"In the whole world I hardly get to my spoken human word any other
word of response that is authentically _human_. God help us, this
is growing a very lonely place, this distracted dog-kennel of a
world."
Indeed, the personality of Emerson seems to have produced a very marked
effect upon all the great men and women with whom he came in contact. We
find that he was often described as an angel in appearance in his
younger days. Here are one or two instances: Of his appearance to them
in their stony solitude at Craigenputtoch Carlyle afterwards wrote to
Emerson:--
"Among the figures I can recollect as visiting us in our Nithsdale
hermitage,--all like apparitions now, bringing with them airs from
heaven, or else blasts from the other region,--there is perhaps not
one of a more undoubtedly supernal character than yourself,--so
pure and still, with intents so charitable; and then vanishing,
too, so soon into the azure inane, as an apparition should."
Mrs. Carlyle always spoke of this visit of Emerson to them there as a
visitation from an angel.
Mr. Charles Congdon thus writes in the "Reminiscences of a
Journalist:"--
"One day there came into our pulpit the most gracious of mortals,
with a face all benignity, who gave out the first hymn and made the
first prayer as an angel might have read and prayed. Our choir was
a pretty good one, but its best was coarse and discordant after
Emerson's voice."
The ancestors of Emerson were all of clean pure blood. Behind him were
many generations of fine old New England ministers, and he was but the
natural product of his race in character,--though from what source
sprang the consummate flower of his genius it is hard to tell. He was
brought up to all good things, under the immediate eyes of a superior
mother and a gifted aunt. He was a fine scholar during his college days,
and entered the Unitarian ministry when quite young. He also married
young, but early lost his wife, and soon afterward retired from the
ministry to devote himself to literature.
In September, 1835, Emerson was married for the second time, to Miss
Lydia Jackson of Plymouth. The wedding took place in the fine old
mansion known as the Winslow house. After the marriage they went to
reside in Concord, in the house where he passed the rest of his life,
and where his family still live. This is the plain, square, wooden
house, with horse-chestnuts in the front yard and evergreens around it,
which has often been described by visitors to Concord. Near by is the
orchard planted by Emerson, and two miles away his wood-lot, which he
describes to Carlyle as his new plaything, and where he proposed to
build a tower to which to flee from intrusive visitors. Of the planting
of the orchard he thus writes:--
"You are to know that in these days I lay out a patch of orchard
near my house, very much to the improvement, as all the household
affirm, of our homestead. Though I have little skill in these
things, and must borrow that of my neighbors, yet the works of the
garden and orchard at this season are fascinating, and will eat up
days and weeks; and a brave scholar should shun it like gambling,
and take refuge in cities and hotels from these pernicious
enchantments. For the present I stay in the new orchard."
In due time came the little troop of children, to gladden the home and
to be a perpetual wonder and delight to the father. In his essay on
"Domestic Life" he thus talks of the little one:--
"The size of the nestler is comic, and its tiny beseeching weakness
is compensated perfectly by the happy, patronizing look of the
mother, who is a sort of high reposing Providence toward it.
Welcome to the parents the puny struggler, strong in his
weakness,--his little arms more irresistible than the soldier's,
his lips touched with persuasion which Chatham and Pericles in
manhood had not. His unaffected lamentations when he lifts up his
voice on high, or, more beautiful, the sobbing child, soften all
hearts to pity and to mirthful and clamorous compassion. His
ignorance is more charming than all knowledge, and his little sins
more bewitching than any virtue."
Emerson was never a rich man, and his home was always so ordered as to
come within the scope of his limited income; but it was always
attractive and charming, and pervaded by an air of dignity and repose.
And that in it he could dispense hospitality in the old royal manner is
shown by the many times he invites Carlyle to come and spend a year with
him, and seriously urges him to do so. Thoreau availed himself of such
invitation, and spent months at a time in Emerson's home. One wonders if
Mrs. Emerson received such instruction as her husband gives in the essay
just mentioned, and if she profited by it:--
"I pray you, O excellent wife, not to cumber yourself and me to get
a rich dinner for this man or this woman who has alighted at our
gate, nor a bed-chamber made ready at too great a cost. These
things, if they are curious in, they can get for a dollar at any
village. But let this stranger, if he will, in your looks, in your
accent and behavior, read your heart and earnestness, your thought
and will,--which he cannot buy at any price in any village or city,
and which he may well travel fifty miles, and dine sparely and
sleep hard, in order to behold. Certainly let the board be spread,
and let the bed be dressed for the traveller, but let not the
emphasis of hospitality lie in these things. Honor to the house
where they are simple to the verge of hardship, so that there the
intellect is awake and reads the law of the universe, the soul
worships truth and love, honor and courtesy flow into all deeds."
If the American people had heeded such wise words as these the
old-fashioned virtue of hospitality would not have become so rare among
us. The "emphasis of hospitality" has been placed upon the material
things to such an extent that one hardly dares to invite his friend now,
unless it be to an elaborate feast; and the labor, to say nothing of the
expense, of preparing the elaborate feast is so great that more and more
we neglect to call our friends around us, and to bind their hearts to
ours by loving and tender ministrations.