There are meteoric men and there are planetary men. The men who now
and then flash across our intellectual heavens, drawing all eyes for
the moment, these I call meteoric men. What a contrast they present to
the planetary men, who are slow to attract our attention, but who
abide, and do not grow dim! Poets like Emerson, Whitman, and
Wordsworth were slow to gain recognition, but the radiance of their
names grows. I call such a poet as Swinburne meteoric, a poet of a
certain kind of brilliant power, but who reads him now? Stephen
Phillips with his "Marpessa" had a brief vogue, and then disappeared
in the darkness. When I was a young man, I remember, a Scottish poet,
Alexander Smith, published a "Life Drama," which dazzled the literary
world for a brief period, but it is forgotten now. What attention
Kidd's "Social Evolution" attracted a generation or more ago! But it
is now quite neglected. It was not sound. When he died a few years ago
there was barely an allusion to it in the public press. The same fate
befell that talented man, Buckle, with his "Civilization in England."
Delia Bacon held the ear of the public for a time with the
Bacon-Shakespeare theory. Pulpit men like Joseph Cook and Adirondack
Murray blazed out, and then were gone. Half a century ago or more an
Englishman by the name of M. F. Tupper published a book called
"Proverbial Philosophy" which had a brief season of popularity, and
then went out like a rush-light, or a blaze of tissue paper. Novels
like Miss Sprague's "Earnest Trifler," Du Maurier's "Trilby," and
Wallace's "Ben Hur" have had their little day, and been forgotten. In
the art world the Cubists' crazy work drew the attention of the public
long enough for it to be seen how spurious and absurd it was.
Brownell's war poems turned out to be little more than brief
fireworks. Joaquin Miller, where is he? Fifty years ago Gail Hamilton
was much in the public eye, and Grace Greenwood, and Fanny Fern; and
in Bohemian circles, there were Agnes Franz and Ada Clare, but they
are all quite forgotten now.
The meteoric men would not appreciate President Wilson's wise saying
that he would rather fail in a cause that in time is bound to succeed
than to succeed in a cause that in time is bound to fail. Such men
cannot wait for success. Meteoric men in politics, like Elaine and
Conkling, were brilliant men, but were politicians merely. What
fruitful or constructive ideas did they leave us? Could they forget
party in the good of the whole country? Are not the opponents of the
League of Nations of our own day in the same case--without, however,
shining with the same degree of brilliancy? To some of our
Presidents--Polk, Pierce, Buchanan--we owe little or nothing.
Roosevelt's career, though meteoric in its sudden brilliancy, will
shine with a steady light down the ages. He left lasting results. He
raised permanently the standard of morality in politics and business
in this country by the gospel of the square deal. Woodrow Wilson,
after the mists and clouds are all dispelled, will shine serenely on.
He is one of the few men of the ages.