It was difficult to appreciate his liking for the newspaper. But he had
been a newspaper man himself; the printer's ink had struck in; he had many
associations with the press-room and the composing-room; he loved the
common, democratic character of the newspaper; it was the average man's
library. The homely uses to which it was put, and the humble firesides to
which it found its way, endeared it to him, and made him love to see his
name in it.
Whitman's vanity was of the innocent, good-natured kind. He was as
tolerant of your criticism as of your praise. Selfishness, in any unworthy
sense, he had none. Offensive arrogance and self-assertion, in his life
there was none.
His egotism is of the large generous species that never irritates or
pricks into you like that of the merely conceited man. His love, his
candor, his sympathy are on an equal scale.
His egotism comes finally to affect one like the independence and
indifference of natural law. It takes little heed of our opinion, whether
it be for or against, and keeps to its own way whatever befall.
Whitman's absolute faith in himself was a part of his faith in creation.
He felt himself so keenly a part of the whole that he shared its soundness
and excellence; he must be good as it is good.