self-poise. He had a balanced mind if there ever was one. Carlyle
considered the "Conduct of Life" to be Emerson's best book, and there
was reason why it should be. It was the subject of all others which he
knew most about. Conduct had been the study of his life. Behavior was a
fine art with him, cultivated partly from motives of prudence but more
for its own sake. From early morning till bed-time he was always the
same, always self-possessed. There was no relaxation of it; he was like
an athlete in full training. It was difficult to place him in a position
where he did not appear to advantage. But he expected nearly as much
from others, and had small patience with those who from ignorance or
carelessness infringed the rules of etiquette. One of his expressions
was, that death or mutilation was the only excuse for being late to
dinner. The notion that poets are an unpractical class of people is pure
illusion. The lives of our chief American poets will be sufficient to
contradict it; if Dante had not been a just governor of Florence and
Aeschylus had not fought like a tiger in the battle of Salamis. Bryant
was the able editor of a newspaper; Lowell made an excellent ambassador;
and Longfellow also had the reputation with his publishers of being a
very shrewd man of business. So was Emerson in all things eminently
practical. He would sometimes say, "I allow myself to be cheated by one
Irishman"; but I do not think he was cheated very much.
In fair weather he always left his books half an hour or so before
dinner and walked out, to get fresh-air and see what was going forward
on his little place. The poem called "Hamatreya" and many of his best
thoughts were evidently suggested by these short excursions. He says in
the "Conduct of Life": "The scholar goes into his garden to obtain a
juster statement of his thought. He puts down his hand to pull up a
weed. Behind that is a second; behind the second is a third; behind the
third a fourth; and beyond that a thousand and four." Who can doubt that
this was a personal experience with him, as it has been with some
others?
There are many anecdotes of his good sense and sagacity, and the
following is perhaps equal to any of them. One summer there was a
camp-meeting of spiritualists at Walden Pond, and every evening they
held an entertainment of speeches, singing and music, to which a small
admittance-fee was charged. It happened, however, that the picnic
pavilion was situated close to Mr. Emerson's land, and numbers of
Concord people went out of curiosity and leaning against his fence heard
and saw everything that went on. A committee of spiritualists
consequently called on Mr. Emerson and requested permission to collect
fees from those who stole their entertainment in this manner. At first
thought this might not seem to be unreasonable; but Emerson replied,
"No, I have always enjoyed the privilege of walking upon my neighbors'
fields, and I cannot now refuse the same right to them." Could a chief
justice have decided the case better?
Emerson's _no_ was always decisive, and if one person could not
induce him to change his mind I do not believe twenty millions would
have succeeded in doing so. When he was involved in a lawsuit regarding
some property, and the suggestion was made that he should compromise it,
he said: "By no means. If it is mine I want the whole of it; if it is
not mine I do not want any of it."
He avoided controversies and often showed great tact in escaping from an
argument. What he had once published was of no consequence to him, and
he cared little whether others liked it or not. If people advanced
opinions or judgments with which he disagreed he made a plain statement
of the fact and then changed the subject of conversation. Opponents who
wished to corner him, and had perhaps set snares for him to fall into,
found themselves outwitted by his unfailing desire for peace and
harmony.
He went to the polls and voted; he attended town-meetings and political
caucuses, but never took an active share in them. The prohibition of
liquor, the tariff question, the woman suffrage movement, and other like
vexatious matters he left severely alone. I doubt if any one discovered
from first to last what his real opinions were on these subjects. At the
Boston Radical Club in 1868 he was asked to give an opinion on woman
suffrage, and he replied that he had no doubt that when all women had
agreed as to what they wanted, what was in fact best for them, they
could easily obtain it through the home influence. These he would say
are questions of judgment. The slavery question was a matter of
principle; and on that point he gave forth no uncertain sound. He did
not, however, engage actively in the controversy till the passage of the
fugitive-slave bill warned him how seriously the republic was in danger.
Then he threw himself into the struggle with all the energy of his
nature, and stumped the Middlesex district for the free-soil candidate
Dr. Palfrey. In one of his speeches at this time referring to Webster's
support of the bill, he forged this terrible figure, "Every drop of
blood in the man's veins has eyes that look downward."
The final test of a deep mind is to respect forms and at the same time
recognize how little comparatively they are worth. The technical skill
of the pianist requires years of laborious effort, and yet it has no
value unless he can also appreciate the intention and spirit of the
composer whose music he plays. So it is in art, politics, religion,--and
all human affairs. When the national government was captured by the
slavocracy, and converted in all its branches into an engine for the
oppression of the negro race and white laborers as well, Emerson saw
clearly that the season of respect for law had passed by, and he
celebrated John Brown as the apostle and martyr of a holy cause. This
accurate historical penetration on the part of one who knew but little
of history is the finest flower in the poet's crown. What he said of
John Brown may now seem somewhat exaggerated; but the importance of the
event has never been exaggerated.
An argument, however, is not always to be avoided even at such times as
we are least inclined for it. In February 1865 the good people of
Concord called a town-meeting to consider the advisability of building a
new high-school house. Alcott, who held some office connected with the
town schools, was strongly in favor of the project, and on his way to
the meeting called on Emerson to secure his vote for it. He soon found,
however, that he had waked up the wrong person. Emerson, who was
finishing his dinner, considered that in time of war retrenchment and
economy were first to be thought of, and that the new school-house had
better be deferred for three years at least. But Alcott had also good
reasons for his opinion, and with all his deference for Emerson in
philosophy and literature he did not seem inclined to yield on the
present occasion. So the two friends argued the case together with equal
good humor and determination, and the discussion had not ceased when
they left the house.
The popular legend that during the Mexican war Mr. Alcott refused to pay
taxes that supported an unjust invasion, and was imprisoned for this, is
so far true; but it can not be true that when Emerson came to visit him
in jail to pay the tax-bill he said, "Bronson, why are you here?" and
that Alcott answered, "Waldo, why are you not here?"; for they never
called each other anything but Mr. Emerson and Mr. Alcott. The story of
Emerson's going with Margaret Fuller to see Fanny Ellsler, the danseuse,
was a pure invention of the enemy and had not even the corner-stone of a
foundation in fact.
Goethe says in his analysis of manners that the man of noble manners may
sometimes give way to his emotions, the man of well-bred manners never.
Emerson's manners were half way between these two; a fortunate union of
natural courtesy and dignified reserve. It was not possible to be
familiar with him. They were better than fine manners, or even well-bred
manners, for they were so natural and simple as scarcely to attract
attention. Yet he was not a man of noble manners, for he never fully
acted out himself. Carlyle had noble manners, but was lacking in
courtesy.
Emerson's house stands about twenty-five yards from the street, and
there is a smooth white-marble walk from his gate to the front-door.
This, together with the pine trees he planted for protection against the
north wind, had a cool refreshing effect in midsummer, but at other
seasons gave the visitor rather a chilly reception. There was something
in Emerson himself that reminded one of this white-marble walk; not that
he was cold-hearted, far from it, nor was he lacking in tenderness; but
warmth of color he had not. He was too purely moral to be altogether
human. He never could have written a tragedy, or made a speech like that
of John Adams on the question of separation. How could it be otherwise?
Can the descendant of five generations of New England clergymen have the
same blood in his veins that warmed the hearts of Marshal Ney and
Mirabeau? Perpetual constraint and self-denial may strengthen character,
but will human nature be better for it in the end?
Constant trimming must finally weaken the tree; and if we consider
history we find that the greatest services to mankind have been those
ardent, self-forgetful natures who lived in a large, grand manner, and
who cared more for the affairs they have in hand than for their
reputations or the salvation of their souls. It was not the just and
virtuous Aristides but the bold reckless Themistocles who saved Greece
from the Persian invasion. Luther and Shakespeare are brilliant examples
of it. Our American poets have all except Poe a high reputation for
virtue and good behavior, but I do not find in them the summer climate
of Burns or the magnetism of Byron and Heine. There is such a thing as
valuing our faults too highly.
Emerson did not like such men, and was apt to do them injustice. He
admired Napoleon and Goethe--a generous nature cannot help that--and his
estimate of Napoleon's character is the best that has yet been made; but
he preferred Lafayette to Mirabeau, considered Caesar wholly lacking in
principle, and thought Machiavelli was the fiend incarnate. His friends
were like himself, cool-headed and scrupulous; but they were not the
persons who cared most for him and appreciated him the best. Such men as
Theodore Parker, M. D. Conway, David A. Wasson and Wendell Phillips did
more for Emerson almost than his own writings, in spreading his
reputation and celebrating his genius. Wherever Phillips and Parker
lectured in the west and were asked, as often happened, who were the
best of the New England lecturers, they always placed Emerson at the
head of the list. They served as mediators between him and the large
class of persons who could not readily understand him.
If he was an exacting moralist, he was never a narrow or pettifogging
one. It is true he laid down the rule that a young lady had always the
right to break off an engagement, but not so a gentleman, for he has the
opportunity, which she has not, of making his own choice,--what no man
would have said who was aware of the arts and stratagems which women
often practise to obtain the man they desire; but he was not generally a
censorious man.
[Illustration: KING'S BUST OF EMERSON. MODELLED IN 1854.]
He believed firmly in the old saying of every man to his trade. He never
preached sermons on week-days; or discoursed on public and private
duties; or lectured about self-sacrifice and the necessity of living for
others. He believed that such talk did quite as much harm as good. "Do
not try to be good," he would say, "but true to yourself." Wisdom was
the best of all virtues because it included all. He thought there were
cases in which divorce from incompatibility is justifiable. When a
certain transcendentalist left his wife and children in Newport, and
came to Concord to write poetry and live the life of an old bachelor,
there were many who blamed him severely; but Emerson said, "He is no
doubt to blame, but you cannot tell how much; perhaps this is the only
way in which he can live." So that there was a large portion of
liberality mixed with his natural severity.
Literature is the most satisfactory of all professions, but it is also
the most difficult to succeed in. The high-minded writer easily finds
themes congenial to his own lofty thoughts, and in the contemplation of
these and the companionship of fine books he escapes the weariness and
loneliness which often pursue those who are engaged in the busiest
avocations. His life is like working in a rose-garden: beautiful images
are always before him. His time is his own: he can arrange his own hours
for study, rest, and recreation. Especially he can avoid the friction
and annoyance of dealing with rude and uncongenial people.
But how is he to persuade others to take an interest in these subjects?
The currents of men's thoughts run in certain habitual channels, and to
change their course, as every writer who becomes popular is sure to do,
is sometimes as great an undertaking as changing the bed of a river. It
requires many years for some to be appreciated, and others never are.
"We know those who have reached the goal, but who can tell how many have
fallen by the way?" Emerson's term of probation, however, was a short
one. More fortunate than many, there was a demand for him before he
came. Besides the so-called transcendental movement carried him forward
in a swift current. He said of it: "At first everybody laughed at me.
Then I had ten readers; then a hundred; and then a thousand." And those
who laughed at him at first were his most devoted admirers after he had
become famous.
If Emerson had not inherited a good property early in life, his career
would hardly have been possible. He never was able to publish more than
a third of what he wrote, and his books were not a source of large
profit to him. He was obliged to make up the deficiency by lecturing.
With what fortitude he did this, considering his slender physique,
travelling long distances in the coldest weather over such railroads as
then were, with a dismal hotel and bad food at the end of every journey,
will always be remembered of him. No wonder that he consoled himself
with such maxims as, "No man has ever estimated his own troubles too
lightly," and such verses as, "Cast the bantling on the rock." Truly it
was severe discipline. At Niagara Falls in 1863 the hotel caught fire
and Emerson rushed forth at midnight, manuscripts in hand, as Caesar
formerly swam with his "Commentaries" from a sinking vessel. The
compensation for it was that in this way he made the acquaintance of
many interesting and distinguished persons. It also added to his
celebrity.
He was the same under all circumstances. It has been said that in his
poems we feel the essayist; but perhaps even more we recognize the poet
in his essays. So too in his conversation at table and in the parlor,
there was something that reminded one of the lecturer: when he appeared
on the platform before his audience he was always the plain country
gentleman. He affected no graces of oratory, and shunned everything like
rhetorical flourish. He was the first of our public speakers to
introduce this improvement which has since found its way into the
court-room and the theatre. His manner was direct, terse and earnest,
with an habitual pause or hesitation to select just the right verb or
adjective that would convey the idea he wished to express. His delivery
was suited to his thought. His hearers were not commonly pleased with it
at first, but if they continued to listen most of them came to have a
great liking for it. He had a habit of pausing now and then and turning
over the pages before him, as if he had lost his place or was looking
for a passage which he could not find; but he never made any explanation
for it, and his own family did not know the reason. It may have been
done to rest himself; or perhaps to give time for his ideas to settle in
the minds of his audience. Some people were foolishly annoyed by it; but
not those who understood him. He used to say that either a speaker
commands his audience, or his audience commands him.
He was the best lecturer of his time: the one who wore the best. Between
1860 and 1870 he gave four courses of lectures in Boston which were well
and profitably attended. No one else could have done this, except
perhaps Agassiz. There were others who drew larger houses, but the
quality was not so good. Very rarely have such cultivated and
intellectual audiences been brought together. A few of his most ardent
admirers used to carry opera-glasses with them in order to watch the
expression of his face.
William Robinson, the ablest political critic of that time, wrote in
1868, "In spite of an increased hesitation in his delivery Emerson is of
all men the one most worth hearing, even better than Phillips and his
matchless oratory." He had the most telling way of saying a thing, and
knew how to give their full force to his wonderfully brilliant
sentences. These would sometimes electrify his hearers, as people are
roused on the announcement of some great and fortunate event.
He liked the society of statesmen, scientists, business men, railroad
managers, of all who could tell him about what was going on in the
world--something, he complained, that the newspapers would not do for
him. He preferred their society to that of other poets and scholars.
Though an unlimited reader of books he was not properly a scholar
himself, and perhaps he felt his own limitation too much in their
company.
He studied little at college and it is doubtful if he afterwards made a
thorough and systematic investigation of any subject. He was called a
philosopher, but he knew little more than the outlines of metaphysics.
He could read French fairly, but Latin was the only language with which
he was well acquainted. Carlyle tried to persuade him to study German.
He did not believe in study, but in the inspiration of nature. This did
well enough for him, but he made a mistake in applying the same
principle to others.
He was wont to excuse Alcott's rambling rhapsodical conversations on the
ground that it was the only talent the man had, that he must do that or
nothing; but many people considered that Emerson was more to blame in
the matter than Alcott himself. A person who makes a profession of
philosophy, as Alcott certainly did, ought to be well acquainted with
the writings of other philosophers of his own time; and it surely would
have done no harm for Emerson to have suggested this to him. When the
Boston Radical Club was formed Emerson thought it would be a good
opportunity for Alcott to place his ideas before the public, but Alcott
found himself at a disadvantage among the scholarly minds he encountered
there.
At the close of his essay on Plato Emerson says, "I am sorry to see him
after so many fine thoughts throwing a little mathematical dust in our
eyes." Does he partially expose here a peculiarity in his literary
procedure? Other people do not read Plato for his fine thoughts, though
there are many such, but for the charm of his discourse and his
beautiful exposition of Greek Philosophy. From this and from hints let
fall in conversation we may suspect that he read books not so much for
what was in them as for ideas which they suggested to him, and which he
might make use of in his essays and lectures. Alcott said that he
carried slips of paper with him on which to jot down these
considerations by the way. Thus he came to value books too much from a
single point of view, and his friends were sometimes surprised at what
he recommended them to read. He would estimate a second-rate novel like
"Christie Johnstone" above Thackeray's "Newcomes."
However, it may generally be said that the greater and more high-minded
an author might be the better was Emerson a judge of him. He liked in a
writer what he called the eternal spirit, that is, what makes his work
valuable for all time. He prized Plato, Shakespeare, and Goethe above
others; and gave the next place to Homer, Dante, and Swedenborg. He gave
Carlyle a very high rank: considered his history of Frederick the Second
even better than Thucydides. During the last year of his life, when he
had almost lost his memory for names and people, he said to a visitor
who called on him, "I have lately been reading a most interesting book
about--" he hesitated for some time, "the greatest man that has lived
for more than two centuries." Then he walked across the room and
pointing to a long row of books added, "About that man." His friend
looked and saw it was an edition of Goethe's forty volumes. Grimm's
lectures on Goethe had lately been published.
The colored students of Howard University requested Emerson to give them
a conversation on books, and tell them what they had better read; and
he, remembering his own maxim, that the greatest prudence lies in
concentration, limited himself purposely to a very few. He recommended
Shakespeare and Milton of course; Gibbon's "Decline and Fall"; Boswell's
"Life of Johnson"; Goethe's conversations with Eckermann and Goethe's
autobiography. "Faust" he spoke of in rather a slighting manner; he did
not think it possessed the eternal spirit. That so much of a puritan as
Emerson should have admired Goethe is as remarkable as Goethe's
admiration for so stanch an old puritan as Milton. The English writers
of his own time, with the exception of Carlyle and possibly Tennyson, he
did not like. He met Macaulay at one of Lady Holland's celebrated show
dinners, and conceived a decided aversion for him. Such severely
critical writers as Froude, Ruskin, and Matthew Arnold he never could
like. He once had an interview with Ruskin, but it did not prove to be
satisfactory. They differed on all points, and Ruskin complained that
Emerson did not understand him. Six months afterwards Emerson remarked
with his most amiable smile, "I expect Mr. Ruskin is still miserable
because I could not understand him." But Ruskin's province lay outside
of Emerson's, who cared little either for painting, sculpture, or music,
or even for literature considered as an art. He had in his study a copy
of Giotto's portrait of Dante which he evidently prized; and also
Raphael Morghen's engraving of Guido's Aurora: but these were presents
from his friends, and it is doubtful if he ever purchased a picture
himself.
He was a frequent visitor at the Boston Athenaeum, and seized upon every
new book of value as soon as it appeared: was the first to read
translations of the Zendavesta and Confucius. He read almost every
readable book in the English language as well as translations from all
languages. He said he would as soon think of swimming across Charles
River when he might make use of a bridge as to read a foreign book in
the original if he could obtain a good translation.
This statement contains a good deal of truth, though it has been often
traversed by those who learn languages easily and think because they get
the literal meaning of Tacitus or Rousseau that they know all about the
matter. The full significance, however, of any good writer can only be
obtained by reflecting while we read, and the continuous exertion
required to decipher a foreign tongue interferes with this not a little.
If the reader can think in the language before him well and good, but
few are so fortunate; and of those few not more than one in ten will be
able to think in three or four different languages. Any person who has
merely a conversational knowledge of Italian, for instance, would do
much better to read the excellent translation we now have of Machiavelli
than to read the original; and no one except a Greek professor would
think of stumbling over Thucydides instead of using Jowett's version of
it. So it is with Taine's "English Literature" and Von Hoist's history
of American politics. On the other hand it may be said that no
translation of the "Odes" of Horace has any value at all; and a faithful
study of one book of the "Iliad" is worth all the translations from
Homer that have ever been made. But the subject is an extensive one.