CONCORD, February 20, 1843.
MY DEAR FRIEND,--I have read Mr. Lane's review, and _can_ say,
speaking for this world and for fallen man, that "it is good for us."
As they say in geology, time never fails, there is always enough of
it, so I may say, criticism never fails; but if I go and read
elsewhere, I say it is good,--far better than any notice Mr. Alcott
has received, or is likely to receive from another quarter. It is at
any rate "the other side" which Boston needs to hear. I do not send it
to you, because time is precious, and because I think you would accept
it, after all. After speaking briefly of the fate of Goethe and
Carlyle in their own countries, he says, "To Emerson in his own
circle is but slowly accorded a worthy response; and Alcott, almost
utterly neglected," etc. I will strike out what relates to yourself,
and correcting some verbal faults, send the rest to the printer with
Lane's initials.
The catalogue needs amendment, I think. It wants completeness now. It
should consist of such books only as they would tell Mr. [F. H.] Hedge
and [Theodore] Parker they had got; omitting the Bible, the classics,
and much besides,--for there the incompleteness begins. But you will
be here in season for this.
It is frequently easy to make Mr. Lane more universal and attractive;
to write, for instance, "universal ends" instead of "the universal
end," just as we pull open the petals of a flower with our fingers
where they are confined by its own sweets. Also he had better not say
"books designed for the nucleus of a _Home_ University," until he
makes that word "home" ring solid and universal too. This is that
abominable dialect. He had just given me a notice of George Bradford's
Fénelon for the Record of the Months, and speaks of extras of the
Review and Catalogue, if they are printed,--even a hundred, or
thereabouts. How shall this be arranged? Also he wishes to use some
manuscripts of his which are in your possession, if you do not. Can I
get them?
I think of no news to tell you. It is a serene summer day here, all
above the snow. The hens steal their nests, and I steal their eggs
still, as formerly. This is what I do with the hands. Ah, labor,--it
is a divine institution, and conversation with many men and hens.
Do not think that my letters require as many special answers. I get
one as often as you write to Concord. Concord inquires for you daily,
as do all the members of this house. You must make haste home before
we have settled all the great questions, for they are fast being
disposed of. But I must leave room for Mrs. Emerson.
* * * * *
Mrs. Emerson's letter, after speaking of other matters, gave a lively
sketch of Thoreau at one of Alcott's Conversations in her house, which
may be quoted as illustrating the young Nature-worshiper's position at
the time, and the more humane and socialistic spirit of Alcott and
Lane, who were soon to leave Concord for their experiment of
communistic life at "Fruitlands," in the rural town of Harvard.
"Last evening we had the 'Conversation,' though, owing to the bad
weather, but few attended. The subjects were: What is Prophecy? Who is
a Prophet? and The Love of Nature. Mr. Lane decided, as for all time
and the race, that this same love of nature--of which Henry [Thoreau]
was the champion, and Elizabeth Hoar and Lidian (though L. disclaimed
possessing it herself) his faithful squiresses--that this love was the
most subtle and dangerous of sins; a refined idolatry, much more to be
dreaded than gross wickednesses, because the gross sinner would be
alarmed by the depth of his degradation, and come up from it in
terror, but the unhappy idolaters of Nature were deceived by the
refined quality of their sin, and would be the last to enter the
kingdom. Henry frankly affirmed to both the wise men that they were
wholly deficient in the faculty in question, and therefore could not
judge of it. And Mr. Alcott as frankly answered that it was because
they went beyond the mere material objects, and were filled with
spiritual love and perception (as Mr. T. was not), that they seemed to
Mr. Thoreau not to appreciate outward nature. I am very heavy, and
have spoiled a most excellent story. I have given you no idea of the
scene, which was ineffably comic, though it made no laugh at the time;
I scarcely laughed at it myself,--too deeply amused to give the usual
sign. Henry was brave and noble; well as I have always liked him, he
still grows upon me."
Before going to Staten Island in May, 1843, Thoreau answered a letter
from the same Richard Fuller who had made him the musical gift in the
previous winter. He was at Harvard College, and desired to know
something of Thoreau's pursuits there,--concerning which Channing says
in his Life,[22] "He was a respectable student, having done there a
bold reading in English poetry,--even to some portions or the whole of
Davenant's 'Gondibert.'" This, Thoreau does not mention in his letter,
but it was one of the things that attracted Emerson's notice, since he
also had the same taste for the Elizabethan and Jacobean English
poets. An English youth, Henry Headley, pupil of Dr. Parr, and
graduate of Oxford in 1786, had preceded Thoreau in this study of
poets that had become obsolete; and it was perhaps Headley's volume,
"Select Beauties of Ancient English Poetry, with Remarks by the late
Henry Headley," published long after his death,[23] that served
Thoreau as a guide to Quarles and the Fletchers, Daniel, Drummond,
Drayton, Habington, and Raleigh,--poets that few Americans had heard
of in 1833.