individuality through Anaxagoras, Soc 
 rates, the Sophists, Plato, and Aristotle, showing that each 
 had a logical place in the development of thought, the 
 succession being, first, a positing of formless matter ; sec 
 ond, of matterless form, or number; third, conditioned 
 matter; fourth, conditioned ideas. But none of these 
 accounts for things as they are. A deus ex machina is 
 always needed, and, being the ground of all real existence, 
 is, of course, all real existence, a pantheism with which 
 no human mind was ever satisfied. After Plato had brought 
 philosophy to the conditioned idea, came Aristotle, and tried 
 to account for all being. His great service to philosophy 
 was, that he saw the law that the true individual is always 
 subject, and never can be predicate ; but he failed to find 
 a permanent real individuality. In the Middle Ages the 
 contest between Platonism and Aristotelianism came into 
 the Church with success to the latter ; and to this day the 
 Roman Catholic Church holds the doctrines of Aristotle. 
 
 In the later part of his paper Mr. Davidson elaborated 
 his theory of individualit} T . Individualism implies unity 
 and multiplicity and the absolute identity of the two. If 
 God s creating man in his own image means anything, it 
 is that he gave as his substantial essence something which 
 should at once be one and many, and one in the very same 
 sense in which it is many. In consciousness we have the 
 onty thing which corresponds to the conception of unity 
 with multiplicity. The unity is in the subject or ego, and 
 the multiplicity is in the objective world which is necessary 
 to our thought of personal identitj*, and the two are iden 
 tified in thought. The entire unity of consciousness is in 
 every thought, and every separate thought presupposes 
 the entire unity of consciousness. This identification of 
 individuality with triune consciousness makes both atheism 
 and pantheism impossible. 
 
336 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 In the Middle Ages, freedom that is, individuality 
 was nearly quenched by the doctrine of the omnipotence of 
 God and the nothingness of the human creature. Since 
 the Reformation the case has been nearly reversed. The 
 present cry for freedom, which takes the form of atheism, 
 license, and universal suffrage, is just as one-sided and 
 leads to results as little desirable as the theory of entire 
 subjection which prevailed in mediaeval Europe. Only 
 with freedom in subjection and subjection in freedom is 
 perfect individuality possible. 
 
 
 Professor PEIRCE followed. " We would like to know 
 more of the connection between the old Greek and the Chal- 
 daic philosophers," he said. " From the tablets lately dis 
 covered in Nineveh it seems that the final result of their 
 philosophy was, that there were two beings, the idea 
 and chaos. Power and motion then came in, and the 
 universe was developed. Moses probably got his accounts 
 from the Chaldees, and added the idea of a deny." Profes 
 sor Peirce doubted if the human mind could reason with 
 regard to the Infinite. From our observations of the stars 
 we find that the universe is finite. If w r e go back to chaos 
 and have nothing but that, there would be a stable equi 
 librium. If it was disturbed by force, it would come to 
 rest again. In the beginning there must have been a force 
 in which all change was differentiated. Chaos must have 
 had a plan of the universe put upon it from without. The 
 tendency of modern science is to come to a point where 
 there shall be no final action. Then the force in the 
 universe must be a finite force. But the power in the 
 universe could not have had a beginning, and it must have 
 been in the world at its beginning. If anything is true in 
 physics this is ; and this power is infinite. Man cannot 
 reason about it : we may call that power bad, or anything 
 else, 3 r ou have God in every part of the universe. 
 
INDIVIDUALITY. 337 
 
 Professor FELIX ABLER stated that the mind demands a 
 first cause ; but immediately, finding that everything which 
 conditions is conditioned, it demands the cause of the first 
 cause, and so we have no first cause at all. Both these 
 demands of the mind for first cause and its cause 
 should be recognized. If God was the cause of the world 
 and was eternal, then the world was eternal, a contra 
 diction. The doctrine of the trinity is only a fair, alluring 
 fantasy. It covers the abyss of the infinite, and is simply 
 a bridge of flowers, which does not bear substantial foot 
 steps. 
 
 Mr. WASSON followed with an earnest protest against 
 individualism, and the sophistry that there is no universal 
 truth. In that doctrine there is nothing which has power 
 to say " Thou shalt." We have ten thousand million " I 
 wills," and out of them comes our democracy. Until we 
 get a "Thou shalt "into politics, we have no common 
 wealth. 
 
 Mr. HIGGINSON was not in favor of insisting upon the 
 importance of authority at the present time. He shrinks 
 from communism and the principle of absolute obedience 
 to an absolute authority. It points directly to the time 
 when the people will rise, and take all the railroads and 
 trains, perhaps, and work them in the interest of that 
 absolute power. The only waj S in which we can get that 
 absolute power are through a hereditary monarchy, through 
 the Roman Catholic Church, or through the commune. He 
 believes the only safe way is not to rebel against universal 
 suffrage or individualism. He believes it best to have as 
 little government as possible ; and the laws here are re 
 spected because we make them ourselves. 
 
 Mr. WASSON again urged the necessity of a " Thou 
 shalt," saying that behind this lies the " ought ; " and Mr. 
 HIGGINSON replied that the representative teacher of that 
 doctrine, Carlyle, had always stopped short of telling how 
 
 22 
 
338 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 far the "ought" went. For a practical way of learning 
 what it is, apart from the three arbitrary ways above 
 mentioned, we are left to the clumsy method of educat 
 ing the race. That is the best way of finding the " ought." 
 
 Professor HYATT doubted the conclusion that may be 
 reached regarding the nature of thought. At present he 
 thinks we can predicate nothing beyond the statement that 
 matter is infinite. Nothing is proved about form or thought, 
 and the world is disputing whether they exist at all. 
 
 At the close Mr. DAVIDSON spoke briefty. The purpose 
 of his essay had been to show that all existence implies an 
 absolute balance of contraries ; that Being itself, as Being, 
 as thinkable, is necessarily triune, an object implying a 
 subject and a relation of entire real unity and ideal differ 
 ence between the two. He expressed satisfaction at find 
 ing that those who understood him agreed with him. 
 
IDEALITY. 339 
 
 XLVIIL 
 IDEALITY. 
 
 BY BENJAMIN PEIRCE. 
 
 " TDEALITY in Physical Science" was the subject of 
 J- Professor Peirce s essay, as will be seen by the 
 sketch of the discussion that followed. The paper was 
 regarded as one of remarkable importance, and was decid 
 edly anti-materialistic in tone. 
 
 There were a few changes made in Professor Peirce s 
 essay since it was first given, but these were in the di 
 rection of greater explicitness, and did not alter its 
 character. Professor Peirce closed as follows: u Men of 
 science, be not false to your childish faith in your bedside 
 prayer. Your logic of induction may be as pellucid as ice, 
 but beware lest you be bound in its frigid and rigid bonds 
 as were the traitors seen by the divine comedian in the 
 lowest depths of Tartarus. Retrace your steps upward 
 through the narrow avenue of Ideality, and } ou will drift 
 from this threatened darkness to see the stars again, will 
 again perceive the central light to be the unfailing fountain 
 of knowledge, and in it and through it will join in the 
 praise and worship of the almighty, omniscient, and all- 
 loving God." 
 
 Dr. BARTOL said that the authority of fact had been 
 spoken of, and he rejoiced in the presence of a man in our 
 midst whom the weight of this fact did not prevent from 
 being an idealist. Professor Peirce had been weighing the 
 
340 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 sun and the stars, but they had not weighed him down. 
 With the soul in the other scale of the balance, all this 
 aggregation of matter was outweighed. All study pre 
 supposed a spiritual faith in the student. Atheism might 
 be construed as a demand for a truer theism. The God of 
 the old theology was one we could neither have nor worship ; 
 the true God might even be a God utterly unconscious of 
 himself in the self-forgetfulness of his universal love and 
 wisdom. He was willing that atheism, in its proper 
 place, might speak its own word as a provocation for the 
 enlargement of our spiritual vision. 
 
 Mr. WASSON said there was a human world of which 
 man himself was the author, and this for him was the real 
 world. The physical philosophers themselves called this 
 an ideal element, and regarded it as superior to that 
 which they regard as fact. It was refreshing to know that 
 we were not standing in a world without thought, but that 
 ideality was something indispensable to the plrysical uni 
 verse. It has seemed obvious that the one-sided philos 
 ophy of evolution could not stand all by itself, and now it 
 has been upset. We could take no one step in the entire 
 process without finding there a thought, the evidence of 
 spiritual power. For instance, it had been said by disciples 
 of that school that the existence of light called the e}*e 
 into being ; that the eye was a consequence of light. But 
 until there was an eye there was no susceptibility to light. 
 There was a motion of fine ether, but no light until the 
 creation of an eye to see it. The doctrine of evolution 
 was lame in proceeding from one side only. There was 
 that Something which designed the eye and proceeded to 
 the making of it ; and in that Something thought was 
 manifest. 
 
 Dr. BOWDITCH was delighted to find a man like Professor 
 Peirce coming forward with such views as had been ex 
 pressed in his essay. He felt that the idea of the function 
 
IDEALITY. 341 
 
 of a part was brought out in it before the organ was formed. 
 His own observation of the growth of living organisms 
 had confirmed him in this view. In studying the growth 
 of the snail from the egg to the adult creature, he had no 
 ticed what had seemed to be an impulse toward a growth 
 in a particular direction or manner. Before the heart 
 was formed the tendency seemed to be towards the for 
 mation of that organ in a certain place, and it was formed 
 there. In this the speaker saw evidence of thought and 
 intention. 
 
 Professor HYATT remarked that efforts to reconcile sci 
 ence and revelation had failed. Now Professor Peirce 
 gave us a declaration of faith unsurpassed in the literature of 
 ptrysical science. Such a declaration could only come 
 after scientific investigation. It was necessary that the 
 facts must have accumulated to make such a declaration 
 of value. Haeckel he regarded as the foremost biological 
 scientist of German} r , and was probably the nearest ap 
 proach to a materialist. Hseckel s hypothesis would derive 
 life from the mineral, and carry it along through the suc 
 cessive steps of development ; and he goes so far as to 
 place a soul in the lowest form of living matter. Profes 
 sor Hyatt did not think scientists were disposed to sacri 
 fice belief, but he felt that they had no right to anticipate 
 discovery with belief any more than to pass false coin. 
 
 The Rev. Mr. CARPENTER felt that the poet and scientist 
 had been shown to have the same great work to fulfil, 
 to seek and perceive the law within the law. 
 
 Mrs. LIVERMORE touched upon what might be called the 
 insolence of certain men of science ; and this impelled 
 Dr. BOWDITCH to say that he considered it insolent in 
 Hseckel to have attacked Agassiz for his belief in some 
 thing higher. 
 
 To this Professor HYATT replied, while acknowledging 
 that Haeckel had been extremely ready to quarrel with 
 
342 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 every one, that Hseckel had criticised Agassiz for pre 
 conceiving a teleological plan of the creation ; and in that, 
 so far as it was purely scientific, he agreed with Hseckel. 
 
 In conclusion Professor PEIRCE explained that he had 
 meant to impress upon scientists to beware lest they forget 
 the first words of their childhood s prayer, " Our Father 
 who art in heaven." 
 
DON QUIXOTE. 343 
 
 XLIX. 
 DON QUIXOTE. 
 
 BY CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. 
 
 LONG ago, the members of the Club learned that the 
 daj s on which they listened to Dr. C. C. Everett 
 must be marked with a white stone, and the paper on 
 " Don Quixote" only confirmed them in their opinion. 
 
 Dr. Everett began with a sketch of the life of Cervantes, 
 and a brief analysis of the peculiar mental endowments 
 which caused him in a period when a man of narrow 
 nature might have hated his age and time, and when a 
 religious man might have abandoned himself to devotional 
 fervor to see the ridiculous side of affairs, consider them 
 as a perfect and irresistible joke, and fall into a laughter 
 in which all the world was forced to join him. "It is 
 true," said Dr. Everett, " that some blame him while the 
 world applauds, and some weep while the world laughs. 
 Cervantes is accused of having destroyed the dignity and 
 chivalrous feeling of his nation : like the philosopher who 
 saw his ass eat figs and perished in a fit of merriment, 
 Spain fell to laughing and so died. It is certain that with 
 the Don Quixote the Spanish zeal for chivalry ended, 
 and the romances of chivalry came to a sudden stop. It 
 was once thought that the woodpecker killed trees, be 
 cause men noticed that the trees that he tapped soon after 
 died ; but we know now that he attacks the trees because 
 they are rotten." The essayist then alluded to the scene 
 
344 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 in which Don Quixote mistakes the recognition which he 
 owes to the label fastened to his back for the result of his 
 wide reputation ; and pointed out the fact that to-day the 
 good knight s dream had become reality, and his portrait, 
 as he looked arrayed in battered armor, helmeted with a 
 barber s basin, mounted on Rosinante, and yet bearing 
 himself with an air of lofty enthusiasm, would be known 
 anywhere. " This," said Dr. Everett, " is the prerogative 
 of genius ; it is crowned king of the world. Coin from its 
 mint, bearing its stamp, circulates everywhere, and we, 
 seeing its image and reading its superscription, know that 
 it is issued by Caesar." He declared that, in showing the 
 ludicrous side of the controversy between old chivalry and 
 the modern world, Cervantes often made the best things 
 seem most ridiculous, and caused the essence of chivalry 
 to seem as ludicrous as he strove to make its forms. 
 
 The object of the essay was to show, first, that the insti 
 tution of chivalry was not ridiculous, but worthy of honor, 
 if not of reverence ; second, much that passes for Quixo 
 tism is worthy of reverence ; and third, what is real Quix 
 otism? "It was inconvenient," said the essayist, "to 
 have illustrations for this lecture ; but if any of you wish 
 to see companion portraits of Don Quixote and his Squire, 
 look at 3 our own faces as tliey appear in the bowl of a 
 spoon, when looked at longitudinally and latitudinally, and 
 you will have a fair idea of their appearance ; " and he 
 then pointed out several of the more obvious antitheses 
 between the two characters. Then, entering upon a con 
 sideration of the age in which the scene of the romance is 
 laid, he protested against " ascribing the errors of feudal 
 ism to chivalry," and slyly insinuated that perhaps, after 
 all, an age which carefully removes the element of intelli 
 gence from a jury-trial has not much to say concerning 
 another which believed in the trial by combat. He then 
 showed that in time the forms of chivalry overlaid and bore 
 
DON QUIXOTE. 345 
 
 down its principles until they were crushed beneath it, as 
 the knights were weighed down by the cumbrous armor 
 made necessary by the yearly improvements of weapons, 
 until at last the first boom of the cannon sounded the knell 
 of the system. 
 
 " With the new civilization," he said, " comes the absorp 
 tion of the individual into the State, and by the abstraction 
 of his individualizing qualities society gains, but man loses." 
 Going on to show that much which passes for Quixotism 
 is worthy of reverence, Dr. Everett included under this 
 name all love, since lovers alwa} S exaggerate, and 
 the youthful anticipations of a life of success unmarred by 
 failure. " Still," he said, " although we laugh at love, there 
 is no creature on earth that might not look noble to us had 
 we love s insight ; and though we laugh at youth, we must 
 reverence its dreams, because they are the truth. We 
 sometimes speak as if those who were not men of one idea 
 were men of all ideas, whereas they are often men of no 
 ideas ; but he who is intoxicated with one glowing thought 
 is no longer an individual, but has entered into immortal 
 ity. We live in and through all things ; we cannot live 
 apart. Man, if not a drop in the main current, is a drop 
 in an eddy. The age lives in and through us all, and is 
 sure not to speak to us alone." 
 
346 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 LANGUAGE. 
 
 BY JOHN FISKE. 
 
 JOHN FISKE began his paper with notice of the great 
 difference wrought by modern thought in the treat 
 ment of the question whether human languages had a 
 common origin. The old theories have been superseded, 
 without being refuted. The antiquity of the human race 
 comes in to alter entirely the point of view of the facts. 
 From this point of the essay an abstract is given below. 
 Considering how multifariously language has varied from 
 age to age, and that mankind has doubtless possessed the 
 power of articulate speech for some thousands of centuries, 
 it no longer seems worth while to seek immediate con 
 clusions about primitive speech from linguistic records 
 which do not carry us back more than four or five thousand 
 years. From the vantage-ground which we now occupy 
 it is not difficult to see that the Irypothesis of a single 
 primeval language, from which all existing languages have 
 descended, involves an absurd assumption. After fifty 
 years of comparative study of languages, in a cautious 
 and prudent way, we have succeeded in making out some 
 few cases of demonstrable genetic kinship among groups 
 of languages. Beside the Aiyan family, we have clearly 
 made out the existence of the Dravidian family in south 
 ern India, and of the Altaic family (to which the Finnish, 
 Hungarian, and Turkish belong) , to say nothing of the 
 
LANGUAGE. 347 
 
 long-established Semitic family. Other families of speech 
 no doubt exist, and will by-and-by have their relation 
 ships definitely marked out. But the moment we try to 
 compare these families with each other, in order to detect 
 some definable link of relationship between them, we are 
 instantly baffled. Any true family of languages will show 
 a community of structure as conspicuous as that which 
 is seen among vertebrate animals. The next family you 
 study will be as distinctly marked in its characteristics as 
 is the group of articulated insects, spiders, and crustaceans. 
 But to compare the two families with each other will prove 
 as futile as to compare a reindeer with a lobster. The 
 only conclusion to which you can logically come is that, 
 while certain languages here and there have become vari 
 ously modified so as to give rise to well-defined families of 
 speech, the like process has not taken place universally. 
 A language which gives rise to several mutually-resem 
 bling descendants must be spoken for a long time by large 
 bodies of men spread over a wide territorial area, and a 
 good illustration is afforded by the ancient Latin, from 
 which have come several languages of modem Europe. 
 But when literar} r men gave up writing in classic Latin 
 and began to write in their own languages derived from 
 it, then a movement toward unity set in. Parisian is 
 asserting its sway over the other dialects of France, and 
 Tuscan is becoming the universal tongue of Italy. Rail 
 roads and telegraphs, newspapers and novels, have already 
 sealed the death-warrant of all patois, and the execution 
 is only a question of time. It is not at all likely that 
 there will ever spring up in this country such dialectic 
 variations as those of France and Italy, or that an}^ essen 
 tial divergence will ever arise between the English lan 
 guage as spoken in England and in America. For the 
 language of the thriving people to whom the ocean has 
 become a common pathway, who have taught mankind 
 
348 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 how to drive ships with steam and how to send electric 
 flashes of intelligence through the watery abyss, for 
 this language a future of unprecedented glory is in store. 
 B} r the end of the twentieth century, English will no doubt 
 be spoken by something like four hundred millions of peo 
 ple, crowding all over North America and Australia, as 
 well as over a good part of Africa and India, with island 
 colonies in every sea and naval stations on every cape. 
 By that time so large a proportion of the business of the 
 world will be transacted by people of English descent 
 that, as a mere matter of convenience, the whole world 
 will have to learn English. Whatever other languages 
 any one may have learned in childhood, he will find it 
 necessary to speak English also. In this wa}^ our lan 
 guage will become more cosmopolitan, while all others 
 become more and more provincial ; until after a great 
 length of time they will probably one after another assume 
 the character and incur the fate of local patois. One by 
 one they will become extinct, leaving English as the uni 
 versal language of mankind. But, however the actual 
 result may be, the considerations brought forward seem 
 to indicate that complete community of speech belongs 
 rather to the later than to the earlier stages of human 
 progress. Mere practical business convenience is the 
 factor which will settle the question. 
 
 Taking up the languages of Asia, Professor Fiske rec 
 ognized three distinct families, the Finno-Tartaric (or 
 Turkish), the Mongolian, and the Samoyed of Siberia. 
 Speaking of the peculiarities of their structure, he said 
 that the inference from the Mongolian tongues is that 
 there never was a primitive speech corresponding to the 
 Aiyan in its relations to modern languages. Then he 
 pictured the rapid changes in savage dialects, and the 
 utter lack of a conservative element in them, and ended 
 as follows : u We shall conclude, I think, after a survey of 
 
LANGUAGE. 349 
 
 the whole matter, that in speech, as in other aspects of 
 social life, the progress of mankind is from fragmenta- 
 riness to solidarity. At the beginning, a multitude of 
 feeble, mutually hostile tribes, incapable of much com 
 bined action, with hundreds of half-formed dialects, each 
 intelligible to a few score of people : at the end, an organ 
 ized system of mighty nations, pacific in disposition, with 
 unlimited reciprocity of intercourse, with very few lan 
 guages, rich and precise in structure and vocabulary, and 
 understood by ah 1 men." 
 
 Among the guests of the day was the late OLE BULL, the 
 distinguished violinist, and one of the happiest features of 
 the discussion which followed the reading of the paper 
 was the Norwegian s conception and graphic description 
 of the difference between the Spanish and English tongues. 
 He subscribed to the opinion of Professor Fiske as to the 
 Finnish and Hungarian languages. Though he agreed 
 that commercial business would be done in English, yet 
 he thought it impossible for any language to get the 
 coloring of another language. The Spanish language is 
 beautiful. The English is stiff, like the Englishman himself. 
 The Englishman says, " A nail is a nail," not a big nail 
 or a little nail ; but the Spaniard puts on his words a 
 beautiful twist (and here Ole Bull illustrated by a gesture 
 to express his meaning better) . The English are military 
 and quick. In Spanish you must spin out to make it 
 grandiose and flexible. The Spanish cannot depict a 
 situation in a few words. Everything will be unfinished to 
 him ; he will have to jump, jump the whole time. It must 
 be spun out so that his system and nerves will feel good. 
 
350 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 LI. 
 
 THE COMIC. 
 
 BY CHARLES CARROLL EVERETT. 
 
 A FTER the opening sentences of his paper, Dr. Ever- 
 *"* ett spoke of the habit of philosophizing upon every 
 thing, and showed how in this way the comic takes on a 
 serious aspect. The essayist then came to the distinctions 
 between the comic and the tragic, and the peculiar quali 
 ties of the comic. He recognized the incongruous as the 
 chief element of the comic, and regarded it as a difficult 
 matter to tell a priori whether a given fact would strike 
 the observer as comic or tragic. There is in the tragic 
 as much incongruity as in the comic ; it depends upon 
 the person interested whether the incongruity brings 
 laughter or pain. The distinction between the comic and 
 tragic has no existence, said Dr. Everett. The greatest 
 suffering in an} r incongruity cannot take away its comic 
 aspect to maity minds. Very much of the comic, also, has 
 its tragic side. Even in Falstaff and Dogberry there are 
 qualities which would by no means appear comic to rela 
 tives or associates of those well-known, fun-making char 
 acters. Taking up Schopenhauer s analysis of the comic, 
 Dr. Everett said that the German erred in making two 
 classes of the comic. The ludicrous is defined as the in 
 congruity in different forms, which we bring together in 
 a single organization. The comic is like a lambent flame, 
 which may play over the surface of things without scorching 
 
THE COMIC. 351 
 
 them. There is absolutely no comic in Nature. It is purely 
 subjective ; objectively considered, it does not exist. In 
 this respect there is a difference between the comic and the 
 tragic. Objectively, the tragic does exist. In the great 
 struggle for existence there is the very essence of tragedy. 
 The competition for life is a tragic struggle. The tragedy 
 may exist without any one seeing it, but the comedy must 
 be seen in order to exist. There is nothing comic with 
 out the mind, which sees the incongruous relations of 
 things. In this respect the world is what we make it. In 
 regard to the real nature of the comic, the problem is not 
 yet solved. Both the comic and the tragic are composed 
 of incongruities, and the difference between them lies in 
 the fact that the comic is found in the incongruous rela 
 tion considered merely as to its form, whereas the tragic 
 is found in the incongruous relation considered as to its 
 content. The comic is on the surface ; the tragic is the 
 real content of things. Thus the comic is the froth and 
 foam of life. Wit sees the distinction between the form 
 and the content, but has no regard for the humanity in 
 the content. Humor, on the contrary, throws a deep sym 
 pathy over the content. It sees the distinction between 
 the form and content, but behind the latter sees the indi 
 vidual, and s} T mpathizes with him. Seeing this character 
 istic of humor, we can understand why friends jest about 
 .each other, and why smiles and tears contend with each 
 other. By this quality of the mind to see incongruity of 
 form we are relieved from the tragic of the contest, and 
 enjoy what is on the surface. Shakspeare takes us into 
 the realm of the form or of the comic, and, when we return 
 to the real, it seems more real and endurable. Perception of 
 the comic implies a separation of form from substance. He 
 who sees only the ludicrous in things, sees only the surface ; 
 he sees mere vacanc} 7 . He sees most wisely who can see a 
 serious thing seriously, but in little matters, where little is 
 
352 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 involved, recognizes the comic relations which lie on the 
 surface. 
 
 At the close of his essay Dr. Everett, after referring to 
 certain theories in regard to the origin of laughter, urged 
 that natural selection would sufficiently account for its 
 existence. He presented, in defence of this position, a 
 humorous imaginative sketch of the evolution of man, 
 according to which, while others sank beneath the burdens 
 of the new humanity, the first man who laughed alone 
 survived to become the parent of the race of man that 
 laughs. 
 
PHILOSOPHY. 353 
 
 LIT. 
 PHILOSOPHY. 
 
 BY GEORGE HOWISON". 
 
 "OEGINNING with a quotation from Goethe s "Prome- 
 -D theus," in which the Titan defies Zeus, Professor 
 Howison stated that in the conception we have the princi 
 ple of progress in man in deadly feud with the principle of 
 conservation and reverence, the spirit of the present and 
 future rending itself utterly from the past, the human reason 
 quite at fault about the divine, and come to open revolt 
 against it and to repudiation of it. The chief question for 
 philosophy to answer is, How shall the human principle of 
 freedom and progress be brought into harmony with the 
 permanence of man, the validity of his past, the possibility 
 of his future, and the voice of that moral law in conscience 
 which declares the nation valid as against the subject man, 
 our neighbor valid as against our selfishness, and God valid 
 as against our mere propensities ? This question has been 
 the problem of Christendom since the beginning of Prot 
 estantism, and is the key to every crisis in human history. 
 It is probably no exaggeration to say that, at present, a 
 larger and more influential mass of men are bewildered by 
 it and give evidence of not holding any key to its solution 
 than at any previous time in the history of the world. As 
 Christianity is a higher and profounder ideal of life than 
 any that preceded it ; as Christendom is the most com- 
 
 23 
 
354 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 plex, most brilliant, and most comprehensive form society 
 has assumed ; as recent science has laid tributary a wide 
 realm of natural resources, so the problem to-day as 
 sumes a reality and difficulty never known before. The 
 free individualism of to-day is engaged in that very con 
 flict with the traditional ideal of the conscience which 
 appears in the " Prometheus." That free thinking, which 
 we may well assume to be itself an eternal factor in 
 man s eternal aim, is apparently on the eve of bidding 
 farewell to the three propositions of God, free-will, and 
 immortality, that triune theistic ideal which may be said 
 truly to be the other eternal factor in that aim. These 
 questions are to be solved by thought alone, and the po 
 sition of nescient scepticism, or even of materialism, is 
 unquestionably of legitimate place in philosophy ; for phi 
 losophy proceeds by stages, and materialism and scepti 
 cism are unavoidable stadia on the way to conviction of 
 truth. 
 
 Coming to the question of the value of philosophy, Pro 
 fessor Howison said he regarded it of absolute worth, 
 because he sees in it the conditions without which we can 
 not fulfil our human vocation, as distinguished from our 
 avocations. Our avocations are means to an end, 
 man ; philosophy has the right to stand as an indestruct 
 ible factor in that end. Human life can be an end onl} r 
 in virtue of holding in itself the conditions of an eternal 
 aim, an aim that, fulfilling the utmost desire of thought, 
 stands to thought as necessary and immovable. Hence 
 we see that the possession of a reasoned thought is essen 
 tial to man s being an end. It is the absolute worth of 
 philosophy, its existence as a good, which is to be shown. 
 Any valid end is one forever in the process of getting 
 actualized: the real conception of end is dj namic, not 
 static ; not rest, but perpetual movement ; not excludent 
 of means, but containing means within it. The real end, 
 
PHILOSOPHY. 355 
 
 in which philosophj- is a vital part, is a life always actual- 
 k ized, yet being perpetually more and more actualized. 
 The value of philosophy lies in its conditioning the solu 
 tion of individual human freedom as against the supremacy 
 of God and the nation, or of the realized man in man 
 kind, who is the sole depositary of that end in which phi 
 losophy is a conditioning factor. Freedom may be noth 
 ing higher than caprice, and thus often antagonizes the 
 complete idea of a spiritual or human being, which finds 
 its realization only in the famiry, the community, the 
 nation, the church, institutions of ever-ascending self- 
 sacrifice. In and through these must the self-will or ab 
 stract freedom of the individual be transformed into the 
 concrete, realized, or rational freedom of the universal man ; 
 or, lacking this transformation, not only does the univer 
 sal or real humanity fail of existence, but the single man, 
 naked and unsheltered, must perish miserably too. The 
 fulfilment and aim, then, even of the mere freedom of the 
 individual, is that rational freedom which is wrought by 
 the sacrificial discipline of the practical world alone. We 
 see now that of a surety he alone is the freeman whom 
 the truth makes free." 
 
 The question of the scope of philosophy involves the 
 two sub-questions : What is it in the complete process of 
 human life that it has to do ? And in what scale, over how 
 great a field, can it perform its task? What philosophy 
 has to do is simply to realize and bring to completion one 
 of the three primitive factors in human reason, the fac 
 tor called intelligence or reason, and thereby complete 
 and realize that very nature itself. For the being of man 
 is a strict trinity, a mystical union in one s self of three 
 hypostatic powers called impulse, will, and reason, or the 
 intellect, susceptibility, and will of psychology. Each im 
 personation would be null without the other two. If by 
 " perception " we signify the note we take of an object 
 
356 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 actually present before the senses, and by "reflection" 
 the mental idea which is present in absence of the real 
 object, then we may say the intellect is summed up in 
 perception and reflection. In the transcendental powers 
 of intellect we have not only that element w r hich we call 
 " reason," a being with the beyond, but we have also 
 the key to the reality as well as to the conception of our 
 moral freedom. Man has his beyond with him, and by 
 his own conscious thoughts, imagination, and will parti 
 cipates in generating it from his own being. Nature s 
 beyond is without it, and hence it is ruled forever by a 
 necessity which is fate. If we add the fact of our con 
 tinually transforming the unreal objects of reflection into 
 the real objects of perception, do we not reach in this 
 power, not merely the fact of will, but the nature and 
 actual existence of its freedom? In the human will, as 
 in dumb nature, there is a phase of necessit}* ; but it is a 
 necessity which annuls fate because it works by motive, not 
 by force. What the reason does in the realization of 
 human freedom is to render it possible by grounding it 
 in God and immortality. But while philosophy in its 
 native order simpl} creates the moral world of freedom, 
 in its ideal order it recreates man s moral world, to rear 
 on the ruins of the merely natural caprice of his heart the 
 far more majestic proportions of the temple of revealed 
 religion, the religion of his intellect, the religion not 
 merely felt, but seen; a building where the heart glows 
 not in faith only, nor in hope, but in love. Such is the 
 function of philosophy as ideally conceived, and as act- 
 tually realized for many a mind that has adorned our 
 world. 
 
 The latter part of the lecture, that relating to the com 
 pass within which philosoph} can perform its work, dealt 
 with modern philosophy to some extent. The question 
 here is, " What can I know?" Professor Howison main- 
 
PHILOSOPHY. 357 
 
 tained that human knowledge is limited in degree only, 
 not in kind, and condemned the doctrine of thing-in- 
 itself," and upheld the permanence and immanence of the 
 " idea" as a controlling influence in human history. 
 
 The discussion which followed was sympathetic with 
 Professor Howison s views. 
 
358 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 LIII. 
 COLOR-BLINDNESS. 
 
 BY B. JOY JEFFRIES. 
 
 DR. JEFFRIES gave a lecture on the color sense and 
 color-blindness. He illustrated the natural or nor 
 mal color perception not touched on particularly in his 
 recent work on "Color-blindness: Its Dangers and its 
 Detection." As with the perception of form, the eye 
 has the best power directly at the centre, objects are 
 only distinctly seen when we turn the eye so that the 
 image falls on this portion of the retina, and thus colors 
 fade in intensity from here outwards. A red wafer seen 
 quite eccentrically will appear black, etc. There is a 
 central zone by which we see all of the three colors now 
 regarded as primary, namely, red, green, and violet. In 
 the zone outside of this we perceive green and violet, and 
 beyond only violet or blue. This is a general expression, 
 and seems related to the three forms of color-blindness, 
 namely, red, green, and violet, as also to the Young- 
 Heluiholtz theor} T of color perception, w^hich assumes that 
 one set of retinal fibres receives red, another green, and 
 another blue or violet light. 
 
 Complementary after-images were experimentally illus 
 trated. Gazing at the red setting sun and turning to the 
 east we see a green rising sun. This is an instance of 
 the phenomenon. Its practical application on railroads 
 and the sea was dwelt on. This and other defects of the 
 
COLOR-BLINDNESS. 359 
 
 normal color sense having been explained, the speaker 
 described color-blindness as a condition where the person 
 sees gray or grayish, where we see red or green or violet, 
 according to his special form of trouble. Red and green 
 blindness include each other ; violet blindness includes 
 3 ellow. Red blindness is most common, then green, violet 
 blindness occurring very rarely. The defect is congenital, 
 largely hereditar} r , but ma} T come from alcohol or tobacco 
 poisoning, or brain disease, etc. When congenital, it is 
 incurable. It may appear in but one eye. It can be 
 produced by hypnotism or the cataleptic condition. A 
 color-blind person when rendered hypnotic may see colors 
 normally. It may be palliated by a colored glass, artifi 
 cial light, or looking through certain solutions, as fuchsine, 
 but is never altered thereby or the person cured of the de 
 fect. From the more than thirty thousand examinations 
 the speaker has made, and the reports from all over the 
 world of similar tests, the proportion is deduced of four per 
 cent of males and perhaps one quarter of one per cent of 
 females being color-blind in greater or less degree. 
 
 The speaker especially explained how the color-blind 
 escaped detection heretofore, and were only discovered 
 after we had the recently devised practical and scientific 
 method of testing, since all means calling for the naming 
 of colors were long ago, by Goethe and by Helmholtz, 
 shown to be valueless. As age, education, race, condition 
 of civilization, or special study of color do not affect color 
 blindness, the value of Professor Holmgren s method of 
 testing which with the many others both for qualitative 
 and quantitative perception the speaker showed and de 
 scribed is as readily seen as appreciated. By it we can 
 scientifically test the color-perception of a deaf-mute, an 
 uncivilized man whose language we cannot speak, and 
 a child of three years. Hence its value in quickly detect 
 ing color-blindness among railroad empk^es and sailors, 
 
360 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 where it is naturally so dangerous, since the very colors 
 red and green are and must be used as signals by night 
 on land and sea. The necessity for and the difficult} of 
 establishing legal control of this curious defect, the speaker 
 particularly explained and dwelt on. 
 
 While color-blindness cannot at present be cured and 
 but little palliated, we can educate and develop the normal 
 sense of color, as the ear, the voice, the touch, the taste, 
 etc. The necessity for teaching color-names and colors 
 themselves, and the education of the color sense in our 
 schools as a part of school-life, the speaker illustrated 
 from his own and others experience of the ignorance of 
 color-names on the part of males, referring to his work 
 in the public schools of Boston and his report to the school 
 committee (School Document, No. 13, 1880). The value 
 of this teaching to the mercantile interest was shown, and 
 as well how it would probably detect and forewarn color 
 blind school-boys. Dr. Magnus s color chart, which the 
 speaker will introduce into this country, was exhibited and 
 its use explained. It obtained a diploma of honor from 
 the International Medical Society at Amsterdam, Septem 
 ber, 1879. 
 
 The speaker was enabled to illustrate the rarest form 
 of color-blindness, namely, violet blindness, by a full- 
 length portrait, hanging on the walls of the parlor, painted 
 by Mr. Henry Sargent. A long mantle hangs from the 
 shoulders of the sitting lady, now of a dark color, but 
 originally painted yellow by Mr. Sargent, under the perfect 
 conviction he was making it a bright blue. There are 
 numerous instances, on record and otherwise, of red or 
 green blind portrait or landscape painters ; here, however, 
 is positive proof of a violet-blind one. 
 
 A curious coincidence is that the speaker, living in the 
 adjacent house, subsequently found in his grandfather s 
 (Dr. John Jeffries) diary, the following : 
 
COLOR-BLINDNESS. 361 
 
 "1793, June 15. Keceived a billet from Mrs. Powell re 
 questing an introductory letter for Mr. H. Sargent to Mr. Copley, 
 London. Wrote one accordingly and gave to Mrs. Powell." 
 
 The original " billet " was also found, and reads thus : 
 
 " Mrs. Powell will esteem it a particular favor if Dr. Jeffries 
 will be so obliging as to give a letter of introduction to her cousin 
 Henry Sargent to Mr. Copley in London. Mr. Sargent is thought 
 by Mr. Trunible, under whose patronage he goes home, to possess 
 an uncommon genius for painting, and is in every respect a most 
 amiable young man. He will be in England some time before 
 Mr. Truinble arrives there, and therefore is under a necessity of 
 making this request, as he will sail in the * Galen Saturday 
 
 Dr. John Jeffries, while residing in England, was a 
 great friend of Mr. Copley, and the two families very 
 intimate. The "Galen" was one of the regular sailing 
 packets of those days. 
 
362 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 LIV. 
 
 JONATHAN EDWARDS. 
 
 BY OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES. 
 
 IT has always been well understood by the friends of Dr. 
 Holmes that his many and varied duties made most 
 unwelcome to him any invitation to read before literary 
 societies. The Radical Club had therefore refrained from 
 laying claim to time already too fully occupied, and until 
 the spring of 1880 the genial poet had never read before 
 them. His own kindliness prompted him at that time to 
 volunteer an essay in the following pleasant note : 
 
 296 BEACON ST., March 31, 1880. 
 
 MY DEAR MRS. SARGENT, I once spoke to you about the 
 possibility of my reading a paper before your Club. I have been 
 getting ready to write on a somewhat interesting subject, and 
 might tack my thoughts together, baste them is what you ladies 
 would say, and try them on in the course of a couple of 
 weeks, if I were admissible to the conclave, desirable, and not 
 inopportune. 
 
 A word from you would settle all these doubtful points, and set 
 me basting the pieces I have not yet put together for my essay. 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 O. W. HOLMES. 
 
 It is needless to say that the proposition was received 
 with delight, to which was added the piquanc} r of a lively 
 curiosity when the subject of the paper became known. 
 The appointed morning was a beautiful one, and the par- 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 363 
 
 lors were carry crowded with the members of the Club, 
 whose expectations were amply rewarded by the reading 
 of the following brilliant essay : 
 
 Of all the scholars and philosophers that America had 
 produced before the beginning of the present century, two 
 only had established a considerable and permanent reputa 
 tion in the world of European thought, Benjamin Frank 
 lin and Jonathan Edwards. No two individuals could 
 well differ more in temperament, character, beliefs, and 
 mode of life than did these two men, representing respec 
 tively intellect, practical and abstract. Edwards would 
 have called Franklin an infidel, and turned him over to the 
 uncovenanted mercies, if, indeed, such were admitted in 
 his programme of the Divine administration. Franklin 
 would have called Edwards a fanatic, and tried the effect 
 of Poor Richard s common-sense on the major premises 
 of his remorseless syllogisms. 
 
 The feeling which naturalh arises in contemplating the 
 character of Jonathan Edwards is that of deep reverence 
 for a man who seems to have been anointed from his birth ; 
 who lived a life pure, laborious, self-denj ing, occupied 
 with the highest themes, and busy in the highest kind of 
 labor, such a life as in another church might have given 
 him a place in the Acta Sanctorum. We can in part 
 account for what he was when we remember his natural 
 inherited instincts, his training, his faith, and the condi 
 tions by which he was surrounded. His ancestors had fed 
 on sermons so long that he must have been born with 
 Scriptural texts lying latent in his embryonic thinking- 
 marrow, like the undeveloped picture in a film of collodion. 
 He was bred in the family of a Connecticut minister in a 
 town where revivals of religion were of remarkable fre 
 quency. His mother, it may be suspected, found him in 
 brains, for she was called the brighter of the old couple ; 
 and the fact that she did not join the church until Jonathan 
 
364 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 was twelve years old implies that she was a woman who 
 was not to be hurried into becoming a professor of religion 
 simply because she was the wife of the Reverend Timothy 
 Edwards. His faith in the literal inspiration of the Old 
 and New Testament was implicit ; it was built on texts, 
 as Venice and Amsterdam are built on piles. The para 
 ble of Eden, as our noble Boston preacher calls it, was to 
 him a simple narrative of exact occurrences. The fruit, to 
 taste which conferred an education, the talking ophidian, 
 the inany-centuried patriarchs, the floating menagerie with 
 the fauna of the drowning earth represented on its decks, 
 the modelling of the first woman about a bone of the first 
 man, all these things were to him, as to those about him, 
 as real historical facts as the building of the Pyramids. 
 He was surrounded with believers like himself, who held 
 the doctrines of Calvinism in all their rigor. But, on the 
 other hand, he saw the strongholds of his position threat 
 ened by the gradual approach or the actual invasion of 
 laxer teachings and practices, so that he found himself, as 
 he thought, forced into active hostilities, and soon learned 
 his strength as a combatant, and felt the stern delight of 
 the warrior as champion of the church militant. This may 
 have given extravagance to some of his expressions, and 
 at times have blinded him to the real meaning as well as 
 to the practical effect of the doctrines he taught to the 
 good people of Northampton, and gave to the world in 
 pages over which many a reader has turned pale and 
 trembled. 
 
 " The more we study the will in the way of analysis, the 
 more strictl}- does it appear to be determined by the in 
 finitely varied conditions of the individual. At the bottom 
 of all these lies the moral personal equation of each 
 human being. Suppose sin were always literally red, as 
 it is in the figurative expressions, though your sins be 
 as scarlet, though they be red like crimson, in that 
 
JONATHAN EDWAKDS. 365 
 
 case, it is very certain that many persons would be unable 
 to distinguish sin from virtue, if we suppose virtue to have 
 a color also, and that color to be green. There is good 
 reason to believe that certain persons are born more or 
 less completely blind to moral distinctions, as others are 
 born color-blind. Many examples of this kind may be 
 found in the Psychologic Naturelle of M. Prosper 
 Despine, and our own criminal records would furnish nota 
 ble instances of such imperfect natures. We are getting 
 to be predestinarians as much as Edwards or Calvin was, 
 only instead of universal corruption of nature derived from 
 Adam, we recognize inherited congenital tendencies, 
 some good, some bad, for which the subject of them is 
 in no sense responsible. Edwards maintains that, in spite 
 of his doctrine, man is entirely, perfectly, and unspeak 
 ably different from a machine, in that he has reason and 
 understanding, with a faculty of will, and so is capable of 
 volition and choice ; in that his will is guided by the dic 
 tates or views of his understanding ; and in that his exter 
 nal actions and behavior, and in many respects also his 
 thoughts and the exercises of his naind, are subject to his 
 will. But all this only mystified his people, and the prac 
 tical rural comment was in the well-known satirical sa} T ing, 
 * You can and you can t, you shall and you sha n t, and 
 so forth, the epigram that stung to death a hundred 
 sermons based on the attempt to reconcile slaver} r to a 
 depraved nature, on the one hand, with freedom to sin 
 and responsibility for what could not be helped, on the 
 other. 
 
 " It is as hard to leave this subject without attempting to 
 help in clearing it up as it is to pass a cairn without the 
 desire of throwing a stone upon it. This impulse must 
 excuse the following brief excursion. 
 
 " In spite of the strongest-motive necessitarian doctrine, 
 we do certainly have a feeling, amounting to a working 
 
366 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 belief, that we are free to choose before we have made our 
 choice. 
 
 "We have a sense of difficult} overcome by effort in many 
 acts of choice. 
 
 " We have a feeling in retrospect, amounting to a practi 
 cal belief, that we could have left undone the things that we 
 have done, and that we could have done the things we 
 ought to have done and did not do, and we accuse or else 
 excuse ourselves accordingly. 
 
 " Suppose this belief to be a self-deception, as we have 
 seen that Hobbes and Leibnitz suggest it may be, a de 
 ceiving of mankind by God himself, as Edwards accuses 
 Lord Kaimes of maintaining, still this instinctive belief in 
 the power of moral choice in itself constitutes a powerful 
 motive. Our thinking ourselves free is the key to our 
 whole moral nature. 4 Possumus quia posse videmur. 
 We can make a different choice because we think we can. 
 Happily, no reasoning can persuade us out of this belief; 
 happily, indeed, for virtue rests upon it, education assumes 
 and develops it, law pronounces its verdict, and the minis 
 ters of the law execute its mandates on the strength of it. 
 Make us out automata if you will, but we are automata which 
 cannot help believing that they do their work well or ill 
 as they choose, that they wind themselves up or let them 
 selves run down by a power not in the weights or springs. 
 
 " On the whole, we can afford to leave the question of lib 
 erty and necessit} where Edwards leaves that of our belief 
 in the existence of the material universe : 
 
 " Though we suppose that tlie Material Universe is absolutely 
 dependent on Idea, yet we may speak in the old way and as prop 
 erly and truly as ever. 
 
 " It is just all one as to any benefit or advantage, any end that 
 we can suppose was proposed by the Creator, as if the Mate 
 rial Universe were existent in the same manner as is vulgarly 
 thought. 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 367 
 
 " And so we can sa} that, after all the arguments of the 
 metaphysicians, all the experiments of the physiologists, 
 all the uniform averages of statisticians, it is just all one 
 as to any benefit or advantage as if a real self-determining 
 power, and real responsibility for our acts of moral choice, 
 were existent in the same manner as is vulgarly thought. 
 
 " The true source of Ed wards s Dante-like descriptions 
 of his Inferno is but too obvious. Whatever claim to the 
 character of a poet is founded on the lurid brilliancy of 
 these passages may as well be reconsidered in the red light 
 of Thomas Boston s rhetorical autos-da-fe. But wherever 
 such pictures are found, at first or second hand, they are 
 sure causes of unbelief, and liable to produce hatred not 
 only of those who teach them, but of their whole S3~stem 
 of doctrines. Who are these cruel old clerical Torque- 
 madas, ask the ungodly, i who are rolling the tortures of 
 ourselves, our wives and children, under their tongues like 
 a sweet morsel ? The denunciations of the pulpit came 
 so near the execrations of the street in their language, and 
 sometimes, it almost seemed, in their spirit, that many a 
 4 natural man must have left his pew with the feeling in 
 his heart embodied in a verse which the writer of this ar 
 ticle found many years ago in a psalm-book in a Glasgow 
 meeting-house where he was attending service, and has 
 remembered ever since : 
 
 " As cursing he like clothes put on, 
 
 Into his bowels so 
 Like water, and into his bones 
 Like oil down let it go. 
 
 " God forgive them ! Doubtless many of them were as 
 sincere and conscientious as the most zealous officers of 
 the Hol} T Inquisition. 
 
 11 It is impossible that people of ordinary sensibilities 
 should have listened to his torturing discourses without be 
 coming at last sick of hearing of infinite horrors and end- 
 
368 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 less agonies. It came very hard to kind-hearted persons to 
 believe that the least sin exposed a creature God had made 
 to such exorbitant penalties. Edwards s whole system had 
 too much of the character of the savage people by whom 
 the wilderness had so recently been tenanted. There was 
 revenge c revenging justice was what he called it 
 insatiable, exhausting its ingenuity in contriving the most 
 exquisite torments ; there was the hereditary hatred glar 
 ing on the babe in its cradle ; there were the suffering 
 wretch and the pleased and shouting lookers-on. Every 
 natural grace of disposition ; all that had once charmed 
 in the sweet ingenuousness of youth, in the laughing gay- 
 ety of childhood, in the winning helplessness of infancy ; 
 every virtue that Plato had dreamed of, every character 
 that Plutarch had drawn, all were branded with the hot 
 iron which left the blackened inscription upon them, sig 
 nifying that they were accursed of God, the damning 
 word nature. 
 
 " With all his powers, his virtues, his eloquence, it must 
 have been more than people could do to stand being called 
 4 vile insects, l filthy worms, firebrands of hell, and 
 other such hard names. But what must have been the 
 feeling of .Northampton mothers when they read what 
 Edwards said about their darlings ! It seems that there 
 had been complaints against some preachers for frighten 
 ing poor innocent children, as he says, with talk of hell- 
 fire and eternal damnation. But if those who complain 
 really believe what they profess to, they show, he thinks, a 
 great deal of weakness and inconsideration. Then follow 
 the words which the writer once quoted on a public occasion, 
 which use of them brought him a letter from a much re 
 spected orthodox clerg} T man, asking where they could be 
 found: It is not strange that he asked, for he might have 
 looked in vain for them in the the ten-volume edition of 
 Edwards s works, published under the editorship of his 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 369 
 
 own predecessor, grandson of Edwards, the Rev. Sereno 
 E. Dwight, or the English reprint of that edition. But 
 the editor of the edition of the work on Revivals, published 
 in New York in 1832, did not think it necessary, perhaps 
 honest, to omit the passage, and this is the way it reads : 
 
 " As innocent as children seem to be to us, yet, if they are out 
 of Christ, they are not so in God s sight, but are young vipers, and 
 are infinitely more hateful than vipers, and are in a most miserable 
 condition, as well as grown persons ; and they are naturally very 
 senseless and stupid, being lorn as the wild ass s colt, and need much 
 to awaken them. 
 
 " Is it possible that Edwards read the text mothers love 
 so well, Suffer little vipers to come unto me, and forbid 
 them not, for of such is the Kingdom of God ? 
 
 " There is reason to fear that Edwards has not been fairly 
 dealt with in all respects. We have seen that in one in 
 stance expressions, which it was probably thought would 
 give offence, were omitted by his editor. A far more im 
 portant matter remains to be cleared up. The writer is 
 informed on unquestionable authority that there is or was 
 in existence a manuscript of Edwards in which his views 
 appear to have undergone a great change in the direction 
 of Arianism, or of Sabellianism, which is an old-fashioned 
 Unitarianism, or at any rate show a defection from his 
 former standard of Orthodox}^ and which its custodians, 
 thinking it best to be wise as serpents in order that they 
 might continue harmless as doves, have considered it their 
 duty to withhold from the public. If any of our friends 
 at Andover can inform us what are the facts about this 
 manuscript, such information would be gratefully received 
 by many inquirers, who would be rejoiced to know that so 
 able and so good a man lived to be emancipated from the 
 worse than heathen conceptions which had so long en 
 chained his powerful but crippled understanding." 
 
 24 
 
370 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL began the discussion, and declared his sym 
 pathy with the views expressed by Dr. Holmes. In allu 
 sion to Edwards s argument upon the will, he said : " We 
 are told that free-will is impossible, or unprovable. So it 
 is, like God, heaven, virtue, beauty, life, and the other 
 great things which prove all the rest and give them their 
 worth ! " 
 
 Professor BENJAMIN PEIRCE said it was surprising that 
 from a gospel whose corner-stone is love there has grown 
 a belief in such a horrible doctrine as this of infant dam 
 nation and eternal punishment. It seems as if the Devil 
 must have been at Edwards s ear. 
 
 Dr. BOWDITCH affirmed that clergymen must take a dif 
 ferent position from that they now hold if they want to 
 preserve anything of the present beliefs in Christianity. 
 Christ was one of the most holy men who ever lived. He 
 propounded noble principles, and died a horrible death be 
 cause he was true to those principles. Christ is not divine, 
 and in that sense could not have died to save men. Of 
 Jonathan Edwards s doctrine of punishment, Dr. Bowditch 
 said it was a damnable thing, and he wondered that men 
 ever lived under such teachings. 
 
 Next came Mr. D. A. WASSON, who was the most em 
 phatic of all the opponents of the Edwards theolog} r . At 
 the very outset he asserted that he did not believe any 
 good ever came out of Edwards s philosophy. The idea of 
 making a church of the community in all its civil and eco 
 nomic order was being abandoned, and religion became the 
 concern of each individual. In his diary Edwards said 
 that he desired so to live as to secure for himself the great 
 est amount of future happiness. " I don t believe he was 
 a good man," asserted Mr. Wasson. "In that is the 
 ke}^ to his character. Edwards, as some one said of 
 Luther, had a realizing mind, which understood full} the 
 terrible import of eternal punishment and total deprav- 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 371 
 
 ity. Now the man who realizes those things and rolls 
 them as a sweet morsel under his tongue and then becomes 
 a father that man is a scoundrel." Mr. Wasson thought 
 most men did not thorough!} realize the full terrible truth 
 of these doctrines, but Edwards did. He was a cold- 
 hearted, hard man. 
 
 Dr. Bartol called on WENDELL PHILLIPS, who said : 
 "The picture drawn by Dr. Holmes, though truthful and 
 accurate so far as it goes, cannot be full or complete. As 
 a whole, it cannot be just to Edwards ; there must be other 
 sides which would soften and redeem it ; other doctrines 
 that explain and fill out the full religious life and charac 
 ter, and justify the profound and loving respect our fathers 
 had for him. Else how can we account for the great fact 
 of New England, which is the outcome of his and similar 
 pulpits ? 
 
 " No one doubts that a large majority of the New Eng 
 land pulpits, one hundred years ago, sympathized with and 
 sustained Edwards. These horrible doctrines, which Dr. 
 Holmes shocked us with, were not Edwards s individual 
 and singular views, but the common faith of New England. 
 Now, religion and theological doctrines are great factors in 
 forming character. If the pulpit of New England taught 
 only, or mainly, these hateful, narrow, inhuman, and de 
 grading doctrines, if such was the character of its teach 
 ing, whence came this generous, public-spirited, energetic, 
 hopeful, broad, humane, self-respectful, independent, and 
 free-thoughted New England, ready for every good work 
 and willing for every necessary sacrifice? 
 
 " We must have a theory broad enough to cover all the 
 facts. It used to be said that he who makes religion 
 twelve and the world thirteen, is no true New Englander. 
 His religion was three quarters of a Yankee. What you 
 gentlemen here call free religion and liberal Christian 
 ity is of very recent growth, and of still very narrow in- 
 
372 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 fluence. But character is of slow growth. Any theory 
 which narrows and degrades the New England pulpit of 
 the eighteenth century fails to account for the community 
 which grew up under it." 
 
 To one who suggested as an explanation that our fathers 
 never really believed such doctrines Mr. PHILLIPS replied : 
 4 It will hardly do to maintain that the hard-headed and 
 practical Yankee, so keen and ready-witted in affairs, so 
 free and bold in civil life, the world s intellectual pioneer, 
 did not know or understand what he believed, in to him 
 the most important matter of all, his religion. Four 
 generations passed over the stage, and left us this com 
 monwealth, their creation, sober, painstaking, serious, 
 earnest men. We cannot accept the theory which repre 
 sents their religion as carelessly taken up, loosely held, and 
 only half understood. Great jurists, practical statesmen, 
 profound scholars, liberal founders of academ} , college, 
 and hospital, boldly searching the world over for means to 
 perfect institutions on which the world now models itself, 
 were these minds crippled by absurd dogmas, worldlings 
 without faith, or h} pocrites afraid to avow their real belief? 
 True philosophy never accepts such theories to explain his 
 tory. It is more natural and philosophical to suppose that 
 the sketch we have listened to, admirable as it is, has not 
 given all the sides of the picture." 
 
 Dr. BARTOL suggested that Edwards s parish repudiated 
 him : after twent} r years listening to him they voted against 
 him ten to one. 
 
 Mr. PHILLIPS replied : " That argument proves too much. 
 "VVe have just exhausted language in praising the eminent 
 Christian spirit and untold influence of Dr. W. E. Chan- 
 ning. But we all know that after Channing had preached 
 twenty years to men who idolized him, they mobbed him 
 for his Antislavery ideas, and refused him the use of his 
 own church for the funeral services of the Abolitionist 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 373 
 
 Follen, Channing s most intimate and valued friend. 
 Channing failed as thoroughly, forty years ago, in teach 
 ing his church justice and humanity as Edwards did, a 
 hundred years ago, in bringing his hearers to relish the 
 idea of infant damnation. It will not do for Unitarians in 
 Boston to throw that Northampton vote in Edwards s face. 
 Northampton never mobbed Edwards for his infant dam 
 nation as Boston did Channing for his Antislavery in Fan- 
 euil Hall." 
 
 JAMES FREEMAN CLARKE, after expressing his satisfac 
 tion with the acute and clear treatment of the subject by 
 the essayist, said that " Jonathan Edwards has achieved 
 celebrity in three directions, first, as a logician and 
 metaphysician ; secondly, as a theologian ; and, thirdly, 
 as a Protestant saint or religious mystic." 
 
 Remarking on each of these characteristics, he said : 
 " As a logician Edwards is unsurpassed in keenness and 
 subtlet} 7 of argument. No stronger argument against the 
 self-determining power in man was ever constructed. But 
 all such arguments beat themselves to pieces against the 
 rock of consciousness. In fact logic, like mathematics, 
 is only an instrument. The greatest logicians and the 
 greatest mathematicians are only remembered when they 
 have discovered and proved some important truth or fact. 
 Sir Isaac Newton, Pascal, Leibnitz, and Leverrier are re 
 membered, not for their mathematics, but for what they 
 discovered by mathematics. Locke, Kant, and Anselm are 
 remembered, not for their logic, but for the s} stems which 
 their logic built. Edwards was a logician of unsurpassed 
 subtlety ; but his logic was for the sake of his metaphysics, 
 and his metaphysics was for the sake of his theology. He 
 wished to prove the will bound, in order to show that natural 
 depravity did not consist in a corruption of the natural in 
 stincts, but in a wrong direction of the will, a confirmed 
 and habitually selfish choice. This was the root of his 
 
374 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 theology, belief in a will habitually directed the wrong 
 way. 
 
 " As a theologian, Edwards has been more influential 
 than as a metaphysician, though not so famous. Edwards 
 was the founder and father of New England Calvinism, 
 which has greatly influenced all theology. What is called 
 1 The New-School Theology derives from him. 
 
 "The essential feature and tap-root of this New Eng 
 land Calvinism consists in making original sin consist in a 
 wrong choice, and not in a corrupt nature. The supposed 
 advantages of this view are twofold, first, as a theodurv, 
 in vindicating God from the charge of being the author of 
 sin, in w r hich, however, it signally fails, as Dr. Holmes has 
 shown. But there is also a supposed practical advantage 
 in showing men that no radical change of nature is 
 needed for conversion, but only a change of purpose. To 
 be sure, this change cannot be effected without God s in 
 fluence, but then that influence comes as soon as one realty 
 exerts himself. Thus we reach this paradoxical result, 
 that a theolog}" which declares that man has the power 
 to change the whole purpose and direction of his will is 
 founded on a metaplrysic which declares the will fatally 
 bound, and having no freedom at all. 
 
 "This theology, however, is not only inconsequential 
 but also superficial. It is not true that a man can change 
 his character by an act of the will. Character consists of 
 habits of thought, of feeling, and action, which no single 
 determination can alter. Therefore, the revival system 
 which has followed the New England theology has alwa} s 
 produced hosts of backsliders. The one important truth 
 in the s} stem is this, that the most important step in our 
 moral career is when we have decided to go in the right 
 direction. The one essential error in the sj stem is to sup 
 pose that when we have begun the journey we have reached 
 its end. 
 
JONATHAN EDWARDS. 375 
 
 " Edwards was not only metaphysician and theologian, 
 but also a Calvinistic saint. He was a man much ab 
 sorbed in rustic contemplation and communion with 
 God. But this type of piety has not been continued 
 among the Orthodox of New England. It would, perhaps, 
 be well if it were. New Orthodoxy has been too coldly 
 intellectual a system ; and even New England Radicalism, 
 which has so bitterly opposed it, suffers from the same de 
 fect. Both are too severely logical to be deeply religious. 
 The denning power of this New England telescope is 
 greater than its space-penetrating power. A little healthy 
 Concord mysticism is not a bad ingredient in this New 
 England banquet. 
 
 " I cannot see that Jonathan Edwards is likely to exer 
 cise a permanent influence, either as a metaphysician, theo 
 logian, or mystic. His metaphysics have long since been 
 outgrown ; his theology is too superficial to endure ; and 
 his mysticism is not in accordance with the atmosphere 
 of New England thought. He will be chiefly remembered 
 as a powerful thinker, whose thoughts produced no lasting 
 results." 
 
 Whether it was because of the popularity and brilliancy 
 of the essay, or of the nearness with which the doctrines 
 cited came home to every listener, or of the moulding in 
 fluence of the old theology upon New England life, or of 
 the keenness of the discussion, that the meeting was one 
 of unusual note, it may not be possible to decide, for all 
 of these elements entered into the success of the day. 
 
376 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 LY. 
 THE IMPOSSIBLE IN MATHEMATICS. 
 
 BY PEOFESSOR PEIRCE. 
 
 PROFESSOR PEIRCE spoke almost entirely without 
 notes, taking as his general subject the advance be 
 yond the limitations of number into a new sphere of mathe 
 matical knowledge which seems to be at hand from the 
 development of the science of quaternions. The mathe 
 matical student, he said, meets problems which cannot at 
 the time be solved, but which afterward are found to have 
 in them more ideality than was suspected ; the}* have their 
 place in science, which is often important, though not 
 known at the time they were discovered. Two classes of 
 mathematical operations may be noted, the direct and 
 the indirect. Addition and multiplication were given as 
 instances of the former, and subtraction and division of 
 the latter. Professor Peirce mentioned the advance which 
 has been made in the conception of negative quantities 
 from the time when each case of a subtrahend larger 
 than a minuend was made a distinct statement by itself, 
 to the time when they were all covered by the statement 
 of a general principle. Incidentally, to show how quickly 
 the human mind reaches its limit in conception of number, 
 Professor Peirce mentioned the African tribe to whom 
 everything above five is infinity ; and remarked upon the 
 characteristic lack of superlatives in the language of great 
 thinkers, and the frequent use of extravagant expressions 
 
THE IMPOSSIBLE IN MATHEMATICS. 377 
 
 by those who have no standard of thought. In one part 
 of his lecture the professor said that he did not regard the 
 introduction of the decimal S3*stem of so much moment as 
 is commonty thought. No scientific instrument has been 
 constructed based on that system ; the natural way of 
 thinking in fractions is by halves, quarters, and so on. It 
 is doubtful whether the American system of reckoning 
 money is any more convenient than the English. 
 
 The latter part of the lecture was upon the advance in 
 mathematical knowledge made possible by the discovery 
 of the science of quaternions. The algebra of quaternions 
 is onry an algebra which meets all the phenomena of space 
 and solves them all. Most of the older definitions of 
 mathematics are too narrow to include qualit}-, which is 
 covered by quaternions as well as quantity. A new defi 
 nition of mathematics was given by Professor Peirce as 
 follows : " Mathematics is the science which draws neces 
 sary conclusions," a definition, he said, wider than the 
 ordinary definitions. It is subjective ; they are objective. 
 This will include knowledge in all lines of research. 
 Under this definition mathematics applies to every mode 
 of inquiry. 
 
 Dr. HOLMES said that he had once tried to compute the 
 relative advantages on either side of the old problem of 
 destiny. Suppose a period of time so long that it would 
 be measured by the time it would take for the whole 
 earth, if it was made up of grains of sand, to be wholly 
 removed by carrying off one grain in a thousand years, 
 to be compared with the time which comes after it with 
 out limit, would a man gain most happiness by choosing 
 to enjoy himself in the first period and be miserable in 
 the second, or by selecting to be miserable in the first and 
 happy in the second ? The doctor found by count under 
 
378 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 a microscope that about a hundred sands made a linear 
 inch, or that there were a million in a cubic inch, but 
 he did not remember the exact number of years in the first 
 period. 
 
 Professor HOWISON found a parallel between the ideality 
 in mathematical truths and the deeper meaning in relig 
 ious truths. Professor Howison asked Professor Peirce 
 whether his linear associative algebra afforded a means 
 for deducing qualitative as well as quantitative results by 
 means of formulae. 
 
 Professor PEIRCE replied that it formed only a very 
 small step in that direction. 
 
 Dr. BARTOL suggested that it could not be possible to 
 invent a symbolism which should represent a thing in 
 all its properties, as there are doubtless properties which 
 we are unable to conceive ; hence, that no S3 r mbolism can 
 take the place of the thing itself. 
 
 In this connection a long metaphysical discussion ensued, 
 in which Dr. Holmes and Professor Howison were the 
 principal participants, Professor Peirce and Dr. Bartol 
 also taking part. The conversation eventually drifted on 
 to the questions whether there might be a class of beings 
 for whom two and two would be five, and whether we 
 should sometime live in space of four dimensions. Pro 
 fessor Peirce took the ground that he did not believe the 
 first to be possible, but he did believe that the second 
 would be realized. 
 
 In this connection Professor LANZA said that what is 
 conveniently called space of n dimensions where n is dif 
 ferent from three, has received this name on account of 
 the analogies of its mathematics to that of ordinary space, 
 or space of three dimensions. That we shall sometime 
 find an interpretation consistent with the mathematics of 
 this subject which will enable us by its means to compute 
 something real and practical is scarcely to be doubted, 
 
THE IMPOSSIBLE IN MATHEMATICS. 379 
 
 as we have already found in so man} r cases of what Pro 
 fessor Peirce has well called the Impossible in Mathematics, 
 a hidden but an eminently practical ideality. Neverthe 
 less, since this ideality must be different from our present 
 conception of space, we can for the present, it seems to 
 me, only regard the term " space of n dimensions," where 
 n is different from three, as a convenient name, which 
 does not necessarily imply that it is space under our pres 
 ent meaning of the word. We have an analogy to this 
 in the imaginary in algebra, for which a practical use has 
 been found in denoting by it perpendicularity ; and yet 
 we cannot say that when this interpretation was discovered 
 we had found a number which, multiplied by itself, would 
 produce minus one, as the interpretation is not number in 
 the ordinary meaning of that word. Moreover, Professor 
 Peirce had well said that art precedes science ; " and 
 although this fact is well known to mathematicians, a 
 great many others are often seriously misled, because they 
 fail to realize that pure mathematics is, after all, only a 
 means of drawing "necessary conclusions" from the as 
 sumptions made at the beginning or in the course of the 
 computations, and that it is only by an appeal to Nature 
 herself that we can assure ourselves of the correctness of 
 these assumptions. 
 
 Rev. Mr. SAVAGE asked Professor Peirce if he could 
 tell him in a word what was space of four dimensions ; to 
 which Professor Peirce replied that he could not. 
 
 At the conclusion of the discussion, Professor PEIRCE, 
 in reference to his mathematical pursuits, observed that 
 his son Charles was now engaged in canying on his in 
 vestigations in the same line to which he had specially 
 applied himself ; and it was a great gratification to him to 
 know that his son would prosecute the work to which he 
 had devoted the latter part of his own life. As this was 
 the last occasion on which Professor Peirce appeared in 
 
380 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Boston, in view of his subsequent illness which soon fol 
 lowed, this statement is remembered by his friends as 
 a sad premonition of what was so soon to happen to him, 
 an event which at any time would have been un 
 timely. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 
 
 I. 
 
 IT may not be out of place to give some idea of the way 
 in which the newspapers have commented upon the 
 Chestnut Street Club ; and from a large number of clip 
 pings are culled the following extracts : 
 
 " THE Boston Eadical Club is an unique. Its organism is orig 
 inal, and has not been successfully counterfeited. It has survived 
 three years without a kitchen. Its members attend the meetings 
 with remarkable regularity, albeit they expect neither cakes nor ale. 
 Thoughtful men meet to consider grave themes, but women are 
 not excluded. It has neither constitution nor by-laws, yet it is 
 one of the recognized institutions of Boston, and the fame of it has 
 gone into other lands. It has never had a meeting outside the 
 house of a private citizen, yet the conversations there have been 
 reported to the country by the metropolitan press, and men of 
 culture, in Germany and France, have thought them worthy of 
 translation for the instruction and delight of the wise in their own 
 lands. 
 
 "It was in the autumn, I believe, of the year 1867, when the 
 Club was founded. The purpose in view was to bring together at 
 intervals a few men and women of culture, most of whom were 
 known to be daring thinkers on subjects of the highest import, 
 and furnish them an opportunity for uttering their thought to an 
 audience capable of appreciating its scope, of criticising its worth, 
 and of developing its relations." 
 
384 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 " THIS Club has defied all criticism, and swept into its train 
 almost every bright name in the liberal ranks. How is it, why is 
 it, that years cannot kill this Club 1 What is the secret 1 The 
 same men who i ailed elsewhere make up this Club; the same 
 public that sneered other clubs out of existence watched for this 
 to fail ; the same age and ideas which, keep the interest in it at 
 white-heat failed to supply oxygen enough to keep the others 
 alive. Where is the magic, the charm 1 We have heard it urged 
 that this gathering lives because its salt is always some new, start 
 ling idea, what the public waits for, as wide eyes open for an 
 eclipse, an earthquake, or conflagration. It does not seem to us 
 that the times, or the men, or the ideas, or the place of meeting, 
 quite explain this singular success. There is a great deal in the 
 gracious welcome of the host, his ready repartee, his democratic 
 recognition of all classes, races, and minds." 
 
 " BUT what has contributed more than anything, I think, to the 
 popularity of the Radical Club has been the real zest given to the 
 conversation by the presence of both sexes. I remember that on 
 one occasion after the meeting of the Club I went to a gathering 
 of very similar nature, composed of men only. These men were 
 to a considerable extent the same, and, as it chanced, the essayist 
 was the same as in the morning ; but it seemed to me that the 
 conversation, good as it was, was lacking in a certain piquant and 
 varied flavor, such as the presence of clever women gives to the 
 Eadical Club. I am sure that men themselves talk better, on the 
 whole, where women take part in the conversation ; and when it 
 comes to arranging the plan and machinery of such gatherings, the 
 tact and energy of women afford an immense lever ; and the Rad 
 ical Club has always had in this respect some of the characteristics 
 of a French salon. 
 
 " The Club has often done real good by eliciting those flashes of 
 thought that come from the contact of mind with mind. The 
 most meditative flintstone cannot develop out of its own con 
 sciousness in a hundred years as many sparks as another flintstone 
 can extract from it in five seconds. Then the criticism, always 
 frankly given by the members on any paper read before them, 
 is a great blessing to the writer, albeit sometimes mingled with 
 shame and humiliation. So complimentary is always the opening 
 
REMINISCENCES. 385 
 
 of these comments, and so keen the subsequent criticism, that Mrs. 
 Howe once compared it to the ancient punishment whereby an 
 offender was first smeared with honey and then hung up to be 
 stung to death by wasps. Yet the wasps, at any rate, take an 
 innocent pleasure in it, and I can answer for one case, at least, 
 where the victim has found it a very useful form of martyrdom." 
 
 " WHAT a group the great parlors showed ! Henry W. Longfel 
 low, with his white head and patriarchal beard ; Oliver Wendell 
 Holmes, looking as he always does, and as, I fancy, he will to the 
 last of his days, a boy in the midst of his white-headed contem 
 poraries ; George William Curtis, with his refined face, whereon 
 the work and wear of his faithful, busy life are beginning to tell 
 visibly in the lines here and there ; Frothingham, of New York, 
 with his tranquil equipoise of manner, his cultivated face, and 
 quiet humor ; and Lydia Maria Child, with scores of others, 
 clergymen, literary men, and journalists." 
 
 " ON one occasion some reference was accidentally made to the 
 subject with which the name of Mr. Darwin is so intimately asso 
 ciated. . . . There followed a period of unusual restraint. The 
 reputation of the Club for rapid and brilliant conversation was 
 certainly in danger, when one of the members asked why it is that 
 Mr. Darwin says nothing at all about a personal God, and what 
 are his probable conceptions of the Deity. Restraint was gone in 
 a moment. Here was a subject about which no one present knew 
 anything whatever. There was not a single embarrassing fact on 
 record. The talkers plumed their pinions and soared serenely 
 aloft at once. The reputation of the Club was saved. 
 
 " It was extremely enjoyable to sit for an hour or two and watch 
 these literary champions. When Higginson, Weiss, and Wasson 
 were at their best, the frosting, as at the confectioner s, was apt to 
 be much better than the cake. Much of the talk was excellent. 
 It was bright, inspiring, hopeful. There was never a mean senti 
 ment or offensive word." 
 
386 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 THERE has been from time to time some impatience mani 
 fested to have the Club dead and buried. Several times 
 elaborate obituary notices have appeared, declaring that 
 the Radical Club had at last and forever departed this life, 
 and betraying that the conviction had been born of the 
 wish ; but the rejoicing has in the event proved somewhat 
 premature. In regard to such notices, the correspondent 
 of a Chicago paper remarked : 
 
 " A sensitive person might, after reading his own obituary, con 
 sider it a duty he owed the fitness of things to die forthwith. Not 
 so the Boston Radical Club. Over this body the last sad rites have 
 been performed, and the public has been informed that The harp 
 that once through Sargent s halls the soul of Hegel shed, to quote 
 an enterprising weekly journal, had sounded its last note. But 
 it was only a case of suspended animation (why should n t the 
 Radical Club take a summer vacation, with the rest of the world ?), 
 and the first meeting of the season, yesterday morning, showed 
 no loss of vitality in point of numbers or interest." 
 
REMINISCENCES. 387 
 
 n. 
 
 ROOM is made here for a few of the many letters 
 which have been received from members of the 
 Club ; and to them are added extracts from the corre 
 spondence of Charlotte Cushman, which, although not 
 directly connected with the meetings, related often to 
 members, and share the interest which attaches to any 
 memento of this noble woman. 
 
 From John Weiss. 
 
 DEAR MRS. SARGENT, I feel like Audrey when Touchstone 
 said to her, " I would the gods had made thee poetical." I am 
 rather better off than Audrey in respect to knowing whether 
 poetry be honest or not. But I should be dishonest in trying to 
 participate in your poetical picnic, unless the verb "to participate" 
 means to have nothing to do with anything. In that case I can 
 attend. Otherwise, as verse must be the contribution to your pic 
 nic, Nature has debarred me, for my versifying cannot train in 
 Whittier s numbers. 
 
 I might come prepared with something choice out of Whittier 
 himself, if I did not fear the possibility that he might recognize it. 
 Once or twice Goethe, hearing some verses of his own, thought them 
 very nice, but had forgotten their paternity. Old Gobbo was 
 " high gravel-blind," and did not know his son ; but "Whittier has 
 grit, and that s a different article to have in the eyes. . . . 
 
 Hardly room to say, 
 
 Ever yours, 
 
 J. WEISS. 
 
388 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 From Mrs. Lydia Maria CJiild. 
 
 WATLAND, April 30, 1871. 
 
 DEAR MRS. SARGENT, I am extremely obliged to Mr. Sar 
 gent for the card he sent me, and to you for the kind invitation 
 sent in a letter by Miss F. I should like much to attend the meet 
 ings of the Eadical Club occasionally ; but circumstances . . . 
 chain me very closely at home. 
 
 I am glad you are so situated as to be able to do larger work 
 than I can do. and that you have souls large enough to make dili 
 gent use of your opportunities. 
 
 Blessings on those who strive in any way to strike off the shack 
 les from human thought ! 
 
 Yours cordially, 
 
 L. MARIA CHILD. 
 
 From Rev. 0. B. Frothingham. 
 
 DEAR SARGENT, It appears from your kind note of invitation 
 that the New York " Tribune " of last week was in error, that 
 the Eadical Club is not dead. I am glad of it ; for, though I am 
 never present now at its meetings, I like to know that the meet 
 ings grow, and to believe that they are as interesting and profitable 
 as ever. Even if the rooms of 13 Chestnut Street should resound 
 with the voices of strangers, the Club, spiritualized and translated, 
 would, like Kaulbach s Huns, fight the eternal battle with the 
 Romans in the air. . . . 
 
 With kindest regards, I am 
 
 Faithfully yours, 
 
 0. B. FROTHINGHAM. 
 NEW YORK, Oct. 14, 1874. 
 
 From John G. Whittier. 
 
 AMESBURY, Wednesday Eve. 
 
 MY DEAR MRS. SARGENT, Few stronger inducements could 
 be held out to me than that in thy invitation to meet Lucretia 
 
EEMIXISCENCES. 389 
 
 Mott and Mary Carpenter. But I do not see that I can possibly 
 go to Boston this week. None the less do I thank thee, my dear 
 friend, for thinking of me in connection with their visit. 
 
 My love to Lucretia Mott, and tell her I have never forgotten 
 the kind welcome and generous sympathy she gave the young 
 abolitionist at a time when he found small favor with his " ortho 
 dox " brethren. What a change she and I have lived to see ! 
 I hope to meet Miss Carpenter before she leaves us. For this and 
 for all thy kindness in times past, believe me gratefully 
 Thy friend, 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
 From the same. 
 
 BOSTON, 27th Mo., 1875. 
 
 MY DEAR FRIEND, I have been reading over the revised copy, 
 which our friend Phillips was so kind as to send me through thee, 
 of his well-timed speech at the Faneuil Hall meeting. It forcibly 
 reminded me of his reply to James T. Austin, the splendid pre 
 lude to his thirty years of oratorical triumphs. It was well he was 
 there to speak once more in his best manner. 
 
 While I am sorry General Sheridan did not wait for some more 
 direct act of violence and lawlessness, where his interference could 
 not have been questioned, I am glad to see him vindicated so well, 
 and the cause of the oppressed colored men so forcibly presented. 
 May God give him and all the old advocates of freedom strength 
 to do what none others can so well do in the struggle which is be 
 fore us for the civil rights of the freedmen ! 
 
 I am writing on the desk of our beloved Sumner. Let us hope 
 and believe that, like John Brown s, his soul is "marching on" in 
 forefront of the battle for the perfect freedom of the class for whom 
 he labored and suffered. In a late letter from the Duchess of Ar- 
 gyle, his old and true friend says, " Dear Sumner ! One does not 
 get accustomed to his absence." 
 
 Always and truly thy friend, 
 
 JOHN G. WHITTIER. 
 
390 SKETCHES AND EEMINISCENCES. 
 
 From Edmund C. Stedman. 
 
 NEW YORK, May 26, 1876. 
 
 MY DEAR MRS. SARGENT, How much. I regret that your kind 
 and tempting invitation reaches me so late that I shall be unable 
 to provide for an absence from New York at the appointed time. 
 Still, your proviso that I should contribute my proper entrance 
 dues (in the form of a poem) to your festival of Parnassus 
 might of itself keep me back. For this year, so far as poetry is 
 concerned, I am paving Hades only, being merely able to go 
 through with the grosser duties of each day; and I would not 
 enter quite empty-handed, where our kings of song come with 
 their plenteous wealth. 
 
 You know that things always come too late, and t is the unex 
 pected only that happens. For years I have been meditating a 
 pilgrimage to Amesbury and Concord, that I might press the hand 
 of our saintly, beloved Whittier, and that I might listen with 
 mine own ears to the words of Emerson, some knowledge of 
 whose empyreal song and thought has been my " liberal educa 
 tion." You now proffer me a chance to meet them both, but I 
 cannot accept it. On recovery from my two years prodigalities 
 of sickness, I ve been compelled to plunge into bread- winning ; 
 am without an associate, and really can t leave my post for a 
 single day : but don t forget me another year, and let me know ia 
 time. I shall have all these pleasures soon or late. Qa ira / . . . 
 
 Begging leave to proffer my respects to Mr. Sargent, 
 I am very faithfully yours, 
 
 EDMUND C. STEDMAN. 
 
 Extract from a letter. 
 
 WE had in Boston a small yacht which could be used for Anti- 
 slavery purposes. On one occasion word was brought to us that 
 a brig was at anchor in the harbor, just arrived from New Orleans, 
 consigned to the late John K. Pearson, and on board of her a slave 
 was imprisoned, in order to be returned. The poor fellow had 
 secreted himself on board at New Orleans with the hope of escap 
 ing when he got to Boston. After the brig got to sea he was dis- 
 
REMINISCENCES. 391 
 
 covered. But being too far out to return to New Orleans, the 
 captain was obliged to bring him to Boston, and was now watching 
 for opportunity to place him. on board some vessel that would 
 return him to slavery. 
 
 Captain Bearse started on board our yacht with a few persons 
 to rescue this slave. He knew the name of the brig, and also that 
 the captain was said to be up in the city at the U. S. Marshal s 
 office. As we sailed down the harbor I asked Bearse what plan 
 he had. He replied that he had none, but should trust to the 
 inspiration of the moment. This seemed to me rather a poor 
 reliance ; but as none of us had any plan or suggestion to offer, we 
 left the management of the matter entirely to him. Before we 
 got near the brig our colored men went below out of sight, and 
 there were only a few white men visible on our deck when 
 Bearse laid us alongside the brig, and shouted to the man on 
 deck, " Is the captain aboard 1 " " No, sir," was the reply. Bearse 
 then said, " I want to see the first mate." " I am the mate," was 
 the reply. Whereupon, instantly (he thinks by inspiration) and 
 without a moment s hesitation, Bearse jumped on board the brig 
 and said, " I want that nigger quicker than lightning ! " whereupon, 
 the mate rushed below and Bearse after him. Directly above the 
 keel the black man was found confined. He was set free and was 
 on the deck of our yacht in less than a minute, and we immedi 
 ately set sail for South Boston Point. The whole thing was done 
 so neatly and expeditiously that we could hardly refrain from 
 laughing out aloud ; and long before we got under full headway 
 we could not restrain ourselves, and the mate saw that he had 
 been mistaken and was entrapped. Apparently, he imagined we 
 had been sent by his captain to take the black man down into 
 the lower bay, where he could be kept in safety, cruising back and 
 forth, until he could be placed on board a vessel to be returned to 
 New Orleans. We also understood that John K. Pearson had 
 seen us start, and watched our whole operation through his glass, 
 but was wholly unable to prevent us, though he afterwards threat 
 ened dire vengeance. 
 
 We threw overboard the rags with which the man was covered, 
 and when he appeared on our deck he was, in clothes at least, a 
 staid, venerable Quaker named Joseph Southwick. We landed 
 at the Point, and drove in a carriage to my house in Linden Place, 
 Brookline, and after dinner I took him to William Jackson s house 
 
392 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 at Newton. The slave had been a field-hand, with no special 
 points of interest about his history except his desire for freedom. 
 
 There was another case which had a very comical side. A slave 
 in Boston said his master was after him (I think he had actually 
 come upon him in the street), and was afraid to stay or even 
 appear on the streets. He was dressed up as a woman, and one 
 afternoon we drove down Cambridge Street in a covered wagon, 
 and at a corner of one of the side streets we took up this woman 
 and started over Cambridge Bridge and through West Cambridge, 
 etc., to Concord. Arrived there, the man took off his bonnet, 
 gown, etc., in the wagon, leaving them there ; after which we gave 
 him in charge of one of the Concord friends. I have frequently 
 laughed to think what an excitement might have been caused 
 if any one had accidentally discovered this womanly gear in our 
 carriage. We might all have been arrested for abducting a woman, 
 as it was certainly true that we came into town apparently with 
 one, and as certainly returned to Boston without one, but with 
 the clothing of one. 
 
 I told also Kichard H. Dana s story of his defence before the 
 U. S. Court of a man who had run off a fugitive slave. The man 
 was known to be guilty, but Mr. Dana made as strong a defence 
 as possible. The jury retired ; and, instead of bringing his client 
 in guilty as Mr. Dana expected, they remained out a long time, 
 and finally came in and told the Court that they could not possibly 
 agree, and were accordingly discharged. The prisoner was released 
 on bail and molested no further. Some years afterward a man 
 approached Mr. Dana, and said, " Good morning, Squire ! " Mr. 
 Dana replied that he remembered his face, but could not recall 
 the circumstances under which they had previously met. " Why, 
 Squire," said the man, " don t you remember the trial of " so and 
 so. mentioning the name of this particular client. Dana remem 
 bered the circumstance, and asked him to explain what had always 
 been a great puzzle to him, why the jury did not convict his client. 
 " Well, Squire," said the man, " all the rest of the jury were ready 
 to convict, but I could not bring my mind to that conclusion, 
 because I had myself driven that very slave across the State line 
 from Worcester County." 
 
 How far away seems the time when these things happened ! 
 And yet the same U. S. judge is still living who, in his charge 
 to the Grand Jury, expressed the opinion that not even our con- 
 
REMINISCENCES. 393 
 
 sciences should be enlightened beyond the law, and if we diso 
 beyed the fugitive slave-law, even on conscientious grounds, we 
 were simply fanatics. 
 
 Eespectfully yours, 
 
 WILLIAM I. BOWDITCH. 
 Mrs. JOHN T. SARGENT. 
 
 From Charlotte Cushman. 
 
 SWAMPSCOTT, Sept. 18, 1868. 
 
 DEAR FRIEND, Do you hope to catch any poetry from me in 
 reply to your "jingling bidding" ? (No offence intended by "jing 
 ling," only the word sounded fitting to anything so cheerful as 
 your dinner on Tuesday 23, at four P.M.) I can t wrke poetry, 
 or even doggerel. The circumstances of my position relative to 
 that same person, who shall be nameless, but his individual ini 
 tials are as like W. I. B. as it would be possible to find initials to 
 be, are too sad to allow any rhyme or even reason to hold pos 
 session of this " distracted globe." But one must eat. I know it 
 is the way I get my living ; and small as my appetite may be in 
 his presence, still, about the hour you mention, I am generally 
 materially minded, and therefore in plain prose I accept with 
 pleasure, and will try to be punctual Only the Lord doesn t 
 make the days half long enough for me, while I am in this beloved 
 land, and I am obliged to squeeze a quart into a gill ; and even 
 then the measure is too full. Joking apart, I shall come. It 
 would have been wiser just to have said that and no more, but, as 
 I said before, "the circumstances of my position," etc. . . . 
 
 With kindest regards, ever, dear friend, 
 Yours truly, 
 
 CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN. 
 
 From the same. 
 
 LENOX, MASS., Oct. 1, 1868. 
 
 DEAR FRIEND, Arrived here quite safely yesterday after 
 noon. Had a lovely journey, until I came under the shadow of 
 the Hill, when the sky began to show gray of blue, and on ar 
 rival we learned that it has rained here for three weeks ; and 
 really the road seemed to justify the assertion, for I was nearly 
 
394 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 dislocated between the station and the house, if you know what 
 part of one s anatomy that is ! The wind has kept up a dismal 
 howl all night, and this morning I cannot get out. My cold is all 
 along between a sneeze and a bark ; I am hoarse, and have a 
 deafness in my ears and a rumbling in my head. But still I am 
 hopeful when I go to bed at night that " something will turn up " 
 to make me better the next morning. . . . 
 
 Oh ! I am homesick for Boston already, and wish I had not left 
 it to come up here ! Then I should have had another chance of 
 seeing you, and perhaps a talk with Charles Sumner, which I 
 much wished. Perhaps I shall see him in Washington ; if not, I 
 shall confide what I want to you, and leave it in your hand to be 
 carried out for me with him. Give my kind love to all your 
 house, . . . and believe me, 
 
 Ever affectionately yours, 
 
 CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN. 
 
 From the same. 
 
 HYDE PARK, N. Y., Oct. 30, 1868. 
 
 DEAREST FRIEND, ... I left St. Louis on the 21st for Chi 
 cago ; passed a day there, then (by night again) started on the way 
 East, where I arrived on Saturday, 24th, and there I remained 
 until the 28th. Most of the time I spent in a dentist s chair, 
 where I was scrouged and gouged and rammed and jammed and 
 crammed until all humanity was destroyed ; and I failed to recog 
 nize in the tumbled, rumpled creature that came out of said chair 
 the lovely old lady that 7 thought sat down in it. However, as I 
 came out of it richer in some respects, though poorer in others, 
 I did not dare to complain, for fear the man would insist on tak 
 ing it all back. . . . Since then I have been in much whirl and 
 hurry to get away from New York, which I did on Wednesday 
 evening. Yesterday I wandered, drinking in the October brand of 
 XX air, and have been slightly intoxicated ever since ; so what 
 ever you read in this letter which ought not to be written, you 
 had better believe has not been written, but pass it on with a 
 pitying sigh. ... I wish I could have found time and backbone 
 to go to dear old Boston again, I have left so much undone there, 
 so many friends unseen, so much unsaid ; but what can I do ? 
 There are friends to be seen, things to be done, and words to be 
 
REMINISCENCES. 395 
 
 spoken elsewhere ; and having given work to Boston and vicinity 
 which is nearly double what I have done anywhere else, I must 
 deny myself the going again. But my heart is there, and it is only 
 a machine which is now going about saying " Good-by." . . . 
 
 I go to Washington to stay with the Sewards for a week, 
 and then return, to New York, whence I sail on the 25th of 
 November. . . . 
 
 And now good-by, and God bless you. . . . Believe me ever 
 faithfully and affectionately yours, 
 
 CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN. 
 
 From the same. 
 
 NEW YORK, Nov. 20, 1868. 
 
 DEAR FRIEND, One single word to thank you for your note of 
 the 5th, with its enclosures. I have been so absorbingly busy since 
 I received it that I have not been able to reply to or to acknowledge 
 it; and now send only a hasty rude note. The account of the " Brain 
 Party "was most interesting, as was also that of Mr. Emerson s 
 Brook-Farm lecture. How I wish I could have heard him ! but I 
 have been in other directions. First, among the flesh-pots of Phil 
 adelphia (society in Philadelphia is a committee on good eating), 
 and then having all sorts of business, mortgages, instruments, 
 deeds, powers, receipts, drafts, until I felt as though the next best 
 thing I could do would be at once to go into business as conveyancer 
 or banker or land agent, or some other occupation which should free 
 me from the social duties which men escape by being any one of 
 these ; so that men are able to keep their minds to one thing, while 
 we poor women have to keep house and bake and brew and mend 
 and make for our servants, and dress and call and do our social duties 
 for ourselves. Then, with harassed brains and weak backs and trem 
 bling knees, we are obliged to sit at the head of the table opposite 
 our dear other halves, and smile and smile (" and be a villain," 
 Shakspeare says) as though everything went on without trouble, 
 for fear of " worrying them, while they have so many worries, more 
 important ! " As if anything could be so important as one s own 
 individual worries. 
 
 Why, how I am going on, as if I were at Sharon instead of in 
 New York, with more things to do than I have time to count ! . . . 
 
 I am off on Wednesday. Give me your prayers ! If you come 
 to New York you will find me here. I saw an account of the 
 
396 SKETCHES AND KEMINISCENCES. 
 
 Woman s Suffrage meeting. When I have got the suffrage, I 
 don t believe I shall value it because I have got it ; and then I shall 
 begin to cry for the moon or a monarchy. 
 
 God bless you ! Believe me ever faithfully your 
 Attached 
 
 CHARLOTTE CUSHMAN. 
 
 IN January, 1872, a letter was received, addressed to 
 the Chestnut Street Club. It is interesting at least as 
 showing how far-reaching was the unconscious influence 
 of the society. It began as follows : 
 
 No. 13 CHESTNUT STREET : 
 
 Who lives here ? I do not know; but this I know, on Dec. 16, 
 1871, the members of the Eadical Club of Boston met here ; and 
 it is to them I want to speak. 
 
 Who am I ? An orphan ; an obscure little creature that knows 
 of your existence only through the friendly columns of the New 
 York Tribune. 
 
 What can I have to say ? This only : that for months I have 
 read what the great men and women who compose this body have 
 said ; and I have learned to love them all. They are an entire 
 family, one in mind, one in heart, one in soul. As a unit I love 
 them, and I wish to thank them for their kindness in publishing 
 the proceedings of their meetings. . . . 
 
 Why do I sympathize with the great Republican Club of 
 Boston 1 It is the tiny tear crying to the mighty ocean, " We are 
 water, and we are akin." For I too have read and written, writ 
 ten all the year, and at its close have lighted my Christmas fire 
 with my crude, unscholarly thoughts ; and I would be a mouse in 
 the wall, that I might sit and listen. . . . 
 
 If my waif reaches you, be lenient with its errors. . . And in 
 conclusion, say to John Weiss that he " performed an act of faith 
 without knowing it," when he wrote his last essay. That each act 
 of the kind done in that Christ-like spirit of charity may set a 
 new jewel in his crown of life immortal is the prayer of 
 Your lowly friend, 
 
 GEORGIA. N. W. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 397 
 
 in. 
 
 FROM time to time there have been held meetings at 
 which original poems were read by members of the 
 Chestnut Street Club. These gatherings were generally 
 called " Poetical Picnics." Many of the pieces, were after 
 ward published; but the following, so far as is known, 
 have never been in print : 
 
 THE world s poor hiss and poor applause 
 
 Let the wind bear away! 
 To thine own soul be true, and scorn 
 The echoes of a day. 
 
 FRANCIS E. ABBOT. 
 MAY, 1870. 
 
 EXPRESSION is but feeling s ebb ; 
 Why make of our thoughts a web ? 
 To love, that flows from door to door, 
 What words can add one drop the more ? 
 
 C. A. BARTOL. 
 FEBRUARY 14, 1870. 
 
 To thine eye, friend, the text was plainly written, 
 Take in the stranger, give the wanderer food. 
 
 In outcast Truth, in lonely Faith and smitten, 
 Thou didst discern and welcome Angelhood. 
 
 0. B. FROTHINGHAM. 
 
398 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 REST in no triumph won ; 
 
 The best is yet to be ; 
 Not yet from half its woe 
 
 Is this great world set free. 
 
 Thy part was nobly done, 
 To make the slave a man. 
 Let every cause of truth and love 
 Still find thee in the van ! 
 
 JOHN W. CHADWICK. 
 FEBRUARY 18, 1870. 
 
 IN the Greece that was, philosophers 
 
 Walked in the gardens sunny, 
 And searched for truth with a loving ruth, 
 
 As the Hyblan bees sought honey. 
 
 The old Greek days are dead and gone, 
 
 The truth blooms fresh as ever ; 
 As young and old and manifold, 
 
 And open to endeavor. 
 
 ROBERT COLLYER. 
 
 THE birds are all singing, the blades are all springing, 
 The sunlight is laughing o er forest and lea. 
 
 O heart of my bosom, art thou in the blossom ? 
 
 Is t thou that art warbling, my heart, from the tree ? 
 
 For the singing and chiming might seem a divining 
 
 Of that which is deeper than thought in my breast, 
 And lo ! as I ponder and question and wonder, 
 
 These words to my ear or I dream are addressed. 
 
 D. A. WASSON. 
 1870. 
 
 THE beggar begs by God s command, 
 
 And gifts awake when givers sleep. 
 Swords cannot cut the giving hand, 
 
 Nor stab the love that orphans keep. 
 
 R. W. EMERSON. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 399 
 
 THE UNDISCOVERED COUNTRY. 
 
 "WERE we quite sure 
 
 To find the peerless friend who left us lonely, 
 Or there, by some celestial stream as pure, 
 To gaze in eyes that here were lovelit only, 
 
 This weary mortal coil were we quite sure 
 "Who would endure ? 
 
 EDMUXD C. STEDMAN. 
 
 TO 
 
 FRIEND of the weary-hearted and the sad, 
 Whose joy has been in making others glad, 
 
 "We will not write thy praise. 
 In grateful hearts, which hold lip- homage cheap, 
 "We choose, with long, sweet tenderness, to keep 
 
 The record of thy ways ; 
 And pray for thee that highest suns may shine 
 
 Through all thy peaceful days. 
 
 LOUISE CHANDLER MOULTON. 
 FEBRUARY 3, 1870. 
 
 MAY love be thine by sun or moon, 
 May peace be thine by stormy way, 
 Through all the darling days of May, 
 Through all the genial days of June, 
 To golden days, that die in smiles 
 Of sunset on the " Blessed Isles ! " 
 
 JOAQUIN MILLER. 
 1872. 
 
 SOMETHING that I live and feel 
 Be the text that I reveal, 
 "Whatsoever maketh young, 
 Bids the harp be newly strung, 
 And with latest rapture tunes 
 To re-sing the oldest runes. 
 
400 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Civil jar or challenge made, 
 
 But tears off the fancy s hood, 
 
 And shows its quarry in the sky, 
 
 And bids it from the wrist be cast, 
 
 Its jesses cut, its chafing past, 
 
 Its flight renewed, this be the spell 
 
 For me, and neither book nor bell. 
 
 J. WEISS. 
 
 SOMETIMES a menagerie comes to this door, 
 
 With birds that can sing and lions that roar. 
 
 Through all the long morning they bellow and sing 
 
 Till the Queen of the caravan enters the ring ; 
 
 Her smile she distributes, her rations she shares 
 
 Mid the lambs and the lions, the bores and the bears. 
 
 To make them as docile as doves she is able, 
 
 With a glance of her eye, or a glimpse of her table ; 
 
 Each anxious logician grows gay as a ballad 
 
 When she offers a morsel of soothing or salad. 
 
 He forgets in a moment his creeds and his causes 
 
 When she feeds him with apples or cheers with applauses. 
 
 Mr. A reverts to the Banquet of Plato ; 
 
 The tea-urn plays censer to P s Cato ; 
 
 W brings with him salt that the Attic surpasses, 
 
 And W disdains not to lunch with the masses. 
 
 Each favorite idol is laid on the shelf, 
 
 Mrs. H forgets Hegel, and everyone, self. 
 
 THOMAS WENTWORTH HIGGINSON. 
 
 PRE-EXISTENCE. 
 
 DREAMS that steal o er me in my waking hours 
 Tell of another life than that of earth. 
 
 For ante-natal memories sometimes come 
 
 O er the dark flood my spirit crossed at birth. 
 
 Visions of other scenes in other lands, 
 Strange glimpses of a life, now mine no more ; 
 
 Thoughts, too, that tell me that what is has been, 
 Forms I have known on some forgotten shore. 
 
KEMINISCENCES. 401 
 
 Friends that were mine before I crossed the flood 
 Which darkly hides that vanished life from view, 
 
 Wakening my love as only brothers could, 
 Tell me that all these memories are true. 
 
 This world is but one scene on life s great stage. 
 
 My soul, to whom these visions now are given, 
 Passing beyond the dark ning flood of death, 
 
 Shall wake to fuller vision in high heaven. 
 
 T. STERKY HUNT. 
 
 THE DEAF BEETHOVEN. 
 
 HE sits like Memnon, turned to stone, 
 Yet breathing notes of glory, 
 
 Strong as old Vulcan s hammer-strokes, 
 Sweet as the swan s last story. 
 
 He cannot feel the mighty thrill 
 That sways us at his gifting, 
 
 The thunder-echoes of his will 
 The world to rapture lifting ; 
 
 He cannot taste the glowing cup 
 
 His hand for us is pouring, 
 He cannot with those wings rise up 
 
 On which he sends us soaring. 
 
 Strange Providence ! to crown us all, 
 And leave the king bareheaded, 
 
 To rouse us at a deaf man s call, 
 And he to Silence wedded ! 
 
 Yet it is thus and ever thus. 
 
 The glory is in giving : 
 Those monarchs taste a deathless joy 
 
 That agonized while living. 
 
 Great Tantalus ! go quench thy thirst 
 
 At fountains sempiternal, 
 Where broken hearts need never burst, 
 
 And all the year is vernal j 
 26 
 
402 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 A temple fair, not made with hands, 
 
 Such was on earth thy building, 
 A house not set on garish sands, 
 
 Nor marred with foolish gilding. 
 
 Its walls colossal marches are, 
 
 Its steps sonatas golden, 
 Its vaults the boundless symphonies 
 
 Whereby the stars are holden ! 
 
 Can Phidias o ermatch thy feat ? 
 
 Amphion cannot reach it, 
 Nor Orpheus, with all his love, 
 
 Nor blazing Sappho teach it. 
 
 Gigantic architect of Sound, 
 
 Sublime though stricken mortal ! 
 Heaven closed thine ears to all around, 
 
 And oped to thee its portal. 
 
 The tones seraphic streaming thence 
 
 Are ours for now and ever. 
 Then let us praise thy glorious gift 
 
 Till all our heartstrings sever ! 
 
 JULIA R. ANAGNOS. 
 
 THE OLD HARP S REVELATION. 
 
 ONE summer eve (on parlor couch reclining, 
 The room half-lighted by the rising moon) 
 I had a dream. "With symphonies repining, 
 Our old Harp in the corner hymned a tune. 
 No hand was seen to move its stricken wires, 
 No form sat near it, as in days of old ; 
 The strings seemed lighted by electric fires, 
 It sighed as if it would a tale unfold. 
 And thus it murmured : " Ah ! the good old time 
 When, at my thrill, these rooms would oft resound, 
 While grace and beauty touched me with a chime, 
 And patriots and sages gathered round ! 
 
REMINISCENCES. 403 
 
 I well remember all the good and great 
 
 Who listened to me then ; and grander yet, 
 
 As if to make my honors culminate, 
 
 George Washington and dear good Lafayette. 
 
 Then there was Winthrop, Bowdoin, Barlow, General Knox, 
 
 Adams, and Franklin, all now passed away, 
 
 Men of integrity, who stood like rocks 
 
 Amid the storms which gathered round their day ! 
 
 Ah ! those were times, indeed, when all of rank 
 
 Was in a loyal purpose, stanch and true ; 
 
 When men were men, with principle so frank 
 
 That what they promised they were sure to do ; 
 
 When patriot purpose meant a breadth of aim, 
 
 And * love of country (more than a pretence) 
 
 Eebuked self-seeking, while it put to shame 
 
 All low ambitions by plain common-sense ; 
 
 When love of right outweighed the love of place, 
 
 And public good was more than private thrift ; 
 
 When men in office had the gift and grace 
 
 To plead for justice and its claims uplift, 
 
 Would it were always so ! By Heaven s behest 
 
 The hand that swept these chords is quiet now 
 
 Within the grave, or finds still better zest 
 
 On heaven s harpsichords ; while on the brow 
 
 Of her who once inspired me is a wreath 
 
 More noble, roseate, fragrant than all other, 
 
 With this inscription circling underneath, 
 
 A loving, faithful, and devoted MOTHEE. " 
 
 JOHN T, SARGENT. 
 
 EOYALTY. 
 
 THAT regal soul I reverence, in whose eyes 
 
 Suffices not all worth the city knows 
 
 To pay that debt which his own heart he owes. 
 
 For less than level to his bosom rise 
 
 The low crowd s heaven and stars ; above their skies 
 
 Runneth the road his daily feet have pressed ; 
 
 A higher heaven he beareth in his breast, 
 
 And o er the summits of achieving hies 
 
404 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 "With, never a thought of merit or of meed, 
 Choosing heroic labors through a pride 
 Of soul, that holdeth appetite to feed 
 Ever on angel-herbage nought beside ; 
 Nor praises more himself for noblest deed 
 Than stones for weight, or open seas for tide. 
 
 D. A. WASSON. 
 
 BIRTHDAYS. 
 
 OH, how do passing years impersonate 
 
 Experience ! Our birthdays come and go 
 Like hurrying phantoms opening wide the gate 
 
 For Time to pass. How fast the onward flow 
 Of each day s dreams and doings! How august 
 
 The course of ages! How the hastening hosts 
 Of opportunity forewarn us that we must 
 
 Be true to life ! And how these fleeting ghosts 
 Beckon us onward! I have sometimes thought 
 
 That in the future, when our spirits pass 
 From out these bodies, which are then as nought, 
 
 Our past life will appear as in a glass, 
 And each year, ranged in line on either side 
 
 The untrod pathway of Eternity, 
 "Will meet us all aghast : Some gross with pride, 
 
 Some lean for want of that fraternity 
 Of food they craved ; some, alas ! bent down 
 
 By weight of cares, and some with sickness pale 
 Some with a smile, and others with a frown ; 
 
 Some naked, without purpose ; while the mail 
 As of a golden armor - earnest work 
 
 For others good shines on the breast of some. 
 One stabs us with a look, as with a dirk, 
 
 For time we wasted. From another come 
 With earnest acclamations, when we meet, 
 
 The gladsome benedictions for good deed, 
 Clapping of hands! remembering, as they greet, 
 
 The poor we aided, or the slave we freed. 
 But all with more or less of sober mein, 
 
 Clad half in sackcloth for our past neglects ; 
 
REMINISCENCES. 405 
 
 Bent o er with sorrow, as those wrongs are seen ; 
 
 Each with a mirror, which those sins reflects. 
 Oh, what a gauntlet this through which to trace 
 
 Our pathway in the future, as on wings 
 Of retribution, while the earnest face 
 
 Of each past year stares at us, and outrings 
 Its special verdict! Happy, sure, are they 
 
 Who, passing such a troop, see them as one, 
 Clad in one uniform! The whole array 
 
 Glistening as crystals in the midday sun : 
 Plumed with approvals, belted with applause, 
 
 Capped with high virtues ; and with bayonets 
 Such as the Love of God, the Almighty s laws, 
 
 Illumine by a light which never sets! 
 
 JOHN T. SARGENT. 
 
 THE POETICAL PICNIC. 
 
 I VE been racking my brains, with no end of persuasion, 
 
 For something in verse that might suit this occasion. 
 
 I was told t was a Picnic, though not dietetic, 
 
 But where each brought his basket of tid-bits poetic. 
 
 No dull/efe champdtre, with flirtation and flummery ; 
 
 No summery feast, though our summons was summary ; 
 
 No lunch in the woods by some tree-shaded river, 
 
 Just now the mere thought of the thing makes me shiver. 
 
 But a meeting where souls I don t mean those of leather, 
 
 But the sort that can never be damped by the weather 
 
 On the best of good footings might gather together. 
 
 "Where ladies and gentlemen, gifted with talents, 
 
 Must never refuse to be weighed in the balance, 
 
 But each must be ready in her turn or his turn 
 
 To pump at the pure intellectual cistern, 
 
 That the flow of their wit and the feast of their reason 
 
 Might gladden the raw Hyperborean season. 
 
 In this March (of the mind) we are all of us trainers, 
 
 And drilled into line as recruits or campaigners. 
 
 For here are our orderly Sargents, who muster 
 
 Their companies, noted for worth and for lustre. 
 
 And surely, with two such encouraging leaders, 
 
 We should all do our neatest as speakers or readers. 
 
406 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 "Well, here we have gathered, each one with his budget, 
 
 No strict dietitians among us to judge it ; 
 
 No grim, knotty tangles of life to unravel, 
 
 No roads up the steep mount of knowledge to travel, 
 
 No problems too weighty for mortals to settle, 
 
 And put conversation upon its best mettle : 
 
 But themes where philosophers proudly surpass us 
 
 While picnicking here on the slopes of Parnassus. 
 
 Then success to these parlors, whose large hospitality 
 
 Gives welcome so warm to the Muses sodality! 
 
 Good luck to our hostess and host, who have ever 
 
 Made mental attractions their earnest endeavor ; 
 
 Whose circles, not Fashion, but Talent has moulded, 
 
 Like fruits in the beauty of blossoms enfolded. 
 
 Let each drink their health, though in quaffing it off, he 
 
 Should find nothing stronger than tea or than coffee. 
 
 And let every guest at these parties remember 
 
 How summer has smiled here in bitter December ; 
 
 How the roses have bloomed in the cheeks of the youthful : 
 
 How the sunshine of thought lit the eyes of the truthful ; 
 
 How the large open fireplace, ruddy and golden, 
 
 Linked times of new thought with our dreams of the olden 
 
 And the picturesque harp needing much a repairer 
 
 Made us think of Tom Moore and the song about Tara, 
 
 And the odors of Souchong commingled with Mocha, 
 
 Suggested those friends in the Vale of Avoca, 
 
 A picnic poetic, no doubt, just as this is, 
 
 But somewhat passe for our youths and our misses. 
 
 Nor let us forget in these rooms the great-gun days 
 
 That summoned the doughty come-outers on Mondays : 
 
 How some things were upset and others were set up ; 
 
 And, spite of the " Tribune " and all it could get up 
 
 To prove that the Club was no longer a gay set, 
 
 But laid on its bier, with a mournful Hicjacet, 
 
 How Thor-hammer Radicals still brought their best nut 
 
 To crack at 13 in the street labelled " Chestnut ; " 
 
 Or how in the talking that followed the theses, 
 
 The ladies and gentlemen picked at the pieces ; 
 
 How ladders were scaled and how ramparts were battered, 
 
 How notions were started, how idols were shattered ; 
 
EEMINISCENCES. 407 
 
 How "Weiss or how Wasson or Abbot began it, 
 How Emerson dreamed it, how Alcott would plan it, 
 How Higginson, Longfellow, Bartol, or Gannett 
 Would kindle a flame, and the others would fan it ; 
 What flashes of thought like auroras would lighten, 
 How old eyes would ponder and young eyes would brighten, 
 And how, as we homeward directed our faces, 
 The Universe still rested firm on its basis. 
 
 But the fluid and solid in equal division 
 Bear rule in the world, nor extort our decision. 
 Give the Muses their due, and all powers befriend us 
 In using the best of the gifts that they lend us ! 
 Grace, beauty, and wit have a patent to rule us 
 No less than the science and morals that school us. 
 This sentiment closes my rhymes and my reasons, 
 So I beg here to stop and to make my obeisance. 
 
 C. P. CRANCH. 
 
 THE WEE BIT BIELD UPO CARDNO BEACH. 
 
 THERE s a wee bit bield upo Cardno Beach, 
 Atween the rocks an the ragin water, 
 
 An there for mony a weary year 
 There lived alane an earl s daughter. 
 
 She biggit the wa s wi her ain white han , 
 
 An she theekit it ower wi broom and heather ; 
 
 the saut sea-kelp she made the bed 
 Whaur grief an she lay doon thegither. 
 
 Against her father and mither s will 
 
 She had married a foreign lord, a stranger. 
 
 Wi his souple tongue he wan her heart, 
 An she never thocht he wad be a ranger. 
 
 But when twa years war come an gane, 
 An her gangrel Mary was prattlin bonnie, 
 
 Pie sta the bairn ae winter nicht, 
 An* left the house, unkent tae ony. 
 
408 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 There was dule the neist day at Dainrie Towers, 
 When the nurse woke up frae her cruel sleepin . 
 
 She fan the bairn s cradle cauld, 
 An ran tae her lady s chamber, weepin . 
 
 "The bairn ! the bairn s awa ! " she cried, 
 " The bairn s awa, an I ken na whither." 
 
 " I fear me sair she s nae gane her lane," 
 As she wrang her han s, said the waesome mither. 
 
 She socht her bairn frae bower tae ha , 
 Frae ha tae stable on she socht her ; 
 
 But when she saw the black barb gane, 
 Weel kent she wha the ill had wrocht her. 
 
 Oh, pale an wan was her bonnie face, 
 
 As she turnt her roun ; but her cheek was tearless. 
 
 " I 11 seek her," she said, " till the day I dee." 
 Her lip was proud an her e e was fearless. 
 
 " Gae, bring me the lock o the gowden hair 
 An the gowd that lies aneath my pillow, 
 
 An saddle for me my milk-white steed, 
 An tie him tae yon weepin willow." 
 
 She hied her doon tae Mary s shrine, 
 An tauld her tale o dule and sorrow ; 
 
 Then awa she rade o er the prentit sna , 
 Tae seek her bairn an her faithless marrow. 
 
 She rade by day an she rade by nicht, 
 She rade by mountain, glen, an river ; 
 
 But aye the sky an the weary sna , 
 An the footprents on an on forever ! 
 
 When three lang days war come an gane, 
 She saw the steel-blue sea afore her, 
 
 An a bonnie barque i the drivin win , 
 That ower the waters swiftly bore her. 
 
 " Oh, wha is yon that sails o the faem ?" 
 She cried as she cam tae the stormy water. 
 
 " It s a foreign lord an a weepin bairn," 
 Said a sailor lad to the earl s daughter. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 409 
 
 She loupit doon frae her milk-white steed, 
 
 An she gae him the reins wi the red govvd burnin . 
 
 " Gae, tell at Dainrie Towers," she said, 
 " That here I 11 wait for my lord s returnin ." 
 
 She watch t the white sails rise an fa 
 
 Awa, awa, ower the waters weary ; 
 But when they sank ower the rim o heaven, 
 
 Her e e grew dim an her heart grew eerie. 
 
 She neither thocht o the frost nor the sna , 
 
 Nor the bitter win s that gart her shiver ; 
 But on her knees prayed ower an ower, 
 
 "Frae a ill, Lord, my bairn deliver ! " 
 
 "WY rocks aneath an rocks aboon 
 
 She spread the bridal-bed o sorrow. 
 Lang was the nicht, but lariger yet 
 
 The nicht o grief that brocht nae morrow. 
 
 She said : The sea gies up its dead, 
 
 An sail it nae the quick surrender ? 
 I 11 bigg a bower, an wait for my bairn, 
 
 Till back tae me the Lord sail send her." 
 
 She biggit the wa s wi her ain white han , 
 An she theekit it ower wi broom an heather ; 
 
 the saut sea-kelp she made the bed 
 "Whaur grief an she lay doon thegither. 
 
 An there she watcht for mony a year, 
 
 Through spring an simmer, hairst an winter ; 
 
 An aye she prayed the Lord tae spare 
 
 Her bairn an him that sae sair had shent her. 
 
 She learnt tae soom i the surgin tide, 
 
 the breakers faem her head tae pillow ; 
 
 To guide a boat, when the win blew high, 
 An tae shoot the sea-birds on the billow. 
 
 Her name was kent baith far an near, 
 
 An mony a puir man s bairn blest her ; 
 Nae churl sae rough but bared his head 
 
 An hield his breath as he gaed past her. 
 
410 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 An mony a nicht her lanesome liclit 
 
 Cheert the fisher lads when the sea was thratchin , 
 An inony a sailor s heart grew great, 
 
 As he, passin , said, " The lady s watchin ." 
 
 But when mony a year was come an gane 
 There cam a nicht when the lift grew surly ; 
 
 She heard the win rair roun her bield, 
 An she saw the sea grow mirk an gurly. 
 
 She trimmed her lamp, an she kneelt her doon . 
 
 the cauld, bare floor o her lanely dwallin , 
 An she prayed as she never prayed afore, 
 
 For somethin strange in her heart was swallin . 
 
 The saut tears trinkled doon her cheeks, 
 Frae e en that tears had lang forsaken. 
 
 "Oh ! there s something sair o the sea the nicht ; 
 I 11 watch," she said, " till the mornin waken." 
 
 She steppit oot, she steppit in, 
 
 As mirker grew the nicht an drearer ; 
 
 But eerie grew she when she saw 
 
 The ghastly tide come near an nearer. 
 
 She wak-ht it rise, she watcht it fa , 
 
 She prayed the Lord tae sen the morrow ; 
 
 For aye across the waves she thocht 
 She heard the voice o dule an sorrow. 
 
 She clamb the rocks aboon her bield, 
 An gazed until the east grew paler. 
 
 " God, I thank Thee ! " Hark ! A shriek ! 
 She thocht her very heart wad fail her. 
 
 " I m here ! " she cried, " I m here ! God, 
 Sen help, sen help, an dinna tarry ! " 
 
 She leukit across the sea, an saw 
 
 The white waves lash the Sunken Skerry. 
 
 An in atween twa rocks she spied 
 
 A barque wi sails a rent asunder, 
 An han s outstretcht tae heaven an shore, 
 
 An ower it passed the waves an under. 
 
REMINISCENCES. 411 
 
 Nae mair she heard, nae mair she saw ; 
 
 But she flew like a bird tae the stormy water : 
 A loup, a plunge, an a mither braves 
 
 The rage o the sea tae redeem her daughter. 
 
 She shot like a shaft through the buffetin waves, 
 Tae the faem flung white 1 rae the Sunken Skerry. 
 
 Syne she raised her head frae the beaten froth, 
 Hield oot her arms, and cried, " Mary ! Mary ! " 
 
 " mither ! mither ! " She heard nae mair, 
 But she saw twa arms outstretcht aboon her. 
 
 " Loup doon ! " she cried, " loup doon ! " A splash, 
 Her bairn, an baith her arms are roun her. 
 
 She kist her i the saut sea brine ; 
 
 She ca d her " Mary, bonnie Mary ! " 
 She reckit ua that the sea ran high, 
 
 As she swam tae the Ian frae the Sunken Skerry. 
 
 Licht, liclit was her heart as she set her doon, 
 
 Ayont the reach o win an weather. 
 But the first word that her Mary spak 
 
 Was, "Yonder, yonder, sinks my father !" 
 
 She turnt her roun ; she leuk t at the flood, 
 An she leukit ance mair at her bonnie Mary ; 
 
 Syne she ban a rope roun her middle sma 
 An plunged again for the Sunken Skerry. 
 
 Oh, mony a jaw gied ower her head ; 
 
 I their foamy arms they strieve tae clasp it ; 
 But when she cried, "A rope ! a rope ! " 
 
 A hundred han s war stretcht tae grasp it. 
 
 An " Throw t ! " they shriekt. She threw t against 
 
 The breast that ance had been her pillow ; 
 Syne, " Pull ! " she said. They heard nae mair, 
 
 For ower her broke a thundrin billow. 
 
 They fastened the rope aboot the prow, 
 
 They drew it strait frae shore tae skerry ; 
 Syne ane by ane they faced the flood, 
 
 They left the barque an didna tarry. 
 
412 SKETCHES AND REMINISCENCES. 
 
 Oh, merry and weet war they ane an a , 
 
 As back they leuk t ower the stormy water. 
 
 "But whaur is she that 1 wrangt sae sair ? " 
 Said the foreign lord tae his weepin daughter. 
 
 They socht her near, they socht her far, 
 They droont the waves wi fruitless callin ; 
 
 For, when the tide gaed doon, she lay 
 1 the sun, o the san , aneut her dwallin . 
 
 The mornin brocht nae morn tae her, 
 
 She wadna wake for a their weepin : 
 Her day was gane, her weary day ; 
 
 Her nicht was come, an she was sleepin . 
 
 They carried her back tae her father s ha , 
 An in her bridal-robes they claed her ; 
 
 An mony a prayer was said an sung, 
 As in her father s grave they laid her. 
 
 But lang will they mourn at Dainrie Towers, 
 The foreign lord an his waesome daughter : 
 
 An this is the tale o the wee bit bield 
 Upo Cardno Beach, by the ragin water. 
 
 THOMAS DAVIDSON. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 ABBOT, FRANCIS E., 40 ; remarks by, 
 217; essay by, on "Darwinism," 
 265 ; remarks by, 270, 323 ; poem 
 by, contributed to one of the "Po 
 etical Picnics," 397- 
 
 Adler, Prof. Felix, remarks by, on 
 Mr. Davidson s essay on " Indi 
 viduality," 337. 
 
 Alcott, A. Bronson, remarks by, 29 ; 
 on Mr.Weiss s essay on " Woman," 
 43 ; on Mr. Linton s essay on " The 
 People," 85 ; remarks by, 138, 
 224, 225, 232, 257. 
 
 Amberley, Lord and Lady, the special 
 work which had interested them in 
 England, 21 ; special meeting of 
 the Club called in honor of, ibid. ; 
 remarks of Lord A., 23. 
 
 Ames, Charles G., remarks by, 147, 
 232, 233. 
 
 Anagnos, Julia R., poem by, con 
 tributed to one of the " Poetical 
 Picnics," 401, 402. 
 
 Armstrong, Gen., remarks by, 93 ; 
 on Miss Grew s essay on "Essen 
 tial Christianity," 125, 127. 
 
 BARTOL, Rev. Dr. C. A., remarks by, 
 on Mr. Emerson s essay on "Re 
 ligion," 19, 20; remarks by, 50, 
 65, 71, 79; on Mr. Sanborn s 
 essay on " Newspapers," 92 ; on 
 Mr. "Weiss s essay on "Music," 
 107 ; on Miss Grew s essay on 
 "Essential Christianity," 122*128; 
 essay by, on " The Prayer Gaugo," 
 149-151 ; remarks by, oa Dr. 
 
 Hedge s essay on "Pantheism," 
 160 ; on Mr. Powell s essay on 
 " Quakerism," 180; on Mr. Long 
 fellow s essay on " Law," 194, 
 195 ; essay by, on " Self-Oblivion," 
 197-201 ; remarks by, 205, 207 ; 
 on Prof. Everett s essay on " Trag 
 edy," 213, 215, 216; on Mrs. 
 Leonowens s essay on " Oriental 
 Religions," 225, 226; on Mr. 
 Cranch s poem on "The Bird and 
 the Bell," 231, 232; on Mr. 
 Weiss s essay on "Fatality," 237; 
 remarks by, 256 ; on Mr. Abbot s 
 essay on " Darwinism," 266, 267 ; 
 in tribute to Rev. John T. Sar 
 gent, 310; on Prof. Hyatt s essay 
 on "Heredity," 321, 326; on 
 Prof. Peirce s essay on " Ideality," 
 339 ; on Dr. Holmes s essay on 
 "Jonathan Edwards," 370, 372; 
 remarks by, 378 ; poem by, con 
 tributed to one of the " Poetical 
 Picnics," 397. 
 
 Blake, Rev. J. Vila, remarks by, 193. 
 
 Bowditch, Dr., remarks by, on Prof. 
 Peirce s essay on "Ideality," 340 ; 
 on Dr. Holmes s essay on " Jona 
 than Edwards," 370. * 
 
 Bowditch. William I., 44; extract 
 from a letter of, 390-393. 
 
 Bowles, Samuel, 94. 
 
 Bradlaugh, Charles, remarks by, at 
 Club Reception to Mr. Emerson, 
 295. 
 
 Brooks, Rev. Charles, remarks by, 
 145. 
 
414 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Brooks, Eev. Phillips, 132. 
 Bull, Ole, remarks by, on John 
 Fiske s essay on " Language," 349. 
 
 CARPENTER, Rev. Mr., remarks by, 
 341. 
 
 Chadwick, Rev. John W., remarks 
 by, on Mr. Channing s essay on 
 "*The Christian Name," 80; re 
 marks by, 256, 257, 265 ; poem 
 by, contributed to one of the 
 " Poetical Picnics," 398. 
 
 Chamberlain, Rev. L. T., remarks 
 by, on Mr. Abbot s essay on " Dar 
 winism," 269, 270. 
 
 Channing, "NY. H., remarks by, on 
 Mrs. Howe s essay on " Limita 
 tions," 32, 35, 36 ; essay by, on 
 "The Christian Name," 73-76; 
 remarks by, on Mr. Wasson s essay 
 on "Thou Shalt/ 100; on Mr. 
 Powell s essay on " Quakerism," 
 183 ; on Mr. Weiss s essay on 
 "Constancy to an Ideal," 219- 
 221 ; in tribute to Rev. John T. 
 Sargent, 311. 
 
 Cheney, Mrs. E. D., remarks by, on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " Woman," 
 42; remarks by, 55, 115; on 
 Miss Grew s essay on " Essential 
 Christianity," 126 ; remarks by, 
 180, 214, 257, 268; at the gath- 
 erins in honor of Charles Sumner, 
 306,807. 
 
 Child, L. Maria, letter from, 388. 
 
 Clemens, Samuel L., an incident con 
 cerning, 186, 187. 
 
 Clarke, James Freeman, 40 ; re 
 marks by, on Mr. Cranch s essay 
 on " Symbolic Conceptions of the 
 Deity," 55 ; on Mr. Chauning s 
 essay on " The Christian Name," 
 79, 80 ; on M. Coquerel s essay 
 on " Religion and Art," 138 ; on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " Heart in 
 Religion," 146; on Mr. Morse s 
 essay on "Evolution," 186; on 
 Mrs. Leonowens s essay on "Ori 
 ental Religions," 225* 226; on 
 Dr. Hohnes s essay oil "Jonathan 
 Edwards," 373-375. 
 
 Coan, Titns Mnnson, essny by, on 
 " Raphael and his Critics," 227, 
 228. 
 
 Collyer, Rev. Robert, remarks by, on 
 Mr. Gannett s essay on " The Un 
 seen," 71, 72; poem by, contrib 
 uted to one of the " Poetical Pic 
 nics," 398. 
 
 Coquerel, Athanase, a biographical 
 sketch of, 130-132; essay by, on 
 "Religion and Art," 132-137; 
 remarks by, 138, 139; on Mr. 
 Weiss s essay on " Heart in Re 
 ligion," 144. 
 
 Cranch, C. P., essay by, on " Sym 
 bolic Conceptions of the Deity," 
 52-54; remarks by, 217, 228; 
 poem by, on "The Bird and the 
 Bell," 229-231 ; remarks by, at 
 the gathering in honor of Charles 
 Sumner, 307, 308 ; poem by, con 
 tributed to one of the " Poetical 
 Picnics," 405, 407. 
 
 Cushman, Charlotte, 387; extracts 
 from letters of, 393-396. 
 
 DAVIDSON, THOMAS, essay by, on 
 " Individuality," 334-336 ; re 
 marks by, 338 ; poem by, con 
 tributed to one of the " Poetical 
 Picnics," 407-412. 
 
 Derby, E. H., incident told by, to 
 D. A. Goddard, concerning the 
 Grand Duchess Marie and Mr. 
 Emerson s books, 300. 
 
 Dwight, John S., remarks by, 231. 
 
 ELDER, Rev. Mr., remarks by, on Mr. 
 Weiss s essay on " Woman," 44. 
 
 Emerson, Ralph Waldo, essay by, on 
 " Religion," 3-6 ; letter from, to 
 Rev. John T. Sargent, concerning 
 a special meeting of the Club in 
 honor of Lord and Lady Amberley, 
 21 ; remarks by, on Mr. Wasson s 
 essay on "Democracy," 27, 28; 
 on Mr. Weiss s essay on "Wo 
 man," 41; on Mr. Weiss s essay 
 on " Constancy to an Ideal," 221 ; 
 on Mr. Weiss s essay on " Fatal 
 ity," 236; Club Reception given 
 
INDEX. 
 
 415 
 
 to, in 1873, 293; poem by "H. 
 H." addressed tu, ibid.; poem by, 
 on " Boston," 294 ; an incident 
 of Prof. Tyndall s visit to Boston 
 relating to", 299, 300; poem by, 
 contributed to one of the " Poeti 
 cal Picnics," 398. 
 
 Everett, Prof. C. C., 40; remarks 
 by, 44 ; essay by, on " The Rela 
 tion of Jesus to the Present Age," 
 47, 48 ; remarks by, 65 ; essay by, 
 on "Tragedy," 2*12, 213; essay 
 by, on "Imagination," 240-242, 
 essay by, on " Don Quixote," 343- 
 345 ; essay by, on " The Comic," 
 350-352. 
 
 Extracts from newspapers regarding 
 the Club, 383-386. 
 
 FISKE, JOHN, 132; essay by, on 
 " Language," 346-349. 
 
 Foster, Mrs. Abby Kelley, remarks by, 
 on Mr. Wasson s essay on " Thou 
 Shalt," 103; on Dr. Bartol s 
 essay on " The Prayer Gauge," 
 153 ; on Mr. Powell s essay on 
 "Quakerism," 181, 182. 
 
 Frothingham, Octavius B., essay by, 
 
 on " Borromeo," 57-65 ; remarks 
 by, on Dr. Hedge s essay on 
 " Pantheism," 159; on Mr.Weiss s 
 essay on " Fatality," 237 ; on Prof. 
 Shaler s essay on "Darwinism," 
 264 ; letter from, 388 ; poem by, 
 contributed to one of the "Poeti 
 cal Picnics," 397. 
 
 Frothingham, Richard, 302. 
 
 GANNETT, W. C., remarks by, 55, 66 ; 
 essay by, on "The Unseen," 67- 
 71 ; remarks by, 195, 228, 233. 
 
 Garrison, Win. Lloyd, remarks by, 
 on Dr. Bartol s essay, on " The 
 Prayer-Gauge," 151. 
 
 Goddard, D. A., at tea with Prof. 
 Tyndall and others, 298, 300. 
 
 Goodwin, Prof. W. W., 44 ; remarks 
 by, 115. 
 
 Grew, Miss Mary, e?say by, on "Es 
 sential Christianity," * 117-122; 
 Whittier s poem on, 128 ; remarks 
 by, 238. 
 
 HALLOWELL, RICHARD P., remarks 
 by, 17, 18, 125, 127, 181. 
 
 Hedge, Rev. Dr. F. H., 293 ; remarks 
 by, on Prof. Everett s essay on "The 
 Relation of Jesus to the Present 
 Age," 49, 50 ; on M. Coquerel s 
 essay on " Religion and Art," 137 ; 
 on Mr. Weiss s essay on " Heart 
 in Religion," 145 ; essay by, on 
 " Pantheism," 154-157; remarks 
 by, 158, 161; on Prof. Shaler s 
 essay on "Darwinism," 264. 
 
 Higginson, Thomas Wentworth, re 
 marks by, on Mr. Emerson s essay 
 on "Religion," 7, 13, 16, 17; on 
 Mrs. Howe s essay on "Limita 
 tions," 33, 34, 35, 36 ; on Prof. 
 Everett s essay on "The Relation 
 of Jesus to the Present Age," 50, 
 51 ; on Mr. Frothingham s essay 
 on " Borromeo," 65, 66 ; on Mr. 
 Channing s essay on " The Chris 
 tian Name," 77-79; on Mr. 
 Weiss s essay on "Music," 106, 
 107 ; essay by, on " Sappho," 109- 
 114; remarks by, 115- on Miss 
 Grew s essay on " Essential Chris 
 tianity," 123, 124, 126; remarks 
 by, 137; on Prof. Everett s essay 
 on "Tragedy," 213, 214, 216 ; on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " Fatality," 
 237, 238 ; on Mr. Potter s essay 
 on " Buckle and Carlyle," 256 ; on 
 Mr. Abbot s essay on "Darwin 
 ism," 268 ; in tribute to Rev. 
 John T. Sargent, 312; remarks 
 by, 332 ; on Mr. Davidson s essay 
 on " Individualism," 337 ; poem 
 by, contributed to one of the " Po 
 etical Picnics," 400. 
 
 Holmes, Oliver Wendell, remarks by, 
 on Mr. James s essay on " Nature 
 and Person," 40; letter from, 
 362 ; essay by, on " Jonathan 
 Edwards," *363-369 ; remarks by, 
 on Prof. Peirce s essay on " The 
 Impossible in Mathematics," 377, 
 378. 
 
 Howe, Mrs. Julia W T ard, remarks by, 
 6, 17, 23 ; on Mr. Wasson s essay 
 oil "Democracy," 29; essay by, 
 
416 
 
 IXDEX. 
 
 on " Limitations," 30-32 ; re 
 marks by, 35, 65, 79, 93 ; on Mr. 
 Wasson s essay on " Thou Shalt," 
 101; remarks by, 107, 137; on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " Heart in 
 Religion," 146 ; on Mr. Powell s 
 essay on "Quakerism," 177; re 
 marks by, 193, 221, 231, 233. 
 
 Howison, Prof. George, essay by, on 
 " Philosophy," 353-357 ; remarks 
 by, 376. 
 
 Hunt, T. Sterry, letter from, 285 ; 
 essay by, on " The Physical and 
 Chemical Harmonies of the Uni 
 verse," 285-292; remarks by, 
 323 ; poem by, contributed to one 
 of the "Poetical Picnics," 400, 
 401. 
 
 Hyatt, Alpheus, letter from, 315; 
 essay by, on "Heredity," 316 
 
 321, 323-326; remarks by, 321, 
 
 322, 323 ; remarks by, 327 ; essay 
 by, on " Evolution," 329-331 ; re 
 marks by, 338 ; on Prof. Peirce s 
 essay on " Idealism," 341, 342. 
 
 JAMES, HENRY, 294 ; essay by, on 
 " Nature and Person," 37-40 ; re 
 marks by, on Mr. Cranch s essay 
 on " Symbolic Conceptions of the 
 Deity," 55, 56 ; essay by, on 
 "Marriage," 208-211. 
 
 Jeffries, Dr. B. Joy, essay by, on 
 "Color-Blindness," 358-361. 
 
 LANZA, Prof., remarks by, on Prof. 
 Peirce s essay on " The Impossible 
 in Mathematics," 378, 379. 
 
 Leonowens, Mrs. A. H., essay by, 
 on "Oriental Religions," 223, 
 224 ; remarks by, 225. 
 
 Linton, W. J., essay by, on "The 
 People," 82-85. 
 
 Livermore, Mrs. Mary A., remarks by, 
 on Mr. Wasson s essay on " Thou 
 Shalt," 103 ; on Mr. Longfellow s 
 essay on "Law," 193, 195; re 
 marks by, 341. 
 
 Longfellow, Henry W., 293, 304. 
 
 Longfellow, Rev. Samuel, remarks 
 by, 23, 151; on Dr. Hedge s es 
 
 say on " Pantheism," 159 ; on 
 Mr. Powell s essav on " Quaker 
 ism," 179, 180, 182 ; essay by, 
 on " Law," 188-193 ; remarks by, 
 193, 194; on Dr. Bartol s essay 
 on " Self-Oblivion, " 205 ; remarks 
 by, 216, 222; on Mrs. Leonow 
 ens s essay on " Oriental Reli 
 gions," 224, 225 ; on Mr. Cranch s 
 poem on " The Bird and the Bell," 
 232; remarks by, 258, 265. 
 
 Loring, Hon. George B., remarks by, 
 on Mr. Wasson s essay on " Thou 
 Shalt," 103, 104. 
 
 Lothrop, Rev. Dr., 132. 
 
 Low, Rev. Charles, remarks by, on 
 Dr. Bartol s essay on "Seff-Ob- 
 livioii," 204. 
 
 McCAULEY, CLAY, remarks by, 34, 
 195. 
 
 Miller, Joaquin, poem by, contribut 
 ed to one of the " Poetical Pic 
 nics," 399. 
 
 Miner, Rev. Dr. A. A., remarks by, on 
 Prof. Everett s essay on " Trage 
 dy," 215, 216. 
 
 Morse, Edward S., essay by, oil 
 "Evolution," 184, 185. 
 
 Mott, Mrs. Lucretia, remarks by, on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " The Imma 
 nence of God," 22, 23, 24 ; on Dr. 
 Hedge s essay on " Pantheism," 
 158 ; remarks by, 265. 
 
 Moulton, Louise Chandler, poem by, 
 contributed to one of the " Poeti 
 cal Picnics," 399. 
 
 " N. W.," a letter from, 396. 
 Newell, Dr., remarks by, 127. 
 
 OWEN, ROBERT DALE, remarks by, 
 on Mr. Weiss s essay on " The 
 Immanence of God," 24, 25 ; re 
 marks by, 29 ; on Mr. Linton s 
 essay on " The People," 87 ; re 
 marks by, 107; on Mr. Abbot s 
 essay on " Darwinism," 269. 
 
 PARKER, THEODORE, quotation from, 
 45, 46. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 417 
 
 Pcabody, Miss Elizabeth, remarks by, 
 13, 114; on Mr. Weiss s essay on 
 " Fatality," 239. 
 
 Pedro, Dom, II., reminiscences of, 
 during his visit to Boston in 1876, 
 301-303. 
 
 Peirce, Prof. Benjamin, essay by, on 
 " The Nebular Theory," 243-250 ; 
 remarks by, on Prof. Hyatt s es 
 say on " Heredity," 327, 328 ; on 
 Prof. Hyatt s essay on " Evolu 
 tion," 331, 332; on Mr. David 
 son s essay on " Individuality," 
 336 ; essay by, on " Ideality," 
 339 ; remarks by 342 > 3 ? ; es 
 say by, on " The Impossible in 
 Mathematics," 376, 377 ; remarks 
 by, 378, 379. 
 
 Phillips, Wendell, remarks by, on 
 Mr. Emerson s essay on " Reli 
 gion," 9-13, 14, 15, 16, 17, 18, 
 19 ; on Mr. Channing s essay on 
 "The Christian Name," 76, 77, 
 79, 81 ; on Mr. Weiss s essay 
 on " Heart in Religion," 147 ; 
 on Dr. Hedge s essay on " Pan 
 theism," 160; on Mr. Wells s es 
 say on " Economic Laws," 162- 
 165 ; on Mr. Powell s essay on 
 Quakerism," 178, 179; remarks 
 by, at Club Reception to Mr. 
 Emerson, 296 ; at tea with Prof. 
 Tyndall and others, 298 ; remarks 
 by, at the gathering in honor of 
 Charles Sumner, 306 ; in tribute 
 to Rev. John T. Sargent, 313; 
 on Dr. Holmes s essay on " Jona 
 than Edwards," 371, 372. 
 
 Potter, William J., remarks by, 15 ; 
 on Mr. Cranch s essay on " Sym 
 bolic Conceptions of the Deity," 
 54 ; remarks by, 65, 71, 80, 147 ; 
 on Dr. Bartol s essay on " Self- 
 Oblivion," 204 ; remarks by, 232, 
 238 ; essay by, on " Buckle and 
 Carlyle," 251-256; remarks by, 
 270 ; at the gathering in honor of 
 Charles Sumner, 305. 
 
 Powell, A. M., remarks by, 87, 115, 
 152 ; essay by, on " Quakerism," 
 167-177; remarks by, 182; on 
 
 Dr. Bartol s essay on "Self-Ob- 
 livion," 205, 206 ; remarks by, 
 217, 238. 
 
 Powell, J. W., essay by, on " Indian 
 Ethics," 271-284;* remarks by, 
 284. 
 
 ROBINSON, W. S., remarks by, on 
 Mr. Sauborn s essay on " News 
 papers," 94. 
 
 S ANBORN, F. B., essay by, on " News 
 papers," 89-92 ; remarks by, on 
 Mr. Powell s essay on "Quaker 
 ism," 181, 182. 
 
 Sargent, Rev. John T., remarks by, 
 6, 18, 50, 76, 85, 108, 124, 137, 
 144, 224, 225, 226, 228 ; tribute 
 by, to Charles Sumner, 305 ; first 
 meeting of the Club after the death 
 of, 310 ; poems by, contributed to 
 the " Poetical Picnics," 402, 404. 
 
 Savage, Rev. M. J., remarks bv, 322, 
 379. 
 
 Schurz, Carl, remarks by, at the 
 gathering in honor of Charles 
 Sumner, 306. 
 
 Shaler, Nathaniel Southgate, essay 
 by, on " Darwinism," 259-264. 
 
 Stedman, Edmund C., 304; letter 
 from, 390 ; poem by, contributed to 
 one of the " Poetical Picnics," 398. 
 
 Stevenson, Miss Hannah, remarks 
 by, 116. 
 
 Stowe, Prof. Calvin E., remarks by, 
 on Prof. Everett s essay on " The 
 Relation of Jesus to the Present 
 Age," 48, 49, 50, 51. 
 
 Sumner, Hon. Charles, remarks by, 
 145 ; the gathering in honor of, 
 304-309. 
 
 TEDLOW, Mr., 44. 
 
 Temple, Rev. Mr., 217. 
 
 Thackeray, an anecdote of, 299, 300. 
 
 Tiffany, Rev. Francis, remarks by, 
 on Mr. Emerson s essay on " Reli 
 gion," 8 ; on Mr. Cranch s essay 
 on " Symbolic Conceptions of the 
 Deity," 56 ; on Miss G row s essay 
 on " Essential Christianity," 124, 
 127. 
 
 27 
 
418 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 Tyndall, Prof. John, reminiscences 
 of, during; his visit to Boston in 
 1873, 298-300. 
 
 WARREN, Judge, remarks by, on Mr. 
 Weiss s essay on " Woman," 43. 
 
 Warren, Rev. Dr. W. F., remarks 
 by, 44, 322. 
 
 Washburn, Rev. Francis, remarks by, 
 147, 2C7. 
 
 Wasson, David A., remarks by, on 
 Mr. Weiss s essay on " The Imma 
 nence of God," 23 ; essay by, on 
 " Democracy," 26, 27 ; remarks 
 by, on Mrs. Howe s essay on " Lim 
 itations," 34, 35 ; on Mr. Weiss s 
 essay on " Woman," 42, 45 ; on 
 Prof. Everett s essay on " The 
 Relation of Jesus to the Present 
 Age," 48 ; on Mr. Channing s 
 essay on " The Christian Name," 
 81 ; on Mr. Sanborn s essay on 
 " Newspapers," 93 ; essay by, on 
 "Thou Shalt," 95-100; remarks 
 by, 115 ; on Mr. Weiss s essay on 
 "Heart in Religion," 146, 148; 
 on Dr. Hedge s essay on " Panthe 
 ism," 158 ; on Dr. Bartol s essay 
 on " Self-Oblivion," 206 ; on Mr 
 W r eiss s essay on " Constancy to 
 an Ideal," 222 ; on Prof. Peirce s 
 essay on " The Nebular Theory," 
 250 ; on Prof. Hyatt s essay on 
 " Heredity," 327 ; remarks by, 
 332 ; on Mr. Davidson s essay on 
 " Individualism," 337 ; on Prof. 
 Peirce s essay on " Ideality," 340 ; 
 on Dr. Holmcs s essay on "Jona 
 than Edwards," 370; poems by, 
 contributed to the " Poetical Pic 
 nics," 398, 403. 
 
 Weiss, Rev. John, remarks by, on 
 Mr. Emerson s essay on " Reli 
 gion," 8, 9, 16, 17 ; essay by, on 
 " The Immanence of God," 21 ; 
 characterization of, by one of the 
 guests at the Lord Amberley meet 
 ing, 22 ; remarks by, on Mr. 
 Wasson s essay on " Democracy," 
 28 ; on Mrs. Howe s essay on 
 " Limitation," 33, 34, 35 ; expla 
 
 nation by, of why the Greeks did 
 not understand music, 36 ; essay 
 by, on " Woman," 41 ; remarks by, 
 on Mr. Channing s essay on " The 
 Christian Name," 79 ; on Mr. 
 Linton s essay on " The People," 
 86; remarks by, 92; on Mr. 
 Wasson s essay on "Thou Shalt," 
 101-103; essay by, on " Music," 
 105, 106; remarks by, 107; es 
 say by, on " Heart in Religion," 
 140-144; remarks by, on Dr. 
 Hedge s essay on " Pantheism," 
 157, 158; on Mr. Powell s essay 
 on " Quakerism," 178 ; on Mr. 
 Longfellow s essay on " Law," 
 193 ; on Dr. Bartol s essay on 
 " Self-Oblivion," 201-204; on 
 Prof. Everett s essay on " Trage 
 dy," 215, 216, 217 ; essay by, on 
 " Constancy to an Ideal," 218, 
 219 ; essay by, on " Fatality," 234- 
 236 ; remarks by, on Mr. Abbot s 
 essay on "Darwinism," 267; at 
 tea with Prof. Tyndall and others, 
 298, 300; remarks by, at the 
 gathering in honor of Charles 
 Sumner, 305 ; in tribute to Rev. 
 John T. Sargent, 311 ; on Prof. 
 Hyatt s essay on "Evolution," 
 332; letter from, 387; poem by, 
 contributed to one of the "Poeti 
 cal Picnics," 399, 400. 
 
 Wells, David A., essay by, on "Eco 
 nomic Laws," 161 ; remarks by, 
 164, 165, 166. 
 
 Whittier, John G., poem by, "For 
 M. E. S.," 1 ; poem by, entitled 
 "How Mary Grew," 128, 129; 
 at reception to Mr. Emerson, 293 ; 
 Dom Pedro s admiration of, 301 ; 
 description of the Emperor s meet 
 ing with, 302, 303 ; remarks by, 
 at the gathering in honor of 
 Charles Sumuer, 306 ; letters from, 
 388, 389. 
 
 Wilson, Rev. E. B., remarks by, 152. 
 
 Wilson, Hon. Henry, remarks by, at 
 the Club Reception to Mr. Emer 
 son, 297. 
 
14 DAY USE 
 
 RETURN TO DESK FROM WHICH BORROWED 
 
 LOAN DEPT. 
 
 This boo 
 
 LOAN DEPT. 
 1970 4 
 
 General Library 
 
 University of California 
 
 Berkeley 
 
U. C. BERKELEY LIBRARIES