Mr. Browne died suddenly, May 1st, 1860. A little volume was
printed in the summer, entitled “In Memoriam J. W. B.,” to
which Mr. Sumner contributed the following notice. Prefixed
were the words of Fénelon:--
“Il n’y a que les grands cœurs qui sachent combien il y a
de gloire à être bon.”
I should feel unhappy, if this little book of tribute to my
early friend were allowed to appear without a word from me. We
were classmates in college, and for two out of the four years of
undergraduate life were chums. We were also together in the Law School.
Perhaps no person now alive knew him better, during all this period.
Separated afterwards by the occupations of the world, I saw him only
at intervals, though our friendship continued unbroken to the end,
and when we met, it was always with the warmth and confidence of our
youthful relations.
Of all my classmates, I think that he gave, in college, the largest
promise of future eminence, mingled, however, with uncertainty whether
the waywardness of genius might not betray him. None then imagined that
the fiery nature, nursed upon the study of Byron, and delighting always
to talk of his poetry and life, would be tamed to the modest ways
which he afterwards adopted. The danger seemed to be, that, like his
prototype, he would break loose from social life, and follow the bent
of lawless ambition, or at least plunge with passion into the strifes
of the world. His earnestness at this time bordered on violence, and in
all his opinions he was a partisan. But he was already thinker as well
as reader, and expressed himself with accuracy and sententious force.
Voice harmonizes with character, and his was too apt to be ungentle and
loud.
They who have known him only latterly will be surprised at this glimpse
of him in early life. A change so complete in sentiment, manner, and
voice, as took place in him, I have never known. It seemed like one
of those instances in Christian story, where the man of violence is
softened suddenly into a saintly character. I do not exaggerate in
the least. So much have I been impressed by it at times, that I could
hardly believe in his personal identity, and I have recalled the good
Fra Cristoforo, in the exquisite romance of Manzoni, to prove that the
simplest life of unostentatious goodness may succeed a youth hot with
passion of all kinds.
To me, who knew him so well in his other moods, it was touching in the
extreme to note this change. Listening to his voice, now so gentle
and low, while he conversed on the duties of life, and with perfect
simplicity revealed his own abnegation of worldly aims, I have been
filled with reverence. At these times his conversation was peculiar and
instructive. He had thought for himself, and expressed what he said
with all his native force refined by new-born sweetness of soul, which
would have commended sentiments even of less intrinsic interest. I saw
how, in the purity of his nature, he turned aside from riches and from
ambition of all kinds, content with a tranquil existence, undisturbed
by any of those temptations which promised once to exercise such sway
over him. But his opinions, while uttered with modesty, were marked by
the hardihood of an original thinker, showing that in him
“the Gods had joined
The mildest manners and the bravest mind.”
His firm renunciation of office, opening the way to a tempting
political career, when formally tendered to him, is almost unique. He
had been Representative from Lynn, in the Legislature of Massachusetts,
and was nominated as Senator for Essex. This was long ago, in 1838,
while he was yet a young man; and here his sagacity seemed to be
remarkable as his principles. At that early day, when the two old
political parties had been little criticised, he announced that their
strife was “occasional and temporary, and that both had forgotten or
overlooked the great principle of equal liberty for all, upon which a
free government must rest as its only true and safe basis.” He then
proceeded to dissolve his connection with parties, in words worthy of
perpetual memory. “I disconnect myself from party,” he said, “whose
iron grasp holds hard even upon the least of us, and mean in my little
sphere, as a private individual, to serve what seems to me the cause
of the country and humanity. I cannot place currency above liberty. I
cannot place money above man. I cannot fight heartily for the Whigs
and against their opponents, when I feel, that, whichever shall be
the victorious party, the claims of humanity will be forgotten in
the triumph, and that the rights of the slave may be crushed beneath
the advancing hosts of the victors.”[167] No better words have
been uttered in our political history. In this spirit, and with his
unquestionable abilities, he might well have acted an important part in
the growing conflict with Slavery. But his love of retreat grew also,
and he shrank completely from all the activities of political life.
There was nothing that was not within his reach; but he could not be
tempted.
I cannot disguise that at times I was disposed to criticise this
withdrawal, as suggesting too closely the questionable philosophy
concentrated in the saying, _Bene vixit qui bene latuit_. But as often
as I came within the sphere of his influence, and felt the simple
beauty of his life, while I saw how his soul, like the sensitive leaf,
closed at the touch of the world, I was willing to believe that he had
chosen wisely for himself, or at all events that his course was founded
on a system deliberately adopted, upon which even an old friend must
not intrude. Having always the greatest confidence in his resources,
intellectual as well as moral, I was never without hope that in some
way he would make his mark upon his country and his age. If he has not
done this, he has at least left an example precious to all who knew
him.